Second Generation of Computers

TRANSISTORS

The transistor was far superior to the vacuum tube, allowing computers to become smaller, faster, cheaper, more energy-efficient and more reliable than their first-generation predecessors.

Second-generation computers still relied on punched cards for input and printouts for output.

Second-generation computers moved from cryptic binary machine language to symbolic, or assembly, languages, which allowed programmers to specify instructions in words.

These were also the first computers that stored their instructions in their memory, which moved from a magnetic drum to magnetic core technology.