Re: Geek Reminiscing

[Baron Chandler <thebaron@mindspring.net>]

> I had a TRS-80. Not by choice mind you- I asked for an Atari computer. But
> my dad heard that Atari was about to go out of business or something so
> I got a TRS80 CoCo with a whopping 16k of RAM (I remember thinking "Wow-
> I'll _never_ use all of it!). The reason I wanted an Atari was that our
> neighbors had several of them- a limitless supply of pirate software was
> just across the street. Instead I had a computer that I could either run
> Color Logo or Typing Tutor on. Fortunately it came with a pretty good set
> of books that tought you BASIC, so if I wanted a new program I could just
> write it.
> 
> Us TRS-80 fans laughed at the TI99.. :-) There was an unspoken rule among
> all TRS-80 users. If we were in Macy's or Richs (remember when they had
> a computer section??) we'd go up to every computer and do:
> 
>   10 PRINT "THE TRS-80 COLOR COMPUTER IS BETTER!"
>   20 GOTO 10
> 
> I loved going into a store and seeing the computers already doing that.

Hehe. The funny thing was, I have to say the TI was still the best of the bunch
I had b4 I had my Apple. And even in some ways the TI was better than the Apple,
in that it had lower case, it had color (my apple ][ had a video modulator and
color output too, but I never used it much except for home videos). I had a 
CoCo. I hated the damn thing. I was so happy to get rid of it and get my
Apple. 

BTW, my apple DID come with some cool programming books. These kids of today!
They have linux and sockets and 3d monster cards and .... they're spoiled
rotten little brats i tell you! Why, when I wsa a kid, we didn't have mice and
4mb GRAPHICS cards - hell we didn't even have 4MB of RAM in our computers at
ALL. :-)

> > my Apple ][ plus (that is featured on the apple2.org site actually) - I'd
> > forgotten about it till i went thru some of the pictures and saw it. It came
> > with a wire clip that you could short some pins with and a new charset ROM
> > that swapped out either inverse or flash text for lowercase. Imagine that.

You know, now that I think of it, having the lowercase chip was actually a
selling point for my ][+ when I sold it. Ha! 

> In 1984 I finally convinced my parents that the TRS-80 just wasn't the thing
> anymore. So I got an Apple //c for Christmas. I remember getting really excited..
> until I found out that TRS-80 BASIC wouldn't do me any good on the Apple //
> and that the Apple didn't come with a programming book. Pfft.

The //c was a neat box. Pricey but neat. I remember wanting one, till I got
my IIgs.

> You know- It was years before I had a game that didn't start up with a
> graphics screen that said "CRACKED BY __________" on it. My parents wouldn't
> let me have a modem- I started asking for one after seeing WarGames on
> HBO. They thought I was going to blow up the planet or something. I finally
> got a modem in high school- Micro Center had a sale on 2400 BPS modems
> so I got one and snuck home with it (and wired up a phone line to my
> bedroom). 

Ha! Well I didn't have a modem till college and didn't have a hard drive till I
got my mac. It was nice to have 80mb to put stuff on. It's getting close to
where 8 gig isn't enough. 80gig anyone?

> I still have several!

I MUST get one from you. I have one at home^2 but god knows where it is.

> Quality Computers is now out of business. They thought they didn't need
> the Apple II market and decided to do Mac stuff only. They thought wrong.

I mailed Mark a message, maybe he'll write some good news back.

Baron.