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Waaay off topic, vintage computer (companies) LONG

75.60.97.146
Posted on August 5, 2012 at 04:18:20
tesla
Audiophile

Posts: 3180
Location: San Diego County, California
Joined: October 25, 2000
 For those of you that were in on the earlier 'scene' of computers, things were new and exciting, what with all the brands and models, such as Atari, Aquarious, Timex-Sinclair, Ohio Scientific, etc, etc. For those of us getting on-line, (before the internet) we had 300 baud modems, (or worse, the dreaded 'acoustical coupler' excuse for a modem.

My introduction to computers was a Commodore 64, and at the time, I thought it was wonderful, what with a whopping 64 K-bytes of memory. (with an actual 32K of usable memory.)

Well, this started a love affair with all things CBM, (Commodore, and Amiga)

I eventually owned all kinds of related Commodore/Amiga computers, ending with my favorite, an Amiga A3000T (T is for tower.) (What about you, Rod?)

Ok, on to the reason for my note.

I was browsing at a DAV thrift store in Oceanside, when I found a piece of CBM history I had no idea existed. it's called a "Citizen VCP-5MU, and it's made by "Japan CBM Corporation." (manufacture date, December 1986)

What the hell?

It is an early attempt at a portable vcr, with 5" color monitor built-in!

It looks to me that they probably used the same monitor as the famous Commodore SX64 portable. Btw, it weighs a hefty 20 lbs, so lightweight it isn't. Oh, it came with a battery pack also.

It works great, if you like a 5" screen. All I need to go camping with, who knows what size crowd I can entertain?






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RE: Waaay off topic, vintage computer (companies) LONG, posted on August 10, 2012 at 00:12:56
pictureguy
Audiophile

Posts: 22597
Location: SoCal
Joined: October 19, 2008
 I visited the fab where most of the proprietary semiconductors were made for the Commodore computers.
BTW, the employees got a good screwing when the doors closed.
At the time I worked for Western Digital in THEIR fab making proprietary devices for them. I had a Pascal Microengine out in the warehouse and still have my VIC-20.....I think it had a 6502 microprocessor ... 8 bit? with something outrageous like 4 or 8kb or memory. I've got it out in the garage with the cassette player used for 'mass storage', since I couldn't afford the HD for the C-64.

In those days I was learning BASIC. Good times.
Too much is never enough

 

RE: Waaay off topic, vintage computer (companies) LONG, posted on August 15, 2012 at 16:48:06
tesla
Audiophile

Posts: 3180
Location: San Diego County, California
Joined: October 25, 2000
 I visited the fab where most of the proprietary semiconductors were made for the Commodore computers.
BTW, the employees got a good screwing when the doors closed.
At the time I worked for Western Digital in THEIR fab making proprietary devices for them. I had a Pascal Microengine out in the warehouse and still have my VIC-20.....I think it had a 6502 microprocessor ... 8 bit? with something outrageous like 4 or 8kb or memory. I've got it out in the garage with the cassette player used for 'mass storage', since I couldn't afford the HD for the C-64.

In those days I was learning BASIC. Good times.
Too much is never enough



A couple of corrections :)
the 6502/6510 was 8 bit.
There wasn't a Hard drive made for the C-64/Vic 20, they used a floppy drive. However, there was a 5 or 7.5 meg HD offered for the Commodore PET computers.
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RE: Waaay off topic, vintage computer (companies) LONG, posted on August 15, 2012 at 17:33:11
pictureguy
Audiophile

Posts: 22597
Location: SoCal
Joined: October 19, 2008
 right you are! NO HD for c-64. Floppy only...and the cassette I have somewhere. You could ALSO build a plug in memory addition for the Vic-20. 24kb if I remember correctly? That would have made you unstoppable.

I couldn't remember the 'bit count' of the 6502 / 6510 CPUs. I DO remember somebody built a massivly parallel computer using a BUNCH of 6502s......Detail escape me.
Too much is never enough

 

RE: Waaay off topic, vintage computer (companies) LONG, posted on August 7, 2012 at 16:09:40
robert920rogers@gmail.com
Audiophile

Posts: 1048
Location: southern california
Joined: February 9, 2010
 About 25 years ago I helped an IT friend of mine move his shop, he gave me a bunch of old stuff he was going to trash.One of them was a 1981 osborne 1 very cool portable I still have it unfortunatly it has very little value. I even have the book detailing the history of that company.

 

Commode Door 64 ?, posted on August 5, 2012 at 13:49:45
AbeCollins
Audiophile

Posts: 46302
Location: USA
Joined: June 22, 2001
Contributor
  Since: February 2, 2002
 I didn't get the point of your post but it sure brought back some cool memories!

My 'gadget computers' consisted of the single board KIM-1 with hex pad and the Timex Sinclair. I had access to an S100 bus based CP/M machine at work but don't recall the manufacturer, there were several back then.

I finally ended up getting the Apple IIe (a clone IIe actually), RadioShack TRS-80, IBM PCjr, IBM PC-AT and the Compaq Deskpro 286.... and several DOS/Windows PC's since then. And now the Mac.

My roommate back in the 1980's had a Commie Dork 64, sometimes called the Commode Door 64. ;-)



 

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