Talk:Personal computer/Archive 1

Moved here
"(Formerly, 'Personal Computers' was redirected to 'Home Computers', which discusses early machines like Apple ][s only. We ought to have a more comprehensuve article here linked to 'Home Computers' for early history.)"

Isn't the term personal computer formalized only after IBM's introduction of the PC? Before then, only home computer was the common name? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Aldie (talk • contribs) 04:12, 6 August 2002


 * Nope. That's what the IBM PC was: the IBM Personal computer, as opposed to all the other personal computers that were already on the market. THere were lots. Tannin 22:05 20 May 2003 (UTC)

Bottom half of article
The bottom half of this article is absolutely bad. What's with all the "of"s? Someone needs to fix it. - RadRafe 22:43, 20 May 2003 (UTC)


 * Quite so. Also, it's not about personal computers in any casse, it seems to be some rough notes about the development of mini computers - which are an entirely different thing. Tannin Text follows:

Images
The image in this page contains a message advocating the bombing of motor vehicals. I don't think that is encyclopaedia-appropriate. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Crusadeonilliteracy (talk • contribs) 15:44, 9 August 2003


 * The picture is so dark you can hardly see the computer so it isn't very good anyway. Rmhermen 15:21, Aug 9, 2003 (UTC)

More criticising of the photos
Both pictures actually lack showing the main case of the PC! *All* the other components are in fact non-unique to PCs. A decent picture of a full PC system would be helpful. :-) (most components might be part of a Net Computer, or Dumb Terminal system.)

As for the picture with the TV, modern graphics cards contain TV in and out (again, in case you're old enough to remember ), and I have seen tvs connected up to part of a PC system.

Also note that people in "Real Life" keep using very old PCs indeed, without replacing them at all, and people often personalize their personal machines, though I'm not sure how to best illustrate this. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Kim Bruning (talk • contribs) 20:54, 2 January 2004


 * I hope the pic of my tower (Evesham, 3 GHz) answers your comments on the pic of my general set-up. Obviously a view inside the tower would be good as well, but I'm not willing to open up (I'm chicken!).
 * For your interest, the TV is not in any way relevant to my computer, I don't want to miss Coronation Street or Eastenders while I do Wiki work (I live in England)!
 * Adrian Pingstone 21:03, 5 Jan 2004 (UTC)


 * Okay well, I don't mind opening up one of my PCs. I've made some pictures and added them to my photo dir. Are any of those useful? There's a 2nd computer in the background, but that shouldn't be a big deal. Pictures include: tower, tower interior, tower rear, shots of the desktop. (In varying quality and lighting). The machine itself is a white label Pentium 4, using an nvidia geforce 2 graphics card, drives in the drive bays (from top to bottom) are CD-writer, DVD-RW, 20 Gb hard disk (cheap one, thrown in with the deal), hard disk 160 Gb. I haven't owned it long enough to really hack around with it, so I guess the hardware is still fairly typical. :-) (Click on the required resolution, then click on the relevant thumbnail to obtain the actual image) Kim Bruning 16:34, 7 Feb 2004 (UTC)


 * I think this one is good but it's overexposed. Could someone with photo shop fix it up? BrokenSegue 16:03, 9 Oct 2004 (UTC)


 * I work at a IT department, and right now I have lots of Dell's (GX260-280, SX260-280, GX620), Compaq DeskproEN's, HP d530's and others, both SFF and regular form factory. Anyone interested in photos? -- Pål Grønås Drange 15:15, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

Components
Also, is there no article on wikipedia about the components of a computer, Expansion slots (PCI, AGP, ISA) hard drive, video, RAM etc? BrokenSegue 16:03, 9 Oct 2004 (UTC)

More history
We need more about the history of personal computers (the lack of a reference to the Xerox Alto is a major oversight), and in fact there's so much one could say (see the material above) that it could probably be a separate article, with a brief overwiew, and link, from here. Noel (talk) 00:32, 21 Nov 2004 (UTC)


 * the data on the history of computers is not enough we need extra knowledge about the comper history-- Saptesh —Preceding unsigned comment added by 61.246.138.22 (talk • contribs) 07:32, 8 August 2006


 * After reviewing some timelines and the OldComputerMuseum's pages I see several machines that should be mentioned and aren't. Like Intel's Intellec Intellec-8 circa 1973 and IBM's IBM 5100 circa 1975. Both important contributions from major players which are obviously hardware precursors of personal computers when viewed but fail to be called personal computers cause of the $2300 in 1974 dollars for the Intellec or the $9500 in 1975 dollars for the IBM 5100. Alatari 18:20, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Image choice
It's great to see a system pictured, but I'd like to see a better system layout than that one, with no TV and the system case clearly shown. Anybody have a camera, and everthing in one clear layout, without extra details? Radagast 01:43, Dec 20, 2004 (UTC)

Definition
The article gives a definition of Personal Computer as

"A personal computer is an inexpensive microcomputer, originally designed to be used by only one person at a time, and which is IBM PC compatible - (though in common usage it may sometimes refer to non-compatible machines)."

I would say that only the initials "PC" are ever taken to indicate an IBM/Intel/Windows-standard personal computer. (ex. usage "Do you own a Mac or a PC?" but never "Do you own a Mac or a Personal Computer?") and the rest of the article text would seem to corroborate this, with discussion of many pre-IBM-PC microcomputers. Exia 05:08, 7 January 2005 (UTC)

History moved
I think we need to tell people about the Elder Days. So, I've moved the great stuff about LINC and PDP 8 back into the article. The "generations" of personal computers seems to be something specific to this article, I don't think I've seen that cateogorization elsewhere. There's so much overlap between, for example, the Commodore 64 style "home" computer and the cheap IBM compatible that I'm sure many households had both at the same time, thoough I imagine the use of a C64 in an office would have been very rare. --Wtshymanski 05:05, 21 Apr 2005 (UTC)


 * Currently, this content is divided among the microcomputer, home computer, and personal computer wikis. The division appears to coincide (roughly) with the changes in marketing nomenclature over the years. However, to date, none of the articles offer a pictorial history that tells the story of the micro (or PC, or whatever you want to call it).
 * As for the personal computer article in particular, I feel that the gallery of photos lacks a certain historical objectivity. While I believe that photos illustrating PCs with character (i.e., examples illustrating real-life contexts, and not just machines as they would appear on a box cover or in a clean room) have their place in the article, the examples fail to illustrate the evolution of PC industrial design and technological innovation; endless submissions of contemporary, x86-compatible home computers do not serve to edify. Is there an article on computer customization or &quot;hot-rodding&quot;? &mdash; Ringbang 21:57, 27 August 2005 (UTC)


 * {By the late 1980s, "home computers" were slowly being replaced by "personal computers" because the graphics and sound capacities of "home" systems were matched by those intended for "business" purposes. This, combined with a general decrease in costs of personal computers, caused the two market segments to fuse. These computers were pre-assembled, often pre-configured with bundled software, and required little technical knowledge to operate.} REmoved this for confusing the definitions of personal and home computers and having the date's inaccurate.
 * {A cynic once said: "Apple never misses an opportunity to miss an opportunity." Ironically, in 1997, a leading computer magazine declared that Apple's new iMac computer was the best-selling personal computer on the market, with nearly 10% market share. The magazine printed a list of computers by several different manufacturers, in order of sales volume: they were not separated by operating system, despite the fact that in that year very few retailers displayed IBM PC's and Macintosh computers side by side.} The cynic needs to be named as does the computer magazine.  It certainly isn't clear that iMac outsold Dell's most popular modules those years so again citations/verifications must back these statements up.  Alatari 10:26, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

Press mention
Forbes has an article claiming an innaccuracy in this article concerning the first mention of the term "personal computer". The author found a reference in a New York Times article from 1962 (the author does not claim that this is the first mention) whereas the Wikipedia entry cited a New Scientist article in 1964. Can someone with access to the New York Times archive please check this out, and have a quick look for any previous mentions of the term. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.153.102.254 (talk • contribs) 01:56, 29 July 2005


 * Review this interesting piece: http://www.blinkenlights.com/pc.shtml They were not called 'personal computers' but they fit the definition. And this research piece found the first device which 'personal computer' was used to describe it: http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/8.12/mustread.html?pg=11  Alatari 15:23, 20 June 2007 (UTC)

There's one they forgot...
They forgot Simon.

http://www.blinkenlights.com/pc.shtml

Scroll to the very bottom. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.33.129.100 (talk • contribs) 03:02, 2 December 2005


 * Agreed can anyone confirm that the article is accurate (i.e. Simon can be considered the first Personal computer). If it is then the info in it should be included in the history section or at least a link to the article. Qazzian 09:04, 11 September 2006 (UTC)


 * The confusion here is that the Simon was never called a 'personal computer' during it's time period. That term didn't come into being until 1962 (earlier references I can not find although they may exist). Do we want to define 'personal computer' and then go back and reevaluate every machine in history by that definition  or do we stick to the actual usage of what machines were called 'personla computers' from their inception?  Alatari 23:16, 30 July 2007 (UTC)