Regrets: Things we had and got rid of

Discussions
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I was browsing through the November 1978 issue of Kilobaud and reading a review of the Apple II. It had this paragraph:

Then, around late September, I received word that, because of difficulties, the Apple Il would not become available
until sometime in 1977.Tired of
waiting, I went ahead and
bought an Apple-I. Later, in the
summer of 1977, when the
Apple-ll became available, I
was able to receive a fair tradein allowance on my Apple-I system towards the purchase of an
Apple II.

I’m sure he kicked himself later.
I’ve owned a few things that I got rid of and wished I hadn’t. Nothing as neat or valuable as an Apple 1, though.
Who else has gotten rid of things and later regretted it?

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I mentioned this in another thread recently, but 2 x PDP-8/Es, a Northstar Horizon, some mechanical calculators… Had a “fully loaded” BBC Micro & printer stolen (by some local crack-heads who probably thought it was a PC )-:

Also some old electronics test kit - nixie tube multimeter…

Odd the stuff I didn’t pick-up when I had the chance: Some serial terminals - (as in- why do I need that when I have a BBC Micro with a serial port, etc.)

You live, learn, time passes and things change…

-Gordon

3

I wish I still had my VIC-20 ,and the original Maganvox Odyssey 1 video gaming system from the early 70s. Both of those items were in the attic when my folks sold the old house.

I guess I wish I didn’t sell my C128, too. I sold that to a friend to use the money for something else. Can’t remember what, though.

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I used to own a Franklin ACE 500, but once I got an Apple//c, I gave it to someone for shipping costs. Needless to say, I sent it away, and didn’t get reimbursed for shipping. Granted, the ACE wasn’t completely compatible with the Apple //, but now it’s harder to find one. :frowning:

5

Over the years a lot of toys have passed through my hands. I’ve moved a LOT and often had to get rid of much of it. There was a Tandy 1000 (hx?), a Televideo TS-803, an ADM-3A terminal, tons of PCs and parts, and more.
Some stuff got lost when my mother passed away and it was at her house. I wasn’t able to go retrieve it and my sisters “got rid of it” for me. That included an IBM keyboard, a DEC PDT-150 (LSI-11 machine,) and lots more stuff.
I still have way too much stuff.

6

The first ‘case’ I made for my UK101 was a hacked-off drawer from a chest of drawers with a perspex cover on. It was much nicer than the second ‘case’ and it would be nice to have it. I have no idea what happened: most likely my parents cleaned a lot of stuff out after I’d moved out with what I thought I needed.

Likewise, I had a springs-and-wires Philips electronics experimenter, with a handful of discrete transistors on big square carriers, and that’s gone. The instruction booklet was a really good tutorial on electronics, as I recall.

I also had one of those Tandy/Radio Shack 100-in-1 experiment kits, which is gone, but I don’t mind too much. I’d quite like to know exactly which model it was, for no particular reason. I think it had a relay, a speaker, a CdS photocell, as well as a small handful of transistors and a bunch of discretes. I think it had a ferrite rod/AM antenna, but I’m not sure. I think it had a choke too.

I had a Meccano pendulum clock kit - never assembled - and that was a bit of a failure on my part. But I’ve no idea what happened, or if I would ever had made it if I’d kept it.

I had a toy static steam engine too… it’s gone. But that’s even further from computation!

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Well - if we’re going that far… I had a toy Mamod steam engine that was also stolen, and an evil stepmother who gave away all my Lego…

-Gordon

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Another piece of gear I wish I had was the Heathkit AA22 Stereo Amplifier my dad build in the late 60’s. It was Heathkit’s first solid state amplififer, and one of the first on the market at all. My dad gave it away some years ago and that guy threw it away. I’m going to have to find another one, one of these days.

9

My regrets were to get rid of my Amiga 2000 and 1200 when I emigrated. they were in storage and sold with the house :frowning:

Using an A600 for nostaliga development/gaming now, but its not the same.

I also had a Digitiser Tablet and a HP pen plotter in there… but not regretful yet on those :stuck_out_tongue:

Richard

10

I honestly don’t regret losing any of it.

My first two computers, KIM-1, and an Atari 800, were loaned to friends long ago, never to be seen again. They may or may not still have them.

My first Macintosh (128K, basement upgraded to 512K, ROM upgraded to 800K drives) was sold, and the money converted in to a motorcycle. Best trade I ever made.

My first PC donated to a friend for a business venture, didn’t quite work out. My NeXTStation recently given to a friend, along with a PB520, who has the vintage bug. He’s getting much more satisfaction from it than I was having it stored in an attic.

Other random PC, old Macs I inherited, and a Sun stuff was e-cycled.

For me, hanging on to this stuff has substantial cost. Space, cognitive load worrying about it, moving it. It’s “cheaper” just being inside my head, talking about it on forums like this.

Computers are tools, at least to me. I distinctly remember marveling about when I bought the Sun workstation. It’s wasn’t utterly obsolete then, just a generation old or so. Hunted it down on eBay, shipping it out, setting it up, getting the graphic card to work. All that. Fired it up, and…$.

A shell prompt. “Welcome to Unix”. Looking just like every other unix. “now what”. Now what indeed. Unix was novel when I installed FreeBSD over a cable modem with a boot floppy. Nowadays? Not so much.

Tools without application sit in the drawer. As do these machines.

So, no, I don’t regret letting go any of this stuff. I have my own memories and experiences and share them with others (solicited or not :wink: ). That’s more powerful than watching some ancient slow (my word, are these things slow…good heavens.) boot to a prompt and just…blink. “Ready”.

Yea, you’re ready, but, I’m not.

(That said, I wrote some Z80 on CP/M (simulator) the past couple days, so I’m not totally irredeemable. No, I don’t know why either, but, there it is.)

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I have a ton of memories of computers… but my main idea is mounting interesting looking computers on my wall. (preferably working)

The bland IBM PC’s were all tools - and they looked like tools… but some computers had good aesthetics. I recycled two SGI machines about 6 years ago… they were massive space hogs :smiley:

I prefer small computers - so anyone throwing a small/interesting machine out, I will usually take it, get it working and then frame it. (Open frames so the computer can be taken off the wall and used)

Richard

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Do you have any photos of any that you’ve done so far that you can share?

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Some Speccys… I have a Amiga500+Amiga600 just with a wire on the back to hang it from. (large machine) and currently doing up a small Amstrad machine. Tape Deck was abused/cracked.

IMG_20200218_200417
IMG_20200218_2004174032×3024 3.18 MB
IMG_20200218_200406
IMG_20200218_2004064032×3024 3.41 MB

(Wow! the cobwebs are showing! … they need cleaning!)

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Ah, very nice. I was thinking of something like a shadow box, but this is cool as well.

15

My next version I plan to use one large board, LCD screen and a display selector. I have them running whilst mounted :smiley:

Version 99

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I regret the first computer I had being thrown out. It wasn’t anythign special really late 90’s/early 2000 dell. Didn’t even have an AGP slot (four PCI slots.) When it finally gave out my brother wanted me to fix it because it… wasn’t booting, it’d act wierd on bios startup. I opened it up and somehow the main board was BENT. Whole thing was hot it was in an unventelated area with the intake next to a wall. i let my brother borrow my computer because I didn’t want to deal with it during a move so let him borrow the thing.

I regret both just throwing it away, and the fact i couldn’t fix it.

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I regret my Sharp MZ-721 and MZ-821, and my Amiga 3000. That is all my computers that I have given away…

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I used to regret getting rid of my Sperry HT. The first PC I actually owned. But looking back to when I got rid of it, it made sense at the time and if I hadn’t “food chained” it to my brother, I would have gotten rid of it later just because it would have been taking up too much space.

I DO regret giving my TRS-80 PC-4 to my nephew. He never appreciated it or used it. It probably ended up in the trash. 8( The PC-4 and I went through a lot together.

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I’ve a feeling I haven’t given any machines away - I did send some chips away, from calculators, to be deprocessed and reverse-engineered, and one of those was damaged in the process, resulting in no useful data. But I don’t regret giving it a try. Actually, I think I have now given a machine away, in the past couple of weeks - @Revaldinho is now in possession of my Archimedes. Oddly, I’ve become much more interested in it since he’s got it to play with! Still, no regret.

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I would change the statement around… I dont regret getting rid of things, but I do regret not cherishing them oldies more. Like my Amiga 1200 - the floppy drive got sticky and would not eject disks; so it was put in the cupboard and abandoned. Hindsight is a perfect science.

I do get a kick of getting a machine working and having its owner actually using it! The smiles make it worth it.