The MITS Altair 8800 was a microcomputer design from 1975, based on the Intel 8080A CPU. Sold as a kit through Popular Electronics magazine, the designers intended to sell only a few hundred to hobbyists, and were surprised when they sold over ten times that many in the first month. Today the Altair is widely recognized as the spark that led to the personal computer revolution of the next few years: The computer bus designed for the Altair was to become a de facto standard in form of the S-100 bus, and the first programming language for the machine was Microsoft's founding product, Altair BASIC.
History
While serving at the
Air Force Weapons Laboratory at
Kirtland Air Force base, New Mexico,
Ed Roberts and
Forrest M. Mims III decided to use their electronics background to produce small kits for
model rocket hobbyists. Roberts and Mims, along with Stan Cagle and Robert Zaller, founded
Micro Instrumentation and Telemetry Systems (
MITS) in Roberts' garage in
Albuquerque, New Mexico, and started selling
radio transmitters and instruments for
model rockets.
In
1969 Roberts bought out the others and moved to a larger office, where he manufactured
calculator kits for hobbyists. Mims assisted by writing manuals for some of the products in return for kits. In
1972,
Texas Instruments developed their own calculator chip and started selling complete calculators at more than half the going rate. MITS was devastated by this, as were many other companies, and Roberts struggled to reduce his quarter-million dollar debt.
With the release of the first
8-bit microprocessor, the
Intel 8008, in
1972, and the more powerful 8080 in
1974, a number of hobbyists started designing microcomputer kits. In July 1974, one such design, Jonathan Titus' well thought-out
Mark-8, based on the 8008, was advertised in
Radio-Electronics magazine. The design was purely on paper, requiring the builder to track down the parts one at a time, a task that was basically impossible outside of
California. Although the Mark-8 was not a success, the editors at
Popular Electronics realized that someone was going to be the first to deliver a "real" kit, and decided they wanted to do it. At this point the story becomes somewhat less clear.
The design
Roberts looked for a deal on
CPUs, and eventually talked
Intel into supplying him with cosmetically blemished 8080's for $75, when they normally sold for $360. In fact the deal wasn't quite as shrewd as Roberts thought at the time; Intel chose the $360 price simply as a play on the famous
IBM System/360 mainframe. The name finally decided upon for the computer came from Solomon's 12-year-old daughter, Lauren. She suggested
Altair, which was the destination for the Starship Enterprise during an episode of
Star Trek that she was watching.
More on
[ Altair 8800 ]
Altair 8800 - Twitter SearchThe Altair 8800, the first PC, was named after a galaxy on Star Trek.ThatGirlCA (ThatGirlCA) Sun, 27 Dec 2009 07:44:21 -0000
The Altair 8800, the first PC, was named after a galaxy on Star Trek.
@altair8800ããããã¡ããã¨åã®é¡ãè¼ã£ã¦ãæ±äººãµã¤ãã®URLããã¤ã¬ã¯ãã§éã£ã¦ããããï½ãã£ã¨æããã¾ãï¼e_riko (Eriko) Fri, 25 Dec 2009 22:26:34 -0000
@altair8800 りょうちゃんと君の顔が載ってる求人サイトのURLをダイレクトで送っておいたよwもっと怒りたまえ!
@ogaoga_thom @altair8800 @yongpilãåã®ä¼ç¤¾ã®ç¤¾é·ã¯åãäºåæ ¡ã®åãã³ã¼ã¹ã«éã£ã¦ãããã¨ãç¥ãä½ã¨ãªãå«ãªæ°åï½ããåã«ãåãå¾è¼©ã§ãããã£ã¦è¨ããããã¨ãã£ãããã»ã»ã»å½¼ã¯æç³»ã§ç§ã¯çç³»ã ããéãã£ã¦ãã¨ã«ãã¦ãããã»ã»ã»e_riko (Eriko) Fri, 25 Dec 2009 17:50:55 -0000
@ogaoga_thom @altair8800 @yongpil 前の会社の社長は同じ予備校の同じコースに通っていたことを知り何となく嫌な気分wあ、前に「僕、後輩ですよ」って言われたことあったかも・・・彼は文系で私は理系だから違うってことにしておこう・・・
@ogaoga_thom @ogaoga_thomãæ¨æ¥ã¨ãããã¨åé«ªãæ¿ã«ãªã£ã¦ã人ã«ã彼女å±
ã人ã¯ããããï½ãã©ãã俺ãªãããã¨ãè¨ããã¦ããã ãã¼ãªã¼ã¨ãæ³åãã¦ã¿ãï½ãã¨ã@altair8800ã®ã¯ãªã¹ãã¹ãªãã¦å»å¹´çµãã£ãçºè¨ã«ãã¦ã±ã¿ï½ã¨ã³ã¸ãã¢ãã¼ã æ¨æï½e_riko (Eriko) Fri, 25 Dec 2009 12:10:09 -0000
@ogaoga_thom @ogaoga_thomが昨日ときょうと前髪が板になってる人に「彼女居る人はいいよね~、どうせ俺なんか」とか言われてるんだろーなーとか想像してみたwあと、@altair8800のクリスマスなんて去年終わった発言にもウケタwエンジニアチーム惨敗w
The nerd in me really wants an Altair 8800 so I can flip a bunch of switches to figure out 2+2.bulentm (Bulent M.) Thu, 24 Dec 2009 19:33:36 -0000
The nerd in me really wants an Altair 8800 so I can flip a bunch of switches to figure out 2+2.
@altair8800 ããã飲ã¿ãããã¨å¯ããªããªãããã³ã«ã³ã¼ã©ã®300åã®ã«ãã§ã¤ã³ã§ãã¢ã¡ãªã«ã§ä¸æ¯æ£è
æ¿å¢ä¸ï¼ï½ï½DJmart7 (Mart Takeuchi) Thu, 24 Dec 2009 10:09:39 -0000
@altair8800 これ、飲みすぎると寝れなくなるぞ。コカコーラの300倍のカフェインで、アメリカで中毒患者激増中!ww
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Altair - Brief article on the history of the Altair 8800.
MITS Altair 8800 - Considered by many to be the first microcomputer, the MITS altair 8800 was based on a 2 MHz Intel 8080 with 256 bytes standard RAM and interfaced with the user through the octal front panel switches. This unit has an 8 floppy disk drive.
The SIMH Altair 8800 Z80 simulator - Altair emulator for PC and Mac.
Meta Description: [ CP/M emulation ]