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In the beginning…

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Re: In the beginning…

Postby B25 » Fri Dec 15, 2017 9:00 pm

My first computer was the Sinclair ZX81 with a whooping 1k of ram. I paid 69.95 for it probably before 1980, can't remember when. I also bout a 16k ram pack for 49.95. And like GR proceeded to type in those demo programs. No monitor or H/D, and a membrane K/B. It had 'blocky' characters, space invaders was great though.

When I wen to Uni, I bout a Commodore PET with double H/Ds cost me about 1600 quid, soon got rid of it, sold it back to the shop for much less and moved on to the BBC Micro. A fantastic pc and well ahead of it's time.
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Re: In the beginning…

Postby Get Real! » Fri Dec 15, 2017 10:30 pm

B25 wrote:My first computer was the Sinclair ZX81 with a whooping 1k of ram. I paid 69.95 for it probably before 1980, can't remember when. I also bout a 16k ram pack for 49.95. And like GR proceeded to type in those demo programs. No monitor or H/D, and a membrane K/B. It had 'blocky' characters, space invaders was great though.

When I wen to Uni, I bout a Commodore PET with double H/Ds cost me about 1600 quid, soon got rid of it, sold it back to the shop for much less and moved on to the BBC Micro. A fantastic pc and well ahead of it's time.

:shock: Whoa... who would've known all that about B25! :)
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Re: In the beginning…

Postby Cap » Fri Dec 15, 2017 11:58 pm

Commodore 64....
Crikey that was a long time ago.
They called graphics 'Sprites' using Basic programming language.

for it's time it was pretty fun stuff.
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Re: In the beginning…

Postby Get Real! » Sat Dec 16, 2017 1:22 am

Cap wrote:Commodore 64....
Crikey that was a long time ago.
They called graphics 'Sprites' using Basic programming language.

for it's time it was pretty fun stuff.

A commodore 64? :? I had you down as a lot younger than us Cap… what’s going on here? Was that picture you posted of yourself some years ago taken in 1970? :lol:
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Re: In the beginning…

Postby Londonrake » Sat Dec 16, 2017 11:19 am

Dragon 32. It had twice the memory of its competitors. Endless cassette loading of things like text games. "In the corner of the room is a chair. On the chair you can see a book and a key". Input - walk to chair - pick up book - open book "On the first page of the book it says........................ :D

Then upgrading to an Atari STFM with a colossal 520 memory. Lusting though after the completely unaffordable Commodore Amiga. :(
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Re: In the beginning…

Postby RichardB » Sat Dec 16, 2017 2:00 pm

Think my first one was a spectrum around 1984. Spent hours programming to get a union jack appear on screen with a few bits missing. If I remember right it also had a programme where you could calculate the number of rabbits breeding or something?? WTF Was that about?
Didn't bother again until tinterweb became readily accessible must have been around 1993, Remember thinking 'why don't the pics download from the bottom up instead of top to bottom, then we could see the bits we wanted to see a lot quicker!!'
Think that one was an early pentium processor
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Re: In the beginning…

Postby Get Real! » Sat Dec 16, 2017 2:27 pm

RichardB wrote:Think my first one was a spectrum around 1984.

You sure it wasn't an ENIAC in 1950? :lol:
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Re: In the beginning…

Postby RichardB » Sat Dec 16, 2017 2:34 pm

Get Real! wrote:
RichardB wrote:Think my first one was a spectrum around 1984.

You sure it wasn't an ENIAC in 1950? :lol:


Ouch unfair that
. I knew I should keep away from any thread to do with I.T
Hope you and yours are all well
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Re: In the beginning…

Postby Robin Hood » Sat Dec 16, 2017 4:09 pm

Whilst you children were playing with the first Home Computers, the BBC and The Spectrum, that my early teen children were playing with, I was well into applying their forerunners on industrial applications like process/machine control and safety/shut down systems.

It shows why I don’t have the knowledge I should have ......although I could design system using relays/logic blocks..... writing the ‘software’ for the later programmable electronic devices was done by others and was a different skill set. All I did was to configure it to industrial control systems by using what you would now call a browser ...... a very crude browser. It presented the available functions and I/O status on a visual interface, usually a black/white or black/green 4"/6" CRT monitor ..... it didn't even have a mouse or a qwerty keyboard. I only needed to know what this ‘thing’ would do and it’s limitations and apply it to something that I did know how it worked.

I never needed to know how it did what it did! But then I am going back to the early 60’s! I doubt you could do what I could do then and I certainly couldn’t do what you can do now .......... I don’t even know what you lot are talking about a lot of the time. :roll: :wink: :D
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Re: In the beginning…

Postby RichardB » Sat Dec 16, 2017 4:40 pm

I don’t even know what you lot are talking about a lot of the time.   


RH , when GR and Sotos start talking computers I don't know what they are talking about ANY Of the time :lol:
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