Old Computer Prices

Our first was a Tandy 1000. Processor was either an 8088 or 8086. Never could remember which. Never really knew the difference. I think it came with 64k RAM. One 5.25 floppy. No hard drive. I may have bumped up the RAM. I did install a 20MB HD. Thought I’d died and gone to heaven when I did that. MS-DOS and C:/ prompt. Windows was what you opened when it was hot. Learned to write Batch Files and some simple GW Basic programs on that thing.

And I’m typing this on a smart phone with 64GB storage. Not sure RAM, but probably around 8GB. Fun times.
 
iblive said:
Our first was a Tandy 1000. Processor was either an 8088 or 8086. Never could remember which. Never really knew the difference. I think it came with 64k RAM. One 5.25 floppy. No hard drive. I may have bumped up the RAM. I did install a 20MB HD. Thought I’d died and gone to heaven when I did that. MS-DOS and C:/ prompt. Windows was what you opened when it was hot. Learned to write Batch Files and some simple GW Basic programs on that thing.

And I’m typing this on a smart phone with 64GB storage. Not sure RAM, but probably around 8GB. Fun times.
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I do remember 8086. It cost like $7000 when they first built it.
20 years later I built the same with all the parts out of trashcans.
I think those motherboards had a turbo switch (didn't it?)
The OS would load from floppy disks. I still have some of those floppys around somewhere...
But good luck finding a floppy drive.

I would start that thing up and it would take like 8 minutes to open a MS Word file. :pound-hand:
But...it was free. Didn't cost a dime.
 
Beagle said:
View attachment 62323

ZX80 kit... :D
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While at the time it was plenty expensive. But the Tandy 1000 plus a Dot Matrix Printer (remember those?)..... if memory serves, I might have had somewhere around a grand invested. No turbo switch..... but I do seem to remember being able to overclock the processor. Unless I’m remembering our next computer which was a Gateway Pentium running Win98. I do remember messing around with overclocking that one.
 
Amp Mad Scientist said:
I do remember 8086. It cost like $7000 when they first built it.
20 years later I built the same with all the parts out of trashcans.
I think those motherboards had a turbo switch (didn't it?)
The OS would load from floppy disks. I still have some of those floppys around somewhere...
But good luck finding a floppy drive.

I would start that thing up and it would take like 8 minutes to open a MS Word file. :pound-hand:
But...it was free. Didn't cost a dime.
Click to expand...

MY IBM had Via Voice,,,,,,,,,,,, the other competitors did not. I thought HELL YEAH. no typing!!!
 
iblive said:
While at the time it was plenty expensive. But the Tandy 1000 plus a Dot Matrix Printer (remember those?)..... if memory serves, I might have had somewhere around a grand invested. No turbo switch..... but I do seem to remember being able to overclock the processor. Unless I’m remembering our next computer which was a Gateway Pentium running Win98. I do remember messing around with overclocking that one.
Click to expand...

My tinnitus hurts just thinking about the early 80s Mannesman Tally dot matrix printers. The screeching was horrendous. I think they charged extra for it...
 
The quote of the century for me was the smug ass salesman at Sears back in 1995 with my grandfather who was buying a computer. He paid about $1850 for a Packard Bell ( before their merger with Hewlett printers into HP) that featured the brand new, ground breaking Windows 95 and came with a 1 GB hard drive and 32MB of RAM. My grandpa asked " Is that alot of storage?" And he grinned and said " Buddy, you'll never use that in your lifetime!".......a basic damned DVD is 4.7GB alone and my below average cellphone im typing this on has 60GB of storage with 3GB RAM lol
 
Clockworkmike said:
The quote of the century for me was the smug ass salesman at Sears back in 1995 with my grandfather who was buying a computer. He paid about $1850 for a Packard Bell ( before their merger with Hewlett printers into HP) that featured the brand new, ground breaking Windows 95 and came with a 1 GB hard drive and 32MB of RAM. My grandpa asked " Is that alot of storage?" And he grinned and said " Buddy, you'll never use that in your lifetime!".......a basic damned DVD is 4.7GB alone and my below average cellphone im typing this on has 60GB of storage with 3GB RAM lol
Click to expand...

I had to go to SCSI to get my first 1GB drive... :celebrate2:
 
Wrote my first FORTRAN program in 1973, in high school using pencil marked cards (80 column punched cards came later in college).

The program used format statements to printout in big block (each letter was printed using many of the letter itself), all cap letters:

CHEVY CAMARO

I still have that green and white lined printout! Been involved with, using, buying and building computers ever since. Started with the IBM mainframe, then Data General Nova mini computers (19 inch rack mount), DEC PDP-11, Zenith Z89, Z80 based running CPM, the IBM PC (bought one at work the first day they were a available. Bought Pascal, CPM and this new thing called DOS with it. also bought and built many specialty ones at work.

75AC7059-237B-4773-814E-04D7A8E50316.jpeg
 
One day I had to contact a customer service IT guy for work. He starts with, “we need to get to the C:/ prompt.” Starts walking me thru the procedure”. Before he gets me walked 1/2 way thru I go..... OK.... he asks, “uhm... ok .... what?” Well, I’m at the prompt. What commands shall I type. Told him he was probably still in diapers when I was writing DOS batch files, etc.
 
Beagle said:
I learned Pascal on an overloaded Prime minicomputer.
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One of my college degrees is in computer science as programming was somehow in my DNA. In my early career days I was considered a knowledgeable source in all things FOTRAN, C and assembly language. When I transitioned into Engineering Management I used to tell the younger engineers: “I used to program in C and assembly. Now I program in Outlook and PowerPoint “ :rolf: .
 
I didn’t start taking college courses till I was an adult. Married with kids. Same for my wife. Primarily taking business type courses. But I did take a couple intro to programming classes. In the late 80s early 90s the school I was attending was still using pascal for intro classes. Turned out I was pretty good at it. But as happens..... life happened. My wife was going to need to swap over to full time student from part time. She was working on her special Ed certificate. I decided to take time off so she could concentrate on her certificate. I think my words were, when it’s time to go full time..... do it hard.... do it fast.. graduate. And boy did she. Started teaching in 1992. Somewhere after that I started back to taking classes. But my goal at that point was to at least have an associates degree before my eldest graduates HS. I got that in Dec 1996. He graduated HS spring 1997. Never got back into programming.
 
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