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Jack Tramiel, Founder of Commodore Business Machines, Dies At Age 83
LoTonah writes "Jack Tramiel, founder of Commodore Business Machines and later, the owner of Atari, died Easter Sunday. He was 83. He undoubtedly changed the computing landscape by bringing low cost computers to millions of people, and he started a price war that saw dozens of large companies leave the market. He also took a bankrupt Atari and managed to wring almost another decade out of it. The 6502 microprocessor would have withered on the vine if it weren't for Tramiel's support. Could anyone else have done all of that?"
Looking at every article and documentary on the late 70's and 80's computing scene these days, you would think that the only computers that existed were Apples and PC's out of Silicon Valley, and that everyone out there had $2,000 to spend on a new computer back when that was the price of a decent used car. But the most popular computer in the 80's wasn't a Mac, or a PC. Commodore was by far the most popular computer line of that era. And they made computers than didn't require a second mortgage for working-class people to buy. And they were EVERYWHERE (not just in the yuppie homes).
Not that you'll even find Commodore mentioned in The Pirates of Silicon Valley, or any other popular computing accounts about that time. You'd think everyone was going around back then just talking about IBM, Steve Jobs, and Bill Gates--when most people hadn't even *seen* a PC or Apple outside of a school or business.
What political party do you join when you don't like Bible-thumpers *or* hippies?
http://www.commodore.ca/history/people/1989_you_dont_know_jack.htm
seems he got around to do quite a lot.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
...than whoever the fuck that Mitch Wallance guy was from 60-minutes.
http://www.commodoreusa.net/CUSA_AMIGAmini.aspx .... The new AMIGA MINI comes with a 3.5 Ghz i-7 CPU, up to 16 GB RAM, GTX 430 GFX, 600 GB SSD, HDMI/DVI out and 8 USB ports. Sure, it isn't a real "AMIGA", but its cool that there is at least an "attempt" to put AMIGA branded computers back on the desktop.
Long live Commodore! And long live the C64 and Amiga 500! Good times...
Why did the chicken cross the road? Because Elon Musk put an AI chip in its head.
The computer that started my love, and now my career, was an Atari ST. I would spend hours watching demos, playing (probably pirated) video games, and experimenting with voice synthesizers, drawing, and music programs.
TOS ERROR #35 in heaven, Jack.
I owned both Atari and Amiga pcs, without them I'd have been trying to figure out a way to lug a crt and an acoustic coupler home. Thank you Jack.
Python: 'And then suddenly you have a language which says "we're all stuck with whatever the whiniest coder wants".'
Thomas Kinkade, Mike Wallace, and Jack Tramiel.
RIP.
Those are primarily PCs in generic cases with the Commodore and Amiga logos slapped on them. The only exception is the "Commodore 64" which has a custom molded case. Aside from that, they're all just generic PCs with a half baked Linux distro thrown in. And oh my god are they expensive.
Anyone would be much better off building themselves a computer or buying a Dell and loading Ubuntu if a Linux PC is what they're after.
http://xkcd.com/218/
for my childhood, thank you Jack.
Good people go to bed earlier.
That's an incredibly accurate way to describe the nonsensical way he ran that brand into the ground.
sig not found
Best game ever. RIP.
You want to know how to help your kids? LEAVE THEM THE F*&K ALONE. --George Carlin
I used my C64 almost exclusively for word processing It got me through college, plus I wrote a novel that was (justly) never published. The program was called SPEEDSCRIPT, and it took a little time to learn, but I've never seen a word processor for PC that was more powerful or more agile. The closest thing I know of today is probably emacs. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpeedScript
One thing that's particularly interesting about Jack Tramiel is that, unlike some of the other 70s tech entrepreneurs (Woz, say), he was really from a previous generation, not natively a computer guy. But, he managed to anticipate and succeed over several technological transitions. He immigrated to the U.S. after surviving a concentration camp during WW2, and started a reasonably successful typewriter company in the 50s. That successfully transitioned to mechanical calculators in the early 60s after the typewriter market started getting too competitive and low-margin, and then once transistors started becoming affordable, he digified that line and put out a line of digital calculators in the late 60s. In fact Commodore in effect put out the first Texas Instruments calculator, using commodity circuits sourced from TI, which TI only later realized they could assemble under their own label, resulting in the now-famous TI calculator line.
Then, finally, he anticipated the home-computing trend, with Commodore releasing its first design in 1977, the same year as the Apple II.
It's not very difficult to imagine an alternate history where Commodore was a typewriter company that had a brief adding-machine phase before completely missing the digital-computing wave and going bankrupt by 1980.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Guru Meditaiton # 81070000.00524950
Si hoc legere scis nimium eruditionis habes
>Could anyone else have done all of that?
Kevin Flynn.
If the Commodore 64 and the Atari 800 never existed, the Apple ][ would have simply been even more prevalent than it was, until the IBM PC would come on the market.
I can tell you unequivocally that being a supplier to both companies sucked big time. They never paid you. It got so bad that we (when I was a supplier to them) basically made any business with them COD because if you didn't you would never get your money. You may all love Jack but I couldn't stand doing business with them. Major PITA.
"TV, a medium as it is neither rare nor well done." Ernie Kovacs
Each succeeding generation of a consumer electronics product is sold at a lower price than its predecessor (this is in addition to having better performance and more features).
What can be sacrificed? Backward compatibility. Customers don't care (or at least they didn't, back in his day)
Just don't blow your fuse.
(Nobody will get this.)
"Never give up, for that is just the time and place when the tide will change." -Harriet Beecher Stowe ^_^
For it's name, at least, the name for the operating system on the Atari ST: T.ramiel O.perating S.ystem
Its an abomination if you ask me. And i was an Atari guy and didn't like Amiga.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
As far as I recall, that thing was designed and produced by MOS technology (which was sadly a one-hit wonder).
Thank you, Jack, for your significant and underappreciated contribution to the computing field. I and many others like me cut our teeth coding for the Commodore 64 and have since made our own valuable contributions. You will be missed.
SYS64738
The first computer I ever programmed or had in my home was a Commodore PET model 2001 computer. My father was a teacher taking an 8 week course in microcomputers and he was able to bring a PET home with him for the duration of the course. That was in 1978. A few years later, the first computer I ever owned was a Commodore 64. In high school computer science class we used Commodore PET model 4032 computers with Waterloo Structured BASIC, until I introduced the teacher to COMAL, which ran on the new Commodore 64s the school had just acquired.
If I can be modded down for being a troll, can I be modded up for being an orc, or a balrog?
No please. let it die. I love the C64, still got two on my desk, and I write software for the C64 and for emulator tools for it in my spare time. But it is over and done with. Either bring out a new computer with a new chip and new OS or bring out a linux box, but don't brand the linux box "commodore" or "amiga" because it is neither.
Did you price that so-called "Amiga"?
It's twice the price of a top end Mac Mini, a SFF computer that has similar enough specs that if you bump the Apple to the same specs, it's /still/ 500 bucks cheaper.
Just... no.
And it's not like you're getting an Amiga OS. You're getting Fuduntu with an emulator and a really gawd-awful skin.
--
BMO
Jack was a WWII Nazi concentration camp survivor who bore the scars of the numbers on his arms.
He was brutal in business. Jack was also very short (I'm not tall, but towered over him).
I've grown to consider all of those things about him before judgement of him. Basically, if it didn't
make money, forget about it (think Oracle).
I met him once (for about 12 seconds). He was very personable to me.
He's a part of computer history, now.
Rest in peace, Jack Tramiel, famed for "The Jack Attack."
The Commodore 64 truly was The People's Computer, like the Volkswagen "bug" was The People's Car.
At a time when an Apple //e cost $2500 for monitor, CPU, extra RAM (necessary), and two disk drives, you could walk out of the store with a full Commodore system for $350 and hook it up to an old TV.
This is why C64 culture was so vital: people took risks with their computers instead of treating them like business machines or expensive curiosities. Back in the BBS days, the Commodore boards were where it was at. Total anarchy zones. If the feds or feebs swooped in to confiscate them, one paycheck later they were up and operating again.
I hope Jack gets the recognition he deserves in the great beyond. With any luck, he's just finished sliding a whoopee cushion onto Steve Jobs' easy chair and is watching from behind a corner with a devilish grin.
Futurist Traditionalism
I have to agree. Having learned my craft during those early years, I recall the times well. Jack was hated by Commodore dealers, hated by users... and I don't doubt hated by his own employees. The way I see it, he basically sucked all the money he could out of a successful company and reinvested very little to keep the success rolling. They were never able to move past their 6502-based designs (the Amiga design was purchased).
I have to recommend this is an outstanding read: http://www.amazon.com/On-Edge-Spectacular-Rise-Commodore/dp/0973864907
Yes, this book details Jack purposefully not paying suppliers, nice to hear it repeated from someone first-hand. According to the book they made a point of not paying suppliers, especially if they were interested in acquiring the company. When the company was cash-strapped and desperate, Commodore would buy them out.
It made more money on the short-term, but was bad for the long-run because it burned bridges in the industry. This made it hard for Jack to get now-wary suppliers and dealers to help him grow his business when he saw an opportunity for a new market/device.
Man is the animal that laughs.
And occasionally whores for Karma.
The ST series could have been nice, but they made it and... did nothing. They never evolved it anywhere. Say what you will about the current OS players, but at least things are always evolving and growing as they duke it out.
I had an ST with the little box by David Small that turned it into a Mac. I used that for a year and then said WhyTF am I bothering with this hybrid monster and just got a Mac IIsi. I was pursuing my Master's degree at the time at USC, and they had amazing discounts for students an Apple stuff. Actually, on all stuff. I got Photoshop at 80% off.
Rather than spend $350 on a case containing a PC motherboard with no memory, no CPU, and no disk, I feel I'd get a much better "Amiga experience" by buying an Amiga Forever CD for $30 or so and running it on my existing machine.
Please stand clear of the doors, por favor mantenganse alejado de las puertas
> The 6502 microprocessor would have withered on the vine if it weren't for Tramiel's support
Uhh, what?
The Apple II came out before Atari's personal computers, and even before the Atari VCS (2600), which uses a 6507... As well as tons of other computers and other devices that use 6502 variants.
and had such an impact on lives of many a geek,
AMIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIGAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!! </scene reference>
But seriously, not it is not "cool that there is at least an "attempt"" to bring back the brand, with zero innovation besides a breadbox casemod. Note that all their other systems (including their "Amiga"s) are just cheap Chinese off-the-line volume machines available to anybody to throw their badge on it.
The 6502 has had a very sorted past and changed hands many time. It ended up with Bill Mensch and the Western Design Center (http://www.westerndesigncenter.com/wdc/WDC_Founder.cfm) I worked with Bill when I was at VLSI Technology as we were fabricating the 65C816 for the Apple IICS. Let's just say it was "interesting" and leave it at that. Bill had his own idea what fabrication design rules "should be". Actually checking the design rules of the foundry you wanted to fabricate your parts at was a detail that was beneath him. Made for lots of "fun"........
"TV, a medium as it is neither rare nor well done." Ernie Kovacs
The word on Jack was, "He's a great guy, and he'll pay you if he has to."
He bought Atari for a dollar down and a dollar when you catch me, 'cause Warner was a serious don't-wanter.
I don't think anyone with a softer nose could have kept Atari going, but let's remember him as he was, one tough sonovabitch.
It's funny how 50% of the posts in a thread about the founder of Commodore are nothing but bitching about Apple.
I never played with Commodore 64 or knew anyone who owned one. But I do remember Tramiel's holy war against the Amiga. After leaving Commodore he just went on the attack against his former company.
Let's give him some credit. Atari was totally fucked already when Tramiel bought it from Warners. He basically kept the company alive by selling old crap he found in the warehouse (7800, XE, 2600jr, etc). That the Atari ST was even released was a minor miracle, even though the system was a bit underwhelming.
Commodore Amiga had its own set of business issues way beyond what Atari was doing. (If anything he forced their hand to release the A500, which was the only Amiga which ever sold a damn.)
It's important to note that the Commodore 64 incorporated graphics support hardware (aka the first "graphics card") which helped make the computer much faster than it's CPU speed would indicate, especially for gaming.
You Sir, must stop talking out of your ass.
Actually, he is correct. The C-64 did have "graphics support hardware" beyond offering a bitmap that programmer could directly manipulate. The GP is only mistaken in that he characterized the hardware as being like a "graphics card". The specialized C64 graphics hardware supported 8 sprites. It was a very handy thing.
You could also consider the reprogrammable character set as such graphics hardware that sped up games. Various VIC-20 and C-64 games used this technique to good effect.
Back then the Apple II had swappable video cards.
Huh? *If* such cards existed they were certainly so rare that hardly anyone had them, a real niche thing. Are you thinking of the 80 column card? It added 64K RAM too but I don't recall this card enhancing graphics. My recollection as a former Apple II, //e, and C-64 programmer is that on the Apple II you had bitmapped graphics and that on the C-64 you also had bitmapped graphics, but it was better, plus specialized hardware support for sprites. The Apple was primitive in comparison.
I hate the smell of noobs in the morning, It smells like ignorance.
You might want to check that attitude if you yourself aren't remembering things quite correctly either.
I was pursuing my Master's degree at the time at USC, and they had amazing discounts for students an Apple stuff. Actually, on all stuff. I got Photoshop at 80% off.
I believe that's called "the drug dealer model."
I feel fantastic, and I'm still alive.
Geez, Tramiel didn't come to your house and force you to buy it at gunpoint. The world couldn't help you from being a dumbass Atari fanboi, so why blame him for smacking you back to reality?
Atari couldn't afford to take three years to design the next Amiga. They did great considering the time/money constraints.
I think I would blame Irving Goulde rather than Tramiel for sucking the money out. Tramiel wanted new designs, he wasn't afraid of trashing an architecture in order to move on.
Commodore had all sorts of 68000, 8080 and Z8000 designs (although most were co-processors to the 650x) that never saw the light of day. But because they saved so much money on using MOStek processors, they kept going back to that well. I think their biggest failures were not forcing MOStek to come up with the 65816 themselves.
Okay, I'm forced to agree with this. Atari did very little to upgrade the ST, and it pissed me off too.
Its a bit of a damned if you do, damned if you don't situation. It was always said that Atari didn't want to confuse users by having to pay attention to hardware specs when buying software, but the rest of the industry was doing just fine with that dilemma.
I would have killed for an expansion slot on the ST. A cheaper Mega ST. Anything. I did some crazy upgrades to my ST (Stereo sound, 4096 colour video expansion, 4Mb memory). I got a 20Mb hard drive (bought it from Bill Wilkinson himself). You shouldn't have to jump through the hoops that I did to expand a machine. I had the Magic Sac, then the Spectre 128, then the Spectre GCR.
But then Windows 3.0 came out, and I got a 286 with a mono VGA card, 2Mb RAM, and a 20Mb internal hard drive. That's when Atari stopped being my main computer.
Here's one of his worst offenses IMO:
Synapse software was the company behind such classics as Shamus and Blue Max. It's founder and president, Ihor Wolosenko, entered into an agreement with Atari (then Warner Communications) to develop a new suite of applications (SynCalc, SynTrend, SynStock, etc...) to replace Atari's aging line of productivity apps. Atari received palettes of finished product about the time Jack took over and he refused to pay Synapse or locate the merchandise. Ihor was now overextended and attempted to produce a 2nd run in Synapse packaging when Jack dumped the contents of Atari's warehouses on the market including Synapse's unpaid inventory. This put one of the most innovative game companies out of business and caused Ihor to leave the technology sector. But hey, at least we got a few more years of cheaply made computers with no support.
Jack's no hero to me.
Apple would simply have found another source.
I have a story to tell about Mr. Tramiel. He touched my life in such an obvious way, with such a hackable C64, and I got the chance to thank him in person for his vision.
I used to work in Silicon Valley. When I first went there, I had visions of rubbing elbows with personal computing luminaries like Jobs, Wozniak, Tramiel, and Bushnell. Let me tell you, working in a startup is not the way to make this happen. Of course, Nolan Bushnell doesn't live in Silicon Valley, and Steve Jobs was busy running Apple, so they got scratched off my list. I did get to meet Steve Wozniak, simply because I was in the right place at the right time. But Jack Tramiel was... well, someone I wanted to meet badly enough to track down myself.
I had heard he still lived near Silicon Valley, but it was only by sheer luck that I came across a way to contact him (which I won't share here). It was my last week to work before moving back east, and I worked up the courage to initiate contact with him. Immediately, I found out he was someone who valued what privacy he could get, so I had to explain why I wanted to meet him in person. He graciously agreed to meet me for Thursday lunch. That gave me two days to think about what I wanted to say to him, and to ask him.
Not that it mattered. I got there a little bit before he did, got shown to his customary booth, and started tripping over my own tongue as soon as he showed up. Any photos you've seen of him reflect exactly how he looked: somewhat rotund, mostly bald, clearly Jewish, and very contented with life. The ease with which he greeted me showed I wasn't the first 37-year-old Commodore fanboi he'd ever met.
We ordered our meals, and began to chat. I tried to present myself as respectfully as I could, but... really, this was Jack Tramiel, and I was having lunch with him! He explained right away that he had just come from the gym, he always ate there after his workout, and that's how the restaurant host knew where to seat me. He worked out three times a week, as a way to stay somewhat active, but he had a good life, he knew it, and it showed.
We talked about how he had learned what American business was about, and how he had learned about America. When I told him I was from Ohio, he piped up immediately with, "Ah, my favorite city is Toledo, Ohio. Even though I've never been there." I knew he was a Holocaust survivor, but I didn't know that an American from Toledo, Ohio was the first Allied soldier to greet him when the Ahlem labor camp was liberated. This soldier taught him to speak basic English, talking about Toledo, Ohio enough that it essentially became young Jacek's understanding of what city life in the USA was like.
We talked about Commodore Business Machines, and how the design evolved from the early PET, through the VIC-20, C-64, and C-128. He had wanted economical designs from the beginning of his involvement with computers, and his products reflected that. He bore no ill will towards IBM, Apple, or any of the other competitors. It was all business; life is too short for animosity on any level. As the fortunes of CBM varied through time, that philosophy made it easier for him to stand aside and let history take its course. (I've heard that from a few other Holocaust survivors as well.)
We also talked a little politics. I asked him what he thought about the conservative/liberal polemic, and his response was simple: The government governs a nation, but it's a nation of people. When a government prefers the nation over her citizens, they suffer as he suffered. He asserted that no form of government was completely immune to this hazard, but some are less suceptible to it.
I had a website that the time, and said something about what an incredible brag I would have for it. He demurred a little, and asked that I refrain from speaking publicly about having lunch with him, at least while he was alive. So I did.
The hour and a half I spent
That is not an Amiga. It's a badge-engineered PC running an OS that has nothing to do with the Amiga OS.
THIS is an Amiga. It's expensive as hell, not very fast, and severely niche. But at least it runs AmigaOS and can run old Amiga code directly. http://acube-systems.biz/index.php?page=hardware&pid=7
There are other models in the works - the AmigaOne X1000, for instance - but they're even more hideously expensive, and they're still in beta.
I knew Jack. I was on the short end of a couple of business deals with him and his companies. He could be a real b*****d in business.
He tried to push his sons into Commodore. The board pushed them, and him, out. His sons just didn't have the same business sense that he did. That led to his buying Atari from Warner Brothers. Atari was losing big money at the time; too many things in the pan and no focus on any of them. Jack discarded all of the current projects to build the ST. And stopped paying all the creditors he could in order to fund it. (Which is why I got the short end the first time. He didn't pay for the Syn-series software from Synapse. I moved back in with Mom and Dad since I didn't get paid for that work for about 3 years.) But he ended up with a very slick computer. With some flaws; just like every other system then and now.
He survived Auschwitz. I don't know if any of his family survived or if he was the only one. He was a very tough man after that. And did a lot for the computer industry. The C64 wasn't the greatest 8 bit system. It didn't have the best graphics or the fastest CPU (even among the 6502 systems). But it was good enough. And, most importantly, it was affordable. And he had the sales channels to put it everywhere; something Atari under Warner Brothers never did.
I remember using a Commodore Pet while in college. (It's now a university, things have changed in 35 years.) It was slow and limited. But you could have the whole thing to yourself. The DECsystem 10 was always busy; you could never get a terminal to log in. I learned a lot on that Pet.
RIP.
DLM (Author of Synfile+ and PaperClip/Atari)
The Magic SAC was pretty slick. Dave came up with a very clever idea. I wish I had joined him earlier instead of continuing my company. Instead I tried to keep it going and then shut it down and went to Bell Labs. So all the work I did on Magic SAC and Spectre was as a contractor. It was a lot of fun. (I'm typing this on my iMac. Though I've owned a lot of Windows systems too. Didn't go back to Macs till we started selling them CPUs.)
The STs issues weren't all due to Atari and Jack Tramiel. The OS was essentially a 68K port of DRDOS with GEM on top. Both had issues. They went out with some very noticeable bugs. Unfortunately, being in ROM meant they were very hard to fix. Every program disk would have to carry the patches. This was long before Flash became the OS memory of choice.
DR was too busy fighting MS to put the resources needed into Atari's OS. And, knowing Jack, I'm sure he wasn't handing them piles of cash for the work.
The world of the ST could have been very different. But the same can be said of many systems that are now gone. The Amiga was great. I still have 3 or 4. Along with a couple of STs. (Not sure if any of them will turn on. Haven't tried in a long time.)
Jack wasn't a perfect man. But he did achieve a lot. My obituary won't be on Slashdot. I'm sure most of the other posters won't either. Jack is. And that shows something about him.
DLM
Everyone seem to praise Jobs, which was arguably the best CEO in the IT business in the last decade, but Tramiels' legacy is impressive. He basically beat all offerings from Atari and Apple and managed to sell 17 *million* C-64s back in the eighties, which is mind boggling. His company paved the market for a real, usable and affordable home computer.
That little brown box opened a whole new world for me. Thank you Jack. You'll be missed.
READY. ...
Yeah, good memories. Thanks, Jack.
because he brought new technology to the populace by aiming to keep the price low by streamlining manufacturing; and selling gajillions of them.
Table-ized A.I.
According to the book, some speculate that the payment reputation is part of what doomed Atari when Jack took over because suppliers remembered being "hi-Jacked"*, and changed their contract/billing terms immediately.
Almost all legendary businessmen seem to have about 30% asshole in them. His penny-pinching spilled over the edges, just like Jobs' perfectionism and idealism created annoying side-effects, including possibly his death.
* Not sure of the exact phrase
Table-ized A.I.
My family couldn't afford a Mac, but could manage a 'Jackintosh' -- a 520ST with a single-sided floppy drive and a monochrome monitor. Sure, it wasn't as fancy as a Mac, but neither is a Toyota Corolla as fancy as a Ferrari. It had a mouse-driven GUI, didn't need a bunch of disks just to get to the desktop, could play some pretty cool games -- even in monochrome mode (Bolo anyone?) -- could use a standard printer, and the floppies were PC-compatible!
In terms of business, gaming and design and music, the ST was a really cheap way to touch on all of these when no other contemporary computer could, at an even-remotely similar price-point. Amiga for business? Yeah, right. Macintosh for home gaming? Not that inspiring, Dark Castle notwithstanding. PC for design? Bleah. Never mind MIDI. You can't really argue with the ST's flexibility -- and it was remarkably easy to sell the idea of buying one to parents who already felt burned when they discovered too late that using that 8-bit computer you talked them into had an extremely steep learning curve when it came to business and productivity applications.
The ST's only real failing was it wasn't marketed particularly well. Had Jack been willing to lift prices to cover advertising costs I expect that it would have done much better, but he seems to have always had a bit of a personal philosophy on that matter that in retrospect was perhaps a little naive.
Regardless, were it not for the ST I probably wouldn't have had a 16-bit computer until several years later. Thanks Jack.
My first experience of a proper Microcomputer was a Commodore PET at a wargaming convention. After that I got interested in what computers could do and have had a career of over 25 years in Computing as a result. I also bought an Atari ST which I used for several years.
Thank you, Jack, for your contribution to my life. You are one of the few people who I can genuinely say will be missed with thanks and gratitude.
Donte Alistair Anderson Roberts - hi son!
Karma: Chameleon
My wife dug up my old C-64 from that storage room in my mom's old house just a couple of weeks ago, and now the first real computer I ever owned now sits in my garage, along with the 1541 disk drive. I don't know if she also managed to dig up all the old cables that came with it so I can turn it on again for old times' sake. I have to wonder if it still works: that thing has been in storage for more than 20 years, and not in the best of conditions. That machine gave me my start in life in the world of computing, and I remember fondly the days of PEEKing and POKEing machine language opcodes from a photocopied 6502/6510 reference manual I managed to dig up from a shop somewhere (after having convinced my parents to pay a not insignificant sum for it). It's part of what made me what I am today, and I'm not like to forget it.
Well Jack, I'd like to thank you for that bit of hardware that gave me and a million other geeks the start of their lives today.
Qu'on me donne six lignes écrites de la main du plus honnête homme, j'y trouverai de quoi le faire pendre.
Yup. It's about as cool as those C= branded MP3 players some years ago.
The C= brand is dead and buried. Some lowlife scum just keeps digging it up and raping it in the arse.
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
10 POKE 53280,0: POKE 53281,0
RUN
Without this man, I probably wouldn't have been able to have a computer at such an early age. Also, for anyone who doubts the mighty C=64, please take a look at some of the demos that are STILL being made for it. There's some amazing stuff out there. Thanks to my little C=1600 VICMODEM and a rotary phone, I was exposed to remote computer networking at an early age. 300 Baud with manual dialing was rough, but I would dial a BBS's number for an hour straight (manually on a rotary phone) to get through. When I finally got a 1670, things got crazy. If you were there for it, you know what I mean.
Rest in peace...
£8r,
((THE MANIAC))
I'd have known a lot less about computers -- since the built-in decompiler came in handy when "compatibility" with C64 programs meant you had to recode because they moved the video addresses, among other things. I guess sometimes the best master is the one who throws you down a well and makes you find your own way out.
Some days I miss my old Atari 800 computer, with the 32MB ram
32MB? Yeah, *you* wish! Would've made one *heck* of a RAM disk, but you'd still have had to bank-switch it in 16KB chunks into the 6502's 64KB address space ;-)
"Slashdot - News and Chat Sites Deviant". (Click "homepage" link above for details).
Note that all their other systems (including their "Amiga"s) are just cheap Chinese off-the-line volume machines available to anybody to throw their badge on it.
Oh yes- I remember those same guys selling what appeared to be generic HTPC cases with absolutely *no* Amiga connection using the "classic" Amiga model numbers (e.g. A1000, A500, etc.)
And the clusterf*** that is the Amiga rights is shown up by the fact that they're selling a computer with the "Commodore" and "Amiga" badges on it, that has nothing to do with that line otherwise, yet different companies are selling the "real" successor to the Amiga, running Amiga OS4.0.
Except that even those Amigas aren't (AFAIK) directly compatible with the old Amigas, and they're basically just overpriced hardware that's been made to a proprietary design solely so they can monetise the latest Amiga OS (which is what people are really paying for), and possibly so the rabid hardcore buyers that it's meant to exploit can feel good that they haven't wasted all that money on a generic PC. Even though it would probably have been better to have the new Amiga OS run on masses-of-bang-per-buck commodity Wintel-compatible hardware instead.
But back to the point- the latter machines are sold under the "AmigaOne" name, apparently they don't have the rights to call it plain "Amiga", yet some generic name-exploiting toss gets to use it(!)
"Slashdot - News and Chat Sites Deviant". (Click "homepage" link above for details).
Well, I'm in the libertarian camp on drugs. ;-)
Read the racist article in question. It starts out only very mildly racist (this is the "I'm totally not racist, but" section) and then once he gets to the numbered points, turns into a rocket-propelled rush to the top of Racist Mountain. Worth a read for entertainment value, your jaw will hit the floor at some of these points.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
We're in agreement there. The issue I was referring to is the market saturation by dumping. Which we accuse China of, and levy huge tariffs. Why we don't on e.g. Microsoft/Adobe when they dump their products on our children, I'm not so sure.
I feel fantastic, and I'm still alive.