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A $200 mini-laptop with a Intel 8088 chip and 640KB

liliputing.com

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Re: A $200 mini-laptop with a Intel 8088 chip and 640KB

#61

Post by selcuka »

skulk wrote: post #14
selcuka wrote: post #13

Curious. Why do we need an actual 8088? Aren't all x86 processors backwards compatible with 8088/8086? Also last time I checked VGA cards supported legacy modes such as CGA, and EGA (this may not be the case anymore). Any modern Intel laptop should be able to run the same software, without emulation.

The end goal of this product isn't to run software, it's to hold a piece of history in your hands and play with it and revel in that feeling.

I get it, but this is not a piece of history per se. It was manufactured last week. Like any other x86 laptop.

Re: A $200 mini-laptop with a Intel 8088 chip and 640KB

#63

Post by piperswe »

selcuka wrote: post #13

Curious. Why do we need an actual 8088? Aren't all x86 processors backwards compatible with 8088/8086? Also last time I checked VGA cards supported legacy modes such as CGA, and EGA (this may not be the case anymore). Any modern Intel laptop should be able to run the same software, without emulation.

The OPL3 addon is a nice addition that doesn't work on new hardware without emulation.

Re: A $200 mini-laptop with a Intel 8088 chip and 640KB

#64

Post by nsxwolf »

kitsunesoba wrote: post #38

A "real hardware" approach to retrocomputing like displayed here appeals to me because it much better captures parts of the experience lost to emulation. Things like insanely low latency thanks to there not being a fractal spiral of hardware and software abstractions sitting between everything. It's much more simple, and you can feel that. That said I'd also like to see some modern advancements brought in… for exampl…

I'm also bummed out that these sorts of things are all including OPL2/OPL3 Adlib style clones when I'd much rather have Sound Blaster support with the digital audio channel.

Re: A $200 mini-laptop with a Intel 8088 chip and 640KB

#66

Post by stubish »

I had a similar device in my hands 15 years ago in Thailand, with the company making it trying to find a market when OLPC was getting all the press. It was a netbook with a low power 386 compatible CPU and just enough circuitry and support to drive the keyboard, screen, some RAM and the SD card serving as the hard drive, and USB. It booted DOS, and in theory could have run Linux. It was powered by 6 AA batteries. They might have been able to produce them in bulk for $100 USD at the time, but I suspect it would have been more like $200. Didn't go anywhere as far as I know.

Re: A $200 mini-laptop with a Intel 8088 chip and 640KB

#70

Post by whartung »

teleforce wrote: post #33

8088 chip does not include FPU, does this laptop has one, otherwise it is going to be very slow.

Very little is going to prevent this thing from being very slow.

It’s an 8088 running 4.77Mhz, on a not really great system architecture. Head to head the original PC was slower than competing Z80s at 4Mhz.

The truly singular advancement the 8088 brought was more precious, precious memory. The PC itself was a different phenomenon. What it lacked in performance it made up for in many other ways.

For most applications, particularly early on, the 8087 did not bring a lot to the table to improve performance. GW-BASIC did not recognize it, for example. Wasn’t going to make Wordstar any faster. And it was an expensive add-on.

Numeric coprocessors we’re always pretty niche until they came bundled with the 486 and 68040, even then the 486SX and 68LC040 continued to sell, and did not have bundled FPUs.

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