计算机英语:关于微机的发展

Development of Microcomputers

　　Modern computers are electronic, and it was not until the 1940's that such machines could be built Research workers in America produced a working computer in 1946.The first models were very -bulky because they depended on valves similar to those you may have seen in old radio sets．Later machines had transistors and at present they use integrated circuits\which take up an incredibly small space.

　　The reason for the development of small computer parts is not just to save space but rather to in-crease the speed of computation. Present models are several thousand times as fast as the 1950 machines，which could perform about 1000 simple additions per second, but even the old computers were more 1000times faster than the human being.

翻译：

微机的发展
 
　　现代计算机都是电子计算机，直到本世纪四十年代才得以问世，1946年美国的研究工作者制造出了一台能实际工作的计算机。第一台样机的体积非常大，因为它们是依靠类似于可以在老式的无线电收音机里看到的那种电子管来工作的。后来的计算机使用晶体管，现在的计算机则使用集成电路，它们所占的空间小得令人难以置信。
   
　　研制小型计算机元件的理由不仅是为了节省空间，而且着眼于提高计算速度。目前流行的机型比50年代的计算机快几千倍，那时的计算机每秒钟只能完成约一千次的简单运算。但即使是老式的计算机也要比人的手工计算快一千倍以上。

原文转自：http://www.ltesting.net