iOpener

From: Geoff Roberts <geoffrob_at_stmarks.pp.catholic.edu.au>
Date: Thu Mar 30 07:33:16 2000

----- Original Message -----
From: "Brian Roth" <broth_at_heathers.stdio.com>
To: <classiccmp_at_classiccmp.org>
Sent: Thursday, March 30, 2000 9:29 PM
Subject: Re: iOpener


> I stopped by again(I don't trust them) to see if they came in. I asked
THREE people
> on the floor about it and none of them even knew what it was. They
actually had to
> look it up in the computer to find it. I think the prerequisite to work
there is to
> know absolutely nothing about technology. Amazing!

Sounds like K-mart......

In 1989, before I knew any better, I looked at a Commodore Colt (truly AWFUL
PC/XT semi-incompatible)
with 2 x 5.25" DD drives and no hard disk in the local K-Mart. I asked the
assistant what he could tell me about it. He opened a book, looked, and
with a perfectly straight face told me the price. I waited.... He knew it
was a computer and how much it was. That was it. I didn't buy it.
(Fortunately). A friend enlightened me and I went and bought my first IBM
compatible PC. (I'd had a TI/994a for some time - still have it somewhere) A
Clone 286/12 with 1MB ram and a 40mb HDD and a 256k VGA card/Multisync
monitor. Cost AU$4k cash. (Which was a good price for a VGA system in 89!)
(The monitor was around $900 on it's own IIRC). Still have portions of it
here and there in other machines.
The Colt was still there a year and a half later. Some poor sucker bought
it when it was reduced to clear for about a third of the original price (ie
about twice what it was worth) some time after that. Poor bastard.
They stopped selling computers completely not long after.

Cheers

Geoff Roberts
Received on Thu Mar 30 2000 - 07:33:16 BST