History Lesson

[Skip]

Originally Posted by TSM

The first PC x86 i used was this a Toshiba T1200 (very advanced for its time)
http://www.old-computers.com/museum/...asp?st=1&c=917

It had a display like a dot matrix printer, no backlight, CGA via an external monitor. It was briliant at the time, way better than my BBC.

1 Mb of RAM in 1987 must have been like 1 Tb of RAM today!

My first proper computer was a 486 SX (I was a late developer! )

[Viney]

Originally Posted by Jelster

I've still got a C64 and an Atari 1040 in my loft. I won't get rid of them, I don't know why.

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No loft ladder?

[Skip]

Originally Posted by Viney

No loft ladder?

ROFL!!!

[timwilky]

That is not history. it is simply obsolete, mass produced.

some of use round here have been code cutting long enough to remember punch cards.

I used to submit my code on coding sheets. a girl would type it up, I would then get back a printout, I would send back any fixes, and then get back a compiler printout. Took about 3 days turnround. Absolutely fantastic when we got our own teletype.

I then moved onto General Automation kit that took about an hour on the front panel switches to bootstrap it enough to be able to read its OS off of a paper tape. (Progress).

Then GEC 4080s and PDP/11s. Absolutely fantastic state of the art. Multituser operating systems OS/4000 for the GEC,for the PDP we had RSX11 and RT11 for realtime stuff. programmed in Fortran in those days, with a bit of Pascal.

Then onto Computer Automation naked minis and whoooo. I had to learn macro assembler. imagine cramming about 10 real time tasks with about 30 overlays into 128K.

Then luxury came my way, The VAX- DEC VMS Virtual memory and an OS to die far. no wonder my younger colleagues could not understand my reluctance to move to Unix, I had all the tools I could ever want and EDT was a programmer heaven.


PCs... Bah their just a home for badly written Microbucks software. I was running OS9 on Dragon 64s back in about 83. Multi user, Multi tasking. Microsoft still hasn't worked out how to do it properly yet.

The first micros I used were Rockwell Aim 65 which I used as low cost controllers and data loggers for test rigs.

You just don't know your born with modern frameworks, class libraries etc. In my day you had to do it all yourself. Damm sight easier ain't it?.

First computer was one of these

http://www.old-computers.com/museum/...asp?c=111&st=1

Then when I went to uni I got a 48g DX33 170mb HD, 4 Mb of RAM VGA graphics. No sound or CD and it cost me £800 and that was 11 years ago

I have a loft ladder Viney, I'm just scared of the dark

Anyways, my first computer was one of these:

http://oldcomputers.net/atari800.html

Seems like a very very long time ago now......

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This was my first one



I got it when i was 7


EDIT
And my second one. http://oldcomputers.net/pics/C64-left.jpg

And my third one http://oldcomputers.net/pics/atari520st-1.jpg

Originally Posted by timwilky

The first micros I used were Rockwell Aim 65 which I used as low cost controllers and data loggers for test rigs.

I remember learning 6502(?) assembler on these oversized calculators at college

[timwilky]

Originally Posted by tricky

I remember learning 6502(?) assembler on these oversized calculators at college

They were great for what we used them for as we linked them upto opto isolated boards for i/o and were able to read voltage from LVDT and strain guages etc. Your post just made me look on my book cases. Doh I must have thrown away my 6502, 6809 and Z80 programming books. I wonder why. Must have been to make room for all these Java ones. I wonder do they still teach assembler to students?.

I did some work with the micro processor development council back in about 1981 linking these things upto a file sharing network using rf cabling and an early implimentation of ethernet. After I left I was informed that one of my rigs ended up in the science musuem as part of a exhibition on robotics.

[TSM]

When i was in collage about 7 years ago now, they did teach assembly basics on a Zilog Z80 proc. The teacher was sooo boring. But i liked it, just did not have a unit of my own to play with. I much prefered the teacher that did Pascal. Still i not good at either. Now im better in the modern languages.