[ale] [OT] nostalgia - Happy 30th birthday IBM PC

[Scott Castaline]

On 10/04/2011 01:11 PM, Michael B. Trausch wrote:
> On Tue, Oct 04, 2011 at 12:31:19PM -0400, Ron Frazier wrote:
>> Let's compare the IBM PC to the laptop I'm typing this on.
>>
>> Price (today's dollars) - PC - $ 7,527 - LT - $ 380 - LT is 19 X LESS
>> expensive
>> CPU Speed - PC - 4.7 MHz - LT - 2181 MHz dual core - LT is 928 X FASTER
>> RAM - PC - 64 KB (that's KILO, not Mega, not Giga) - LT - 8 GB (OK so I
>> upgraded the memory.)
>>      If I'm doing the math right, 64 KB is .000061 GB, so LT has 131,148
>> X MORE MEMORY
>> Removable storage: PC - 5 1/4" floppy @ 160 KB or .0001525 GB - LT -
>> assume 4 GB memory stick - LT has 26,230 X MORE removable storage
>> Hard Drive - PC - NONE - LT - 500 GB - LT has INFINITE MORE HDD
>>
>> I don't remember the specs on the old RGB monitors, probably 80 x 40
>> characters of 8 bit color characters.  I could look it up, but this
>> will make the point.  If the characters were a 7 x 9 matrix of
>> pixels, that would mean approximately 560 pixels wide in graphics
>> mode and approximately 360 pixels down.  That's a total of 201,600
>> pixels of 256 colors.  Someone else may correct my numbers if
>> they're wrong.
> In the early PC days, there were two types of video cards.  You had
> text display cards, and graphics display cards.
>
> The original model 5150 IBM PC came with either MDA (text) or CGA
> (graphics) cards.  The MDA supported 80x25 text mode (often referred
> to as PC video mode #7) only.  It had a whopping 4KiB of memory.  The
> CGA card, which if memory serves was the more popular option becuase
> it could display not only graphics, but color, had 16 KiB of RAM.  It
> had 40x25 and 80x25 text modes and if memory serves, it was in the
> 80-column mode by default.
>
> It had 2 graphics modes, 320x200 and 640x200.  (Those graphics modes
> were actually also used to implement the text modes, if memory
> serves.)  The CGA fonts were ugly, too (that is, uglier than the VGA
> family of fonts, which are also ugly...)
Ah yes, the good ole days of ascii graphics was born,,,,,,,,,,
>> LT has 1366 x 768 pixels or 1,049,088 pixels of 32 bits which is
>> millions of colors.  So the LT has 5 X MORE PIXELS.
>>
>> Like I said, times sure have changed.  I wish we could do this with
>> automotive technology.  I could own a nice Rolls Royce for, say,
>> $5000!
> As the joke goes...
>
>> If GM had developed technology like Microsoft, we would all be driving>
>> cars with the following characteristics:				>
>> 									>
>> 1. For no reason at all, your car would crash twice a day.		>
>> 									>
>> 2. Every time they repainted the lines on the road, you would have to	>
>> buy a new car.							>
>> 									>
>> 3. Occasionally, executing a manoeuver such as a left-turn would cause>
>> your car to shut down and refuse to restart, and you would have to	>
>> reinstall the engine.							>
>> 									>
>> 4. When your car died on the freeway for no reason, you would just	>
>> accept this, restart and drive on.					>
>> 									>
>> 5. Only one person at a time could use the car, unless you bought	>
>> 'Car95' or 'CarNT', and then added more seats.			>
>> 									>
>> 6. Apple would make a car powered by the sun, reliable, five times as	>
>> fast, and twice as easy to drive, but would run on only five per cent	>
>> of the roads.								>
>> 									>
>> 7. Oil, water temperature and alternator warning lights would be	>
>> replaced by a single 'general car default' warning light.		>
>> 									>
>> 8. New seats would force every-one to have the same size butt.	>
>> 									>
>> 9. The airbag would say 'Are you sure?' before going off.		>
>> 									>
>> 10. Occasionally, for no reason, your car would lock you out and	>
>> refuse to let you in until you simultaneously lifted the door handle,	>
>> turned the key, and grabbed the radio antenna.			>
>> 									>
>> 11. GM would require all car buyers to also purchase a deluxe set of	>
>> road maps from Rand-McNally (a subsidiary of GM), even though they	>
>> neither need them nor want them. Trying to delete this option would	>
>> immediately cause the car's performance to diminish by 50 per cent or	>
>> more. Moreover, GM would become a target for investigation by the	>
>> Justice Department.							>
>> 									>
>> 12. Every time GM introduced a new model, car buyers would have to	>
>> learn how to drive all over again because none of the controls would	>
>> operate in the same manner as the old car.				>
>> 									>
>> 13. You would press the 'start' button to shut off the engine.	>
> 	--- Mike
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