My IBM Dream - Chapter 1: the beginning

IBM - XT (eXtended Technology)
Processor: Intel 8088 @ 4.77 MHz, Memory: 128KB ~ 640KB, Operating System: IBM BASIC / PC-DOS 2.0
Released to the market: March 8, 1983

I remember that same summer. I used to hang out at my cousin’s (ironically the second Mike in this short story) house every summer. He was blessed with having the most advanced gadgets there was to find in the market because his mom was a top executive in a local bank. Anyway, where was I? Well, he had an IBM XT. It was kick-ass because we grew tired of playing Atari (bad graphics… 2-bit… Imagine a basketball game that had players taller than the basketball hoop).

There was this large black cardboard thing that you place inside a slot in the machine for you to start up the machine. And then after a minute, you replace it with another black cardboard thing. When the blinking cursor comes up, you type in [dir] and press [Enter]. You select a game to play from the list it gives you by typing it down and pressing again. Patience is extremely needed but it pays off because we had tons of games to choose from. There was the ever popular “Pacman”, the gruesome “Battle Tank”, the adventurous “Where in the world is Carmen San Diego?”, and our favorite, “World Olympics”, to name a few.

We’d play games from the moment I’d get there until my parents pick me before dinner time. It was loads of fun.

One time, I arrived at Mike’s house and he wasn’t in his room yet. I wanted to start playing with the games on the machine already, so what I did was turn it on, inserted any random black cardboard thing I could find and waited for the games to load.

I typed in [dir] and pressed [Enter]. I then noticed that each and every letter I typed in it would return "Disk boot failure"… What the heck is “Disk boot failure” anyways?

I turned off the machine. I turned it on again and I then tried a different black cardboard type of thing and did the whole process altogether. The same thing happened again.

I’m really perspiring heavily now. Yikes! Did I destroy the machine? What did I do? I just did exactly what Mike did every time. I’m definitely dead.

A few moments after, Mike enters his room. I point to the machine and tell him everything I did and what had happened. Then he said that I used the wrong diskette. So that’s what it’s called, a “Diskette”. He quickly took out the one inside the machine and replaced it with one under a pile of “Diskettes”…

He tried to run the machine, but, it returned the same message as when I tried it out. I’m really dead. I killed the machine. I killed our toy.

I just sat there. Dumb founded. “I’m dead”. I said to myself.

Well. That week we were not allowed to use the machine for any games. Uncle Willie (Mike’s father), we destroyed it and it can only be used for typing from now on.

Mike hated me for this.

Well, little did I know, Mike was the only one allowed to use the computer and he used it secretively or when I’m not around, until one time I made a surprise visit and caught him playing “World Olympics”…

What a cheat!

Well, it was his anyway and I cannot argue for his dad not allowing me to use it again.

Mike eventually asked his dad if I could play with the computer again. Well, he said yes to Mike, only if I was under Mike’s supervision. So we played, with the computer all summer. We bought many more games which needed a whole diskette all in itself. It was fun times.

Until eventually, the computer broke again and Mike’s dad scolded us both for over-using the computer for games, when it was really meant to help us type up assignments and other stuff like that. Mike’s dad added in a jokingly way “This boy destroyed it again eh. Tsk tsk…”

Well ironically now I’m in I.T. and every time a relative or friend needed help with computers or any electronic devices, they’d call me up to try to fix it, especially Uncle Willie. Quite ironic alright!

P.S. please do not use this entry as proof that my cousin Michael and I used pirated copies of games back in the 80’s. Believe me, we never knew the difference... Well, as if we even cared…