How did technology change the way music was recorded and packaged in the years leading up to 1954.?

Columbia issued the first microgroove albums (33 1/3 vinyl) records in 1948.  RCA didn't like them (having introduce a similar system some years earlier) and put out 45s with big holes in them (anything to be incompatible with Columbia's system).  Eventually, the two sides worked it out and albums came out at 33 1/3 and singles became the 45s.  This was pretty much the standard that would follow, but 78s continued to be produced in some places.  In India, they lasted long enough that "A Hard Day's Night" by the Beatles was issued on 78 in 1964 there.

Well it was recorded in mono and the the records were on thick vinyl.