Did you have a home computer in the 1980s?

[wanderings]

We had a ZX81 which attached to the TV (I was also a child of the 80s): it could do programming and graphics. I quickly got better at using it than my parents, but it was not much good for word processing. It really helped me with maths.

Later we had an Amstrad PCW which was great for word processing, and programming (I loved using Logo to draw pictures), but not games. My mum didn't embrace the idea of using it to plan or draft a piece of writing - she would not type a word until she had it finalised on paper. It lasted a few years before it went wrong too often. I learned to type on it; my mum got me a book about how to touch type, and I got quite speedy with it. The manual for this computer was literally an inch thick (and on really thin paper), and written in a very longhand style - how things have changed!

I'm still looking for the special key that plays a little melody.

We had an Atari 400 which was considered absolutely top of the range. I used it to play space invaders and tried to play an adventure game that you had to download from a cassette. It took ages and invariably crashed half way through.

The only "computing" I ever did on it was getting it to write my name on a continuous loop

Commodore 64. Best computer ever.

A Vic20 and then a Commodore 64. I used to program quizzes on it. Daley Thompson's Decathlon knackered your joystick. I used to love playing choose your own adventure games on it too.

No, we had Pong or some knock off. I didn't have access to a computer at home until 1995 and didn't have my own until 2010.

ZX80, ZX81, Spectrum, Commodore 64 and Amstrad PCW.

Acorn electron, amstrad PCW.

Yes but that be partly as my dad taught on computers as early as the 70's.

So he used to bring home a Nascom and Compukit in the 70's. He bought us a ZX81, and later a spectrum, and then a BBC B. We also had the pong standalone.

When I went to university, I had an Atari STE, my boyfriend had an Atari FM, and our friends had Amiga's. We used to frequent the computer centre for PC's or the Suns. I still remember the internet slowly becoming more.

Late 1980s yes. No idea what it was, we had one from when I was about 6 as my Mum worked for an IT company.

Commodore 64

Amstrad PCW bought in 1989 in Curry's.

Had a pong game for the tv and in the early 90s a second hand apricot which was an apple copy.

First 'proper' computer, sometime in the second half of the the 90s was £999 from Aldi - one of their early special buys when they really were. The equivalent from anywhere else was £1500. With Dial up internet.

Texas Instruments ti 99/4A. Ah the memories. Whole afternoons spent typing in code in order to get a stick man walking across the screen. I'm a web developer, by the circuitous route of a Mac Classic II, an English degree and a Multimedia Arts postgrad.

Texas Instruments ti 99/4A. Ah the memories. Whole afternoons spent typing in code in order to get a stick man walking across the screen. I'm a web developer, by the circuitous route of a Mac Classic II, an English degree and a Multimedia Arts postgrad.

No, I was very jealous of my friend having a ZX Spectrum. Mum would bring home the school BBC computer in the summer holidays, and she eventually had an Amstrad word processor.

I didn't have access to a PC at home until now DH moved in with me in 1996

I was a student and then in my first job in the 80s. My now-DH had a Commodore 64; i was using mainframes for my uni research and then VAX and Silicon Graphics machines at work so home computers seemed a bit besides the point. I can't remember when we got our first PC.

We had an Apple something or other. I'm not sure if it counts as home computer.

Like this.

We had a BBC.
Swanky.

C64 - my dad was also an IT teacher :) My brother is now has his own programming company.

We had a BBC micro which my mum used to write on, using WordWise. We were very swanky as we had (wait for it!) a disk drive!
I played the Welcome games and a few others but most games I got were on tape.

After a couple years we got (excitement!) A Colour Monitor!

We had a micro at school one year in our classroom, for maths, but someone had a disk of games so we used to play at lunch, until we got in trouble and the computer was Disconnected.

I realised that it was just the lead to the monitor that had been removed, so then we played Chuckie Egg etc blind. I could get to level 5...

Then somehow in the middle of one maths lesson, the computer somehow started making the most horrendous loud fart-whine, fart-whine noises followed by a piercing wail. The teacher took forever to figure out what it was because she knew the computer was Disconnected.

That bit of blind typing remains the pinnacle of my programming career...

Commodore 64 here.

Zx80, zx81 then the spectrum. Endless boring hours waiting for games to load then instantly crash or sat copying code out of magazines.

@CMOTDibbler That must have been great, your mum bringing home the school BBC computer, and probably unthinkable now. I remember the BBC computers at primary school.

@Phonelock That looks like one of the computers at my secondary school in 1992.

My dad brought home from the office a microwriter; a device where you typed with one hand only, which had five keys which fitted under the fingers of the hand. You typed by pressing different combinations of the keys, and there were mnemonics to help you remember them; for instance, P was "press all". He said that with practice, you could type really quickly with it.

He sometimes took me to his office in the holidays, and one of the best things I saw was a plotter: a machine which drew coloured pictures and diagrams, using actual pens.

Spectrum 48k. Was really envious of friends who had the Commodore 64. We couldn't afford it.

We had a computer can't remember the actual type I think Armstrong then BBC - I remember spending hours typing instructions (now I guess that would be referred to as code) from a spiral bound Manuel getting it to flash the word colour on the screen in a different colour. As well as some other things I could get it to do -

Games were loaded on a tape I think - we then moved to a different machine, we had a floppy disk where games would take forever to load! All this while taping the top 40 from the Radio, in between a Sunday lunch & peaches from a can for Sunday night tea!