A Loss Of Faith

olivier · Post by **olivier** » Wed Feb 03, 2010 1:26 pm

You make me feel older. My first PC was a TRS-80 with a Z80 assembler developed by a small company called Micro...something.

MSimon · Post by **MSimon** » Wed Feb 03, 2010 1:37 pm

I got my hands on an Altair in April of '75.

When it appeared on the cover of Pop Electronics in Dec (Jan '75 issue) of '74 I knew the revolution had started in earnest. My electronic friends wondered what the fuss was about.

By mid or late '76 I was building an IMSAI.

http://www.classiccmp.org/cini/my_imsai.htm

I used the TDL software.

BenTC · Post by **BenTC** » Wed Feb 03, 2010 1:43 pm

chrismb wrote:We (in out school electronics club) were also mesmerised by the Sinclair ZX80, and subsequently ZX81, building various add-ons to that silly little expansion port at the back.

Ahhh the venerable ZX81. My first computer. Grandparents bought it back from Singapore when I was 11. All 1KB main memory of it, plus 16KB expansion pack that piggybacked the back on the thermal printer connection. Taught myself to program, but didn't have the opportunity to do hardware.

KitemanSA · Post by **KitemanSA** » Thu Feb 04, 2010 1:51 am

Ahh, the olden golden days.

You guys were far ahead of me. My first computer was a KayPro II. I produced the Kitsap L5 News on that puppy for several years.

My first intro to BUYING computers was at a "Byte-Shoppe". Remember those? I walked in and there was this caverous store-front. At the back was a shelf with a small number of computers for sale.

Along the right wall was a three or four glass cases. All alone, on the top shelf of one of the cases was this MASSIVE green velvet covered display board with an S-100 bus board on it. That board was covered with what seemed to be hundreds of ICs. Propped beside the board was this hand-written sign that exclaimed "64 kbytes RAM, Only $499.95!!!"

As a poor student, I figured that was too rich for my blood and didn't look again for several years.

ladajo · Post by **ladajo** » Thu Feb 04, 2010 2:17 am

I still have my ZX80 (In loft in box in garage). I wonder if they are a collectors item now? Don't know why I kept it all these years.

MSimon · Post by **MSimon** » Thu Feb 04, 2010 2:58 am

Itty Bitty Micro-machines was one of the first Byte Shops. Evanston, Illinois. I bought my first 2708 there.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Itty_bitty_machine_company

alexjrgreen · Post by **alexjrgreen** » Sun Feb 07, 2010 5:55 pm

ladajo wrote:I still have my ZX80 (In loft in box in garage). I wonder if they are a collectors item now? Don't know why I kept it all these years.

Might need to refresh the EPROM...

MirariNefas · Post by **MirariNefas** » Sun Feb 07, 2010 8:53 pm

I'm young. First computer was an Apple IIe, but back then all I knew how to do was play hangman and a game called centipede. Later, I remember learning how to spell and do basic arithmetic on the family 286. Good times.

I just got through reading William Gibson's Neuromancer, written in 1984. It takes place in the technologically advanced future, where our cyber savvy protagonist tries to sell an amazing 3 megabytes of RAM on the black market.

CaptainBeowulf · Post by **CaptainBeowulf** » Mon Feb 08, 2010 8:03 am

I remember reading a short story set in Niven's Ringworld universe - one of the compilations by various science fiction authors about the Kzin wars. It was probably written in the 80s or early 90s. The protagonist - some world government agent in the distant future - had access to huge amounts of information on the government's amazing computer storage arrays. IIRC these storage arrays held multiple gigabytes of information...

KitemanSA · Post by **KitemanSA** » Mon Feb 08, 2010 12:41 pm

Which of course, due to their superior systems, was winnowed down from iato-exo-terra-bytes of data.