Introduction - Computer Busses - page 23

faster than it was when graphical user interfaces first reached the market.
Another casualty of the rise of the IBM PC was DEC. As IBM had done with the Sys-
tem/360 range, DEC invested billions of dollars in their VAX range, which became an unbe-
lievable success. As Compaq Computers would do in the 1980s, DEC achieved unbelievable
growth, going from its foundation in 1957 to a sales turnover of $8 billion in 1986 (the peak
year for DEC, before the PC destroyed the market for minicomputers).
The introduction of the PC would see the end of computer manufacturing for Osborne,
Altair, Texas Instruments and Xerox. Going in the opposite direction were the new compa-
nies such as Compaq Computers, Sun Microsystems, Apollo (for a while), Cray and Micro-
soft. Compaq Computers, in 1981, generated $110 million in their first year, a further two
years on it was $503.9 million, and two years after that it was $1 billion. The following year
it was $2 billion. From zero to $2 billion, in six years (a world record, at the time). Microsoft
was another high-growth company going from $16 million in 1981 to $1.8 billion in 1991. In
most years, Microsoft doubled its size. Consistently Microsoft was also highly profitable
with at least 30 % of sales resulting in profit, and at least 10% invested in research and de-
velopment. The next 20 years would also see the creation of many computer-related multibil-
lionaires, such as Bill Gates who, within in twenty years, would be worth almost $100 bil-
lion.
Before the introduction of the IBM PC, the biggest threats to IBM came, at the top end
from DEC and at the bottom end from Apple. Both companies could do little wrong. DEC
released their classic PDP-11, and then followed it up with the VAX range. Apple quickly
developed their range of computers, and moved from a mainly game-playing computer, to
one which could be used for game playing and also for business applications. For Apple, the
key to the move into the business environment was the introduction of VisiCalc. From the
1980s, software would become the dominant driving force, and the best hardware in the
world could not make up for a lack of application software.
1981 would become a pivotal year for the development of computers. Before this year,
different computer standards thrived, and incompatibility reigned. After it, there would only
be one main standard, which would be a truly open standard, which would be driven not by
IBM, but by Intel and Microsoft.

At the time, the computer industry split itself into two main areas:

• Serious/commercial computers . Mainly IBM and DEC with their range of mainframe

computers and minicomputers. Within 10 years, both IBM and DEC would change to be
different companies. IBM would end up loosing their quasi-monopoly on computers sys-
tems, and DEC would end up being taken over by Compaq, who would evolve from the
new market created by IBM.

• Hobby/home/game-playing computers . These computers had grown from the basic 8-

bit processors, such as the 6502 and the Z80. The main product leaders were Commo-
dore, Sinclair, Apple, Osborne, Altair, Acorn, Radio Shack and Xerox.

Few of these computers, at the time, were compatible with each other, and it was a great ad-
vantage to a manufacturer that their computers were incompatible with others, as software
written for one would not work on another. For example, the Apple II and the Commodore
PET were based on the same processor, but had incompatible hardware, especially with the
graphics system.
It was in 1981 that IBM released, ahead of schedule, the IBM 5150 PC Personal Com-
puter. It featured the 4.77 MHz Intel 8088 processor, 64 KB RAM, 40 KB ROM, one 5.25-