Can you imagine life today without easy access to computing technology? No smartphone in your pocket, no PC on your desk, no video games on your TV, and no Internet to connect them all? It would feel like the stone age!
But that was the reality most people faced before the computing revolution of the 1980s. Back then mainframe computers were room-sized mammoths only directly used by white-coated technicians and privileged researchers. Computing power belonged solely to big business, government agencies and well-funded universities.
The average citizen didn‘t have direct access to interactive information technology in their daily lives. Communications still relied on "snail mail", telephones and televisions piping one-way broadcasts. Dedicated hobbyists built crude home computers, but most saw them as toys.
That all changed in the 80s. Thanks to the silicon microchip, computers finally became personal – customized for an individual human user rather than an organization. Let‘s take a closer look…
From Mainframes to Microchips: Setting the Stage
As a baby boomer, I still remember visiting a local college in the 1960s and gawking at rows of hulking machinery tended by technicians in white lab coats. The humming, blinking mainframe computer filled an entire climate-controlled basement. Yet its storage and speed were still thousands of times less than what‘s common in today‘s smartphones!
Processor technology limited earlier computers‘ abilities while ballooning their size and expense. But that was about to change – engineers found ways to continually shrink down and speed up the integrated electronic circuits delivering computing power.
Gordon Moore, co-founder of chip giant Intel, recognized the trend in 1965 and predicted the number of transistors squeezable onto a processor would double every couple years. What became known as Moore‘s Law proved prescient and still broadly holds true.
As silicone microchips grew exponentially more compact and capable they paved the way for a personal computing revolution by the late 1970s and early 80s. Suddenly affordable new microcomputers with printable circuits put practical information technology directly in the hands of consumers.
Home Computers Herald the Future
With processing constraints lifted, a new category soon emerged – the "home computer". Now realistic computing devices tailored around individual users moved from geeky garages to mainstream stores.
Payment plans made costly new hardware more accessible for American families, from the original 1977 Apple II to popular early 80s systems like the Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum, Atari 800 and TRS-80. Prices rapidly fell from over $1,000 to under $500 as competition heated up. Hit games like Space Invaders and Frogger made them attractive for entertainment too.
| Model | Release Date | CPU | Speed MHz | RAM KB | Price | Units Sold |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Apple II | 1977 | MOS 6502 | 1 | 48 | $1,298 | 6+ million |
| Atari 800 | 1979 | MOS 6502 | 1.79 | 48 | $1000 | 2 million |
| Sinclair ZX80 | 1980 | Zilog Z80A | 3.25 | 1 | $100 | 100,000 |
| Commodore 64 | 1982 | MOS 6510 | 1 | 64 | $595 | 17 million |
Microcomputer capabilities were still primitive by modern standards, but their trajectory was clear. And killer apps began emerging for personal productivity, education, information access, communications and entertainment.
Tech pundits proclaimed this the start of an era where computers support humans directly rather than the other way around. The underlying digital technology advances now seem inevitable, but their business and social impacts were largely unanticipated at the time.
GUI Operating Systems Point & Click Novice Usability
Early home computer makers mainly focused on making processing affordable rather than accessible. Their systems still required arcane technical knowledge to operate. You needed familiarity with applications like the BASIC programming language and needed to memorize and accurately type commands for tasks likes copying files or launching programs.
This was fine for engineers and hobbyist hackers. But for their futuristic machines to transform society, computers needed to welcome newbie users. That breakthrough came from Xerox, who originally pioneered the graphical user interface (GUI) for their Alto research system in the 1970s featuring windows, icons and a mouse pointer.
Apple realized the GUI‘s potential to open computing to the masses. After inspiring visits to Xerox PARC, Apple brought this visual operating system paradigm to mainstream consumers in 1984 with the first mass-market GUI OS available on their Macintosh PC.
Microsoft soon copied the breakthrough graphical approach for dominent IBM PC compatibles with the 1987 launch of Windows 2.0. Almost overnight graphical UI became integral to personal computing, letting users intuitively point and click to initiate commands.
Microsoft Windows 1.01 GUI
By trademarked analogies like "Desktop" and "Folder" the GUI made computer internals more familiar. Abstractions let you think less about bits/bytes and more about tasks/outcomes. Computing became inviting real-world living spaces rather than a cold coding matrix.
This windowed graphical OS evolution brought an interaction revolution – finally directly empowering every computer owner regardless of technical skill.
Gaming Consoles Crash then Rescue Home Entertainment
It didn‘t take long for innovators to envision home computers as multimedia devices rather than purely practical tools. Their graphical capabilities, storage improvements and interfaces standardizing peripheral connections (like joysticks) made personal computers great for play as well as productivity.
Dedicated gaming consoles connected to the family TV also vied for precious space under entertainment stands as microprocessors enabled more immersive experiences. The 1977 Atari 2600 pioneered bringing lush color arcade games like Space Invaders home and kickstarted a market segment.
But a flood of rushed low-quality games crashed the North American console business by 1983. An innovative Japanese company revived the promising new medium that same year – the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). Signature games like Super Mario Brothers, The Legend of Zelda and Mike Tyson‘s Punch-Out made NES the best selling console in history, moving over 60 million units!
I still have vivid memories of that groundbreaking era when digital entertainment leapt from funky hobby to mainstream phenomenon. Computer capabilities empowered interactive cinema-quality adventures from the comfort of your couch with a slice of pizza!
Office Work Changes Forever Via IT Automation
Another place computerization rapidly transformed landscape was workplace output…
White collar office jobs had run on typewriters, carbon paper, filing cabinets and calculator pads since the 1940s. Knowledge work relied on support staffs for research/analysis. But PCs automated information flows to boost individual productivity.
Inexpensive 80s microcomputers suddenly gave every employee tools previously limited to secretarial pools. Word processors like WordStar, WordPerfect and Microsoft Word replaced typing pools. Formulas flowed freely via VisiCalc then Lotus 123 spreadsheets. Managers painstakingly summarized data trends by hand before spreadsheet pivot tables!
As IBM‘s first PC rapidly proliferated, these platforms networked together in local area networks to share resources like file/print servers and expensive first-gen laser printers from Canon and HP. savvy companies soon realized connected computing power could provide competitive advantages.
80‘s IT departments were born to handle the influx infrastructure and deal with inevitable upgrade headaches still familiar today. But prospering businesses didn‘t mind too much.
Connecting Computers Sows Internet Seeds
Even while personal computers themselves advanced rapidly through the decade, the networking protocols allowing them to communicate took crucial steps too.
The 1970s saw the rise of electronic bulletin board systems (BBS) allowing hobbyists to dial-in with analog modems to exchange messages, files and simple games. The 1980 birth of UseNet brought connected messaging to universities. But these were siloed communities using custom setups.
Standardized networking technology conceived in the 1960s was finally seeing large scale adoption ten years later. Ethernet local connections became common in offices, and wide-reaching Internet transmission controls (TCP/IP) started reliably routing growing data flows. By 1989 over 100,000 hosts were Internet-accessible, increasingly linked by emerging domain name system (DNS) addressing.
With these fundamentals in place building out the World Wide Web became feasible. The concept of globally available hypertext information proposed by Sir Tim Berners-Lee would soon bring cohesive coherence and kickstart the Internet‘s exponential expansion through the 1990s.
But its primordial networked roots trace back to advances in the 1980s generation slowly connecting leased-line computers via phone links – an exciting precursor hinting at the always-on age to come!
CDs Beat Floppies for Storage Dominance
Aside from networking, another crucial computer component impact also shifted – data storage formats.
Through most of the 70s and 80s, personal computer programs and documents relied on floppy disks. These removable magnetic media cartridges peaked at ~1.4 MB capacity in the late 80s – barely enough to store this article in text form! And the floppies were failure prone, with even minor damage often corrupting data. Plus transferring anything substantial required bundles of disks, with constant swapping.
Fortunately, a new format rapidly gained steam as the 80s closed… Compact Disc digital storage originally created for music albums turned out handily applicable to computers. These high density plastic discs made possible hundreds of times more capacity than floppies in the same footprint.
By 1985 CD-ROMs stored vast software repositories and interactive multimedia programs until cheap high-capacity hard drives took over. This optical media could reliably handle rough use unlike fragile magnetic floppies. And discs made software distribution and backups vastly simpler.
Within a few years CDs surpassed failing cassettes as the music medium of choice too! This storage standard persisted over two decades until Internet downloads eliminated physical media.
Closing Perspective: What Hath the Microchip Wrought?
Looking back over epic progress in the 1980s makes clear how exponentially improving silicon microchips reinvented existing realms while enabling countless new possibilities. Suddenly computers weren‘t distant mainframe monsters but constant companions.
Over a few short years common conceptions changed radically. Computers transcended from impenetrable business machines tended by specialists to interactive appliances personalized for individual owners. Microcomputers evolved from hobbyist kits to empowering consumer devices supporting creativity, decisions and communications.
The truism "the computer age" reflects this reality bend the 1980s initiated. As processing sped up and physical equipment shrunk down then networked together, digital technology seeped unseen into the very foundations of modern existence.
Few forecasters recognized how deeply Moore‘s Law would shape lifestyles and commerce. Most citizens went about their 80s lives not fully realizing nascent innovations would soon become indispensable utilities similar to power and plumbing. Tech always seems inevitable in hindsight, but its ultimate impacts began revealing themselves within this revolutionary decade.
The 1980s made computers intimate companions. And our world has never been the same!
