1950s it was realized that "scaling down" the size of electronic digital computer circuits and parts would increase speed and efficiency and thereby improve performance if only manufacturing methods were available to do this. About 1960, photo printing of conductive circuit boards to eliminate wiring became highly developed. It then became possible to build resistors and capacitors into the circuitry by photographic means (see printed circuit).In the 1970s vacuum deposition of transistors became common, and entire assemblies, such as adders, shifting registers, and counters, became available on tiny "chips." During this decade many companies, some new to the computer field, introduced programmable minicomputers supplied with software packages. The size-reduction trend continued with the introduction of personal computers, which are programmable machines small enough and inexpensive enough to be purchased and used by individuals (see computer, personal). Many companies, such as Apple Computer and Radio Shack, introduced very successful personal computers. Augmented in part by a fad in computer, or video, games, development of these small computers expanded rapidly.In the 1980s, very large-scale integration (VLSI), in which hundreds of thousands of transistors are placed on a single chip, became increasingly common. During that decade the Japanese government announced a massive plan to design and build a new generation the so-called fifth generation of supercomputers that would employ new technologies in very large-scale integration. This project, however, was abandoned by the early 1990s (see artificial intelligence). The enormous success of the personal computer and resultant advances in microprocessor technology initiated a process of attrition among giants of the computer industry. That is, as a result of advances continually being made in the manufacture of chips, rapidly increasing amounts of computing power could be purchased for t...
