Christmas 1989

On Tue, 15 Nov 2022 11:12:23 -0000 (UTC)

Post by Jason Evans
I was watching this episode of The Computer Chronicles
http://youtu.be/PJ95IclntIY which is the 1989 Holiday
Buyer's Guide.
Let's say you wake up on Christmas Day in 1989 and you can have any
computer that you want that it available at that time. What do you choose?
A shiny new 486? The latest Mac? A new Amiga? ...or maybe something more
exotic?

Welcome to the NG.

I want a portable!
Loading Image...

--
Bah, and indeed Humbug.

Ben Collver

2022-11-15 15:01:36 UTC

Nice question. Do you mean the me of the present, or me as i was in
1989? On the exotic front, i'd consider the MSX2+

https://www.msx.org/wiki/Panasonic_FS-A1WSX

Jason Evans

2022-11-15 15:24:23 UTC

Post by Ben Collver
Nice question. Do you mean the me of the present, or me as i was in
1989? On the exotic front, i'd consider the MSX2+
https://www.msx.org/wiki/Panasonic_FS-A1WSX

Present you, it just happens to be in the year 1989. No price limits, it
just has to exist that year.

Scott Lurndal

2022-11-15 15:45:55 UTC

Post by Ben Collver
Nice question. Do you mean the me of the present, or me as i was in
1989? On the exotic front, i'd consider the MSX2+
https://www.msx.org/wiki/Panasonic_FS-A1WSX

Present you, it just happens to be in the year 1989. No price limits, it
just has to exist that year.

At that time, I would have loved to have a VAX-11/730.

D.J.

2022-11-15 16:41:57 UTC

Post by Ben Collver
Nice question. Do you mean the me of the present, or me as i was in
1989? On the exotic front, i'd consider the MSX2+
https://www.msx.org/wiki/Panasonic_FS-A1WSX

Present you, it just happens to be in the year 1989. No price limits, it
just has to exist that year.

At that time, I would have loved to have a VAX-11/730.

That is what I did my VAX Pascal homework on... hated it.
We had Dec VT102 vacuum tube terminals and a 132 column green bar
printer.
--
Jim

Peter Flass

2022-11-15 18:02:03 UTC

Post by Ben Collver
Nice question. Do you mean the me of the present, or me as i was in
1989? On the exotic front, i'd consider the MSX2+
https://www.msx.org/wiki/Panasonic_FS-A1WSX

Present you, it just happens to be in the year 1989. No price limits, it
just has to exist that year.

At that time, I would have loved to have a VAX-11/730.

+1

Nice little machine - loved it!

--
Pete

Andy Leighton

2022-11-15 20:20:15 UTC

Post by Ben Collver
Nice question. Do you mean the me of the present, or me as i was in
1989? On the exotic front, i'd consider the MSX2+
https://www.msx.org/wiki/Panasonic_FS-A1WSX

Present you, it just happens to be in the year 1989. No price limits, it
just has to exist that year.

At that time, I would have loved to have a VAX-11/730.

Wasn't the 11/730 a bit long in the tooth by Christmas 1989?

--
Andy Leighton => ***@azaal.plus.com
"We demand rigidly defined areas of doubt and uncertainty!"
- Douglas Adams

Scott Lurndal

2022-11-15 20:33:59 UTC

Post by Andy Leighton

Post by Ben Collver
Nice question. Do you mean the me of the present, or me as i was in
1989? On the exotic front, i'd consider the MSX2+
https://www.msx.org/wiki/Panasonic_FS-A1WSX

Present you, it just happens to be in the year 1989. No price limits, it
just has to exist that year.

At that time, I would have loved to have a VAX-11/730.

Wasn't the 11/730 a bit long in the tooth by Christmas 1989?

Yes, but still viable.

Bob Eager

2022-11-15 22:44:36 UTC

Post by Ben Collver
Nice question. Do you mean the me of the present, or me as i was in
1989? On the exotic front, i'd consider the MSX2+
https://www.msx.org/wiki/Panasonic_FS-A1WSX

Present you, it just happens to be in the year 1989. No price limits, it
just has to exist that year.

At that time, I would have loved to have a VAX-11/730.

That was about the time I got a VAXstation 3100 on my desk (through
devious means) and added it to the cluster.

I now possess one of my own!

--
Using UNIX since v6 (1975)...

Use the BIG mirror service in the UK:
http://www.mirrorservice.org

Thomas Koenig

2022-11-16 06:26:03 UTC

Post by Ben Collver
Nice question. Do you mean the me of the present, or me as i was in
1989? On the exotic front, i'd consider the MSX2+
https://www.msx.org/wiki/Panasonic_FS-A1WSX

Present you, it just happens to be in the year 1989. No price limits, it
just has to exist that year.

At that time, I would have loved to have a VAX-11/730.

That was slower than the 11/780, at 0.3 VUPs. There were RISC
machines on the market which outperformed it by an order of
magnitude or more.

And, technically speaking, the VAX 11 line was discontinued in
1988, so it would not have been available in 1989, unless you
bought a used one :-)

Scott Lurndal

2022-11-16 15:15:24 UTC

Post by Thomas Koenig

Post by Ben Collver
Nice question. Do you mean the me of the present, or me as i was in
1989? On the exotic front, i'd consider the MSX2+
https://www.msx.org/wiki/Panasonic_FS-A1WSX

Present you, it just happens to be in the year 1989. No price limits, it
just has to exist that year.

At that time, I would have loved to have a VAX-11/730.

That was slower than the 11/780, at 0.3 VUPs. There were RISC
machines on the market which outperformed it by an order of
magnitude or more.

The 11/780 required significant power. The 11/730 was suitable
for a home installation.

greymaus

2022-11-15 16:16:46 UTC

Nice question. Do you mean the me of the present, or me as i was in
1989? On the exotic front, i'd consider the MSX2+
https://www.msx.org/wiki/Panasonic_FS-A1WSX

That was the one, made by several companies, but with the same OS..Nice
keyboard?.. I have one regret, buying a spectrum instead of a C64.
The Amiga was whole generation ahead of the MSX.

--
***@mail.com

Fe, Fi, Fo, Fum, I smell the stench of an Influencer.
Where is our money gone, Dude?

Ben Collver

2022-11-16 17:15:38 UTC

Post by Ben Collver
Nice question. Do you mean the me of the present, or me as i was in
1989? On the exotic front, i'd consider the MSX2+
https://www.msx.org/wiki/Panasonic_FS-A1WSX

That was the one, made by several companies, but with the same OS..Nice
keyboard?.. I have one regret, buying a spectrum instead of a C64.
The Amiga was whole generation ahead of the MSX.

I like that the MSX had an open specification.

An uncle of a friend used an Amiga for video production in the early
90's. The Amiga was definitely ahead. OTOH, the Amiga and MSX game
lists are both about 2,000 games long.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_MSX_games
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Amiga_games

Charlie Gibbs

2022-11-16 18:13:00 UTC

Post by Ben Collver
An uncle of a friend used an Amiga for video production in the early
90's. The Amiga was definitely ahead.

The Amiga was designed from the start to be video-compatible.
It's 7.16-MHz clock speed was twice the 3.58-MHz color burst
frequency, and all its timings made it easy to develop video
hardware, e.g. the Video Toaster. (Those were for NTSC video;
I think there was a version suitably adjusted for PAL.)

Amigas were used in a number of cable TV stations for that channel
showing weather and local news. Occasionally you'd see a Guru
Meditation box.

Todd Rundgren created the video for his sing "Change Myself"
on a bank of 10 Amigas.

At a computer animation festival I saw a video titled "Dance
of the [S]tumblers"; music was the Rimsky-Korsakov piece of the
same name. At the end, the low-rez but cute dancing figures
were crushed by a falling Guru Meditation box; instead of the
normal hex codes, the numbers in it were "THX1138.2001".

--
/~\ Charlie Gibbs | Microsoft is a dictatorship.
\ / <***@kltpzyxm.invalid> | Apple is a cult.
X I'm really at ac.dekanfrus | Linux is anarchy.
/ \ if you read it the right way. | Pick your poison.

Charlie Gibbs

2022-11-16 18:22:20 UTC

Post by Ben Collver
An uncle of a friend used an Amiga for video production in the early
90's. The Amiga was definitely ahead.

The Amiga was designed from the start to be video-compatible.
It's 7.16-MHz clock speed was twice the 3.58-MHz color burst

^^^^
AUUUUGGGHHHHH! My #1 pet peeve spelling error and I MADE IT MYSELF!
Mea culpa. Mea maxima culpa.

Andreas Kohlbach

2022-11-16 23:54:23 UTC

Post by Ben Collver
An uncle of a friend used an Amiga for video production in the early
90's. The Amiga was definitely ahead.

The Amiga was designed from the start to be video-compatible.
It's 7.16-MHz clock speed was twice the 3.58-MHz color burst

^^^^
AUUUUGGGHHHHH! My #1 pet peeve spelling error and I MADE IT MYSELF!
Mea culpa. Mea maxima culpa.

slrn can do supersedes, AFAIR...

--
Andreas

Andreas Kohlbach

2022-11-16 23:53:25 UTC

Post by Ben Collver
Nice question. Do you mean the me of the present, or me as i was in
1989? On the exotic front, i'd consider the MSX2+
https://www.msx.org/wiki/Panasonic_FS-A1WSX

That was the one, made by several companies, but with the same OS..Nice
keyboard?.. I have one regret, buying a spectrum instead of a C64.
The Amiga was whole generation ahead of the MSX.

I like that the MSX had an open specification.
An uncle of a friend used an Amiga for video production in the early
90's. The Amiga was definitely ahead. OTOH, the Amiga and MSX game
lists are both about 2,000 games long.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_MSX_games
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Amiga_games

Amazing the Amiga didn't really kick off in the US. From 1985 to may be
1988 (which was a "generation" or two back then) it blew everything out
of the water, especially at that price. Like the IBM PC and its clones. And
the Macintosh only just got color and couldn't even do preemptive
multitasking.

Amazing the Amiga didn't really caught on in the US.

--
Andreas

Charlie Gibbs

2022-11-17 04:05:23 UTC

Post by Andreas Kohlbach
Amazing the Amiga didn't really kick off in the US. From 1985 to may be
1988 (which was a "generation" or two back then) it blew everything out
of the water, especially at that price. Like the IBM PC and its clones. And
the Macintosh only just got color and couldn't even do preemptive
multitasking.
Amazing the Amiga didn't really caught on in the US.

Part of that was poor marketing. The president and chairman of the
board, Mehdi Ali and Irving Gould, were pulling down bigger salaries
than their counterparts at IBM, while running the company into the
ground. Stockholder meetings were held in the Bahamas to minimize
the number of pesky shareholders asking embarrassing questions.

The final days were documented in "The Deathbed Video", produced
by the people who made the Amiga go, and got to watch it murdered.
It's hard to watch, but it has its humourous moments - like when
the techs stenciled the names of board members on the speed bumps
in the company parking lot.

Andreas Kohlbach

2022-11-17 07:01:13 UTC

I know (Mr. Gould messed up). But why was the Amiga so highly successful
in Europe, but not in the US? Might really just boil down to poor
marketing.

Commodore might just have ran the ads they did in Europe.

Post by Charlie Gibbs
The final days were documented in "The Deathbed Video", produced
by the people who made the Amiga go, and got to watch it murdered.
It's hard to watch, but it has its humourous moments - like when
the techs stenciled the names of board members on the speed bumps
in the company parking lot.

Yeah, I watched it. That is one of at least two video every Commodore
lover should have watched. The other is Jim Butterfield's Commodore 64
Training Tape from 1983. It runs about two hours
<https://archive.org/details/commodore-64-training-tape-with-jim-butterfield>.

--
Andreas

Charlie Gibbs

2022-11-17 18:37:48 UTC

I know (Mr. Gould messed up). But why was the Amiga so highly successful
in Europe, but not in the US? Might really just boil down to poor
marketing.

It was indeed poor marketing. The joke at the time was that if
Commodore made sushi, they would market it as "cold dead fish".

Anne & Lynn Wheeler

2022-11-17 22:38:20 UTC

Post by Charlie Gibbs
It was indeed poor marketing. The joke at the time was that if
Commodore made sushi, they would market it as "cold dead fish".

previously posted

Total share: 30 years of personal computer market share figures
http://arstechnica.com/articles/culture/total-share.ars
and has graph of personal computer sales 1975-1980
http://arstechnica.com/articles/culture/total-share.ars/3
and graph from 1980 to 1984 ... with the only serious competitor to PC
in number of sales was commodore 64
http://arstechnica.com/articles/culture/total-share.ars/4
and then from 1984 to 1987 the ibm pc (and clones) starting to
completely swamp
http://arstechnica.com/articles/culture/total-share.ars/5

--
virtualization experience starting Jan1968, online at home since Mar1970

Anssi Saari

2022-11-21 10:18:03 UTC

Post by Anne & Lynn Wheeler
and then from 1984 to 1987 the ibm pc (and clones) starting to
completely swamp
http://arstechnica.com/articles/culture/total-share.ars/5

Still, would've been nice if some other players had survived, other than
Apple. I did always like Apple's hardware but not their prices or
software. Usually not the owners either.

Andreas Kohlbach

2022-11-18 02:10:03 UTC

Post by Andreas Kohlbach
I know (Mr. Gould messed up). But why was the Amiga so highly successful
in Europe, but not in the US? Might really just boil down to poor
marketing.

It was indeed poor marketing. The joke at the time was that if
Commodore made sushi, they would market it as "cold dead fish".

Good one. Have to remember that. :-)

--
Andreas

greymaus

2022-11-17 08:18:39 UTC

Post by Ben Collver
Nice question. Do you mean the me of the present, or me as i was in
1989? On the exotic front, i'd consider the MSX2+
https://www.msx.org/wiki/Panasonic_FS-A1WSX

That was the one, made by several companies, but with the same OS..Nice
keyboard?.. I have one regret, buying a spectrum instead of a C64.
The Amiga was whole generation ahead of the MSX.

I like that the MSX had an open specification.
An uncle of a friend used an Amiga for video production in the early
90's. The Amiga was definitely ahead. OTOH, the Amiga and MSX game
lists are both about 2,000 games long.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_MSX_games
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Amiga_games

the amiga was doomed because it was fun.

The IBMPC had the name IBM on it.

Post by Andreas Kohlbach
Amazing the Amiga didn't really caught on in the US.

--
***@mail.com

Fe, Fi, Fo, Fum, I smell the stench of an Influencer.
Where is our money gone, Dude?

Andreas Kohlbach

2022-11-18 02:19:06 UTC

the amiga was doomed because it was fun.

May be because people thought it's a gaming machine. And it sort of
was. Because it was "everything".

Post by greymaus
The IBMPC had the name IBM on it.

Indeed. Had first (second) hand experience. A work mate of my dad was
rich (for some reason...). When my dad once mentioned to him his son (me)
is "in computers" in 1989 or so he asked if I may come by to recommend a
computer for his 10 year old son. I agreed (free beer was also promised ;-).
I already mentioned that I'll recommend the Amiga and to bring mine next
week.

A few days before the meeting he called and said there was no need to
bring mine, as he just (like it would be no problem) bought an Amiga
500. I brought some software I "got from where I cannot remember". ;-)

Besides games (I remember he liked Boulder Dash and Leaderboard Golf) and
"professional" software, like a word processor and a spreadsheet. And
mentioned he doesn't need to update his IBM XT (or AT) to PS/2, because
the Amiga can do all what the IBM can - and more.

Well the Amiga had no IBM logo on it. And months later I learned that
only his son used the Amiga, and he paid some 12,000 Deutsch Mark (5,000
USD or more?) for a PS/2.

--
Andreas

Ahem A Rivet's Shot

2022-11-18 08:53:55 UTC

On 17 Nov 2022 08:18:39 GMT

Post by greymaus
the amiga was doomed because it was fun.
The IBMPC had the name IBM on it.

Quite so, but alone that would not have killed the Amiga because it
was clunky, slow and expensive - which was fine for IBM's market.

However IBM published every detail of the PC (and AT) and the
market for a cheap IBM workalike was so obvious that it exploded almost
instantly and became brutally competitive. Then the chipsets appeared
making PC and AT clones really easy (and cheap) to make. The 80386
delivered the final nail in the coffin for everything else but by then
there wasn't much left to kill apart from the Apple who took some important
niches and hung on. After the 80386 the PC design started to take over the
data centre starting with minis - which by then were mostly unix boxes. The
BSDs and Linux accelerated that process dramatically (wot no license fee).

Notice that IBM no longer play in the market they created, they've
retreated to their comfort zone of high support mainframes.

This monocultural trend has shown no cracks until recently with the
emergence of ARM from the mobile and low power space into the desktop,
laptop and server world (there are some really impressive 48 core ARM
chips in use - don't ask about price). Even here there is convergence with
PCI-e, SATA, NVMe etc turning up in ARM chips now.

BTW ARM RISC ? Have you seen the size of the ARMv8 instruction set
documentation ? If that's reduced these days please don't show me complex.
High level languages used to be more complex than assemblers, I reckon it's
a toss up between C++ with STL and ARMv8 for complexity - Algol68 got lost
in the dust a long time ago.

--
Steve O'Hara-Smith
Odds and Ends at http://www.sohara.org/

Thomas Koenig

2022-11-18 10:52:06 UTC

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
On 17 Nov 2022 08:18:39 GMT

Post by greymaus
the amiga was doomed because it was fun.
The IBMPC had the name IBM on it.

POWER (now styled Power, I believe) isn't a mainframe (not a descendant
of /360), but it is certainly used in datacenters, and is the basis
for the what used to be System i.

[...]

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
BTW ARM RISC ? Have you seen the size of the ARMv8 instruction set
documentation ?

It is on the border of insanity (12000 pages these days?), and
I'm not clear which side.

Nobody ever accused POWER of being small, and the ISA is _far_ smaller.

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
If that's reduced these days please don't show me complex.

I understood that RISC meant reduced complexity for each instruction.
At least ARM is still load/store (or is it?)

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
High level languages used to be more complex than assemblers, I reckon it's
a toss up between C++ with STL and ARMv8 for complexity - Algol68 got lost
in the dust a long time ago.

C++ is also borderline insane. Their module concept is... breathtaking
(why does a macro which is defined before using the module have to
have an effect inside the module? Hello world?)

Listening to a talk about that was one of the weirdest experiences
related to computers that I ever had, especially since the speaker
suggested having the compiler make http queries to an oracle during
compilation to find the placement of modules, to solve the "which
file contains which module" question.

When asked "how does the oracle know", the answer was "not my
department".

Carlos E.R.

2022-11-18 11:58:25 UTC

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
On 17 Nov 2022 08:18:39 GMT

Post by greymaus
the amiga was doomed because it was fun.
The IBMPC had the name IBM on it.

And there was an explosion of software, too.

I bought a PC clone mid 80's because the chaps at the students club at
uni told me that they could provide me with the software I needed, and
everybody, including teachers were using PCs. I would be alone if I got
a Mac, or any other thing. Compatibility was the word.

--
Cheers, Carlos.

greymaus

2022-11-18 16:26:49 UTC

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
On 17 Nov 2022 08:18:39 GMT

Post by greymaus
the amiga was doomed because it was fun.
The IBMPC had the name IBM on it.

And there was an explosion of software, too.
I bought a PC clone mid 80's because the chaps at the students club at
uni told me that they could provide me with the software I needed, and
everybody, including teachers were using PCs. I would be alone if I got
a Mac, or any other thing. Compatibility was the word.

From memory, both A500 (amiga) and the early Mac's needed extra memory
to do anything serious. Compared to present computers, their memory
installed memory was tiny. A lot of the present need is bloat, IMHO.

--
***@mail.com

Fe, Fi, Fo, Fum, I smell the stench of an Influencer.
Where is our money gone, Dude?

Carlos E.R.

2022-11-18 17:52:09 UTC

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
On 17 Nov 2022 08:18:39 GMT

Post by greymaus
the amiga was doomed because it was fun.
The IBMPC had the name IBM on it.

And there was an explosion of software, too.
I bought a PC clone mid 80's because the chaps at the students club at
uni told me that they could provide me with the software I needed, and
everybody, including teachers were using PCs. I would be alone if I got
a Mac, or any other thing. Compatibility was the word.

Well, that PC had 512 KB. It was in the name: Amstrad PC 1512DD.

--
Cheers, Carlos.

greymaus

2022-11-18 20:52:55 UTC

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
On 17 Nov 2022 08:18:39 GMT

Post by greymaus
the amiga was doomed because it was fun.
The IBMPC had the name IBM on it.

And there was an explosion of software, too.
I bought a PC clone mid 80's because the chaps at the students club at
uni told me that they could provide me with the software I needed, and
everybody, including teachers were using PCs. I would be alone if I got
a Mac, or any other thing. Compatibility was the word.

Well, that PC had 512 KB. It was in the name: Amstrad PC 1512DD.

I remember an Amstrad, ran Locoscript, an incredible usefull machine. I
saw them in small garages or workshops, covered in dirt, but any one could
use them. CP/M?

--
***@mail.com

Fe, Fi, Fo, Fum, I smell the stench of an Influencer.
Where is our money gone, Dude?

Carlos E.R.

2022-11-18 21:13:56 UTC

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
On 17 Nov 2022 08:18:39 GMT

Post by greymaus
the amiga was doomed because it was fun.
The IBMPC had the name IBM on it.

And there was an explosion of software, too.
I bought a PC clone mid 80's because the chaps at the students club at
uni told me that they could provide me with the software I needed, and
everybody, including teachers were using PCs. I would be alone if I got
a Mac, or any other thing. Compatibility was the word.

Well, that PC had 512 KB. It was in the name: Amstrad PC 1512DD.

I remember an Amstrad, ran Locoscript, an incredible usefull machine. I
saw them in small garages or workshops, covered in dirt, but any one could
use them. CP/M?

No, this one had an 8086 (not 8088) and run DOS 3.1 or .2

--
Cheers, Carlos.

Charlie Gibbs

2022-11-18 18:01:51 UTC

IBM realized their error and tried to reverse it with MicroChannel,
but it was too late; as with Pandora, the box had been opened and
couldn't be closed again.

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
Notice that IBM no longer play in the market they created,
they've retreated to their comfort zone of high support mainframes.

They don't like to play in areas they can't control, and they
realized they had lost control of the PC.

Kerr-Mudd, John

2022-11-18 18:47:01 UTC

On Fri, 18 Nov 2022 18:01:51 GMT

IBM realized their error and tried to reverse it with MicroChannel,
but it was too late; as with Pandora, the box had been opened and
couldn't be closed again.

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
Notice that IBM no longer play in the market they created,
they've retreated to their comfort zone of high support mainframes.

They don't like to play in areas they can't control, and they
realized they had lost control of the PC.

They also tried with Token Ring to get into the PC networking market;
another fail. (more proprietry h/w and worse of all, slower).

--
Bah, and indeed Humbug.

D.J.

2022-11-21 16:31:42 UTC

On Fri, 18 Nov 2022 18:47:01 +0000, "Kerr-Mudd, John"

Post by Kerr-Mudd, John
On Fri, 18 Nov 2022 18:01:51 GMT

IBM realized their error and tried to reverse it with MicroChannel,
but it was too late; as with Pandora, the box had been opened and
couldn't be closed again.

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
Notice that IBM no longer play in the market they created,
they've retreated to their comfort zone of high support mainframes.

They don't like to play in areas they can't control, and they
realized they had lost control of the PC.

They also tried with Token Ring to get into the PC networking market;
another fail. (more proprietry h/w and worse of all, slower).

For a very short time my university had Token Ring in the admin
building and the student lab.

More than once, "What is this for ?" and the student unplugs the
cable.
--
Jim

Kerr-Mudd, John

2022-11-21 17:43:10 UTC

On Mon, 21 Nov 2022 10:31:42 -0600

Post by D.J.
On Fri, 18 Nov 2022 18:47:01 +0000, "Kerr-Mudd, John"

Post by Kerr-Mudd, John
On Fri, 18 Nov 2022 18:01:51 GMT

IBM realized their error and tried to reverse it with MicroChannel,
but it was too late; as with Pandora, the box had been opened and
couldn't be closed again.

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
Notice that IBM no longer play in the market they created,
they've retreated to their comfort zone of high support mainframes.

They don't like to play in areas they can't control, and they
realized they had lost control of the PC.

They also tried with Token Ring to get into the PC networking market;
another fail. (more proprietry h/w and worse of all, slower).

For a very short time my university had Token Ring in the admin
building and the student lab.
More than once, "What is this for ?" and the student unplugs the
cable.

That was another thing; really clunky connectors (even if it was
hermaphroditic):
Loading Image...

--
Bah, and indeed Humbug.

Anne & Lynn Wheeler

2022-11-18 20:40:07 UTC

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
However IBM published every detail of the PC (and AT) and the
market for a cheap IBM workalike was so obvious that it exploded almost
instantly and became brutally competitive. Then the chipsets appeared
making PC and AT clones really easy (and cheap) to make. The 80386
delivered the final nail in the coffin for everything else but by then
there wasn't much left to kill apart from the Apple who took some important
niches and hung on. After the 80386 the PC design started to take over the
data centre starting with minis - which by then were mostly unix boxes. The
BSDs and Linux accelerated that process dramatically (wot no license fee).

a couple years ago there was analysis of IBM revenue ... mainframe
hardware had dropped to couple percent of revenue ... but the mainframe
group was 25 percent of revenue (and 40% of profit, effectively all
software and services).

--
virtualization experience starting Jan1968, online at home since Mar1970

D.J.

2022-11-21 16:24:18 UTC

On Wed, 16 Nov 2022 18:53:25 -0500, Andreas Kohlbach

Post by Ben Collver
Nice question. Do you mean the me of the present, or me as i was in
1989? On the exotic front, i'd consider the MSX2+
https://www.msx.org/wiki/Panasonic_FS-A1WSX

That was the one, made by several companies, but with the same OS..Nice
keyboard?.. I have one regret, buying a spectrum instead of a C64.
The Amiga was whole generation ahead of the MSX.

I like that the MSX had an open specification.
An uncle of a friend used an Amiga for video production in the early
90's. The Amiga was definitely ahead. OTOH, the Amiga and MSX game
lists are both about 2,000 games long.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_MSX_games
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Amiga_games

Amazing the Amiga didn't really kick off in the US. From 1985 to may be
1988 (which was a "generation" or two back then) it blew everything out
of the water, especially at that price. Like the IBM PC and its clones. And
the Macintosh only just got color and couldn't even do preemptive
multitasking.
Amazing the Amiga didn't really caught on in the US.

I had an Amiga then. Most people wanted to know why it didn't run
ms-dos programs. One person tried to tell me if it didn't run ms-dos,
it was illegal. Many claimed, as they saw me using an Amiga computer,
that such machines didn't exist. All in the US.
--
Jim

Charlie Gibbs

2022-11-21 19:18:28 UTC

Post by D.J.
I had an Amiga then. Most people wanted to know why it didn't run
ms-dos programs.

Because you didn't put a bridge board in it. :-)
I did a lot of MS-DOS development work on my Amiga,
first with a 286 bridge board, later a 386SX bridge board.

Post by D.J.
One person tried to tell me if it didn't run ms-dos,
it was illegal.

Well, "PC" also stands for Politically Correct...

Post by D.J.
Many claimed, as they saw me using an Amiga computer,
that such machines didn't exist. All in the US.

That reminds me of the 1984 lightbulb joke:

Q: How many thought police does it take to change a light bulb?
A: There never was a light bulb.

See my .sig.

greymaus

2022-11-21 20:27:14 UTC

Post by D.J.
I had an Amiga then. Most people wanted to know why it didn't run
ms-dos programs.

Because you didn't put a bridge board in it. :-)
I did a lot of MS-DOS development work on my Amiga,
first with a 286 bridge board, later a 386SX bridge board.

Post by D.J.
One person tried to tell me if it didn't run ms-dos,
it was illegal.

Well, "PC" also stands for Politically Correct...

Post by D.J.
Many claimed, as they saw me using an Amiga computer,
that such machines didn't exist. All in the US.

Q: How many thought police does it take to change a light bulb?
A: There never was a light bulb.
See my .sig.

I had a bridgeboard for ms.dos. I had decided to get a PC and have it
boot to either Linux or Windows (The first one, I think), so I had that
working, when Xmas week arrived, and a present was required for someone
that I couldn't be bothered to visit, and the enhanced Amiga was sent on
to amuse the people at the party. It came back later with the board
removed, and a cigarette burn where it had been. Never again. The PC was
a quality built machine, that crowd that had cows as an advertisement.

My daughter told me recently that _her_ daughter had asked her to be
absent for the girls Xmas party. Do things ever change?.

Happy thanksgiving to all USAians.

--
***@mail.com

Fe, Fi, Fo, Fum, I smell the stench of an Influencer.
Where is our money gone, Dude?

Andreas Kohlbach

2022-11-22 06:55:21 UTC

Post by D.J.
On Wed, 16 Nov 2022 18:53:25 -0500, Andreas Kohlbach

I had an Amiga then. Most people wanted to know why it didn't run
ms-dos programs. One person tried to tell me if it didn't run ms-dos,
it was illegal.

Holy sh*t!

Post by D.J.
Many claimed, as they saw me using an Amiga computer, that such
machines didn't exist. All in the US.

They might even have thought you came from outer space. *g*

--
Andreas

Jason Evans

2022-11-15 15:47:25 UTC

Post by Jason Evans
A shiny new 486? The latest Mac? A new Amiga? ...or maybe something
more exotic?

I'm thinking about a fully maxed-out SparcStation 1. That would have been
insanely powerful for the time.

Robert Komar

2022-11-15 16:10:32 UTC

Back then, I was a grad student with access to many different computers.
My favourite was a Sun 4/110 workstation, mostly because it was Unix (SunOS)
and had a nice windowing system (SunView) for the time.

Rob Komar

D.J.

2022-11-15 16:38:50 UTC

On Tue, 15 Nov 2022 11:12:23 -0000 (UTC), Jason Evans

I received a new Amiga A1000, monitor, and the box the computer came
in. The box had some software and a couple of books.

Unfortunately the printer, I live in the US, printed the British pound
symbol instead of the $ sign. Weird printer... cellophane with wax as
the print medium. The printer melted the wax into the standard paper,
tracter feed 8.5x11.
--
Jim

Andreas Kohlbach

2022-11-16 01:11:59 UTC

Post by D.J.
I received a new Amiga A1000, monitor, and the box the computer came
in. The box had some software and a couple of books.
Unfortunately the printer, I live in the US, printed the British pound
symbol instead of the $ sign. Weird printer... cellophane with wax as
the print medium. The printer melted the wax into the standard paper,
tracter feed 8.5x11.

What printer?

Reading some old manuals I came across the Epson RX80 (or FX?). It
allowed to use different font sets already in the early 1980s. You just
needed to know *how*.

Would be lame though if the retailer sold printers in the US set up for
the UK market.

--
Andreas

Carlos E.R.

2022-11-16 11:24:21 UTC

What printer?
Reading some old manuals I came across the Epson RX80 (or FX?). It
allowed to use different font sets already in the early 1980s. You just
needed to know *how*.
Would be lame though if the retailer sold printers in the US set up for
the UK market.

Not a month ago I got a ticket printed on a machine that could not do
the euro symbol.

Of course, I did not ask, could be a configuration thing, change code
page or whatever. Still, on 2022...

--
Cheers, Carlos.

greymaus

2022-11-16 14:47:41 UTC

What printer?
Reading some old manuals I came across the Epson RX80 (or FX?). It
allowed to use different font sets already in the early 1980s. You just
needed to know *how*.
Would be lame though if the retailer sold printers in the US set up for
the UK market.

Not a month ago I got a ticket printed on a machine that could not do
the euro symbol.
Of course, I did not ask, could be a configuration thing, change code
page or whatever. Still, on 2022...

Possibly a sign of the future. The EU may be facing a fort Sumter
movement. (In keeping accounts, I avoid currency symbols)

--
***@mail.com

Fe, Fi, Fo, Fum, I smell the stench of an Influencer.
Where is our money gone, Dude?

Carlos E.R.

2022-11-16 19:09:15 UTC

What printer?
Reading some old manuals I came across the Epson RX80 (or FX?). It
allowed to use different font sets already in the early 1980s. You just
needed to know *how*.
Would be lame though if the retailer sold printers in the US set up for
the UK market.

Not a month ago I got a ticket printed on a machine that could not do
the euro symbol.
Of course, I did not ask, could be a configuration thing, change code
page or whatever. Still, on 2022...

Possibly a sign of the future. The EU may be facing a fort Sumter
movement. (In keeping accounts, I avoid currency symbols)

I think it was not only the currency symbols, but also some other
letters used in Spain.

--
Cheers, Carlos.

Andreas Kohlbach

2022-11-16 23:44:49 UTC

Post by Carlos E.R.
I think it was not only the currency symbols, but also some other
letters used in Spain.

Which one's you meañ? ;-)

--
Andreas

Peter Flass

2022-11-18 00:00:07 UTC

Post by Carlos E.R.
I think it was not only the currency symbols, but also some other
letters used in Spain.

Which one's you meañ? ;-)

¿¡

--
Pete

Andreas Kohlbach

2022-11-18 02:25:51 UTC

Post by Carlos E.R.
I think it was not only the currency symbols, but also some other
letters used in Spain.

Which one's you meañ? ;-)

¿¡

Ah, I forgot those. That sentences with "!" and questions start with.

--
Andreas

Carlos E.R.

2022-11-18 12:03:58 UTC

Post by Carlos E.R.
I think it was not only the currency symbols, but also some other
letters used in Spain.

Which one's you meañ? ;-)

¿¡

Ah, I forgot those. That sentences with "!" and questions start with.

Yep. And accented vowels. And ª, used on numbers, like 1º or 1ª. Meaning
"first", female or male. It is the letter 'a' 'o' with an underscore,
upperscript. Similar, but not the same as '°' used on '°C', meaning
"degrees".

It is not a problem if the printer supports unicode, but it seems this
is not universal, or not done on cheap printers.

--
Cheers, Carlos.

Ahem A Rivet's Shot

2022-11-18 14:43:12 UTC

On Fri, 18 Nov 2022 13:03:58 +0100

Post by Carlos E.R.
It is not a problem if the printer supports unicode, but it seems this
is not universal, or not done on cheap printers.

Even with unicode support I doubt there's a printer around with
*all* the glyphs.

--
Steve O'Hara-Smith
Odds and Ends at http://www.sohara.org/

Carlos E.R.

2022-11-18 17:50:19 UTC

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
On Fri, 18 Nov 2022 13:03:58 +0100

Post by Carlos E.R.
It is not a problem if the printer supports unicode, but it seems this
is not universal, or not done on cheap printers.

Even with unicode support I doubt there's a printer around with
*all* the glyphs.

That too.

--
Cheers, Carlos.

Ahem A Rivet's Shot

2022-11-19 11:36:39 UTC

On Fri, 18 Nov 2022 18:50:19 +0100

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
On Fri, 18 Nov 2022 13:03:58 +0100

Post by Carlos E.R.
It is not a problem if the printer supports unicode, but it seems this
is not universal, or not done on cheap printers.

Even with unicode support I doubt there's a printer around with
*all* the glyphs.

That too.

So I got curious - I have a test file lurking called UTF-8-demo.txt
so I just threw it to the printer (a Kyocera PostScript laser) with
lpr-cups. Overall not bad but not great - a few missing glyphs in the
maths, the combining characters didn't (bad) and a clean miss on Thai,
Amharic, Runes and Braille.

In vim in a urxvt window it's just missing Amharic and Runes which I
could fix if ICBA to figure out what fonts to install for them.

--
Steve O'Hara-Smith
Odds and Ends at http://www.sohara.org/

Carlos E.R.

2022-11-19 12:18:02 UTC

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
On Fri, 18 Nov 2022 18:50:19 +0100

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
On Fri, 18 Nov 2022 13:03:58 +0100

Post by Carlos E.R.
It is not a problem if the printer supports unicode, but it seems this
is not universal, or not done on cheap printers.

Even with unicode support I doubt there's a printer around with
*all* the glyphs.

That too.

But that's cheating, you are converting text to postscript in the
computer, I understand.

You have to send the text as is to the printer.

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
In vim in a urxvt window it's just missing Amharic and Runes which I
could fix if ICBA to figure out what fonts to install for them.

--
Cheers, Carlos.

Ahem A Rivet's Shot

2022-11-19 13:25:32 UTC

On Sat, 19 Nov 2022 13:18:02 +0100

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
On Fri, 18 Nov 2022 18:50:19 +0100
So I got curious - I have a test file lurking called
UTF-8-demo.txt so I just threw it to the printer (a Kyocera PostScript
laser) with lpr-cups. Overall not bad but not great - a few missing
glyphs in the maths, the combining characters didn't (bad) and a clean
miss on Thai, Amharic, Runes and Braille.

But that's cheating, you are converting text to postscript in the
computer, I understand.

This is true.

Post by Carlos E.R.
You have to send the text as is to the printer.

It doesn't do that, I tried putting the text file onto a USB stick
and plugging it into the printer but the only thing it offered to print was
a PDF left there by the maker of the stick.

--
Steve O'Hara-Smith
Odds and Ends at http://www.sohara.org/

Carlos E.R.

2022-11-19 14:02:15 UTC

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
On Sat, 19 Nov 2022 13:18:02 +0100

But that's cheating, you are converting text to postscript in the
computer, I understand.

This is true.

Post by Carlos E.R.
You have to send the text as is to the printer.

It doesn't do that, I tried putting the text file onto a USB stick
and plugging it into the printer but the only thing it offered to print was
a PDF left there by the maker of the stick.

Right, not all postscript printers can print raw text directly. I think
it was the original hp laserjet that could, because it was going to be
used from MsDOS.

Maybe I can try mine.

***@Telcontar:~> cat hello
Hello world
***@Telcontar:~> lpr -o raw hello
***@Telcontar:~>

It printed correctly :-)

Where did you get that UTF-8-demo.txt file?
My printer is old (HP CP1515n), I very much doubt it will cope.

--
Cheers, Carlos.

Ahem A Rivet's Shot

2022-11-19 14:40:15 UTC

On Sat, 19 Nov 2022 15:02:15 +0100

Post by Carlos E.R.
Where did you get that UTF-8-demo.txt file?

It originated with Markus Kuhn at Cambridge (dated 2002). I'm not
sure now where I found it (some unicode info site possibly belonging to
the consortium), but you can find it here if you want:

http://www.sohara.org/Misc/UTF-8-demo.txt

--
Steve O'Hara-Smith
Odds and Ends at http://www.sohara.org/

Carlos E.R.

2022-11-19 17:57:00 UTC

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
On Sat, 19 Nov 2022 15:02:15 +0100

Post by Carlos E.R.
Where did you get that UTF-8-demo.txt file?

It originated with Markus Kuhn at Cambridge (dated 2002). I'm not
sure now where I found it (some unicode info site possibly belonging to
http://www.sohara.org/Misc/UTF-8-demo.txt

I cut a bit of it to another file, not wanting to waste a lot of paper,
and tried: it only printed a single line.

I guess the printer want CR·LF terminated lines.

***@Telcontar:~/samples> unix2dos -n p p1
unix2dos: converting file p to file p1 in DOS format...
***@Telcontar:~/samples> file p p1
p: UTF-8 Unicode text
p1: UTF-8 Unicode text, with CRLF line terminators
***@Telcontar:~/samples>
***@Telcontar:~/samples> lpr -o raw p1
***@Telcontar:~/samples>

And it printed garbage, as I expected.

--
Cheers, Carlos.

Peter Flass

2022-11-19 17:30:22 UTC

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
On Sat, 19 Nov 2022 13:18:02 +0100

But that's cheating, you are converting text to postscript in the
computer, I understand.

This is true.

Post by Carlos E.R.
You have to send the text as is to the printer.

It doesn't do that, I tried putting the text file onto a USB stick
and plugging it into the printer but the only thing it offered to print was
a PDF left there by the maker of the stick.

Right, not all postscript printers can print raw text directly. I think
it was the original hp laserjet that could, because it was going to be
used from MsDOS.
Maybe I can try mine.
Hello world
It printed correctly :-)
Where did you get that UTF-8-demo.txt file?
My printer is old (HP CP1515n), I very much doubt it will cope.

I’ve never heard of a printer that couldn’t print a plain text file.

--
Pete

Charles Richmond

2022-11-19 11:06:02 UTC

Post by Carlos E.R.
I think it was not only the currency symbols, but also some other
letters used in Spain.

Which one's you meañ? ;-)

¿¡

Ah, I forgot those. That sentences with "!" and questions start with.

Yep. And accented vowels. And ª, used on numbers, like 1º or 1ª. Meaning
"first", female or male. It is the letter 'a' 'o' with an underscore,
upperscript. Similar, but not the same as '°' used on '°C', meaning
"degrees".
It is not a problem if the printer supports unicode, but it seems this
is not universal, or not done on cheap printers.

Do *not* forget the cedilla (c with a squiggle tail under it) used in
French, Portuguese, etc.

--
Charles Richmond
--
This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software.
www.avast.com

Andreas Kohlbach

2022-11-16 23:45:56 UTC

Post by Carlos E.R.
I think it was not only the currency symbols, but also some other
letters used in Spain.

Which oñe do you meañ? ;-)

--
Andreas

Andreas Kohlbach

2022-11-16 23:32:52 UTC

What printer?
Reading some old manuals I came across the Epson RX80 (or FX?). It
allowed to use different font sets already in the early 1980s. You just
needed to know *how*.
Would be lame though if the retailer sold printers in the US set up for
the UK market.

Not a month ago I got a ticket printed on a machine that could not do
the euro symbol.
Of course, I did not ask, could be a configuration thing, change code
page or whatever. Still, on 2022...

Printers back that were usually dot matrix and when printing text they
used an installed font for each letter. Today it's more like postscript
or PDF and all printers probably print graphics even if it's "text".

--
Andreas

Ahem A Rivet's Shot

2022-11-17 08:19:40 UTC

On Wed, 16 Nov 2022 18:32:52 -0500

Post by Andreas Kohlbach
Printers back that were usually dot matrix and when printing text they

This was the era of the NLQ 24 pin dot matrix displacing the Qume
and Diablo daisy wheel printers for all but the most fussy or well heeled.

Post by Andreas Kohlbach
used an installed font for each letter. Today it's more like postscript
or PDF and all printers probably print graphics even if it's "text".

These days decent printers talk PostScript, PCL and perhaps PDF,
cheap printers take proprietary format images from a driver.

Laserjets and Laserwriters were around since the mid 1980s but they
were expensive especially since PostScript licenses were expensive and the
hardware for a RIP was probably more powerful than the computer generating
the printout. One big win with PostScript was that it was also used on
Linotron so a PostScript printer could be used to produce accurate proofs
of material being sent for printing.

--
Steve O'Hara-Smith
Odds and Ends at http://www.sohara.org/

Andreas Kohlbach

2022-11-18 02:21:30 UTC

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
On Wed, 16 Nov 2022 18:32:52 -0500

Post by Andreas Kohlbach
Printers back that were usually dot matrix and when printing text they

This was the era of the NLQ 24 pin dot matrix displacing the Qume
and Diablo daisy wheel printers for all but the most fussy or well heeled.

With a daisy wheel printer you have the same problems of dot matrix
printers, that some characters are not available without some effort.

Post by Andreas Kohlbach
used an installed font for each letter. Today it's more like postscript
or PDF and all printers probably print graphics even if it's "text".

These days decent printers talk PostScript, PCL and perhaps PDF,
cheap printers take proprietary format images from a driver.
Laserjets and Laserwriters were around since the mid 1980s but they
were expensive especially since PostScript licenses were expensive and the
hardware for a RIP was probably more powerful than the computer generating
the printout. One big win with PostScript was that it was also used on
Linotron so a PostScript printer could be used to produce accurate proofs
of material being sent for printing.

My saying: Today you don't need to concern yourself with foreign characters.

--
Andreas

Carlos E.R.

2022-11-18 12:06:38 UTC

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
On Wed, 16 Nov 2022 18:32:52 -0500

Post by Andreas Kohlbach
Printers back that were usually dot matrix and when printing text they

This was the era of the NLQ 24 pin dot matrix displacing the Qume
and Diablo daisy wheel printers for all but the most fussy or well heeled.

With a daisy wheel printer you have the same problems of dot matrix
printers, that some characters are not available without some effort.

Post by Andreas Kohlbach
used an installed font for each letter. Today it's more like postscript
or PDF and all printers probably print graphics even if it's "text".

These days decent printers talk PostScript, PCL and perhaps PDF,
cheap printers take proprietary format images from a driver.
Laserjets and Laserwriters were around since the mid 1980s but they
were expensive especially since PostScript licenses were expensive and the
hardware for a RIP was probably more powerful than the computer generating
the printout. One big win with PostScript was that it was also used on
Linotron so a PostScript printer could be used to produce accurate proofs
of material being sent for printing.

My saying: Today you don't need to concern yourself with foreign characters.

That's what I thought, but recently I hit that problem in the ticket of
a shop, that had some Spanish letters wrong. I think the printer was
Chinese made. Meaning a Chinese name, too.

--
Cheers, Carlos.

D.J.

2022-11-16 15:47:32 UTC

On Tue, 15 Nov 2022 20:11:59 -0500, Andreas Kohlbach

What printer?
Reading some old manuals I came across the Epson RX80 (or FX?). It
allowed to use different font sets already in the early 1980s. You just
needed to know *how*.

Could have been an Epson, but I don't remember.

Post by Andreas Kohlbach
Would be lame though if the retailer sold printers in the US set up for
the UK market.

US Air Force exchange.
--
Jim

Theo

2022-11-17 12:26:54 UTC

What printer?

I was wondering if it might a Tektronix Phaser, before they were bought by
Xerox:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xerox_Phaser

ISTR there were some smaller desktop Phaser models.

Post by Andreas Kohlbach
Reading some old manuals I came across the Epson RX80 (or FX?). It
allowed to use different font sets already in the early 1980s. You just
needed to know *how*.

That was commonly a DIP switch somewhere in the depths of the machine or
maybe on the back - allowed you to swap out certain characters for others
(currency symbol was common, also other Latin1 characters), as well as set
the default font if no control codes were sent.

Post by Andreas Kohlbach
Would be lame though if the retailer sold printers in the US set up for
the UK market.

That does surprise me. Although 'grey imports' were common at that time -
you got the machine cheap due to currency arbitrage because it was intended
for some other country, maybe the distributor had to cut off the mains plug
and replace it with the local one (if any plug was supplied at all), the
manuals might have been in the wrong language, etc. The downside of a grey
import was you didn't get local warranty support from the manufacturer, you
had to send it back to whatever market it came from.

Theo

Andreas Kohlbach

2022-11-18 02:25:02 UTC

Post by Andreas Kohlbach
Reading some old manuals I came across the Epson RX80 (or FX?). It
allowed to use different font sets already in the early 1980s. You just
needed to know *how*.

I think with the Epson I mentioned you could use ESC-sequences to do some
magic, like swapping the character set. You could do this in BASIC. Like

PRINT CHR(27) ...

--
Andreas

Kerr-Mudd, John

2022-11-18 09:34:10 UTC

On Thu, 17 Nov 2022 21:25:02 -0500

Post by Andreas Kohlbach
Reading some old manuals I came across the Epson RX80 (or FX?). It
allowed to use different font sets already in the early 1980s. You just
needed to know *how*.

I think with the Epson I mentioned you could use ESC-sequences to do some
magic, like swapping the character set. You could do this in BASIC. Like
PRINT CHR(27) ...

Espon Escape codes; takes me back.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ESC/P
(but most of the links there are dead; I had hoped to link to a list of
Esc codes)

Dot matrix:
https://www.nytimes.com/1985/12/17/science/peripherals-getting-the-most-out-of-a-dot-matrix-printer.html
(TL;DNR: 1985 Basic printer cost $299, IBM $549)

Almost as much 'fun' as Dialup modem "AT" commands.

--
Bah, and indeed Humbug.

Theo

2022-11-18 21:52:45 UTC

Post by Kerr-Mudd, John
Espon Escape codes; takes me back.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ESC/P
(but most of the links there are dead; I had hoped to link to a list of
Esc codes)

'Epson FX-80 compatible' was usually advertised.

http://www.lprng.com/RESOURCES/EPSON/epson.htm
suggests it was ESC R and then byte 0 to 12 to set the international charset.

https://files.support.epson.com/pdf/general/escp2ref.pdf
for a 'modern' (1997) list. ESC/P2 was fancier and used on some inkjets,
while ESC/P was for 24 pin dot matrix. That says there's a 9-pin ESC/P,
although the FX-80 isn't listed - possibly it was an earlier subset.

I think the DIP switches typically selected the default charset, and with
the control code you could change it from software.

Theo

Carlos E.R.

2022-11-18 21:58:43 UTC

Post by Kerr-Mudd, John
Espon Escape codes; takes me back.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ESC/P
(but most of the links there are dead; I had hoped to link to a list of
Esc codes)

'Epson FX-80 compatible' was usually advertised.
http://www.lprng.com/RESOURCES/EPSON/epson.htm
suggests it was ESC R and then byte 0 to 12 to set the international charset.
https://files.support.epson.com/pdf/general/escp2ref.pdf
for a 'modern' (1997) list. ESC/P2 was fancier and used on some inkjets,
while ESC/P was for 24 pin dot matrix. That says there's a 9-pin ESC/P,
although the FX-80 isn't listed - possibly it was an earlier subset.
I think the DIP switches typically selected the default charset, and with
the control code you could change it from software.

There are pin printers sold and used today, so I suppose they still use
that language. Also thermal printers.

--
Cheers, Carlos.

Peter Flass

2022-11-19 01:09:42 UTC

Post by Kerr-Mudd, John
Espon Escape codes; takes me back.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ESC/P
(but most of the links there are dead; I had hoped to link to a list of
Esc codes)

'Epson FX-80 compatible' was usually advertised.
http://www.lprng.com/RESOURCES/EPSON/epson.htm
suggests it was ESC R and then byte 0 to 12 to set the international charset.
https://files.support.epson.com/pdf/general/escp2ref.pdf
for a 'modern' (1997) list. ESC/P2 was fancier and used on some inkjets,
while ESC/P was for 24 pin dot matrix. That says there's a 9-pin ESC/P,
although the FX-80 isn't listed - possibly it was an earlier subset.
I think the DIP switches typically selected the default charset, and with
the control code you could change it from software.

There are pin printers sold and used today, so I suppose they still use
that language.

I occasionally see them in applications that want carbon-paper copies.
Auto-repair shops seem to be big users.

Post by Carlos E.R.
Also thermal printers.

--
Pete

Carlos E.R.

2022-11-19 11:34:23 UTC

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Kerr-Mudd, John
Espon Escape codes; takes me back.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ESC/P
(but most of the links there are dead; I had hoped to link to a list of
Esc codes)

'Epson FX-80 compatible' was usually advertised.
http://www.lprng.com/RESOURCES/EPSON/epson.htm
suggests it was ESC R and then byte 0 to 12 to set the international charset.
https://files.support.epson.com/pdf/general/escp2ref.pdf
for a 'modern' (1997) list. ESC/P2 was fancier and used on some inkjets,
while ESC/P was for 24 pin dot matrix. That says there's a 9-pin ESC/P,
although the FX-80 isn't listed - possibly it was an earlier subset.
I think the DIP switches typically selected the default charset, and with
the control code you could change it from software.

There are pin printers sold and used today, so I suppose they still use
that language.

I occasionally see them in applications that want carbon-paper copies.
Auto-repair shops seem to be big users.

Some banks, institutions... there are procedures that require carbon copies.

I wonder what cable they use to connect now. The old centronics cable,
or USB? I see cables that convert from both.

Post by Peter Flass

Post by Carlos E.R.
Also thermal printers.

--
Cheers, Carlos.

Thomas Koenig

2022-11-15 17:19:36 UTC

I'd try to get one of the early RISC workstaions. Probably a
SPARCStation 1 or an IRIS 4D (too early for an Indigo, which has
a much higher cooless factor).

Ahem A Rivet's Shot

2022-11-15 17:26:15 UTC

On Tue, 15 Nov 2022 11:12:23 -0000 (UTC)

Post by Jason Evans
Let's say you wake up on Christmas Day in 1989 and you can have any
computer that you want that it available at that time. What do you
choose? A shiny new 486? The latest Mac? A new Amiga? ...or maybe
something more exotic?

A maxed out Motorola 88K box with 64Mb of RAM, several drives and a
couple of X Terminals.

--
Steve O'Hara-Smith
Odds and Ends at http://www.sohara.org/

Scott Lurndal

2022-11-15 17:39:26 UTC

Post by Kerr-Mudd, John
On Tue, 15 Nov 2022 11:12:23 -0000 (UTC)

A maxed out Motorola 88K box with 64Mb of RAM, several drives and a
couple of X Terminals.

I actually had one of those in 1990 as my home workstation, with an NCD-16.

Ahem A Rivet's Shot

2022-11-15 18:28:14 UTC

On Tue, 15 Nov 2022 17:39:26 GMT

Post by Kerr-Mudd, John
On Tue, 15 Nov 2022 11:12:23 -0000 (UTC)

A maxed out Motorola 88K box with 64Mb of RAM, several drives and a
couple of X Terminals.

I actually had one of those in 1990 as my home workstation, with an NCD-16.

Wow jealous - that was the same time I was setting up to use twenty
of them at the Inland Revenue in a clustered application - specced slightly
above standard each one had two SCSI controllers - with fifteen 1GB drives
and a QIC tape spread among the four busses - as well as two network ports.
When the Motorola rep caught on that these were for a distributed database
application that would be essentially single user (it sucked in data and
printed reports) he gibbered a bit.

We got the 19 inch NCDs - despite the procurement officer declaring
that we would have them over his dead body - we called our fixer and they
were delivered to our office the next day *and* he sent a memo complaining
about the lack of the promised dead body.

--
Steve O'Hara-Smith
Odds and Ends at http://www.sohara.org/

Scott Lurndal

2022-11-15 19:04:29 UTC

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
On Tue, 15 Nov 2022 17:39:26 GMT

Post by Kerr-Mudd, John
On Tue, 15 Nov 2022 11:12:23 -0000 (UTC)

A maxed out Motorola 88K box with 64Mb of RAM, several drives and a
couple of X Terminals.

I actually had one of those in 1990 as my home workstation, with an NCD-16.

We had been using the Moto MVME 88k boxes at Convergent/Burroughs/Unisys
as our primary servers until our own 88k boxes (Unisys S/8400) arrived;
I then took it home and used it there (with a 56kbaud Modem, IIRC). I
used it until 1997 when I left to go to SGI (who provisioned 128k ISDN
for me and I bought a custom-built 2 socket Pentium Pro "Providence" box as an
replacement for the moto box and brought home a spare indy for SGI OS work).

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
We got the 19 inch NCDs - despite the procurement officer declaring
that we would have them over his dead body - we called our fixer and they
were delivered to our office the next day *and* he sent a memo complaining
about the lack of the promised dead body.

We had a bunch of NCD-16 (b&W) and two -17c's that we used for OS development
on the 88k S/8400 systems[*] (and later the P6-based OPUS[**] boxes).

[*] Most of which were sold in Japan.
[**] https://techmonitor.ai/technology/opus_is_its_most_important_product_since_unisys_was_created

I eventually dropped off an NCD-16 and an NCD-17c at the computer
history museum during a vintage fair five years ago.

Carlos E.R.

2022-11-15 19:15:05 UTC

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
On Tue, 15 Nov 2022 17:39:26 GMT

Post by Kerr-Mudd, John
On Tue, 15 Nov 2022 11:12:23 -0000 (UTC)

A maxed out Motorola 88K box with 64Mb of RAM, several drives and a
couple of X Terminals.

I actually had one of those in 1990 as my home workstation, with an NCD-16.

Wow jealous - that was the same time I was setting up to use twenty
of them at the Inland Revenue in a clustered application - specced slightly
above standard each one had two SCSI controllers - with fifteen 1GB drives
and a QIC tape spread among the four busses - as well as two network ports.
When the Motorola rep caught on that these were for a distributed database
application that would be essentially single user (it sucked in data and
printed reports) he gibbered a bit.
We got the 19 inch NCDs - despite the procurement officer declaring
that we would have them over his dead body - we called our fixer and they
were delivered to our office the next day *and* he sent a memo complaining
about the lack of the promised dead body.

I had to google NCD.

https://terminals-wiki.org/wiki/index.php/NCD_NCD19

--
Cheers, Carlos.

Ahem A Rivet's Shot

2022-11-15 19:41:47 UTC

On Tue, 15 Nov 2022 20:15:05 +0100

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
On Tue, 15 Nov 2022 17:39:26 GMT
We got the 19 inch NCDs - despite the procurement officer
declaring that we would have them over his dead body - we called our
fixer and they were delivered to our office the next day *and* he sent
a memo complaining about the lack of the promised dead body.

I had to google NCD.

I expect they didn't last long past that era.

Post by Carlos E.R.
https://terminals-wiki.org/wiki/index.php/NCD_NCD19

That's the bunny - ye gods the price! No wonder he didn't want us
to have them.

--
Steve O'Hara-Smith
Odds and Ends at http://www.sohara.org/

Carlos E.R.

2022-11-15 21:43:59 UTC

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
On Tue, 15 Nov 2022 20:15:05 +0100

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot

I had to google NCD.

I expect they didn't last long past that era.

I saw something similar in 1998, in colour. We also used Windows
computers with software to work as X terminal, I don't remember the
name. It's no the tip of my tongue, but doesn't roll.

Memory is the second thing to get lost with age.

Post by Carlos E.R.
https://terminals-wiki.org/wiki/index.php/NCD_NCD19

That's the bunny - ye gods the price! No wonder he didn't want us
to have them.

Uau, yes.

--
Cheers, Carlos.

Charles Richmond

2022-11-19 10:56:52 UTC

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
On Tue, 15 Nov 2022 20:15:05 +0100

I had to google NCD.

I expect they didn't last long past that era.

The three signs of old age are 1) loss of memory... and I cannot recall
the other two... ;-) :-(

--
Charles Richmond
--
This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software.
www.avast.com

Andreas Kohlbach

2022-11-16 01:05:33 UTC

Post by Jason Evans
I was watching this episode of The Computer Chronicles
http://youtu.be/PJ95IclntIY which is the 1989 Holiday
Buyer's Guide.

Probably the last episode of the first season. So the last good
episode. For me it sucked when it went into the second season 1990. Just
like flipping a switch from the cool 1980s to the boring 1990s.

Post by Jason Evans
Let's say you wake up on Christmas Day in 1989 and you can have any
computer that you want that it available at that time. What do you choose?
A shiny new 486? The latest Mac? A new Amiga? ...or maybe something more
exotic?

Had an Amiga at the time. But if I had money I'd probably went for an
Acorn Archimedes <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acorn_Archimedes>.

--
Andreas

Quadibloc

2022-11-16 08:44:12 UTC

If the choice is restricted to "ordinary" computers - not an IBM mainframe
or a Cray supercomputer - in hindsight, a 486 would of course be the wisest
choice.

John Savard

Thomas Koenig

2022-11-16 09:02:17 UTC

Post by Quadibloc

If the choice is restricted to "ordinary" computers - not an IBM mainframe
or a Cray supercomputer

With great power comes a great electricity bill.

Post by Quadibloc
- in hindsight, a 486 would of course be the wisest
choice.

Why?

Anne & Lynn Wheeler

2022-11-16 17:57:39 UTC

Post by Quadibloc
If the choice is restricted to "ordinary" computers - not an IBM mainframe
or a Cray supercomputer - in hindsight, a 486 would of course be the wisest
choice.

I was posting SJMN sunday adverts on internal IBM forums showing prices
significantly cheaper than IBM Boca/PS2 predictions. Then had of Boca
contracted with Dataquest (since bought by Gartner) to do study of
future of PC ... including several hr video taped round table of silicon
valley experts. The responsible person at Datquest I had known for a
number of years and asked me to be one of the experts ... and promised
to garble my identity so Boca wouldn't recognize me as an IBM employee.

note fall 88 , clone makers on the other side of the pacific, had
built up large inventory of 286 machines for the xmas season ... and
then Intel announce 386sx (386sx consolidated lots of chips needed
for 286 build) and the market/prices drops out of the 286.

some old afc posts ... includes some reports on killer micros
taking over mainframe market
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001n.html#79 a.f.c history checkup... (was What specifications will the standard year 2001 PC have?)
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001n.html#80 a.f.c history checkup... (was What specifications will the standard year 2001 PC have?)
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001n.html#81 a.f.c history checkup... (was What specifications will the standard year 2001 PC have?)
http://www.garlic.com/~lynn/2001n.html#82 a.f.c history checkup... (was What specifications will the standard year 2001 PC have?)

i386 & 486
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I386
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/486DX

--
virtualization experience starting Jan1968, online at home since Mar1970

johnson

2022-11-16 09:28:54 UTC

I think that was the year HP bought out Apollo Computer.
I'd have one of their last models 9000/something, they can still run *BSD.

songbird

2022-11-16 12:22:52 UTC

Jason Evans wrote:
...

Post by Jason Evans
Let's say you wake up on Christmas Day in 1989 and you can have any
computer that you want that it available at that time. What do you choose?
A shiny new 486? The latest Mac? A new Amiga? ...or maybe something more
exotic?

the Amiga was amazing when it came out and i really did
want one, but i'd already had an IBM PC so could not afford...

songbird

Charlie Gibbs

2022-11-16 18:12:59 UTC

Post by songbird
...

Post by Jason Evans
Let's say you wake up on Christmas Day in 1989 and you can have any
computer that you want that it available at that time. What do you choose?
A shiny new 486? The latest Mac? A new Amiga? ...or maybe something more
exotic?

the Amiga was amazing when it came out and i really did
want one, but i'd already had an IBM PC so could not afford...

At that time I didn't have an IBM clone yet. I didn't consider
them sufficiently better than my CP/M box to justify the switch.
When the Amiga came out I got one as soon as I could scrape up
the cash.

greymaus

2022-11-16 22:20:10 UTC

...

Post by Jason Evans
Let's say you wake up on Christmas Day in 1989 and you can have any
computer that you want that it available at that time. What do you choose?
A shiny new 486? The latest Mac? A new Amiga? ...or maybe something more
exotic?

heavy phone charges mean little phone use in Ireland at that time,
and what was going on was on Amiga's. networking was the thing around
Dublin on lines local to the city. Amiga's. Nobody had HD's. So one got
an MSDOS machine with a HS stuffed with shareware, and enthusiasm waned,
a list of the shareware compared to the PD stuff available from the
Amiga's?.

I met that man later, he was doing publicity for a dodgy politician.

A guy called * Carroll was doing work with the Amiga, emigrated to
Minnesota.

There was a public event about the internet at about that time, 1994, so
I brought my son up. He showed no interest. Blackrock Collage, Dublin,
and the talk was by a man called Andy Mowett, who arrived onstage
wearing an Army coat and frayed jeans.

It turned out that there was more going on in Blackrock Collage that
time than a group of nerds discussing what turned out to be the
internet.

I remember about that time that Bill Gates published a book, `The Way
Forward' which saw an Internet-like system dominated by Microsoft.

I met a man later who knew the late Paul Allen, and said that he was an
OK guy. There is something about a yacht he owned being hard to sell
recently.

--
***@mail.com

Fe, Fi, Fo, Fum, I smell the stench of an Influencer.
Where is our money gone, Dude?

Ahem A Rivet's Shot

2022-11-17 08:28:09 UTC

On 16 Nov 2022 22:20:10 GMT

Post by greymaus
There was a public event about the internet at about that time, 1994, so
I brought my son up. He showed no interest. Blackrock Collage, Dublin,
and the talk was by a man called Andy Mowett, who arrived onstage
wearing an Army coat and frayed jeans.

How on earth did I miss that ? In 1994 I was living in Blackrock
setting up Internet Eireann as the first low cost dial up IP service in the
country. Our advertising had to explain what the internet was.

--
Steve O'Hara-Smith
Odds and Ends at http://www.sohara.org/

greymaus

2022-11-17 11:27:15 UTC

Post by Ahem A Rivet's Shot
On 16 Nov 2022 22:20:10 GMT

We live in far different spheres :)

--
***@mail.com

Fe, Fi, Fo, Fum, I smell the stench of an Influencer.
Where is our money gone, Dude?

Douglas Miller

2022-11-16 14:39:11 UTC

In 1989, I would have chosen a Sequent Symmetry. Nothing too fancy, 2 or 4 '386 procs. Each of their 386's running DYNIX/ptx could run circles around any 386/486 PC. Of course, the power bills would have killed me.

songbird

2022-11-16 16:25:28 UTC

Douglas Miller wrote:
...

Post by Douglas Miller
In 1989, I would have chosen a Sequent Symmetry. Nothing too fancy, 2 or 4 '386 procs. Each of their 386's running DYNIX/ptx could run circles around any 386/486 PC. Of course, the power bills would have killed me.

still much better than what a mainframe chewed up. when we
replaced the mainframe the savings in electricity (for running
the computer and also the air conditioning) would eventually
pay for the Sequent.

songbird

Ahem A Rivet's Shot

2022-11-17 08:42:03 UTC

On Wed, 16 Nov 2022 06:39:11 -0800 (PST)

Post by Douglas Miller
In 1989, I would have chosen a Sequent Symmetry. Nothing too fancy, 2 or
4 '386 procs. Each of their 386's running DYNIX/ptx could run circles
around any 386/486 PC. Of course, the power bills would have killed me.

Now that brings back a memory. We benchmarked a big Sequent at BT
around then, it had thirty two 486s each with a full 16MB of RAM, the
competition was the best Sun and HP had to offer (details forgotten,
except we had to downgrade the compiler on the HP because of a C++
compatibility issue - a deprecated keyword had become illegal in the
latest version and we had to support systems where it was mandatory) at the
time and a quarter of an Amdahl mainframe running UTS. There was no clear
winner but there was a clear loser - the Amdahl never completed the build
let alone the tests.

--
Steve O'Hara-Smith
Odds and Ends at http://www.sohara.org/

Bob Eager

2022-11-16 21:24:28 UTC

I actually saved up and bought what I wanted in November 1989.

An IBM PS/2 Model 80 with a 115MB disk! And keyboard and monitor.

The keyboard cost me £135 (about $200 U.S. then).

I have used that keyboard (not the computer) daily since then. I am
typing this on it.

--
Using UNIX since v6 (1975)...

Use the BIG mirror service in the UK:
http://www.mirrorservice.org

Leonard Blaisdell

2022-11-16 22:38:05 UTC