My Computer Use
I have been using computers for a long time.
When I was in 8th grade, 1981/1982, a friend had a Commodore VIC 20. Some where around that time my step-father brought his work Kaypro II home and I got to play with that as well.
In 10th grade in electronics class we had a circuit board computer with a 2 digit display and a hexadecimal keypad. We also got a Heathkit Hero 1 robot to assemble and program. A year later in computer class I was introduced to the TRS-80 Model III. A few months later I purchased a used Commodore 64. In college we had Apple II’s in the hardware lab and IBM PC’s in the software lab. At home I upgraded to an Amiga 2000.
After college work supplied me with a Zenith SuperSport laptop with MSDOS 4, might have been 5 and they taught me to work on PDP-11’s. Eventually the PDP’s were replaced with Windows NT. At home I bought my first Mac. My personal computer has been some form of Mac since 1994. While at work I have often used a Windows computer. From time to time I take an old computer and install Linux on it to play with.
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Computers have change a lot over the decades I have been using them. I have had a lot of happy hours using them. I have also had a few hours of frustration trying to get them to work correctly.
The Commodore 64 was a great machine that was held back by a flaw that made the floppy disk really slow. Even with the flaw it did an amazing job for an 8-bit computer. I wonder sometimes what Commodore could have been had they fixed the flaw.
The Commodore Amiga was an amazing machine. I believe Amiga 2000 was the peak of the design. Commodore came out with more Amiga’s after the 2000 but at the introduction of 2000 the IBM clones were in full bloom and the Amiga’s future was sealed. The OS still exist today.
PDP-11’s are gone. Though it would not surprise me to hear that somewhere in a closet at a government facility one is still running a crucial piece of software. Funny thing is at the time I was using them I didn’t realize what an incredible legacy I was working on. Though their graphics abilities were way out paced by the Windows NT (4.0 I think) machine we replace them with, their endurance was better. The PDP’s were solid running machines. As I swapped them out with PC I could have brought old PDP’s home for free. I think the newest one I worked on was a PDP-11/84 with a Textronix color terminal.
If Windows 95 had existed in 94 I would never had bought a Mac. Windows 95 was not as good as Mac System 7 but it was good enough. At the company I worked for we did not adopt 95 quickly. All of the software us techs used ran just fine on DOS. Customers were on PDP’s. The swap to Windows NT had not stated yet. (It seems I have a vague memory of running the customer front end on Windows 3.1 or Window NT 3.5. I don’t think we were swapping PDP’s for that. I think it was new installs only. My memory fails me.)
I am not an Apple fan boy but I have used them for a long time. Mac’s have their weaknesses but for what I do they serve me well. The iPhone/iPad/Mac eco system works great. I share data between the three all the time. Pages, Numbers, Olive Tree Bible Study and Touch Draw 2 are my main apps these days. I still morn the loss of Claris Works and Hypercard.
That is enough of an old tech enthusiast ramblings. I do look froward to what the computers of the future shall bring.
