Vintage computer collecting

[danemodsandy]

P.S.:

The laptop has a fresh load of Win 95 on it, but I have not taken the time to install all the VGA and sound card drivers, etc. Those diskettes ARE included, and anyone who's a collector should have no difficulty finishing the setup. I just don't have the time to go all the way through the process.

Now, who's your daddy, laptop?

 

[alanlendaro]

Confidential to autowasherfreak ....

Does everyone remember those little tidbits at the bottom of the old Ann Landers columns. Never the full letter, just a short, pithy answer for the person. Thought it would be fun to use now.

Anyway, here is a scan of the front page of a promo piece for the Xerox 800. It's a really neat machine - haven't powered it up in years. Its in storage in my mom's attic. Was a bit tempermental at times, I think the tape heads were worn. Used a print wheel instead of the Selectric element and could reach 350wpm playback speeds. Had proportional spacing, along with 10 and 12 pitch and lots of typestyles on printwheels. Also did full automatic full justification of text and had pretty good line editing capability - no display at all so you had to know what you were doing. Years ago I could make it do all sorts of cool stuff.

 

[redcarpetdrew]

Anyone ever hear of a Franklin Ace 1000? Guaranteed to be 99.999% compatible with all Apple software. Of course that was due to them copying Apple's autostart rom among other things... They got sued out of existence and I ended up with a orphan. I couldn't run Prodos on a Franklin as Prodos asked the computer what it was. Anything other than 'Apple' and it would freeze. Thank goodness for the Apple User's Group! I obtained a chip to put in my Franklin that told Prodos it was a 'Apple' and Bingo!

I want to find a Commodore PET or a CBM (the PET with a built in cassette drive for the business community...)

RCD

 

[jeffg]

I know the Franklin, but by that time (82-ish) I was working on Data General minis (Novas, Eclipses etc). My boss had written an accounting software suite in Fortran that ran on the DG's, with huge 300MB disk packs. We used to play Zork on them after work hours..

"You are in a maze of twisty passages, all alike."

 

[whirlcool]

I remember the Commodore Pet with the built in floppy drives. They were sold around 1980 or so. They sold quite a few of those, I am sure you'll come around one if you are patient.

Here is a website you may all enjoy. You can find information on just about any vintage computer ever made in the world.

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www.old-computers.com

 

[alr2903]

Oh child, we update every every five years sometimes sooner if lightning helps us out We just are not tech savvvy, just enough to get by. But i am glad to see some are preserving "old school", fits right in with this forum, preservation. Good for you alr2903

 

[autowasherfreak]

The Xerox 800 almost looks like a Selectric. I have IBM Model 85 typewriter that has storage and no display and to make corrections you have to have it in store mode, then play (print) the document and stop it just before or right after the error and then make the corrections. If the power goes off all documents are lost. I have IBM Model 95, that has battery backup, but the motor died on it.

The 800 looks fun!

 

[jasonl]

For the Zork fans

Epic nerdcore by MC Frontalot
<object width=250 height=40> <param name=movie value=http://listen.grooveshark.com/songWidget.swf></param> <param name=wmode value=window></param> <param name=allowScriptAccess value=always></param> <param name=flashvars value=hostname=cowbell.grooveshark.com&widgetID=14533241&style=metal&p=0></param> <embed src=http://listen.grooveshark.com/songWidget.swf type=application/x-shockwave-flash width=250 height=40 flashvars=hostname=cowbell.grooveshark.com&widgetID=14533241&style=metal&p=0 allowScriptAccess=always wmode=window></embed></object>

 

[danemodsandy]

Laptop Is Gone...

...Someone laid claim to it today. Thanks everyone!

 

[rocketwarrior]

Vic-20

In the early 80's I was operating my business with a C-64 for awhile (and I also had a C-64 portable with color screen). But, get this, I was my own Sysop on a bulletin board called the LABB which operated on a Vic-20.

In those days, programmers wrote lean.

 

[j2400]

I have many old computers. The odd thing is that unlike some I still use old technology for doing some tasks, like heavy duty word processing or what little page layout I do. I like the older software I have--it has all the features I actually need. A lot of modern software seems to have features added for no reason but to sell new versions. These features have a way of making the software slower, more complicated, and overall a big pain in the neck.

Plus, an older computer isn't as usable on the Internet, which eliminates one distraction when doing "real work!"

 

[autowasherfreak]

I like to use my Apple IIe's and my typewriters because there are not interruptions from e-mail and so forth.

 

[mpatoray]

I am going to try and work on some more of my vintage computers, I am going to try and get my Macintosh Quadra 950 running using A/UX 3.1 I will post pictures this weekend.

 

[j2400]

This thread inspired me to dig out my old Apple IIc Plus. I got it out of sentiment--Apple II series were among the first computers I ever used. This IIc Plus appears to work, although I haven't really done anything with it. One of these days....

The picture shows the computer, and an external 5 1/4" disk drive. A 5 1/4" data disk I used many, many years ago on an Apple IIe is pictured, too. The yellow thing is a protection sheet that was put into the internal floppy drive during transit. I remember hearing about those, but never saw one until this IIc Plus.

 

[mpatoray]

A Youtube video I posted of my Apple IIgs running "Music Studio 2.0" by Activision. The IIgs has 1.25 MB ram, and the program was ran off of the 2 800k 3.5" floppy drives.

The video was captured out of the composite output on the IIgs, and the audio was from the Headphone out(which is why it is a little noisy)

 

[roto204]

Wow

That Xerox system is cool. I scored an IBM MagCard/A system from a local library, but without any MagCards, was at a loss for what it could/should do. A massive, inch-and-a-quarter thick bundled cable connected what looked like a normal Selectric III to the unit--did it do something similar to the Xerox system?

 

[roto204]

Pic

Grainy, but here it is from another site:

 

[sudsmaster]

Still have my first computer - a Leading Edge Model M. With dot matrix printer, and CGA color monitor, it set me back $3000 in 1984... but it was instrumental in leading me to a new career in the IT world... which lasted about 15 years.

Some time later I started building my own systems, starting with 386 motherboards and then up to the most recent, a Pentium 4 machine with Nvidia graphics card. Have a Pentium Dual Core motherboard, processor, and chassis waiting for me to build it up as well, but am in no big hurry.

I built a lot of Novell file servers, and still have all of the ones I created for my home lab, as well as a Linux system that was fun for a while until it decided it would no longer talk to my monitor ;-).

 

[autowasherfreak]

I have a couple of IIc clones, but no monitors for them with the built in 5 1/4" floppy drive.

Every once and a while you can find IBM Mag Cards on eBay. The typewriter units for the Mag Card were Selectric II's the III's came out in the early 80's.

A friend of mine from one the typewriter groups has a IBM MC/ST but the card unit doesn't work. I would really like to get my hands on a IBM MC Composer.

 

[twintubdexter]

you gotta be an old coot to remember this

The company I worked for briefly in the early 1980's had a small computer store on Maiden Lane in San Francisco that I managed for awhile. They carried the entire Hewlett Packard line of calculators. This was pretty much HP's entry in PC market, the HP-85. It used these little data tapes and had a built-in thermal printer. Only the wealthy could afford one, the price was over $3,000. You see one pop up for sale now and then.

I moved to Cupertino (sort of a San Jose suburb) and remember several of my friends, fairly unskilled people with high school educations, working at HP in assembly making 3 times as much money as me and getting 10 times the benefits along with HP stock options...grrrrrrrrrr.