Why blinkenlights ?

[woodelf]

Jos Dreesen wrote:

> So why is it then  that almost all early micros had them ?

I had Z80 kit around 1983 with keyboard and 7 segment display.

> a 7segment display with keyboard ( as in a H8) is clearly more usable, 
> and would have cost nothing more. Or were early eproms (for the monitor 
> program) that expensive ?

What monitor program? I think the Altair 8080 came with a 256 byte
ram as main memory. I never did see the original magazines with the
but you now can find some good history about micros on the web to give
you a better idea of why they came with them the blinking lights.

http://www.bytecollector.com/mark_8.htm

>             Jos