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View Full Version : One day a computer will fit on your desk (1974)



Garret Mott
15-Apr-2022, 03:16 PM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sTdWQAKzESA

Garret Mott
15-Apr-2022, 03:17 PM
And before anyone else says it: We'll never need more than 640K

Stephen W. Meeley
15-Apr-2022, 03:26 PM
This reminded me of something that a speaker said at my daughter's HS graduation (2018)...


"Remember how in elementary school we were not allowed to use calculators because no one in real life would carry one around in their pocket, or how we were told to never talk to anyone on the internet, or get into a stranger's car?


Well, now we all have a button on our pocket calculators that summons an internet stranger, specifically so we can get in their car!"

Garret Mott
15-Apr-2022, 03:30 PM
And what could possibly go wrong with that?

Years ago I got a free calculator from a bank that had a sticker on it saying "The computer in this calculator is more powerful than the one that went to the moon"

I worked at a place that made instruments for Apollo & they were basically Korean war tech including cloth insulated wires.

Vincent Oorsprong
19-Apr-2022, 02:29 AM
Garret,

While it is denied "he" said that it is a fact that memory was so expensive those days that getting more would be almost impossible for a "normal" business or person.

How expensive? At the office I had an IBM PC that - mid 80's - cost around 40k. The PC was configured with 128kb and extended to 512kb with memory chips of 8kb for 400 guilder each. BTW; our first 1 GB HDD in 1993 had a price of 3000 guilder.

Vincent Oorsprong
19-Apr-2022, 02:29 AM
Great video. the young boy must now of be at our age...

Garret Mott
19-Apr-2022, 05:38 AM
For sure things were expensive! What's amazing to me is just how inexpensive a computer is today. A customer has a single user embedded DB system that's run their business for 30+ years (upgraded from 2.3 to now 19.0) & they got a new "all-in-one" that runs it just fine for $250US. Their first computer was (IIRC) about $3500 US - in 1980's dollars.

DaveR
19-Apr-2022, 08:21 AM
I've told this before, maybe, but when I wanted to buy the first PC for the bank I was working for in Nassau, 1983, I fancied the original compaq portable as it would be the only such machine in a four-storey office building and I didn't fancy lugging it around. Everything else computer-wise was on our Burroughs mid-frame.

None available in the Bahamas, of course, so we got a price from a compaq dealer in Miami and I went to Barclays Bank and bought $6,000 of travellers cheques. That's $4,000 for the PC including the extra floppy upgrade, and a guess of $1,000 for duty as we couldn't find a customs duty rate, and $1000 for 'suitable' software. The bank only had $100s. Writers cramp, twice. IIRC I bought Turbo Pascal. Must spent the rest on lunch...

BahamasAir to Miami, and brought it back as hand baggage on the last flight that night, the rest of the flight being drunk spring breakers. Got to customs prepared to go up to 25% and the officer just waved me through cos he couln't be bothered with the paperwork. Sometimes having a Customs team in the local Darts league had its privileges.

Garret Mott
19-Apr-2022, 09:49 AM
I've got a good Bahamas customs story, but it can wait 'til a beer @ a conference.