Crystal Fire: The Birth of the Information Age

This book is very interesting for anyone inclined to science. You dont have to by a physicist or mathemetician to appreciate it, yet it covered the actual science behind it as well.

Not only is it a good history book, but a good primer in understanding semi conductor mechanisms as because its historical, it also explains the discoveries in depth layer by layer.

After this book you will know the history, but also have a much better understanding of semi conductor physics.

This is a fascinating though technical story. Unfortunately, it is read by monotoned, plodding individual. I suggest listening to a sample of this guy because he makes a great story extremely tedious. It is probably better to read this material rather than to suffer the narator which is too bad. It really will interest a 45-55 computer or electrical engineer.

This book pulled out of the dustbin a critical piece of technological history that ultimately changed all of our lives in the IIH of the 20th century. The transistor. Not a physicist or scientist myself, I did find some passages to be heavy-going, realizing that I was not comprehending 100% of the technical information being imparted. But that seemed a small price to pay to find out the story itself, the personalities, the business aspects, and at least some % of the technical aspects. The reader is not the best ... a bit too much monotone for my taste. But OK.

Yes it has to be played in double speed but the time spent listening to this book was rewarding and enlightening.

For those studying electronics this is a must listen

i learn english with my audiobooks here and this is the worst quality audible narrator, and seems to be a great book but not audio

This was a great story; however, I played this audiobook on my Ipod at 2x the normal speed. The narrator spoke very slowly, so I'm not sure I could have listened to the entire book without the fast playback speed.

This will be a valuable listen if you are interested in the subject and can play the audio at a fast pace.

Well researched and comprehensive history of the invention and development of the modern transistor which led to the creation of the semiconductor industry and the computer age. Focus is on the unique environment at Bell Labs immediately before, during, and after WWII, which supported and fostered both pure and applied research. The book paints a balanced, but largely unflattering, picture of William Shockley - one of the three Bell Labs scientists who won the Noble Prize in physics for the invention of the transistor. John Bardeen, who shared the prize, and later won another for his work on superconductivity at the University of Illinois, comes off much better. This book may contain far too much technical detail for the average reader, but it does a very good job of explaining how this technology evolved, spurred the formation of many companies that are now household names, and eventually migrated from Bell Labs in New Jersey, to Silicon Valley in California.

I found this book to be very informative although I have worked in electronics design and repair for over 40 years. I believe anyone with basic electronic knowledge will enjoy reading this. Those with no knowledge may find the going a bit slow, but should learn a lot about a subject that now touches every life every day. This was a VERY good read.

Good book but here's the deal: reader Dennis McKee sounds exactly like Sam Elliot -- you know the actor with the mustache who was born to play western-cowboy rolls. I could not unlink this audio from Sam Elliot's image in my head. This is a book about the invention of the transistor, but it sounds like ol' Cookie on the cattle drive sitting around the campfire spinning yarns. Mr. McKee would be fine for some things -- maybe a Louis L'Amour book -- but he's not the right guy for a high tech book. This is EXACTLY my kind of book, but it took me 2 years to get though the audio in fits and starts.

Print not audio.

Sounded like Sam Elliot.

Nah, too boring for TV.