10 Dec
1998
10 Dec
'98
12:56 a.m.
> > Sure. But there were other build-it-yourself
machines that have not
> > attracted the prices of the Altair. Things like the 'Hewart Mini 6800'.
> > or the 'PE CHAMP'. Or the various Elektor computers. Or the Science of
> > Cambridge MK14 (although that one is somewhat expensive now). Or the
> > Nascom. All came as kits. Most of them are a few 10s of dollars
> Well, it may just be a case of marketing in a
popular journal, but
> NONE of the above appeared on my radar screen as a curious teenager
> in nowhere West Virginia, USA at that time.
A lot of them are UK/European designs -- the MK14 was
essentially a
Sinclair product, the Nascom was a UK machine (that begat the Gemini
Galaxy, which you won't have heard of), PE = Practical Electronics, a UK
magazine, and the Champ was a 4040-based machine + EPROM programmer that
they published and Elektor is a Dutch magazine thats sold across Europe.
Now, I don't want to start another silly Europe
.vs. USA flamewar. And I
am not suprised that a lot of those machines didn't make it to the
States. But I am truely suprised that the Altair should be 2 orders of
magnitude (at least) more valuable than any of the above.
Value is still depending - Its the same with the PET hype
in the US - The people like to have what they dreamed of
(or what they once had) and Pascal Microengines or Nascoms
(I'm still looking for a Nascom I system ...) have just
been special to the time - Like cars - take a Glas 2500 -
a german car from the 60s - comaparable to any italian
sports car but unknown to most common peoples - if you
know the later BMW csi models, you might imagine a Glas,
since BMW bought Glas and took their modern technology
to rebuild the company (at this time BMW had only pre
war designs ...). Glas went bankrupt becuse they couldn't
get new money into the company but instead the banks closed
the credit line (One truly unconnected fact was that the
major lending bank was also the 'house bank' of BMW and
controlled by the owner family of BMW). The 50s and 60s
have been a quite turbulent time in car busines over here :)
Gruss
Hans
--
Ich denke, also bin ich, also gut
HRK