Author Topic: BYTE MAGAZINE. Have you read it? (Read 6482 times)

iLLucionist · « **on:** Sun, 08 October 2017, 06:13:09 »

Mmm yess... the nostalgia. Well, I wasn't invented back then (29 yo), but anyway.

WinNT vs OS/2. WP 5.1 vs Word for Windows. COREL! Draw. DOS 5.22 vs DOS 6.0. 8080, Macintosh, IBM PC.

Big box software. CRTs. ISA. Riser cards. Coprocessor. FPU.

I wish I could buy ALL Byte Magazines somewhere..

Have you read it? Don't you miss those kind of hardcore, in-depth, magazines? IT EVEN HAD CODE LISTINGS!

Findecanor · « **Reply #1 on:** Sun, 08 October 2017, 07:40:16 »

I read it now and then at the library in the mid '90s. I don't remember much. Wired was more hip.

iLLucionist · « **Reply #2 on:** Sun, 08 October 2017, 07:58:54 »

Quote from: Findecanor on Sun, 08 October 2017, 07:40:16

I read it now and then at the library in the mid '90s. I don't remember much. Wired was more hip.

Yeah, Wired was also cool. But I felt BYTE was more solid, with more background material and inside-outs.

rowdy · « **Reply #3 on:** Sun, 08 October 2017, 20:56:56 »

BYTE, Nibble, Creative Computing - they all had their appeal back in the day.

Chaos Manor was great, sad to hear of Jerry Pournelle's passing recently.

Findecanor · « **Reply #4 on:** Mon, 09 October 2017, 02:26:41 »

I used to also read Dr Dobbs Journal back in the late '90s and early '00s even. The best monthly magazine about programming. I learned a lot from it.

iLLucionist · « **Reply #5 on:** Mon, 09 October 2017, 13:20:08 »

Quote from: Findecanor on Mon, 09 October 2017, 02:26:41

I used to also read Dr Dobbs Journal back in the late '90s and early '00s even. The best monthly magazine about programming. I learned a lot from it.

Never knew that one.

IF ONLY I COULD FIND THEM ONLINE. Read them all. I would be soooo happpiieeee.

rowdy · « **Reply #6 on:** Mon, 09 October 2017, 21:00:01 »

Quote from: iLLucionist on Mon, 09 October 2017, 13:20:08

Quote from: Findecanor on Mon, 09 October 2017, 02:26:41
I used to also read Dr Dobbs Journal back in the late '90s and early '00s even. The best monthly magazine about programming. I learned a lot from it.

Never knew that one.

IF ONLY I COULD FIND THEM ONLINE. Read them all. I would be soooo happpiieeee.

https://archive.org/details/byte-magazine-rescans

Zobeid Zuma · « **Reply #7 on:** Mon, 09 October 2017, 22:31:04 »

I had mixed feelings about Byte. It was fun to flip through sometimes, even just looking at the ads. But I was into Atari and Amiga, while Byte was all about PC, PC clones, more PC clones. And sometimes a bit of Unix or networking stuff (which I didn't understand at all). Also keep in mind that PCs in those days didn't have the awesome hardware specs required to run Unix. You needed a super-expensive graphics workstation with something like 16 MB of RAM—minimum!—to handle Unix.

Two or three years after the Mac debuted, they had a large article covering all the different attempts to add a GUI-WIMP desktop environment to Unix. OSF Motif was one such project, and I can't even remember the others now. It was like a prophetic glimpse into the future of the GNOME/MATE/Cinnamon/Xfce/KDE/Unity wars! Hard to believe in 2017 that battle still rages.

It was a moment of great joy for me when the Commodore Amiga 3000 came out and appeared on the COVER of Byte, along with a big, optimistic article explaining how Commodore had finally got their act together and were going to compete with Apple and IBM (and the many, many clones) in both home and business markets.

And of course, that was right before Commodore's death spiral began.

iLLucionist · « **Reply #8 on:** Tue, 10 October 2017, 17:33:25 »

Quote from: rowdy on Mon, 09 October 2017, 21:00:01

Quote from: iLLucionist on Mon, 09 October 2017, 13:20:08
Quote from: Findecanor on Mon, 09 October 2017, 02:26:41
I used to also read Dr Dobbs Journal back in the late '90s and early '00s even. The best monthly magazine about programming. I learned a lot from it.

Never knew that one.

IF ONLY I COULD FIND THEM ONLINE. Read them all. I would be soooo happpiieeee.

https://archive.org/details/byte-magazine-rescans

I have literally spend 3 hours now there. It's really great!

rowdy · « **Reply #9 on:** Tue, 10 October 2017, 20:49:40 »

Quote from: iLLucionist on Tue, 10 October 2017, 17:33:25

Quote from: rowdy on Mon, 09 October 2017, 21:00:01
Quote from: iLLucionist on Mon, 09 October 2017, 13:20:08
Quote from: Findecanor on Mon, 09 October 2017, 02:26:41
I used to also read Dr Dobbs Journal back in the late '90s and early '00s even. The best monthly magazine about programming. I learned a lot from it.

Never knew that one.

IF ONLY I COULD FIND THEM ONLINE. Read them all. I would be soooo happpiieeee.

https://archive.org/details/byte-magazine-rescans

I have literally spend 3 hours now there. It's really great!

The magazines back then had things in it that you thought "Yes, I could do that too!"

These days you'd need a team of highly trained engineers and millions of dollars funding to copy half the things out there.

TacticalCoder · « **Reply #10 on:** Wed, 18 October 2017, 22:10:18 »

Quote from: iLLucionist on Sun, 08 October 2017, 06:13:09

Mmm yess... the nostalgia. Well, I wasn't invented back then (29 yo), but anyway.

WinNT vs OS/2. WP 5.1 vs Word for Windows. COREL! Draw. DOS 5.22 vs DOS 6.0. 8080, Macintosh, IBM PC.

Big box software. CRTs. ISA. Riser cards. Coprocessor. FPU.

I wish I could buy ALL Byte Magazines somewhere..

Have you read it? Don't you miss those kind of hardcore, in-depth, magazines? IT EVEN HAD CODE LISTINGS!

I probably still have a few somewhere. I clearly remember Jerry Pournelle and his "Chaos Manor" where he'd try lots of stuff and reports back in BYTE. But I'm from the EU and I was into C64 and then Amiga while BYTE was kinda US-centric and PC-centric so I wasn't an avid reader... But I do remember reading a few of these.

I installed OS/2 back in the days on a PC: got it for free from a friend of my mom who worked at IBM and knew I was into computers. First PC was a 386 but then I received a 286 for free a while after. No FPU indeed: was an add-on that you'd plug into the motherboard!

The craziest thing to me to this day was the "turbo" button where I could turn my 486 (?) from 33 to 44 Mhz, something like that... But it would work while the computer was working, including while games were running!

The noise these old PC alim would do was crazy: so with my neighbour I built a system lowering the alim fan speed depending on the temp of a termistance. And I'd put my HDD into a "muffler" to lower its noise. I'd use carpet inside the tower case too. Anything to make these monsters less noisy. I was a kid and had no idea what I was doing, but things worked well enough!

Another good one: I'd take quality japanese fans and wire the 12V and the 5V from the alim to create 7V so the fans would rotate slower than at 12V... Did that for years and years and years. Basically I had quiet PCs before that was even a thing.

Oh the memories... Thanks for starting these threads mate!

iLLucionist · « **Reply #11 on:** Thu, 19 October 2017, 04:09:26 »

Quote from: rowdy on Tue, 10 October 2017, 20:49:40

Quote from: iLLucionist on Tue, 10 October 2017, 17:33:25
Quote from: rowdy on Mon, 09 October 2017, 21:00:01
Quote from: iLLucionist on Mon, 09 October 2017, 13:20:08
Quote from: Findecanor on Mon, 09 October 2017, 02:26:41
I used to also read Dr Dobbs Journal back in the late '90s and early '00s even. The best monthly magazine about programming. I learned a lot from it.

Never knew that one.

IF ONLY I COULD FIND THEM ONLINE. Read them all. I would be soooo happpiieeee.

https://archive.org/details/byte-magazine-rescans

I have literally spend 3 hours now there. It's really great!

The magazines back then had things in it that you thought "Yes, I could do that too!"

These days you'd need a team of highly trained engineers and millions of dollars funding to copy half the things out there.

Accurate AF. Sometimes they even had electronics layed out and explained how to program it via com port or some sorts.

iLLucionist · « **Reply #12 on:** Thu, 19 October 2017, 04:10:34 »

Quote from: TacticalCoder on Wed, 18 October 2017, 22:10:18

Quote from: iLLucionist on Sun, 08 October 2017, 06:13:09
Mmm yess... the nostalgia. Well, I wasn't invented back then (29 yo), but anyway.

WinNT vs OS/2. WP 5.1 vs Word for Windows. COREL! Draw. DOS 5.22 vs DOS 6.0. 8080, Macintosh, IBM PC.

Big box software. CRTs. ISA. Riser cards. Coprocessor. FPU.

I wish I could buy ALL Byte Magazines somewhere..

Have you read it? Don't you miss those kind of hardcore, in-depth, magazines? IT EVEN HAD CODE LISTINGS!

I probably still have a few somewhere. I clearly remember Jerry Pournelle and his "Chaos Manor" where he'd try lots of stuff and reports back in BYTE. But I'm from the EU and I was into C64 and then Amiga while BYTE was kinda US-centric and PC-centric so I wasn't an avid reader... But I do remember reading a few of these.

I installed OS/2 back in the days on a PC: got it for free from a friend of my mom who worked at IBM and knew I was into computers. First PC was a 386 but then I received a 286 for free a while after. No FPU indeed: was an add-on that you'd plug into the motherboard!

The craziest thing to me to this day was the "turbo" button where I could turn my 486 (?) from 33 to 44 Mhz, something like that... But it would work while the computer was working, including while games were running!

The noise these old PC alim would do was crazy: so with my neighbour I built a system lowering the alim fan speed depending on the temp of a termistance. And I'd put my HDD into a "muffler" to lower its noise. I'd use carpet inside the tower case too. Anything to make these monsters less noisy. I was a kid and had no idea what I was doing, but things worked well enough!

Another good one: I'd take quality japanese fans and wire the 12V and the 5V from the alim to create 7V so the fans would rotate slower than at 12V... Did that for years and years and years. Basically I had quiet PCs before that was even a thing.

Oh the memories... Thanks for starting these threads mate!

Ahh the nostalgia... so good. I miss those days when there was more to "hack" on computers, both software and hardware wise.

I remember the joy I felt when I managed to program something, because on DOS your program is the only thing that ran. So it really felt like YOU were CONTROLLING THE WHOLE computer. Especially when using interrupts and blitting to the screen manually etc. Like you are taking reign of your resources.

sth · « **Reply #13 on:** Thu, 19 October 2017, 04:20:19 »

anyone here remember MacAddict?

i found about 4 years' worth of backissues in the free pile at my library as a kid and it blew my mind that people were THAT into a specific type of computer. i still blame them for my smug, sarcastic sense of superiority when it comes to taste in hardware :/

iLLucionist · « **Reply #14 on:** Thu, 19 October 2017, 04:36:15 »

Quote from: sth on Thu, 19 October 2017, 04:20:19

anyone here remember MacAddict?

i found about 4 years' worth of backissues in the free pile at my library as a kid and it blew my mind that people were THAT into a specific type of computer. i still blame them for my smug, sarcastic sense of superiority when it comes to taste in hardware :/

I was only into ThinkPascal back in the day and ResEdit. Macworld had a magazine right? But it was never so thorough as BYTE.

sth · « **Reply #15 on:** Thu, 19 October 2017, 18:02:54 »

Quote from: iLLucionist on Thu, 19 October 2017, 04:36:15

Quote from: sth on Thu, 19 October 2017, 04:20:19
anyone here remember MacAddict?

i found about 4 years' worth of backissues in the free pile at my library as a kid and it blew my mind that people were THAT into a specific type of computer. i still blame them for my smug, sarcastic sense of superiority when it comes to taste in hardware :/

I was only into ThinkPascal back in the day and ResEdit. Macworld had a magazine right? But it was never so thorough as BYTE.

Macworld:PC Magazine::MacAddict:Byte

macworld was the boooooring one

rowdy · « **Reply #16 on:** Thu, 19 October 2017, 20:50:30 »

Magazines with program listings that you could type in yourself.

Then they started including a 3.5" floppy disk with each issue.

Then a CD.

Then a DVD.

Now they don't bother, as anything included on the cover disk would be out of date by the time the magazine was printed, published and made it onto the shelves.

I've still got a box of floppies and CDs somewhere.

sth · « **Reply #17 on:** Thu, 19 October 2017, 21:40:20 »

Quote from: rowdy on Thu, 19 October 2017, 20:50:30

Magazines with program listings that you could type in yourself.

Then they started including a 3.5" floppy disk with each issue.

Then a CD.

Then a DVD.

Now they don't bother, as anything included on the cover disk would be out of date by the time the magazine was printed, published and made it onto the shelves.

I've still got a box of floppies and CDs somewhere.

I'm baffled they still do linux magazines with LiveDVDs in the US.

iLLucionist · « **Reply #18 on:** Fri, 20 October 2017, 07:15:16 »

Quote from: sth on Thu, 19 October 2017, 21:40:20

Quote from: rowdy on Thu, 19 October 2017, 20:50:30
Magazines with program listings that you could type in yourself.

Then they started including a 3.5" floppy disk with each issue.

Then a CD.

Then a DVD.

Now they don't bother, as anything included on the cover disk would be out of date by the time the magazine was printed, published and made it onto the shelves.

I've still got a box of floppies and CDs somewhere.

I'm baffled they still do linux magazines with LiveDVDs in the US.

That's how I got into Linux.. special issue on installing Linux. It was SUSE 7.1 or 7.2. I digged the look of kde back then.. with the dotted title bar, a hip file browser, configurable everything. Mmm

rowdy · « **Reply #19 on:** Fri, 20 October 2017, 21:46:12 »

Quote from: sth on Thu, 19 October 2017, 21:40:20

Quote from: rowdy on Thu, 19 October 2017, 20:50:30
Magazines with program listings that you could type in yourself.

Then they started including a 3.5" floppy disk with each issue.

Then a CD.

Then a DVD.

Now they don't bother, as anything included on the cover disk would be out of date by the time the magazine was printed, published and made it onto the shelves.

I've still got a box of floppies and CDs somewhere.

I'm baffled they still do linux magazines with LiveDVDs in the US.

For a lot of people downloading a whole ISO would be too much. Lots of kids have mobile-only internet connection with large fees for exceeding the download allowance (is that still a thing outside Australia?)

So any CD/DVD with an OS on it will save having to download 700M - 4GB.

sth · « **Reply #20 on:** Tue, 24 October 2017, 16:34:37 »

Quote from: rowdy on Fri, 20 October 2017, 21:46:12

Quote from: sth on Thu, 19 October 2017, 21:40:20
Quote from: rowdy on Thu, 19 October 2017, 20:50:30
Magazines with program listings that you could type in yourself.

Then they started including a 3.5" floppy disk with each issue.

Then a CD.

Then a DVD.

Now they don't bother, as anything included on the cover disk would be out of date by the time the magazine was printed, published and made it onto the shelves.

I've still got a box of floppies and CDs somewhere.

I'm baffled they still do linux magazines with LiveDVDs in the US.

For a lot of people downloading a whole ISO would be too much. Lots of kids have mobile-only internet connection with large fees for exceeding the download allowance (is that still a thing outside Australia?)

So any CD/DVD with an OS on it will save having to download 700M - 4GB.

well, usually 4G data is capped in the US for mobile connections. however, if you have access to a computer on which to install linux, chances are good that it's a laptop nowadays, which you can take to a cafe to download an ISO via wifi for less than the cover cost of a magazine (even with a $5 coffee at starbucks).

home internet connections are usually capped at a few hundred GB or more per month so its often not a big deal if you already have internet access at home. i know AUS has been different in its approach though.

rowdy · « **Reply #21 on:** Tue, 24 October 2017, 20:43:23 »

Quote from: sth on Tue, 24 October 2017, 16:34:37

Quote from: rowdy on Fri, 20 October 2017, 21:46:12
Quote from: sth on Thu, 19 October 2017, 21:40:20
Quote from: rowdy on Thu, 19 October 2017, 20:50:30
Magazines with program listings that you could type in yourself.

Then they started including a 3.5" floppy disk with each issue.

Then a CD.

Then a DVD.

Now they don't bother, as anything included on the cover disk would be out of date by the time the magazine was printed, published and made it onto the shelves.

I've still got a box of floppies and CDs somewhere.

I'm baffled they still do linux magazines with LiveDVDs in the US.

For a lot of people downloading a whole ISO would be too much. Lots of kids have mobile-only internet connection with large fees for exceeding the download allowance (is that still a thing outside Australia?)

So any CD/DVD with an OS on it will save having to download 700M - 4GB.

well, usually 4G data is capped in the US for mobile connections. however, if you have access to a computer on which to install linux, chances are good that it's a laptop nowadays, which you can take to a cafe to download an ISO via wifi for less than the cover cost of a magazine (even with a $5 coffee at starbucks).

home internet connections are usually capped at a few hundred GB or more per month so its often not a big deal if you already have internet access at home. i know AUS has been different in its approach though.

LOL not in Straya.

If I tried to download 4GB in a cafe I'd be there for months!

News:

Author Topic: BYTE MAGAZINE. Have you read it? (Read 6482 times)