How did you get started?

From: Charles P. Hobbs <transit_at_primenet.com>
Date: Thu Apr 10 23:57:36 1997

How did I get started . . .

I remember playing around with TRS-80's in school, and Apples, CoCo's and
Vic's/C64's in computer stores and other places, but I had bought a
TI 99/4A. Remember, this was the early-mid 80's, when most of these
machines would cost you at least $400 or so. At those prices, you became
quite the advocate for what you had bought: you wanted to defend your
investment . . .

Fast forward to late 1990. I'm standing in a flea market in Southern
California, looking around for a packet radio (special modem used in
ham radio) when I see someone selling a Radio Shack Color Computer for
$10. Now, the Color Computer has a special place in my heart because
that's the computer I learned to program on (I spent far too much time in
my highschool days, hanging around Radio Shack, playing with this
machine!) Of course, that machine cost around $600 back in early 1981 . .
.and now I can have it for $10? I snapped it up, took it home, hooked it
up to the TV, and enjoyed the nostalgia rush. I even loaded up a cassette
full of old BASIC programs I had written . . .

During the next few months, I bought an Atari 800, a BBC Model B, an
Aquarius (was really given to me free!), a NEC 6001, a Franklin Ace
Apple Clone (needed it to run my Alphasyntauri music synthesizer, which
I also got at the flea market), and eventually, a Commodore 128 (never
wanted a 64, BASIC was too minimal . ..)

This was in addition to the TI 99/4A, the Apple IIe, and the Amiga 1000
that I also obtained new.

I still have all of these machines, and currently have the TI, the Amiga
and the Alphasyntauri connected to a mixer, for electronic music projects.

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Charles P. Hobbs __ __ ____ ___ ___ ____
transit_at_primenet.com /__)/__) / / / / /_ /\ / /_ /
                                        / / \ / / / / /__ / \/ /___ /
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Received on Thu Apr 10 1997 - 23:57:36 BST