Re: Selling keyboards without the terminal

2018-10-20 Thread William Donzelli via cctalk
It's Beanie Babies all over again, people. Give it a year or two and the keyboard market will likely crash. Pick them up on the slide down. I bet most will not be gutted, simply due to the general lack of activity of computer people. Just like we are. -- Will (who paid attention to all those IBM

Re: Microsoft-Paul Allen

2018-10-20 Thread Tony Duell via cctalk
On Sat, Oct 20, 2018 at 8:28 PM Fred Cisin via cctalk wrote: > > >> Similarly, although they sold a joystick board, they didn't sell > >> joysticks. DA15 connector for two joysticks. > >> In some of the documentation, the sketch of a joystick was clearly the > >> Radio Shack Coco joystick (which

Re: Selling keyboards without the terminal

2018-10-20 Thread Warner Losh via cctalk
On Sat, Oct 20, 2018 at 9:05 PM Warner Losh wrote: > > > On Sat, Oct 20, 2018 at 7:56 PM Al Kossow via cctalk < > cctalk@classiccmp.org> wrote: > >> >> >> On 10/20/18 5:16 PM, Warner Losh via cctalk wrote: >> > I'm surprised there aren't a boatload of arduino projects to create a PC >> >

Re: Selling keyboards without the terminal

2018-10-20 Thread Warner Losh via cctalk
On Sat, Oct 20, 2018 at 7:56 PM Al Kossow via cctalk wrote: > > > On 10/20/18 5:16 PM, Warner Losh via cctalk wrote: > > I'm surprised there aren't a boatload of arduino projects to create a PC > > keyboard to each of the classics... > > If things continue as they are, people will be forced to

Re: Selling keyboards without the terminal

2018-10-20 Thread Al Kossow via cctalk
On 10/20/18 5:16 PM, Warner Losh via cctalk wrote: > I'm surprised there aren't a boatload of arduino projects to create a PC > keyboard to each of the classics... If things continue as they are, people will be forced to do that, or create replicas. In the past, the kb collectors would build

Re: Selling keyboards without the terminal

2018-10-20 Thread Warner Losh via cctalk
I'm surprised there aren't a boatload of arduino projects to create a PC keyboard to each of the classics... Warner On Sat, Oct 20, 2018, 6:00 PM Ian Primus via cctalk wrote: > Ugh - this is super frustrating to see. Especially since I have a 3101 > here with no keyboard. And the reason *why*

Re: Selling keyboards without the terminal

2018-10-20 Thread Ian Primus via cctalk
Ugh - this is super frustrating to see. Especially since I have a 3101 here with no keyboard. And the reason *why* it has no keyboard? It got bought out from under me. I bought this terminal, complete, on eBay. It arrives... with no keyboard. I complained to the seller, he refunded all my money

Softcard (Was: Microsoft-Paul Allen

2018-10-20 Thread Fred Cisin via cctalk
The Softcard was a Z-80 based single-board computer On Sat, 20 Oct 2018, Eric Smith via cctalk wrote: It wasn't. It was only a processor card. No version of the Softcard had it's own video output. It used normal Apple video output. If you wanted 80x24, you had to use a separate third-party

Re: Microsoft-Paul Allen

2018-10-20 Thread Eric Smith via cctalk
On Sat, Oct 20, 2018, 01:46 Jim Manley via cctalk wrote: > The Softcard was a Z-80 based single-board > computer It wasn't. It was only a processor card. that plugged into an Apple ][ slot, equipped with its own > 80x24 character x line black-and-white video output, No version of the

Re: Microsoft-Paul Allen

2018-10-20 Thread Fred Cisin via cctalk
Similarly, although they sold a joystick board, they didn't sell joysticks. DA15 connector for two joysticks. In some of the documentation, the sketch of a joystick was clearly the Radio Shack Coco joystick (which needed a different connector) On Sat, 20 Oct 2018, Tony Duell wrote: And is

Re: Selling keyboards without the terminal

2018-10-20 Thread Doc Shipley via cctalk
On 10/20/18 10:41 AM, Noel Chiappa via cctalk wrote: > From: Al Kossow > The quality of modern keycaps is poor. > These guys are after mechanical boards with double-shot keytops. There's something I'm still not quite grasping. I can see two reasons for people liking the old

Re: Microsoft-Paul Allen

2018-10-20 Thread Fred Cisin via cctalk
On Sat, 20 Oct 2018, Jim Manley via cctalk wrote: IBM wasn't even aware of the penetration of dial-up among consumers and very small businesses, . . . Another sign that IBM wasn't confident about the longevity of the PC is that they outsourced the development of its OS to Microsoft, believing

Re: Microsoft-Paul Allen

2018-10-20 Thread Tony Duell via cctalk
On Sat, Oct 20, 2018 at 6:52 PM Fred Cisin via cctalk wrote: > Similarly, although they sold a joystick board, they didn't sell > joysticks. DA15 connector for two joysticks. > In some of the documentation, the sketch of a joystick was clearly the > Radio Shack Coco joystick (which needed a

Re: Microsoft-Paul Allen

2018-10-20 Thread Fred Cisin via cctalk
On Sat, 20 Oct 2018, Jim Manley via cctalk wrote: IBM wasn't even aware of the penetration of dial-up among consumers and very small businesses, or they would have initially offered modems, at least as options, if not in package combos. Retailers who understood the consumer and very small

Re: Microsoft-Paul Allen

2018-10-20 Thread Tomasz Rola via cctalk
On Fri, Oct 19, 2018 at 01:50:20AM -0600, Jim Manley via cctalk wrote: > I thought it was just hilarious that Microsoft chose The Rolling > Stones' "Start Me Up" for the theme song at the launch of Windows 95, > unaware of the later lyrics in the song (not played during the launch, > oddly

Re: Selling keyboards without the terminal

2018-10-20 Thread ED SHARPE via cctalk
all this   keyboard jewelry reminds me of people ripping keys off old vintage typewriters  that had the celluloid tops to make woman's jewelry  of very sad..  saw this happening in the  places that sold  this kid of stuff..   . In a message dated 10/20/2018 9:31:33 AM US Mountain

Re: Selling keyboards without the terminal

2018-10-20 Thread Daniel Seagraves via cctalk
> On Oct 20, 2018, at 2:03 AM, Doc Shipley via cctalk > wrote: > > That's just nasty. Your invective, that is. There are idiots in any > enthusiast group, and predators. Including this group, if we're honest. You > want to talk conspicuous consumption? How many on this list, myself

Re: Selling keyboards without the terminal

2018-10-20 Thread ED SHARPE via cctalk
I am Definitely not a gamer! but my hands are poor at typing and the benifit of hearing the key click helps the accuracy a little.. my xps Dell has pretty loaded games but I have never played one yet use it for video editing and internet. l also like keyboard letters do not wear off of

Re: Selling keyboards without the terminal

2018-10-20 Thread Noel Chiappa via cctalk
> From: Doc Shipley > You guys want people to stop scavenging those irreplaceable treasures? > Ante up, pure and simple. That works for keeping stuff out of the hands of scrappers (who are, after all, business-people) - but not for fetishists who will pay totally mind-blowing sums

Re: Selling keyboards without the terminal

2018-10-20 Thread Warner Losh via cctalk
On Sat, Oct 20, 2018, 9:42 AM Noel Chiappa via cctalk wrote: > > From: Al Kossow > > > The quality of modern keycaps is poor. > > These guys are after mechanical boards with double-shot keytops. > > There's something I'm still not quite grasping. > > I can see two reasons for people

Re: Selling keyboards without the terminal

2018-10-20 Thread Noel Chiappa via cctalk
> From: Al Kossow > The quality of modern keycaps is poor. > These guys are after mechanical boards with double-shot keytops. There's something I'm still not quite grasping. I can see two reasons for people liking the old keyboards: - i) Higher quality construction - ii)

Re: Microsoft-Paul Allen

2018-10-20 Thread John Foust via cctalk
At 05:55 AM 10/20/2018, Adam Sampson via cctalk wrote: >Jim Manley via cctalk writes: > >> Many are unaware that the largest fraction of CP/M licenses ever sold >> were for the Microsoft Softcard for the Apple ][ (about 300,000 sold, >> all told), > >Do you mean sold up to that point? Amstrad

Re: Microsoft-Paul Allen

2018-10-20 Thread Adam Sampson via cctalk
Jim Manley via cctalk writes: > Many are unaware that the largest fraction of CP/M licenses ever sold > were for the Microsoft Softcard for the Apple ][ (about 300,000 sold, > all told), Do you mean sold up to that point? Amstrad went on to sell several million PCWs with CP/M later in the

Re: Selling keyboards without the terminal

2018-10-20 Thread Doc Shipley via cctalk
On 10/19/18 12:18 PM, Daniel Seagraves via cctalk wrote: On Oct 19, 2018, at 10:34 AM, Bill Degnan via cctalk wrote: Here is a great example of why the keyboards and terminals are getting separated Keyboard fetishists are vermin; They are destructive and have no redeeming qualities, and

Re: Selling keyboards without the terminal

2018-10-20 Thread Yvan Janssens via cctalk
So, I have built a USB adapter for my 5150’s keyboard. The experience is actually quite bad, as stated earlier. The main reason why I still use it is because I took it with me from Belgium - it’s a French keyboard, and having access to all the special characters makes typing in eg. French, German

Re: Microsoft-Paul Allen

2018-10-20 Thread Jim Manley via cctalk
Just to be clear, it wasn't that the CGA hadn't been designed and put into production by the launch of the PC, the demand for the CGA was simply overwhelming compared with the much lower demand and relatively greater supply of the MDA. Plus, IBM had no experience selling into retail, let alone