The 8086 microprocessor is Intel's first 16-bit microprocessor released in 1978. It has approximately 29,000 transistors, operates at 5V, and can address up to 1 megabyte of memory space using 20 address lines. The 8086 uses separate 16-bit addresses for I/O devices, allowing it to access 64k I/O addresses. It can operate in minimum or maximum mode depending on the state of the MN/MX pin. In maximum mode, additional pins are used for bus requests and status signals to support multi-processor systems. The 8086 architecture separates execution and bus interface functions, using segment registers and an instruction pointer to generate physical addresses across 1MB of memory divided into segments.