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On Sun, 11 Oct 2009 10:43:14 +0100, T i m <...@spaced.me.uk
On Sun, 11 Oct 2009 08:44:07 +0100, ji...@magrathea.plus.com (Jim)
wrote:
I stumbled upon it last night and I enjoyed it too (in a lighthearted
sorta way).
It was good for me because I lived though most of that era, including
flicking through the computer mags looking at the (high) prices and
eventually buying a ZX81 in kit form (later building another 20 for
friends and family ... nothing changes eh). ;-)
3D Monster Maze on the ZX81 is probably what set me up for Doom. ;-)
I never had an Electron, had (have) the BBC B but really only played
'with' it re sideways ROM / RAM / FDD etc. I had (have) several
Spectrums and a QL but probably spent most of my time (over all my
computers pre the PC) playing with / on the Spectrums (including
re-casing one with a real keyboard, not that it helped much).
T i m
p.s. I built a 'Telly tennis' game kit a while back ... still brings a
smile. Going even further back I *think* I built my first Telly Tennis
game / kit. Long thin black plastic unit with two rollers (one each
end) to move the bats. It wasn't Binatone / Atari / Commodore though ?
This was the Maplin one:
http://www.maplin.co.uk/DiscontinuedModule.aspx?ModuleNo=28504
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Anonymous Wrote:
Jim <...@magrathea.plus.com
I was pleasantly surprised. There seemed to have been considerable
effort expended on getting things right as far as characterisation,
costume and set dressing were concerned. Quite often (as in "Life on
Mars" and its sequels) directors seem to get portrayal of that period
horribly wrong. Well, not just that period, any decade of which I have
living memory. This one felt right and the performances were very good
throughout.
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On Sun, 11 Oct 2009 14:32:23 +0100, Ian McCall <...@eruvia.org
On 2009-10-11 12:19:34 +0100, %ste...@malloc.co.uk (Steve Firth) said:
RADALand. BBC Drama (sorry Peter) tend to have a wonderful knack of
making any period in history look and sound like any other period in
history, with the exception that the morals will always be those of the
present day.
ITV Drama do the same, except the morals are those of the 19th century
and everything looks like a scene from a postcard or chocolate box.
Cheers,
Ian
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Anonymous Wrote:
Ian McCall <...@eruvia.org
Ah yes, that tends to happen with just about anything and in most
countries. I found the Italian drama La meglio gioventù (The Best of
Youth) to be a fairly good version of the events of the 70s and 80s in
Italy. But some things grated, the corners were knocked off everything
with the brutality and corruption of the police at that time airbrushed
over, smoking was apparently unknown at that time and the treatment of
the mentally ill was shown to be sympathetic and well ordered
incorporating all the current advances in attitudes towards therapy.
Which was odd, since being alive and working in Italy at the time, my
memory is of the levels of graft, the casual public brutality shown by
the (various) police squads, the impossibility of getting through any
meeting of more than three people without the room becoming obscured by
smoke (still a problem to this day in Italy) and the fact that the nuns
who seemed to form the majority of nursing care for patients with mental
problems treated their charges in appaling ways.
Ee up master, ye'll be getting back to that stock broking business on
the Inter City 125 will ye? <tugs forelock>
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Anonymous Wrote:
Ian McCall <...@eruvia.org
Not very surprising. The objective is to entertain the audience, mostly,
and to educate them, just a tiny bit. More or less the same objective as
the original authors, of course.
--
Peter
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On Mon, 12 Oct 2009 22:38:01 +0100, Peter Hayes <...@blueyonder.co.uk
I thought it was rubbish, try thr podfather documentary on Robert Noyce
on BBC4, just facts and talking heads not actors in ginger beards.
G
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On Sun, 11 Oct 2009 09:58:14 +0100, Ian Piper <...@mac.com
On 2009-10-11 08:44:07 +0100, ji...@magrathea.plus.com (Jim) said:
Alexander Armstrong's portrayal of Sinclair seemed unusually off the
mark for him: there was another program on just before Micro Men that
had a clip of Sinclair being interviewed so it was easy to compare the
voice, and it was a surprisingly poor rendition. In the story itself
Sinclair came out of this very badly I thought, while Curry came across
as a nice guy. I know which company I'd rather have been working in - I
rather liked the Acorns and for a long time lusted after an Archimedes
A3000.
Ian.
--
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Anonymous Wrote:
Ian Piper <...@mac.com
Yep, same here I suspect. It was nice to see that something I'd only
half-remembered turned out to be true - that Hermann Hauser effectively
lied (in a good cause) to the two main development bods, telling each of
them that the other said it was perfectly doable in four days, with the
result that it just about was.
I owned a BBC Micro (still have it) and it remains one of the finest
machines ever made, in my opinion. I also had a A310, followed by an
A5000. Very nice machine with the exception of sounding like a
hovercraft. I looked at the RISC PC machines with interest, but had
grave doubts about the path Acorn (or more importantly RISC OS) were
taking, so jumped ship for the Mac.
One of the things that continues to frustrate me is that there doesn't
seem to be a written history of the UK computer timeframe, unlike the
many, many books available for the American computer histories.
Jim
--
"Microsoft admitted its Vista operating system was a 'less good
product' in what IT experts have described as the most ambitious
understatement since the captain of the Titanic reported some
slightly damp tablecloths." http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/
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On Sun, 11 Oct 2009 14:21:50 +0100, Ian McCall <...@eruvia.org
On 2009-10-11 10:15:49 +0100, ji...@magrathea.plus.com (Jim) said:
Digital Retro?
<http://www.amazon.co.uk/Digital-Retro-Evolution-Personal-Computer/dp/1904705391 /ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1255267150&sr=1-1
Not
a timeline as such but very informative about the Sinclair/Acorn thing.
Haven't seen the programme yet but if they're depicting Acorn as the
winner then that's a rather drastic rewrite of history. The Spectrum
won the 1982 wars easily - people could afford Spectrums, they couldn't
afford Beebs (you bourgeoisie splitter, you...). Quality of engineering
clearly sits with the Beeb, but then that's why the daft price
difference too.
Cheers,
Ian
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Anonymous Wrote:
Ian McCall <...@eruvia.org
According to Bill Cotton, who was running the Beeb end of it, the high
price was because they didn't expect to sell many of them. When they
did, and the flood gates opened, they had no reason to reduce the price.
Ker-CHING!
--
Peter
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Anonymous Wrote:
Ian Piper <...@mac.com
Well yeah, it was a fictionalisation of the whole thing. What I took
from it, which was most surprising, was that Sinclair was fixated on the
cars and didn't really think home computing would take off. It'll be
the C5 that's mentioned in his obituary not the millions of computers he
sold to people of my generation.
And he was sort of right because a whole lot of programmers didn't
emerge from that period. People of that generation may be more computer
literate than any generation before them but I know a lot of people
who're younger than me who don't like computers.
And the BBC was the superior machine with the decent keyboard, but it
was less 'fun'. It's what I had before the PCW then the PC, then the
Mac!
Tim
--
Tim Gowen
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Anonymous Wrote:
Tim Gowen <...@nospam.demon.co.uk
It would be.
It was intended as a complement to an educational TV series on
computing- never for people to use out in the wild.
The Beeb had to shoose a partner to make it, and they chose Acorn
(didn't they?). Bill Cotton, who was the head of TV then, told us much
later that they expected to sell maybe 5-10,000 of them, so it was
priced for those volumes with the BBC getting a royalty on each.
Eventually they sold over a million. Bill said that they were competely
taken by surprise.
--
Peter
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On Sun, 11 Oct 2009 12:56:13 +0100, T i m <...@spaced.me.uk
On Sun, 11 Oct 2009 12:31:03 +0100, ti...@nospam.demon.co.uk (Tim Gowen)
wrote:
Seeing him trundling along in the C5 reminded me of when I was using
mine fairly regularly and for the purpose I believe it was intended,
cheap comfortable local transport [1].
T i m
[1] Cheap compared with say even a moped (if you also consider the
TAX, Insurance, MOT etc), comfortable (compared with a bicycle) and
local (with 5 miles or so). I used to use mine to 'pop up the shops'
when away racing my electrically propelled endurance machine
(motorbike format).
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On Sun, 11 Oct 2009 22:14:36 +0000 (UTC), Simon Slavin <...@hearsay.demon.co.uk
On 10-11-2009, Tim Gowen <...@nospam.demon.co.uk
Which is the problem. You can't tell which bits of it are true and
which bits aren't. The idea behind fictionalisation is that you keep
all the important parts and change only the unimportant. But with a
programme like which things are important is subjective.
Simon.
--
I'm trying a new usenet client for Mac, Nemo OS X, since 0 days.
You can download it at http://www.malcom-mac.com/nemo
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On Sun, 11 Oct 2009 14:27:02 +0100, Ian McCall <...@eruvia.org
On 2009-10-11 12:31:03 +0100, ti...@nospam.demon.co.uk (Tim Gowen) said:
!
Got to say that seems like a change of history too - not many
programmers arose from that era? -Everyone- who had a home machine in
1982/1986 knew at least -some- coding. I wouldn't expect the current
crop of 8 year olds to write the legend of 10 PRINT "HELLO" in many
cases, because computers aren't exciting to them in their own right,
they're just furniture that's around the place. So yes, I agree with
your second statement completely but not at all with the first one.
Very different from 82/86. I'd say that started to change in the 16-bit
era and also with the re-introduction of console gaming.
Cheers,
Ian
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Anonymous Wrote:
Ian McCall <...@eruvia.org
Judging by the stuff that I've seen, the new Hello World is mucking
about with HTML, CSS, Javascript and all that jazz to create/tweak
themes for the iPhone.
Seriously, I think that there is still an "excitement", it's just a
slightly different type; it's evident from some of the efforts out there
that people are experimenting with tweaking themes in the same way that
we used to experiment with BASIC listings. Some experimenters stop at
the first few steps, others go on to get the bug.
You can easily claim it's not "proper programming" but they're still
feeding curiousity and "scratching that itch".
-z-
--
"And the tiny universe compiles."
http://powazek.com/posts/1655
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Anonymous Wrote:
Ian McCall <...@eruvia.org
Yeah but how many people in their thirties now, who were doing little
bits of programming when they were 10-15, can actually still remember
that it's better to use for...next loops than GOTO statements! Unless
they're still in the business!
Tim
--
Tim Gowen
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On Sun, 11 Oct 2009 18:12:10 +0100, Ian McCall <...@eruvia.org
On 2009-10-11 15:10:16 +0100, ti...@nospam.demon.co.uk (Tim Gowen) said:
True, but conversely the business is heavily populated with people in
their 30s who initially got into it through home computing. I speak as
one of them, and we're definitely an over-represented section of the
population in professional computing.
Cheers,
Ian
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Anonymous Wrote:
Tim Gowen <...@nospam.demon.co.uk
What's a GOTO statement?
As you were. Umm I'm not in my 30s either.
What I miss from those days is the comparative excellence of magazines
about computing. Today magazines are simply consumer sales vehicles
pushing the latest MouseBlaster 2800 series of multi-core gaming
machines. At least back then there was editorial content wirth reading,
written by people who knew what they were talking about and (mostly)
able to communicate it to others.
I learned a great deal about fractal landscapes, handy algorithms and
structured programming from magazines at the time. I imagine that in the
majority of current magazines I'm not going to find a single line of
code.
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Anonymous Wrote:
Steve Firth <...@malloc.co.uk
I've got every issue of Personal Computer World from issue 1 up until
roughly 1993. The rot (which was sadly inevitable) started in the late
80's when the PC started to become the only architecture worth writing
about. After that, as you say, it started to become reviews of similarly
capable machines, rather than alternate solutions to problems you hadn't
thought of yet.
The days of magazines containing source code where you are effectively
hitting the bare metal are, sadly, behind us.
Jim
--
"Microsoft admitted its Vista operating system was a 'less good
product' in what IT experts have described as the most ambitious
understatement since the captain of the Titanic reported some
slightly damp tablecloths." http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/
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Anonymous Wrote:
Jim <...@magrathea.plus.com
That was one of the things that really alienated me from
Windows/Microsoft. The changes from Windows 3.1 onwards that effectively
meant that I was no longer trusted to write code for a computer that I
had bought and paid for. At least Apple continues to make development
tools available to all who are interested and doesn't erect arcane
barriers to stop common folk writing code.
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On Sun, 11 Oct 2009 16:38:44 +0100, Jaimie Vandenbergh <...@sometimes.sessile.org
On Sun, 11 Oct 2009 16:16:44 +0100, %ste...@malloc.co.uk (Steve Firth)
wrote:
I've not read any for some time, but PC Pro used to have ye
olde-fashioned CompSci pages at the back, with actual code and
articles about interesting algorithms in.
Cheers - Jaimie
--
It's all fun and games until someone loses an eye. Then it's a scavenger hunt.
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Anonymous Wrote:
Jaimie Vandenbergh <...@sometimes.sessile.org
I'm going to pretend that "Wirth reading" wasn't accidental.
I'll have a look at PC Pro, but I stopped reading it because I started
to feel physically ill after putting up with the anti-Apple diatribe it
printed for decades.
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On Sun, 11 Oct 2009 22:36:07 +0100, Jaimie Vandenbergh <...@sometimes.sessile.org
On Sun, 11 Oct 2009 17:10:48 +0100, %ste...@malloc.co.uk (Steve Firth)
wrote:
Ho ho!
It did? I didn't even notice... but I wasn't at all fruit-flavoured
myself back then, so maybe I just wasn't paying attention.
It may well not have all those interesting techie bits in the back any
more, it was definitely on a downward spiral and I've not read any
for, um, probably four years.
Cheers - Jaimie
--
I love VoIP. You don't get people phoning up to complain that the
network is down. -- Peter Corlett, ASR
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On Mon, 12 Oct 2009 07:10:04 +0100, Chris Ridd <...@mac.com
On 2009-10-11 22:36:07 +0100, Jaimie Vandenbergh
<...@sometimes.sessile.org
And now of course, you can't read it because it was shut down.
--
Chris
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On Mon, 12 Oct 2009 08:13:38 +0100, Jaimie Vandenbergh <...@sometimes.sessile.org
On Mon, 12 Oct 2009 07:10:04 +0100, Chris Ridd <...@mac.comwrote:
Oh. That probably means they did indeed continue with the interesting
techie bits, rather than convert over to the usual reproducing of
press releases, '100 confusing things about Windows' and 'build a pc'
guides that the others all do.
Cheers - Jaimie
--
"I'll never forget my first wife - drove me to drink. I'm
eternally grateful." - W. C. Fields
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On Mon, 12 Oct 2009 09:32:52 +0100, Chris Ridd <...@mac.com
On 2009-10-12 08:13:38 +0100, Jaimie Vandenbergh
<...@sometimes.sessile.org
Sorry, I was thinking of PCW not PC Pro.
--
Chris
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On Mon, 12 Oct 2009 10:52:02 +0100, chris <...@gmail.com
What do you mean? The site and magazine are still available...
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On Mon, 12 Oct 2009 11:04:07 +0100, Chris Ridd <...@mac.com
On 2009-10-12 10:52:02 +0100, chris <...@gmail.com
Wrong mag, sorry. I mentally equated articles slagging of non-Windows
boxen with what PCW used to do...
--
Chris
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On Mon, 12 Oct 2009 11:20:07 +0100, chris <...@gmail.com
Phew... I quite like PCPro.
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Anonymous Wrote:
Chris Ridd <...@mac.com
That was PC World. PC Pro is indeed an Apple-basher, but this month
they leave us alone because Windows 7 is reviewed.
Tim
--
Tim Gowen
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Anonymous Wrote:
Steve Firth <...@malloc.co.uk
That's one of the things you had to hand to BBC BASIC - no reliance on
the hated GOTO statement. You had REPEAT...UNTIL loops, as well as named
procedures and functions.
Not to mention inline 6502 assembly language. Which I will, one day,
mark my words, learn.
I remember reaching the conclusion that GOTO[0] was inelegant somewhat
before being officially taught it.
Definitely a coder's machine, albeit a bit short in the RAM dept.
Jim
[0] the trick is to know *when* its use is appropriate.
--
"Microsoft admitted its Vista operating system was a 'less good
product' in what IT experts have described as the most ambitious
understatement since the captain of the Titanic reported some
slightly damp tablecloths." http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/
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On Mon, 12 Oct 2009 22:32:55 +0100, eastender <...@nospam.com
That's a nice thought, speaking as one of the writers who reviewed many
a machine in the 1980s.
E.
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Anonymous Wrote:
eastender <...@nospam.com
For which magazine(s)?
I have all of PCW from issue 1 up until 1993-ish, so I could dig out one
of your reviews if you did any for that publication.
Jim
--
"Microsoft admitted its Vista operating system was a 'less good
product' in what IT experts have described as the most ambitious
understatement since the captain of the Titanic reported some
slightly damp tablecloths." http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/
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On Tue, 13 Oct 2009 09:45:12 +0100, eastender <...@nospam.com
I worked first in the electronics press where we looked at some of the
first micros and components, and then for a minicomputer magazine (DEC
User), doing stuff on Vax/VMS, Unix, etc. In fact, I worked for DEC
(Digital Equipment) as my first job. But I wrote a long series of
reviews of PCs (eg IBM AT) for Which Computer mag - these were
business-oriented reviews where I also looked at some of the bundled
software, if any.
Went to many a press do given by Acorn, IBM, Apple etc.
But my proudest achievement? Well it has to be writing an article on
Usenet that's in the history of the net paper (Usenet's Pranks and
Pragmatism) in 1984.
E.
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On Sun, 11 Oct 2009 18:37:52 +0100, Duncan Kennedy <...@nospam.otterson-bg.couk
In message <...@nospam.demon.co.ukI started out with one of the first 81's (for my son, of course). That
was just under 100 GBP at the time. I learned to program Sinclair
BASIC on that and managed to develop some simple stuff for my office.
A year or so later the price dropped to 50 GBP if I remember and I
bought another. This one I built into a large box with connections,
controls and meter for the tape recorder, a full size, full travel
keyboard, a programmable joystick box, and, of course, cable mounted RAM
module, along with sockets for externals like the thermal printer and
joystick . I still have both of them somewhere. Such was life.
As somebody said, Monster Maze was a big step at the time.
--
Duncan K
Downtown Dalgety Bay
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Anonymous Wrote:
Duncan Kennedy <...@nospam.otterson-bg.couk
Did you watch Charlie Brooker's 'Gamewipe' this past week? It used 3-D
Monster maze as a (good) example; that's what reminded me of it.
--
Peter
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On Mon, 12 Oct 2009 10:24:18 +0100, Duncan Kennedy <...@nospam.otterson-bg.couk
In message <...@cara.demon.co.ukCeresole <...@cara.demon.co.uk
Missed that.
Were you not involved in writing for something 'way back, Peter? Zx
/Amsttrad / Atari?
--
Duncan K
Downtown Dalgety Bay
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Anonymous Wrote:
Duncan Kennedy <...@nospam.otterson-bg.couk
WACCI. The Worldwide Amstrad CPC Computer Users' Club. I wrote some
pieces for it, helped to edit it. It was huge fun. My main contribution
was doing some covers, and a series of articles called 'playing with
Protext', which was about just that. I also used to write about some
more or less obscure CPC applications such as DU.
But (and this is relevant to the subthread about coding for the 8-bit
processors) I had started on a ZX-81, built it into a box with something
like a full travel keyboard and a RAM pack, and started out to learn Z80
machine code. And then along came the CPC6128. And although I bought
myself an assembler, in fact I never used it. I discovered a decent
keyboard, a built in 3" floppy drive (soon added an extra 3.5 with-
GASP- 750K capacity) and actual applications that worked... There were
rather good CP/M editors and nice comms software, but the real discovery
was Protext, on ROM. Terrifically capable, terrifically fast. I wrote a
huge number of programme scripts with it. At Lime Grove two people used
their own computers. Peter Snow and me. He had an early IBM, an XT I
think. It certainly had a hard drive, and he ran Wordstar on it. I used
it a couple of times; Protext key commands were very similar. But the
CPC was faster, and Protext more capable. I could write my own printer
drivers for it.
But there you go; beta/VHS.... Not really...
--
Peter
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Anonymous Wrote:
Peter Ceresole <...@cara.demon.co.uk
Make that CP/M applications... Jeez, the time, she flies. Like a banana.
--
Peter
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On Mon, 12 Oct 2009 14:45:40 +0100, Duncan Kennedy <...@otterson-bg.co.uk
In message <...@cara.demon.co.ukCeresole <...@cara.demon.co.uk
Ah! That's it - I had completely forgotten about WACCI - and, indeed,
of Protext. I lived in Protext for work - I was the only one with a
computer until I got a team with 2 Commodores, an Apricot that wouldn't
talk to anything and a teletype contraption rigged to our HO that only
ever started up once with enormous noise that stopped the entire team in
their tracks, printed 2 lines of rubbish and went back to giving it's
power supply over to running my deputy's contact lens cleaner.
Never go round to CP/R - mainly BASIC of various flavours - including
Power Basic - wrote a suite of simple business graphics programs for the
Amstrad during very boring Board Meetings - staff and Board thought I
was making notes. Gave up programming with the purchase of an Ambra
(cheap IBM) 486. I was useful when I went back to my own business on
web development 14 years ago.
So we went down similar computer routes at that time apart from the
assembler (I only used a little I didn't rally understand but copied
from magazines - possibly yours!) I was even with Demon for many years
from 93 and still watch their groups but perhaps that's another story.
:-)
Was the CPC the one with the ROM box that plugged in the back? I think
it was - I had a full box of 6 with Protext and separate spell checker
as I remember - can't remember the rest although one was tools I think.
I still have a box of 3" back-up disks I kept when I parted with the
6128.
I went on to the Atari STE - for which I got a real giant hard drive -
all of 25MB - cost me nearly 350 quid - which was a great deal in those
days - that's why I still have it - it was a specially converted SCSI
external. And there was the hand scanner. I had all my office work,
some video titling, some photos and drawings and lots more and never got
beyond 12.5 MB.
I also travelled with the Z88 for several years.
--
Duncan K
Downtown Dalgety Bay
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Anonymous Wrote:
Duncan Kennedy <...@otterson-bg.co.uk
Mine were... Protext, an extension for that called Promerge, an Arnor
Utilities ROM called Utopia, which was very useful indeed... Then CP/M
on ROM, which took two slots, plus a load of CP/M utilities. There was
more but I simply can't remember.
And of course 256k of RAM drive, which meant that in CP/M the virtual
drive made everything so smooth and quick.
Okay, in one way you could say it was lipstick on a pig, but it was a
tasty pig. I used it for years for serious work.
That was a really nice machine. But my fave was the NC200. Apart from
the fact that it had Protext built in and an almost infinite battery
life (I cheated and built a battery pack with D cells and a Maplins
battery holder) it had, don't laugh, an almost perfectly functional
display. Worked perfectly in bright sunlight and if the light fell, the
backlight was good. For writing scripts in summer on a bench in Hyde
Park (I actually did this when there was an emergency request- it saved
me going back to Ealing Studios one Friday afternoon) I've never found
anythgin to equal it- even now.
--
Peter
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On Mon, 12 Oct 2009 18:38:55 +0100, Duncan Kennedy <...@nospam.otterson-bg.couk
In message <...@cara.demon.co.ukCeresole <...@cara.demon.co.uk
That's right - Utopia.
I had one of these running the Z88s (two of them) with a warning lead
and 5 rechargeable AAs - 1.2v. They looked good on the train as the box
fitted exactly into an old leather shirt stud box my grandfather left.
But Pipedream was never Protext - though worked as a spreadsheet, WP and
database depending on how you configured it - I think the basis was a
spreadsheet.
This from a Mac man?
You may have been sitting on the next bench while I updated a client's
web site - although I think I was later.
I still have the two ZX88s and all the extras like an EPROM burner and a
data link to a PC.
--
Duncan K
Downtown Dalgety Bay
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Anonymous Wrote:
Duncan Kennedy <...@nospam.otterson-bg.couk
I had a homebrew lead with a pack with 5 'D' cells. Massively heavy,
overkill maybe, but they jolly well worked. I could put the pack down
and the long lead meant I could move the NC200 about on my lap, as I
wanted.
Also, I could save to the floppy at any time, to transfer to the CPC.
And, later, to a Mac (with an external 3" floppy drive). The built in
comms meant I could fairly easily connect with the Mac, as well, but I
always preferred to use the floppy.
Oh yes. I never found a laptop I liked to use outdors in daylight,
although they're a lot better now. But the funny dotmatrixy display on
the NC was clear as a bell, always.
I still have one (of two) working NC200s. Actaully I say 'working' but I
don't really know as I haven't tried it recently. My days of alfresco
word processing are fairly far away... And the external 3" drive has
definitely evaporated.
--
Peter
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Anonymous Wrote:
Peter Ceresole <...@cara.demon.co.uk
I used to love the powerbook 160 for outdoors in daytime. You just
turned the backlight off (it didn't make any difference either way).
Used to sit in the park writing on that.
--
Woody
http://www.alienrat.com
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On Mon, 12 Oct 2009 21:18:59 +0100, T i m <...@spaced.me.uk
On Mon, 12 Oct 2009 20:52:34 +0100, usen...@alienrat.co.uk (Woody)
wrote:
I re-discovered my PB 170 today. I just need to re-discover the PSU
now. ;-(
T i m
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Anonymous Wrote:
Woody <...@alienrat.co.uk
Ditto PB140.
I had a working 140 up until a few months ago. It did actually still
work, but the screen crystals or whatever it is that go black had
finally run out of whatever it is they have, and only the finest
adjustment of the contrast slider would render the screen readable.
--
Pd
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Anonymous Wrote:
Jim <...@magrathea.plus.com
It ended with a bit of heavy-handed metaphor, Sir Uncle Clive trundling
along in a C5, on what looked like a disused airfield, being overtaken
by giant trucks bearing the logos of US technology companies.
One thing that struck me was that the Apple ][ was launched some time
before the start of the story, and was still going strong after it ended
- and probably was hardly affected by the events in the story.
But what fun times they were, in that little bubble before it popped.
Someone in the film said that there were over 600 companies producing
microcomputers in the UK at the time!
Daniele
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Anonymous Wrote:
D.M. Procida <...@apple-juice.co.uk
It _was_ a tad heavy handed, true, but it was also rather sadly
accurate. And at least they got the Microsoft logo correct for the time
- nice touch.
I think the Apple ][ didn't make big inroads into the UK home computer
scene as it was very expensive. I was expecting to hear something more
about the Commodores and Tandys though - the VIC20, C64, and TRS-80
range were extremely popular over here. Heck, my first computer was a
TRS-80 Model 1. However, given the time contraint and the focus of the
story I suppose they couldn't spend much time on machines which weren't
directly pertinent.
Weren't they just? Everyone doing their own thing in their own way, and
compatability didn't matter a damn because the machines simply weren't
powerful enough for it to be a factor. I absolutely loved the old PCW
shows - they were Tech Mecca for me.
I wouldn't be at all surprised to find that was a conservative number.
Jim
--
"Microsoft admitted its Vista operating system was a 'less good
product' in what IT experts have described as the most ambitious
understatement since the captain of the Titanic reported some
slightly damp tablecloths." http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/
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Anonymous Wrote:
Jim <...@magrathea.plus.com
Did you notice that they had footage of a ca. 1980 computer show, and
they showed... an Amstrad CPC! *Everyone* knows the CPC didn't appear
until 1984!
So I enjoyed a bit of nerdy fun spotting that kind of thing too.
Daniele
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Anonymous Wrote:
D.M. Procida <...@apple-juice.co.uk
Yep, I noticed that and had a slight wince :-)
I also found myself wondering if I was somewhere in that crowd.
Jim
--
"Microsoft admitted its Vista operating system was a 'less good
product' in what IT experts have described as the most ambitious
understatement since the captain of the Titanic reported some
slightly damp tablecloths." http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/
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Anonymous Wrote:
Fred Bambrough <...@[127.0.0.1]
Gods, I'd forgotten about that!
Jim
--
"Microsoft admitted its Vista operating system was a 'less good
product' in what IT experts have described as the most ambitious
understatement since the captain of the Titanic reported some
slightly damp tablecloths." http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/
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Anonymous Wrote:
Jim <...@magrathea.plus.com
3-D Monster Maze, the only computer game I ever really liked.
--
Peter
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On Sun, 11 Oct 2009 14:29:17 +0100, Ian McCall <...@eruvia.org
On 2009-10-11 11:54:09 +0100, pete...@cara.demon.co.uk (Peter Ceresole) said:
And a fantastic piece of coding. Up there with 1k Chess in my book
(have always been terribly impressed by the idea of doing the rules of
chess plus a rudimentary AI opponent in just 1k).
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1K_ZX_Chess
Cheers,
Ian
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Anonymous Wrote:
Jim <...@magrathea.plus.com
In New Zealand the big ones were the Apple ][ and the Commodores,
although the TRS-80 was my main workhorse when I was programming cash
registers. The C-64 was particularly good for comms, with an easily
controllable RS232 interface that I used to dial up remote sites,
download the day's transactions and update a dBase II database.
I also used a Japanese "General" computer which had its own operating
system built around a proprietary database. It had dual 8" floppy drives
with *huge* storage capacity, nearly a megabyte I think (980KB maybe?)
on a single disk.
--
Pd
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On Sun, 11 Oct 2009 14:32:54 +0100, jonny <...@dontmailme.org
The Personal Computer handbook price list (September 1983)
Apple //e £925 (Alone) £1,300 (Starter Pack - disk drive+controller
card, mono monitor+stand, 80-column card)
Acorn/BBC (Model A) £300 (Model B) £400 (no mention of Electron)
Commodore VIC-20 £125 64 £345 PET (4000) £650 (8000) £800
IBM PC £2,200 PC-XT £3,330
Sinclair ZX81 £50 ZX Spectrum £100 (16k) £130 (48k)
Tandy TRS-80 £200 (I) £300 (CoCo) £2,000 (II) £1,800 (III) £1,500 (IV)
Texas TI-99/4A £150
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Anonymous Wrote:
jonny <...@dontmailme.org
Is that the one with the brown vinyl cover? I had that!
Daniele
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On Sun, 11 Oct 2009 17:03:30 +0100, jonny <...@dontmailme.org
No it has a picture cover featuring
BBC Micro
Commodore VIC-20 and 64
Oric 1 (not mentioned in the book!)
TI-99/4A
ZX Spectrum
The book has articles and B&W photos of:
Apple //e
Atari 400/800
BBC Micro
Commodore VIC-20
Commodore 64
Commodore PET (4000/8000 Series)
Cromenco C-10
DAI
DEC Rainbow/325/350
Epson HX-20
Exidy Sorcerer
Genie (TRS-80 II Clone)
IBM Personal Computer
Nascom 2/3
NEC PC-8001
North Star Horizon/Advantage
Osborne-1
Research Machines 380Z/480Z
Sharp MZ80A
Sharp MZ80B
Sinclair ZX81
Sinclair ZX Spectrum
SuperBrain II
Tandy Colour Computer
Tandy TRS-80
Texas TI-99/4A
Xerox 820
It also has a section featuring games in BASIC, a history of computers
and a user group section with contacts and address!
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Anonymous Wrote:
jonny <...@dontmailme.org
The electron was just over £200 (afaicr, £215). I bought one, one of the
first ones, and then took it back as I decided I wanted a BBC model b,
as all the reviews I read were 'it does x, unlike the bbc that does x &
y' etc.
I really did love the BBC, it was a great machine
--
Woody
http://www.alienrat.com
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Anonymous Wrote:
David Kennedy <...@nospamherethankyou.invalid
Wow, 64K?!
--
Tim Gowen
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Anonymous Wrote:
David Kennedy <...@nospamherethankyou.invalid
I've got one of those. And an immaculate MZ80K.
Depends, although I'd tend to say 'yes' due to being highly biased in
favour of the Beebs.
Jim
--
"Microsoft admitted its Vista operating system was a 'less good
product' in what IT experts have described as the most ambitious
understatement since the captain of the Titanic reported some
slightly damp tablecloths." http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/
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Anonymous Wrote:
Jim <...@magrathea.plus.com
I got an MZ80K from a car boot sale a few years after they weren't made
anymore, when I also had other machines. I totally rewrote the rom and
had great fun with that machine - great case, less than great keyboard.
--
Woody
http://www.alienrat.com
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On 11 Oct 2009 17:30:50 GMT, Adrian <...@gmail.com
usen...@alienrat.co.uk (Woody) gurgled happily, sounding much like they
were saying:
We got an MZ80K to replace a ZX80. The keyboard seemed phenomenal...
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Anonymous Wrote:
Jim <...@magrathea.plus.com
I always fancied an MZ80K but ended up with a PET instead. IIRC the PET
was actually cheaper although still cost one arm, one leg and several
internal organs. The context of wages was missing from Micro Men, but at
that time I was paid as a University Demonstrator - one rung below
Lecturer and had a salary that was lower than probationary Teacher's pay
at the time. They got £3000(ish) pa, I got £2700 and the PET cost me
£600. I also failed to impress the taxman with my argument that it was
"tools of the trade".
Mmmmm... at the time, we used to get applicant for Secretarial jobs who
when asked if they had WP experience would mention something on the BBC.
"View" was it? Anyway whatever it was they didn't get the jobs. The BBC
Micro did people wanting to use a computer for work no good at all,
unless that work involved blowing EEPROMs. TBH for me it was tried one,
it wasn't much cop, I stuck with an Apple IIe which did the job better.
IMO etc.
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Anonymous Wrote:
Steve Firth <...@malloc.co.uk
That can't be true. My MZ80K cost me £2.
--
Woody
http://www.alienrat.com
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Anonymous Wrote:
Steve Firth <...@malloc.co.uk
Yep, that was it. There were a few 'View' products but I can only
remeber 'View' (word processing) and 'Viewsheet' (spreadsheet).
The Apple ][ was much better at certain things - such as 80 col text
with a usable RAM space. The Beeb, however, was superb at connectivity -
the thing had so many ports that the case barely held together. You
could link it to a disk drive or your fridge with almost equal ease.
In some ways it was an upmarket PLC with big, BIG brass knobs on. And I
mean that in a good way. The sideways ROM/RAM thing was sheer genius -
as was the MODE 7 Teletext feature.
And where WP was concerned, well, if you were a small business you were
probably outputting onto a dot-matrix (or maybe golfball) anyway, so who
cared what the input was like? That was Someone Else's Problem.
Jim
--
"Microsoft admitted its Vista operating system was a 'less good
product' in what IT experts have described as the most ambitious
understatement since the captain of the Titanic reported some
slightly damp tablecloths." http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/
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Anonymous Wrote:
D.M. Procida <...@apple-juice.co.uk
It was heavy-handed but I actually laughed out loud.
-zoara-
--
"And the tiny universe compiles."
http://powazek.com/posts/1655
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Anonymous Wrote:
zoara <...@privacy.net
You what? LOL? ew. zOMG.
--
Pd
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