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I had a brief moment of nostalgia recently when I ran across a website devoted to obsolete computers.

We still have an original IBM PC, which only has two floppy disks (the 5-1/4 inch variety), no hard drive and basically runs on 16 KB of RAM.

Next we had an IBM XT (extended technology) system. When the XT arrived on the scene with a five-megabyte hard drive, this was the ultimate in computer technology. It ran on PC-DOS and BASIC. No more swapping out floppy disks or running out of room to store information. Five megabytes was an impossibly large amount of room and no one could possibly fill it up. Unfortunately we found a way.

Then the IBM AT (Advanced Technology) was developed and was it ever a hotrod computer. It could hold up to 16 megabytes of RAM and support a 20-megabyte hard disk. I ran AT systems for years and years.

These systems were for the most part stable. Occasionally a floppy disk would bite the dust, especially if your mother pinned it to the fridge with a magnet. They ran day in and day out and seemed to be virtually indestructible.

We had other computers as well, Commodore 64, Atari 400 and 800 and Apple II. It wasn’t until the “Clone” became available that computers hit the mainstream. Everyone was learning computer technology. Even I could change cards and mount hard drives. Now I want a cross and holy water to approach a computer.

Anyway, if you have one of the old “boat anchor” computers hanging around and you would like to get it rolling again or you just want to reminisce here’s the website, obsoletecomputermuseum.org.

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