SGI: Discussion

BTW, Is the 8080 IMSAI in full operational order?

Possibly - I haven't tried to power it up yet. The nice thing is it came with incredibly comprehensive documentation - schematics and instructions for the IMSAI 8080 itself and every third party card in it, as well as the sales receipts for every single component in the thing, all purchased from 1975 to 1979. Yes, even tiny things like chips and caps - every single receipt! It's an amazing bit of history.

I bought the machine from Stewart Cheifet, who was the host of The Computer Chronicles, though his name isn't on the receipts so he apparently wasn't the original owner.

With all that documentation it should be pretty easy to get it up and running though - it's really clean inside.

Wow, most excellent score. Much respect!


I remember watching the computer Chronicles, that was the dude that did the co-hosting with the CP/M feller, right?

Yep - Stewart Cheifet and Gary Kildall were the hosts through most of the eighties. I let him know I was a fan - he replied that it was a great gig that let him play with all sorts of new hardware/software.

Most of the shows can be streamed/downloaded:

http://www.archive.org/details/computerchronicles

Wandering around Chilliwack today (a town in BC) where I came across a 2nd hand bookshop where I found a copy of 'The Soul of a New Machine' by Tracy Kidder....Something to read on the remainder of my holiday

I liked it. Not quite sure it was something that should've won a Pulitzer, but hey.

Guess I should raise my hand then. Always room for an Altair; otherwise the only S-100 gear I'm really interested in having on-hand is CompuPro (Godbout/Viasyn).

Edit : Well, and the stuff that Andrew Lynch and John Monahan are producing . In particular, nice to see an IDE controller with community support and 4MB SRAM cards.