anyone here into retro computing -

[Smaug's Smokey Hole]

Golden Age of Computing ended when normies demanded more and more GUI based applications and use. Nothing needs to come off the command line to be useful (except for vidya games).

Remember when a computer didn't have internet and it was still something that could entertain you for hours?

 

[Flabba_Wabba_Jabba_Noonga]

Remember when a computer didn't have internet and it was still something that could entertain you for hours?

Yeah, I programmed my own networking interface for basic message communication between mates using C. Very similar in operation to NetCat but way more primitive. Probably one of the reasons I work in software development

 

[Pargon]

I’ve been posting from a Compaq Presario from 1995 since I opened this account, does that rate?

 

[Smaug's Smokey Hole]

Yeah, I programmed my own networking interface for basic message communication between mates using C. Very similar in operation to NetCat but way more primitive. Probably one of the reasons I work in software development

I always imagined that the current generation that grew up as natives in the connected tech-world would know more about it. They're all fucking morons, they're intensely dependent on social media and devices but know less about them than people twice their age that don't actually give a shit but understands that if they want to get out on Instagram and things aren't working they can at least try to pull cables and mess with settings to see if it solves things, just like in the 90's when things didn't work.

 

[Kosher Dill]

Golden Age of Computing ended when normies demanded more and more GUI based applications and use. Nothing needs to come off the command line to be useful (except for vidya games).

Today, the command line is mostly a meme for people who like to LARP as "power users". There are very few practical applications left that still land in the sweet spot for CLI - not completely automated to the point of zero interactivity, but also not requiring much in the way of visualization, selection, review of data, or iteration. Even fewer of these applications are for end users.

 

[Flabba_Wabba_Jabba_Noonga]

Today, the command line is mostly a meme for people who like to LARP as "power users". There are very few practical applications left that still land in the sweet spot for CLI - not completely automated to the point of zero interactivity, but also not requiring much in the way of visualization, selection, review of data, or iteration. Even fewer of these applications are for end users.

You clearly use Windows and have never actually done any programming whatsoever. If you want to run any code you pretty much have to use the CLI.

 

[albert chan]

Last year, this YouTuber actually observed and located an old warehouse that sells, or used to sell, old computers from almost 20+ years ago.

And this coincidentally was made a month ago on where you can find retro computers. I might actually watch this one tomorrow. It seems pretty interesting.

I always imagined that the current generation that grew up as natives in the connected tech-world would know more about it. They're all fucking morons, they're intensely dependent on social media and devices but know less about them than people twice their age that don't actually give a shit but understands that if they want to get out on Instagram and things aren't working they can at least try to pull cables and mess with settings to see if it solves things, just like in the 90's when things didn't work.

You somehow managed to describe the early 2010’s young millennial before Generation Z came along and hijacked the MacIntosh computer for nostalgic, vaporwave purposes.

 

[Pee Cola]

You somehow managed to describe the early 2010’s young millennial before Generation Z came along and hijacked the MacIntosh computer for nostalgic, vaporwave purposes.

Thanks to those pesky Zoomers, I have a bitch of time when trying to do search on anything related to my Mac Plus.

 

[AmpleApricots]

I've always been impressed by quickdraw on macs and the dead simple and oddly zen way they address video memory, allowing you to draw shapes, lines or invert an area in one API call which redraws only what is absolutely necessary. Seems like that architecture specifically would be a great fit for epaper especially if we ever figure out how to up the refresh rate.

I used to have a 13" android eink tablet. Some eink screens are super quick (for eink) and can also switch into a "1-bit" (strict black/white) mode to be even faster, on top of that comes partial refresh. You wouldn't be able to play doom on such a screen in a way that's fun but you can kinda do mouse-cursor driven GUIs and slower games like adventures for example. Text-only console (if you can live with the lag) works pretty well, even more so if you switch to bitmap fonts to be able to use that fast mode without any visual deterioration. There are ghosting issues if you run the screen like that though, they're not distracting though, it's like seeing the writing of a different page through the paper if that makes sense. I liked the screen and it's absolutely amazing on the eyes, but I didn't like the shitty, ancient and exploitable kernel, chinkware-infested Android on top of it (leave it to the chinese to make an $800 device feel like a supermarket noname special-deal-of-the-week tablet) and ended up getting rid of it fairly quickly. Waveshare sells an 10,3" HDMI-connectable e-ink screen that explicitly has no OS and needs no special drivers and does everything via an FPGA and that might be interesting but at 450 bucks it's kinda expensive for what it is. Also like many eink screens it runs at an absolutely bonkers resolution (1872x1404) which you won't be able to squeeze out of most old computers. Would be interesting to look at it in emulation though. At least with WinUAE and it's uae gfx card driver it should work pretty well for standard workbench.

Prompted by this thread and a SCSI HDD from a yard sale I decided to throw my off-time this weekend into getting some of my mouldering macs working again and discovered this neat project. I forgot how much of a bitch scsi though is and my voodoo skills are lacking, so now I'm fighting an external drive that refuses to change its scsi ID, format or mount, but will still give me its characteristics and size in lido.

I remember the times when people had to hunt down obscenely expensive and rare industrial IDE/SCSI adapter solutions when the SCSI drives started to disappear. (Funnily, the IDE drives have disappeared now too) For a while I also used to hook up modern USCSI drives to these old computers as SCSI is a backwards compatible protocol (actually didn't work with every drive so what the specs required and what the manufacturers did where two different things like so very often) but these drives were intended for servers and insanely loud, (15k RPM) hot and power hungry. Nowadays I wouldn't bother with any of that anymore. All these modern SCSI solutions really are a godsend. I still have a few computers/controllers that require winchester drives and I doubt there's any ready-made solution for that.

Also getting around to cleaning up that disk image. I'll throw it on mega when I finish, I'm aiming for 4gb usable in 6.0.8 and 7.5.5 since that's just under the limit system 6 can address. Currently it's 900mb of mostly system 6 with a smattering of 7.x. This will change when I get the ten thousand stuffit archives I've collected onto it.

I'd run a virus scanner over the final result. I picked up some ancient viruses in unexpected places before.

 

[CrunkLord420]

I don't own any retro hardware buy I enjoy 6502 programming for the NES and C64.

 

[ducktales4gameboy]

I'd run a virus scanner over the final result. I picked up some ancient viruses in unexpected places before.

Already accounted for. I had an old iBook in my closet. It's not having a good day, or at this rate, probably month.

Spoiler: abandon all hope ye who enter here

Stuffit is having an aneurysm over that folder but it did get past the hours of beachballing to give me a progress bar. That's the entire contents of the info-mac and umich FTPs (archives within archives!) plus about 40GB of unsorted crap from internet archive's software category being filtered through 256MB of ram on a 800mhz G3.

E: If anyone happens to know if there's a linux tool that can properly uncompress .sit/.hqx with the resource forks intact onto a HFS volume please let me know so I can spare this computer's life.

E2 : Aww yeah, Norton actually found something. Makes me really nostalgic for the times when it was actually a useful tool.

 

[Mr. Duck]

I have an Socket 7 AT board that i've wanting to use for a while now, i have almost all components to build a retro machine except an AT case, as they have become rare as fuck over here.

 

[fuckidunno]

Golden Age of Computing ended when normies demanded more and more GUI based applications and use. Nothing needs to come off the command line to be useful (except for vidya games).

sadly, in the mid-later part of the 90s GUI really effected the blind - not just in general use, but phone tech support was a job a number of blind guys I knew would do.
that employment opportunity ended

 

[Cats]

the 8bit guy looks like a soft shell turtle

 

[AmpleApricots]

I have an Socket 7 AT board that i've wanting to use for a while now, i have almost all components to build a retro machine except an AT case, as they have become rare as fuck over here.

Later Boards from around that vintage usually also fit into ATX cases if style isn't a concern. Many of them even have ATX power supply connectors, it was around the time ATX showed up after all. You can also buy ATX shields where only the hole for the AT keyboard connector is cut out. Or just buy blank shields and cut the hole yourself if you can.

 

[Van Darkholme]

I'm still waiting for new keycaps for my Amiga 1200.
I should probably use it again at some point.

 

[serious n00b]

Last year, this YouTuber actually observed and located an old warehouse that sells, or used to sell, old computers from almost 20+ years ago.

When is he going to make a video about his fat goth e-girl addiction?

 

[AmpleApricots]

I'm kinda thinking about biting on one of the Checkmate A1500 Plus cases to give one of my A1200s a practical home now that they're back in stock, especially because I don't really care a lot for the original keyboard case and it doesn't work well with expansions. I plan to outfit it with a Blizzard 1230 IV and Delfina soundcard if, Allah willing, I can get the latter one to stably run. I was also fantasizing about some tiny inbuilt ARM connected via serial or somesuch I could reach via ARexx scripting for specific functions. I never was a big fan of the AGA Amigas (in fact, brought my A1200 back to the store to buy an 486) because quite frankly back in the day they kinda sucked and were too little, too late but nowadays 256 colors are an attractive proposition. I also do have older Amigas with graphics cards but in my experience the graphics cards (to reach 256 colors) just don't work well with like, 90% of applications as they all bypass the OS to directly bitbang registers. 200 bucks though. Ouch.