Star Beacon
—
I like gizmos and gadgets. It’s one of the reasons I edit Friday’s technology page.
And there’s so much out there. There’s the iPad from Apple, which some say may replace the computer.
And speaking of computers, many of today’s smart phones are doing the work of a computer, from reading e-mail and surfing the Web to texting and heck - can you believe it - making telephone calls!
When I bought my camera with 12 megapixels, I thought, how can it get any better? But the model that replaced mine has 18 megapixels, with high-definition video!
Wow! And to think I came from a generation that in the 1960s shunned material goods.
But that was before 3-D, high-definition television. Or electronic book readers. Or GPS.’
Would you believe my family is lucky enough to have a GPS in which my voice is used to give the directions? “Get off the ferry now,” my voice says. Can’t wait to put my car on a ferry to hear that one.
What has really caught my eye lately - in fact I can’t get it out of my head, as Electric Light Orchestra sings - is the IBM 5100 portable computer.
You may have missed the commercial on Youtube, so look it up and see if it is something you would be interested in.
The commercial shows a real estate agent talking about all of the questions her customers have. What are payments on a house? What about taxes? All sorts of stuff. With the IMB 5100, she can give her customers quick answers.
At an airport, we are told fuel is expensive. The IBM 5100 helps keep expenses down.
It is used at a mid-sized insurance company, at a construction site with folks wearing hard hats, at a family farm where they need to know the proper mix of feeds.
So it can answer lots of questions. The commercial states it is portable and affordable and plugs into ANY outlet.
Who could want more? Ah, but is it powerful?
The commercial states, “It brings the advantage of the computer to more and more people.” And get this, it is more powerful than bigger computers from a few years ago!
I want that advantage. Don’t you?
Suddenly the iPad isn’t so interesting anymore, right? You covet the 5100.
This portable computer has a 16-bit processor and 64KB of RAM. It weighs a mere 50 pounds and you bet it is affordable. Get out your loose change. This baby goes for $19,975, better known at $20,000.
Hey, finish reading this column before running out to buy yours.
OK, OK, so the commercial is from 1975. The computer runs on a cartridge system. The capacity is so small, it would not hold one of today’s digital pictures.
If you look up this video, there are other retro-technology video suggestions. Like in 1990, Radio Shack had a cellular phone. No, it wasn’t one of those big, clumsy things that could kill you if you got hit by it. This is one of those big clumsy things tethered to a holster with the receiver in it. It makes you look like you are going hiking, but all of your equipment is to make a telephone call. The cost, I understand, was $16,000 and calls were 60 cents per minute. Hmmm, and it cost a dime at the time to make a telephone call at a pay phone.
Two years later, we bought our first home computer. This was 17 years after the 5100. It cost $2,200 with dot matrix printer and monitor. It had 130 megabytes of computer storage, 4 megabytes of RAM, Windows 3.1, which was just a software program at the time, with DOS (for disc operating system) 5 as the operating system.
Remember DOS? You had to learn to type cryptic statements to get programs running, like C:\filename\program.exe. If you look on Youtube, you will even find commercials that try to make DOS look like fun.
Our first cell phone came five years after the Radio Shack commercial. The phone was still huge, but didn’t have the holster and the price dropped to around $20 per month, but each phone call cost you and long distance was extra.
So now we have tiny smart phones that contain music, photos, high-definition video, texting, thousands of applications from GPS services to pricing items to games and more.
We have netbooks under $300 that have far more computer power than the 5100 and weigh the same as a hardcover book. It could replace the hardcover book.
But in 30 years people will look at them on Youtube 3-d and laugh at how primitive we are today.
Those people need to be whacked over the head with a 5100.
Lebzelter is special sections editor. E-mail him at bobleb@starbeacon.com.
