My first machine was the rather obsure piece of technology from Australia, called "Microbee". It was a 3.37Mhz Z80 based computer, with 16Kbytes of RAM, and a
rather unique feature with allowed the computer to retain all data in RAM, even after being shut down. The computer used static RAMs, and has a rechargable battery pack (three AA cells) which kept the RAM alive when the machine was turned off. It was also able to generate a rather high resolution of 512x256 (monochrom) for a machine in its class.
Other then that, it wasn't a very interesting system, it has a two-tone beeper for sound, but a rather expanded & easy to use BASIC. As the pack-rat that I am, I still have all my Microbee stuff, I keep thinking about taking it out & copying the various basic program I wrote to a PC for safe keeping (currently sitting on tapes).......but who know when that's going to happen!
Back in the early 1980's, after seeing War Games for the first time
, I asked by parents to buy me a computer. They agreed ,and bought one from the local (and only) computer shop at the time, however, they didn't know anything about these new fangled "computers", and went with the one recommended by the store owner. I remember the store also had a TI-99/4A, a few Apple II clones - yes, clones, would you buy something called "General 64"?
, a Microprofessor, Dragon 32, and a few others. Well, the Apple II clones where around $2000 (without a screen or disk drive), and I guess my parents went with the more "affordable" system. They've could have done worse, but the Microbee basically had no support anywhere - you couldn't walk into any computer store and find Microbee related HW/SW. I couldn't even find any books for it, and everything I taught myself was from the original owners manual that came with it.
I took a BASIC course, offered at the same store BTW, and tought myself to program. I also dissected the programs that came with the machine (on cassette tape), and figured out how to do certain things. Eventually, I found a source for more Microbee related items, but had to travel about two hours to the actual importer, which was a tiny home converted into an office. There I had another 16Kbytes soldered it (while I waited), and added a 9-pin brother dot matrix printer - all for the tiny sum of $400. I also bought another book, which gave me more insight into BASIC, and especially, the graphics capabilities. I also learned that they were in the process of "converting" apple disk drives to work with the Microbee, but that never happend before the machine disappeared from the scene (if there ever was one).
I played with the Microbee for a couple of years, until the C64 came out. At that point my parents couldn't afford to buy another computer, so I just bummed off my friends who did have the new/amazing computer. Afew years later, I was able to get a C128 system, which I used for a few years, then sold got an Amiga 500.
