Steve Wozniak Essay, Research Paper Steve Wozniak ’ s childhood had a large consequence on his radical developments in the computing machine universe.
Wozniak grew up in Sunnyvale California. His household lived in a development built for Lockheed applied scientists like his male parent. ( Rose, 26 ) As a adolescent he w During his high school old ages, Wozniak was a cut-up and was one time suspended for puting a metronome disguised as a bomb in a friends cabinet. ( Brodhagen, 1 ) The more serious side of Wozniak loved electronics and exhausted one twenty-four hours a hebdomad working at Sylvania Electronics, where Wozniak ’ s love for computing machines grew. Wozniak was working with electronics from an early age. In 1962 Wozniak built a reckoner utilizing a few electronic constituents and entered it in a local scientific discipline carnival.
( Brodhagen, 1 ) It won him a award. In 1971 Wozniak and his friend Bill Fernandez built a computing machine in Fernandez Õ s garage. ( Rose,25-26 ) They called it t Wozniak decided to travel the University of California at Berkeley after he returned from C! olorado State. While he was at that place, his female parent sent him an article about a cryptic individual who called himself Ò Captain Crunch. Ó ( Rose, 27 ) Crunch would construct electronic boxes, known as bluish boxes, that mimicked the tones regulating telephone company exchanging equipment.
This allowed him to do free long distance phone calls. Apparently Crunch was the leader of an belowground group who called themselves the Ò phone phreaks. Ó They would utilize engineering to acquire what they wanted, but they wope by remaining one measure in front of the constabulary. Wozniak was highly interested and called his friend from high school, Steven Jobs. ( Rose, 27 ) They decided to travel into concern selling them. Wozniak managed to do one which merely used 40 dollars worth of parts, alternatively of the 1,500 dollars it cost Captain Crunch.
Wozniak and Jobs so went to college campuses and sold them to dorms for 150 dollars and up. Wozniak became obsessed with Ò phreaking Ó and about forgot about school. This is! the first illustration of Wozniak Õ s In 1975 personal computing machines became a world. The Altair 8800 was released.
( Rose, 31 ) It was a computing machine kit. It came with all the pieces that were needed to construct it, and it was so assembled by the consumer who bought it. It was truly designed for computing machine hobbyists, who loved the fact that they were able to construct it. It had its down side though. Once it was assembled, there wasn Õ t much that it could make.
The Altair 8800 inspired two work forces to get down the Ò Homebrew Computer Club. Ó ( Rose, 32 ) Wozniak was among the 32 people who attended the first meeting. The nine was for computing machine hobbyists who wanted to speak about computing machines. They would portion any new information that they Ò discovered Ó and speak about computing machine designs, constituents, etc.
Wozniak found t Wozniak was working for Hewlett Packard and Jobs was working for Atari. ( Rose, 32 ) Sometimes Jobs would allow Wozniak come in to Atari at dark and drama games. Once Jobs had an thought degree Fahrenheit! or a game, Breakout, and he convinced Wozniak to do it. It took Wozniak merely four yearss to do it. This farther grounds of Wozniak ’ s early ability to pull strings computing machines, non merely as a builder, but as a coder. Something that came in really ready to hand when he was planing the Apple I.
From a really early age Wozniak wanted his ain computing machine. ( Rose, 26 ) This became possible when the Altair 8800 came out. Wozniak heard about it from members of the nine, but he could non afford the 395 dollars it cost. ( Rose, 32 ) In fact, he did non even have the money to purchase the 179 dollar Intel 8080 microprocessor that ran it.
This howe Alternatively of utilizing the Intel bit, Wozniak bought a inexpensive microprocessor, the 6502, that a company called MOS Technology was selling for 25 dollars. ( Rose, 32 ) Then Wozniak used his inventiveness and cognition of computing machines to construct his first on the job computing machine. Jobs fell in love with Wozniak Õ s design and persuaded him to travel into concern. Together the! Y started Apple computing machines in early 1976.
Jobs was the people individual who would sell the computing machines and Wozniak was the applied scientist who would plan and construct the computing machines. ( Rose, 32-33 ) The procedure for constructing the computing machine was really difficult and really boring. First Wozniak had to compose a plan, in jinx, to supervise the keyboard. ( Turly, 1-2 ) Then Wozniak revised his computing machine and Jobs was able to acquire him six sample RAM french friess from Intel because they were the best RAM french friess on the market. Then Wozniak wired the whole thing together. The edifice of the physical computing machine was non the lone obstruction that Wozniak One adult male constructing a computing machine and composing all the codification was uncommon, but it happened.
What made Wozniak particular was the fac t that his computer worked. Many other companies came out with personal computers, but most of them went out of business. (Laureate, 1) WozniakOs understanding of electronics helped him when he built his computer because it had ports so that it was expand! able. Big corporations thought the little computers that companies like Apple made were useless and that they would not succeed. (Rose, 34-36) It was no wonder that Hewlett Packard refused Wozniak’s offer to sell them his computer. It was the young entrepreneurs like Wozniak that changed computer history for ev To get their company going, Wozniak sold his programmable calculator and Jobs his van and they raised a total of 1,300 dollars.
(Rose,34) Then Jobs went searching for people to fund them. It took him a couple of months, but he finally found Mike Markkula who, like so many others, fell in love with Wozniak’s computer and bought a third of the companyOs shares for 341,000 dollars. Now Apple was a company. They started to sell the Apple I for 666.66 dollars with the slogan ONewton…OA Mind Forever Voyaging Through Strange Seas of Thought…Alone.OO (Rose, 33) This slogan, as strange as it was, helped Apple sales.
They had started the company in JobsOs garage, b! ut now they were ready to move out and really get their business going. Wozniak slaved on to make the Apple computer better. Once Appl In 1981 Apple computer was doing pretty well and life was going great for Wozniak. His company was making the highest selling computer on the market. Then he took off in his single-engine Beechcraft airplane on February 7. (Rose, 52) The plane lifted off the ground, shuddered and crashed.
When Wozniak woke up in the hospital he could not remember the crash or anything before it. He had amnesia for five weeks. After he recovered from the cras Apple became so great that it earned Wozniak and Jobs an award that had not been presented for over one hundred years. (Rose, 249-250) In May of 1984 President Reagan gave them the National Technology Award. WozniakOs dream to own his own computer had turned into a multi-billion dollar company.
Two weeks earlier Wozniak had left Apple to work on an universal remote control. WozniakOs developments! in computers were revolutionary. Kenn Brodhagen said OSteve Wozniak is probably one of the most influential hardware engineers in the field of computers…O (1) Dave Whiner described Apple this way: OIf Apple was the Beatles, Steve Jobs would have been Paul McCartney. The commercializer, pop icon.
Steve Wozniak would have been a combination Starr — a combination poet and teddy bear. It was JobsOs garage that Apple started in, but it was WozniakOs computer.O (1) I think that this is a good and accurate portrayal of Apple Computers. Wozniak was obsessed with making computers and Jobs was obsessed with selling them. WozniakOs childhood was a big part of his success in his later life.
As a child and young adult he spent all his free time either on pranks or tinkering with electronics. Then when he grew up and wanted a computer he put every thing that he learned as a child and young adult into use and did what he had to do. He built a computer that worked. The co! mputer he built, then became the first personal computer that the every day person could use. It was not just made for the computer hacker.
That is why Wozniak was so successful. He made a computer that was expandable, fairly easy to use and something that the consumer would buy. Wozniak changed the computer industry because once he made his computer and Steve WozniakOs prankster nature changed the world for ever. Since he tended not to listen to what people say, he didnOt get discouraged when people told him he was wrong or that he would fail. He just kept on working.
The result of all his work was that the personal computer became a reality. He is one of the greatest men alive. His work effects tens-of-millions of people every In researching this paper I looked in a recent MacMall (a mail order catalog that specializes in selling Apple products) and there were twelve different computers made by Apple. Ranging in price from 499.99 dollars to 4,199 dollars and from ! one that will fit in your pocket to one that will cover your whole desk.
Apple also had a wide range of printers, scanners, drives and monitors. In my phone interview with Jim Harper he summed it up this way: OSince 1984 Apple has sold twenty-six million Macintoshes. The Macintosh in your home is more powerful and faster than the computer that put the man on the moon. It all started back in 1976 with Steve WozniakOs Apple I.O Performa User $U &
