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Nostalgia - This Was a Bargain in 1979


Monroe

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I hope this isn't considered too technical ... just a trip down memory lane. I have never heard of this "low cost" computer for under $10,000 with an 11 MB hard drive... came across this site with this old ad and it was interesting reading.

 

Anyone actually remember this early model?

 

This Was a Bargain in 1979

 

http://tips.vlaurie.com/2014/12/this-was-a-bargain-in-1979/

...

 

 

 

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  • 4 weeks later...

Wow, I didn't know hard drives were around in 1979 already!

 

First time I came across a HDD was in 1984 ('85?), when my favorite computer store got a 5MB model for the IBM PC in their accounting office.

 

--JorgeA

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In case you have the Shugart Associates' SA1004 drive and you need it repaired ... I found a company that can fix it, should be "as good as new" !

 

Hard disk drives we repair and sell

 

Shugart

Model.................Size.....Capacity....Interface

Shugart SA1002  8.0".....5MB .........SA1000

Shugart SA1004  8.0".....10MB........SA1000

Shugart SA1106  8.0"......30MB.......SA1000

Shugart SA4008 14.0".....29MB.......SA1000

 

http://www.mfarris.com/largedisk/shugart.html

 

also Parts and Part numbers

 

http://www.armyproperty.com/product/56481/SA1004/

 

Some history ...

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shugart_Associates

 

Shugart Associates was a computer peripheral manufacturer that dominated the floppy disk drive market in the late 1970s and is famous for introducing the 51⁄4-inch minifloppy floppy disk drive.

 

Founded in 1973, Shugart Associates was purchased by Xerox in 1977. In the early 1980s the name was changed to Shugart Corporation. Xerox exited the business in 1985 and 1986, selling the brand name and the 8-inch floppy product line to Narlinger Group (in March 1986). Narlinger promptly rebranded itself as Shugart Corporation and continued as such into the early 1990s. Under Narlinger management, Shugart acquired several discontinued product lines such as the Optotech 5984 Write Once Read Many (WORM) drive.

 

Where did all the years go so fast ... I still think e-mail was the greatest  instead of sending something in the mail with 3 or 4 days delivery time.

 

I've stopped with Windows XP and my T42 IBM Thinkpads ... I've have no interest in the future with more speed or whatever.

 

The years are going way to fast.

...

Edited by monroe
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You never know what you run across at times.  I ended up picking up an original "The Oregon Trail" disk "for IBM/Tandy".  Of course, I don't have a drive that it works in anymore, but interesting that I was able to find it.  May look for it online I suppose if I get bored and see what the whole hype was.

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Wow, I didn't know hard drives were around in 1979 already!

 

First time I came across a HDD was in 1984 ('85?), when my favorite computer store got a 5MB model for the IBM PC in their accounting office.

 

--JorgeA

 

Once while scrolling thru some site with stupid pics I've seen a photo of 80 MB HDD sent on board of an environmental satellite in the early '70, (most probably some Landsat or early NOAA, if you'd ask me). The crap, while standing vertically, was almost as tall as an adult man ;) Bad point is that I can't find the pic again...

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Once while scrolling thru some site with stupid pics I've seen a photo of 80 MB HDD sent on board of an environmental satellite in the early '70, (most probably some Landsat or early NOAA, if you'd ask me). The crap, while standing vertically, was almost as tall as an adult man  ;) Bad point is that I can't find the pic again...

 

Naah, by the end of the 60's they were already smaller than that (though not really-really "tiny") but hardly they could have had 80 Mb of capacity.

 

The most iconic photo is that of an IBM 305 being loaded on a plane, but that dates back to the fifties:

http://royal.pingdom.com/2010/02/18/amazing-facts-and-figures-about-the-evolution-of-hard-disk-drives/

 

At the time the "choice" for "civil" use was between IBM, Memorex and Control Data, and I believe the latter was the first one to get to 80 Mb in a "reasonable" size with the CDC 9762:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_hard_disk_drives#1950s.E2.80.931970s

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storage_Module_Device

http://www.chrisfenton.com/cray-1-digital-archeology/

while the IBM 3340 is the first one using the new "arm landing" technology:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_IBM_magnetic_disk_drives#IBM_3340

but still it was in "cartridges":

http://computermuseum.informatik.uni-stuttgart.de/dev_en/ibm4331/ibm3340.html

 

Since aerospace tends to be a little ahead of "normal" industry it cannot have been that big in the '70's.

 

jaclaz

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  • 3 weeks later...

I hate computers. I swear we would be better off without them. Uni-bomber would have never did what he did.

$10,000 for 11MB is almost laughable nowadays. I see that pictures of the Hard drive shrinking. Tell me now? Could I get a decabyte storage unit that is big as my desk for a low price right about now. YES THAT IS RIGHT A DECABYTE. PLEASE SHOW ME A WORKING DECABYTE UNIT SOMEBODY. THOSE PICTURES MAKES ME WANTS TO LAUGH. OH MANKIND. They forget the picture of the ipod hard drive ( the one that bounces ).

$10,000 is like getting hit by a train and still feeling it every morning.

Okay looking and reading more. Every-time I see computers from the past I think we were closer to Artificial life then we are now. I mean the computers we have now are so terrible. The flash units we use have a limited amount of writes as well unless you go industrial.

BUT YOU KNOW WHAT I LOVE THE SPACE AGE DESIGN OF COMPUTERS AND VARIOUS PRODUCTS INSPIRED BY THEM.

Edited by ROTS
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  • 1 month later...

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