Amplifier by their physical placement in the signal chain; a preamplifier may precede other signal processing stages, for example. The first practical electrical device which could amplify was the triode vacuum tube, invented in 1906 by Lee De Forest, which led to the first amplifiers around 1912. Today most amplifiers use transistors. The first practical device that could amplify was the triode vacuum tube, invented in 1906 by Lee De Forest, which led to the first amplifiers around 1912. Vacuum tubes were used in almost all amplifiers until the 1960s–1970s when the transistor, invented in 1947, replaced them. Today, most amplifiers
John Snell (electrical engineer) John Snell (electrical engineer) Sir John Francis Cleverton Snell, GBE (15 December 1859 – 6 July 1938) was a British electrical engineer and administrator. He was born in Saltash, Cornwall, the only son of Commander John Skinner Snell, RN and his wife Harriet Cleverton and educated at Plymouth Grammar School, Finsbury Technical College and King's College, London. After working for four years from 1885 with Messrs. Woodhouse and Rawson he was appointed in 1889 a resident engineer at Messrs. Crompton and Co., where he worked on electrical supply projects in London and Stockholm. From 1892 he worked as assistant to