[geeks] Found: Ti99/4a!

[Dave McGuire]

On April 9, Mike Hebel wrote:
> DM>   Born in 1969, got an Atari 800 when I was 11.  Then an S-100 CP/M
> DM> system (an Imsai 8080) when I was 13 (still have it in storage in
> DM> NJ!), then a PDP-11/34a when I was 15, and a PDP-11/73 when I was
> DM> 16. (they weren't exactly considered "vintage" at the time)  Then
> DM> things started getting "busy". :)
> 
> Ok.  I think Dave wins this round - that is unless there's another
> entry?

  I didn't start as early as some (at least not with computers), but
then I didn't have the benefit of a technically-oriented family
member.

> Where the hell did you store a PDP-11/34a when you were 15?  Were your
> parents actually crazy enough to let you store that at home?

  Store?  I RAN it, I didn't store it.  It was up 24/7 most of the time
(I had a dialin line and my friends used it as an email exchange
system).  It took up about a third of my bedroom...two 6' racks and
one 4' rack.  I had big orange extension cords running to two other
circuits in the apartment to keep it running 'cause 15 amps didn't cut
it.

  There was nothing "crazy" about it.  When all the other guys in my
school were breaking into cars and working at Burger King, I was
learning Pascal on a minicomputer, and my mother & grandmother were
very proud of me.  I lived in a small apartment with my grandmother;
she didn't much care for the noise (my system disk was an RK07...it
sounded like a jet plane) but other than that she had no complaints.

> Got a local certification in Electronics and am most of the way to
> making an ASS of myself in Electronics formally.  Then I actually
> started working in the computer field and have done nothing but deal
> with nasty ASS people since then.  Especially the ones nickel and
> diming me on contracting jobs right now.

  I *hate* nickel & dimers.  *barf*

    -Dave

-- 
Dave McGuire              "Anybody who is willing to EAT YOU probably isn't
St. Petersburg, FL         such a good person to be hanging out with." -Sridhar