It was 1989 when I got my first computer - an Apple II GS. I used to program in BASIC. I remember Delphi, Prodigy, and the Internet before the Web. I remember BBSs and measuring your dial-up connection in Bauds. I remember when hard drives were an “add-on.” I remember boot disks and 5 and a quarter floppies. That computer was such a huge part of my life that eventually I would major in Computer Science and take a job as a patent attorney specializing in computer-related technology. Now I spend my days pondering the inner-workings of high speed routers.
So when I see this CNN article about the 25th anniversary of the Commodore 64, my inner dork wet himself a little. Though I never had one, I remember the Commodore 64, the Apple II, II+, IIc and IIe. The Tandy at Radio Shack. But then I got to this line:
“The computer featured 64 kilobits of memory (a lot for 1982)…”
The Commodore 64 had 64 kilobytes of memory. If you’re going to do an entire article on the Commodore 64, you might want to get that one fact straight. Saying that it had 64 kilobits of memory is like saying the Titanic sank because it hit some driftwood. Ok, back to the nerdery for me.
UPDATE: They’ve fixed the story, but my point still stands. I should have taken a screen shot.
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December 7th, 2007 at 12:33 pm
at least you didn’t write your post in all BASIC commands. then you’d be a giant dork. now, if you’ll excuse me, i am going to go play zork.
December 7th, 2007 at 12:37 pm
Dear god, what has this blog become? Is this even English?
Now if you’ll excuse me I have to go back to chewing my gum and twirling my hair.
And playing MoonMist.
Fuck.
December 7th, 2007 at 1:17 pm
We used to play Jumpman. On my PC Jr.
December 7th, 2007 at 1:45 pm
I remember my first too. A Commodore Vic 20.
Introduced in 1980 and retailing at $299, it had 5K of RAM (3.5K for the user). It was the first computer ever to sell over 1 million units, just a few months ahead of the Apple II’s 1 million mark.
I used to “program” it to play pong-like games. That was the beginning and the end of my developer days.
December 7th, 2007 at 1:49 pm
I remember lusting after the radioshack Tandy, marvelling at the 256 color graphics and the realistic 8-bit (4?) sound. It was the ultimate in computing technology, but I had to make due with a cobbled together hodgepodge of crap XTs.
But BBSes were the shit back in the day, particularly multi-line ones where you could chat with another computer user in real time! I know you’re not from here originally so you may not have had The List, but I recall clearly hanging out with some friends and flipping lustily through the dot matrix printouts of Focke’s List, looking for new boards with names that promised megabyte after glorious megabyte of grainy lo-res porn scans.
The more things change, the more they stay the same.
December 7th, 2007 at 2:03 pm
Commodore 64? Lucky bastard - I got stuck with a VIC-20. I’m not kidding. Cassette drives?!?! Jesus…
December 10th, 2007 at 10:40 am
I once wrote a lengthy piece about a soldier who went MIA in Vietnam. At one point in the article I inadvertantly referred to him as being in the “1st Calvary” instead of “1st Cavalry.” I received phone calls from people saying that I, to paraphrase, hated America and Jesus. My point is, the CNN shlub may have insulted the memory of a computer but at least he didn’t insult the memory of a deceased U.S. serviceman and the Son of Man.
December 14th, 2007 at 12:37 am
Was there ever an Apple 1? Or were Apples like Leonard Part 6?
December 17th, 2007 at 4:01 pm
one predecessor ruled them all — the timex sinclair.
kneel before your master.