11 Apr
2003
11 Apr
'03
12:46 p.m.
On Fri, 11 Apr 2003, Tony Duell wrote:
I was being somewhat facetious. I'll be the first to say that the 9830 is
a computer. In fact there is no question in my mind and no need to even
have to argue for this.
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On Fri, 11 Apr
2003, Tony Duell wrote:
Sure, as does a graphical display, and many other features that came out
later. Point is, the HP9830 _was_ earlier than the IBM5100, and
presumably HP couldn't justify providing a CRT display on it (they
certainly could have designed one -- they had CRT displays on larger
computers at the time).
If you want to consider _early personal computers_ then IMHO you have to
consider the HP9830... The other point is that the 9830 is fairly
similar (to the user) to the
IBM5100. It's about the same size (albeit with only a 1-line display), it
runs a high-level language from internal ROM, it has built-in mass
storage, etc. And yet the 5100 is a bit later than the 9830. Why the
former gets all the glory is beyond me...
A multi-line display on a CRT helps a lot ;)