A moment of silence, please

From: Sam Ismail <dastar_at_crl.com>
Date: Tue Aug 12 15:40:51 1997

On Tue, 12 Aug 1997, Tim Shoppa wrote:

> Unfortunately, the high demand for common "trendy" machines (i.e. IMSAI's,
> Altairs, whatever) often displaces the preservation of machines which
> are much rarer, which are far more important historically, and which
> present far greater difficulties to preserve, maintain, and use.

Not as long as there are people like us to preserve the balance of systems.

> For example, any average Joe could assemble a perfect IMSAI-lookalike
> using still commercially available parts. The IMSAI chassis is certainly
> the single most common S-100 box ever made. So why are IMSAI's regarded
> as so valuable, while all the S-100 boards made by enterprising guys in their
> garage in small quantities are undesirable? I really don't know. But I
> do know that the guys making S-100 boards in their garages were the true movers
> and shakers of leading technology for most of a decade.

In time, if this hobby becomes another speculator's attraction, these
boards will start to take on monetary value. As of now, the only real
value would be to those who need these boards to make a working system.
Other than that, most of us are just collecting them for the
preservational value, ie. the value inherent in preserving any bit of
history so that we may better understand our past when it is long forgotten.

Sam
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Computer Historian, Programmer, Musician, Philosopher, Athlete, Writer, Jackass
Received on Tue Aug 12 1997 - 15:40:51 BST