Timeline of electrical and electronic engineering

The following timeline tables list the discoveries and inventions in the history of electrical and electronic engineering.

History of discoveries timeline

Year	Event
600BCE	Thales of Miletus discovered static electricity by rubbing fur on substances such as amber
1600	English scientist William Gilbert coined the word electricus after careful experiments.
1705	Francis Hauksbee made a glass ball that glowed when spun and rubbed with the hand
1720	Stephen Gray discovered insulators and conductors
1745	German physicist Ewald Georg von Kleist and Dutch scientist Pieter van Musschenbroek invented Leyden jars
1752	Benjamin Franklin showed that lightning was electrical by flying a kite, and explained how Leyden jars work
1783	French physicist Charles-Augustin de Coulomb formulated Coulomb's law
1785	French mathematician Pierre-Simon Laplace developed a technique which was called Laplace transform to transform a linear differential equation to an algebraic equation. Later on his transform proved to be a valuable tool in circuit analysis.
1800	Italian physicist Alessandro Volta invented battery
1820	Danish physicist Hans Christian Ørsted accidentally discovered that the change in electric field creates magnetic field
1820	One week after Ørsted's discovery, French physicist André-Marie Ampère published his law. He also proposed right hand screw rule
1825	English physicist William Sturgeon developed the first electromagnet
1827	German physicist Georg Ohm introduced the concept of electrical resistance
1831	English physicist Michael Faraday published the law of induction (Joseph Henry developed the same law independently)
1831	American scientist Joseph Henry in United States developed a prototype DC motor
1832	French instrument maker Hippolyte Pixii in France developed a prototype DC generator
1836	Irish priest (and later scientist) Nicholas Callan invented transformer in Ireland
1844	American inventor Samuel Morse developed telegraphy and the Morse code
1850	Belgian engineer Floris Nollet invented (and patented) a practical AC generator
1855	First utilization of AC (in electrotherapy) by French neurologist Guillaume Duchenne
1856	Belgian engineer Charles Bourseul proposed telephony
1856	First electrically powered light house in England
1862	Scottish physicist James Clerk Maxwell published four equations bearing his name
1873	Belgian engineer Zenobe Gramme who developed DC generator accidentally discovered that a DC generator also works as a DC motor during an exhibit in Vienna.
1876	Russian engineer Pavel Yablochkov invented electric carbon arc lamp
1876	Scottish inventor Alexander Graham Bell invented telephone
1877	American inventor Thomas Alva Edison invented phonograph
1877	First street lighting in Paris, France
1878	First hydroelectric plant in Cragside, England
1878	English engineer Joseph Swan invented Incandescent light bulb
1879	Thomas Alva Edison introduced a long lasting filament for the incandescent lamp.
1882	First thermal power stations in London and New York
1888	German physicist Heinrich Hertz proved the that electro magnetic waves travel over some distance. (First indication of radio communication)
1888	Italian physicist and electrical engineer Galileo Ferraris publishes a paper on the induction motor and Serbian-American engineer Nikola Tesla gets a US patent on the same device
1890	Thomas Alva Edison invented fuse
1893	During the Fourth International Conference of Electricians in Chicago electrical units in were defined
1894	Russian physicist Alexander Stepanovich Popov developed a prototype of a radio receiver
1896	First successful intercontinental telegram
1897	German inventor Karl Ferdinand Braun invented cathode ray oscilloscope (CRO)
1900	Italian inventor Guglielmo Marconi succeeded in first radio broadcast
1901	First transatlantic radio broadcast by Guglielmo Marconi
1904	English engineer John Ambrose Fleming invented diode
1906	American inventor Lee de Forest invented triode
1912	American engineer Edwin Howard Armstrong developed Electronic oscillator
1919	Edwin Howard Armstrong developed standard AM radio receiver
1921	Metre Convention was extended to include the electrical units
1926	Yagi-Uda antenna was developed by the Japanese engineers Hidetsugu Yagi and Shintaro Uda
1928	First experimental Television broadcast in the US.
1929	First public TV broadcast in Germany
1931	First wind energy plant in the Soviet Union
1936	Dudley E. Foster and Stuart William Seeley developed FM detector circuit.
1938	Russian American engineer Vladimir K. Zworykin developed Iconoscope
1939	Edwin Howard Armstrong developed FM radio receiver
1939	Russell and Sigurd Varian developed the first Klystron tube in the US.
1941	German engineer Konrad Zuse developed the first programmable computer in Berlin
1944	English engineer John Logie Baird developed the first color picture tube
1947	American engineers John Bardeen and Walter Houser Brattain together with their group leader William Shockley invented transistor.
1950	French physicist Alfred Kastler invented MASER
1951	First nuclear power plant plant in the US
1953	First fully transistorized computer in the US
1958	American engineer Jack Kilby invented the integrated circuit (IC)
1960	American engineer Theodore Harold Maiman invented the LASER
1962	Nick Holonyak Jr. invented the LED
2008	American scientist Richard Stanley Williams invented memristor which was proposed by Leon O. Chua in 1971

History of inventions timeline

Brief History of Electronics Timeline
Date	Invention/Discovery	Inventor(s)
1745	Capacitor	Leyden
1780	Galvanic action	Galvani
1800	Dry cell	Volta
1808	Atomic theory	Dalton
1812	Cable insulation	Sommering and Schilling
1820	Electromagnetism	Oersted
1821	Thermoelectricity	Seebeck
1826	Ohm's law	Ohm
1831	Transformer	Faraday
1831	Electromagnetic induction	Faraday
1832	Self-induction	Henry
1834	Electrolysis	Faraday
1837	Relays	Cooke, Wheatstone, and Davy
1839	Photovoltaic effect	Becquerel
1843	Wheatstone bridge	Christie
1845	Kirchhoff's circuit laws	Kirchhoff
1850	Thermistor	Faraday
1860	Microphone diaphragm	Reis
1865	Radiowave propagation	Maxwell
1866	Transatlantic telegraph cable	T.C. & M. Co.
1874	Capacitors, mica	Bauer
1876	Rolled-paper capacitor	Fitzgerald
1876	Telephone	Bell
1877	Phonograph	Edison
1877	Microphone, carbon	Edison
1877	Loudspeaker moving coil	Siemens
1878	Cathode rays	Crookes
1878	Carbon-filament incandescent lamp	Swan, Stearn, Topham, and Cross
1879	Hall effect	Hall
1880	Piezoelectricity	Curie
1887	Gramophone record	Berliner
1887	Aerials, radiowave	Hertz
1888	Induction motor	Ferraris and Tesla
1893	Waveguides	Thomson
1895	X-rays	Roentgen
1896	Wireless telegraphy	Marconi
1900	Old quantum theory	Planck
1901	Fluorescent lamp	Cooper and Hewitt
1904	Two-electrode tube	Fleming
1905	Theory of relativity	Einstein
1906	Radio broadcasting	Fessenden
1908	Television	Campell, Swinton
1911	Superconductivity	Onnes
1915	Sonar	Langevin
1918	Multivibrator circuit	Abraham and Bioch
1918	Atomic transmutation	Rutherford
1919	Flip-flop circuits	Eccles and Jordan
1921	Crystal control of frequency	Cady
1924	Radar	Appleton, Briet, Watson, and Watt
1927	Negative-feedback amplifier	Black
1927	Video camera tube	Max Dieckmann and Rudolf Hell
1930	Patent of traffic signal timing system	Thomas Watson awarded patent
1932	Neutron	Chadwick
1932	Particle accelerator	Crockcroft and Walton
1934	Liquid crystals	Dreyer
1935	Transistor field effect	Hieil
1935	Scanning electron microscope	Knoll
1937	Xerography	Carlson
1937	Oscillograph	Van Ardenne, Dowling, and Bullen
1939	Early digital computer	Aitken and IBM
1943	First general-purpose computer (ENIAC)	Mauchly and Eckert
1943	Printed circuit board	Eisler
1945	First commercially successful computer (UNIVAC I)	N/A
1948	Bipolar transistor	Bardeen, Brattain, and Shockley
1948	Holography	Gabor and Shockley
1950	Modem	MIT and Bell Labs
1950	Karnaugh mapping technique (digital logic)	Karnaugh
1952	Digital voltmeter	Kay
1953	Unijunction transistor	GEC
1954	Transistor radioset	Regency
1954	Solar battery	Chapin, Fuller, and Pearson
1956	Transatlantic telephone cable	U.K. and U.S.A.
1957	Sputnik I satellite	U.S.S.R.
1957	FORTRAN programming language	Watson Scientific
1958	Video tape recorder	U.S.A.
1958	Laser	Schalow and Townes
1959	First one-piece plain paper photocopier (Xerox 914)	Xerox
1959	Veroboard (Stripboard)	Terry Fitzpatrick
1960	Light-emitting diode	Allen and Gibbons
1961	Electronic clock	Vogel and Cie
1962	MOSFET transistors	Hofstein, Heiman, and RCA
1963	Electronic calculator	Bell Punch Co.
1963	First commercially successful audio compact cassette	Philips Corporation
1964	BASIC programming language	Kemeny and Kurtz
1966	Optical fiber communications	Kao and Hockham
late 1960s	First digital fax machine	Dacom
1969	UNIX operating system	AT&T's Bell Labs
1970	Floppy disk recorder	IBM
1970	First microprocessor (4004, 60,000 oper/s)	Intel
1970	First commercially available DRAM memory	IBM
1971	EPROM	N/A
1971	PASCAL programming language	Wirth
1971	First microcomputer-on-a-chip	Texas Instruments
1972	8008 processor (200 kHz, 16 kB)	Intel
1972	Ping Pong (video game)	Atari
1972	First programmable word processor	Automatic Electronic Systems
1972	5.25-in diskette	N/A
1972	First modern automated teller machine (IBM 2984)	IBM
1973	Josephson junction	IBM
1973	Tunable continuous-wave laser	Bell Labs
1973	Ethernet	Metcalfe
1973	Mobile phone	John F. Mitchell and Dr. Martin Cooper of Motorola
1974	C (programming language)	Kernighan, Ritchie
1974	Programmable pocket calculator	Hewlett-Packard
1975	BASIC for personal computers	Allen
1975	Liquid-crystal display	United Kingdom
1975	First personal computer (Altair 8800)	Roberts
1975	Digital camera	Steven Sasson of Eastman Kodak
1975	Integrated optical circuits	Reinhart and Logan
1975	Microsoft founded	Gates and Allen
1975	Omni-font optical character recognition system	Nuance Communications
1975	CCD flatbed scanner	Kurzweil Computer Products
1975	Text-to-speech synthesis	Kurzweil Computer Products
1975	First commercial reading machine for the blind (Kurzweil Reading Machine)	Kurzweil Computer Products
1976	Apple I computer	Wozniak, Jobs
1977	Launch of the "1977 trinity computers" expanding home computing, the Apple II, Commodore PET and the TRS-80	Apple, Tandy Corporation, Commodore Business Machines
1977	First handheld electronic game (Auto Race)	Mattel
1978	Space Invaders (video game)	Taito
1978	WordPerfect 1.0	Satellite Software
1980	3.5-in floppy (2-sided, 875 kB)	N/A
1980	Commodore 64	Commodore Business Machines
1981	IBM Personal Computer (8088 processor)	IBM
1981	MS-DOS 1.0	Microsoft
1982	Laser printer	IBM
1982	First commercially marketed large-vocabulary speech recognition	Kurzweil Applied Intelligence and Dragon Systems
1983	Satellite television	U.S. Satellite Communications, Inc.
1983	"Wet" solar cell	Germany/U.S.A.
1983	First built-in hard drive (IBM PC-XT)	IBM
1983	Microsoft Word	Microsoft
1983	C++ (programming language)	Stroostrup
1984	Macintosh computer (introduced)	Apple Computer
1984	CD-ROM player for personal computers	Philips
1984	First music synthesizer (Kurzweil K250) capable of recreating the grand piano and other orchestral instruments	Kurzweil Music Systems
1985	300,000 simultaneous telephone conversations over single optical fiber	AT&T, Bell Laboratory
1985	Nintendo Entertainment System	Nintendo
1987	Warmer superconductivity	Karl Alex Mueller
1987	80386 microprocessor (25 MHz)	Intel
1989	Sega Genesis (console)	Sega
1989	First commercial handheld GPS receiver (Magellan NAV 1000)	Magellan Navigation Inc.
1989	Silicon-germanium transistors	IBM fellow Bernie Meyerson
1990	486 microprocessor (33 MHz)	Intel
1994	Pentium processor (60/90 MHz, 166.2 mips)	Intel
1994	Bluetooth	Ericsson
1994	First DVD player ever made	Tatung Company
1995	PlayStation (console)	Sony Computer Entertainment
1996	Alpha 21164 processor (550 MHz)	Digital Equipment
1996	P2SC processor (15 million transistors)	IBM
1997	Deep Blue (IBM RS/6000SP supercomputer) defeats world chess champ Garry Kasparov	IBM
2001	Xbox (console)	Microsoft
2001	iPod	Apple Inc.
2007	iPhone	Apple Inc.
2011	IBM Watson defeated two of Jeopardy's greatest champions	IBM

Consumer Electronics

1843-1923: From electromechanics to electronics

Thomas Edison's phonograph

• 1843: Watchmaker Alexander Bain (inventor) develops the basic concept of displaying images as points with different brightness values.
• 1848: Frederick Collier Bakewell invents the first wirephoto machine, an early fax machine
• 1861: Grade school teacher Philipp Reis presents his telephone in Frankfurt, inventing the loudspeaker as a by-product.
• 1867: French poet and philosopher Charles Cros (1842 - 1888) presents the construction principle of a phonograph in his 'paréophone', which turned out not to be a commercial success at the time.
• 1867: James Clerk Maxwell (1831 - 1879) develops a theory predicting the existence of electromagnetic waves and establishes Maxwell's equations to describe their properties. Together with the Lorentz force law, these equations form the foundation for classical electrodynamics and classical optics as well as electric circuits.
• 1874: Ferdinand Braun discovers the rectifier effect in metal sulfides and metal oxides.
• 1877: Thomas Edison (1847 - 1931) invents the first phonograph, using a tin foil cylinder. For the first time sounds could be recorded and played. A phonograph horn with membrane and needle was arranged in such a way that the needle had contact to the tinfoil.
• 1880: the American physicist Charles Sumner Tainter discovers that many disadvantages of Edison's cylinders can be eliminated if the soundtrack is arranged in spiral form and engraved in a flat, round disk. Technical problems soon ended these experiments. Still, Tainter is regarded as the inventor of the gramophone record.
• 1884: Paul Nipkow obtains a patent for his Nipkow disk, an image scanning device that reads images serially, which constitutes the foundation for mechanical television. Two years later his patent runs out.
• 1886: Heinrich Hertz succeeds in proving the existence of electromagnetic waves for the first time - now the groundwork for wireless telegraphy and radio broadcasting in physical science is laid.
• 1887: Unaware of Charles Sumner Tainter's experiments, German-American Emil Berliner has his phonograph patented. The turntable rotates at 150 RPM and is operated by a crank handle. A steel needle reads the data and transfers the vibrations mechanically to a membrane inside the horn. Berliner used a disk instead of a cylinder primarily to avoid infringing on Edison's patent. Quickly it becomes obvious that flat Gramophone records are easier to duplicate and store.
• 1888:
  • Alexander Graham Bell (1847 - 1922) significantly reduces interfering noises by using a wax cylinder instead of tin foil. This paves the way to commercial success for the improved phonograph.
  • American Oberlin Smith describes a process to record audio using a cotton thread with integrated fine wire clippings. This makes reel-to-reel audio tape recording possible.
• 1890:
  • The phonograph becomes faster and more convenient due to an electric motor. The electric motor brings on the first juke box with cylinders - even before flat disk records were widely available.
  • Thomas Edison discovers thermionic emission. To this day, this effect forms the basis for the vacuum tube and the cathode ray tube.
• approximately 1893: The invention of the selenium phototube allows the conversion of brightness values into electrical signals. The principle is applied in wirephoto and television technology for a short time. Selenium is used in light meters for the next 50 years.

Cinématographe camera by the Lumière brothers in 1895 (ref 86.5822) at the French Museum of Photography in Bièvres, Essonne, France

• 1895: Auguste Lumiere's cinematograph displays moving images for the first time. In the same year, brothers Emil and Max Skladanowsky present their "Bioscop" in Berlin.

• 1897
  • Ferdinand Braun invents the "inertialess cathode ray oscillograph tube", a principle which remained unchanged in television picture tubes.
  • The Italian Guglielmo Marconi transmits wireless telegraph messages by electromagnetic waves over a distance of five kilometers.
• 1898
  • The Danish physicist Valdemar Poulsen creates the world's first magnetic recording and reproduction, using a 1 mm thick steel wire as a magnetizable carrier.
  • Nikola Tesla demonstrated the first wireless remote control of a model ship.
• 1899: The dog "Nipper" is used in "His Master's Voice", the trademark for gramophones and records.
• 1902
  • Otto von Bronk patented his "Method and apparatus for remote visualization of images and objects with temporary resolution of the images in parallel rows of dots". This patent, originally developed for phototelegraphy, impacted the development of color television, particularly the NTSC implementation.
  • For the first time audio records are printed with paper labels in the middle.
• 1903: Guglielmo Marconi provides evidence that wireless telegraphic communication is possible over long distances, such as across the Atlantic. He used a transmitter developed by Ferdinand Braun.
• 1904
  • For the first time, double-sided records, and those with a diameter of 30 cm are produced, increasing playing time up to 11 minutes (5.5 minutes per side). These are created by Odeon in Berlin and debuted at the Leipzig Spring Fair.
  • The German physicist Arthur Korn developed the first practical method for telegraphy.
• 1905: The Englishman Sir John Ambrose Fleming invents the first electron tube.
• 1906
  • Robert von Lieben patented his "inertia working cathode-ray-relays". By 1910 he developed this into the first real tube amplifier, by creating a triode. His invention of the triode is almost simultaneously created by the American Lee de Forest.
  • Max Dieckmann and Gustav Glage use the Braun tube for playback of 20-line black-and-white images.
  • The first jukebox with records comes on the market.
  • American Major General HHC Dunwoody files for a patent for a carborundum steel detector for use in a crystal radio, an improved version of the Cat's-whisker detector. It is sometimes credited as the first semiconductor in history. The envelope detector is an important part of every radio receiver.
• 1907: Rosenthal puts in his image telegraph for the first time a photocell.
• 1911: First film studios are created in Hollywood and Potsdam- Babelsberg .
• 1912: The first radio receiver is created, in accordance with the Audion principle.
• 1913: The legal battle over the invention of the electron tube between Robert von Lieben and Lee de Forest is decided. The electron tube is replaced by a high vacuum in the glass flask with significantly improved properties.
  • Alexander Meissner patented his process "feedback for generating oscillations", by his development of a radio station using an electron tube .
  • The Englishman Arthur Berry submits a patent on the manufacture of printed circuits by etched metal.
• 1915: Carl Benedicks leads basic studies in Sweden on the electrical properties of silicon and germanium. Due to the emerging tube technology, however, interest in semiconductors remains low until after the Second World War.
• 1917
  • Based on previous findings of the Englishman Oliver Lodge, the Frenchman Lucien Levy develops a radio receiver with frequency tuning using a resonant circuit.
• 1919: Charlie Chaplin founded the Hollywood film production and distribution company United Artists
• 1920: The first regularly operating radio station KDKA goes on air on 2 November 1920 in Philadelphia, USA. It is the first time electronics are used to transmit information and entertainment to the public at large. The same year in Germany an instrumental concert was broadcast on the radio from a long-wave transmitter in Wusterhausen.
• 1922: J. McWilliams Stone invents the first portable radio receiver. George Frost builds the first "car radio" in his Ford Model T.
• 1923
  • The 15 year old Manfred von Ardenne is granted his first patent for an electron tube having a plurality of electrodes. Siegmund Loewe (1885-1962) builds with the tube his first radio receiver "Loewe Opta-".
  • The Hungarian engineer Dénes Mihály patented an image scanning with line deflection, in which each point of an image is scanned ten times per second by a selenium cell.
  • August Karolus (1893-1972) invents the Kerr cell, an almost inertia-free conversion of electrical pulses into light signals. He was granted a patent for his method of transmitting slides.
  • Vladimir Kosma developed the first television camera tube, the Ikonoskop, using the Braun tube.
  • The German State Secretary Karl August Bredow founded the first German broadcasting organization. By lifting the ban on broadcast reception and the opening of the first private radio station, the development of radio as a mass medium begins.

1924-1959: From cathode ray tube to stereo audio and TV

• 1924: the first radio receivers are exhibited at the Berlin Radio Show
• 1925
  • Brunswick Records in Dubuque, Iowa produced their first record player, the Brunswick Panatrope with a pickup, amplifier and loudspeaker
  • In the American Bell Laboratories, a method for recording of records obtained by microphone and tube amps for series production. Also in Germany working on it is ongoing since 1922. 1925 appear the first electrically recorded disks in both countries.
  • At the Leipzig Spring Fair, the first miniature camera "Leica" is presented to the public.
  • John Logie Baird performs the first screening of a living head with a resolution of 30 vertical lines using a Nipkow disk.
  • August Karolus demonstrated in Germany television with 48 lines and ten image changes per second.
• 1926
  • Edison developed the first "LP". By dense grooves (16 grooves on 1 mm) and the reduction of speed to 80 min -1 (later 78 min -1 ) increases the playing time up to 2 times 20 minutes. He carries himself with the decline of his phonograph business.
  • The German State Railroad offers a cordless telephone service in moving trains between Berlin and Hamburg - the idea of mobile telephony is born.
  • John Logie Baird developed the first commercial television set in the world. It was not until 1930, he is called a " telescreen sold "at a price of 20 pounds.
• 1927
  • The first fully electronic music boxes ("Jukeboxes") used in the USA on the market.
  • German Grammophon on sale due to a license agreement with the Brunswick-Balke-Collender Company. Its first fully electronic turntables.
  • The first industrially manufactured car radio , the "Philco Transitone" from the "Storage Battery Co." in Philadelphia, USA, comes on the market.
  • The first shortwave radio - Rundfunkübertragung overseas broadcast by the station PCJJ the Philips factories in Eindhoven in the Dutch colonies.
  • Opening of the first regular telegraphy -Dienstes between Berlin and Vienna.
  • First commercial sound films ("The Jazz Singer", USA) using the "Needle sound" back in sync with the film screening for LPs over loudspeakers.
  • First public television broadcasts in the UK by John Logie Baird between London and Glasgow and in the USA by Frederic Eugene Ives (1882-1953) between Washington and New York.
  • The American inventor Philo Taylor Farnsworth (1906-1971) developed in Los Angeles, the first fully electronic television system in the world.
  • John Logie Baird developed the first videodisc player. 30-line television images are stored on shellac records. At 78 RPM mechanically scanned, the images can be played back on his "telescreen". It could not play sound nor keep up with the rapidly increasing resolution of television. Therefore, it takes more than 40 years before the first commercial optical disc players come onto the market.
• 1928: Fritz Pfleumer gets the first tape recorder patent. It replaces steel wire with paper coated in iron powder. According to Valdemar Poulsen (1898) to the second crucial pioneer of magnetic sound, image and data storage
  • Dénes Mihály presented in Berlin a small circle, the first authentic television broadcast in Germany, having worked at least since 1923 in this field.
  • August Karolus and the company Telefunken put on the "fifth Great German Radio Exhibition Berlin 1928" the prototype of a television receiver, with an image size of 8 cm × 10 cm and a resolution of about 10,000 pixels, a much better picture quality than previous devices.
  • Meanwhile, there are in New York (USA) already the first regular television broadcasts of the experiment station WGY, which the General Electric Company (GE) operates. Irregular television news and dramas radiate from these stations by 1928. Also in the USA the first commercially produced television receiver of the Daven Corporation in Newark is offered for $75.
  • John Logie Baird transmits the first television pictures internationally, and the same across the Atlantic from London to New York. He also demonstrated the world's first color television transmission in London.
• 1929
  • Edison withdraws from the phono business - the disk has ousted the cylinder.
  • The company Columbia Records developed the first portable record player that can be connected to any tube radio. It also created the first radio / phonograph combinations, the precursor to the 1960s music chests.

Daylygraph

• • The German physicist Curt Stille (1873-1957) records magnetic sound for film, on a perforated steel band. First, this "Magnettonverfahren" has no success. Years later it is rediscovered for amateur films, providing easy dubbing. A "Daylygraph" or Magnettongerät had amplifier and equalizer, and a mature Magnettondiktiergerät called "Textophon".
  • Based on patents, which he had purchased of silence, brings the Englishman E. Blattner the " Blattnerphone "the first magnetic sound recording on the market. It records on a thin steel band.
  • The first sound film using optical sound premiers. Since the early 1920s, various people have developed this method. The same optoelectronic method also allows for the first time the post-processing of recorded music to sound recordings of it.
  • The director Carl Froelich (1875-1953) turns "The Night Belongs to Us", the first German sound film.
  • 20th Century Fox presents in New York on an 8 m × 4 m big screen the first widescreen movie.
  • The radio station Witzleben begins in Germany with the regular broadcasting of television test broadcasts, initially on long wave with 30 lines (= 1,200 pixels) at 12.5 image changes per second. It appear first blueprints for television receiver.
  • John Logie Baird starts in the UK on behalf of the BBC with regular experimental television broadcasts to the public.
  • Frederic Eugene Ives transmits a color television from New York to Washington.
• 1930
  • Manfred von Ardenne invented and developed the flying-spot scanner, Europe's first fully electronic television camera tube.
  • In Britain, the first television advertising and the first TV interview
• 1931
  • The British engineer and inventor Alan Dower Blumlein (1903-1942) invents "Binaural Sound", today called "Stereo". He developed the stereo record and the first three-way speaker. He makes experimental films with stereo sound. Then he becomes leader of the development team for the EMI -405-line television system.
  • The company RCA Victor presents to the public the first real LP record, the 35 cm diameter and 33.33 RPM give sufficient playing time for an entire orchestral work. But the new turntables are initially so expensive that they are only gain broad acceptance after the Second World War - then as vinyl record.
  • The French physicist René Barthélemy leads in Paris the first public television with clay before. The BBC launches first Tonversuche in the UK.
  • Public World Premiere of electronic television - without electro-mechanical components such as the Nipkow disk - on the "eighth Great German Radio Exhibition Berlin 1931 ". Doberitz / Pomerania is the first German location for a tone-TV stations.
  • Manfred von Ardenne can be the principle of a color picture tube patent: Narrow strips of phosphors in the three primary colors are closely juxtaposed arranged so that they complement each other with the electron flow to white light. A separate control of the three colors has not yet provided.
• 1932
  • The company AEG and BASF start for the magnetic tape method of Fritz Pfleumer to care (1928). They develop new devices and tapes, in which celluloid is used instead of paper as a carrier material.
  • In Britain, the BBC sends first radio programs time-shifted instead of live.
  • The company telephone and radio apparatus factory Ideal AG (today Blaupunkt) provides a car radio using Bowden cables to control it from the steering column.
• 1933
  • After the Nazi seizure of power in Germany is broadcasting finally a political tool. Systematic censorship is to prevent opposition and spread the "Aryan culture". Series production of the " People's recipient VE 301 "starts.
  • Edwin Howard Armstrong demonstrates that frequency-modulated (FM) radio transmissions are less susceptible to interference than amplitude-modulated (AM). However, practical application is long delayed.
  • In the USA the first opened drive-in theater.
• 1934: First commercial stereo recordings find little favor - the necessary playback devices are still too expensive. The term "High Fidelity" is embossed around this time.
• 1935
  • AEG and BASF place at the Berlin Radio Show, the tape recorder " Magnetophon K1 "and the appropriate magnetic tapes before. In case of fire in the exhibition hall all four exhibited devices are destroyed.
  • In Germany the world's first regular television program operating for about 250 mostly public reception points starts in Berlin and the surrounding area. The mass production of television receivers is - probably due to the high price of 2,500 Reichsmarks - not yet started.
  • At the same time, the research institute of the German Post (RPF) begins with development work for a color television methods , but which are later reinstated due to the Second World War.
• 1936
  • Olympic Games in Berlin broadcast live.
  • "Olympia suitcase", battery-powered portable radio receiver, introduced.
  • The first mobile television camera (180 lines, all-electronic) is used for live television broadcasts of the Olympic Games.
  • Also in the UK are first regular television broadcasts - now for the perfect electronic EMI system, which soon replaced the mechanical part Baird system - broadcast.
  • Video telephony connections between booths in Berlin and Leipzig. Later connections from Berlin to Nuremberg and Munich added.
  • The Frenchman Raymond Valtat reports on a patent, which describes the principle of working with binary numbers abacus.
  • Konrad Zuse works on a dual electromechanical computing machine that is ready in 1937.
• 1937
  • First sapphire needle for records of the company Siemens
  • The interlace method is introduced on TV in order to reduce image flicker. The transmitter Witzleben now radiates television to the new standard with 441 lines and 25 image changes, i.e. 50 fields of each 220 half-line from. Until the HDTV era into the interlace or interlace method remains in use.
  • First movie encoder make it possible not to send the TV live, but to rely on recordings.
• 1938
  • The improved AEG tape-recorder " Magnetophon K4 "is first used in radio studios. The belt speed is 77 cm / s, which at 1000 m length of tape a playing time of 22 minutes results.
  • Werner Flechsig invents with the shadow mask method for separate control of the three primary colors in a color picture tube.
• 1939
  • On the "16th Great German Radio and television broadcasting exhibition Berlin 1939 ", the" German Unity television receiver E1 "and announces the release of free commercial television. Due to the difficult political and economic situation, only about 50 devices are sold instead of the planned 10,000.
  • In the USA the first regular television broadcasts take place.
• 1940
  • The development of television technology for military purposes increases the resolution to 1029 lines at 25 frames per second. Commercial HDTV television reached that resolution almost half a century later.
  • The problem of band noise with tape devices is reduced dramatically by the invention of radio frequency bias of Walter Weber and Hans-Joachim von Braunmühl.
• 1942 : The first all-electronic computer is used by John Vincent Atanasoff completed, but quickly fades into oblivion. Four years later the ENIAC completed - the beginning of the end of Electromechanics in computers and calculators.
• 1945-1947 : American soldiers capture in Germany some tape recorders. This and the nullity German patents leads to the development of the first tape recorders in the United States. The first home device " Sound Mirror "by the Brush Development Co. is there on the market.
• 1948
  • The American physicist and Industrial Edwin Herbert Land (1909-1991) launches the first instant camera, Polaroid camera Model 95 on the market.
  • Three American engineers at Bell Laboratories (John Bardeen , Walter Brattain and William Shockley example ) invent the transistor. Its lesser size and power compared with electron tubes brings (from 1955) portable radio receivers starting its march through all areas of electronics.
  • The Hungarian-American physicist Peter Carl Goldmark (1906-1977) invents the vinyl record (first published 1952), much less noisy than their predecessors shellac. Thanks to micro-groove (100 grooves per cm) can play 23 minutes per side. The LP is born. This one is the redemption of the claim "high fidelity one step closer" to the end of the shellac era.
  • The Radio Corporation of America (RCA) leads the music format with 45 RPM records, later to conquer the market for cheap players. The first publication in Germany in this format appears 1953rd
  • The British physicist Dennis Gabor (1900-1979) invents holography. This method of recording and reproducing image with coherent light allows three-dimensional images. It was not until 1971 when the procedure gained practical importance, he received the Nobel Prize for Physics.
• 1949
  • In Germany, the first ultra-short (take FM -) channels on their regular program operation.
  • Experimentally since 1943, series production since 1949 there are for professional use stereo - Tonbandgeräte and matching ribbons. Also portable devices for reporters, initially propelled by a spring mechanism, has been around since 1949
• 1950
  • In the USA the first finished recorded are audio tapes marketed.
  • Also in the USA brings the company Zenith the first TV with cable remote control for channel selection on the market.
• 1951
  • The CBS (Columbia Broadcasting System) broadcasts in New York the first color television program in the world, but using the field sequential standard, not reaching to the resolution of the black and white television and was to be incompatible.
  • With the " tape recorder F15 "from AEG 's first home tape recorder appears on the German market.
  • RCA Electronic Music is the first synthesizer prior to the creation of artificial electronic sounds.
• 1952
  • Reintroduction of regular television broadcasts in Germany after the Second World War.
  • 20th Century Fox developed with "Cinemascope" the most successful wide-screen process to better compete with television. Only some 50 years later pulls the TV with the 16: 9 size screen after.
• 1953
  • The "National Television System Committee" (Abbreviated as NTSC) normalized in the USA named after her black-and-white-compatible NTSC -Farbfernseh process. A year later, this method is introduced in the United States.
  • The car radio top model "Mexico" from Becker for the first time to an FM area (in mono) and an automatic tuning.
• 1954
  • RCA developed for the first apparatus for recording video signals on magnetic tapes. 22 km magnetic tape are needed per hour. By 1956, succeeds the company Ampex through the use of multiple tracks, the tape speed to more practicable 38.1 cm / s lower.
  • The European Broadcasting Union is founded "Euro Vision".
  • First regular television broadcasts in Japan.
• 1955
  • The second generation "TRADIC" (Transistorized Digital Computer), first to use only transistors therefore much smaller and more powerful than its predecessor tube computers.
  • The Briton Narinder S. Kapany investigated the propagation of light in fine glass fibers (optical fibers).
  • The first wireless remote control for a television US-based Zenith consists of a better flashlight, with which one lights up in one of the four devices corners to turn the unit on or off, change the channel or mute the sound.
• 1956
  • The company Metz introduces radio device type 409 / 3D. First mass production of printed circuit boards. This follows since the 1930s, several improvements to the manufacturing technology.
  • The company Ampex introduces the "VR 1000" the first video recorder. That same year, CBS uses it for the first magnetic video tape recording (VTR) from. Although other programs are produced in color since 1954, the VTR cannot record color.
• 1957 : The Frenchman Henri de France (1911-1986) developed the first generation of color TV system SECAM ( Système électronique couleur avec mémoire ), which avoids some of the problems of the NTSC method. The weaknesses of the SECAM system be fixed in later modifications of the standard for the most part.
• 1958
  • By merging the Edison patents and the Berliner, Blumlein recording method is stereo - Schallplatten commercially viable. The company Mercury Records launches the first stereo record on the market.
  • The company Ampex expands the video recorder with the Model "VR 1000 B" to the color capability.

See also

• Electronics
• History of electronic engineering
• Timeline of historic inventions