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

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

#181

Post by hilbert42 »

Koshkin wrote: post #178
hilbert42 wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My thoughts exactly, especially the 486. It was a good all-rounder, worked well—thoroughly debuged unlike the Pentium—and fast enough to be useful even today for some work. Also, I'd heard accounts that some influential third parties (companies developing stuff for the military etc.) were still using it long past its used-by date because it was the last of the 86 line whose internals they could fully understand. IBM…

It's an OKI M80C88A-2, and the genuine Intel 8087.

Thanks. Presumably for use embedded in their hardware products. A genuine 8087 must mean Intel still makes them or there's a lot of old new stock around.

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

#182

Post by bee_rider »

2b3a51 wrote: post #171
bee_rider wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can also probably get little pencil boxes at an art store or some place like that. Would recommend. A little plastic box that prevents me from having to fish around in my backpack possible get poked when I want my pencil is great, and they are pretty cheap.

UK: Try an image search for 'Helix Oxford Maths Set' Compasses, dividers, protractor, setsquares (that we don't use these days) and a 15cm ruler. Pencils, sharpener, rubber. Usually a stencil for lettering and a leaflet with geometry definitions. Available from supermarkets, stationers and cash and carrys right now because it is GCSE Maths exam time.

Overkill for me, but it does look quite nice!

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

#183

Post by trasz4 »

zhte415 wrote: post #142
pmontra wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ouch. "Not cheap" didn't prepare me to see a per unit price of $1,329.27, or $1,222.92 for 1000+ batches.

I read your comment and thought that can't be a unit of 1, it must be a typo and a batch of 1000. Then I clicked the link. But that can't be. Don't they appear in all kinds of things now, from washing machines to fire alarms? So I checked Alibaba, which has 8088s from $0.3 - $2. [1] I'm confused why the military version is three orders of magnitude more expensive. [1] https://www.alibaba.com/trade/search?fsb=y&IndexA…

In military/aerospace you're mostly paying for the paperwork, not anything physical.

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

#184

Post by CydeWeys »

argiopetech wrote: post #157
NovaDudely wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It always stuck with me when announcing the Virtual Console on Wii U that Satoru Iwata said it perfectly "It can be fun to relive your childhood but just for a little while". It is fun to look back but we tend to forgive a lot of things that kind of sucked. It is like how some people who live through Hurricanes and then a decade later speak about how fun it was coming together even though it was just horrible. Memori…

For what it's worth, as a born and raised Floridian, hurricanes are always fun before (laughing as people panic buy, watching the track, wondering if it will turn at the last moment or unexpectedly linger on top of you), during (admiring the wind/rain, wondering if we'll have to run the generator this year), and after (marvelling at the damage, having a good excuse to run the chainsaw, wondering when we can stop runn…

They're fun right up until you lose your house, or someone you know dies.

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

#186

Post by thomastjeffery »

myth_drannon wrote: post #141
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…

The latency issue is very real. I work in Linux, Mac and Windows on fairly fast computers and programming in VSCode is so annoying because of the latency . On my 486 in Borland Turbo C++ ide, I click on a key and I see it instantaneous. Of course if you never tried it, you wouldn't notice the difference and think I have some sort of OCD. But it is really noticable. I don't know if it's 100ms or 200 ms but there is a…

Get a high refresh rate (If you are in Linux, you may want to turn off your display compositor (KDE/XFCE), or use a lightweight xorg window manager like fluxbox or i3. This isn't necessary when using a fast GPU, but even then you may dislike animations.

Use a text editor with a real GUI toolkit (not electron or similar) like emacs or gvim/nvim-qt. Unfortunately, emacs can struggle rendering syntax highlighting, but outside that it is lean and snappy. Hopefully the recent progress with tree-sitter will resolve that.

I have met very few people who care about latency the way I do. I think most of it comes from my nostalgia of DOS-era computing. The most satisfying hardware purchase I have ever made is a good looking 2K IPS/VA 120hz/144hz+ freesync display. Millions of hours of my life experience were noticeably improved.

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

#188

Post by kitsunesoba »

thomastjeffery wrote: post #186
myth_drannon wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The latency issue is very real. I work in Linux, Mac and Windows on fairly fast computers and programming in VSCode is so annoying because of the latency . On my 486 in Borland Turbo C++ ide, I click on a key and I see it instantaneous. Of course if you never tried it, you wouldn't notice the difference and think I have some sort of OCD. But it is really noticable. I don't know if it's 100ms or 200 ms but there is a…

Get a high refresh rate ( If you are in Linux, you may want to turn off your display compositor (KDE/XFCE), or use a lightweight xorg window manager like fluxbox or i3. This isn't necessary when using a fast GPU, but even then you may dislike animations. Use a text editor with a real GUI toolkit (not electron or similar) like emacs or gvim/nvim-qt. Unfortunately, emacs can struggle rendering syntax highlighting, but…

I'm looking forward to the day that display tech, GPUs, and connection standards have gotten to the point that high PPI (@2x UI scaling) high refresh rate microLED displays are practical. It's going to be so nice to have text with as much contrast, cripsness, and accurate letterforms as print with as little latency as is possible on a modern system.

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

#189

Post by thomastjeffery »

kitsunesoba wrote: post #188
thomastjeffery wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Get a high refresh rate ( If you are in Linux, you may want to turn off your display compositor (KDE/XFCE), or use a lightweight xorg window manager like fluxbox or i3. This isn't necessary when using a fast GPU, but even then you may dislike animations. Use a text editor with a real GUI toolkit (not electron or similar) like emacs or gvim/nvim-qt. Unfortunately, emacs can struggle rendering syntax highlighting, but…

I'm looking forward to the day that display tech, GPUs, and connection standards have gotten to the point that high PPI (@2x UI scaling) high refresh rate microLED displays are practical. It's going to be so nice to have text with as much contrast, cripsness, and accurate letterforms as print with as little latency as is possible on a modern system.

It's not as comfortable as print, due to backlighting, but you just described the phone screen I'm typing this comment on.
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