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Digital Retro
Digital Retro is about personal-use (though not necessarily home-use) machines: there are no PDP11's or mainframes represented, nor devices like the DECWriter, which gave computer access to individuals but required a mainframe or minicomputer in the background. The book covers hardware that was sold at retail (barring the Altair and a few other mail-order-only kit machines), at prices householders could afford for their hobby use, including gaming, or that businesses could afford for their executives and other knowledge workers. All the same, the prices are sure to make you calculate every so often things like how many BogoMIPS could be had today for the $3,250 that a 613KHz HP-85 cost in 1980 -- and those are 1980 dollars. Early adoption has its risks as well as its rewards.
From iconic to obscure
Too many computer makers (and even more computers) came and went in the decade-plus spanned by this book for it to cover all of them; Laing's list of chosen machines is representative rather than comprehensive. More than 30 of the machines came from the The Museum of Computing in Swindon, and despite their age most look like they just popped out of their delivery boxes.
Digital Retro's central section starts out with a MITS Altair, the machine generally considered the first computer practical for a hobbyist to buy. (And the buyer had to be a dedicated hobbyist; the Altair was sold in kit form for home-assembly, and its display was a series of winking lights, its input facilities a row of toggle switches.) "Practical" in the case of the Altair meant affordable and accessible -- there wasn't much of a practical nature for the solder-weary user to actually do with an Altair once it was assembled; the chicken and the egg of availability and usefulness were still fighting it out at this point in computer history. The Altair also has another interesting spot in personal computer history: it provided the first platform for an operating system from Bill Gates and Paul Allen.
(There's an Apple I in homemade wooden raiment snuck into the book's introduction -- an Apple I proved too difficult to find for a full writeup and photoshoot, however, and no Apple II clones made the cut.)
From the Altair to the NeXT cube which caps off the Digital Retro's collection, the 38 machines (and in some cases machine families, such as the MSX computers mentioned below) are presented in order of appearance. The book presents too many interesting machines to give each a proper summary, but here are a few to whet your appetite:
- The Sharp MZ-80K (December, 1978) -- with its 10" screen and built-in drive (tape drive, though -- the 3.5" diskette wasn't invented yet), the MZ-80K seems ahead of its time; the choice of a Zilog Z80 processor didn't do much for its longevity as a business system, though; Z80 systems were soon eclipsed by other choices.
- The GCE/MB Vectrex (June, 1982) -- the only video game system I really wanted as a kid, and one of the seeming few I've never encountered used in thrift stores. Bright vector graphics, built-in screen and a quality joystick gave it the same kind of appeal that the arcade-console versions of Asteroids and Battlezone had for me.
- The Jupiter ACE (September, 1982) -- an impossibly simply looking machine, a terraced slab of white plastic with a minimalist typewriter layout (just 40 grey keys). The ACE was aimed at programmer-hobbyists, though, like the similar-looking Sinclair ZX-80, but the ACE ran a version of FORTH and had raised keys rather than the Sinclair's flat membrane.
- The Sinclair QL (January, 1984) -- one of which, Laing notes, was Linus Torvalds' machine (between a VIC-20 and the 386 with which Torvalds started a quaint Unix-like operating system).
Game consoles are also well represented; six dedicated game machines, starting with the Atari VCS (1977) are included; a whole book could be devoted to consoles, but the ones chosen for Digital Retro (besides Atari and the Vectrex mentioned above, the others come from Colleco, Mattel, Nintendo, Sega) are an eclectic bunch, and a good use of space.
Because Laing is based in the UK, the book features quite a few machines that most Americans have probably never encountered in person, like the Acorn Atom, the Dragon 32 (a Welsh-made near-clone of the Tandy TRS-80) and the Grundy NewBrain. If this book had been an American production, many of these UK-made machines might have gone overlooked.
No incentive to work together
In the wilder days of the personal computer's adolescence, the quest for compatibility and standardization among machines was anything but a top priority -- and when it was a factor at all, it was usually about software compatibility between sibling computers (like the TI 99/4 and its 99/4A successor) or at most within a single model line.
As the book's back cover points out, "Compatibility? Forget it! Each of these computers was its own machine and had no intention of talking to anything else." An overstatement, but not much of one.
Laing covers an intriguing exception to this one-off philosophy, a multi-manufacturer line of machines that appeared in 1983 (starting a 5-year run), sharing a Zilog processor and adherence to an early Microsoft attempt at standardization called MSX. Mostly-compatible machines were launched by JVC, Hitachi, Sony (a name that didn't pop up in the American computer market for quite a few more years) and 18 other Japanese manufacturers as well as SpectraVideo, the only non-Japanese maker. Each manufacturer tweaked their entries in the line to distinguish themselves, adding features like (in Pioneer's case) control of laser-disc players. The differences soon rendered the attempt at standardization moot, and the MSX standard fell from grace. And if you're wondering what MSX stands for, you'll have to choose from the three possibilities listed: I prefer "Matsushita Sony X, where X could stand for any other company."
Get a good look
The photographs dominate; they give external views of each machine from several angles, over two two-page spreads apiece. (The pictures are well-chosen, but not exhaustive: there are no shots from the underside, and in only a few cases are internals exposed. Don't expect to replicate the innards of an Altair from the photographs.) You can make out what sort of ports each device provided, see what kind of display it used in most cases, and look at the included input peripherals. (Many of these machines, though, were hooked to televisions, and only the main unit and its input devices are pictured.)Speaking of peripherals, one of the nice things about a photo book like this is for the mugshots it provides of unique physical arrangements tried by computer manufacturers: the integrated tape drive of the black-clad Amstrad CPC-464 (which sits to the right of the keyboard) makes it one of the most interesting to me; it sure is a lot neater arrangement than the cassette drive linked messily to the family C64 in the early '80s.
Besides the photographs, though, the spreads devoted to each computer provide a compact history of the machine, list its country of origin, and give a rundown of the most important specs (processor type and available I/O ports).
Practical Upshot
Digital Retro is a coffee-table book which happens to have quite a bit of interesting history, not a deep historical text. For each machine displayed, though, a chunk of text titled "What happened next" gives an idea of what developments each one led to (or prevented); some of these are only a paragraph or two, others are mini-essays in themselves. If you crave more technical and historical details, Laing's book makes an excellent companion volume to narrative-centric books which cover the same period of computer history though, like Fire in the Valley and Steven Levy's Hackers. It's a perfect way to appreciate the aesthetic appeal (and exuberant variety) of personal computers from the mid '70s to the late '80s.
You can purchase Digital Retro from bn.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews. To see your own review here, carefully read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.
I still use mine. Mostly I just make happy SID noises, and palette shifts.
-Jesse
Nothing says "unprofessional job" like wrinkles in your duct tape.
In the wilder days of the personal computer's adolescence, the quest for compatibility and standardization among machines was anything but a top priority -- and when it was a factor at all, it was usually about software compatibility between sibling computers (like the TI 99/4 and its 99/4A successor) or at most within a single model line.
You mean like Linux-vs-Windows executable formats on x86 processors?
Some of these old systems never loose their appeal... A few years back, about 4 if I recall, My boss asked me to find him a computer. He is a pioneering engineer type, never went to college, designs aircraft sensors with pen & paper... And wanted a single-line display handheld computer that took some BASIC variant for a programming language. A high tech toy from the early 1980's.
I found one on Ebay for like 5 bucks - He uses it almost daily. I guess if it works, you don't need to add features and soak up RAM.
Trying to use sarcasm in text-based forums does not work.
Every now and then I pick up my year 1 set of Byte Magazines and peek at the oldies but goodies, and the adds from the hopefuls. Those were the days, when Boys were Boys, and Women were- uh, well, if you were reading Byte Magazine you really had no idea what the hell Women were for. It was a real pity when the mag was essentially taken over by their advertising sales force, and died horribly.
that issue is probably the one thing that drove people to the ibm/msdos standard more than anything else. I remember cartoons around 1985 of a salesman showing a real kickass machine with a great price, sound, graphics, etc., to a customer and all the customer could ask was, "But is it PC compatible?".
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
They were fun when I had them but I dont miss them one little bit. ZX 81 with that crappy excuse for a keyboard, took forever to key anything in. A Sinclair Spectrum with a more usable keyboard but god forbid the ram pack should move when you were doing anything. The joy of saving to cassette tape, and the interesting gamble of trying to actually reload it. Even my Amstrad6128 with its monitor and build in disk still pale in comparrison to my first PC, an IBM 286 (assembled by Vickers Tankworks I believe because the case was so heavy). And then one of my old favourites, a lovely tidy Olivetti 386 I got on the cheap, still dont miss it though.
No thanks, I love my Inspiron 9100 now and will probably love my next machine even more.
Do not try to read the dupe, thats impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth
What truth?
There is no dupe
The GCE/MB Vectrex (June, 1982) -- the only video game system I really wanted as a kid, and one of the seeming few I've never encountered used in thrift stores. Bright vector graphics, built-in screen and a quality joystick gave it the same kind of appeal that the arcade-console versions of Asteroids and Battlezone had for me.
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sarchasm: The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it.
One of the things it mentioned was that the original Mac project was to produce a games machine, but that as time went on that altered and it became a general-purpose computer. However....look at the Vectrex pictures in the book, then look at the Mac. Interesting, isn't it? I'll have a dig now for some links, but for those who have the book you'll see one hell of a physical resemblance, particularly in profile. I wonder...Mac shape inspired by the Vectrex? I don't know, but stranger things have happened.
Cheers,
Ian
I have 2 Model 100s, one of which I have used as a Newton keyboard..but thats another story... Retro indeed! Last night I spent tinkering with a Apple IIgs. I wanted to get the beta Marinetti MacIP TCP/IP layer (check SourceForge) working through a Mac IIci running a router so I could use the GS to access the internet without need of a ethernet card or modem. It worked too.. I got on IRC briefly and used a telnet client to contact a service. There is no such THING as an obsloete system and besides: Apple II FOREVER!
- Minutus cantorum, minutus balorum, minutus carborata descendum pantorum.
wasn't even a computer, it was a calculator. I had one of these in high school and (stupidly) gave it away a few years later. Since then I've occasionally found myself online looking for one to replace it. It had application specific programming that allowed you to enter an algebraic formula like f=1/2*pi*r*c and it would prompt you for each variable, solving for the missing variable automatically. Only "macro" type programming (no branching) but its algebraic function was so powerful it didn't need anything more to solve some really complex problems.
I bought one of the rebranded Sharps from radio shack a few years later and it was nothing at all like the old machine. Such a simple device, but with functions I've never seen since.
The Sinclair Scientific http://www.vintagecalculators.com/html/sinclair___ the_pocket_calculat.htmlhere was my first calculator. It came as a kit, and it had a small-stack RPN scheme that required remembering numbers or writing down intermediate parts of calculations. I think it only had sine, so you had to get cosine by a root(1-sin**2). It had so little memory that values of e, ln(10), etc., were written on the case! (Hm, I wonder if this is why I remember ln(10) to this day, whereas my students have no clue about the value...)
I loved this little calculator, partly because it was so light compared to the fancy, expensive boxes the other kids had, but mainly because my Dad had given it to me. My heart ached when I looked up a picture of the little calculator, after reading this thread. This, I think, is why reminiscing about old technology is useful: it dredges up memories of simpler days in all our lives, when an infinity stretched before us on a path so bright and smooth.
I recycle old computers. My house overfloweth, my garage overfloweth, my warehouse overfloweth, my dad's garage overfloweth, etc..
You would not believe some of the Dino's I have. Some of the best stuff of "the glory days".
I have a genuine IBM XT 5160 with 640k, 10m "hardcard" and IBM color display. I keep it to play **OLD** Sierra games.
I really want to put it on my lan somehow so I can download games on demand from my big machines because of space on the 10m..
I've got other Dino's too. A few years ago I finally scrapped out my Burroughs B700 and my B730 mainframes. They had dual 15" removable hard disks of a whopping 5 megabytes each!
I fired up the B730 and my neighborhood went brown out just before my old time screw-in fuse box burst into flames... So much for that.
I gave all the cards to my dad so he could miser the gold out of them.
Seriously, it's SCARY the stuff that I have. If you want to walk through the past, my house is the place.
I pickup old computers and refurbish and repair them. Very few are not repairable.
I can install Damn Small Linux on even the oldest clunkers and turn them into usable internet terminals for people that don't want to or can't spend much money on a computer. We're talking cheap... (and to the smart-alecs that visit my website just to beat me up, ignore the prices, they are NOT valid, MOST of the stuff I get in I GIVE AWAY FOR FREE to my son's church.....)
Anyway, don't throw old computers away, fix them up and have some fun. I could crap when I see people gut out old computers and electronics and replace the insides with modern stuff. I was aghast when I saw what some moron had done to one of those cool ass old Predicta TV's a few months ago.
If you just can't stand looking at it anymore, send it to me but for god's sake, DON'T TRASH IT!