The Intel Museum, housed in the company's Robert Noyce Building at Intel's Santa Clara headquarters, is a free and surprisingly engaging 10,000-square-foot exhibition on the history and science of the semiconductor. It traces the arc from the invention of the transistor in 1947 through the founding of Intel by Robert Noyce and Gordon Moore in 1968 to the present — the museum is where you actually understand what Moore's Law means and why it matters.
Interactive exhibits explain how silicon chips are made, what goes on in a cleanroom, and how the logic of a processor works. It is aimed at a general audience and handles the technical material well without being dumbed down. Free admission makes it worth visiting even if you have only mild interest; for anyone curious about how the modern world's infrastructure was built, it is genuinely fascinating. Located at 2200 Mission College Boulevard, a short drive from central Santa Clara.