[retrotecchie]

@WizzyWigg

I did have an Acorn Electron which was the Beeb's little brother. Other gems that I used to own were Amstrad CPC464s and a Dragon 32.

[WizzyWigg]

Originally Posted by retrotecchie

@WizzyWigg

I did have an Acorn Electron which was the Beeb's little brother. Other gems that I used to own were Amstrad CPC464s and a Dragon 32.

The Amstrad brings back memories. It was the first computer I bought my son. It started his career journey 😂.

[retrotecchie]

@WizzyWigg

I had just started in my electronics career and had access to supplies and a workshop back in 1987. I did a deal with a local superstore to take all the customer returns off their hands (as Amstrad didn't want 'em back) for a small consideration and ended up with over thirty dead CPC464 machines. My mate and I used to go in on a Saturday and fettle dead Amstrads, with a hit rate of about three 'workers' for every five dead ones. We both had one each, used a couple at work for various nefarious purposes, and sold the refurbished ones for £50 each 👍

I still play with (and occasionally build) Z80 based computers to this day. I even built a 286 PC with a Z80 co-processor board that could run DOS and CP/M simultaneously and even run old Spectrum games.

[WizzyWigg]

@retrotecchie
It's amazing the effects A S had on people's lives 😉.

[meldrewreborn]

@WizzyWigg @retrotecchie

my experience was only as a consumer, I’ve never dabbled in circuit boards at any time. Bet I had a Sinclair spectrum put it in a case with a full keyboard and an opting slot for an expansion card , which I filled with a 32MB hard drive. Later I move on to an Amstrad with an EGA monitor. Mostly I assemble my own PC from component bought from computer fairs or more recently from the internet. Over time I might need to upgrade a component so I can do that, the waste involved in scrapping a whole laptop when something goes u/s would frustrate me enormously.

I once bought some pirate software in Hong Kong, most of which worked, but a Chinese version of windows 95 , with no alternative language, defeated me.

[retrotecchie]

@WizzyWigg

Yes, there were an awful lot of folk in the 80s that bought a surprising amount of Lord Sugar's tut. His 'stereo' systems really were a 'mugs eyeful'. Lots of flashing LEDs and knobs and buttons, but made out of the cheapest possible materials and the poorest quality Chinese-made electronics he could shove into them.

I was about 15 when my parents bought me an Amstrad 'tower system' stereo one Christmas. From a distance, it looked the business, but up close it was pretty dire and the build quality and sound was truly atrocious. I've seen egg-boxes with a better build quality than his speakers. A shame, because a lot of his earlier stuff was actually rather good.

He hit rock bottom with his PC1640 'IBM clone' 8086 machine. The monitor sat in a moulded recess in the main box that also housed 4 AA batteries for backing up the real time clock. After a year or so, the batteries would leak and drip electrolyte onto the mainboard and rot the PCB tracks. As for his 'proprietary' 3" diskettes....🤣🤣🤣

But fixing his products did keep me in beer-money for a good while when I was younger 👍

[retrotecchie]

Originally Posted by meldrewreborn

@WizzyWigg @retrotecchie

I once bought some pirate software in Hong Kong, most of which worked, but a Chinese version of windows 95 , with no alternative language, defeated me.

I installed a firearms training simulator in a firing range under the Kremlin back in 2007 (and yes, I've met Mr Putin 🤬). We'd spent six months translating our proprietary software into Russian but when we did the final installation, the client (FSB) insisted that we used a Russian language version of Windows XP. Our multilingual version had English, Arabic and the usual European languages, but not Russian, so our 'minder' who was part of the IT department said he would get a copy for us, and help us install it. He bought a five rouble (about a quid, back then) knock-off copy from a vendor in a newspaper stand outside the entrance to the Red Square metro station 🤣🤣🤣

The most fun I've ever had (not!) was trying to activate that via my mobile phone!

[WizzyWigg]

@meldrewreborn
Those were the days, Sunday morning computer fairs. Sausage barm, coffee, and rummaging around for DIMMS, SIMMS, Floppies and whatever.
Before Linux started to take off it was good old torrents. Saying that still got legit DOS 3.3, Windows 1.0.

[WizzyWigg]

Originally Posted by retrotecchie

@WizzyWigg

Yes, there were an awful lot of folk in the 80s that bought a surprising amount of Lord Sugar's tut. His 'stereo' systems really were a 'mugs eyeful'. Lots of flashing LEDs and knobs and buttons, but made out of the cheapest possible materials and the poorest quality Chinese-made electronics he could shove into them.

I was about 15 when my parents bought me an Amstrad 'tower system' stereo one Christmas. From a distance, it looked the business, but up close it was pretty dire and the build quality and sound was truly atrocious. I've seen egg-boxes with a better build quality than his speakers. A shame, because a lot of his earlier stuff was actually rather good.

He hit rock bottom with his PC1640 'IBM clone' 8086 machine. The monitor sat in a moulded recess in the main box that also housed 4 AA batteries for backing up the real time clock. After a year or so, the batteries would leak and drip electrolyte onto the mainboard and rot the PCB tracks. As for his 'proprietary' 3" diskettes....🤣🤣🤣

But fixing his products did keep me in beer-money for a good while when I was younger 👍

I remember them well 😂😂😂😂😂😂😂.

[meldrewreborn]

Sugar and I attended the same primary school (different years). His autobiography details his early days - he’s always been able to spot gaps in the market before others.

his early PC didn’t have a cooling fan, many critics said it needed one, while Sugar disagreed he put one in to satisfy the buyers.