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You’re looking at a photograph of an Apple I computer that currently resides in the collection of the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, D.C. It was on display at one point, but I believe it is not being displayed at the moment (feel free to correct me on that).

I downloaded this 256-color GIF image from CompuServe back in 1994 (judging by the file date). I think it came from the Archive Photos forum, but I am not 100% sure about that. Either way, it’s a nice photo, and if you see it floating around the Internet, it’s likely because I first posted it on VC&G in 2006.

As you may know the Apple I (which was officially titled “Apple Computer 1” on the circuit board and “Apple-1” in its manual) did not ship with a case. The wooden enclosure you see here was created by early Apple employee Randy Wigginton’s father. It’s interesting how it presages the design of the Apple II enclosure to some extent.

I’d like to have heard Steve Jobs’ reaction when he first saw this.

Long before Boot Camp and Parallels, if you wanted to run IBM PC compatible software on your Mac, you had to strap on this unholy contraption — the Dayna Communications MacCharlie.

If I recall correctly, the MacCharlie was essentially an IBM PC clone in a beige box that hooked to the Mac’s serial port. As a result, the Mac merely served as a serial terminal for the MacCharlie via custom terminal software running on the Mac. That’s not a particularly efficient setup, but the lack of expansion ports on the original Macintosh meant that there was no other reasonable point of entry.

Since it worked through the serial port, the MacCharlie could only run text-based MS-DOS applications. Conveniently, the MacCharlie shipped with a keyboard extender that added the IBM PC’s special function keys and a numeric keypad to the Macintosh keyboard.

Discussion Topic of the Week: Have you ever used a hardware system adapter (something that lets you use software from one platform on another through hardware, not software emulation) for any computer system?

In Memoriam: Aaron Swartz (1986-2013)
Software developer, Internet activist
(Photo: Daniel J. Sieradski)

Aaron’s death is not simply a personal tragedy. It is the product of a criminal justice system rife with intimidation and prosecutorial overreach. (source)

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From 1983 to 1996, James “Jim” Maxey operated a very successful Oregon-based BBS called Event Horizons. Through that board’s file section, Maxey made available thousands of GIF images in many categories, from landscapes to pornography, that he had created using a video digitizer board and conversion software called T-EGA.

Bob Talmadge wrote an excellent profile of Jim Maxey’s BBS years for his site BBSDays.com. I recommend reading it if you’re interested in learning more about Maxey’s BBS. Also, Jack Rickard of BoardWatch magazine mentioned Maxey’s early 1990s image-related BBS activities in an article he wrote for Wired issue 1.04 in 1993.

The early and pioneering nature of Maxey’s color graphics files for IBM PC computers ensured that his digital pictures, which he called “MaxiPics,” spread far and wide to other BBSes at the time. This is one such picture, and it depicts a house and yard in autumn. The 640 x 350 EGA format file dates from 1987 and was likely captured from a video source — more on that in a moment.

[ Continue reading [ Retro GIF of the Week ] Digitized Autumn Leaves » ]

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In honor of the impending New Year, I bring you this ray traced image that dates back to December 1992 — 20 years ago — and celebrates New Year 1993.

As per its inscription, this image was created using StrataVision 3D and retouched with PhotoMac by its author, CT. I have not determined who CT is yet, but I will do some more poking around soon and update this entry if I find out. (If you find out first, please let me know.)

Happy New Year!

“The first business computer system that will not instantly crush your secretary.”

Discussion Topic of the Week: Quick! Name your favorite computer, calculator, or console with a Z80 CPU.

An angle-corrected close-up view of Prodigy’s front page on Christmas 1992.

Twenty years ago today, I awoke with anticipation and ran downstairs. It was Christmas morning, and I could hardly wait to open my presents.

One of those presents turned out to be a connection kit to Prodigy online service, which I had been begging my father to buy for most of the year. 1992 was the year I jumped head-first into computer telecommunications by calling local BBSes. I became fascinated with modems and wanted to explore their every possible application.

That Christmas morning, my dad was on hand to document my first experiences with Prodigy using the family Sony Camcorder. I have captured various stills from that video, and I am posting them here to share a small slice of the Prodigy experience in 1992.

Unfortunately, my computer at the time, the IBM PS/2 Model 25 (which my dad purchased new circa 1987 and later became a hand-me-down to me), came equipped with a monochrome monitor. So the glory of Prodigy Christmas 1992 in color is sadly now lost to history (well, unless someone else out there can find some color screenshots of Prodigy on Christmas 1992).

[ Continue reading Prodigy 20 Years Ago Today » ]

Just in time for Christmas: Macworld has posted a slideshow of vintage Christmas-related Macintosh art and ephemera that I created for that site. I hope you enjoy it.

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In the BBS world of the late 1980s and early 1990s, one could easily find digital art that celebrated consumer brands, like the image of a Coke can seen here. In fact, I’d say brand art was a particularly distinctive genre of early computer art.

If I had to explain why brand art was so common, I’d first speculate that when people needed something to test out their imaging equipment with — say, a new scanner or a video digitizer card — an advertisement or product package was always at hand to be a guinea pig.

More importantly, consumer brands also inspire loyalty that consumers identify with personally. Think Doritos and Mountain Dew. Fans of those products like to spread their love of them as a cultural identifier, and the same was true in the 1980s and 1990s online space.

[ Continue reading [ Retro GIF of the Week ] Coca-Cola Classic » ]

BRE Software’s Atari ST Public Domain Software Christmas ’88 Update

I found this neat holiday-themed BRE Software Atari ST catalog in a pile of documents that I received from my wife’s uncle when he gave me his Atari ST collection a few years ago. It features both public domain and commercial software for Atari’s 16-bit computer series.

(I wish I could get my hands on the Christmas demo disks mentioned on this page. Only $4.00 each or $9.95 for all four.)

The entire document is four pages long, and I’ve scanned the whole thing so you can download it in PDF format, complete with searchable text.

Discussion Topic of the Week: Have you ever given a vintage computer or video game-related present to someone for Christmas (not when it was new, but when it was vintage/retro)?