<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;" class="">Yeah, the intelligent terminals we built at TI in 1977 had a multitasking OS and 48K of DRAM. But we also used a full 16 bit microprocessor, the TI 9900, because we could. And just for fun we added a second one for our floppy disk option.<div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">The Datapoint 2200 did pretty much the same stuff in 1970, and spurred the creation of the 9900 and the x86 architecture as a side-effect. </div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class=""><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Datapoint_2200" class="">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Datapoint_2200</a></div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">RB<br class=""><div><br class=""><blockquote type="cite" class=""><div class="">On Jun 14, 2019, at 12:35 PM, John Day <<a href="mailto:jeanjour@comcast.net" class="">jeanjour@comcast.net</a>> wrote:</div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"><div class=""><div class="">I have always contended that timesharing was just the interim step until hardware size and prices came down. We treated timesharing like that and complained when it wasn’t. ;-) We were hard to satisfy. True. But then the OS was our responsibility, so it was our fault at least partially.<br class=""><br class="">What I never understood was why the early PC developers thought ’single-user’ meant single process at a time!? The first Macs couldn’t even edit and print at the same time. We had been building multi-tasking OSs on hardware that small for nearly a decade at that point. It wasn’t hardware limitations.<br class=""><br class="">John<br class=""><br class=""><br class=""><blockquote type="cite" class="">On Jun 14, 2019, at 12:49, Larry Press <<a href="mailto:lpress@csudh.edu" class="">lpress@csudh.edu</a>> wrote:<br class=""><br class="">John Day wrote:<br class=""><br class=""><blockquote type="cite" class="">I am sure there are other early examples of “PC-like” things. <br class=""></blockquote><br class="">The LINC and LGP-30 were "PC-like" -- personal, but not desktop.<br class=""><br class="">When I was a student, you could reserve 15-minute "happy time" shots on Sundays when you operated a 7090 yourself. I guess it was PC-like for those 15 minutes :-).<br class=""><br class="">The first time I touched a timesharing system (QUICKTRAN) felt totally personal.<br class=""><br class="">My first desktop PC was an S-100 CP/M computer with 8" floppies -- you could own your own tools.<br class=""><br class="">Larry<br class=""></blockquote><br class=""><br class="">_______<br class="">internet-history mailing list<br class=""><a href="mailto:internet-history@postel.org" class="">internet-history@postel.org</a><br class="">http://mailman.postel.org/mailman/listinfo/internet-history<br class="">Contact list-owner@postel.org for assistance.<br class=""></div></div></blockquote></div><br class=""><div class="">
<div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); letter-spacing: normal; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><div style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class="">—<br class=""><div style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class="">Richard Bennett<br class=""><a href="http://hightechforum.org" class="">High Tech Forum</a> Founder</div><div style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class="">Ethernet & Wi-Fi standards co-creator</div><div style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class=""><br class=""></div><div style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class="">Internet Policy Consultant</div></div></div>
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