A trippy trip down memory lane (online CPU Museum)

[tek_heretik]

http://www.cpu-museum.de/?a=cpus I have this one...IBM Blue Lightning DX2 486-V666GA 66MHz...as a paperweight on my physical desktop

On a side note, if humanity wanted to shutdown 'Skynet' in the Terminator, why didn't they just shut down all the power plants? Yeah, I know, battery power but still, it would have put the majority of Skynet out of commision and the small pockets could have been eliminated one by one.

Answer: No Skynet, no movie, lol.

Why did this come to mind? Because with the exponential progression of 'artificial inteligence', Skynet is right around the corner. :eek:

[Robtygart]

My first Processor, and I still have it.

[oshunluvr]

Lol, 486? Old school? You kids don't know how good you've got it..

...

[HalationEffect]

Huh, the site doesn't specifically list either of the CPUs from my first computers (I'm considering my first ever home computer and my first ever 'proper' PC separately).

My first home computer, which I bought in 1982, was a Sinclair ZX81, which had a 3.25MHz Z80A made by NEC (along with 1 whole kilobyte of RAM which I later upgraded to a mighty 16K!), and my first PC was a home-brewed 'frankenbox' which had a 20MHz 80286 made by AMD. The closest CPUs to those on the CPU Museum site are a 4MHz Z80 and a 16MHz AMD 80286.

[tek_heretik]

My first Processor, and I still have it.

I had a K6-2, 450MHz I believe, I overclocked the poop out of it, lol, it took a lot of nonsense from me.

[tek_heretik]

Lol, 486? Old school? You kids don't know how good you've got it..

...

I know eh?! But it seems although hardware is ahead of the game some what, software has become increasingly bloated and complicated requiring pimped hardware.

[tek_heretik]

Huh, the site doesn't specifically list either of the CPUs from my first computers (I'm considering my first ever home computer and my first ever 'proper' PC separately).

My first home computer, which I bought in 1982, was a Sinclair ZX81, which had a 3.25MHz Z80A made by NEC (along with 1 whole kilobyte of RAM which I later upgraded to a mighty 16K!), and my first PC was a home-brewed 'frankenbox' which had a 20MHz 80286 made by AMD. The closest CPUs to those on the CPU Museum site are a 4MHz Z80 and a 16MHz AMD 80286.

And let me guess, the mobos had a gazillion jumpers and switches, had to love the forest of jumpers, like doing a damn crossword puzzle, get it wrong and yer screwed, lol.

But back then, those were 'smokin' and 'state-of-the-art', lol.

[HalationEffect]

And let me guess, the mobos had a gazillion jumpers and switches, had to love the forest of jumpers, like doing a damn crossword puzzle, get it wrong and yer screwed, lol.

But back then, those were 'smokin' and 'state-of-the-art', lol.

Oh my, sooooo many DIP switches! And no internet to look the settings up with.

When this 'plug and play' malarkey came along, I was initially resistant to it, because I'd got used to manually setting IRQs and such, and didn't entirely trust any automated system to get it right...

[tek_heretik]

Oh my, sooooo many DIP switches! And no internet to look the settings up with.

When this 'plug and play' malarkey came along, I was initially resistant to it, because I'd got used to manually setting IRQs and such, and didn't entirely trust any automated system to get it right...

That is a funny story, and yeah, I have been resistant to new protocols and technologies along the way, but after much research...

[oshunluvr]

I had a Timex Sinclair 1000 with a Zilog Z80A CPU @ 3.25 MHz and 2 KB memory. I had an external RAM module that pimped it to 16KB memory! A couple years later I had an Apple IIc that was a 65C02 CPU @ 1.023MHz and a HUGE 128MB ram. A couple years later, I was able to swap in a 4MHz replacement. Problem with that was the game programs at the time depended on the CPU clock so a game would run at 4 times normal speed. Let me tell you, F-15 Strike Eagle is un-playable at 4X! Fortunately, all I had to do was bend out one pin on the CPU, solder a wire to it and it's socket and wire those to a SPST switch. Booting up with the switch in ON gave you 4MHz and off got you 1MHz.

However, the first computer I programmed was in 1976: an IBM 360/40 using punch cards. It used magnetic core memory (the technology between vacuum tubes and transistors). Later, as an Air Traffic controller I was stunned to learn our entire national air traffic system relied on IBM 9020s - which was 4 IBM 360/50s working together. These computers weren't replaced until the early 90's.

[tek_heretik]

I had a Timex Sinclair 1000 with a Zilog Z80A CPU @ 3.25 MHz and 2 KB memory. I had an external RAM module that pimped it to 16KB memory! A couple years later I had an Apple IIc that was a 65C02 CPU @ 1.023MHz and a HUGE 128MB ram. A couple years later, I was able to swap in a 4MHz replacement. Problem with that was the game programs at the time depended on the CPU clock so a game would run at 4 times normal speed. Let me tell you, F-15 Strike Eagle is un-playable at 4X! Fortunately, all I had to do was bend out one pin on the CPU, solder a wire to it and it's socket and wire those to a SPST switch. Booting up with the switch in ON gave you 4MHz and off got you 1MHz.

However, the first computer I programmed was in 1976: an IBM 360/40 using punch cards. It used magnetic core memory (the technology between vacuum tubes and transistors). Later, as an Air Traffic controller I was stunned to learn our entire national air traffic system relied on IBM 9020s - which was 4 IBM 360/50s working together. These computers weren't replaced until the early 90's.

Wow, those are quite the stories, the first story is hilarious!

[Guest]

Would you be willing to part with the Gigabyte EP45-UD3R? If it still works, I'm most def. interested in it

[woodsmoke]

The Timex Sinclair was my families first computer also and yeah the DIP switches were something else!
woody

[oshunluvr]

The dang thing used a cassette tape to load software. It took like 15 minutes to boot if I recall correctly.