Insights from Chapter 8
#1
The decision that brought the chip into every household was a carbon copy of the decision a decade earlier that had done the same things for the chip’s immediate ancestor, the transistor. The decision maker in both cases was Patrick Haggerty, the farsighted and plucky chief executive of Texas Instruments.
#2
In 1954, Haggerty launched a radio that was completely transistorized and small enough to carry in a pocket. The product was a success, and Haggerty knew that the chip would soon be built into a wide range of consumer products.
#3
The president’s brainchild, the pocket calculator, became a matter of some priority at Texas Instruments. The company put Kilby in a shrouded office and told him always to refer to his new project by a code name.
#4
The team began by setting down the fundamental elements that their calculator would require. In 1965, it was almost an act of faith to believe that you could reduce the size, weight, and cost of an electronic calculator by factors of ten or more.
#5
The calculator team had to work on four separate sections: the input section, the memory and central processor, the output section, and the power supply. They were limited to a battery, which meant they had to be smaller than usual.
#6
The first pocket calculator was not released until 1971, and it sold like hotcakes. Within a decade, the country had more calculators than people.
#7
The first digital watch was produced by an American firm under the Pulsar brand name and introduced in the fall of 1971. It was marketed as a high-bracket item. As the electronic watch improved, its price fell.
#8
The history of microelectronics has been a history of Japanese firms learning from American innovators. The development of the microprocessor was no different. In 1969, a Japanese business-machine manufacturer, Busicom, contracted with Intel to design and produce twelve interlinked chips for a new line of desktop printers.
#9
The introduction of the $150 handheld calculator by Jack Kilby in 1971 completely changed the rules of the game. Companies like Busicom with their heavyweight $1,000 machines were in big trouble.
#10
The microprocessor was first used in 1971 to help with traffic flow, and it has since been used in almost every single type of device. It was the marriage of the microprocessor and a group of devices called transducers that finally brought microelectronics into every home, school, and business.
#11
The computer-on-a-chip has been used in countless applications, from cars to clothes dryers. It has been used to control speech-synthesizing chips, and even replace organic hearing aids.
#12
The personal computer community was a sort of national cooperative, with each new computer user sharing techniques and programs with everyone else. But there was a time when computers were huge, expensive, and intimidating even to experts.
#13
The computer had become a part of everyday life by the 21st century, replacing traditional means of control in familiar devices. But the impact of microelectronics on human society was still unknown.