What constitutes "vintage"

[Floppies_only]

Gang,

The subject header says it succinctly. How old does a computer have to be to be considered vintage? It isn't in the FAQ. Also, is this qualification similar to vintage automobiles, which (last I knew) had to be made before a date certain to be considered antique, or does a computer have to be before a certain technology benchmark to be considered vintage (like, 486 or earlier or 68040 or earlier)?

Also, what about hybrid systems? What if you want to use new hardware with old hardware to increase the real usefulness of the old hardware? For example, I heard about a guy who interfaced a flash drive to his '80's microprocessor trainer. Is describing that a vintage computer discussion? How about using a vintage computer with a brand new one to put the vintage computer on the internet? Does asking questions about how to do that constitute a vintage computer discussion? It would vastly expand the possible uses of our vintage equipment if the answer was yes.

Thanks,
Sean

 

[barythrin]

That will be a personal debate for everyone. We all agree on old stuff being vintage but with various ages here in the group "old" means different things. I pretend that vintage in my head is pre-1985 although I break that rule myself with some systems that are just obscure or obsolete vs properly vintage. Personally I don't consider a 386 vintage just because of my age. 286 is fuzzy, but again this is just because of how old I was when 386 laptops became affordable to my budget not really because of any date info.

I think upgrading or creating new devices for vintage machines is great and should be highly supported by the community. So I would consider modding your c-64 or Apple II with a new Flashcard reader to be on topic for the device which itself is still vintage, just a new improvement on the device.

- John

 

[digger]

<32bit == vintage ???

<32bit == vintage ???

My take is that, since the vast majority of current desktop machines these days are still based on the IA32 (x86) architecture, which was was introduced with the Intel 80386, anything older than an 80386 can be considered vintage, if only because it is not capable of running most present-day software. Yes, I know, the later expansion of the IA32 instruction set with SIMD and other extensions makes the 80386 equally incompatible with present day software, but those later improvements hardly constitute an actual change in architecture, such as x86_64. As a matter of fact, even x86_64 can be considered an extension of IA32, even though it's a major extension.

Of course, the above reasoning only applies to the PC platform.

Well, I guess we could make the distinction even simpler: any 16bit (or lower) desktop architecture (with emphasis on desktop) can be defined as being vintage.

However, should the qualification of any 32bit system as "vintage" really be dismissed outright? Any good arguments for considering some 32bit architectures and platforms vintage as well?

 

[Yzzerdd]

If it's got a category here (excluding the obvious off-topic and such), then it's vintage.

--Jack

 

[TroyW]

Well, I guess we could make the distinction even simpler: any 16bit (or lower) desktop architecture (with emphasis on desktop) can be defined as being vintage.

However, should the qualification of any 32bit system as "vintage" really be dismissed outright? Any good arguments for considering some 32bit architectures and platforms vintage as well?

Where would the 68000 based machines fit into that? They were all internally 16/32-bit (the CPU registers are 32 bits wide, though few self-contained structures in the processor itself operate on 32 bits at a time. The 68000 may be considered a 16-bit microprocessor which is microcoded to accelerate 32-bit tasks) right from the start of production in 1980, and if a CPU that first went into production 28 years ago isn't vintage, well, I'll eat my foot, hahaha

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorola_68000

 

[digger]

Good point, TroyW.

68000-based home computers are definitely vintage.

And yet the 68000 was already a (future upward compatible) 32bit processor. This once again goes to show how far ahead of its time this architecture was.

Apparently, IBM had at one point considered basing the original IBM on a Motorola 68000 CPU, but eventually opted for the Intel 8088, because it was cheaper.

Who knows how history would have turned out, had IBM gone ahead with producing a 68000-based PC. Without the ugly memory segmentation and 1MB addressing limit of the 8086/8088, software development on such a PC would have been a lot more pleasant. In addition, the well thought out forward compatibility would possibly have made later CPU and OS upgrades less painful. But of course, we can only speculate about that now.

When I was younger, I used to prefer the Intel architecture over the Motorola architecture, purely because I was in the PC camp and considered it a rivalry thing against the Mac (even though I always respected the Amiga, even then).

Oh well, at least the 80386 architecture wasn't so bad, apart from the whole necessary virtual 8086 real-mode emulation kludge in DOS.

But I digress, of course.

What other 32bit (and higher) CPUs constitute vintage hardware?

What about the 64bit DEC Alpha? Do you think one could already consider that vintage? Or is the performance still "too high"? Where would one draw the line?

And Yzzerdd, if it doesn's specifically have a category in this forum, that still would not necessarily rule out the possibility of it being vintage anyway, right?

 

[carlsson]

To me, a plain 68000 has always and will always be a 16-bit processor, no matter what happens inside of it. I'm unsure about the 68020, but the '030 clearly is a 32-bitter to me, just like the 386 should be.

What if's are fun. Whom would Intel have sold CPUs to if IBM hadn't chosen them?

 

[TroyW]

Thank you digger!

I agree, the 68000 and later 68K CPUs were much nicer then the x86 CPUs and it's a shame indeed that IBM chose the wrong processor.

Personally, I'd class all 680x0 CPUs as vintage, even the (fairly uncommon, but very fast) 68060, because they were abandoned as a platform by the majority of programmers and users when Apple switched over to the PowerPC line and thus no major manufacturers still used for desktop computing after the glory days of the Amiga, Mac, ST and others all using the same CPU series.

To me, a plain 68000 has always and will always be a 16-bit processor, no matter what happens inside of it. I'm unsure about the 68020, but the '030 clearly is a 32-bitter to me, just like the 386 should be.

What if's are fun. Whom would Intel have sold CPUs to if IBM hadn't chosen them?

'020 was most certainly 32-bit, with the only exception being the 24-bit address lines on the 68ec020s as used in the Amiga 1200 computer and CD32 console.

The 68020 (usually just referred to as the '020, pronounced oh-two-oh or oh-twenty) had 32-bit internal and external data and address buses.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorola_68020

I think if IBM hadn't chosen the Intel CPUs and had instead went with the 680x0 series, then Intel would have been forced into a very different path. Maybe they would have became a second tier manufacturer of 680x0 CPUs, maybe they would have made their own version, or maybe they would have been forced to take a different path entirely and concentrate on say RAM or some other component. Only one thing is certain, things would be VERY different today, how we'll never know because of a shortsighted choice by IBM IMHO.

 

[carlsson]

Shortsighted I dunno. Perhaps the X86 was easier or cheaper to integrate with the other chips on the IBM PC? By the way, was the Quick and Dirty DOS written for X86 to start with, or was it originally made in 8080 and ported over when Microsoft a bit later on got the rights to deliver an operating system?

The Macintosh was at a very early stage a 6800 (6809 ?) project. The Atari ST was for a while a NS 32016 computer. Commodore were on their way to develop a Z8000 or even Z80000 (does that exist?) computer before they bought the rights to the Amiga project. What I'm trying to say is the history of computing is mined with what if's, and sometimes it is hard to tell which had been better or worse than another. Maybe those companies who made CP/M computers would've chosen Intel anyway, or would the fact that IBM chose Motorola have opened the field for Zilog's future CPUs as they already had a wide array of Z80 customers? I don't know if MOS/CSG and other 6502 producers had been affected as it appears even C= were looking in the direction of Zilog when they planned the follow-up to PET and CBM-IIs.

Or maybe all personal and home computer developers would've chosen Motorola 68K, which would've put them in some kind of oligolopoly situation. There would've been clones, variations and so on but perhaps only one major processor architecture in use.

 

[TroyW]

I personally think that it was a shortsighted choice that they made, just my opinion, I have yet to meet anyone who programmed both the x86 and the 68k CPUs who said they didn't prefer the 68ks flat memory model, amongst other things. Also it was chosen on cost and not merit, never a good basis for a technological choice, but one that is often made nonetheless. In this case it just seems like they could have made a better choice which everyone would have benefited from. Once again, my opinion, your mileage may vary, add sugar to taste.

As far as I remember, Quick and Dirty DOS was originally written for the 8080 and was ported over to the x86. If a different CPU had been chosen, that would have meant that a different OS would have had to have been used for the new IBM PC, and your guess is as good as mine as to what would have been used.

I doubt that everyone would have used 68k, because there is always someone trying to build a better mousetrap, and I'm not trying to claim that the 68k series was or is the absolute pinnacle of CPU technology, just that it's a better CPU to program for then the x86 in my opinion and the opinion of many others, and it's sad that the x86 became so popular when there were better alternatives. It's a great example of the better technology not always being successful in the long run, a theme that keeps cropping up time and time again in the computer industry.

 

[Druid6900]

There are winners and losers in any competing technologies, always have been.

VHS vs. Beta, PCI vs. VLB, *IX vs. Windows, PC vs. Mac, et c. et c.

x86 won, 68xx(x) lost and that's the way it goes. You have to learn to live with these things

 

[carlsson]

Well, 68K based computers were manufactured a bit into the 1990's so to say they lost to the Intel X86 is a bit of an oversimplification.

Btw, was VLB ever supposed to be a competitor to the PCI bus?

Depending on how large the QDOS codebase was, Bill G may just as well have managed to make the development team port it to 68K. On the other hand if IBM had chosen Motorola, would they ever have asked Digital Research to deliver an OS? If not, Bill may not have gotten involved at all, not to that point at least.

What are the odds that the IBM PC would had become a personal Unix workstation?

 

[Terry Yager]

I personally think that it was a shortsighted choice that they made, just my opinion, I have yet to meet anyone who programmed both the x86 and the 68k CPUs who said they didn't prefer the 68ks flat memory model, amongst other things. Also it was chosen on cost and not merit, never a good basis for a technological choice, but one that is often made nonetheless. In this case it just seems like they could have made a better choice which everyone would have benefited from. Once again, my opinion, your mileage may vary, add sugar to taste.

I usually try to avoid religious discussions, but I must chime in on this one.

As I recall, it was not so much a matter of cost as it was availability. Motorola was not geared up to produce as many 68Ks as IBM felt they would need at the time. No doubt, most programmers would prefer the flat memory model, but the hardware just wasn't there in any significant quantity.

As far as I remember, Quick and Dirty DOS was originally written for the 8080 and was ported over to the x86. If a different CPU had been chosen, that would have meant that a different OS would have had to have been used for the new IBM PC, and your guess is as good as mine as to what would have been used.

Q&D was CP/M, ported to the x86 by SCP! (Lather, Rinse, Repeat).

--T

 

[Druid6900]

Btw, was VLB ever supposed to be a competitor to the PCI bus?

Yup, in fact, several manufacturers didn't know which way to jump, hence the VIP 486s (VLB, ISA, PCI)

I have one that is dead, but, I can't throw it out until I take a sincere attempt at resurrecting it.

Think I might have a working one as well. Somewhere.

 

[carlsson]

Q&D was CP/M, ported to the x86 by SCP!

Hm, ok. I suppose there were some other personal computers using the new 16-bitters from Intel prior to IBM choosing them. It is not my field of experience and I can't be bothered to look up the exact timeline of which PCs were released when.

What about Zilog's later CPUs, were they rather grafted-on Z80's or really a new generation, and how come barely anyone (as far as I know at least) manufactured computers on those?

 

[Terry Yager]

Hm, ok. I suppose there were some other personal computers using the new 16-bitters from Intel prior to IBM choosing them. It is not my field of experience and I can't be bothered to look up the exact timeline of which PCs were released when.

What about Zilog's later CPUs, were they rather grafted-on Z80's or really a new generation, and how come barely anyone (as far as I know at least) manufactured computers on those?

Seattle was basically a hardware company, who produced an x86-based S-100 board, so they needed an OS for it, which was derived (stolen(?)) from DR's product.

AFAIK, the later Zylog chips were a true evolution of the Z80, not a 'grafted in' kludge.

--T

 

[digger]

Btw, was VLB ever supposed to be a competitor to the PCI bus?

According to the Wikipedia article, it wasn't. VLB was actually a stopgap solution, because ISA wasn't cutting it anymore, and IBM was charging too expensive licensing fees for the use of MCA.

The VLB standard simply extended the ISA architecture with a local bus that was hardwired to the 80486 processor, making it incompatible with other architectures. It couldn't even easily be implemented in Pentium systems.

PCI on the other hand, was designed from scratch as a platform- and architecture-independent bus.

One advantage that VLB did have for a time, was the fact that it was running synchronously with the 80486, resulting in operating speeds of up to 50MHz. The consumer variant of PCI ran at an indepedent fixed clockspeed of 33MHz. Even though the latter was benificial for long term compatibility across various systems and architectures, this initially resulted in some VLB cards actually performing faster than their contemporary PCI counterparts.

Nevetheless, most manufacturers only used VLB until something better would come along, and with the arrival of the Pentium, they were even more compelled to switch to PCI.

Now that I think of it, VLB cards can pretty much be considered vintage these days. Maybe we should open a topic dedicated to VESA Local Bus cards and motherboards. It would be interesting now to look back to see what kind of cards were released for this architecture back then.

 

[Druid6900]

Well, in hindsight, it may appear that way, but, since VLB was a reality and PCI was merely a concept at the same time, they did have to battle it out to see which was going to be the defacto "standard" when PCI was actually implemented.

VLB was an evolution of the ISA to 32-bit while maintaining backward compatibility to 16 bit devices just as EISA attempted to be. Not the compatibility part, of course, as the spacing on an EISA slot wouldn't allow a ISA card to work, nor would the signals. I just meant the 32-bit evolution part.

Try sticking an ISA card in a PCI slot.

Even when PCI came out the winner, one or two ISA slots kept showing up on most boards until the P4 came out.

Both buses had their strong points and their weak points, but the PCI slots just contrasted with the motherboard SOOO much more nicely than the VLB connectors LOL

 

[carlsson]

Heh. In modern times I've seen PCI slots in various colours although they traditionally and perhaps by definition should be white.

 

[Yzzerdd]

Heh. In modern times I've seen PCI slots in various colours although they traditionally and perhaps by definition should be white.

Ya, I agree. Just like AGP should always be brown. And ISA black. And VLB tan. Etc.

--Jack