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Offtek have been supplying laptop memory, computer memory and memory for all devices online since 1997 and have quickly established ourselves as one of the UK's premier memory distributors as well as one of Europe's largest online memory suppliers.

We offer fast, free UK delivery including a 60 day money back guarantee and ensure your order is 100% compatible.

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As Seen On

When Was The First Computer Invented?

This, as a question, is quite a difficult one to answer. There have been significant events over the last 200 years and the answer depends very much on which definition of the word ‘computer’ you are referring to. The ‘When?’ will very much depend on the ‘Who?’

Invention of The First Computer
The first and easiest way to answer the question is to answer it from the perspective of who invented the first machine bearing the name. That accolade goes to Charles Babbage, an English London-based Mathematician, who invented the first mechanical computer back in 1822.

This very first incarnation did not resemble a computer as we know it. It was the first appearance of what would become known as the ‘difference engine’, which is considered to be the first actual computing machine.

Other Notable Contributors to the Evolution of the PC

  • Moving forward some 110 years, Berliner Konrad Zuse created the Z1, thought to be the world’s first fully-functioning electrically-driven prototype computer.
  • We entered the era of electric computers, the first of which came to be when Tommy Flowers created The Colossus, which famously helped British code breakers crack the Enigma code in the mid-1940s.
  • Around the same time, John Vincent Atanasoff and Cliff Berry created ‘The ABC Computer’, which was the first electronic digital computer in existence. Created at Iowa State University, it used 270 vacuum tubes and was able to solve quite complex maths problems. It was comparable in size to a UK pool table.
  • The first Computer Company that primarily dealt with Computers was The Electronic Controls Company and it was formed in 1949 by Messrs Eckert and Mauchly. The enterprise would later be renamed EMCC and was behind the UNIVAC computer line.
  • The first commercial computer came into existence in 1950, when Konrad Zuse created the Z4. The computer, the only one of its kind, was sold to a Swiss Tech Institute. This was Konrad Zuse’s 2nd major breakthrough.
  • The first mass-produced computer made an appearance in 1964 when The Programma 101 was launched in New York at a major World Fair. Created by Pier Giorgio Perotto, it was put into production by Olivetti. Just under 50,000 were sold at a cost of around £25,000.
  • The first PC or Personal Computer, as we would describe it, came in the form of the Altair 8800. It was created by the MITS company in 1975 and gained exposure when it was featured on the cover of Popular Electronics Magazine, a well-subscribed National interest publication.

The history of computers goes back almost 200 years and contains a series of historic ‘firsts’. Each electronic pioneer driving the other to make computers faster, smaller and more powerful. This competition has led us to the marvels we see today.

The question of who actually invented the computer has a specific and easy answer, as we did at the beginning. However, there have been so many great minds involved in getting us where we are today, that it would seem unfair to settle on just one of them. Charles Babbage started it all, but many great inventors helped the concept on its way.

To them all...We thank you!

The History SanDisk

SanDisk is a name ubiquitous in the world of technology, which began its life back in 1988 when Eli Harari, Jack Yuan and Sanjay Mehrotra got together to form the company, with its Headquarters in California. This trio were responsible for developing ‘Floating Gate’ technology called EEPROM, which represented something of a breakthrough in semiconductor hardware.

12 years after its inception the company was joined by the Toshiba Corporation in researching new types of semiconductor for the digital camera market.

The Mobile Phone Boom
Around 2003 to 2004, the mobile phone industry was going through a major boom time and Sandisk were a major part of the expansion. As the capabilities of mobile devices increased, their need for expanded memory became ever greater. From memory cards able to store just a few hundred megabytes at the beginning, the technology advanced to such a degree that in a few short years, they were able to cram in 10s or even 100s of Gigabytes into the same space.

Over the next few years, Sandisk made a number of acquisitions which strengthened their hand in the semiconductor market. From 2005 to 2014, the company acquired:

  • Matrix Semiconductor
  • M-Systems
  • Pilant Technology (a manufacturer of SSD technology)
  • FlashSoft
  • Schooner Information Technology (Developer of Membrain and SchoonerSQL)
  • SMART Storage Systems (SSD manufacturers for the enterprise market)
  • Fusion-io (producers of flash memory used in Enterprise level data centres)

These acquisitions were made at considerable cost to Sandisk, with the total amount in the region of $5bn, but it placed the company well in the market to make even greater strides in the global permanent and flash storage markets.

Since 2014, Sandisk continued to innovate and launched a number of technological firsts, like the Ultra microSDXC memory card, with a staggering 128 Gigabytes of storage contained within. Around the same time, the company launched the Extreme PRO SDXC, which was the highest capacity SD memory card in existence.

Western Digital Acquisition
Fast forward to 2016 and just a few months after Sandisk launched its ‘InfiniFlash’ technology (an entire new category of ‘all-flash’ storage system) and it entered the high end SSD market, the company was bought out by Western Digital, one of the largest HDD manufacturers in the world for a massive $19bn. 

Since 2005, Sandisk is said to have sold over 2 Billion microSD memory cards around the world, illustrating just how large scale its operation is. The company still operates in the same way under the umbrella of Western Digital, who supports in the subsidiary’s efforts to continue to this day, to innovate in the field of memory hardware.

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