Re: Apple II-Or Come on people, It's a 20 year old computer

["ruud.dingemans" <ruud.dingemans@wanadoo.nl>]

Paul Schlyter wrote:
> 
> >>>> I've never seen a more impotent computer than the Apple Lisa....
> >>>
> >>> Hey, a bit more respect for the grandmother of all modern personal
> >>> computers, ok.
> >>
> >>FYI: the majority of today's modern computers did NOT evolve from the
> >>Lisa.  Many people frown on this, but "the grandmother of most modern
> >>computers" happens to be the IBM PC.
> Well, without a CPU, a bus, mass storage, etc
> you can do absolutely nothing with that stuff.  And in THAT respect,
> most of today's computers are descendants of the IBM PC.

Jeez, are you displaying a wealth of ignorance here. Ok, you really
think the PC was anything special in this respect,
or "started" something in this respect?

Switch back another four years to the Apple II in 1977 (the ibm was from
'81), and then tell me that this design didn't have a cpu, bus, mass
storage, etc. All basic elements were there already. And I'll not even
mention Intel's MCS-4 from 1971, or the French
Micral from 1973. Let alone the Alto, also from '73!

Read up first, and then try to argue in favor of the IBM PC here, ok?

> > Now, who started the personal computer industry ?
> 
> Intel did, back in 1972 when creating the 4004 instead of the special

Wrong. Go to www.blinkenlights.com, do the quiz, and then come back,
enlightened. Besides,
the 4004 was from '71, while its design started in '69.

> TTL logic requested by that big japanese calculator manufacturer.
> Without microprocessors, there would be no personal computer industry.

Wrong. There is no technical reason modern personal computers couldn't
run without a 'processor on a chip'.
A cpu board with multiple chips, like in the old pdp-11's, would do
nicely as well.

> And the very first personal computer - the Mits Altair - used the
> Intel 8080 as a CPU.

Now I'm certain: you must be either brainwashed by the pc industry, or a
genuine (although ignorant) troll.

Again, goto blinkenlights.com and then tell us the Altair was the first
pc. It wasn't even close. Go back at least
four years from the Altair, to 1971, and then come back - enlightened.

> >>> It may have been a flop at the time because of cost, but it started a
> >>> revolution nonetheless.
> >>
> >> No it didn't.

Yes it did, in the sense that it was the first *commercially available
personal computer* built around the GUI/mouse
concept. All modern personal computers today use this idea. And it
wasn't Xerox that put this idea on the market. Xerox
didn't even invent the original ideas (look up on Engelbart). Apple
extended Xerox's concepts to the point that the GUI
as we now know it, came along. The menu bar, for instance, was basically
Apple's contribution.

> > The idea was not that 'stolen'. Apple bought Xerox's Lab at PaloAlto.
> >
> > But this is true that the first GUI computer were Xerox's.

Wrong, and wrong (yes, I know somebody else said that, not you).

I've said it before and I'll say it again: the Alto and the Lisa were
(besides the II) the real revolutions in the
personal computer industry. Certainly not the pc, which was basically a
cheap rerun of basic concepts already used
in the Apple II. That everybody copied *that* rather sloppy design
because it had the label IBM on it, *set back* the industry's innovation
for several years.

Regards, RD