"Mark Metzler wrote:
I was in WalMart last night, and I swung by the Electronics area. I was curious as to how much a replacement drive would cost me for my PC at home, which has a 17gb drive in it. They had a 80gig drive sitting on the shelf next to the surge suppressors for $70. Never mind that it comes with the software to copy everything to the new drive. So I stood there trying to do the math on what it would cost to equate that volume of storage with ST506 drives at $1995.00 a pop. My head started hurting, so I rounded the ST506 to $2000.
It would take 16,000 ST506’s to reach the memory of the drive in WalMart (again sitting on the shelf, not behind a locked cabinet).
At $2000.00 a pop, it would cost me $32,000,000.00.
Now that would have been a nice sale, but would have been stolen by Jim Scharffe or Mike Daniel.
Here is another perspective. If stacked on top of one another, they would be as tall as a 667 story building.
If from sea level, they would stack high enough to top the tallest building in Downtown Denver.
If sold with a cabinet and power supply, Josef Rabinowitz would be retired. "
"Ohmigod! I'm reminded of when I worked for Heath Kline at Priority One Electronics in Chatsworth...and before that for Galaxy Computers in Woodland Hills when the Commodore 64 was introduced! We thought it huge compared to the Timex Sinclair...."
"We both have been into computers since 1970's & currently own 6 OSBORNE's in working condition. Although we use DOS now, we miss cpm & how actually FAST it was compared to Windows. We miss dBase. Append as well instead of Access now. We still have data on 5 1/4" discs we need to put into the dos machines we use now.
Sorry to hear you are leaving the business - we certainly hope you find a buyer who will keep the collection intact!
Best to you & your wonderful efforts!"
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SYSTEM WE ARE ALWAYS LOOKING FOR VINTAGE COMPUTER SYSTEMS
IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO DONATE TO
THE FREEMAN PC MUSEUM
Welcome to The Freeman PC Museum collection. The following is a complete list of vintage computer systems in the museum. Feel free to scroll through the list, view details of the system, see related links and advertisements, and join in on the mini forums for each of the systems.
The following list is complete. If you are searching for a particular model, manufacturer, or a list of computers from a particular year, use the "Search" form on the left. Thank you again for visiting The Freeman PC Museum, and enjoy.
ACE 1000 introduced in 1983 and replaced the ACE 100. This Apple II clone had 64Kb RAM, a 6502 cpu and slots for expansion. Apple sued Franklin for copyright infringement and won.
Single board computer designed by Jim Ferguson in 1980. Jim designed this board to add the CRT interface on board and to make a computer that was easier to use and more reliable than S-100 computers. In 1981 Xerox licensed BigBoard and used the design in its 820 series of computers. IBM also used some of the BigBoard design in the IBM PC.
Developed by Toshiba for Xerox in 1983. Xerox decided not to bring it to market so ACP purchased rights and marketed the PC/XT compatible in the USA. Built with significantly more quality than any other computer at this time. Featured PC card riser technology that allowed low profile design.
Eagle Computer was formed by using computers manufactured by Audio Visual Labs. The Eagle I and II included AV ports on the back that were replaced by RS-232 ports on the Eagle. Eagle Computer was a instant success and CEO Dennis Barnhardt took them public. On the day of the offering Dennis went out and purchased a new Ferrari and had a most unfortunate accident and was killed. The company died as well from a slow death as it never recovered from the loss of Dennis.
