OT - sort of

[Charlie Carothers]

Tony Duell wrote:
>> My bad!  The combination of poor quality text and my 71 year old eyes 
>> did me in again. :-)  My daughter says if you turn it "just so" the Ms. 
>> Pac-Man copyright date does look like 1960, but it is actually 1980. 
> 
> OK, that makes more sense.
> 
>> Yep, that makes a lot more sense.  In 1960 I suppose about the only 
>> thing to play a computer game on would have been either a mini or a 
>> mainframe - actually I think it would have had to be a mainframe.  Based 
>> on a *very* quick web search, the first PDP-8 shipped in 1964, so if 
>> that was the first mini...  Some might say the IBM 1620, introduced in 
>> 1959, was a mini but I think that is a stretch.
> 
> THe PDP1 was around in the very early 1960s IIRC. And Spacewar, of 
> course, ran on it. I would class that machine as a mini, but others may not.
> 
> -tony
> 
> 
I did not even know there *was* a PDP-1, which is not surprising I guess 
as it appears only about 50 were made.  Various web sites give dates of 
1959/60/61 for its production start.  I of course found several 
interesting web sites about that machine, including 
http://pdp-1.computerhistory.org/pdp-1/ which I want to browse through 
in more detail.  (Why do people insist on using dark gray characters on 
a light gray background???  Arrgggghhh!)  From the pictures I've seen so 
far of the PDP-1, it does appear to be rather large to fit my mental 
image of a mini, FWIW (not much).  In some ways I'm reminded of the 
SDS-910 which I believe was a bit smaller and I sort of always thought 
of as a "midi".  Whatever that is...
Later,
Charlie C.