As I mentioned back in April, I joined up with How-To Geek in February, and I’ve been regularly writing tech history-related features in addition to my usual how-to pieces.

Since that first post, I’ve written many more pieces that may be of interest to VC&G readers. Here’s a list:

• Why I Still Use a 34-Year-Old IBM Model M Keyboard
• How to Read a Floppy Disk on a Modern PC or Mac
• Why Did Dial-Up Modems Make So Much Noise?
• 40 Years Later, ‘Pac-Man’ Is Still Capturing Our Hearts
• Windows 3.0 Is 30 Years Old: Here’s What Made It Special
• Why Notepad Is Still Awesome for Taking Notes
• How the Gravis PC GamePad Transformed PC Gaming in the ’90s
• Remembering Windows 2000, Microsoft’s Forgotten Masterpiece
• Deja Vu: A Brief History of Every Mac CPU Architecture
• Why Did the Turbo Button Slow Down Your PC in the ’90s?
• The Web Before the Web: A Look Back at Gopher
• Virtually Forgotten: Nintendo’s Virtual Boy, 25 Years Later
• The CDs You Burned Are Going Bad: Here’s What You Need to Do

Some of my favorites include the Turbo Button piece, in which I discovered the first PC to ever use a turbo button, the Noisy Modem piece, in which I identified the man who invented the onboard modem speaker, and my look at Gopher, wherein I talked to the lead creator of the Gopher protocol. My ode to Windows 2000 is fun too. But heck, they’re all fun reads.

Hope you enjoy reading them! Keep an eye on my How-To Geek author page for more in the future.

35 years ago today, IBM launched the IBM Personal Computer — the first-ever IBM PC. While it was simply called the “IBM Personal Computer” back then, we now know it more commonly by its model number, 5150.

PCWorld recently asked me to do something to celebrate this anniversary, so just a few days ago, I took apart my personal IBM PC 5150 and documented the process on my workbench. And back in 2011, I wrote some other articles about the IBM PC on the occasion of the machine’s 30th anniversary.

In fact, I’ve done a lot of coverage of the IBM PC over the years, so I thought you guys might enjoy seeing a collection of all of them in one place. Here we go.

Features

• Inside the IBM PC 5150 (PCWorld, 2016)
  I examine and take apart IBM’s first PC on my trusty workbench
• Can You Do Real Work With the 30-Year-Old IBM 5150? (PCWorld, 2011)
  I spent a week with the IBM PC using it for modern work like word processing, graphics, and even Internet tasks
• IBM PC Oddities (Technologizer, 2011)
  Neat and unusual trivia, accessories, cultural moments surrounding the IBM PC
• Ten Greatest MS-DOS Games of All Time (PC World, 2011)
  Exactly what it sounds like — the best IBM PC games that ran in DOS.
• Classic PCs vs. New PCs: Their True Cost (Technologizer, 2009)
  Wherein I compared the IBM PC (among other computers) to modern cost-equivalents when adjusted for inflation
• Inside the World’s Greatest Keyboard (PCWorld, 2008)
  I took apart an IBM PC AT-era (1984) Model M keyboard, which set the standard for all PC keyboards

IBM PC Retro Scans of the Week

• Disemboweled IBM PC 5150 (2016)
• The Official IBM PC Desk (2012)
• My Own IBM Computer (2011)
• The IBM PC Kid (2010)
• IBM Taught Me How to Read (2010)
• Stunning IBM PC Paper Art (2008)
• Presenting the IBM of Personal Computers (2006)

IBM PC-Related VC&G Posts

• Origins of the ASCII Smiley Character: An Email Exchange With Dr. David Bradley (2015)
• The Beleaguered IBM PC in History (2011)
• IBM PC 30th Anniversary Extravaganza (2011)
• A Few Thoughts on the IBM PC’s Birthday (2011)

There may be more lurking out there, but that’s quite a bit of reading if you’re interested in the IBM PC.

Is somebody gonna clean this mess up?

Here we have a biggole two-page IBM PC 5150 advertisement spread from 1982 — published not long after the launch of IBM’s first PC in August 1981.

It looks like IBM is trying to play up the bare-metal technical angle for Byte readers, who likely were building their own PCs from kit parts just a few years prior (and some still were doing it then).

The result, quite frankly, is a huge mess (looks like my workbench). And the advertisement didn’t come out too well in the magazine print run, which makes the image dark and muddy. It’s not my fault, I swear!

I particularly like the phrase “the RS232C interface that gives you the world” in the advertising copy. It implies using the serial port for networking — that is, in connecting to remote computers. It’s funny because back then, that statement was a hyperbolic boast that was not meant literally. Online services were limited to a teeny-tiny fraction of the world population and their capabilities were limited. Today, networking does really give you the world.

Discussion Topic: Have you ever broken a computer while you were taking it apart? Tell us about it.

Now you’ll have more time to spend with your dog

I’ve previously featured a later-model IBM PS/1 that also happened to be my brother’s college computer, circa ’94. But here we see an ad for an early — if not the first — model of the PS/1. This is back when PS/1 systems had the OS and a nifty mouse-based GUI program launcher built into ROM. They also shipped with Prodigy on the hard disk. I’m starting to really want one of these for my collection.

Discussion Topic: Has a pet ever done damage to your computer or game system? Tell us about it.

IBM and Disney go together like peanut butter and petroleum jelly

Just before my brother left for college in the fall of 1994, my whole family went shopping for a new PC to send off to school with him. We made our way to an IBM PC factory outlet near Durham, NC. Upon walking in to the store, I remember being amazed by rows of 20-foot tall warehouse-style shelves, each one stacked with large boxes for IBM PC systems. A salesman met us at the door and apparently steered my father toward this: the IBM PS/1 Imagination system. I guess it was a good deal.

The machine itself came equipped with a 25 MHz 486-SX CPU, 4 MB of RAM, a 2400 BPS modem, and a Disney Sound Source (a sort of primitive SoundBlaster that plugged into the parallel port). Unlike earlier PS/1 models, this one shipped with MS-DOS 6 and Windows 3.1. It also came with a suite of pre-installed Disney software that my brother promptly deleted.

My dad also bought an unusual IBM-brand external ISA CD-ROM drive that required its own peripheral card. There wasn’t enough room in the PS/1 case for a CD-ROM drive and a 5.25″ floppy.

After college, my brother took this machine to work with him as a programmer, and he used it there until it was long outdated — probably until 1999 or so. It now rests safely in my collection, although the hard drive is now shot, and I think the power supply is fried too. Almost a decade ago, its rubber feet chemically decomposed into the most abysmally black and sticky tar that you can imagine. I need to restore the machine.

Just recently, I found the rather large shipping box for this computer sitting in my mom’s attic. Today, it holds miscellaneous housewares. This “scan” is actually a perspective-corrected photo of the side of that box (here is the original photo).

Discussion Topic of the Week: What computer did you take with you to college?

The IBM Instruments Computer System

What a strange machine. The IBM Instruments Comptuer System was a completely modular 68000-based PC with its own custom OS (CSOS, according to Wikipedia, which stood for “Computer System Operating System” — ???). It also utilized Motorola’s rarely-seen Versabus bus architecture. The ICS was aimed at scientific and engineering use, and it launched in 1982 — the year following the launch of the IBM PC 5150.

Has anyone used or seen one of these? This is an oddity of oddities. Thank goodness the IBM PC didn’t end up like this.

Discussion Topic of the Week: What was the first IBM brand computer you ever owned (even when collecting)?

Outsource your sex educations needs to Datachem

“Mommy, where do babies come from?”

“Well, after a wild night of CTRL-ALT-DELETE, your father hit my CTRL-C then pressed CTRL-V, and nine months later, you came out from LPT1.”

Discussion Topic of the Week: Have you ever played any sex-related computer games? (Or heck, even educational software.)

Multitasking in the early days.

Ah, the IBM 3270 PC. What a strange beast. It was essentially an IBM PC that could also emulate an IBM 3270 terminal, which allowed it to link up to IBM mainframes. In a sense, this was IBM’s version of the AppleLine protocol adapter (featured in a Retro Scan a few weeks ago), albeit one built into an IBM PC.

By the way, look at the keyboard on this machine. Function keys galore. I’ve always wanted one of those.

Discussion Topic of the Week: Have you ever used an IBM mainframe computer?

There are too many good links this week. I honestly don’t know what happened. Maybe I’m getting better at this.

Recent News

• Vintage Computer Festival Southeast 2.0
  The AHCS does it again

  “The Atlanta Historical Computer Society and the Computer Museum of America are pleased to announce the second annual Vintage Computer Festival Southeast. We have selected the dates of the 3rd and 4th of May to make it easy for people to attend both VCF East and VCF Southeast this year.

• Nintendo Launches Game Boy Advance on Wii U Virtual Console
  Another painfully slow trickle of games from Nintendo, but the emulation is very well done.

  “From April 3 through April 24, select Game Boy Advance titles will launch in the Nintendo eShop on Wii U each week. In addition to off-TV play, these games feature Restore Points that save progress during game play, and Miiverse functionality.

• Microsoft Ends Support for Windows XP
  Spoiler: It’s not really dead

  “Windows XP, Microsoft Corp.’s beloved seventh major operating system and arguably the company’s most successful, was left to perish on Tuesday at its creators’ hands. It was 12 years, seven months old.

• Fifty Years of IBM System/360
  The most successful computer platform that the least number of people know about

  “50 years ago today, IBM unveiled the System/360 mainframe, a groundbreaking computer that allowed new levels of compatibility between systems and helped NASA send astronauts to the Moon.

• Gmail 10th Anniversary
  A great piece by Harry McCracken I missed last week

  “If you wanted to pick a single date to mark the beginning of the modern era of the web, you could do a lot worse than choosing Thursday, April 1, 2004, the day Gmail launched.

• Raspberri Pi Announces New “Compute Module”
  A new variety of this vertsatile, hackable machine

  “The compute module contains the guts of a Raspberry Pi (the BCM2835 processor and 512Mbyte of RAM) as well as a 4Gbyte eMMC Flash device (which is the equivalent of the SD card in the Pi). This is all integrated on to a small 67.6x30mm board which fits into a standard DDR2 SODIMM connector (the same type of connector as used for laptop memory*).

Cool Links

• Story of the Windows XP Bliss Desktop Image
  Hachman hits it out of the park with this research piece

  “It’s not too far-fetched to believe that a billion people have viewed the “Bliss” image that defines the desktop view of Windows XP, the seminal OS that Microsoft is retiring Tuesday. But you’d barely notice the real-world “Bliss” scene if you stepped out of your car and gazed at it today.

• A Custom Portable N64 Console
  Kotaku drools all over a Bacman forum post

  “We’ve seen portable retro consoles before, but this N64 mod is beautiful. It uses a 3.5” screen, internal memory and Rumble Pak, an Expansion Pak, a GameCube analog stick and 4 hour battery life.

• Kevin Mitnick Befriends a Former Foe on Facebook
  …an old hacking target of decades past

  “You gotta love the old friends you meet on Facebook.

• Looking at the Web with Internet Explorer 6, One Last Time
  Lee Hutchinson explores the modern web with IE 6 in all its splintered glory

  “Windows XP wasn’t the only thing to be shuffled into unsupported purgatory yesterday. Also included in the group of applications to be dumped down the memory hole is the browser that everyone loves to hate: Internet Explorer 6.

• 1988 Inside Edition Story on Nintendo
  Retroist digs up a vintage scare piece

  “In 1988 parents were still baffled by the spell that video games had cast over their children. This segment from Inside Edition tries to get to to the bottom of it all.

Echo Box

A place for products, creative works, and upcoming projects seeking support. No endorsement from VC&G is implied.

• Project: MEGAFOOT
  An indie sci-fi action film seeking funding on IndieGoGo. One of the rewards ($150 level) is a limited edition Megafoot NES cartridge.

Submit News

If you want me to include something on a future Newsbits column, send me an email with “[Newsbits]” in the subject line.

Step 1: Plug the monitor into the computer.

This roughly 7″ x 10″ sheet came packed with my brother’s 486SX 25MHz IBM PS/1 computer, which my dad bought him right before he started college. (Ah, the days when 486 was king.)

We were still installing programs off 5.25″ floppies then, and boy was that an adventure when the PS/1 insisted that its 3.5″ floppy drive was drive A:. Most programs assumed that drive A: in MS-DOS was always a 5.25″ drive (with the 3.5″ drive, if present, being drive B:), which screwed up many install scripts when you had to install off a set of 5.25″ disks.

What the sheet shows is almost mind-numbingly self-explanatory — how to hook the monitor up to the computer. It reminds me of these ridiculous USB plug-in instructions.

By the way, I left the authentic mold stains on the scan because I think they add character. The back of the sheet is blank.

Discussion Topic of the Week: Have you ever owned an IBM brand computer when it was new?