[pdurrant]

Spoiler:

Originally Posted by wodin

I put together my first white box in 1985. It was an XT clone with a 20 MB drive, a double sided double density 5.25" floppy drive, 1 MB of RAM (in the words of Mr. Gates "More than anyone would ever need!"), and a 12" 16 color CGA monitor all in a flip top box and the total bill was right at $1,000. A Star NX-10 dot matrix printer was another $200.

I hestitate to suggest it, but I think your memory must be faulty. I have in front of me a UK computer magazine from December 1985.

The cheapest hard disk I can find in the adverts is £595 for 10MB.
12" colour monitors were at least £150
1MB RAM wasn't possible in an XT clone - 640KB maximum. 512KB add on memory for IBMs is listed as £275.
A 1.2MB floppy drive was at least £100.


Even allowing for the common $1:£1 computer 'exchange' rate of the time, I find it very hard to believe that you could have put together the system you describe for $1000 in 1985.


Also, I can't find the Star MX-10 in it. The user manual that's online has a copyright date of 1986.
A Star SG-10 cost around £200. and was the cheapest of the star range.


I could believe such a system in 1986 or 1987.