Computing · 1975

Altair 8800

A $439 kit computer that ignited the hobbyist revolution.

MITS's Altair appeared on the cover of Popular Electronics in January 1975 and sold thousands of kits. Bill Gates and Paul Allen wrote BASIC for it, founding Microsoft.

See it in the living tree Wikipedia

Arcs above join it to what it stood on, arcs below to what it led to. The bar places this stretch on the tree's whole timeline.

What it built on 1

Intel 8080 1974

What it led to 1

Personal computer 1977

Related measurements

The dashed line marks when it first worked.

Transistors per microprocessor Latest: 58.2B transistors (2021) Source: Our World in Data

Computation per constant dollar, 1850-2006 Latest: 7.3B million units of computer power per 2006 $ (2003) Source: Nordhaus 2007, Two Centuries of Productivity Growth in Computing, J. Econ. Hist. 67(1), Table 6