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Owner of the Oldest Working Computer
Posted: 2003-02-18 07:57pm
by Defiant
We've already seen what everyone's first computer was. Now, who has the oldest WORKING computer?
I'll start with my Apple IIe (circa 1983) with two 5.25 floppy drives and the cheesy amber monitor. Screams with a whopping 128kb of memory
Posted: 2003-02-18 08:18pm
by ArmorPierce
well that's about 15 years older than the oldest computer that I still have at hand.
Posted: 2003-02-18 08:24pm
by Exonerate
Ahh... I remember the good old days when the university had 4kb of space set aside for every user, and even *gasp* 6kb if you were good. Back then, we had to stick the telephone right next to the modem so it could send and recieve signals, and images would take literally hours to load.
Err, I'm not actually that old, but this is what my History Teacher says... Most of you guys probably have computers older than me. I can remember my dad's old Apple...
Re: Owner of the Oldest Working Computer
Posted: 2003-02-18 08:24pm
by GrandMasterTerwynn
Defiant wrote:We've already seen what everyone's first computer was. Now, who has the oldest WORKING computer?
I'll start with my Apple IIe (circa 1983) with two 5.25 floppy drives and the cheesy amber monitor. Screams with a whopping 128kb of memory
Currently in my garage is a perfectly functional IBM PC Portable. This is an IBM PC-XT with a little integrated monochrome monitor and a handle. (Hence, portable.) It has a 20 MB hard disk, a 5.25" FDD (360K I think, unless we took it up to 1.2M) and a 286 processor running at 10 MHz (The original processor was an 8088 at 4.77 MHz, but not anymore thanks to an expansion card.)
Posted: 2003-02-18 08:33pm
by GrandMasterTerwynn
Exonerate wrote:Ahh... I remember the good old days when the university had 4kb of space set aside for every user, and even *gasp* 6kb if you were good. Back then, we had to stick the telephone right next to the modem so it could send and recieve signals, and images would take literally hours to load.
Err, I'm not actually that old, but this is what my History Teacher says... Most of you guys probably have computers older than me. I can remember my dad's old Apple...
Ahhh, acoustic modems. Average speed of 100 to 300 baud. (Or less than 0.3 Kbps for you young'uns. Typical dialup nowadays is 56 Kbps.) And images, forget about images. The best you'd do for right up to about the 90s was text. (Modem speeds up through the mid 90s never exceeded 9600 baud (9.6 kpbs,) and the typical modem was something like 2400 baud.)
<edit>
And Apple? Pshh, that's not too old. What's old is the old Commodore 64 we used to have. Pretty slick stuff for a system that had 64 kilobytes of RAM, and an 8-bit 6502 processor that had an incredible 0.6 MHz clock speed.
</edit>
Re: Owner of the Oldest Working Computer
Posted: 2003-02-18 08:34pm
by Defiant
Defiant wrote:I'll start with my Apple IIe (circa 1983) with two 5.25 floppy drives and the cheesy amber monitor. Screams with a whopping 128kb of memory
Oh, and I got this computer as a X-mas gift when I was 13, so I'm not that old!!
Posted: 2003-02-18 08:34pm
by Montcalm
The oldest one we have here is an old commodore vic-20 for those who don`t know what it is this thing hooks up on the tv.
Re: Owner of the Oldest Working Computer
Posted: 2003-02-18 08:34pm
by Exonerate
Defiant wrote:Defiant wrote:I'll start with my Apple IIe (circa 1983) with two 5.25 floppy drives and the cheesy amber monitor. Screams with a whopping 128kb of memory
Oh, and I got this computer as a X-mas gift when I was 13, so I'm not that old!!
Wait... That means you're, what, 30?
Not that old? Everybody point and laugh!
Posted: 2003-02-18 08:49pm
by Dalton
Mmm...we have an old Gateway from 1992 I think...though for years before that my mom used to bring home an Apple ][e from the school library for the summer.
Posted: 2003-02-18 08:52pm
by salm
i´ve got a 286 at home. i think it still works.
Posted: 2003-02-18 09:07pm
by Wicked Pilot
Does my origional Nintendo count?
Posted: 2003-02-18 09:19pm
by Mr Bean
I have an Apple II-working, One "Hobbest" computer desigened around the 8008 Intel Chip if I remeber right, Its earily 80s anyway
I had a Commondore but it got lost in one of my many moves
Posted: 2003-02-18 09:29pm
by TrailerParkJawa
I have a functional Commodore 64 in my closet. Along with the 5 1/4" hard drive. Load "*",8,1
Posted: 2003-02-18 09:33pm
by The Dark
Wicked Pilot wrote:Does my origional Nintendo count?
Until I came here I was the only person I knew who still had a working NES front-loader. There're a few of the second gen top-loaders they made, but mine's from Christmas of '86. Still have the SMB/DH cart, and about 30 others. I still play it from time to time, and have a working Zapper (darn thing's indestructable...I don't know how many times I've dropped it on cement floors, and it still fires). I also have the "illegal" Pac-Man cartridge produced by Tengen.
As for computers, my family was slow to get into the PC. The first one we had was a 386. I remember the Tandy computers from Elementary School, though, with the original Oregon Trail
.
Posted: 2003-02-18 10:04pm
by Kelly Antilles
We have an Atari 1200XL (yes, it's a computer that still works) that my husband got for christmas in 1983.
Also have an original Atari 2600 that still works too.
Posted: 2003-02-18 10:10pm
by irishmick79
I've got an old gateway Pentium. Maybe 15 gigs of memory, and a prossesor that can't even hack running Rebellion.
Posted: 2003-02-19 02:23am
by Drewcifer
GrandMasterTerwynn wrote:Ahhh, acoustic modems. Average speed of 100 to 300 baud. (Or less than 0.3 Kbps for you young'uns. Typical dialup nowadays is 56 Kbps.) And images, forget about images. The best you'd do for right up to about the 90s was text. (Modem speeds up through the mid 90s never exceeded 9600 baud (9.6 kpbs,) and the typical modem was something like 2400 baud.)
Wow, that brings back some memories. My dad and I used to play
Adventure! on Compuserve, using a dumb terminal that was a keyboard, a thermal printer, and an intergrated accoustic modem with those phone earpiece couplers on the back. You had to pick up the phone, dial the server yourself, and when the chirps started, you shoved the phone snugly down into the couplers. Eventually, the printer spit out: Login?
You are standing at the end of a road before a small brick building...
Posted: 2003-02-19 02:52am
by Hyperion
Currently in posession of a 100% operational Tandy 102.
Re: Owner of the Oldest Working Computer
Posted: 2003-02-19 03:55am
by jegs2
Defiant wrote:We've already seen what everyone's first computer was. Now, who has the oldest WORKING computer?
I'll start with my Apple IIe (circa 1983) with two 5.25 floppy drives and the cheesy amber monitor. Screams with a whopping 128kb of memory
I've got a
Timex Sinclair 2068 personal color computer, with a Z80A processor (clocked at 3.57 MHz) and 48K of RAM. The TS2068 was manufactured in 83. The only disk drives available for the system were either aftermarket or homemade (used cassette tapes & cartridges for programs).
Posted: 2003-02-19 04:42am
by Boba Fett
Montcalm wrote:The oldest one we have here is an old commodore vic-20 for those who don`t know what it is this thing hooks up on the tv.
Hehehe...
I still have one Commodore-16 and a Commodore-64.
All in perfect condition.
Do you remember that for these machines you could use magnetophon tapes to store programs?
Posted: 2003-02-19 04:44am
by Darth Fanboy
Etch a Sketch
Posted: 2003-02-19 04:46am
by Boba Fett
TrailerParkJawa wrote:I have a functional Commodore 64 in my closet. Along with the 5 1/4" hard drive. Load "*",8,1
"syntax error"
Does it look familiar?
Posted: 2003-02-19 04:48am
by Crayz9000
irishmick79 wrote:I've got an old gateway Pentium. Maybe 15 gigs of memory, and a prossesor that can't even hack running Rebellion.
LMAO... 15 gigs of memory is quite enough to run *anything* out there
Posted: 2003-02-19 07:24am
by Montcalm
Boba Fett wrote:Montcalm wrote:The oldest one we have here is an old commodore vic-20 for those who don`t know what it is this thing hooks up on the tv.
Hehehe...
I still have one Commodore-16 and a Commodore-64.
All in perfect condition.
Do you remember that for these machines you could use magnetophon tapes to store programs?
Yes we have that.
Posted: 2003-02-19 08:30am
by RadiO
8000-series Commodore PET, which I got for a tenner a few years ago.