Asked by
nisha
in
Computers & Technology
at
7:33 PM on October 31, 2007
Jyotishmaan's Answer
A vacuum tube is just that: a glass tube surrounding a vacuum (an area from which all gases have been removed). What makes it interesting is that when electrical contacts are put on the ends, you can get a current to flow though that vacuum. Thomas Edison noticed this first in 1883. While fiddling with lightbulbs he saw that he could get current to jump from the hot filament to a metal plate at the bottom. The first computers used vacuum tubes for circuitry. They were very expensive to operate and in addition to using a great deal of electricity, generated a lot of heat, which was often the cause of malfunctions
Answered at
9:13 PM on October 31, 2007
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