Old computers...

[billie114]

I was surfing the net when I came across a site on old computers and it really brought back memories.

I remember buying my first 'computer' and getting so very excited about it as I was the only one in the office to actually own my own pc. I don't know if anyone out there still remembers the good old 48k ZX Spectrum. The only competition in those days was whether you were a speccy owner or a commodore 64 owner and let me tell you there was extreme rivalry to the point where you wouldn't talk to someone that owned the rival pc.

I remember the hassle of connecting the keyboard/pc to the tv and loading the programs with a normal tape recorder. Sitting with a screwdriver to get the tone exactly right...nothing would load unless the speed was exact. All the games and software were stored on a normal tape cassette and it took forever to load. No saving facilities so you either had to leave the game running or start from the beginning each time. Later I bought a device called a Plus-D and I put all my programs onto those big floppies.

There was no Microsoft Word, only a program called Tasword and if you didn't get the right printer, it would print everything backwards. And of course I had the latest dot matrix printer that printed everything backwards. But that was the fun of it all writing programs in machine code and basic to try and rectify it.

The most fun I got out of my Speccy was the monthly magazines where they gave you games written in 'Basic' for you to write onto tape yourself and what fun when it actually worked. I wrote a few of my own simple games myself.

To this day whenever someone says 'next', I always respond with 'X'...this was one of the most common commands in writing 'Basic ' programs.

Needless to say the speccy got put in the cupboard when I got my first Intel Pentium 386 and then all the fun, problems and upgrades started with a vengeance.

Anyone else out there have memories of their first pc?

[Nutty_ZA]

Originally Posted by billie114

I was surfing the net when I came across a site on old computers and it really brought back memories.

I remember buying my first 'computer' and getting so very excited about it as I was the only one in the office to actually own my own pc. I don't know if anyone out there still remembers the good old 48k ZX Spectrum. The only competition in those days was whether you were a speccy owner or a commodore 64 owner and let me tell you there was extreme rivalry to the point where you wouldn't talk to someone that owned the rival pc.

I used to have a Sinclair ZX80 and then a ZX81... then, I gave up when Clive Sinclair bought out the ZX Spectrum(which was 8 bit colour whereas the ZX80 and ZX81 were b&w, as far as I remember; I was only about 11 at the time) and got a commodore VIC20(at least my parents bought me one)
And yes, I remember typing in BASIC from "computing" magazines into the touch pad of the ZX80/81... after having got to line 1680 GOSUB 354, the jack used to fall out and you had to start from the very begining again
BUT... those were the days

Originally Posted by billie114

To this day whenever someone says 'next', I always respond with 'X'...this was one of the most common commands in writing 'Basic ' programs.

The Next command still exists in Visual BASIC...

As in:

private function strip_out_dots(dottedword)
For i = 1 to len(dottedword)
if mid(dottedword,i,1) <> "." then
strip_out_dots = strip_out_dots & mid(dottedword,i,1)
end if
next i
end function

[Keighty]

My first computer was a Commodore +4 (not 64!) complete with cassette player for loading games (which took forever!)

[TheGuru]

Great Post

I remember the z80 very well. As Nutty pointed out you would buy a magazine, then spend to hours typing code in. Then when you run it it errors because there is a , in the wrong place, or the volume was wrong

To think that there are wrist watches now with FAR MORE memory and CPU power

10 PRINT LOL;
20 GOTO 10

The good old days

I see the ads on this page show some Spectrum stuff, brilliant!

[Nutty_ZA]

Result of Guru's code running on a ZX81
lollollollollollollol.... *machine crashes as it's in endless loop*

enjoy the pic

[Mike]

Wow this thread brings back memories

When 48k was a lot of memory

Did you know that there is a Jet Set Willy game in the arcade?

[billie114]

Thanks guys...you had me laughing so hard I nearly fell off my chair. It really brought back memories. I used to drive to Durban every weekend to this little shop to buy my games. I really thought I was so hot. I had boxes and boxes of tapes.

I had forgotten about the errors. Alot of the time the error was in the printing of the magazine. Very frustrating. And the jacks were so well used that they did fall out at the most crucial part. I nearly threw it out the window many times.

I remember working all weekend on a program for a form I was modifying for work. I was nearly finished and ready to print when the power went out. I had to start from scratch. I was not amused...eventually got it done though.

I won't hold it against you Keighty for being a Commodore owner. We all make mistakes (sorry couldn't resist)

Mine looked more like this....

[Mike]

Originally Posted by billie114

I had forgotten about the errors. Alot of the time the error was in the printing of the magazine. Very frustrating. And the jacks were so well used that they did fall out at the most crucial part. I nearly threw it out the window many times.

I remember working all weekend on a program for a form I was modifying for work. I was nearly finished and ready to print when the power went out. I had to start from scratch. I was not amused...eventually got it done though.

The code errors and tape problems used to drive me nuts

I used to go to the shop and enter a bit of basic to make it print rude messages. Then I'd leave the shop

I'd be gutted if the power had gone out on me

It is a good thread this