Mathatron & other stuff

From: Doug Yowza <yowza_at_yowza.com>
Date: Fri Aug 21 13:37:55 1998

On Thu, 20 Aug 1998, Joe wrote:

> >The 9830 doesn't get discussed much, but it's one of my favorites.
> >There's a lot of noise on this list about the Altair, a "PC" from 1975
> >that was just a big box with lights and toggles. In 1972, the HP 9830 was
> >an elegant light-weight
>
> Light-weight!!!!!!!!!! I have both an Altair and a 9830 and the 9830 is
> at least three times as heavy as the Altair! It's also probably 5 times
> stronger. I have used my 9830 as a step stool (after it died of other
> causes). I wouldn't even think of doing that with the Altair.

You're right, I was thinking of the 9825. The 9830 seems to be comparable
in weight to my IMSAI, though. It was also designed to be load bearing,
with stackable disk drives and printer, etc.

> desktop computer with full alphanumeric keyboard,
> >built-in secondary storage, built-in display,
>
> One line LED. Whoppee!

Compared to blinkenlights? I'm able to do real work with a 32 column
alphanumeric display.

> built-in BASIC,
>
> Yes, and ONLY BASIC! The Altair was a general purpose machine.

Say what? The 9830 could be expanded with ROM modules, you could load
software from disk and tape, you could connect a terminal to an optional
serial port. How general purpose can you get?

> and it just
> >plain works. There was nothing else remotely like it at the time, and it
> >was even reasonably priced (around $5000, I think).
>
> That's what, 12 times the price of the Altair? The two machines aren't

How much was an Altair with lots of RAM, terminal, and tape drive? That's
right, about the same.

> comparable. They're completely different. Have you ever tried to generate
> music or word process on a 9830? You can't do it. You could on an
> Altair. The 9830 is a sophisticated programmable calcualtor. The Altair is
> a striped down general purpose computer.

You're underestimating the 9830. Yes, I know of a word processor for the
9830. Remember, you could connect a terminal to it as well as a printer.
My 9830 came with a nice little program to generate custom xmas cards,
even. If somebody made a music card for it, it would be just as easy to
generate music as with the Altair (assuming you also hooked up a terminal
and added a bunch of S-100 cards to the Altair without smoking its
powersupply).

-- Doug
Received on Fri Aug 21 1998 - 13:37:55 BST