Wish Your PC A Happy 25th Birthday!

25 years ago, IBM changed the world. It wasn't intentional. When Big Blue announced a microcomputer called the IBM Personal Computer on August 12, 1981, they hoped only to make a nice profit. They made a profit alright and in the process, they changed the world. The IBM PC, also known as the Model 5150, made a significant impact on our culture. When the company that was synonymous with computers announced its first PC, everyone knew it was a great milestone in the history of a very young industry. A cool, grey, horizontal box.

Technology-wise, the most interesting thing about IBM's PC, was its CPU. An Intel's 8088, a powerful 16-bit processor in an era when most popular models still used basic 8-bit CPUs. IBM offered the system with several operating systems, including the then-popular CP/M, something called P-System and a new OS that IBM named PC-DOS. Most people would remember PC-DOS as MS-DOS for versions marketed by publisher Microsoft. (Legendarily, Microsoft's OS was based on QDOS, or "Quick and Dirty Operating System," which it picked up for a song from a small Seattle company.) Too much geeky knowledge for you? Ok, I'll stop.

Within 18 months IBM's machine sat at the center of a booming PC ecology, with a bevy of hardware add-ons, third-party software, clones, books and magazines. Some of IBM's later machines were hits and some were flops, but all of them like the vast majority of computers on the planet today, were direct descendants of the IBM Personal Computer.

So happy, happy birthday to my PC! For all he's done for me, the least I can do is buy him a table dance.