Commodore Computer Devotees Tinker With the Past (I still love my Amiga)

The Los Angeles Times ^ | 6/27/2006 | Terril Yue Jones

[Smogger]

username: fleeb@fleeble.com password: fleeble

I miss my Amiga :( It took nearly half a decade for my stupid PC to catch up. And don't you Atari ST and Mac users start hating. You know the Amiga smoked your computers back in the day.

[E Rocc]

I still have a TI-99 around here somewhere.

-Eric

[dfwgator]

LOAD "*",8,1

[beezdotcom]

Ah, yes...did my first PEEK and POKE on a VIC-20...

[GrandEagle]

I graduated from the old TI, tape drive and all, to a Kaypro4 (I called it a transluggable - sort of a very overweight, non-battery powered, sort of laptop).
I had a friend with a Comodore 64. I did many a term paper on that one!

[ElkGroveDan]

I have an Atari 400 & 800 up in the attic that I kept for the superior games after I got my first 8088 PC.

I thought some collector might be interested in them, but there's still worth nothing on e-bay.

But if there is an avid Freeper out there, I might bewilling to...

[50sDad]

I owned several Atari 400's with the (gasp!) illegal third-party 64K memory upgrade, and a hand-wired Cherry keyboard to replace the Gawdforsaken membrane gel-switch keyboard. Used those big, klunky 5-1/4" floppy drives, and we were grateful for them as they replaced the even more cursed cassette tape drive. ("Hard drive"? What the hell is a "hard drive"?) Today, you can actually get a software simulator for the PC that will run all that 8-bit junkware.

[garyhope]

Amiga's were great and ahead of their time for graphics and design back in the 80's.

My ex-wife had 2 of them for her fashion design department at a major fashion manufacturer.

Why did they disappear?

[Tijeras_Slim]

My first computer was an Amiga 3000. Great machine, but the lack of software for some purposes was frustrating. It had a 100Meg hard drive, I couldn't imagine ever filling that puppy up! :)

[50sDad]

Gave all my Atari junk (except the 400 that's wired to my TARDIS console) to a "computer museum" run by a local computer store, only to find out a month later that they were driven out of business because despite having sold 300 PC's to the local school district, they only owned ONE copy of Windows98!

[avg_freeper]

Anyone remember GeOS?

[commonguymd]

That was a big ouch.

[Buck W.]

My first computer was a TRS-80, aka Trash-80. I had the premium model: Level II Basic AND 16K!

[RightWhale]

There is a TI-99 up on the shelf and a couple VIC-20s and a Capsela 500 in a box in the closet. VIC-20 made an excellent controller.

[in hoc signo vinces]

This guy needs to get out of his mom's basement.


I had an IBM PC Jr...anyone remember that disaster? U had to plug in a basic cartridge so the computer could run programs...was hilarious.

[Jack Wilson]

The challenge in those early days was to find something useful to do with the computer beyond attempting to store your recipes on it.

[Smogger]

Why did they disappear?

Because the people that ran Commodore Business Machines were idiots. It was my first lesson that superior tehnology, no matter how much more advanced, does not trump marketing and business strategy.

[50sDad]

Ever run into the dreaded "BASIC CART" bug that let you key information for hours, only to COMPLETELY and TOTALLY lock up beyond any hope of recovery? Boy, those were the days!

[Publius6961]

I suppose I should contact the real geeks, but I've still got a couple of VIC-20s and a tape drive, power supplies etc... but. No monitor.

Was there something "different" about Commodore monitors? What are my chances of getting the VIC-20s to display something eventually?
I remember writing many engineering programs on a Commodore 64, using the tape drive alone...

[capt. norm]

I'm with you on the Amiga.

Way ahead of its time and with the Commodore user-friendliness.

I always wondered why they dropped the ball on the Amiga.