Back then, a good friend (AA5B) was a grad student at Princeton U, so Bruce was able to get me into a lab with access to a PDP-11/45. I still have one of my earliest programs hanging on my wall.
I've owned dozens (hundreds?) of computers over the years. The first 1/2 dozen I remember well, but others were a blur...
- KIM-1 (1978)
- OSI Superboard (1979)
- Atari 800 (1980)
- Apple ][+ (1981)
- Franklin ACE-100 - my first computer from my first real job (1982)
- Ferguson Big Board (1983)
- Franklin ACE-1000 (1983)
- Franklin Red Lightning (one of a few prototypes) (1984)
- Franklin BOGUS (one of 3 or 4 prototypes) (1984)
- IBM System 3 (a BIG machine) (1984)
- DECstation 3100
- DECstation 5000/200
- DECstation 5000/240
- DEC PDP-11/03
- DEC PDP-11/23
- DEC PDP-11/24
- More Atari 800s
- 8088 PC clone
- 80286 clone
- 80486 (first machine I ever paid more than $4000 for)
- Many Pentium machines (piles are still in the basement)
- Sun Sparc 5 clone
- Sun Ultra Sparc 5
- Several Atari 400s and many Atari peripherals
- Franklin ACE-2200
- Franklin ACE-2100
- Atari ST-520
- Two more KIM-1s
- Rockwell AIM-65
- S-100 computer made up of odd bits of hardware
- Many single board computers
- Heathkit Hero Jr robot. Rescued from a trash can
- Apple iMac, 2.4 GHz (2008)
- Apple iMac, 1 GHz G4 (for the kids to use)
Like most people, I've got a collection of PCs in the house running various incarnations of Windows and FreeBSD. My main computer for everyday use is the Intel iMac.
The $4000 PC deserves a mention. There used to be a well-know rule that "the computer you really want costs $4000." I never spent that kind of money, but never actually bought the super machine I wanted. When I started my consulting company, I went out and bought a huge 486 based machine. The final price was $4017, proving the old adage was accurate.
I continue to look for vintage computers that interest me. This is my list of things I'm especially looking for, but other 6502 machines are of interest too...
- Almost any Franklin ACE-10 disk drive. These mechanical devices are hard to keep working
- Saturn 128K memory expansion card for the Apple ][
- Franklin expansion cards
- Franklin X-10 hard drive
- Pretty much any Franklin parts, motherboards, cases, etc.
- Any Apple ][ compatible hard drive
- KIM-4 motherboard
- KIM expansion boards, such as those made by MTU
- Any Perkin-Elmer minicomputers, parts, software or manuals
- SYM-1 single board computer