Shucks, you guys are young folks and johnny come latelys. I started with an
LGP30 in 1968. The monitor was real easy on the eyes because there wasn't
one. The paper tape wasn't too bad most of the time. unfortunately when
one of the tubes went it tended to mess up the operation of the computer.
The 2K of memory filled pretty fast but since everything was written in
assembly language programs tended to be pretty compact (unlike some software
that has been developed recently by some unnamed large firms). The draw
back of this system was that while it could be used on board a boat you
would need a good size cabin with air conditioning to be able to use it. Ah
yes, those were the days-----well maybe not.

Brian


"Jack Erbes" wrote in message
...
Vic Smith wrote:
snip
I went with the first IBM PC, the 8088, 64k mem, single floppy deal.
Tricked it all out a bit later, so it was a hot rod. Heh.
Think I paid 2700 bucks for the barebones.
The IBM monitor was the green.
Clones were coming with amber monitors, and to my eyes they were
"tacky." Never told anybody that until now.

--Vic

Tacky? That amber monitor only came with the Cadillacs of the 5150's!

The amber was a lot easier on the eyes for extended use. And with that,
the Hercules graphic card, and a second floppy drive I was the King of
WordStar for a long time.

I was only a mere Chief Petty Officer but I had figured out how to use
WordStar on a dual floppy PC and even the officers came to sip at the font
of knowledge...

And I thinking you might have had 640k of RAM? I don't think you could
run a floppy disk on a 64k 5150. Maybe though.

http://oldcomputers.net/ibm5150.html

Jack