As it got better at concocting multilayered devices from plastic resins, it moved on to computer circuit boards.

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Using wires, pieces of metal sheeting and circuit boards, artist Peter McFarlane transforms old circuit boards into amazing computer-age fossils that somehow look prehistoric.

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And Benjamin Yates makes his unique coffee tables from recycled circuit boards, old VCRs and computer components.

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The whole personal computer era can be seen as one giant triumph of dis-integration, as IBM's circuit-boards-to-boxes-to-software mainframe business gave way to the layered computer industry we see today: Intel making the electronics, Dell the boxes and Microsoft the software.

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