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silveradept[Welcome to December Days, where I natter on about things organized around a theme (sometimes very loosely), one a day, for 31 days. This year, we're taking a look back at some touchpoints along the way of my journey with computing and computing devices.]
Back on Day 2, I talked about the Kaypro II as one of the first computers I have memory of playing games on. What I didn't remember about it was that it was a portable computer, for some value of portable. And not portable in a laptop kind of way, although laptops and personal digital assistants will enter the picture as processor speed and families continue to advance.
Even today, the desktop computer is generally composed of a central tower with a motherboard, into which are slotted a compatible CPU, compatible RAM, and some number of expansion cards that provide video output, ports for keyboard and mouse input, sound output, ports to attach other devices to for internal or external data storage, and so forth. The motherboards of our current time generally have a number of those ports integrated into their design, as well as spaces to power additional ports depending on what kind of case the board is put inside and how much power needs to be drawn to make all of the components work. Because of the modularity of the machine, a desktop usually needs to have all of its peripherals connected to the main tower. This usually results in the need for cable management, as the tower will sprout an impressive number of cables from all of its ports to its peripherals, and the general idea is that desktops want to stay where they're placed, rather than move around a lot. It was always an annoyance when a sleepover or other such thing was planned and everyone wanted to bring their computers, because it meant finding enough space to set up the desktops (and, eventually, making sure there was enough cable to run between the machines and the switch or router so that we could all play locally.)
Machines like the Kaypro and the Compaq 286 (I'm pretty sure that computer had something in the 80286 family as its CPU) that the bulk of the memory revolves around still had ports to plug things in, but they didn't need nearly as many of them, because the case designs for these types of computers incorporated a screen, a keyboard, and some disk drives into their case designs. It cut down on the number of cables that needed to be run, and the case itself often had legs to stand on so that the monitor would be at an ergonomic working height. For someone who had a job that needed computer access regardless of where they were, these cases with built in components were pretty good. They were built with the idea in mind of being portable and rugged enough to take the punishment of being driven, dragged, and carried around. And if you were strong enough to carry around a two or three foot tall steel case full of computer components, they probably were portable.
Thus, "luggables," the somewhat awkward attempts to miniaturize the desktop so that it could be transported and carried around with someone. Since this is also still an era where the most common video display service is a cathode ray tube, there was definitely some additional weight going on carrying around the display components in the case as well.
I, perhaps thankfully, never owned a luggable, even though I could see their immediate use and application for things like social trips or the regular Boy Scout events that myself and two similarly nerdy friends would all be at together, generally funding each other's company more palatable and full of interesting topics than the rest of the Scouting troop, who tended to be pranksters against the nerds, doing things like trying to lock us into the room we had taken over for electronics displays or the usual kinds of shaving cream type matters one does to those who fall asleep during times when everyone is apparently supposed to stay up very late. (I suspect we all stayed in the organization because we enjoyed our social interactions and not because of any greater commitment to the cause of Scouting. I would get glimpses of how it was probably supposed to go at bigger camping trips, when there were other examples and merit items that could be undertaken, but that is a different set of memories and not on topic for this session.) I remember the Compaq being good enough that I could see well enough to play King's Quest III on it for a little bit and things didn't seem especially cramped or tiny where it would be impossible to see the things on screen. Also, it helped that the game being played was one with a text parser - the luggable case had a full keyboard built into it, but did not have a mouse attached, so anything that was point and click wouldn't have worked nearly as well without some additional hardware, and funding the right port to plug it in to. And, likely, turning the machine off and back on again, as we hadn't developed USB and the ability to hot plug things in and out of our computers. They were working on things like that, absolutely, but it would still be a little while before the world got to watch an early viral video of Windows 98 crashing live while trying to demonstrate the ability to hot plug peripherals. It was fine, at the time, because only a select few programs, most of them related to art or graphic design, really used the mouse to do things at this point, and if you were planning on using specific peripherals, you probably knew you were going to do that before you turned the machine on. And also because there were enough ports of the right types on your machines to be able to hook everything up, a phenomenon that's not the case for machines of our era, where we are expected to have a hub or three attached to our machines to make sure there are enough ports for charging and interacting with our devices.
I'm pretty sure that by the time we made it to the all night graduation party that happened at the end of required schooling the liable had been replaced by a laptop of some sort, but I definitely remember also taking a short amount of time during that space to play a little Super Mario Brothers 3 in emulation with the friend from that era who went on to public schooling in the same space as myself, rather than being diverted to a religious high school because of the beliefs of his parents. I may have referenced the luggable while doing so at that party, as a fond throwback memory of only a few years ago. I haven't heard from the friend who owned the luggable in a while, and I only keep a small amount of social media tabs on the other friend of our trio, since I moved fairly significantly far away for work and he did not. Some friendships drift a bit as you all move up into the role of having to play an adult. Although, for this set of friendships in particular, there was always the possibility of strongly conservative Christianity interfering in the friendship, demanding a person give up a core part of themselves so they they would outwardly be a devout adherent of the religious practice and all of its prejudices against those deemed "immoral" based on their "lifestyle choices." I had an inkling of an idea at the time that denominational issues might sink the friendship if someone decided to get remarkably anti-Papist in their outlook, but I didn't learn the greater reason why things might have gone south in those years until much later. I consider it a failing of myself to have not been safe enough to open up to at the time, but I also know that my younger self might not have been as good at OPSEC as would have been needed to avoid disclosure to unauthorized persons, so I try to be more forgiving of myself.
I think it was also about this time that the differentiation in our friendship trio was beginning to show out, as I was the person who was also acquiring secondhand game consoles and cartridges to play, and the other two, while games were certainly part of their repertoire, they were much more likely to be using their machines for programming or interfacing with other technology. It made me the most mainstream of the three, I suspect, and put me in the kind of place where I could translate between the worlds of the "normal" people and the "nerds," which, frankly, is a damn useful skill for anyone to have, regardless of their age. In school, however, where things get cliquey in a hurry, being someone who can crosswalk between groups is a really good spot to be in. (And, of course, as an information professional, a significant amount of my job is translating from human to machine and back again, so I still have to speak a significant amount of nerd on a regular basis.) On the down side, with the complexities of our identities, being someone who can move between multiple groups and get along with people in all of them can lead to feeling a bit isolated or that there isn't really a group that's "yours" or "home." At this point if my life, I'm still developing an identity that is on the pathway toward "gamer" more than anything more "serious" in technology. Even now, I think of myself as more of an end user of technology and software who has someone else's neat trick to deploy rather than someone who does serious hacking of either hardware or software. (Despite some of the neat tricks that are yet to come in this series.) And, given how the identity of "gamer" became a toxic cesspool of gatekeeping, mistaking your extremely small group as the only important one in the room, sexism and misogyny, and other elements that it hasn't really repudiated even try this day, I suppose I can be thankful that I didn't yoke myself to that idea was a core personality element before all of those toxic components spilled out into the plain sight of everyone else.
As it turns out, many stories about technology aren't always, or sometimes even primarily, about the technology itself. Processors get faster, memory more expansive, storage gets larger, graphics and sound improve to theater quality and beyond, but, at least for me, a lot of my stories have technology as tools, impediments, and occasionally things that make life and other things easier for me and others, but the real stories that came along with it are what happened with the technology, the people who gathered to use it or showcase their prowess with it, and the memories that got made where the technology was available. Mine is mostly computing devices. For others, it might be cameras, pens and pencils, sketchbooks, turntables, DACs, or musical instruments. We're still not to the point of my computing journey where widespread network access is available for all devices everywhere, so most of these memories are being made in person, and with the hauling of fairly large objects (and their associated cables) around to achieve them. And while our grownups always worried that our parallel play wouldn't produce any ability to socialize in the real world, we turned out okay, even if many of our interactions were screen-mediated. And, perhaps in a sadistic way, it made it easier for the situation where we have to interact by virtual while we wait out a virus and those people who believe in spreading it.
- CPU: Intel 80286 @ 6 or 8 MHz
- Memory: 640 KB of RAM
- Graphics: CGA or monochrome monitors
- Sound: Internal Speaker
- Inputs: Keyboard
- Storage: 20 MB hard drive, one 5.25" floppy disk drive
- OS: MS-DOS (probably 3.3)
Back on Day 2, I talked about the Kaypro II as one of the first computers I have memory of playing games on. What I didn't remember about it was that it was a portable computer, for some value of portable. And not portable in a laptop kind of way, although laptops and personal digital assistants will enter the picture as processor speed and families continue to advance.
Even today, the desktop computer is generally composed of a central tower with a motherboard, into which are slotted a compatible CPU, compatible RAM, and some number of expansion cards that provide video output, ports for keyboard and mouse input, sound output, ports to attach other devices to for internal or external data storage, and so forth. The motherboards of our current time generally have a number of those ports integrated into their design, as well as spaces to power additional ports depending on what kind of case the board is put inside and how much power needs to be drawn to make all of the components work. Because of the modularity of the machine, a desktop usually needs to have all of its peripherals connected to the main tower. This usually results in the need for cable management, as the tower will sprout an impressive number of cables from all of its ports to its peripherals, and the general idea is that desktops want to stay where they're placed, rather than move around a lot. It was always an annoyance when a sleepover or other such thing was planned and everyone wanted to bring their computers, because it meant finding enough space to set up the desktops (and, eventually, making sure there was enough cable to run between the machines and the switch or router so that we could all play locally.)
Machines like the Kaypro and the Compaq 286 (I'm pretty sure that computer had something in the 80286 family as its CPU) that the bulk of the memory revolves around still had ports to plug things in, but they didn't need nearly as many of them, because the case designs for these types of computers incorporated a screen, a keyboard, and some disk drives into their case designs. It cut down on the number of cables that needed to be run, and the case itself often had legs to stand on so that the monitor would be at an ergonomic working height. For someone who had a job that needed computer access regardless of where they were, these cases with built in components were pretty good. They were built with the idea in mind of being portable and rugged enough to take the punishment of being driven, dragged, and carried around. And if you were strong enough to carry around a two or three foot tall steel case full of computer components, they probably were portable.
Thus, "luggables," the somewhat awkward attempts to miniaturize the desktop so that it could be transported and carried around with someone. Since this is also still an era where the most common video display service is a cathode ray tube, there was definitely some additional weight going on carrying around the display components in the case as well.
I, perhaps thankfully, never owned a luggable, even though I could see their immediate use and application for things like social trips or the regular Boy Scout events that myself and two similarly nerdy friends would all be at together, generally funding each other's company more palatable and full of interesting topics than the rest of the Scouting troop, who tended to be pranksters against the nerds, doing things like trying to lock us into the room we had taken over for electronics displays or the usual kinds of shaving cream type matters one does to those who fall asleep during times when everyone is apparently supposed to stay up very late. (I suspect we all stayed in the organization because we enjoyed our social interactions and not because of any greater commitment to the cause of Scouting. I would get glimpses of how it was probably supposed to go at bigger camping trips, when there were other examples and merit items that could be undertaken, but that is a different set of memories and not on topic for this session.) I remember the Compaq being good enough that I could see well enough to play King's Quest III on it for a little bit and things didn't seem especially cramped or tiny where it would be impossible to see the things on screen. Also, it helped that the game being played was one with a text parser - the luggable case had a full keyboard built into it, but did not have a mouse attached, so anything that was point and click wouldn't have worked nearly as well without some additional hardware, and funding the right port to plug it in to. And, likely, turning the machine off and back on again, as we hadn't developed USB and the ability to hot plug things in and out of our computers. They were working on things like that, absolutely, but it would still be a little while before the world got to watch an early viral video of Windows 98 crashing live while trying to demonstrate the ability to hot plug peripherals. It was fine, at the time, because only a select few programs, most of them related to art or graphic design, really used the mouse to do things at this point, and if you were planning on using specific peripherals, you probably knew you were going to do that before you turned the machine on. And also because there were enough ports of the right types on your machines to be able to hook everything up, a phenomenon that's not the case for machines of our era, where we are expected to have a hub or three attached to our machines to make sure there are enough ports for charging and interacting with our devices.
I'm pretty sure that by the time we made it to the all night graduation party that happened at the end of required schooling the liable had been replaced by a laptop of some sort, but I definitely remember also taking a short amount of time during that space to play a little Super Mario Brothers 3 in emulation with the friend from that era who went on to public schooling in the same space as myself, rather than being diverted to a religious high school because of the beliefs of his parents. I may have referenced the luggable while doing so at that party, as a fond throwback memory of only a few years ago. I haven't heard from the friend who owned the luggable in a while, and I only keep a small amount of social media tabs on the other friend of our trio, since I moved fairly significantly far away for work and he did not. Some friendships drift a bit as you all move up into the role of having to play an adult. Although, for this set of friendships in particular, there was always the possibility of strongly conservative Christianity interfering in the friendship, demanding a person give up a core part of themselves so they they would outwardly be a devout adherent of the religious practice and all of its prejudices against those deemed "immoral" based on their "lifestyle choices." I had an inkling of an idea at the time that denominational issues might sink the friendship if someone decided to get remarkably anti-Papist in their outlook, but I didn't learn the greater reason why things might have gone south in those years until much later. I consider it a failing of myself to have not been safe enough to open up to at the time, but I also know that my younger self might not have been as good at OPSEC as would have been needed to avoid disclosure to unauthorized persons, so I try to be more forgiving of myself.
I think it was also about this time that the differentiation in our friendship trio was beginning to show out, as I was the person who was also acquiring secondhand game consoles and cartridges to play, and the other two, while games were certainly part of their repertoire, they were much more likely to be using their machines for programming or interfacing with other technology. It made me the most mainstream of the three, I suspect, and put me in the kind of place where I could translate between the worlds of the "normal" people and the "nerds," which, frankly, is a damn useful skill for anyone to have, regardless of their age. In school, however, where things get cliquey in a hurry, being someone who can crosswalk between groups is a really good spot to be in. (And, of course, as an information professional, a significant amount of my job is translating from human to machine and back again, so I still have to speak a significant amount of nerd on a regular basis.) On the down side, with the complexities of our identities, being someone who can move between multiple groups and get along with people in all of them can lead to feeling a bit isolated or that there isn't really a group that's "yours" or "home." At this point if my life, I'm still developing an identity that is on the pathway toward "gamer" more than anything more "serious" in technology. Even now, I think of myself as more of an end user of technology and software who has someone else's neat trick to deploy rather than someone who does serious hacking of either hardware or software. (Despite some of the neat tricks that are yet to come in this series.) And, given how the identity of "gamer" became a toxic cesspool of gatekeeping, mistaking your extremely small group as the only important one in the room, sexism and misogyny, and other elements that it hasn't really repudiated even try this day, I suppose I can be thankful that I didn't yoke myself to that idea was a core personality element before all of those toxic components spilled out into the plain sight of everyone else.
As it turns out, many stories about technology aren't always, or sometimes even primarily, about the technology itself. Processors get faster, memory more expansive, storage gets larger, graphics and sound improve to theater quality and beyond, but, at least for me, a lot of my stories have technology as tools, impediments, and occasionally things that make life and other things easier for me and others, but the real stories that came along with it are what happened with the technology, the people who gathered to use it or showcase their prowess with it, and the memories that got made where the technology was available. Mine is mostly computing devices. For others, it might be cameras, pens and pencils, sketchbooks, turntables, DACs, or musical instruments. We're still not to the point of my computing journey where widespread network access is available for all devices everywhere, so most of these memories are being made in person, and with the hauling of fairly large objects (and their associated cables) around to achieve them. And while our grownups always worried that our parallel play wouldn't produce any ability to socialize in the real world, we turned out okay, even if many of our interactions were screen-mediated. And, perhaps in a sadistic way, it made it easier for the situation where we have to interact by virtual while we wait out a virus and those people who believe in spreading it.
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Date: 2021-12-09 03:04 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-12-09 03:42 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-12-09 10:04 pm (UTC)And that clone BIOS on the 386 was a royal PITA! I remember trying to run QEMM386 on those back in the late '80s/early '90s and having no problem on any other 386 except the Compaqs! They did something weird with splitting their memory in that 384k block between 640k and 1MB where your expansion ram would start, and it made trying to map into it all but impossible. Overall, I always hated their gear. When they bought Dec, I mourned the loss of Dec. When they "merged" with HP, I said "two lousy brands that I wouldn't buy in the first place combined into one very lousy brand that guaranteed I'll never buy." I've oft told the story of HP screwing us over when I worked at the police department. We had lots of HP scanners and ink jet printers. We sent our techs out for training and certification to repair their kit. Then HP refused to sell us parts kits.
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Date: 2021-12-10 01:22 am (UTC)Yes, HP became a terrible company and shows no signs of getting any better. And Compaq wasn't a particularly good company to have to deal with either.
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Date: 2021-12-09 04:20 pm (UTC)Hm, maybe I'll post about my computer history on my account, since it's getting too long for a comment! I'm impressed at the level of detail you have (or are finding) on all these.
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Date: 2021-12-09 05:20 pm (UTC)I programmed a couple of games on my graphing calculator as well, but it was generally going to be short-lived, as the teachers tended to insist on wiping the memories of the machines before examinations, so that we didn't just use programs to solve problems, but instead had to do most of it by hand. Now that we're grownups, of course, the real world is fine if you use the programs to do the calculation (so long as it's the right program and you're using it correctly.)
The more I researched luggables, the more it became clear that they were a very popular design, even though they were heavy, unwieldy, and small-screened.
no subject
Date: 2021-12-09 09:06 pm (UTC)When he sent it to a colleague across the Iron Curtain, he was remonstrated for his sense of humor. Including "To Russia, With Love" in the addressing attracted the attention of the security services, who have both seen James Bond and are not noted for their sense of humor. His colleague was intact, but did not enjoy the pop quiz from these humorless entities.
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Date: 2021-12-09 09:17 pm (UTC)The one I remember had color graphics, but lots of other luggables, like the Kaypro, were definitely a single color.
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Date: 2021-12-10 02:51 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-12-10 02:54 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-12-10 03:22 am (UTC)