TechSpot Celebrates 30 Years of the PC

Damn, I'm getting old.. nice review

Floppy disk, PS/2 Keyboard & Mouse, Packard Bell, Intel 80386, Dial-up internet, DOOM, Bulletin Board Systems, Netscape Navigator, Voodoo 3dfx, Windows 3x-98. I never get tired of the old classic PC stuff.

For us Tech geeks, this is news.

My first 5150 cost me a arm and a leg back in 1983 and sported a 10 mb hard drive cannibalized from an HP computer. The drive formatted out to 7mb.

CarolinaGuy

Is the use of Windows 8 tablet interface intentional

Ah yes this list brings back memories! One correction though: 3dfx's Voodoo graphics chip launched in October 1996 not December. The first company to build and sell a board powered by one was Orchid Tehcnology with their Righteous 3D card. I ordered one on October 10th just three days after it became available and received it the next day.

Needless to say I've been a PC gamer ever since .

How, on Earth, do you compile a list like this and leave out the public release of the "Internet" (formerly ArpaNet) in 1992, the release of Mosaic (the first browser), Eudora (the first email program), and even Windows-XP???

oh wow
now i see how old i am i remember 1976

If this is how far things can get in 30 years, here's to the next 30.

I really like how you chose to present the article.

Interested in what the next 30 year the "pc" will accomplish.

I think PC's aren't going to disappear. They will transform. Maybe into very small CPU's with huge screens and terrible performance. In that form they may become the home servers working along with tablets an smartphones. Also talking to the freezer, the stove, the windows and even the car and managing the TV (IP or normal cable) I don't know. What I think is for sure, a PC is not going to disappear in a lot of years, and even less as a concept.

I keep touching the screen but nothing is happening.

Authentic isn't it?

And to think Apple lovers loathe the word PC, as if it were some sort of diminishing term. Well, guess what? (Southern accent in 3... 2... 1...) That's exactly what you damn are!

I knew the upgrade wouldn't be worth it.

My personal favourites are Wolf 3d and Gmail, I remember when Gmail accounts used to sell for £50 on eBay...

Double post...?

What a neat review indeed. Seeing Jobs sitting with a computer in his lap, then seeing how the iPad is carried with ease, it's sort of impressing in itself. I'll definitely try to visit this article again in 20 years, probably from a pair of eye glasses or something.

There should have been rememberance of the MITS/Altair and the TRS-80 (Radio Shack Trash 80) as these were both great for starting the hobby of personal computing. We should also pause for a moment and think about the CPM operating system which led to countless systems that have improved the process to where we are today.

My first computer was the TRS-80 that came with 4k of dynamic RAM and BASIC in ROM. I even modified an old TV for the monitor then upgraded my memory to 16K along with adding a cassette tape for a mass storage device. I can fondly remember the evolution from the cassettes to 5 and 8 inch floppys then to hard disks with the unheard of 5 MB storage, WOW.

We've come a long way baby!!!