Good question. Do we have (m)any users who are in their 60s and 70s?

Keep saving and repairing hardware from the dump thats what Ive been doing and now i have over 35 working computers and so many parts. Im currently in the process of shifting my room around to accommodate for everything.

If you have kids just start them young with 486 or Pentium 2 or something along those lines and they will have fun playing classic games like we did when we where younger and hopefully the hobby will stick with them when their older and you can pass your 486 to them.

But could you imagine passing down a still working 486 after 40 more years.

Could people in 1986 imagine anything remotely close to what we have in 2016 in terms of technological advancement? Absolutely not.

Today's computers will not be useful even as a lageish door stopper, just like a 286 looks to a teenage gamer with an i9 octacore computer.

Maybe then then not Dosbox 0.75 is released.
But Windows10-Box 0.5beta 😀, Or Android 4.x Emulator (on a Smartphone or Tablet)

I think retro is not old Computers, retro is the Computer you grow up with.

For me it's a C64 and my first PC was a Pentium 90.

So i am not really interested in a 286, 386 or 486. and i do not plan to get one.

For people that grown up with a 486, that PC is a must have.

I think there will always be fresh blood, and I'd wager some of that fresh blood will be due to Vogoners of yore passing their hardware down as we age out. But at some point, knowledge of retro PCs will become a lost art, our craft becoming a lost civilization to be unearthed by future technolyologists. Yeah, I just made that up.

Sammy wrote:

I think retro is not old Computers, retro is the Computer you grow up with.

Bingo!

clueless1 wrote:

I think there will always be fresh blood, and I'd wager some of that fresh blood will be due to Vogoners of yore passing their hardware down as we age out.

Just last week I sold a bunch of 086,286 and 486 computers and shells to an 18 year old kid and I asked if he was really going to fiddle with those and he said yes. Faith restored.

keenmaster486 wrote:

I predict most kids who are being taught how to "code" will only know this crap: […]
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I predict most kids who are being taught how to "code" will only know this crap:

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1Move the little bubbly square from here to there! Then make the little bubbly circle jump up and down! Yay!

...but LOGO has been a thing since 1967 😉

Ah, but LOGO has actual commands whereas wannabes like "Scratch" or whatever it is have graphical blocks that you drag around. And idiot can do that, I've taught it to 7-year-olds who couldn't program their way out of a paper bag (and when I was 7, I was writing prime number generators).

sf78 wrote:

Just last week I sold a bunch of 086,286 and 486 computers and shells to an 18 year old kid and I asked if he was really going to fiddle with those and he said yes. Faith restored.

Well, well, well. And I thought I was the only one 😀 Had some interesting conversations with my boss this last summer since he's been building computers since the early 90's. The other day we were discussing how to put a 486 in the right way on Socket 3 motherboards. I bet he never thought he'd be talking about that with an 18-year-old intern 🤣

keenmaster486 wrote:

Eventually, all of the hardware will either have been crunched up in recycling or landfills, or in the hands of collectors, where it will eventually die. What are we going to do when the hardware runs out?

Mark my words: Emulators, emulators everywhere. Best to work on them now and support those projects so that they can be more and more accurate and support more and more expansion cards, etc. Dump all the firmware, archive all the drivers, scan all the documentation and do what you can. 😀

I wonder about that as well.
For me, when I grew up, there wasn't that much nostalgia really. I mean, once you upgraded to a new computer, the old stuff wasn't that interesting anymore. Although... some games on the C64 were quite unique, and we kept playing them from time to time (eg games like Track 'n' Field, which you could play with 2 or more players).

But as I got older, and more proficient with computers, I also wanted to have another look at the old machines I owned, get a better understanding of them, and try my hand at programming some stuff on them.
However, I started pretty much at the beginning as far as home computers go. I've had a ZX81, a C64 and an 8088-based XT clone with Hercules/CGA. So for me there's not much to explore that was 'before my time' (Apple II perhaps, but it's not fundamentally different from the machines I've used... just 6502-based with BASIC, like a C64). Stuff like PDP-11 is not very attractive in physical form. Besides, it runs UNIX and the CPU is very similar to the 68000 which I'm familiar with.

I wonder if it's different for younger generations. Would they really want to explore the 'roots of computing'? Old MS-DOS PCs, C64s and such? It seems there's moderate interest in the emulator scene at least. And in the case of C64 and Amiga, some people are also interested in the actual hardware.

James-F wrote:

Could people in 1986 imagine anything remotely close to what we have in 2016 in terms of technological advancement? Absolutely not.

I think so. Just look at the Amiga 1000 or the early Macs. They're not that different to what we have now..
Other examples would be the those handheld computers from the early 90s's, like Newton or Pen Computers (/w Win 3.1).
There were even early smartphones like the Nokia Communicator.

Or just just think of all the 3D hysteria a few years ago. 3D movies got popular in the early 50s already.
Same for HD TV. It's an old thing, dating back to the late 80s. Japan was one of the few countries that really supported this, I think.
Unlike that PAL Plus thing in Europe, which only lasted a few years.

Virtual Reality was a big thing in early nineties, too, but was quickly forgotten afterwards.
I mean, does some of you still remember QuickTime VR ? It featured a most impressive panorama,
where you could "walk around" in a specific location (Myst style). This was even supported in the browser,
when the QuickTime plug-in was installed.
I can also still remember when I weared one of these cyber helmets in a computer store.
It must have been the VFX1, or a similar model. I think it ran a simulation about a glider (or similar) in a VR space (grid sytle).

Anyway, I don't want to sound pessimistic or something like that, I'm fascinated about new stuff like you (SSDs, CF cards, mutl-core
cpus, etc.) but anytime they praise a "new technology" it somehow feels like an old rerun.
So it's just a matter of the point of view, I guess.

keenmaster486 wrote:

Ah, but LOGO has actual commands whereas wannabes like "Scratch" or whatever it is have graphical blocks that you drag around. And idiot can do that, I've taught it to 7-year-olds who couldn't program their way out of a paper bag (and when I was 7, I was writing prime number generators).

Funny, we once had a PenMan plotter that was similar to program like the turtle from LOGO..
It's on-board computer was controlled via serial port and understood certain command like those from LOGO.
I remember how I "printed" pictures from AutoSketch v2 with it. I think I had to "print" them to a HP LaserJet "file",
just to get a HPGL compatible file. I think I then had to use HPGL to PenMan utility to convert it to PenMan format..
After this I copied the file to the com port and the little turtle robot started moving.
Funny, this is similar to today! If you want to create a PDF document, you do use a "virtual PDF printer".
See ? That's what I mean with reruns - it happens all the time.

http://www.computinghistory.org.uk/det/20994/ … lotter-Printer/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mR8enP09RPI

It seems quite likely to me that in 30 years the typical user will have access to more than enough computing power to accurately emulate even a very fast x86 PC, thus completely obliterating the need to keep old hardware around. Or rather, more likely the software will all be running on some centralized server and everything will be streamed to the user.

As for programming, I don't think anything is ever going to kill off C++ at this rate. And say what you will about Scratch and the like, but it's all a big step of from BASIC.

Oldskoolmaniac wrote:

Keep saving and repairing hardware from the dump thats what Ive been doing and now i have over 35 working computers and so many parts. Im currently in the process of shifting my room around to accommodate for everything.

You're going to have to part ways with that stuff sooner or later, especially since I can't imagine you're using more than 10% of it with any kind of regularity. And when the time comes I doubt you'll be able to find anyone who wants more than 10% of the rest.

keenmaster486 wrote:

...

Wow, cynical much? You're coming off like a total hipster dude.

"Coding" won't go anywhere. If you peer outside your retro hobby bubble, you might notice that "coding" is a hot and trending profession. Somebody needs to turn the next Snapchat or Android from dream to reality! There is seriously MASSIVE bank to be made as a developer. The kids that don't progress beyond Scratch wouldn't have been developers anyway, so it's not even worth a femtosecond of thought. There's nothing wrong with that either, people still need to do all the other non-IT-related jobs.

Music comes and goes, styles and trends change. You can't lump "the culture" into a big ball and write it off. New symphonies are still being written, new jazz still comes out, there's a whole genre called RetroWave that makes brand new electronic music in the style of the Yamaha DX7 and its contemporaries. There's a bazillion-and-one sub-genres of electronic dance music now, which never existed before. There's nothing wrong with enjoying the music of the past, there's a lot of great stuff, but you're kidding yourself if you think old=good new=bad. We only remember the good stuff, the Michael Jackson, Bee Gees, Jimi Hendrix, whatever. There is, was, and forever will be MOUNTAINS of PURE SHIT made in the music world. We complain about it when it's released, and forget about it in a few years.

Remember the boy band craze of the 90s? Are we still talking about the Backstreet Boys, N*sync, or Five? No. But they were behemoths, absolute chart toppers. They were played on the radio constantly. But as I said, times change.

And the player is immaterial. The tactile experience of handling records is certainly nice, but there'a a lot to be said for the convenience of solid state players. And they'll only get better. A 64GB SD Card can already hold more lossless audio than a milk crate full of 33 RPM LPs.

Lay off the navel gazing and play some DOS games!!! 😁

AI will be the big issue of the future. You'll never be sure if you're interacting with people or machines online. beep beep.

Errius wrote:

AI will be the big issue of the future. You'll never be sure if you're interacting with people or machines online. beep beep.

You know when you're talking with a nice lady by the name of Eliza. 😉

Well I don't know about you but I'm hoping in 30yrs that I at least look like what I do now if not younger. If wishes were candy.....

The "cloud" will be an option but will be much more pervasive. You'll still have the ability to run without but connectivity will not be a problem anymore so most will choose not to disconnect since it will be a hassle not to connect. Assuming the country the person lives in is not preventing access everyone will have access to some form of internet and even if they are blocked there are always ways around it.

Having your vinyl record is nice but if you could replicate the exact sound of the vinyl record via direct interface to your brain or perhaps just to your ear to play it safe via a chip then why not? Of course some people are going to have issues with this (and rightly so) so physical media will still be around for those people.

I think energy convervation and resources will be an even bigger concern so old hardware may be an issue but no reason this old hardware shouldn't be emulated fully by then even if it isn't legal.

Coding will be the same as it's always been. Old generation claims newer generation will be dumber. Same as with everything else.

Went out to breakfast this morning and my Dad was telling me how his work is making them take courses on Millenials in the workplace and how to cater to their needs. 🙄

DosFreak wrote:

I think energy convervation and resources will be an even bigger concern so old hardware may be an issue but no reason this old hardware shouldn't be emulated fully by then even if it isn't legal.

This is an interesting one...
If we look at today... a C64 or an Amiga only needs a handful of watts. I believe the C64 is 7W, and the Amiga is something in that range as well.
Even if you have a very energy-efficient machine (laptop or such), a modern machine is likely to be 20+W when running an emulator for these machines.

But a Laptop has allready a Display, for a C64 you need a Monitor or a TV.
Thats around 7 Watts + 30 till 50 Watts.