[GEM Development] The OpenGEM Interviews

[Liam Proven]

Ben A L Jemmett wrote:
> <homer>Mmm, PC1512...</homer>

But they were /horrible/ boxes! I remember telling everyone to avoid 
them, but they sold very well, regardless.

The 2000 series 'Strads were all right. I fondly remember the 
endl-of-line 2386s being sold off. I told people to get them as good 
inexpensive powerful Windows machines. (This was the early days of 
Windows 3.0, IIRC.) A 386SX with 4MB RAM, as standard. And about a 60MB 
HD. Powerhouse! :¬)

The 3000 series machines were actually pretty good, but by then, they 
were just generic clones and there was too much competition.

> MS-DOS 3.2; curiously, at around the same time Research Machines were
> shipping the Nimbus range with MS-DOS 3.1.  Always amused me; 3.2 was the
> first MS version to support 3.5" floppies AFAIK, which the Nimbus had but
> the PC1512/1640 lacked!  Yes, I'm a bit sad like that.

(!)

Oh really? I'm sure you're right. It was a long time ago.

> 640x200 in 16 colours (4 planes), and that was the PC1512.  

Yes indeed. Pretty hires for 1989 or so.

> The PC1640 had
> an EGA-compatible adapter onboard, which could be configured for various
> modes of operation (CGA, EGA, Hercules, possibly the PC1512's 16-colour
> CGA?) with DIP switches on the rear panel.

Now that I never tried. EGA itself was good enough. I thought VGA pretty 
overrated when it first came out - the little dots in the centres of 
zeros were annoying - but then, in those days, PC computing was 
primarily text-based. EGA text was fine.

Mind, I'm a luddite like that. I still have live systems with VGA and 
even /mono/ VGA
screens. Not SVGA, plain ol' 640x480 VGA.

> Yes, I'm looking for a distraction with my afternoon coffee, why do you ask?

:¬)

-- 
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