On Oct 20, 2009, at 4:36 PM, Richard Gerome wrote:
> > How did that ever come to be??? I often wondered about that... It > should be PC for windows and PPC for Apples!!! In the old days I > always referred to them as Apple base or IBM base computer but > somewhere along the way someone changed it??? Who did??? CoolKat > Well calling an Apple a PPC would have been rather confusing in the day when Apple's ran on a 6502 CPU! In the beginning they were called generically 'microcomputers' in order to differentiate them from mainframe and minicomputers, which were still very large devices owned by universities and corporations. The abbreviation 'PC' specifically identifying DOS-based (and later Windows-based) computers dates back to the introduction of the IBM PC. (I was there at the time...I remember a buddy of mine who was an engineer fro IBM coming home excitedly one day with a big white box with a couple of floppy drives in it and that distinctive IBM green phosphor monitor. He was one of the lucky IBM employees to get one of the first ones off the line at an employee discount. He'd splurged and got a whopping 64 megabytes of RAM in his.) Initially 'PC' ONLY referred to the IBM system; later systems that were compatible were called 'PC-Compatible'. They ALWAYS ran MS/PC-DOS and were based on the 8088 chip. All computers at the time were called by their manufacturer's model names: Apple II, Commodore 63, TRS-80, and on and on. At the time IBM- PC was only one of the many such models. As the PC and it's clones came to dominate the industry, usage slipped and 'PC' came to identify any Windows or DOS-based 808x system. It was NEVER used in the sense of 'all small consumer-owned computers', at least not in the computer literature of the time. Anyone referring to PC's in that fashion pretty much believed that all such computers WERE DOS/Windows-based systems. -- Bruce Johnson University of Arizona College of Pharmacy Information Technology Group Institutions do not have opinions, merely customs --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are a member of G-Group, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
