One of the strangers was in the kitchen, making toast, accompanied by Radio Leeds from a cheap transistor on the window-sill.

In short, insofar as Intel's capacity to produce cheap transistors is exploding faster than the existing computer industry's ability to absorb those transistors, Intel is fast becoming a victim of its own success in driving Moore's Law.

Taking his core team to new offices nearby the original CDC headquarters, they started to experiment with higher quality versions of the "cheap" transistors Cray had used in the 1604.

Furthermore, the availability of cheap transistors makes obtaining maximum power gain through each transistor rather unimportant in any case.

In the 1980s the development of relatively cheap transistor and integrated circuit technology allowed the development of digital video effects hardware at a price within reach of individual VJs and nightclub owners.

So a cheap transistor would not be suitable.

Having gone out into the boiling streets for a quick meal at a nearby Irani cafe, I have returned to sit in my nocturnal pool of Anglepoised light with only a cheap transistor for company.

As everywhere in Yugoslavia, pornographic magazines were ubiquitous, along with loud Western rock-and-roll music blaring from cheap transistors.