Introduction - Computer Busses - page 42

market share, either with improved technology or through legal action. The Pentium
processor was a great success, as it was technologically superior to many other proces-
sors in the market, even the enhanced RISC devices. It has since become faster and
faster.
6. 6502 and Z80 processors, the classic 16-bit processors which became a standard part in
most of the PCs available before the IBM PC. The 6502 competed against the Motorola
6800, while the Z80 competed directly with the Intel 8080.
7. Apple II , which brought computing into the classroom, the laboratory and even the
home.
8. Ethernet , which has become the standard networking technology. It is not the best net-
working technology, but has survived because of its upgradeabliity, its ease-of-use, and
its cheapness. Ethernet does not cope well with high capacity network traffic. This is be-
cause it is based on contention, where nodes must contend with each other to get access
to a network segment. If two nodes try to get access at the same time, a collision results,
and no data is transmitted. Thus, the more traffic there is on the network, the more colli-
sions there are. This reduces the overall network capacity. However, Ethernet had two
more trump cards up its sleeve. When faced with network capacity problems, it in-
creased its bit rate from the standard 10 Mbps (10 BASE) to 100 Mbps (100 BASE). So
there was 10 times the capacity, which reduced contention problems. For networks
backbones it also suffered because it could not transmit data fast enough. So, it played
its next card: 1000 BASE. This increased the data rate to 1Gbps (1000 Mbps). Against
this type of player, no other networking technology had a chance.
9. WWW , which is often confused with the Internet, and is becoming the largest, database
ever created (okay, 99% of it is rubbish, but even if 1% is good then its all worthwhile).
The WWW is one of the uses of the Internet (others include file transfer, remote login,
electronic mail, and so on).
10. Apple Macintosh , which was one of few PC systems which competed with the IBM PC.
It succeeded mainly because of its excellent operating system (MAC OS), which was ap-
proximately 10 years ahead of its time. Possibly if Apple had spent as much time in de-
veloping application software rather than for their operating system it would have con-
siderably helped the adoption of the Mac. Apple refusing to license it to other manufac-
turers also held its adoption back. For a long time it thus stayed a closed system.
11. Compaq DeskPro 386 . Against all the odds, Compaq stole the IBM PC standard from
the creators, who had tried to lead the rest of the industry up a dark alley, with MCA.
12. Sun SPARC , which succeed against of the growth of the IBM PC, because of its excel-
lent technology, its reliable Unix operating system, and its graphical user interface (X-
Windows). Sun did not make the mistakes that Apple made, and allowed other compa-
nies to license their technology. They also supported open systems in terms of both the
hardware and software.
13. Commodore , who bravely fought on against the IBM PC. They released mainly great
computers, such as the Vic range and the Amiga. Commodore was responsible for forc-
ing the price of computers down.
14. Sinclair , who, more than any other company, made computing acceptable to the masses.
Okay, most of them had terrible membrane keyboards, and memory adaptor that wob-
bled, and it took three fingers to get the required command (Shift-2nd Function-Alt etc).
and it required a cassette recorder to download programs, and it would typically crash
after you had entered one thousand lines of code. But, all of this aside, in the Sinclair
Spectrum they found the right computer, for the right time, at the right price. Sometimes
success can breed complacency, and so it turned out with the Sinclair QL and the Sin-