Introduction

This blog will emphasize exploration of and use of, personal computing and computing devices.
Specifically, desktop/laptop PCs, tablets, and cell phones.

My first interest occurred in the early 70's. I asked mmy father to help me haul a Sperry Rand tape deck home from the local salvage yard. I had spotted the machine amongst a huge pile of machines from the closing of a nearby Sperry Rand factory. Other machines included 5mb drives the size of a dishwasher and mainframes the size of a nightclub bar.

The tape drive was about seven feet tall, three feet wide and three feet deep. The machine weighed about three hundred pounds and cost a whopping $5. At that point I had no knowledge relevant to computing or electronics. I was curious to know if the machine could be adapted to analog recording.
I realized the machine's front glass door sealed a vacuum chamber that allowed the tape to move at very high speeds without aerodynamic flow and turbulence, disrupting the movement. I also realized, immediately, the speed of the tape meant a LOT of tape would be used to record music and that tape would not be cheap. I gave up on the adaptation after I realized the conversion to analog was unlikely and probably impractical if not impossible.

My next foray into personal computing was after I had acquired training and certification in Electronic Engineering Technology. I had landed a job at one of the major electronics engineering companies and decided to buy two items. The first was one of the first PCs. At that time, the typical PC, if there was such a thing, had a keyboard integrated with the computer and used a television as the monitor. The device had a version of the BASIC programming language installed in the permanent memory of the device. The company had used a proprietary graphics chip to include sprite functions in the graphics library. Think PacMan.

I perceived major drawbacks to the machine being:
1-the color-black. I suggested a beige color would be more popular and that, business-wise, beige was the new black.
2-The machine had accessorized what are now considered integral components. Memory was minimal unless 'modules' were purchased and installed. There was no hard drive. A floppy drive could be purchased and connected. That drive had about 1.22mb per floppy and each disk was 'floppy' and about 5.25 inches in diameter.

The second computing device I purchased at the company was one of their calculators. The most advanced programmable calculator ever designed and built. I said then, the calculator was more powerful than their personal computers, and more useful since plastic magnetic cards were used similarly to the floppy drives in their desktop computers and the whole thing was portable. A 'holster' case with a belt clip was part of the kit. Memory modules that plugged in the back for specialty libraries. The modules placed assorted specialty formula at the user's fingertips.
Magnetic memory cards for user written programs and data. There was a lockable printer with a cradle for holding the calculator, available. I purchased one of those as well. I plotted the output of a Fourrier transform algorithm I had seen in Byte Magazine about the same time.
I also plotted the output of a Biorythm program among others.

Historically, it would be another ten years before the first true PCs became available. IBM, one of the major competitors in the market, leaked a design that became the de facto standard for personal computers. Even now there is question whether the leak was accidental, as IBM stated, or intentional.
The 5.25 1.22mb floppy would be replaced by a plastic cassette about 3 inches wide and holding 3+mb, though still using flexible plastic magnetic media.

The first hard drives were considered to have huge memory capabilities at 5mb.
The first screens were 16/256 colors. Windows 3.1 was my first IBM type PC operating system. As we know now, Windows would be the standard against which all competitors would be measured.

Enough of the past.