A story

From: Jerome Fine <jhfine_at_idirect.com>
Date: Mon Jan 14 09:18:38 2002

>Tarsi wrote:

> The computer had migrated to the Goodwill in Mason City, which is about 35
> miles from Hampton, the place where the church was (is).
> I'm so happy about this one. Lots of people talk about their first computer
> they had. Well, I didn't have this one back then, but it was the first PC I
> ever touched, so that's something.
> Tarsi
> 210

What year did you first use the PC?

My son remembers going to work with me about 20 years ago and using
the computer there (obviously a PDP-11 running RT-11) to play SST
(Super Star Trek). He is now 33, so he was then about the same age
as you were when you touched that first PC.

I was 43 at the time and had already been woking with computers for
over 20 years even back then. Around 1980, the DEC computers
with a hard disk drive were still quite large, but they did have a VT103
which was a VT100 with the backplane that could hold a PDP-11.

Of course, the early VT103 used a floppy. I don't think that I ever
saw another VT103 with the hard drive (an RD53 in that case) under
the VT100 tube. DSD did make an 880/30 what was a 30 MBytye
hard drive (emulated 3 * RL02s) plus an RX03 in a 19" wide box and
about 5" high. If a user had the backplane wired for 22 bits, then
it could use all 4 MBytes of memory. Together with an 11/73, that
made quite a system. Did anyone else ever soup up their VT103?
Received on Mon Jan 14 2002 - 09:18:38 GMT