Lol

[maxamuus]

Remember punching a hole on the edge so that you could make it double sided?

Oh wow i had TOTALLY forgot about that.

 

[b-boy]

Yeah, but our system used the 5-1/4" floppy floppies. Remember punching a hole on the edge so that you could make it double sided?

And you put a piece of electrical tape on the edge to make it read-only.

I still have an old IBM AT 1.2 MB drive sitting in a drawer. In my mind i'm waiting for the day the President Of the USA has an old floppy he needs to read to save the world. I'll be ready!

 

[b-boy]

Hell, that seems like just yesterday. Anyone remember decks of punched cards? Punched paper tape? My first encounter with a computer was programming in Fortran II on an IBM 1620 in 1965. Magnetic core memory - all 20K characters of it. Arithmetic operations by table lookup from core memory - talk about sloooooow! But somehow it was a lot more fun in those days.

Holy crap. You are old!

I do remember paper tape. The tape reader would shred 20 hours of work in about 3 seconds when it jammed.

I agree. It was more fun back then. Programmers were like Gods because no one else had a clue. It was great.

 

[passedpawn]

Hell, that seems like just yesterday. Anyone remember decks of punched cards? Punched paper tape? My first encounter with a computer was programming in Fortran II on an IBM 1620 in 1965. Magnetic core memory - all 20K characters of it. Arithmetic operations by table lookup from core memory - talk about sloooooow! But somehow it was a lot more fun in those days.

I punched cards. Hand numbered in case you dropped them.

And yes, I went through the variations of Fortran, which still haunts me today. Fortran IV though, you dinosaur

We called them Hollerith cards

 

[jsguitar]

I had this beast in the fifth grade if I remember correctly. I didn't have all the accessories though. I learned to program some really simple animated graphics in basic but then got into other things, mainly music. The memory 'cards' were huge and the whole memory compartment is a tank.

 

[b-boy]

I had this beast in the fifth grade if I remember correctly. I didn't have all the accessories though. I learned to program some really simple animated graphics in basic but then got into other things, mainly music. The memory 'cards' were huge and the whole memory compartment is a tank.

Whatever happened to TI? They ruled the early 80s. They owned the calculator market and that TI99 was the first computer I remember being sold at retail stores.

 

[maxamuus]

 

[passedpawn]

Whatever happened to TI? They ruled the early 80s. They owned the calculator market and that TI99 was the first computer I remember being sold at retail stores.

I bought a Commodore VIC20 at the time the TI thingy was popular. It was a toss-up at the time.

Imagine how one did research at the time, without the internet. Can anyone here imagine? Really?

But don't cry for TI. Take my word for it (as an electronics guy), they doing fine. Commodore? Not so much.

 

[jsguitar]

^^^Yeah, Commodore out competed TI in the home computer market but TI is still going strong in the electronics market. Related to my own experience, I recently had a good mic preamp that had TI chips in it. They have a good rep from what I understand.

 

[passedpawn]

I was usually spent after 15 minutes of anticipation just waiting for the ****s to DL 1/3rd of the way into the pic.

hehehe. I just recovered from a laughing fit.

 

[b-boy]

^^^Yeah, Commodore out competed TI in the home computer market but TI is still going strong in the electronics market. Related to my own experience, I recently had a good mic preamp that had TI chips in it. They have a good rep from what I understand.

So they do chip sets now? Glad to hear they are still around.

 

[Golddiggie]

So they do chip sets now? Glad to hear they are still around.

Look at a random controller card for computers today (desktops mostly). Chances are you'll see some TI stamped chips on it.

 

[passedpawn]

So they do chip sets now? Glad to hear they are still around.

TI sells a great array of processors. I'm a design engineer. I use their MSP430 16-bit processors A LOT! In fact, I've made them a lot of money considering the number of devices I've put their processors in.

So yes, TI is still around.

[edit] I should mention that I design their analog parts into as much as I can. I live TI. Go America. I design as much U.S. stuff as I can into my products. I just finished a device for a Swedish company that is full of TI and Analog Devices (another US company) components.

 

[estricklin]

Like Pioneer Trail on Apple 2e

I ended up getting an Apple 2e after I had my 4086, but still had fun playing around with it.

As for TI, if I'm not mistaken they sold a LOT of modem chipsets in the 90s, in fact my el cheapo 56k I spoke of earlier had a TI chipset.

 

[opus345]

How about playing Star Trek on a Decwriter? Anyone else ever use a Televideo CRT to code where you didn't have a backspace key? I learned to hate CTRL-H. And I hated numbering my card decks even after I dropped em.

 

[b-boy]

How about playing Star Trek on a Decwriter? Anyone else ever use a Televideo CRT to code and you didn't have a backspace key? I hated using CTRL-H. And I hated numbering my card decks even after I dropped em.

.

I remember the DECWriters. My lab had a PDP 11/45. That's where I learned to code. We had one of those CRTs. It was about 3 feet thick. If. I ever get cancer I'm blaming that sucker.

 

[Jaybird]

I remember 9-pin vs. 24-pin dot matrix.

I wrote an awesome 1st person game on a DEC mainframe back then. Wish I still had the code. Lots of goto's, LOL

LOL!!! Did you really Laugh out loud???HUH did ya? I DIDN'T THINK SO!!!!!

Ok I did a little

 

[passedpawn]

LOL!!! Did you really Laugh out loud???HUH did ya? I DIDN'T THINK SO!!!!!

I remember that program so well. What a hoot. The program was a full 7 periods of high school. You made choices throughout the day. It was cool.

Did I lol? No, but I chuckled inside. Yes, I'm a hypocrite.

 

[b-boy]

I remember that program so well. What a hoot. The program was a full 7 periods of high school. You made choices throughout the day. It was cool.

Did I lol? No, but I chuckled inside. Yes, I'm a hypocrite.

Your original post referred to insincere LOLs. I think yours was a sincere LOL, so it's acceptable.

 

[passedpawn]

Your original post referred to insincere LOLs. I think yours was a sincere LOL, so it's acceptable.

Believe me, I don't insincerely LOL. I'm not an unhappy person though. In fact, I LOL all the time.

LOL, LOL, and LOL! I'm in a great mood and you fools are fueling it. Stop it!

 

[maxamuus]

How about a ROFL? or a LMAO ?

 

[estricklin]

Zork!!

 

[passedpawn]

Zork!!

I can't believe I spent money on those games. But they were fun.

 

[Golddiggie]

How about a ROFL? or a LMAO ?

But did you REALLY do either of those things?? I seriously doubt it. If you did, we need photo/video evidence.

 

[BigPicture]

You guys are really old!

I remember hitting the shareware shop in town & picking up my 1st copy of Doom. It came on one 3.5 inch disk. THAT was high tech. I played it on my 286 IBM and it was way cool.

I had a 14.4 modem with V90 to hit that BBS & play to the wee hours of the night.

My wife complained she was a computer widow.

 

[b-boy]

You guys are really old!

I remember hitting the shareware shop in town & picking up my 1st copy of Doom. It came on one 3.5 inch disk. THAT was high tech. I played it on my 286 IBM and it was way cool.

I had a 14.4 modem with V90 to hit that BBS & play to the wee hours of the night.

My wife complained she was a computer widow.

Hey, get off my lawn you young punk! (Shaking fist)

 

[estricklin]

You guys are really old!

I remember hitting the shareware shop in town & picking up my 1st copy of Doom. It came on one 3.5 inch disk. THAT was high tech. I played it on my 286 IBM and it was way cool.

I had a 14.4 modem with V90 to hit that BBS & play to the wee hours of the night.

My wife complained she was a computer widow.

ID Software says "If you are playing a pirated copy of Doom, you are going to HELL".

 

[maxamuus]

You guys are really old!

I remember hitting the shareware shop in town & picking up my 1st copy of Doom. It came on one 3.5 inch disk. THAT was high tech. I played it on my 286 IBM and it was way cool.

I had a 14.4 modem with V90 to hit that BBS & play to the wee hours of the night.

My wife complained she was a computer widow.

Ummm hate to break it to you but If you were playing Doom on a 286 and married at the time you arent exactly a spring chicken.

 

[sudbuster]

I remember those days... I think our first modem was 300 baud... Back when you had two colors on the screen and one of them was dark.

I remember when cell phones were more car phones because the damned things were too big to carry around. Or you used an entire briefcase to carry it around.

Hear the squelch and grind of the modem? The sound was cool, the speeds were pathetic (by today's standards).

Man, some of us sound like such old farts...

Yeah, well, you're not an"old fart" 'til you can remember WW2....

 

[bottlebomber]

Yeah, well, you're not an"old fart" 'til you can remember WW2....

Shoot, you probably remember digging trenches in the Great War