[cctalk] Experience using an Altair 8800 ("Personal computer" from 70s)

I case anyone is interested... I've just passed on my "Mits Altair 8800" - this is a very historic system from the 70s - it is: First Personal Computer (long before IBM PC) First S100 buss system First system Bill Gates wrote code for (long before Microsoft) I did write a pretty decent emulator for my exact Altair system some years ago... And with recent interest in the system, I've just updated it with a few minor improvements and a "cleaned up" edition of the software I created to bootstrap a hardware front-panel based system (no on-board ROM) via a serial port card - requiring you to enter only 18 bytes through the front panel So .. if you'd like to experience what it was like to use a system from the 70s - here's some of the things you can do: Bootstrap it cold Run NorthStar DOS (one of the first commercial DOSes) Run DMF (Device Management Facility) - a DOS I created for it - can you tell that at the time I was working on an IBM mainframe ... my - OS name sounds a lot like various IBM mainframe packages at the time. A few other software setups (for example there's a stand-alone bootable FORTH) Has Editors, Assemblers, BASIC and other tools from the era. and a few games - some written by yours truly - some very early commercial offerings (like "Cranston Manor Adventure", or "Valdez") Note1: My Altair emulator was created under DOS and is a 16 bit program! It does work very well with DosBox (I recommend the one on my site) Note2: I've not updated the ALTAIR.ZIP on "Daves Old Computers" yet - you can get the updated one from: "Daves Old Computers" -> Personal -> Downloads -> OlderDownloadsFromPrevious - look for "ALTAIR" under: Simulators and Emulators *** I don't follow this list nearly as much these days - if you want to reach me, use the contact link on my site! -- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Search "Dave's Old Computers" see "my personal" at bottom!