I'm waxing nostalgic about computers I've used, and I'm tempted to buy one
as a (hopefully) semi-usable system.

I either want a Mac IIci with a cache card, Quadra 700, or an old Sun,
either one of the shoebox LX/IPX/Classic or Sparc 2/5/20.

The problem with either of them are the peripherals. Sun back then used fixed-sync monitors. Ditto, I think, Apple.

Does anyone have a similar retro rig running? How do they hold up in 2020?





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Re: Retro Want
By: poindexter FORTRAN to All on Sun May 31 2020 02:55 pm

I've been playing around with old hardware for some years, and using it today definitely isn't like back in the day. Part of the problem is because the whole computing ecosystem has left older machines incompatible. Modernish hardware doesn't use floppy disks, have serial and parallel ports, run 16-bit code, Ontrack boot manager, .etc. Most peple need a bridge machine from around 2000, maybe running Windows 98 or System 9. Recent example is a 486 laptop that can't use drives over 512MB without Ontrack. Ontrack won't work on a modern
computer, and USB -> IDE adapters won't work with drivers under 512MB as they use CHS. That would have been the easy way to get the data over. I settled on parallel port, using old Laplink software. Laplink won't do LPT transfers on 2000 or newer. And if you were wondering, modern networking schemes are not compatible with 3.1.

Most people just play games on these old machines, or maybe program. Once you get the machines set up, the software and interfaces often feel really old. And I think we've forgotten how unstable Windows 95, OS 7 .etc were. I'm not saying, don't do it, but don't be surprised by the cheap 16-color clip-art interfaces and Visual Basic software, constant hard disk access, GPFs, 50KB/s wifi speeds, .etc -- plus the things you wouldn't expect, like that no email service will work with older email apps.
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manimal347 wrote to poindexter FORTRAN <=-

Most people just play games on these old machines, or maybe program.
Once you get the machines set up, the software and interfaces often
feel really old. And I think we've forgotten how unstable Windows 95,
OS 7

Yeah, unstable, but rebooting into DOS and re-running Windows was
levels of magnitude quicker than crashing in Windows 10.

System 7 was pretty bad - we had a file server called "Mr. Bus
Error" because it crashed so often.


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I just put together an Athlon 1ghz system. In order to get it to work i had
to burn 3 cd's and a boot disk. The system is new enough that usb drives work as a way to transfer files. I also found using a IDE to CF card drive to be
use ful if you want to move a lot of information between them.
I agree that windows 98/95/me have aged pretty badly. I was painfully
reminded that building a computer used to be a day long affair (Recently, I built a workstation for the office in about 2 hours). I am enjoying using it. Currently it's just playing the Star trek after dark screen saver, but I also have the old build engine games on there. I found it relaxing to build and
poke at.
But yeah, in the days of cheap server hardware and raspberry pi these old machines don't do much.
But my old Atari 800 is fun to look on the desk :)

Peter James
PDX Nerd since 1980

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Hello there, sorry to bother you if this works, this is just a test.

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Re: Retro Want
By: verviotik to hohokam on Sat Aug 08 2020 03:56 pm

Hello there, sorry to bother you if this works, this is just a test.

Got you here
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verviotik wrote:

Hello there, sorry to bother you if this works, this is just a test.

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You should probably create your own text post rather than hijacking someone elses.
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