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Digital Retro: The Evolution and Design of the Personal Computer [Paperback]

Gordon Laing
4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (23 customer reviews)
RRP: £19.95
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Book Description

4 Oct 2004 1904705391 978-1904705390
Compatibility? Forget it! Each of these computers was its own machine and had no intention of talking to anything else. Much like their owners in fact, who passionately defended their machines with a belief verging on the religious.

This book tells the story behind 40 classic home computers of an infamous decade, from the dreams and inspiration, through passionate inventors and corporate power struggles, to their final inevitable extinction, and subsequent worship by the nostalgic collectors market. Digital Retro is an essential read for anyone who owned a home computer in the Eighties.


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Product details

  • Paperback: 192 pages
  • Publisher: ILEX (4 Oct 2004)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 1904705391
  • ISBN-13: 978-1904705390
  • Product Dimensions: 1.6 x 24.1 x 25.5 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (23 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 165,398 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Review

Full of pictures and descriptions of classic machines, a fascinating trip down memory lane. -- PCW Magazine, January 2005

The book is packed with glossy photos and reams of fascinating trivia. -- What Laptop, February 2005

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Customer Reviews

4.7 out of 5 stars
4.7 out of 5 stars
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
13 of 13 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent purchase. 31 Oct 2004
Format:Paperback
I bought this the other day as a birthday present for a fellow technophile. I spent an unintentional hour flicking through the pages at the gizmos that I owned or aspired to in my childhood. It will be a wrench to wrap this!

The photographs give a real feel for what these machines were like (judging from the ones I used to own), and the brief commentaries bring them into even shaper focus.

It's a coffee table book, but expect the coffee to go cold. Absolutely wonderful.

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9 of 9 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars Smell the solder 26 Nov 2004
Format:Paperback
Lots of lovely, proudly different defunct hardware from the now bygone era of "Home" as opposed to "Personal" Computers. But given that the book celebrates the aesthetics of these machines - text information given is pertinent, but minimal - it's a shame that a few photogenic models from the past don't appear. For the nerds in the know, I would have included oddities like the Memotech and Enterprise.
The images presented are very sharp and clear, but on some machines the colour and contrast are a bit washed out. In the case of the Spectrum, for example, you could be left with the impression it was dark grey rather than jet black. This may be because the 'black slab' design of so many of the machines makes it hard to reveal detail without reducing contrast, but I have seen better pictures of the Spectrum elsewhere. All the photos are large & detailed however, and the machines shown are all in showroom condition.
My final niggle is that there are no photographs to remind readers - many if not most of whom probably never saw more than one or two of these in operation - what these relics showed on screen in day to day use. From the dot-crawl haze of most Sinclair machines on ordinary TVs (No FST either, 14 inch portables of course!) to the mysterious green on black glow of more 'serious' computers, to the variously blocky, colour clashing, purple, or upmarket RGB displays, what came out the business end of these machines is surely a necessary compliment to such an exercise as this? Especially when many of the items in the book have onboard displays, it's a shame they are all 'off'!
... Read more ›
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8 of 8 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Digital Retro 22 Oct 2004
Format:Paperback
I bought a copy of this book and within 24 hours I was having to order another one The reason? A friend of mine popped around, picked it up and fell in love with it, so I let him have my copy. The history of computers is littered with products that came, we saw... and didn't conquer. Digital Retro chronicles many of them. In addition to being packed with lots of interesting facts and information (I love the "Did you Know?" and "What happened next" sections in particular), it is lavishly illustrated with many great photographs of these wonderful (and not so wonderful) boxes of silicon chips and electronics.

In addition, Gordon Laing has done a lot of legwork, interviewing many of the pioneers behind the machines and in the process, digging out lots of new and interesting facts about how these computers were conceived and developed. We hear about the triumphs and disasters, the struggles and the sucessess - which sadly, none of the players were able to capitalise on and make their machine the de facto standard for home computing (a certain Mr Bill Gates would eventually take that prize...)

The design of this coffee-table book means you can read it from cover-to-cover or dip into sections that take your fancy. You might think that a book like this would only appeal to old computer nerds wanting to trek along the road to nostalgia, but you'd be wrong. My teenage sons were mesmerised by the old computers and Laing's writing style really brings the subject to life.

Even if you're only vaguely interested in computers, you should check out this book - you won't be disappointed and I bet you'll see computers in a new light as a result.

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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Back To The Future 11 Oct 2004
By A Customer
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
'Computer World. Computer World. Computer World' sang Kratwerk in 1981, and they weren't kidding. In these Wintel-dominated times it's easy to take the Internet, ludicrous processing power, massive hard disk capacities and plug 'n' play connectivity for granted. Back in the day, however, things were very different. Gordon Laing's meticulously researched, elegantly designed homage fills a yawning gap in the bookshelves of computer afficionados and industrial design fetishists alike. With the benefit of a quarter of a century's hindsight, it's all too easy to poke fun at the often idiosyncratic and sometimes misplaced efforts of yesterday's hardware and software pioneers. Laing, however, treats his subjects with the reverence they deserve. Studded with fascinating insights gleaned through interviews with many of the industry's true innovators, Laing's authoritative survey rekindles happy memories of a more innocent era - one where computing was the domain of enthusiastic hobbyists rather than the commoditised behemoth it is today.
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Wow 5 May 2006
Format:Paperback
This is s real high quality book with beautiful images, i wasn't fortunate enough to live when these machines were the dominant computers but it was still worth the read.
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11 of 13 people found the following review helpful
3.0 out of 5 stars Good but lacking depth 1 April 2006
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
I liked this book a lot, brought back memories as I lived through this era of computing and owned a fair few of the machines listed.

Trouble is I think they spent more time on presentation then content. A few paragraphs and picture captions cannot suffice for anybody interested in the underlying technology. There were very scant specs on each machine.

Why was there no screenshots of the machines working. For all the photographs there was none of the output. For instance, saying the Apple Lisa was the first with a GUI, with no detail is bad enough put not showing a photo of the GUI is frankly an omission I cannot condone.

This book is more of a coffee table book for the 'yuppies' to flick through at the 'dinner party' than a proper retrospective look at computers of old.

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Most Recent Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent , well written and with great photo material !
An excellent photo and info collection of the best known and some rare computer and consoles. Well written and with high quality ! Recommended to anyone into retro computing !
Published 12 months ago by JohnGR
5.0 out of 5 stars A compelling read
A balanced look at the era which produced some well known industry figures. The machines reviewed and explained are presented in chronolgogical order along with the story of their... Read more
Published 13 months ago by Hereward
4.0 out of 5 stars It's exactly what I was looking
Layout and design are excellent. Data about the computers and devices that appear in book are great and are very well documented. Read more
Published 13 months ago by xangel
5.0 out of 5 stars Great book - idea for a casual read
It would be fair to say that this book is incomplete - there too many computers missing that should have appeared but if the writer did that then they would have a book three times... Read more
Published 14 months ago by SB
5.0 out of 5 stars For 'nerds' of a certain age...
Like many of my age group, I grew up programming BASIC and playing games on my home computers - I started with a Commodore VIC 20, and moved on to a Commodore 64, thus entering... Read more
Published 24 months ago by bob turnip
4.0 out of 5 stars Fantastic trip down memory lane, but some classic machines missing.
This is my first review in 10 years of buying from Amazon. This book is a real classic. Well presented, and with lovely photographs and content. Read more
Published on 10 Feb 2011 by Peter Jones
5.0 out of 5 stars Simply brilliant
This book really is fantastic in so many ways.

They way it is written, you do not need to be a techno-whizz to understand what is being said. Read more
Published on 11 Dec 2010 by Rex Maverick
5.0 out of 5 stars Warming your feet on the PSU
Just grabbed this down off the shelf to check a couple of facts - ended up spending half an hour luxuriating in the wonderful pictures, detail and anecdotes. Read more
Published on 13 Oct 2010 by Richard Hammond
5.0 out of 5 stars Great read
The first thing that I noticed is that this book has a nice, glossy, quality feel about it. It does not go into huge architectural detail about each machine but has a good degree... Read more
Published on 17 Sep 2010 by chrislogic
4.0 out of 5 stars Glorious walk through memory lane
Having owned numerous 'Home' computers over the past 25 years, this book was a wonderful walk through my memories - sort of like the warm feeling you get recalling the sunny summer... Read more
Published on 29 Dec 2009 by Thomas K. Johnston
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