Buy used: $23.77

Get Fast, Free Shipping with Amazon Prime

FREE delivery November 17 - 22 on orders shipped by Amazon over $35

Or fastest delivery November 17 - 21

Select delivery location

Used: Very Good | Details

Sold by Reading The Way

Fulfilled by Amazon

Access codes and supplements are not guaranteed with used items.

Have one to sell?

Sell on Amazon

Follow the author

Paul Freiberger

Fire in the Valley: The Making of The Personal Computer (Second Edition) 2nd Edition

by Paul Freiberger (Author), Michael Swaine (Author)

4.4 49 ratings

See all formats and editions

Price

New from

Used from

Paperback

"Please retry"

$23.77

$37.22

$4.79

Mass Market Paperback

"Please retry"

—

$121.04

$37.34

There is a newer edition of this item:

Fire in the Valley: The Birth and Death of the Personal Computer
$23.75
(130)
Only 1 left in stock - order soon.

“A book not to be missed, just plain good reading about the drama of the Kids next door turning their dreams into millions.” —The New York Times “Swaine and Freiberger capture the communal spirit of the early computer clubs, the brilliance and blundering of some of the first start-up companies, the assortment of naiveté, noble purpose and greed that characterized various pioneers, and the inevitable transformation of all this into a major industry. Must reading.” —Philip Lemmons, editor-in-chief, BYTE Magazine

ISBN-10

0071358927
ISBN-13

978-0071358927
Edition

2nd
Publisher

McGraw-Hill
Publication date

November 29, 2000
Language

English
Dimensions

7.5 x 1.75 x 9.75 inches
Print length

463 pages
See all details

Michael Swaine
130
Paperback
40 offers from $6.20
Robert X. Cringely
123
Paperback
61 offers from $1.30
Paul Freiberger
27
Paperback
18 offers from $4.88
Tony Fadell
2,286
Hardcover
78 offers from $7.53
Laine Nooney
31
Hardcover
52 offers from $16.71
Steven Levy
713
Paperback
46 offers from $4.54

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

In the early 1970s, while Silicon Valley was designing the latest generation of digital wristwatches and pocket calculators, a ragtag group of college dropouts, hippies, and electronics hobbyists were busy creating the future in their garages. What they built was the personal computer, but what they were aiming for was something much more ambitious: a revolution. Fire in the Valley is the story of their efforts, and in particular, the contributions of an informal think tank called the Homebrew Computer Club. Its technically gifted community, comprising sci-fi aficionados and Berkeley counterculturists, believed computers could usher in an age of human empowerment, perhaps even a utopia.

The club's most famous member is Steve Jobs of Apple, whose story is told here, as is Bill Gates's, who was strongly influenced by Homebrew. What sets Fire in the Valley apart from the many other books about early days at Apple and Microsoft, though, is its focus on the brilliant engineers and coders who built the foundation that would eventually support those two companies. They included ex-Berkley Barb editor and hardware designer Lee Felsenstein, who was adamant about using computers for populist ends; Adam Osborne, who took PCs to the next level by making them portable; hacker legend John "Captain Crunch" Draper, who used telephony for his own mischievous purposes; and activist Ted Nelson, the Thom Paine of the computer revolution.

The cast of characters is sometimes tough to keep track of, and authors Paul Freiberger and Michael Swaine have wisely included a graphic timeline in the first pages of the book that readers will find useful. It stretches from 1800 to 1999, encompassing events that have occurred since Fire in the Valley's original 1984 publication. This second edition includes new chapters and photographs to document the last 15 years, but they serve as more of an epilogue than a new act in this drama. The Homebrew Club's mark on personal computing history is cemented, and Fire in the Valley is an engaging account of it, one that should inspire readers everywhere. --Demian McLean

Review

A book not to be missed, just plain good reading about the drama of the Kids next door turning their dreams into millions. -- The New York Times

Swain and Freiberger capture the communal spirit, the brilliance and blundering, the assortment of naivete, noble purpose and greed, and the inevitable transformation of all this into a major industry. Must Reading -- Byte

From the Publisher

Fire in the Valley, Updated Edition, tells the colorful and sometimes hilarious stories of the personal computer pioneers. Bill Gates, Paul Allen, Steve Jobs, Larry Ellison, Steve Wozniak, Ed Roberts, Ted Nelson are all there and more. The book also captures the medley of influences of the times-the wild risk-taking, the 60s consciousness, rebellion against bureaucracy, the kitchen-table engineering that were essential to the making of the personal computer.

Fire in the Valley, Updated Edition, explores these topics with the insights from today's vantage point. It put the events that shaped two short decades into an historical context. The book explains the technological advances that made the PC possible and reveals how software came to play a more central and profitable role. It explores the politics of inventors and innovation and shows how the race to create the PC lit a fire of excitement in Silicon Valley--a fire that ultimately changed our society forever.

From the Back Cover

"A great adventure that gives the reader a sense of being close to a historical movement that is still playing itself out."--From the foreword by John Markoff, The New York Times. In January 1975, Popular Electronics magazine published a cover story on the Altair, an odd metal box with switches and blinking lights that proved to be the progenitor of today's personal computer. Inspired by possibilities that the leaders of the electronics and mainframe computer industries couldn't see, unlikely entrepreneurs--hippies, dropouts, phone phreaks, and electronics hobbyists--seized the opportunity. How those personal computer pioneers went from side street garages to Wall Street's graces, and how their brilliance, enthusiasm, camaraderie, and competition changed the world is all here in Paul Freiberger and Michael Swaine's classic, Fire in the Valley: The Making of the Personal Computer. First released in 1984, it uniquely captures the explosive, frenetic energy of those early days. This updated edition features interviews with the major players, new chapters, dozens of new photos, and updates throughout that carry the story forward into the Internet era. The authors convey the exciting development of companies such as Apple, Microsoft, Sun, Netscape, Lotus, and Oracle. Itself a milestone in the fascinating history of the personal computer, Fire in the Valley is the definitive account of how it all happened and why.

About the Author

Paul Freidberger is the co-author of Fuzzy Logic: The Revolutionary Computer Technology That Is Changing Our World (S&S, 93), which won the Los Angeles Times Book of the Year award. He has been a newspaper reporter and columnist for the San Jose Mercury News, the San Francisco Examiner, and other publications. He has written articles for numerous publications and produced reports for National Public Radio. He has appeared on radio and television as a commentator on technology issues. He currently works as a member of the research staff at Interval Research Corp. in Palo Alto, California. Michael Swaine is editor-at-large for Dr. Dobb's Journal, a programmer's magazine, and a columnist for several magazines and electronic and broadcast venues. He holds degrees in computer science and psychology and has worked as a computer programmer, magazine editor, and publisher. He has written books on technology and has launched several computer magazines and a book line. In the past eighteen years, he has written over nine hundred articles on computers and technology. He is the creator of the Mr. Usasi puzzle detective.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ McGraw-Hill; 2nd edition (November 29, 2000)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 463 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0071358927
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0071358927
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 2.3 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 7.5 x 1.75 x 9.75 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #1,286,752 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #2,050 in Internet & Telecommunications
- #5,555 in Internet & Social Media
- #12,555 in Mathematics (Books)

Customer Reviews:
4.4 49 ratings

Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.

Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Videos

Help others learn more about this product by uploading a video!

Upload your video

Important information

To report an issue with this product, click here.

About the author

Follow authors to get new release updates, plus improved recommendations.

Paul Freiberger

Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.

Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Paul Freiberger, author of "When Can You Start?" is an award-winning writer. His work has been widely praised for its effectiveness and compassion. As President of Shimmering Resumes, Paul helps individuals throughout the world improve their careers with job interview preparation, resumes and job search.

Paul won The Los Angeles Times Book Award as co-author of “Fuzzy Logic” (Simon & Schuster, 1994) and he co-authored the best-selling "Fire in the Valley: The Making of the Personal Computer" (McGraw-Hill, 1984, rev. 2000), translated into many languages and later made into the Hollywood movie Pirates of Silicon Valley. He has produced reports for National Public Radio programs, including All Things Considered and Morning Edition. He is a former columnist for the San Jose Mercury News and a reporter for the San Francisco Examiner. He directed communications for McKinsey & Company, the world’s most respected global management consulting firm.

Paul has gone through several job transformations himself. He has worked as a teacher, a night porter, a newspaper reporter, a technology project manager, a chef, a communications executive, and an entrepreneur. He knows the job search process and how to make it work. He earned a B.A. in history at the State University of New York at Binghamton and a Masters in Italian from Middlebury College.

He is working on a book on job search strategies for new graduates.

Customer reviews

4.4 out of 5

49 global ratings

2 star

0%

1 star

6%

How customer reviews and ratings work

Sort reviews by

Top reviews from the United States

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

Amazonman

Good Account of Computer History, But...

Reviewed in the United States on July 14, 2010

Verified Purchase

Let me first give credit to the authors. There is a massive amount of historical information in this book. I am sure it was a combined effort of many people. They must have had to interview hundreds of people, alongside extracting information from a significant number of reference material.

Because it contains so much historical information regarding the history of computers, it is a valuable book... more like a reference book.

However, after being about half way through the book, I began to get tired of the pedantries. Specifically, how much detailed information is contained in every chapter to the point of it being too detailed. They would have been better off just writing an encyclopedia on computer history I am convinced. Imagine trying to read an encyclopedia from cover to cover: it doesn't quite make sense. Well, that's sort of like the experience of reading Fire in the Valley.

And what seems clear from this is that a set of people just put together their sets of notes and translated them into paragraphs. It wasn't written from a macro-scopic perspective: it's simply a translation of a group of people's rough notes into paragraphs. There's just too many "facts" for this not to be the case. Then those translated notes that became paragraphs were packaged into chapters. Then, finally, edited to smooth things out. Finally, two people took credit for the book, but it must have been the combined effort of many people. But we can't just charge these authors as being lacking in writing quality: so many books are actually just translations of a set of notes. The reading experience is thus boring and tedious because it's just one name, one date, one product code/name after another, ad nauseum.

They also seem to repeat the same sorts of things over and over, like the running theme about the Altair, and how it was the first computer for hobbyists. They must have repeated that well over a dozen times. Again, this indicates a large group of people working on the written material where there exists overlap.

I also noticed how some things were left out that were actually important... in some of these areas, I could see how the text was just rushed: just translated from a set of notes without much further thought or investigation.

Lastly, the perspective from which this book was written is itself a bit flawed and biased. I acknowledge that this is a book about Silicon Valley, so it is going to be American-centric. But the authors really make no effort to look outside of this little part of the world in terms of accounting for the rise of the personal computer. It's very 1 dimensional. And the authors, in many areas, just project their own experiences with computers early on onto the entire populace and industry at the time. In short, they make hasty generalizations, seemingly speaking for the actors themselves. This also gets tiring.

So, a valuable book by virtue of all the details it contains about the history of computers, but poor writing quality and an overload of details, alongside repetition: this gets 3 stars. Again, it would have been better for the authors to approach this from the perspective of creating an encyclopedia.

One person found this helpful

Helpful

Amazon Customer

This is a must-read book for any computer enthusiast, but it's not without it's problems

Reviewed in the United States on April 28, 2016

Verified Purchase

Fire in the Valley is definitely a must-read book. It has extraordinary depth and provides historical details about computers in general and microcomputers, or personal computers, specifically. It reaches back in history but mainly deals with the 1960s through the 1980s, sometimes going further back or forward, but often stuck in a Groundhog Day-like loop between the mid-1970s and the early 1980s.

The book does a good job of telling us about the start of the personal computer, about individuals who were fascinated with computers and wanted one when none were available, so they made their own. They shared information in user groups, newsletters, magazines, and computer shows. They built the first computers, and started third party accessory businesses as well as computer stores.

It mostly deals with CP/M, MS-DOS, and Apple computers, and only mentions Commodore and Atari in passing. And while I personally appreciate the information it provides on the people behind innovations like CP/M, the computer BIOS, BASIC, the Apple I and II, the early Macintosh, and the NEXT computer, computers by a company like Commodore are too important to leave out.

By ignoring companies like Commodore or Atari, Fire in the Valley marginalizes the hobbyists, programmers, and gamers who cut their teeth on these amazing machines. The venerable 6502 and the Motorola 68000, Microsoft's ubiquitous BASIC, the innovative AmigaDOS operating system, even Digital Research's GEM operating system, were all home to one or more computers by these companies.

So while Fire in the Valley does a great job of providing historical context for many of the inventions that preceded today's personal computer, it's only part of the story. Not only does it stop telling its story around 1990 or so, but it leaves out many of the giants of the industry. It paints a picture of Bill Gates as hacker and villain, Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak as knights who pretty much invented the modern computer as we know it, and leaves out many of the amazing people who are responsible for innovations that helped make computers what they are today.

Please read this book, but be sure to supplement it with other books about some of the other amazing people and companies who helped us create the personal computer.

4 people found this helpful

Helpful

Top reviews from other countries

Translate all reviews to English

R de Bulat

Get this book!

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on August 7, 2012

Verified Purchase

This is, as most reviewers agree, a fantastic read; informative and entertaining, holding your interest throughout. As a piece of modern history it is effective and never dull. I was interested in buying it after seeing the film "Pirates of Silcon Valley," another worthwhile purcharse, although only region 1 at the present time. The cost of the book, second hand, seems expensive, but it is a sizeable volume, close to those manuals that cost £50.00, back in the day. Nevertheless, I waited and managed to get it second hand for less than 15 quid and I believe it is worth that or a bit more. The story of how computers changed our world is facinating, as are the accounts of the people who made it happen, those who are well known as well as those who aren't. I'm too long in the tooth to have been a geek, but have used computers since 1984, when they were less than ubiquitous and beginning to be interesting, without being all encompassing and all too pervasive; a walk down memory lane, you might say. This is the story of an exciting and innovative time, when anything seemed possible and was: get it, you won't regret it.

Torben Guse

Pflichtlektüre zur Computerhistorie

Reviewed in Germany on December 16, 2015

Verified Purchase

Ein sehr gutes Buch über die Enstehungdgeschichte des Personal Computers. Hier werden die Hintergründe von den ersten Ideen überhaupt eine Rechenmaschine zu verwirklichen, über Großrechner und Minicomputer (nur noch Schrankgröße) bis zur Workstation und dem Personal Computer beschrieben. Dabei wird sowohl auf die Erfinder und Entwickler als auch auf die Firmengründer eingegangen. Die jeweiligen Kämpfe um das Setzen von Standards bei Bussystemen und Betriebssystemen wird ebenfalls veranschaulicht. Die Sicht der Dinge ist allerdings Naturgegeben sehr auf den amerikanischen Markt fokussiert, aber das wird bei dem Titel des Buchs auch niemanden verwundern.

2 people found this helpful

Translate review to English

See more reviews

Image Unavailable

Follow the author

Fire in the Valley: The Making of The Personal Computer (Second Edition) 2nd Edition

There is a newer edition of this item:

Customers who viewed this item also viewed

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Review

From the Publisher

From the Back Cover

About the Author

Product details

Videos

Important information

About the author

Paul Freiberger

Customer reviews

Top reviews from the United States

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

Top reviews from other countries