by Rainier Wong

Created on: November 21, 2009

In 1997, Americans began to bring home a machine that has a typewriter-like keyboard and a television-like unit for display. It was the Apple II, the world's first fully pre-assembled personal computer. The inventor, Steve Wozniak and his partner, Steve Jobs had already been in their computer manufacturing business that carried same name as their computers for a little bit more than a year. The computer soon became popular in other countries as well. It was a great step ahead from their first product, the Apple I. However, Apple was not the first to make a dream come true for many people in this world.

Before any computer appeared in the homes of ordinary people, a computer could only be used in a government, a military or a corporate establishment as the wonder machine required a large room to operate due to its size. Having a computer on a desk was only a dream until 1975 when the Altair 8800 was introduced. Although the Altair was not a fully pre-assembled model, it set the pace for later models like the Apple I and Apple II.

The giant computer making company International Business Machines, better known as IBM, began to enter the personal computer maker with its IBM PC in 1981 and began to challenge Apple. I have used both Apple II and the IBM but I personally like the Apple better as I felt it was more user-friendly.

One person helped the personal computer industry to grow and he was no other than William Henry Gates III the co-founder of Microsoft. He produced the operating system and the BASIC programming language for the personal computer as the machine would be useless unless there was an operating system that controlled its operation and it could be progammed to do something.

As years went by, more and more ideas were placed into the personal computer. In the 1980s, Apple introduced the Lisa, a machine that requires no commands to be typed in. Instead, a device known as mouse is use to move an arrow on the screen to an icon that represented a command or a task. To activate the command or task, the user press on a button of the mouse, an action known as clicking. The Lisa was not really a success. It was replaced by the famous Macintosh in 1984.

Another famous computer that requires the attention of vintage computer enthusiasts is the Commodore C64. The C64 is an all time best seller even many years after the company that made it folded. Other famous personal computers that I can recall about include the Atari XT, the Commodore Amiga, and the Sinclair Spectrum. You might have heard of such machines before or even used at least one of them yourself. Nowadays, you do not see such machines being sold or advertised as new models any longer as they are no longer manufactured. Today, the main two type of personal computers that are in the market are those from IBM and from Apple. However, you no longer need to get a real IBM as you can get a clone or what is normally called an IBM compatible that can do the job as well since the clone also has the same processor.

During this present century, we can surf the Internet, create music, watch videos, play 3D games, and perform many marvelous tasks on our personal computer something that was not possible on the earlier machines. Innovators and experts will continue to work on improving the personal computer until one day it will be almost as easy as switching on the television and watching it. Programming a personal computer may be an easier task in the future.

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