Well, my first Mac ...wasn't mine, actually. The story is ....
I was waiting outside the classroom for Oceanography 115 to begin, all proud of
myself because I'd managed to type up my notes using WordStar, and print them
out using my first PC-XT (well, it was really my second one: I - quite
literally - "blew up" the first one ...sparks flew out the back, and smoke
poured from the case ...it was all my fault really, but the manufacturer
replaced it anyways). It was a 10MHz /640K /18MB HD /720K FD /Hercules
"graphics" card, AND a for-real Central Point copy card - it really would copy
ANYTHING, even physically altered copy protection stuff - "screamer".
Anyways as I was standing there, a friend came up and we got to talking about
class and - literally - comparing notes. I was stunned: not only did his notes
flat-out look better (fancy fonts, etc.), BUT HE HAD DIAGRAMS "drawn" on the
page too ...he'd bought a Mac Plus and printer ...then he told me what he paid:
way out of my reach (I'd borrowed the money to buy the XT in the first place).
But you still had to "learn to use it" (the PC was a *constant* struggle ...and
using one wasn't easy being, what with being an "early adopter" in a small
rural
community), so I asked him how he'd managed all that (ruefully comparing it
with
my plain typewriter "font" printouts). He just grinned, and said "Well, I
figure
a computer should be about as hard to use as a telephone."
I've never forgotten his words.
And even if I couldn't afford a Mac then (nor for a long time after), Mac
"lust"
set in rather early.
It would be years before my first one "arrived" ...it came in several soiled
pieces ...slightly charred, a bit melted, and still smelling of smoke. Yeah.
Burnt. A friend came by and asked if I'd like to have this one sitting in the
trunk ("boot" to you Brits and Aussies) of his car that a friend of his had
given him, that had been damaged in a house fire? - YES! (So my first Mac, a
Classic II ...was a freebie.) I didn't know Macs from Jack, but (by then) I was
a PC guru, and figured how hard could it be to resurrect it?
The poor thing was simply a mess. So I took it totally apart. Dumped ALL the
parts in a big tub of warm soapy water in the back yard, and carefully scrubbed
it with a soft brush and rags, as clean as I could (after all, I figured it was
dead anyways ...and it simply smelled too bad to keep it inside the house like
it had been delivered; my wife wouldn't stand for it at all). After a few days
to let it dry off, I reassembled it ...turned it on ...and to my (and my
wife's)
wonderment, the little thing came up with what would later become a familiar
boing.
..and to a little Mac logo with a question mark. It turned out the hard drive
had been damaged. So more learning "adventures" immediately ensued, and I
eventually became pretty adept at working with Macs. Even to helping others "on
occasion".
What struck me most from the beginning though - other then thinking that they
were tough little buggers - was the ease of use of the interface: I started
with
System 7 (and pretty much "ended" with it, as I still use it), and still regard
it as one of the easiest, best laid-out, most intuitive UI's around. (And this
from someone who made a career or two out helping others with Microsoft
products.)
You didn't have to be a "guru" ...or make a career out fixing the thing ...to
be
extremely productive on a Macintosh with System 7. And learning new
applications
was so much easier then the "other alternatives". (I still actively collect
vintage Mac software applications.)
I admire the original all-in-one design for aesthetic reasons ...and for its
small non-obtrusive footprint. It is the "real" Mac to me.
But it's the Mac OS and the vintage applications that I actually "love" (if you
want to call it that ...perhaps "admire" is a better term, and appreciate
better
yet). System 7 designed applications were superb (still are) ...though sadly,
apparently no one thinks it important to write applications or OS's that are
based upon the kind of end-user intuitive design that is so apparent in the
vintage stuff anymore (and though I hardly need things to be "easy" for me to
use them, I still appreciate "intuitive" as a design goal).
It turns out that my old buddy from Oceanography 115 was spot on: a "good"
computer is one that "...is about as hard to use as a phone" ...and so I still
use the old stuff to get "real work" done. On a classic (SE/30) naturally. (All
puns intended!)
--- brandon davis ---
-- sacramento, ca --
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Compact Macs Digest #2292
1. Re: Why do you like them?
----- Original Message -----
And as someone who came late to Macs (7.5.n era), I didn't really 'get' a lot
of
the ethos behind the MacOS 'til I got my first Plus.
-Brian
----------------------------------------------------------------------
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