No, I think tubes would have continued to have been used instead.Do you think it is feasable to avoid the invention of the transistor and have a transistorless world using valves for electronics for the rest of the 20th century. And if so what do you think it would look like?
The main question I was asking was how feasable would a timeline with no or delayed transitor invention be. And what kind of consequences would lack of digital technology have on culture and lack of smart weapons have on war and geopolitics?
Magniac asked:
Is the invention (or not) of the transistor the important thing, or is it the miniaturisation of the original transistor boards (ala Apollo), or is it the invention of the silicon chip that matters? This is all very confusing to a non-techhead like myself.
Yes, of course - all of the above. Transistors let you build smaller and especially more reliably. Silicon chips let us industrialize computer and logic production, literally stamping them out in foundries, using maps of lots and lots of circuits.
Aren't there microtubes though? Still not really a great replacement for a trasistor but I think there some that are only 2-3 larger than you average transistor, doesn't tsmething like that leave soom room for advancement in electronics?
You mean there were miniature Tubes/Valves, called Nuvistors, however the last of said stock was bought up & used by the British high end audio company Musical Fidelity for a extremely high end amplifier (the Nu-Vista 300 Power/Pre-amp combo, of which 500 were made) a couple of years ago...I know there was a desktop calculator made with cold cathode vacuum tubes, the Anita VII or VIII of the UK. There are minature tubes the size of a pencil top called Nuvistors, usually used for UHF work and they were metal cased. I know during World War II, metal cased tubes were used because they were more durable.