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Microcomputer inventor, 79, is among the 51 dead in devastating California wildfires as hunt for...
Daily Mail ^ | Nov. 14, 2018 | Dailymail.com Reporter

Posted on 11/14/2018 10:28:34 PM PST by bunkerhill7

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Knew him. RIP Mr. Godbout
1 posted on 11/14/2018 10:28:34 PM PST by bunkerhill7
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To: bunkerhill7

I never knew him but I shopped at his old corrugated steel electronics surplus shop at Oakland Airport many times. It had essentially zero organization but if you spent enough time there, you could probably find most anything you were looking for. I guess that was part of the appeal.


2 posted on 11/14/2018 10:40:08 PM PST by Attention Surplus Disorder (Apoplectic is where we want them)
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To: bunkerhill7

I remember his psychedelic ads in BYTE magazine. RIP, Bill Godbout.


3 posted on 11/14/2018 10:53:04 PM PST by Steely Tom ([Seth Rich] == [the Democrat's John Dean])
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To: bunkerhill7
I recognize his name and have read articles he published. I had a small S100 system before opting for a Heathkit-H8. S100 was a pretty versatile approach. Sad to see Bill Godbout among the fire victims.
4 posted on 11/14/2018 11:00:14 PM PST by Myrddin
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To: bunkerhill7

I am just amazed that the fire could completely decimate every car and house, and yet the pines trees still have all their needles.


5 posted on 11/14/2018 11:05:02 PM PST by Slyfox (Not my circus, not my monkeys)
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To: bunkerhill7

I didn’t know him but his name brings back memories. I was a teenage electronics geek when the first microcomputers, often in kit from, became available. He was a pioneer in the microcomputer business. This is so sad. RIP.


6 posted on 11/15/2018 2:02:22 AM PST by Wilhelm Tell (True or False? This is not a tag line.)
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To: Attention Surplus Disorder

You gotta love places like that.

RIP


7 posted on 11/15/2018 3:09:08 AM PST by mylife (The Roar Of The Masses Could Be Farts)
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To: bunkerhill7

This fire is the most under reported news item in the country.


8 posted on 11/15/2018 3:17:56 AM PST by HighSierra5
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To: Attention Surplus Disorder

I can get tubes, transistors and military surplus?

Cool


9 posted on 11/15/2018 3:18:36 AM PST by mylife (The Roar Of The Masses Could Be Farts)
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To: bunkerhill7

I knew him, too. He was among my electronics mentors, and paid me to build up boards for him when people ordered “Assembled and Tested” kits.

RIP, Bill.


10 posted on 11/15/2018 5:21:01 AM PST by saundby
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To: Slyfox
I am just amazed that the fire could completely decimate every car and house, and yet the pines trees still have all their needles.

Lots of underbrush to burn apparently. Pines need fire for their seeds to germinate. It's a part of the natural life of the forest. Unfortunately the envirowhackos have been making sure that normal wildfires are suppressed. This means you get a much hotter fire when it does come through, because there is a surplus of fuel.

11 posted on 11/15/2018 6:29:43 AM PST by zeugma (Power without accountability is fertilizer for tyranny.)
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To: Slyfox

Some live pine trees posses a natural flame retardant. A dead dried out pine tree will go up in flames like a roman candle.


12 posted on 11/15/2018 6:33:49 AM PST by central_va (I won't be reconstructed and I do not give a damn)
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To: bunkerhill7

I couldn’t place the name so I checked Wikipedia. He’s the guy who invented the expansion bus for the Altair 8800, which was the first PC marketed featuring a Microsoft OS (Altair BASIC) on an Intel chipset, which because the gold standard for PC configuration once IBM released the 5150 (PC DOS on an Intel 8088).


13 posted on 11/15/2018 7:48:15 AM PST by Paal Gulli
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To: mylife

I loved it then; it was in a dark beat to hell quonset hut bldg at Oakland airport. No tubes, really, though I found a brand new in the box GE 6550 once. (Still have it! almost 40 years later!)

When I went there often, it was about 1978-1980ish, at the very very front end of uprocessors and 256K ROM/RAM; I was not much interested in that area, to my detriment. He had circuits to flash a bunch of LEDs (which were probably about a buck each instead of 5 cents.)

ALL Electronics in LA and Apex Surplus are probably the remaining places; but nothing is cheap any more; those guys know that for every $1 part they sell you there’s a 55 gallon drum full of crap that will sit around forever.

Nowadays, I can hardly justify getting involved with the stuff. There is nothing you can build anywhere near as cheaply as you can buy it. and I CAN’T READ the teeny little writing on the parts any more.

Of course the granddaddy of them all was Radio Row in NYC near where I grew up in Joisey. All torn down for the WTC by the early 70’s. I used to take the bus into NYC when I was 10-14 years old, imagine that, and wander around there all day long, I loved it. The incredibly grimy stores with the weirdest stuff. And the guys who ran them, equally as grimy as their stores. “Hey kid, you think I’m doing this for my health? Whaddya want?”


14 posted on 11/15/2018 9:58:40 AM PST by Attention Surplus Disorder (Apoplectic is where we want them)
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To: bunkerhill7

RIP.


15 posted on 11/15/2018 10:38:01 AM PST by fieldmarshaldj ("It's Slappin' Time !")
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To: Attention Surplus Disorder
"I loved it then ..."

It was a fun time. My new wife was very patient with me during our trips from the south Bay Area up to Santa Rosa. I would stop at every computer store along the way.

I assembled an IMSAI 8080 that I bought from "Kentucky Fried Computers" in Berkeley. Many early computer enthusiasts used electro-mechanical teletypes to interface with their computers. I wanted to make my own equivalent with a tv monitor and an electronic keyboard.

I well remember the day when a guy in one of the computer stores explained to me how the handshake interface worked to pass a byte to the monitor card. It was the last step I needed before being able to boot up my IMSAI and get the "Ready" prompt. What a satisfying day.

I still have the IMSAI computer above the rafters in my garage. I hope someday to fire it up for the amusement of my grandson who is three. It'll be a while I think.

16 posted on 11/15/2018 10:52:00 AM PST by William Tell
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To: Attention Surplus Disorder

Good times!


17 posted on 11/15/2018 4:04:46 PM PST by mylife (The Roar Of The Masses Could Be Farts)
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To: William Tell

Remember core memory?

The 1st modern confuser I ever worked on was based on the 8080 chipset, a Zenith Z100.

That was cutting edge in 1980.


18 posted on 11/15/2018 4:12:11 PM PST by mylife (The Roar Of The Masses Could Be Farts)
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The Navy in 1980 thought the Z100 was the shizzle.

Then we got a portable Kaypro III LOL it had a modem!
It was like 96K baud LOL


19 posted on 11/15/2018 4:16:51 PM PST by mylife (The Roar Of The Masses Could Be Farts)
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Anyone remember loading software from tapes by finger boning addresses in in octal? Remember paper tapes?


20 posted on 11/15/2018 4:36:31 PM PST by mylife (The Roar Of The Masses Could Be Farts)
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