11 May
1997
11 May
'97
9:36 p.m.
Well, I was too busy with other stuff and unfortunately couldn't attend a
real good swap meet this weekend, but I did re-discover a cache of
magazines in my parents' barn. I found out I had an entire run of
Creative Computing, I have almost the complete run of A+ (including the
first issue...this is an Apple ][ mag), a (I think) complete run of
Incider (another Apple ][ rag), a few issues of byte from 1981 (the
SmallTalk issue) and 1984, a couple issues of Family Computing from 1984,
an issue of SoftTalk, and some other miscellany. This stuff is as good
as gold! Creative Computing is a total blast going through all the ads.
The main thing that struck me is the diversity of computer systems that
were available in the early 80s. Contrast that with what you got today
(Wintel crap/Macincrap). That diveristy is what we are discovering
today. I think in 10 years there probably will be no memorable classic
computers worth collecting from the 90s. MAYBE the Mac portable, and I
can't think of anything else right off hand. There is just going to be
this hideous montage of various IBM PC clones by different manufacturers
or just run-of-the-mill computer shop PCs. Bleah! Long live the
thriving micro-computer revolution of the 70s and 80s!
Sam
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Computer Historian, Programmer, Musician, Philosopher, Athlete, Writer, Jackass
11 May
11 May
10:40 p.m.
On Sun, 11 May 1997, Sam Ismail wrote:
The main thing that struck me is the diversity of
computer systems that
were available in the early 80s. Contrast that with what you got today
(Wintel crap/Macincrap). That diveristy is what we are discovering
today. I think in 10 years there probably will be no memorable classic
computers worth collecting from the 90s. MAYBE the Mac portable, and I
can't think of anything else right off hand. There is just going to be
this hideous montage of various IBM PC clones by different manufacturers
or just run-of-the-mill computer shop PCs. Bleah! Long live the
thriving micro-computer revolution of the 70s and 80s!
Viva la 70s and 80s!
That said, I can think of one or two machines produced during the 90's
which may eventually be collectable: the BeBox, original Newton Message
Pad, Eo machines, SPARCstation Voyager, and possibly a few pocket/palmtop
machines. Being a bit of a Sun-weenie, I might also add Sun 4/110.
Most of the above machines had fairly small production runs, and had a
certain cool factor to them. Not all machines produced during the 90's
have been boring beige boxes. Some innovative and interesting machines
have been produced. Add an unupgraded Pilot 1000 to the list.
Most people don't want interesting computers, they want machines which
help them do something. The difference between the people on this list
and nearly everyone else is that we LIKE computers. We think they are
more than just a tool needed to accomplish as task or to provide an
occasional diversion. We can make computers do things other than run
prepackaged software. We know that computers are FUN. We value what
is different and unique about the old machines. Compatibility is good
for business, but it sure is boring.
--pec
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
12 May
12 May
3:42 a.m.
Due to massive amounts of caffeine & sleep deprivation, Sam Ismail said:
[snip]
I think in 10 years there probably will be no memorable
classic
computers worth collecting from the 90s. MAYBE the Mac portable, and I
can't think of anything else right off hand.
Speak for yourself, buckshot! ;^>
I can think of one *very collectible* system that was produced into the
90's: Try a Tandy Color Computer 3. They were produced into 1991/92, if
memory serves. Yes, an 8-bit machine that actually had viability (and
profitability) into the 90's!
BTW, the CoCo series has the distinction of having the longest production
time of any 8-bit system, and I think of any non IBM/Mac system.
Anyway, that's just my $0.000002 (and that's all it's worth!) ;-)
Thanks,
"Merch"
--
Roger Merchberger | If at first you don't succeed,
Programmer, NorthernWay | nuclear warhead disarmament should
zmerch(a)northernway.net | *not* be your first career choice.
7:46 a.m.
On Mon, 12 May 1997, Roger Merchberger wrote:
I'm talking 90s born, bred, and dead. The CoCo3 was born and bred in the
80s. What system conceived in the 90s will likely become a classic? I
think Paul was definitely on track about the PalmTops (Newton, Pilot,
Psion, etc). Those are really cool machines. I have a Psion 3a that is
broken (just needs some repair work and it will be fine) that I was
planning on trading in for a 3c. Just now I thought back to when I had my
Aquarius with all the goodies and sold that and my Atari 2600 to trade up
to my first Apple ][+. I then realized how much I regretted that
decision, even to today. Does history repeat itself? Hmmm...guess it
depends on how much money I have when it comes time to make a decision on
the 3c.
Sam
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Computer Historian, Programmer, Musician, Philosopher, Athlete, Writer, Jackass
I think in 10
years there probably will be no memorable classic
computers worth collecting from the 90s. MAYBE the Mac portable, and I
can't think of anything else right off hand.
Speak for yourself, buckshot! ;^>
I can think of one *very collectible* system that was produced into the
90's: Try a Tandy Color Computer 3. They were produced into 1991/92, if
memory serves. Yes, an 8-bit machine that actually had viability (and
profitability) into the 90's! 
8:19 a.m.
On Mon, 12 May 1997, Sam Ismail wrote:
I'm talking 90s born, bred, and dead. The CoCo3 was born and bred in the
80s. What system conceived in the 90s will likely become a classic? I
How about an Amiga 4000? (Desktop model of course) I know they still
sorta teknik'ly maybe make these things but mabe in 10 years or so?
A little plain looking but just maybe...
Les
8:06 a.m.
On Mon, 12 May 1997, Roger Merchberger wrote:
BTW, the CoCo series has the distinction of having the longest production
time of any 8-bit system, and I think of any non IBM/Mac system.
I thought the C64 had that distinction (along with most units produced for
any one type which was estimated to be around 10 million). Of course, if
we're talking about the CoCo *series*, well then...
BTW, it's not as "new" as it used to be, but I always liked to flip over
my 64C when my PeeCee buddies used to say "where you'd get THAT old piece
of junk." and show them the little sticker that said (c) Commodore 1992
Les
7:07 a.m.
The main thing that struck me is the diversity of
computer systems that
were available in the early 80s. Contrast that with what you got today
(Wintel crap/Macincrap). That diveristy is what we are discovering
today.
The other side of the coin, though, is the difficulty of converting
programs
to make them work on your computer. I remember spending a lot of time
in high school, trying to convert TRS-80 and Apple II programs to run on
my TI-99/4A. Fun? Yes. Would I want to do this under deadline pressure?
Probably not.
Of course, the computers couldn't read each other's tapes (disks were
out of the question for most of us anyway) . . .
7:53 a.m.
On Mon, 12 May 1997, Charles P. Hobbs wrote:
But wouldn't you agree that all the frustration you went through back
then is what enables you to write good code today? The diversity back
then was at least conducive to creativity. You were always challenged.
If you got bored, there was always some other system out there to conquer.
These days its trying to figure out what IRQ and base address you should
use, and some of that is handled for you anyway. What fun is that?
Sam
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Computer Historian, Programmer, Musician, Philosopher, Athlete, Writer, Jackass
The main thing
that struck me is the diversity of computer systems that
were available in the early 80s. Contrast that with what you got today
(Wintel crap/Macincrap). That diveristy is what we are discovering
today.
The other side of the coin, though, is the difficulty of converting
programs
to make them work on your computer. I remember spending a lot of time
in high school, trying to convert TRS-80 and Apple II programs to run on
my TI-99/4A. Fun? Yes. Would I want to do this under deadline pressure?
Probably not.
6:02 p.m.
On Mon, 12 May 1997, Sam Ismail wrote:
On Mon, 12 May 1997, Charles P. Hobbs wrote:
But wouldn't you agree that all the frustration you went through back
then is what enables you to write good code today?
Perhaps, although I do very little coding nowadays (oh, a few C programs
on
Unix, and some Perl/CGI, and I'm learning C on the Mac)
The main
thing that struck me is the diversity of computer systems that
were available in the early 80s. Contrast that with what you got today
(Wintel crap/Macincrap). That diveristy is what we are discovering
today.
The other side of the coin, though, is the difficulty of converting
programs
to make them work on your computer. I remember spending a lot of time
in high school, trying to convert TRS-80 and Apple II programs to run on
my TI-99/4A. Fun? Yes. Would I want to do this under deadline pressure?
Probably not. The diversity back
then was at least conducive to creativity. You were always challenged.
If you got bored, there was always some other system out there to conquer.
One other thing about the old days that I don't miss so much is the
fanatical commitment to one system.
Of course, nowadays, you can get just about any of these old systems for
around $10, but back in the old days, when these systems (yes, even a VIC)
cost $300 and up, the Apple vs TRS80 vs Commodore vs. IBM vs Mac vs Amiga
vs Atari discussions approached the intensity of jihads!
And of course, some systems were much better provided for than others. If
you had an Apple II, a TRS-80, or (later on) a Commodore 64, you were
pretty much all taken care of in terms of software. Users of Lesser-known
systems like the TRS-80 Color Computer, or the TI-99/4, had to fight to
find any
decent software outside of what Radio Shack/TI wanted to provide for
them. (The CoCo had it a little better, since its architecture was
somewha better known)
By the late 80's and early 90's, it was pretty much IBM, IBM, IBM and
its clones all over the place, with Mac in second place and the Amiga
in distant third (This was in the US--I understand that things were
quite different in Europe and the rest of the world)
These days its trying to figure out what IRQ and base
address you should
use, and some of that is handled for you anyway. What fun is that?
There's always assembler language programming (almost a sine qua non for
emulator development :-)
13 May
13 May
4 a.m.
On Mon, 12 May 1997, Charles P. Hobbs wrote:
Of course, nowadays, you can get just about any of
these old systems for
around $10, but back in the old days, when these systems (yes, even a VIC)
cost $300 and up, the Apple vs TRS80 vs Commodore vs. IBM vs Mac vs Amiga
vs Atari discussions approached the intensity of jihads!
Checked into the OS Holy Wars in the comp.os.(crossposted).advocacy
newsgroups lately? Makes our old squabbles about mere hardware
architecture seem like nothing.
And there were never any arguments about TRS-80 vs. Amiga. By the time
the Amiga made any impact, the TRS-80 was being pretty well phased out
in favor of those damned Tandy 1000 atrocities.
--
Ward Griffiths
"America is at that awkward stage. It's too late to work within
the system, but too early to shoot the bastards." --Claire Wolfe
12 May
12 May
1:27 p.m.
The other side of the coin, though, is the difficulty
of converting
programs
to make them work on your computer. I remember spending a lot of time
in high school, trying to convert TRS-80 and Apple II programs to run on
my TI-99/4A. Fun? Yes. Would I want to do this under deadline pressure?
Probably not.
Of course, the computers couldn't read each other's tapes (disks were
out of the question for most of us anyway) . . .
Does anyone else remember a Dutch thing called 'Basicode-2' ? This was an
attempt at making universal basic programs for all the popular home
computers of the time (early 1980's). It was in 2 parts :
1) A common cassette format - the basic source would be stored in ASCII,
using Kansas City tones at 1200 baud. You would load a translator program
into your machine (some machines, like the TRS-80 model 1, needed a little
hardware add-on as well), and then load the Basicode program. I designed a
piece of hardware to translate Basicode tapes into RS232 data, which meant
I could load them into machines without a cassette interface...
2) The machine-specific commands (Clearing the screen might be CLS, HOME,
PRINT "<reverse heart>", etc) were replaced by basic subroutines. I think
GOSUB 100 was clear screen, GOSUB 110 was position cursor at X,Y (basic
variables X and Y), etc. Again, you loaded a package of subroutines (which
were often included with the tape reading program) before loading the
program. I think your program began at line 1000.
Of course many things (sound, hi-res graphics, etc) were impossible, but
the system did work to some extent. Programs were transmitted on
broadcast-band radio (the BBC radio 4 station transmitted them in the
middle of the night as something called the 'chip shop takeaway service'
(!) - the 'chip shop' was a radio programme that covered home computing at
that time). You recorded these programs off-air using a normal tape
recorder and played them back into your machine after loading the
translator tape.
At one time you could buy a cassette with translators for all the common
machines on one side, and a set of demonstration programs on the other. I
think I still have mine somewhere...
7:57 a.m.
On Mon, 12 May 1997, A.R. Duell wrote:
Of course many things (sound, hi-res graphics, etc)
were impossible, but
the system did work to some extent. Programs were transmitted on
broadcast-band radio (the BBC radio 4 station transmitted them in the
middle of the night as something called the 'chip shop takeaway service'
(!) - the 'chip shop' was a radio programme that covered home computing at
that time). You recorded these programs off-air using a normal tape
recorder and played them back into your machine after loading the
translator tape.
I must say quite bluntly, that's fucken cool. That is unadulterated,
undisputable, irrepressible coolness to the nth degree. Wide-band, mass
software distribution. There's something you won't see today.
Sam
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Computer Historian, Programmer, Musician, Philosopher, Athlete, Writer, Jackass
5:51 p.m.
On Mon, 12 May 1997, Sam Ismail wrote:
On Mon, 12 May 1997, A.R. Duell wrote:
I remember Radio Nederlands trying to broadcast computer tapes over
shortwave radio back in late 1981. They did programs fro TRS 80's,
Commodore Pet's and Atari 400/800. I remember that the experiment was a
mixed success, with several TRS-80 users, a few Commodore users, and
only one Atari 800 user succesfully recording the program off-air, and
loading it into their computer.
Of course many things (sound, hi-res graphics,
etc) were impossible, but
the system did work to some extent. Programs were transmitted on
broadcast-band radio (the BBC radio 4 station transmitted them in the
middle of the night as something called the 'chip shop takeaway service'
(!) - the 'chip shop' was a radio programme that covered home computing at
that time). You recorded these programs off-air using a normal tape
recorder and played them back into your machine after loading the
translator tape.
I must say quite bluntly, that's fucken cool. That is unadulterated,
undisputable, irrepressible coolness to the nth degree. Wide-band, mass
software distribution. There's something you won't see today.
13 May
13 May
3:51 a.m.
On Mon, 12 May 1997, Charles P. Hobbs wrote:
I remember Radio Nederlands trying to broadcast
computer tapes over
shortwave radio back in late 1981. They did programs fro TRS 80's,
Commodore Pet's and Atari 400/800. I remember that the experiment was a
mixed success, with several TRS-80 users, a few Commodore users, and
only one Atari 800 user succesfully recording the program off-air, and
loading it into their computer.
Possibly because just about every system except the TRS-80 was extremely
picky about cassette signal levels, and most were impatient about getting
signal within a narrow time frame after the load instruction was given.
Back in the old days, people used to complain about the reliability of
the TRS-80 cassette subsystem. That's because it was so much better than
the Apple or Pet cassette interface that people waited longer before
upgrading to disk, that people had time to build up a string of problems.
Apples were generally upgraded to disk almost immediately because the
cassette interface was so abominable -- but because it'd been used for
such a short period of time, folks forgot how bad it was.
Of course, the TRS-80 Color Computer had the best cassette interface in
history. And it was faster than a Commodore disk interface.
(No, I'm not knocking Apples and Commodores. It's just that I had to
listen to the whining about TRS-80 cassette reliability for too many
years from folks who weren't _quite_ annoyed enough to upgrade.)
--
Ward Griffiths
"America is at that awkward stage. It's too late to work within
the system, but too early to shoot the bastards." --Claire Wolfe
12 May
12 May
3:06 p.m.
In message <199705121627.18889(a)club.eng.cam.ac.uk> you wrote:
Does anyone else remember a Dutch thing called
'Basicode-2' ? This was an
attempt at making universal basic programs for all the popular home
computers of the time (early 1980's). It was in 2 parts :
Reach down to my right ankle and the old filing cabinet and there is
my Basicocde2 cassette and manual. It was designed to oeprate the same
program on Apple II and IIe's, BBC Model A and B, Commodore 64, Pet
and Vic 20, Sharp MZ80A, Sinclair ZX81, Tandy TRS-80 and Video Genie.
The BBC in the UK would broadcast programs over Radio-4 and Basicode
would allow everyone to use them. Quite the idea.
The cassette I have has the translator programs for all the above
computers and several games on the reverse side.
Yes, those were the days of creative computing.
--
Lindsay Thachuk
in Western Canada with the World's Best Computer
- the Acorn RiscPC with the only 200 Mhz StrongARM in ARMstrong
9:26 a.m.
It was thus said that the Great Sam Ismail once stated:
I think in 10 years there probably will be no memorable classic
computers worth collecting from the 90s. MAYBE the Mac portable, and I
can't think of anything else right off hand. There is just going to be
this hideous montage of various IBM PC clones by different manufacturers
or just run-of-the-mill computer shop PCs. Bleah! Long live the
thriving micro-computer revolution of the 70s and 80s!
Don't be too sure about that. There will be some - The Amigas after
Commodore died. The BeBox. Certain workstations. Also, don't forget PDAs,
which came unto their own this decade (like the Newton, Zeus, Pilot, etc).
-spc (It's just that they'll be lost amid all the PC noise ... )
9:55 a.m.
I think in 10 years there probably will be no
memorable classic
computers worth collecting from the 90s. MAYBE the Mac portable, and I
can't think of anything else right off hand. There is just going to be
this hideous montage of various IBM PC clones by different manufacturers
or just run-of-the-mill computer shop PCs. Bleah! Long live the
thriving micro-computer revolution of the 70s and 80s!
I think a collection of Unix workstations would be mighty fine - Suns,
SGIs, NeXTs, etc.. I also think a collection of laptops (yes, PC) would
also be very nice. In other words, if the items show sparks of creativity
and/or clever engineering, a nice collection can be made.
People said that transistor radios would never be collectable - now there
is a huge following. The same will happen with the equipment from
the 1990s.
William Donzelli
william(a)ans.net
9932
days inactive
9933
days old
16 comments
10 participants
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