Computerland - and the Computer That Tried to Save It

[@TechTimeTraveller]

Computerland is a really fascinating rags-to-riches-to-rags story. All kinds of intrigue, chicanery and pioneering spirit. One could not possibly cover it all in a short KZbin video. For more info, I highly recommend checking out two books. The first is *Once Upon a Time in Computerland* by Jonathan Littman. Out of print, but available for borrowing at archive.org, this is a deeply engrossing book that reads like a murder mystery novel. You'll learn all about Bill Millard, IMS/IMSAI, Computerland and all that went with it. Littman talks about Millard's fascination with Est, a made-in-California quasi religion, his ability to outfox his enemies, and the crippling lawsuit that mortally wounded Computerland just as it was hitting its stride. It details much of the decision making, the battle with Computerland's principal creditor, the tug of war between Millard and one time protege John Martin Musumeci, and everything in between. A truly great read. The second book is *The Fifteen Percent: Overcoming Hardships and Achieving Lasting Success* , by Millard's lawyer, Terry Giles. A great read about an impressive lawyer, with a few pages dedicated to his encounter and eventual friendship with Millard, and his efforts to salvage Computerland and extricate his client from a messy and expensive lawsuit. Giles' account offers a rebuttal to the idea that Millard was a greedy tax evader who hid from authorities for 20 years before he was tracked down in the Caymans. He provides some fascinating insights on Millard himself, as well as some other very interesting clients he's worked with.

[@CB3ROB-CyberBunker]

-most- computer retail chains of the past have such stories. even the ones that turned into box pushers later on. (and most of em know each other too ;)

[@laserhawk64]

Given how much of an expert you are on this stuff, I'm sure you already know, but -- that's a pretty standard industrial aka "embedded" ISA backplane in that box, and ISA computer cards for those with everything through early Pentium chips are fairly common on the used market even today -- Everyone's Favorite Auction "Bay" Site is _littered_ with them! Really, what you have there is about what I'd expect to see running the local coin laundry. I'm not even kidding.

[@TechTimeTraveller]

@@laserhawk64 Yeah at the time of the video I had been misled a bit by Computerland's documentation.. it seemed to suggest the bus deviated a little from the ISA standard for the CPU and controller boards. But I did some testing on all of the slots and the pins were all the same. Probably just Computerland trying to put lipstick on a pig. I recall seeing industrial machines using ISA backplanes, but I never personally saw them in home computers back then.

[@laserhawk64]

@@TechTimeTraveller Yeah, it's not a home thing. It's far more an industrial thing. Here's a boggle: PC/104 is a stacking industrial form factor based on the same idea, but using a great whacking set of pin headers on boards that stack like PCB Pringles, instead of the slot/backplane concept. Thing is, that set of pin headers is literally just an ISA-16 slot in a different guise -- there's all the signals you'd expect from such a slot, with nothing extra and nothing missing! I recently got an odd Ampro LittleBoard/386 -- it's a later generation and the manuals are not publicly available, and annoyingly it has no onboard video. It has PC/104 expansion but not ISA anything, in traditional form, and PC/104 cards of all kinds, being meant for industrial use, carry industrial-strength prices. (Yikes!) You can't get a video card for less than about $200 US on eBay. But I have a collection of old wire-wrap wire and a tool for it, for another project, and I need something to use as a tutorial. I think I found my thing ;) got a cheap (ish) six-slot ISA-16 passive backplane on eBay, I'll make my own converter cable.

[@PlasmaCoolantLeak]

I bought a copy of Littman's book when it was first published. I purchased my first PC, an IBM PS/2 Model 25 through Computerland. Good times.

[@joemck85]

Those old IBM monitors used very slow phosphors because they were intended for reading and writing text. I forget whether the refresh rate is 50 or 60 Hz, but the slow phosphors made it completely flicker-free. Combined with the higher resolution text characters, this made MDA the preferred option for business use.

[@StingyGeek]

This channel has such high production values. There is so much crap on youtube, and then you find a resource like this. Just awesome.

[@TechTimeTraveller]

Many thanks!!!

[@loughkb]

I was a service tech at Computerland in Ft. Wayne Indiana in the late 80s. I remember working on those. Seems so long ago.

[@lenowin]

I quite enjoy finding a new channel that I like, keep it up.

[@TwoWholeWorms]

Part of me wants to say "RETROBRITE IT!" but the other part of me absolutely adores the fact the colour of the case and the frontage are _completely_ different.

[@TechTimeTraveller]

My BC286 thankfully isn't nearly as bad. I think the 2 tone on the BC88 is pretty. :)

[@gwesco]

I took a class in Novell Netware around 1994 at the local community college. I can't begin to tell you how it works now but the irony of the situation is I currently teach Windows server at the same community college. Windows no longer supports IPX as of Windows 7. Sadly, the instructor I took the class with in 1994 became a friend of 20+ years and died of Covid in January 2021. I also teach some Linux classes and Windows is slowly becoming more Linux-like. I had one of the early XT clones around 1986 or so. It cost $300 and had no hard drive which was a $360 upgrade for a controller card with a Seagate ST225 20 MB hard drive. I later went for that and spent quite a while with Dos 3.6 I believe.

[@The_Vanished]

I've literally been waiting for a Dr Claw reference forever, thank you

[@TechTimeTraveller]

There's one more tucked away in the Mini Unfridging 2 video. I enjoy that character a bit too much.. lol

[@DerrickMims]

Your channel reminds me of Defunctland, and I mean that comment as very high praise. Thank you for the work you’re doing.

[@X-OR_]

I grew up in Hayward, Ca and lived walking distance from Computerland Main Service center. As a Teenager, I would go dumpster diving at the Computerlands Service center and pull out nearly complete IBM type systems. I was able to mix and match parts and get systems up and running. When Computerland closed down, they tossed out Tons of Apple service inventory parts...

[@TechTimeTraveller]

Man there must have been some awesome finds. Such a bizarre story with that company.

[@AmazingJeeves]

0:13 ... I know that’s two separate machines, but for a moment I thought you’d created that rare beast, the “PC Sr.”

[@TechTimeTraveller]

Hahaha! I still have a bucket list mission to get a 3 drive PCjr going with as many expansion sidecars installed as it will take. In the meantime I just have to settle for the fantasy.

[@danielclifton6140]

I remember one of those sat in the corner of our I.T room at school in about 1997, never saw it working but by then we were using old Acorns..... it wasn't a rich school

[@FirstWizardZorander]

This is an amazing video. High production quality, thoroughly researched, and not least of all entertaining! Well done!

[@313Games]

Great video, well made and presented, with just the right sprinkle of humour. Subscribed! P.s. I loved the rumba gag.

[@rickydoingtech]

Hands down one of the best retrotech-channels on this platform imho

[@JanBruunAndersen]

I must be a dinosaur because I bought my latest PC from a dedicated computer store. Not your usual computer store. This one specialised (maybe it still does, it has been some years) in selling refurbished business computers. I got myself a good quality Lenovo with an Core 2 CPU, 8 GB of RAM, DVD drive, and a SATA SSD. It is still going strong, running Fedora Linux.

[@NatalieThress]

honestly I think a backplane type system could be good today, especially with small form factor builds since those usually put the graphics card on a riser anyway

[@logicone5667]

Unfortunately due to my age my first computer was a Packard Bell with a Celeron processor. As a kid born in 84 I always was amazed of commodore and IMSI computers being sold at small computer shops. My computer was one of those package deals from Walmart that included a monitor and printer, lol..

[@Inject0r]

This is some very interesting stuff! Why don’t you have any more followers?! Keep up the great work. I’m hoping you’ll soon get the subscribers you deserve. 💪

[@TechTimeTraveller]

Many thanks! I'm working on it. KZbin is tough to crack when you are starting out. But I will keep at it and we will see if something breaks out.

[@supergrover1827]

Great video about computerland. I remember the stores, and always wondered what happened to them.

[@TechTimeTraveller]

They actually did a reboot up here in Canada in the early 2000s. But I think it eventually went the way the rest of it went. We had a family friend that owned a competing Compucentre franchise so I didn't get into them often but I definitely remember being in awe when I did.

[@markharrisllb]

This is the first video I’ve seen of yours and it certainly won’t be the last. I really like how you told such a fascinating tale whilst also showing us the computer. When I watch videos about technology in the 70s and 80s I can’t help but think how far ahead the general public were in America than we were in the U.K. My first computer was a Windows 2 with both a 3.5” floppy drive and a 5.25” with a dot matrix printer I bought around 1989. Of course I did the sensible thing and bought 2 boxes of 5.25” disks. PCs only really took off in the U.K. with Windows 95.

[@ThePDXMike1]

Thanks for the trip down memory lane. I went to work at the Portland Oregon ComputerLand around 1984. It was still a franchised store, run by a group of very religious people, not that that is bad, but they used to pray for divine guidance on purchasing products. They hired a retired military officer to run the day-to-day business, I left after about 18 months because of his management style, . I then went to work at the NYNEX business center (for those not familiar NYNEX was the New York-New England Exchange a "baby Bell" formed after the Bell system breakup. NYNEX purchased the IBM Business centers, when IBM decided to get out of the retail business.) ComputerLand bought the NyNEX business centers right around when VanStar came into being. I remember meeting Bill Tauscher at a retreat.

[@Dr.GeoDave]

Hercules graphics standard was a monochrome, hi resolution graphics standard compatible with the IBM monochrome monitor that was optimized for text using IBM’s special monochrome monitor (not a composite monitor). It required special drivers built into the software; as I recall Borland’s turbo Pascal had that capability. BASIC was not compatible

[@JeromeBrown-jerunamuck]

I can confirm what Dave says. Additionally, there were few graphics/game programs that made use of the higher resolution graphics. One I had was a golf program and a paint program. Both came with the Hercules cards.

[@LayneRuley]

this is such a well made video and EVERYTHING IVE EVER WANTED FROM KZbin ABOUT OLDER COMPUTERS. thank you tech gods

[@SSDDR32]

great story telling, appreciate the breaks with your humor as well

[@McVaio]

I buy all my computers from Micro Center, a dedicated computer store that is still thriving.

[@MrJest2]

It's kind of funny - during this time period, I was working in Silicon Valley, at a few software companies, and for a couple years selling clone hardware as well as supporting a major BIOS company. All my friends and roommates worked in tech, too. I don't think I ever once bought a full computer system, and never from a retailer like ComputerLand... it was all piece-parts, acquired from here and there, sometimes "hand-me-downs" as friends upgraded their own systems. Of course, we watched industry trends and events, and used to mock the corporate drama that took place among the various retailers as the clones took over market share - usually while ignoring or taking far more seriously the drama that encompassed our own companies. I guess what is closest to you is more important, but we all probably discounted a lot of the danger signs and indicators that presaged the Dot-Com Bust around the turn of the century.

[@ScarletSwordfish]

Great video and really interesting story. This was my family's first computer. I have vague memories of playing the educational game Sticky Bear on it as a toddler. It's hard to find information about so I appreciate this video and learning just what an odd beast it was.

[@roytofilovski9530]

Computerland could have morphed into something akin to Best Buy. Failure was never inevitable. As for the machine, it is very old yet worked without any restoration. That is very rare for a computer of that vintage.

[@RichardRaehal]

The red button is the reset. The BC88 uses an DOS application to switch speeds. The clock is also non-standard so you have to use one application to read the internal clock and then the standard dos date application to set the clock for dos. - I see you figured it out as you started using the system....

[@UXXV]

Came via The Retro Computing Roundtable podcast! Subbed!

[@TechTimeTraveller]

Welcome and thank you. I had to reboot this channel after KZbin's 'branding' system accidentally deleted the old one (BradH) so I'm really glad it is being seen and enjoyed. There are a bunch more videos already made that I'll be posting soon also. Thanks for watching!!

[@TwoWholeWorms]

The Roomba and Trebuchet jokes, tho xD

[@noahstmnts]

That voice sounded exactly like Dr. Claw from Inspector Gadget.

[@logicone5667]

Lol, the self destruct button voice reminded me of the villain (I think his name was Dr. MADD and he had a cat) from the inspector gadget cartoon from the 80s/90s..

[@TechTimeTraveller]

Dr. Claw. I did a parody bit of him later into the video.

[@haweater1555]

2:25 Fifty-somethings will recognize the IMSAI as used by Matthew Broderick's character in the 1983 classic "WarGames" , hacking into NORAD. The producers of the film intentionally chose a computer that was already obsolete looking at the time.

[@jessihawkins9116]

I thought he used a 486 in that film 🤔

[@johnas2004]

17:31 - Looks like an Arcnet network card, worked great with Novell networks (I used to work on similar system with DR-Net networking under Concurrent DOS).

[@jdmcs]

I have an 8088 that uses Control-Alt-Plus and Control-Alt-Minus (using plus and minus on the number pad) to enable and disable Turbo, respectively. Does that work on this PC?

[@_sharkdev_]

My geometry teacher has a BC88 that came with the class, and we got it to power on and connect to an old cga monitor. It shows up a command line so im getting a keyboard for it now. I need to know though, do you know of any place I can find a manual? I can't seem to find any online

[@TechTimeTraveller]

No... very limited info out there sadly. I once found a sales infomercial they did for it.. but didnt bookmark it and couldn't find it again. I've never seen any actual documentation. I now have a BC286 as well and it came allegedly with everything the owner had.. but no manual.

[@_sharkdev_]

@@TechTimeTraveller I’m starting to think they didn’t come with one, I’ve seen two other channels with a bc88 that also said they didn’t have a manual

[@lonnymoore2622]

love it inspector gadget refrence.

[@rambo8wradio]

17:54 I have never thought i would ever hear anybody say "Unfortunately [...] I'll have to use my IBM model F". :D

[@TechTimeTraveller]

Haha.. I just wanted it to be all computerland

[@line6guy]

I'm curious. The ComputerLand store shown near the very end. Where was that store? it reminds me of the store I worked in from 1981-1985.

[@TechTimeTraveller]

I'd have to figure out where I got that from. I want to say Chicago but not 100% on that.

[@AlexEvans1]

I think I never even saw a Computerland in person, let alone going into one, but then again in 1981 I got a ZX-81 followed by a Coleco Adam and a CoCo2, none of which pointed me to Computerland.

[@Osse22]

Just wondering how effective it would of been to update BC 88 CPU board. Since most software was hardware dependent. Excellent video on the early history of computers.

[@ct6502-c7w]

Dr Claw was cranky!

[@themax4677]

Where's M.A.D. Cat when you need him?

[@tubastuff]

No mention of Millard's daughter being given control of CL, nor their relationship with Werner Erhard of est. (Think "Semi-Tough").

[@TechTimeTraveller]

That's coming when I do a video on IMSAI. Felt it was more relevant there. I did mention Barbara being handed the reins.. how she handled it is up to interpretation.. reviews were decidedly mixed.

[@tubastuff]

@@TechTimeTraveller I guess you had to have been there. Lots of folks in the Bay Area got involved in Erhard's est training. Wasn't actor Ted Danson also caught up in that?

[@stephendouglas9355]

Great research and presentation!

[@KameraShy]

Back in the day when computers were a novelty, computer stores were a social hangout for the burgeoning geek and hacker cult. As well as training and hand-holding which most customers needed. Computer clubs were also a thing back then and would often adjourn to the local store. But as computers proliferated and became a familiar fixture at work, the thrill was gone and consumers began shopping on price which dealt a major blow to the high overhead retailers. You could order a custom configured machine by mail with quality components for far less than Computerland or the others could sell. A lot of small builders came and went.

[@robertlock5501]

Those Dr. Claw impressions tho.... 😂🤣😂🤣😂🤣😂🤣😂🤣

[@lancelotxavier9084]

"superior service" LOL ! The service couldn't have been much worse. They had no idea how to run a retail.

[@TechTimeTraveller]

I've heard that. And that they charged a ton on the service side.

[@lander1591]

386 upgrade card? Why not put a newer cpu upgrade card in? Making and designing your own Home Brew one would fit the theme... You could completely mix it up and put a Pi4 running TwisterOS Box86 and DOSBOX... so you have a vintage i386 PC packing a modern ARM processor, emulating the old OS but also being compatible with the I/O of the modern world.

[@michaelperugini4199]

Microcenter is a brick and mortar computer store.

[@williamharris8367]

I enjoyed this video, but it would be nice had you said something about Computerland in Canada. It appears that the chain folded here in the mid-1980s. I have been unable to determine if it had a presence outside of Ontario and Quebec. I grew up in Halifax, and I was completely unaware of this chain.

[@TechTimeTraveller]

Yes I may add that in when I do a recut of the video. When I did this video I was still figuring out things like transitions and sound control and was not completely happy with the end result. Plus, I've found some new info and finally got color working on my BC88, so I will probably do a cleaned up recut and a new video will have all that. Computerland Canada is a bit weird. It appears they went bust in the 80s but then attempted a comeback in the early 2000s. Apparently they parked a huge balloon downtown in Toronto for a while to advertise. The story is kind of muddy there so that's why I didn't touch it.

[@williamharris8367]

@@TechTimeTraveller The Canadian magazine _The Computer Paper_ is available online via The Internet Archive (albeit not great quality scans). If you have the time, it may be worth skimming some issues for mention of Computerland, even if just the ads. Sadly, there were no other industry publications with a national scope or as long a publication run.

[@plutoniumshore]

16:25 The last time I updated JUST the CPU in a PC....Was my IBM ps2 33mhz and I upgraded it to the DX66 =P

[@TechTimeTraveller]

Yeah I think the only time I ever did just a CPU swap was from a 486DX33 to an overdrive 486dx4100. It did make a difference for Warcraft purposes.

[@kevinchastain727]

I have a Zenith data systems 286 that has the same back plane architecture the cards have two 8 bit slots so the cards have a 16 bit buss between the cards. 8 bit card will still work with it though there used to be a lot of these that could be bought for next to nothing I payed 10 dollars apiece for mine.

[@TechTimeTraveller]

I have since encountered a few more machines like the BC88.. I believe the AT&T 6300 uses a similar system too. $10! Sheesh. Can't even buy a floppy drive for that now.

[@kevinchastain727]

@@TechTimeTraveller that's why I have keep all the old junk people have thrown away as storage has not been a problem.

[@AmstradExin]

Since it's just an ISA backplane, why not already upgrade to an Core2Duo? :D There ARE some ISA compatible cards....

[@diwieolaten8777]

Your stuff is way to underrated

[@50shadesofbeige88]

19:05 okay, when you hit 100K subs you have to bring back Dr Claw. 😂

[@alexdhall]

I agree! 🎉

[@Hollaendaren]

I have an AST 386 that has its turbo mode on a keyboard shortcut, ctrl-alt-up/down iirc. It's built into the bios, no additional software required for it to work. Maybe this machine does it like that too if there is no physical switch? Very interesting video!

[@Omensan]

Exactly this. On one of my old units it was left-ctrl keypad-plus and left-ctrl keypad-minus. Good bet this has something similar.

[@jessihawkins9116]

yes maybe they have this program so a batch file can change the parameters when starting and ending a program that required this. 🤔

[@shawnm355]

self distruct button. CURSE YOU PERRY THE PLATYPUS

[@Arty000]

man I love your videos. cant stop watching.

[@Couchflyer-NY]

I’m old enough to have seen the rise and fall of brick and mortar computer stores. One day a local Radio, TV and HI-Fi store changed into a Computerland. Commission salesmen that sold color TVs suddenly began parroting specs of PC compatibles. Needless to say, qualified upgrade/service staff was nonexistent. Eventually, manufacturers demanded that technicians be certified by the manufacturer. And, the expense of training and testing was to be paid for by the store. I guess the only exception would be a Computerland branded machine with a 90 day limited warranty. Computerland was a far cry from the independent computer store where geeks and hackers bought their gear.

[@michaelstoliker971]

I'm not a fan of collecting X86 computers either. In fact my collecting activities are limited to members of the Atari family of computers. I got into computers after the homebrew era and the Atari launched me into a programming career in lab automation systems (multi-bus and intel embedded controllers). Although I had years of using X86 systems up to present day, it was the PC in a Keyboard era that I remember most fondly. I'd happily expand my collection into other 8-bit and 16-bit systems from Apple, TI, and Commodore, but I have to worry about lack of room, money, and the threat of sleeping in the dog house. I'm really enjoying your series on home brew computers. My only exposure was an SDK-85 I had to build as a trainer for work. Unfortunately it was company property so I couldn't keep it.

[@joeturner7959]

I would have tried cntrl-alt-+ and cntl-alt-- that is how most turbos switched from the keyboard. cp04 /? or cp04 low

[@Ampersand100]

Very interesting history of ComputerLand. Nice old-school bitmap world map you used to show the franchise locations...where is it from?

[@TechTimeTraveller]

I believe I borrowed it from a PC version of Carmen Sandiego. I can't remember offhand which it was.. might have been Deluxe.

[@primus711]

You could just stick all that into a amiga 2000 lol

[@NightSprinter]

Liked if at LEAST for your Dr. Claw voice. XD

[@TechTimeTraveller]

Many thanks. He's making a reappearance in the next video due out in a couple days, thanks to the MAD-1 computer. :)

[@LarixusSnydes]

Hmm? Normally the Turbo button slows the computer down to the original PC speed for compatibility, rather than the other way around. Counter-intuitive, but true for most machines of that era.

[@TechTimeTraveller]

I don't think any of my machines ever had a turbo button.. or at least one that was functional. I find it interesting that the BC88 starts in low gear by default rather than the other way around. But yeah their way makes the turbo part sound more correct.

[@JessHull]

Oh yeah Computerland

[@thekornreeper]

Awesome

[@stefans8325]

Look for a iEi Integration Corp. wsb-h810-r10, that should work as your long awaited CPU upgrade-card add an Intel Pentium G3420T and a 2x8 GB DDR3-L RAM Kit and a mSATA SSD. If you are not afraid to cut some slots of your ISA bus board you could even add some PCI slots or even with out cutting you can have some internal PCI slots. But as the mainboard brings dual Gigabit ethernet, USB3, VGA (1080P), SATA question is what PCI Card would you add 3dfx Voodoo? The Soundblaster AWE32 or Gravis Ultrasound are ISA and do not need PCI. Would not it be a funny idea to upgrade a BC88 like this?

[@choppergirl]

Um, it looks like they just ripped the Frog Design Asthetics of the Mac II. Beige with the exact same grilled lines. This design would carry on to the IIfx, the the IIci, the Mac SE, SE30, etc, so it was not like it was obscure.

[@CrazyMan_Engineer]

When I was a kid i owned a Tandy 1000 tx that had the talking parrot dos program.

[@randywatson8347]

Where is the cat?😅 I scored an NCR PC3390 about 10 years ago... pretty rare and it has basically almost everything on a single board on a two height 16-bit isa riser. Ram is 512kb onboard. It's impossible to find the small 1mb expansion board for it.

[@alexdhall]

"Next time Gadget....next time!" 😹😼

[@dennisp.2147]

I dunno, it seems like kind of a cynical rip-off to me. Industrial PC's with a backplane had been out well before this machine. Zenith even had desktop machines with a similar arrangement that they sold scads of to Government agencies in the US starting in 1984. From where I sit, it seems like they decided to try and use inexpensive industrial parts mated to an otherwise generic whitebox case to make a machine that they could sell as "infinitely upgradeable." Also, by 1988, an 8088 was quite long in the tooth.

[@paulstubbs7678]

What, no Novel server to log your BC88 into..... As for upgrade cards, I'd be more interested in the Z80 etc. cards. After PC & clones became comodities, about the only avenu left was Apple.

[@williamhaynes7089]

By the time i was able to shop at ComputerLand... me and my friends pretty much thought it was a 90% apple store... we were pc people and never shopped there.

[@BrainSlugs83]

On those older games, the higher the number the *slower* they go. You're configuring a delay with that number. Obviously, 5 is going to be way too fast, and 30,000 is going to be way too slow. Try a number like 100, 500, or 1000, and dial it in from there.

[@vanhetgoor]

There is a computer bus, and nothing will keep you from making your own 386 processor card for it. The recipes for building your own computer are widely spread, just pick one and adapt it to the ComputerLand-bus. Often great ideas are not understood or go under in a heavy fight about who is entitled to what and that kind of stuff. More people had the idea of making a futureproof computer cabinet with universal peripheral cards in it. When something new is invented, all connections, the keyboard and the monitor are already waiting for it. The idea is great, but it never worked. Any great idea has many fathers and all fathers want the most of it. That is why all great ideas suck!

[@SwedishEmpire1700]

looks like a interesting computer.

[@WonderfulRetrolife]

Please.. Is there any way to get a copy of this DOS disk or at least a copy of CP84.COM file? I couldn't 'SWAP!' the CPU speed of my BC88 for years because of this missing floppy disk & CP84 file. Need help.. Thank U.

[@TechTimeTraveller]

I have added a link to it in the description. Thanks for reminding me!

[@WonderfulRetrolife]

@@TechTimeTraveller YOU ARE MY SAVIOR !!

[@michaelince7998]

Jeez what a story

[@DanafoxyVixen]

I get the feeling this computer would have been more interesting if they had chosen a non x86 CPU card

[@TechTimeTraveller]

A z80 would have been interesting for sure. Or a 68000.

[@johnps1670]

A processor on a card fits the original idea of a PC in my opinion.

[@CB3ROB-CyberBunker]

no but it has always been normal on all industrial isa boards. as well as in all early tulip computers to do it that way.

[@CB3ROB-CyberBunker]

coincidentially it is also the normal way of doing it in 'boxes that technically are a pc but just for one task' such as network bridges and ups monitors. basically just an industrial pc isa cpu card and 2 network cards or 1 network card and 1 rs232 card. setups like that. but basically those are just industrial pc's just with just 2 or 3 slots and all the software in what normally is the bios rom.

[@meatbyproducts]

I miss my Tandy 1000

[@RetroLifeAgain]

Is there a program to save and load time from BC88 RTC(HD146818P)? My BC88 always reset date to 1980-01-01 every time I reboot. Unfortunately I don't have the original ComputerLand DOS 2.11 disks.

[@TechTimeTraveller]

Probably the standard DOS date program would work. I found a battery on mine that is mounted at the front of the chassis where the indicator lights are. I think that *might* be the clock battery? Maybe replaceable..

[@russellhltn1396]

ALR was another company that tried the "just upgrade the CPU" route. As you note, when you upgrade the CPU, you generally want to upgrade other things as well - like the bus speed. (And memory, and disk drive, and...) Without that, the upgraded computer will never perform as well as a new one.

[@AiOinc1]

Don't forget, the IMSAI 8080 makes a big appearance in the movie War Games! My honest guess is that this computer isn't an in house design, so much as a licensed copy of an industrial machine, which is where these backplane x86 machines are most often seen. Kind of stupid how they went down though. The legal battle was 110% no question a cash grab at someone who made a bit of money, and they were taken out on a legal technicality that didn't make much sense. As always, California legislation is a total joke and ruins something good for everybody. What else is new? Nobody won at the end of this, and that's a real shame, because it means absolutely none of this was even slightly necessary.

[@TechTimeTraveller]

Looking back, I kind of wish I'd told the IMSAI story first.. because it sets the stage for William Millard and Computerland. But I had a Computerland machine and did not have an IMSAI. They're crazy expensive.

[@AiOinc1]

@@TechTimeTraveller Oh I'm sure. It was no small machine in it's time.

[@Agent77X]

MS DOS is still the best operating system 😊

[@mdesm2005]

Again, the repetitive background music just gets on my nerves, and I have to bail at 6:47. Too bad, sounded like an interesting story

[@TechTimeTraveller]

This is one of two videos I'm going to revisit and fix the sound on. They were both early learning attempts.. lot of the process wasn't dialed in yet.

[@mdesm2005]

@@TechTimeTraveller Great. Because I find the subject matter interesting.

[@mdesm2005]

in fact, you really don't need any music

[@EarlofBaltimore]

sub seek went?

[@Jkauppa]

how would you know what's it like in heaven, you law animal

[@Jkauppa]

animals only mess up heaven into pieces

[@The_Conspiracy_Analyst]

zzzzzz

[@misterhat5823]

Never heard of it. RatShax was the only place I saw a computer as a kid, other than the junky Apples at school.