#etower 600is

[commodorez]

Strange question, but I'm curious. Do you have a least favourite computer?

Ohhhh, good one. I'm going to make some enemies for these, I'm sure.

Least favorite vintage computer:

Apple I

Not for any technical reasons, or anything about its history. I happen to like and respect Steve Wozniak, and everything he did in the service of computing in the 1970s. His ROM monitor known as WOZMON is only 256 bytes so it can fit into a first generation 1702A EPROM, which is damned impressive. I use the newer EWOZMON regular basis on other 6502 machines.

The Apple I exemplifies a computer that no longer exists as a computer. Rather, it's become the legendary trading card for the ultrawealthy techbro types who seek to commodify the history of the home computer revolution that they didn't bother to study. It's been reduced to no more than a static display piece, and a cornerstone of revisionist history, ignoring the larger picture.

An Apple I is considered too monetarily valuable to risk applying power to or fixing, "gotta leave it original!" with failed, leaky capacitors, doing nothing. Well if you can't use it, it ceases to be a computer because it isn't computing anything. They had almost a dozen of them at VCF West XIV, most of which were under plexiglass with a hired guard to keep an eye on them because the high price they fetch. Only one was powered up at a time under the watchful gaze of experts, handling things with museum gloves. Unlike other exhibits, these were not available to be touched or interacted with (which defeats the whole reason people enjoy vintage computer festivals).

Assuming you look beyond the hype, and get your hands on a working Apple I? It turns out to be quite underpowered and limited -- which makes sense, Woz was optimizing the shit outta his part count and budget! I wish I had his skills. It was a major technical achievement to get it to do that much with so little. It's a TV Typewriter (RIP Don Lancaster) bolted to a minimal 6502. If i had one at my disposal in the 1970s, I'd probably do like the contemporary hackers did and modify it as my budget and skills allowed. But it's 2024 and an Apple I -- you aren't allowed to do that. No, if I had an Apple I, I could sell it and buy a house with that money.

If it weren't for all that, I think I'd probably just be indifferent to it, or maybe even like it for what it is.

Least favorite general computer:

eMachines eTower 600is

What a piece of shit. I had one when it was new, running Windows ME and it was hot garbage. I could not stand this underpowered excuse for a computer after a few months when the new computer sheen wore off. Floppy drive died too soon. Didn't come with the advertised 64MB of RAM (who puts 33MB of RAM in a computer?). Hard drive was only 10GB, kept filling it up. It was filled with bloatware, the keyboard was cheap garbage. I don't begrudge my parents for buying it, they didn't know any better and I was too young to have any say in the matter. That said, it endured the shortest tenure of any computer in my house to date.

Never obsolete my ass.

#apple i #emachines #etower 600is #windows me

[helpfulprogramsblogvs3-blog]

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[commodorez]

But but but the e-machine is never obsolete, i-it says so on the computer.

But in actually, I unironically just want to get the case, stickers and all, and gut it to build a gaming computer inside its carcass. Just for kicks and grins.

I've seen that done before.

Sometimes I wonder if my eTower 600is could have been salvaged if I had taken the time to upgrade the hardware appropriately, and install a better OS than Windows ME. 98SE comes to mind... maybe 2K? In the end, it was still a shitty eMachine at heart.

#etower 600is #emachines #windows ME

[commodorez]

I found something I didn't expect to still exist: the receipt for my 4th computer from 2003. I never could pin down the exact timeframe it was purchased in my memory, but I remember it was a big deal to get this upgrade. This was a good surprise present, and it resulted in my eMachines eTower 600is running Windows ME to be retired.

It was a custom job featuring something like an Athlon at ~2.4GHz, with DVD burner, CD drive, floppy drive, 80GB IDE hard drive (even though it was a SATA-equipped motherboard), ASUS A7N8X motherboard (the one with that rare talking POST subsystem), and 512MB of RAM running Window 2000. Oh, and an ATI Radeon 9800 Pro. It was later upgrade-installed with an earlier version of XP which resulted in a very unoptimized system, which sucked away any power that the machine had, and left me hating XP for many years.

I later re-installed XP and 2000 in a dual-boot situation with modern SATA hard drives to get the most of the machine. Massive improvement. It's in storage though, as I have better hardware to run XP on these days.

#windows xp #windows 2000

[commodorez]

The Quest To Play War Eagles

Way back in 1994, I played my first video game on my dad’s IBM PC compatible.  War Eagles was one of the handful of games in his library, and it was the only one that used a joystick.  We had a Kraft KC-3, a 2-button joystick that worked with both IBM and Apple machines, and had both kinds of required connectors along with a switch to select which mode it was in.  The most unique feature it sported was the ability to turn off the centering springs for each axis.

Within the next year, Windows became relevant enough for us to make the leap to the GUI world.  The Kraft was put on a shelf, along with the DOS game collection, but the computer disappeared to parts unknown.

In 2001 or thereabouts, I spotted War Eagles on the shelf, and started asking questions.  I opened the box to find a 5¼“ floppy disk, the first one I had seen in a few years.  Immediately, I wanted to play it  -- the problem was how was I going to read the disk? 

I had no way of playing the game, so I asked for something comparable.  I spent some time looking through the game section of my local Comp USA for a WW I biplane game that would satisfy my interests.  Instead, I got Microsoft Combat Flight Simulator, based on FS98.  For the time being this was enough to satiate my desire for a flight sim dogfighter.  I even got a Microsoft Sidewinder, one of my first USB devices to make the gaming experience more enjoyable.  However, I also discovered that CFS worked just fine with the Kraft KC3, so I frequently switched between the two.

Some time later, I visited a family friend’s house, and the kids computer was a generic Windows 95 machine, but with one difference: it had both 5¼“ and 3½“ floppy drives.  What a concept!  During our next visit, a copy of my War Eagles disk was made onto 3½“ floppy, which I could use at home.

I tried to play it on my eMachines eTower 600is running Windows ME, only to discover that the game ran WAY too fast.  It was like the plane was flying at warp speed. Not going to cut it...

“You need to use an emulator.” “What’s an emulator?”  “It will slow the game down so you can play it.  Your computer is too fast.” Fast? Hardly, it was an eMachine.  I tried to figure out how to use an early PC XT emulator, but I had no idea what I was doing.The quest to play War Eagles again was put on hold.

A few years later, DOSBox became a prominent method of running MS-DOS games, and so I took this opportunity to run War Eagles again.  Sure enough, I was able to set a correct cycles count and dial the gameplay speed back to a reasonable setting.  The problem was using the joystick.  I was on a machine that lacked any sort of game port, and required the use of a USB adapter.  Try as I might, I could not get DOSBox to recognize the joystick’s existence, and so I was relegated to using the keyboard.  Close, but no cigar.  The quest continued.

Fast forward to about 2012, and I inherited an IBM PC.  Jackpot.  Problem was that the machine had a few issues due to age, and needed some work before it was 100% functional.  Still, it was working enough to read disks, so I tried running the game: the original floppy disk was corrupted.  Bummer.  I didn’t have a suitable tweener rig yet, so I couldn’t fix the disk, nor make a replacement. 

So now I sit here with my newly acquired Commodore PC40-III, a spare game controller card in one hand, and a blank floppy disk in the other.  Installing the card was easy enough, as was making a new copy of the game via Vega, my Windows 95 tweener rig.  The PC40-III has VGA graphics, so it can handle the EGA mode of War Eagles with ease.  Playing the game again with the correct joystick was a blast, and after I got the hang of it, I knew my efforts were worth the trouble.

The future has one goal in mind: preparing my NRFB NOS IBM 5170.  I want to play three specific games, Commander Keen, Lightspeed, and War Eagles on era appropriate hardware.  I want to experience them on a machine with native EGA graphics, and I have a suitable card for the task.  The only remaining part to acquire before that project starts is a Soundblaster with the C/MS upgrade (because I really want one).

Nostalgia has motivated me, gotten me this far with my vintage computing hobby.  Let’s see where it takes me next...

#PC AT compatible #War Eagles #Kraft KC3 #Vega #IBM 5170 #5170