OK I was checking out a retro video and an article about the Epson
HX-20 and reflecting not on the actual computer but on the growth
of so called retro reviewers and their take of various machines.
When I started back at the beginning of the millennium collecting
other computer platforms to that of the Amiga I had but a handful
of very useful and informative sites that gave information on the
models. The best being Old Computers dot com.
For Commodore and the Amiga it was Bo Zimmerman and The Big Book
of Amiga Hardware plus the German Amiga resource site. Classic.
I always have seen my own endeavours as pretty new to the scene.
However reflecting on it now I am starting to realise I am getting
on a bit long in the tooth, if that is the expression. I watch the
videos now with a kinda... been there done that kinda attitude. And
only cus I really have been there and done that. I recall researching
all kinds of machines and sourcing them and eventually getting my
hands on them. I am not sure what possessed me to gather so many.
Truly amazing that when I watch these YouTube videos I am sensing
a touch of time-walking as I am taken back to why I even obtained
the particular bit of kit in the first place.
As for the Epson, maybe I read that it was supposed to be the first
laptop. No idea. I would have to go back to a time before these
YouTube retro guys existed on the web and delve into the sites I
was reviewing at that time. The point being that I sense that the
words of YouTubers that get repeated over and over now are becoming
a truth, and I'm not really sure about that.
I know that I had been very interested in portable machines and
I know that The Osborne dated April 1981 was the first. It was
Adam Osborne that invented the portable in truth. Though the Epson
HX-20 was one of the first 'lap'top usable machines, albeit a
little crude. It was released in 1982 a year later. The Compaq
portable was announced at around the same time and the Commodore
SX-64 in 1983 along with the TRS-80 Model 100. I sense I may have
travelled backward to the Osborne and picked up the Epson along
the way.
The point is that if I had been reviewing portables of the day I
doubt I would have considered any of these computers as a laptop.
They were more related to the mobile devices of the time. For
me a laptop evolved from an IBM machine and probably would have
been the Grid Compass 1101 or the Toshiba T1100. And so why am
I saying all this. Cus the Tubers that 'Tube' tend to Tube things
they can show on videos. Whereas the reviewers of the day, back when
I started, actually researched the broader spectrum of historic data
and collated it in a more accurate way, citing facts that were not
coloured by what could be shown on a desk in a YouTube video.
For me the Epson would be better time-lined in with the Casio calculator
type machines of the day and I sense that is where I saw the machine
sitting and so was neglected from view. Computers were for me
more about the rows, lines, columns of display. And that is why
computers like the Toshiba have to be considered the forerunner to
the laptop with the Osborne being a luggable portable but on the
right track when it comes to base components of a laptop. Nothing
that followed the Epson tended to follow that format. I guess the
TRS-80 could be seen to be close, but even here it was making
effort to produce a more coherent screen display.
Dunno... Time plays tricks and at times like these I wish I could
go back to those earlier days and access more of the sites being
produced by folk that actually used the kit. That is why I like
Old Computers dot com cus you get the comments from experienced
computer users.
I am not decrying what the tubers do. I fully applaud their efforts
but I sense that sometimes there is a depth to the subject
matter that is not reflected in what is being said. Sadly this
also flows through various Wiki entries that have a habit of
contradicting themselves at times. With multiple entries
claiming differing things. For me, like I say, I tend to believe
more , information produced closer to the moment and by folk
that actually used the kit. That is why I collect old books
and magazines.
Final thought... wish I had got one of those Toshiba machines.
