Memory Lane - Computers - Coleco Adam

[imoldernu]

I happened across a story about The 1983-1985 Coleco Adam, and spent several hours recalling when my company tried to sell it. The Wiki article about the "Adam" is fascinating. Bought one for my kids, and just got rid of it last year.

In any case, this link is to a very detailed history of computers going back to the 1970's.

Coleco Adam computer

The "menu" page brought back memories of other early-on machines, that I either owned or used in my business. Apple 1, Apple 2, Commodore 64.... all in the '70's.

Unfortunately, no memory of the operating systems, though I think I was pretty good with "DOS".

So I grew up with the early models commonly used by the public...Your experience was probably different. How far back do you remember? Did you own any of the machines shown in the "oldcomputers" index pages?

The other part of this that I'm digging in to, is the briefcase "FAX" machine that I used to keep in touch with the home office when I was visiting my district....Connect by landline phone/FAX to forward detailed reports... same day.

Hmmm... 40+ years ago.

 

[aja8888]

My first computer was an Apple 2E. I added a color card, color monitor and extra floppy drive. I guess I spent near $3K on that machine and ended up giving it to the local elementary school years later.

I also had a dot matrix printer that cost about $400!

 

[jim584672]

Timex Sinclair 1000 with 2k memory. Hook to the TV with a cassette recorder for the programs.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timex_Sinclair_1000

 

[Red Badger]

C-64 in the early 80's. Here's a thread that I kicked off on same(ish) topic. My early adoption of technology was a catalyst to my career.

http://www.early-retirement.org/forums/f27/entering-the-big-bad-bit-barn-90424.html

 

[RobbieB]

My first was an Olivetti M10.

 

[easysurfer]

Timex Sinclair 1000 with 2k memory. Hook to the TV with a cassette recorder for the programs.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timex_Sinclair_1000

Same here. Brings back memories. The cassette recorder that may or may not work when trying to save a program .

 

[aja8888]

Even before my Apple 2E purchase in the early 1980's, I learned Fortran programming in college (early 1970s) and wrote some programs to cut gear teeth and calculate I-Beam load forces (ME student). I cut the cards on that IBM machine and ran the programs. Those disk drives were as large at 18"pizzas!

 

[jimbee]

Timex Sinclair 1000 with 2k memory. Hook to the TV with a cassette recorder for the programs.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timex_Sinclair_1000

That was my first home computer too. After a couple of months i sold it and bought a TI 99/4A. A couple of years after that I bought a Commodore 64. A couple of more years and I bought a Commodore Amiga. And another Amiga. And another Amiga.

 

[Jerry1]

My first one was the TI-99. Then I moved up to a TRS-80 (Radio Shack “trash” 80). I think it had 64K of memory and dual floppy drives. I think it was about $1,200. Amazing the change in computers. Just bought my dad a Chromebook for $229.

 

[Ronstar]

I can’t remember the name of my first work computer. Around 1975, it stored data on magnetic strip cards. The thing was about worthless, required constant changing of of the cards. I did most of my computations in the mid 1970’s using hp calculators.

Graduated to a Wang computer in the late 1970’s. It connected to a pen plotter that could prepare part of a civil engineering plan in about an hour. Then needed to be finished by hand.

Switched companies in 1981 and used an HP85 for a few years. Then moved into IBM, HP and Dell pc’s through the rest of my work career.

At home I started with an Apple IIe, then IBM, HP, and Dell pc’s before switching to Macs in 2005.

 

[Souschef]

My first was a "luggable" with a 7 inch hi res screen that I bought in 1986. It was a Cordata. It ran DOS at 4.7 MHz and had 640K of memory. I added a Western Digital 20 MB Hard Card to save programs like Lotus 123. It had 2 5-1/4 in floppy disk drives.
My first experience with computers was in 1964 when I wrote programs in BASIC to run on an IBM 1620. Subsequent to that in 1968 I ran programs on a GE Tymeshare teletypewriter using punched paper tape for input.

 

[HFWR]

My older brother had a “box” that, as far as I remember, was only good for playing an ascii-graphics “Star Trek” game.

I learned BASIC and FORTRAN on a dumb terminal connected to a mainframe at U of L.

My first computer was a TI-99/4a, followed by a Tandy T1000...

 

[MikeWillRetire]

I had the TI-99, connected to a tv. I used it to write BASIC programs for some civil engineering work. 64k of memory! Then I would save the programs on my cassette player. Good memories.

 

[charais]

I love remembering old technology! We had an Atari 1040 ST, bought it in Seattle in the early 1980's. Quite the machine back in the day! We bought an IBM desktop with a cool amber screen for $5000 in mid 1980's. Then we got a Gateway Desktop in early 90's and it was $6000! Top of the line at the time. Worked great until I did a "regedit" and accidentally wiped it clean. Oops. DOS was dangerous! lol When I was an intern in the 70's I remember the "super computer" that took up a huge amount of space and had to have special A/C to keep it running cool. Now my smartphone probably has more capacity and capability. Amazing the changes we've seen!

 

[Car-Guy]

My first computer was a Vic 20. I still have it and it still works. Still have my original Atari too with about 10 game cartridges and it still works too. All from back in the late 70's.

My first "practical" computer back in the early 80's was a dual 5 & 1/4 floppy model with a monochome monitor and 256k of ram. I upgraded it about a year later to 640k of ram and a 10 meg hard drive. The next year I finally got a CGA color monitor.

I also still have a couple of big boxes of old computer parts too. Floppy drives, (8's, 5 1/4's and 3.5's) various HD's, keyboards, cables, etc... They'll probably all go the the dump on the next downsizing...

 

[FI_RElater]

I remember someone at my first job (in the 70's) having the luggable Sinclair (in the aluminum case); my early stuff was on a PDP-8, but I used a Wang for word processing (the old 8" floppy) and it was a pain since you needed to include all your formatting in the beginning (tabs, etc for tables, and any fonts or special characters). Don't forget the need to "repack" your disks (RL-02's) or on the real old systems the need for the "bootstrap code" prior to loading the operating system. Ah, the "old days"...

 

[MRG]

I started in trade school in 1983 on a comadore 64 writing basic code. I hated it, too much FM happened and it made zero sense. I mean where did X come from? Shortly after we started doing IBM mainframe assembly language. Oh yeah, I know where X came from. Later Megacorp would out a PC on my desk so I could use a 3270 emulator program.[emoji848] Eventually I started coding on PCs and decided I still hated PC development. Went back to something on larger platforms again.

Don't think we put a PC in our house till the later 90s.

 

[braumeister]

One of my favorite early computer stories concerned a friend who was so enamored of his Osborne (early 80s). It was portable only in the sense that it had a handle; I think it weighed about 30 pounds and had a 5" CRT screen and two 5.25" floppy disk drives. He thought it was pretty much the ultimate computer and would take care of his needs for the rest of his life. He bought a second one just for spare parts.

 

[mountainsoft]

My first computer was an Interact Model One: Interact Model One computer. I hung onto it for many years and finally sold it in Nov 2017.

I later owned:

Atari 130XE: https://www.old-computers.com/museum/computer.asp?st=1&c=21

Atari 600XL: The Atari 600XL Computer Systems

Atari Mega STE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atari_MEGA_STE

Commodore Amiga 1200: Commodore/Amiga 1200 Computer : Yo Amiga 1200!

Mac LC-III: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macintosh_LC_III

I bought my first Windows PC in 1995: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Packard_Bell

Since then I have built and upgraded my own Windows based computers from individual components.

 

[CRLLS]

I started at work with a hand built, machine language programmer. 16 toggle switches and a push button. Flip the switches, 8 for address and 8 for the word, then press the button to write. Then we went to a CPM based C100 bus machine. At home, I tried a friend's Z-80 and didn't like the display, slipped the VIC20 and bought a C-64. learned to rewrite basic programs. Later built a V20 based XT turbo. Tried WIN1.1 and dismissed it. Then built a 286 machine. After that is became less expensive to buy a built PC than building one myself. Time moves on and so did I. Today, I couldn't write any kind of program if my life depended on it. Don't really care to either.

 

[John Galt III]

I still have my late 80's AT&T desktop (no badge of any sort on it, just a metal box with a floppy disk reader and a 20 meg (?) hard drive inside) which they gave us programmers so we could work from home. Dialed in on a 1200 baud modem with Xtalk software (Crosstalk). The computer still works, and I play games on it once in a while.