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Digital Retro: The Evolution and Design of the Personal Computer
 
 
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Digital Retro: The Evolution and Design of the Personal Computer (Paperback)

by Gordon Laing (Author) "The period between the mid-Seventies and the late Eighties was completely unique in the history of computing ..." (more)
4.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
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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: 25.2 x 22.4 x 1.8 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 162,261 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Product Description

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

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

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Inside This Book (Learn More)
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First Sentence
The period between the mid-Seventies and the late Eighties was completely unique in the history of computing. Read the first page
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Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
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Customer Reviews

13 Reviews
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Average Customer Review
4.6 out of 5 stars (13 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Smell the solder, 26 Nov 2004
By Cinemascope (On your PC screen) - See all my reviews
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'!
It's a lovely book - in a not very crowded genre - that anyone who has any interest in electronics, design, games platforms or valiant commercial flops will appreciate, but it simultaneously gives the impression that only the surface has been scratched, once you start to count all the machines that you remember which don't appear.
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8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent purchase., 31 Oct 2004
By D. C. Minter (London, UK.) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
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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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Digital Retro, 22 Oct 2004
By G.P. Cole (United Kingdom) - See all my reviews
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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Most Recent Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars First mainstream PCs
If you owned a computer in the 80s this book will bring nice memories. It doesn't go much into depth but it's a superb and a comprehensive introduction to the main models of that... Read more
Published 4 months ago by Mr. Javier Diez

5.0 out of 5 stars Wow
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.
Published on 5 May 2006 by Derek John Murray

3.0 out of 5 stars Good but lacking depth
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. Read more
Published on 1 April 2006 by A. Wilson

5.0 out of 5 stars Best book I have ever bought
As the above says if you had a computer in the 1980's then buy this book - absolutely amazing trip down memory lane. Read more
Published on 17 Jan 2006

5.0 out of 5 stars Brings a tear to the eye !
What a fantastic book - as a child of the 70's & early 80's this book rekindles all the feelings of those days and the home computer revolution occuring at the time. Read more
Published on 11 Feb 2005

5.0 out of 5 stars Utterly superb - geek heaven!
It's like someone wrote a book just for me... the all new photography is stunning (pity they had to use substitutes for a couple but I guess it's getting harder to track them... Read more
Published on 22 Nov 2004 by T. Allen

3.0 out of 5 stars Beautiful presentation
Undoubtedly the photographs are the best part of this book! The design and production are very good, and it's very well printed. Read more
Published on 8 Nov 2004 by ashvaleman

5.0 out of 5 stars Sweet memories
Computers got a bit boring after 1990. By then Intel and Microsoft were dictating the future, new versions of windows, faster versions of the same chips. Read more
Published on 19 Oct 2004 by Simon Rockman

5.0 out of 5 stars Back To The Future
'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... Read more
Published on 11 Oct 2004

5.0 out of 5 stars Press Play On Tape
Covering everything from the build-it-yourself Altair 8800 to the keep-dreaming-you'll-never-be-able-to-afford-one NeXT cube, Digital Retro looks at the people and products behind... Read more
Published on 10 Oct 2004 by cain_uk

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