Mikkh 8bits

[jojo]

Hi Mikkh

Just had a look at your web site.

Interested that you started on Acorn Electrons.

That too was one of my earliest machines. (Though my first was the Jupiter Ace).

I still have both!. Though haven't powered them up in years.

It got me thinking about a short piece that I wrote for a BBC B mag called Solinet. (Remember it??)

It was in the early 90s, around the time Windows 95 was released.

I had used PCs occasionally, though other peoples'.

Anyway I was arguing that, for most users, a computer does:

Word processing.

Data storage.

Some number crunching, usually on a spreadsheet.

Games.

Apart from games, I couldn't see any real advantages, (at that time), to a PC over an Electron or BBC B.

But the 8 bit machines started almost immediately, compared to the 20+ minutes, (at that time), for a PC.

Now, of course, we have the internet, but even those PCs from the early 90s wouldn't be a lot of use there.

I have say that, I still miss the convienence of my Electron. The 3.5" floppy was a bit unreliable sadly. So you needed several backups. I did experiment with a Hard Drive for a while. It worked really well until I spilt some liquid on the controller board. (Which was bigger than the Electron's main board!!).

I ran a small group for the Electron for a short time. (I was one of a succession of people who took a turn). This was around the time when I got my first PC. So I started a web site.

I'm surprised and a little pleased to discover, it's still there.

'Ave a butchers!

www.get.to/eug

Robert Sprowson was a bit of a whizz who tended to have answers when the rest of us didn't.

Dave Edwards was my successor. (I think)

The email address is long since defunct.

Think you're gonna love the technical page. Will be a bore to those who never experienced the 'high' of getting some code to work, but I have a feeling it will fire a few old brain cells in you.

Enjoy.

[mikkh]

Yes, happy days indeed. I bought my first Electron from Currys for £65 (sale price) - BBC's were about £500 and way beyond my price range at the time. I did get one later by swapping all my fishing tackle for one, and it came wth a 5 and a 1/4 'proper' floppy drive, the usual input being via a cassette tape player.

I did get an Acorn Archimedes much later, but I'd already been spoilt by an Amiga and wasn't too impressed with it

I flirted with most of the 8 bit computers at one time or another, but the compact clean looks of the Electron was always my first love and was far superior to the commodore 64 brick and the Spectrums horrible keyboard. I remember buying another Electron just to play the latest 'Repton' that came out (I was using a 'Speccy' at the time)

The Amiga with it's awesome graphics (for the time) became my computer of choice and coupled with a noisy Citizen dot matrix printer, spelt the end for my trusty Electron. Amiga basic never captured my imagination like BBC basic did on the Electron though and I used it far more as a games machine than a serious computer.

My first published poem appeared in the 'Electron User' magazine, so that was another reason to remember it with fondness. I'll dig it out and post it later

[jojo]

That Arch was a pile though, wasn't it.

Some nieces were bought one by their mother. She couldn't afford the HD so they hade to load the OS from floppys each time. What a perfirmance.

I'd forgotton about the dont matrix printers and how noisey they were.

I had a full colour one, eventually, but never found the software to make it work.

I eventually dumped it, even though I kept the Electron, as said. Then, a few years later, i really needed some of the documents saved on disc. But sadly couldn't print them out.

never found an emulator that can read Electron's single sided 3.5" floppys

C'est la vie.

[mikkh]

Here's the poem wot I wroted


No such line at one two five
Out of room? what is this jive!
Bad Command? Too many FOR's?
Type Mismatch! What is the cause
String too long? Patience getting short
Not as easy, as I first thought
This programming lark is doing my head
Think I'll play a game instead
Out with the tapes, Snapper or Hopper?
One things for sure, I'll come a cropper
Goodbye mistake, farewell Bad Mode
Just got to wait for the game to load
But what's this I see, Oh horror, Oh Shock
A 'rewind tape' and a 'data?' and 'block' !
I throw up my arms in bitter despair
And give the screen an angry glare
Enough I cry, That's it! I blub
I'm off to find a friendly pub

MJH 1987

My prize was a copy of a top 3 game called 'Future Shock' which I pretty much hated, but as it says at the top of this scribbled copy I kept - Fame at last !

[Lynnrose]

Wow, well done Mikkh, you deserved to win x