P3D Re: Back from the DDDead! - Part I

["Greg Wageman" <gjw@xxxxxxxxxx>]

From: Michael Kersenbrock <michaelk@xxxxxxxxxxx>


>Ha! Call *that* pioneering?  I started my own discrete CPU logic design
until
>I switched to designing and building my own 8008 system *before* any
>of the processors hit the magazines.
>
>Of course, it didn't hurt that in the early 70's I was an engineer


From: Bob Wier <wier@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>

>Ha! Call *that* pioneering? I built *my* first computer from
>a kit in 1976 - one of the Don Lancaster designs - the SWTPCO
>(Southwest Technical Products) kit based on the Motorola 6800.
>It came with a big 256 bytes of memory (not 256K - 256.
>
>(I built a SWTPCO CT-1024 "TV Typewriter" for that)

From: Tom Hubin <thubin@xxxxxxxxx>

>Late 1960s I worked with an IBM 1620. It had 20k nibbles of BCD memory.
>Later the IBM 360. Finally built my own machine.
>
>Mid 1970s my first build was a Heathkit H8 with 8kb of ram amd a 12
>button keypad. later I added monitor, keyboard, a pair of 360kb drives,
>and DOS. Several years later I built a Heathkit (Zenith) XT.

Hmm, you guys are obviously all a bit older than I.  In the early 70's I
was in grade school.  However, I was subscribed to "Popular Electronics"
when the Altair was featured.  I sent the "bingo card" back and received
IMSAI's sales literature on it, which I still have around here
somewhere.  However, I was a penniless high school student at that time
and no way could I afford the thousands of $$ they wanted for a workable
system.

Between my freshman and sophomore years in college, I bought and built
Southwest Technical's "CT-64" terminal kit-- an updated design of the
CT-1024.  The CT-64 had 16 lines of 64 characters, and a serial
interface that would do a blazing 1200 baud!  With my trusty acoustic
coupler, I never had to leave my dorm room and fight the lines down at
the computer center to get time on the university's IBM 370. :-)

     -Greg W. (gjw@xxxxxxxxxx)



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