News

Face it; that "antique" computer is not going to be worth money!

The Hunky Mouse just got the good news that the Computer Museum in Swindon has started a mobile computer section. A chance, at last, to clear out the attic and make a few bob? Apparently ... not.

In fact, it seems that there never was a commodity other than fried fish which was less likely to become an investment, than antique computers. Put it this way, the Museum of Computing isn't having to fork out a fortune on exhibits.

Organiser Simon Webb is very pleased with his new acquisitions. "We've had a few new machines loaned/donated, a UK101, Jupiter Ace (at last!) and a Nascom II in a rather natty wooden case. A PET 2001 is arriving Saturday." All very nice, but not mobile, are they?

"No. I'm trying to put together a sub-exhibition of mobile computers, now have an Agenda and just picked up a Psion MC400 from a car boot today for £3! Unreal isn't it?"

Your Sniffer is trying not to face up to facts. First, that MC400 he's been carefully avoiding in his monthly "junk clear-outs" is, really, just junk, isn't it? And second, the trouble with antique computers is that nobody will ever want to do anything with them.

Take that lovely Commodore Pet. It has a whole eight kilobytes of memory ...

A car five times as old as the Pet is still a working model, and you could drive from London to Brighton in it. A Pet is about good enough to run a quick Basic For ... Next loop a thousand times. Well, "quick" hardly describes it - you can time it with the second hand of the station clock.

Time to hire that skip ...