Museum of 20th Century IT

Exhibit

Alison and Shawn are preparing to exhibit information technology from 1981-2000 for one week, fall 2011, at Hartell Gallery, Cornell U. (Sept 18-24).

Posters

All sections have a 3'w x 4'h poster with a common header, green type on black stripe, like early terminals. Each poster/pedestal item has a black backdrop. Poster text in a neutral, 20th century font (monospace?).

Sections

Apple Design Evolution

SE

Portable with handle. Monitor over drive. Beveled edges. Facing up 5°. Pin stripes.

LC

Pizza box, more pin stripes. Tilted up 5°

7200/7100/Centris 650

Thicker boxes with slightly rounded face and tail. This design common to many 1992-1999 Macs.

8600

Large upended box. Touch of color.

All In One (AIO) G3

Rounded beige and see-through. Pinstripes replaced by perforation, but that idea begins and ends with this model. Topologically just like the classic Mac portables, but too heavy to carry around.

iMac

Round. Clear shows why it's a teardrop on its side.

G4

Bringing round to the tall box. Actually this started with the Bondi Blue G3. The G4 is the same shape but grey.

iBook G3

Powerbook G3

Smooth, but without perforations of the AIO or clear plastic of the i-line.

iMac aesthetically inspired items

Wacom Graphite

Harmon Kardon Subwoofer

USB Floppy—VST

Handheld

• Handspring Visor
  • Practice writing in Graffiti.
• eMate
  • Write in Newton

Amigas

• Consoles
  • Amiga 500
  • Amiga 1200
• Boxes
  • Amiga 2500
  • Amiga 3000U/X
  • Software
• Amiga 3000 running:
  • Sim Earth
  • IntroCAD
  • Mods
  • Deluxe Music?

Chat Station

• G3 Tower
• iMac Graphite

Users can chat with each other in our special chat room or on Amiga World's #aminet channel: irc.amigaworld.net. See chat software.

Guest Book

• SE FDHD 1989

Components

Handspring Visor Deluxe

History

http://www.fundinguniverse.com/company-histories/Handspring-Inc-Company-History.html

Amiga 500

Minimized materials, but still meeting demand for expandability through externalized components pioneered by Apple and Commodore consumer-level predecessors.

Amiga 2500

The largest Amiga, a workhorse, with expansion bays for drives and cards.

Amiga 1200

The portable member of a later generation of Amigas.

Amiga 3000/UX

Runs Unix or Amiga.

Amiga 3000

Compact desktop.

Apple eMate

1997

Apple Mac SE

1987.

Apple Mac SE FDHD

This is the 1989 introduction of a high density floppy drive and internal hard drive to the portable series. It looks just like all the previous portables, but is much more powerful in that one doesn't need to constantly insert floppies to run programs, but one can use DOS formatted floppies to transfer files to PCs. Also remarkable for a small microcomputer is the expansion slot.

Apple Mac LC

Little pizza box Mac.

Apple PowerBook 160

1992

Apple Mac 7100/66

1994

Apple Mac 7200

1995

Apple Power Mac 8600

1997

Apple Power Mac G3

1997

Apple All In One G3

1998

Apple iMac DV SE

1999

Apple PowerBook G3 Wall Street II

1998. http://lowendmac.com/pb2/wallstreet-powerbook-g3-ii.html

Apple iBook G3

1999. http://lowendmac.com/pb2/original-ibook-g3-300-mhz.html

Apple Power Mac G4

1999. Advertised as the first supercomputer for consumers, since it crossed the boundary for US limits on exports of powerful computers.

Apple Airport Base Station

1999. Perhaps the pinnacle of expression of the rounded aesthetic, further along the iMac lines.

Description

A multimedia extravaganza featuring the personal collection of two Gen-Xers, this exhibition incorporates functioning computers, slide show viewers, personal computing devices, and visual displays—both print and digital. Information technology devices from 1981-2000 inform this retrospective conversation between design and computing. In this exploration of the physical history of information technology, some objects are classified as cutting edge design or functional innovations; others feature graphic or design software that served as visualization tools. Themes of the exhibition include the history of the Macintosh as a design object, portability, and the Commodore Amiga computers’ tools and software related to visualization, drafting, and music.

Preparation

• Replace batteries in computers. Old batteries prevent storage in parameter RAM, causing difficult hardware problems. See Amiga#Batteries.
• Replace or repair Mac LC power supply. It's not supplying 5 and 12 V, and it's making a 2Hz click.
• Create list of all computers to display and create floor plan, determine placement, # of power supplies needed.
• Opening or closing reception?
• Posters for advertising show and educational posters for show
• LCD Screen application/ movie

References

Big Book of Amiga Hardware

Online encyclopedia with guides to all the Amigas and very many peripherals. http://www.bboah.com/

Cory Arcangel's Pro Tools

Nostalgic information technology tools exhibitor Cory Arcangel is described in the short article in New York Magazine. http://nymag.com/print/?/arts/art/features/cory-arcangel-2011-5/index1.html

Classic Amiga

A forum, a wiki, and tons of videos of apps. http://www.classicamiga.com/

"The Apple Macintosh Computer" by Greg Williams, Byte Magazine Feb 1984. http://shawnreeves.net/documents/protected/mac128-ByteMag1984.pdf (protected because of copyright)

Emulators

MiniVMac allows users of newer Macs to run a Macintosh Plus in a window on their computer. http://minivmac.sourceforge.net/doc/start.html

See our notes on running Mini vMac.

UAE runs Amiga OS on Windows, Linux, and Mac.

http://www.amigaemulator.org/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UAE_(emulator)

History

Old computers archive:Lots of interesting computers from the seventies and 80s, more than the usual suspects. http://oldcomputers.net/

The Apple Museum:Anecdotes, pictures, and data. http://www.theapplemuseum.com

A concise article following the development of GUI with mid-80s Macs and Amigas playing a significant role:http://www.catb.org/~esr/writings/taouu/html/ch02s05.html

Installing RAM in an Apple SE

http://www.ccadams.org/se/ram.html

Internet Relay Chat (IRC)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_Relay_Chat

Low End Mac

Expansive source for specs and contexts of each Apple computer model. Used by people trying to get the most out of older computers. http://lowendmac.com/

Software

Info-Mac is one of the few traditional, hierarchical archives of shareware and freeware. http://www.info-mac.org/viewforum.php?f=94

Aminet is *the* archive for Amiga software. http://aminet.net/

Drivers for old Mac equipment can be found at the Mac Driver Museum. http://www.macdrivermuseum.net/

Video

We Are Manufacturing, a video about Apple Macintosh fabrication from Apple Computer, 1989. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dk306ZkNOuc

Bibliography

The Victorian Internet: The Remarkable Story of the Telegraph and the Nineteenth Century's On-line Pioneers by Tom Standage. Walker & Company, 2007 Computer:A history of the information machine by Martin Campbell-Kelly and William Aspray. Basic Books, 1996.

Kudos

Thanks to Jonathan Ochshorn for advising us and making it happen officially.

Thanks to Tom at Finger Lakes ReUse Center for helping find iMac peripherals.

Thanks to Andre and Beth Sprankle at AAP computer services for help wrangling a couple Mac SE computers for parts.

Thanks to Meg Elliott for providing an excellent working classic system.

Thanks to Beth Kunz at AAP events for helping organize and plan the space.