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Posting from a Vintage Computer?

Ole Juul said:
Debian 5.0. It's good on older machines because you can install it without a GUI and then just add X11 and something like Fluxbox without much ado. I think MS-Windows is generally more effective with lower ram. Linux seems memory hungry by comparison. Unfortunately I've never gotten familiar with Windows, but I get the impression that Win 98 is pretty polished and works well on older stuff.
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Debian 6.0 is the same way. but i agree completely, Windows is far better for machines with little RAM. win2k runs great all the way down to 32 MB.
 
It doesn't look like my ISP is giving me free dialup any more. :( Too bad, I wanted to test good ol Nettamer. (It has a built in stack and only does dialup.) Apart from being a killer e-mail app for ppp, it has basic FTP and HTTP download capability. I can't remember if it does forms, but if somebody here wants to check, I have old versions and three versions for XT, including the best one which is 1.08. Post here, or send me an e-mail if you want any of those and I'll put them on a server for you.
 
i'd love to try NetTamer, but i have no dial-up access whatsoever. it probably wouldn't even work well over my Vonage phone line. for those of us that can't do dial-up to an ISP though, there is always the possibility of shoving a modem in a modern box and connecting it directly to a vintage machine to act as a sort of ISP.
 
Mike Chambers said:
i'd love to try NetTamer, but i have no dial-up access whatsoever. it probably wouldn't even work well over my Vonage phone line. for those of us that can't do dial-up to an ISP though, there is always the possibility of shoving a modem in a modern box and connecting it directly to a vintage machine to act as a sort of ISP.
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There's an idea. I'm not sure it would be so easy with Colston's stack though. It's built right in so you can't fiddle with it. Perhaps it wants a dialtone. I wish I could remember. It was my main e-mail program for some years.
 
There was a seperate TCP package for v2.1 you buy at one point. WebExplorer:- http://spider.seds.org/os2/webex.html was part of Warp Connect IAK from memory and could be downloaded as an individual program. I didn't have much luck with it though. NS 2.02 (dispite the version number it was v3 code under the hood) was better.

You can get lynx for OS/2 to see if that'll work on v2.1 with the seperately available TCP/IP package and EMX 0.9c installed by the looks
 
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Thanks--the links given in the article are long dead, but the OS2BBS site has several versions of WE available. I'll give it a try when I get a chance.
 
It would appear WebEx is for OS/2 v3 up but it'd be interesting to see if it does run on 2.1.

# System requirements:

* OS / 2 Warp 3.0 (will not run otherwise)
* TCP / IP 3.0 or Internet Connection for OS / 2 or TCP/IP 2.0
* SLIP/PPP account, ISDN or direct connection

# Download size: 700 KB
# License: free for evaluation use
 
Ole Juul said:
Sorry, I got my laptops mixed up. (blush) They're Toshibas, but I went back and checked my notes and it was actually the PII with 64 megs ram. The PIII worked, but with only 256 megs it's still not comfortable for on some sites.
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That's not surprising. I'm at present experimenting with Slackware 13 on a P166mmx, 125megs of ram with dailup. This post is from it. Out of the three browsers-Firefox, Seamonky and Konqueror which do you think is the better on this machine?

To my surprise Konqueror is quicker, I've turned off the java stuff, disabled images and it seems to perform on par with Opera on the 200mmx. Tried putting Opera 10 on it but got an error. Might give 8.5 a shot. Konq. doesn't throw an error when Java is enabled like the other two either.
 

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Most of my old computer posting goes on on Uncreativelabs as they have different message board software that does not run things to death. It's a bit like 28.8K over broadband on my 286 running Arachne 1.73, but I can post over there. I think I have managed to get on over here a few times from that box too, though I shut off images and scripting. It's useable, but not great.

Just tried it from the 486 DX4-100 w/64MB of RAM and Windows For Workgroups 3.11 on it, renders pretty fast, but looks like an old, poorly coded message board, and I have some trouble logging in as the login and username fields are overlapping and the login button is nowhere to be found (!!!), this is under Netscape 4.08 though, not sure what IE 5.1 is like just yet as I have not tried it, maybe I will tonight if I have time. Also need to try Opera, and see if I can put together a Windows 2000 Professional installation in order to try Firefox, IE6/7/8, under 80486 power (ah yes, another loopy idea I have to try).

Have not been able to get either 8088 online yet, Minuet no longer works with my Comcast internet, I need some more free time to tinker with Lynx, and I doubt Arachne will be happy on an 8088.
 
NT4 and opera might be the go. I ran RH and Madrake linux 6.x on an all-in-one 486DX2/66 Compaq for a bit. Weird thing was Mandrake was ment to be for 586 up cpus but it installed without a hitch picking up all the hardware in the machine. Couldn't use the package managers though as they complained about achitecture type.

You'll see a discussion about it on Uncreative Labs.
 

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Text based services would seem to run well enough on virtually any vintage PC. Telnet, usenet, IRC all would function just fine.

I'm sure many a BBS used text-based forums that functioned similarly enough to the basics of this forum.
 
Ole Juul said:
I am posting from Lynx. The vBulletin interface is unfortunately just as amateurish and broken as it is with a GUI. This does show, however that it is possible to post on Vintage kit - at least that which will run Lynx. This is a PI, but I think any 386 should do it.
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I was going to mention that, glad somebody beat me to it. Also saved me the trouble of asking if it'd gotten any better since I last tried it. Yeah, it can be done but...I'd rather lobotomize myself with a mallet and an icepick!

--T
 
tezza said:
Browsing from a barely-capable machine would make a good kind of retrochallenge. It could go along the lines of.."Who can browse to this very simple HTML 1.0 page and successfully view it, go through to another page from it and post form contents from it".

The test page could be setup on a server and contain nothing beyond very simple HTML 1.0. No javascript, no css. The only thing allowed in the page would be a hyperlink to another page (which needed to be clicked through to), a 256 colour image, and a simple form. In other words, the basic ingredients of web pages when they first appeared

To enter, people would have to submit photographs of their vintage screens showing the main page, click through page, and an email from the form as proof it actually worked for them. People could cheat by seprately loading the second page rather than clicking from the first so click through success would need to be verfied from server logs, that the judge(s) would have access to.

The prize (i.e. Kudos) would go to that person was successful with the oldest machine.

Of no practical use whatsoever of course, but it could be kinda fun.

Tez
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Set the WayBack machine to 1992, Mr. Peabody...

Are we allowed to go retro with this game?
First time I hit the Inet (no web browsing yet), I was on a '286-based machine, but only for about a month-or-so, when I upgraded to a '386SX @16MHz and a 14400 bps modem. I was actually going through a portal on my friend Charlie's Amiga-based BBS, which he was kind enough to give me one of his spare accounts on. Then I was able to telnet to the old now-defunct Detroit FreeNet, (via MichNet), where I'd do some IRC-ing in between tunneling from one GOPHER hole to another (or sum'n like that...the details are a little fuzzy now). Used to p!ss me off though, cause my friend in Detroit had a much faster connection from his house about a mile away from the server @Oakland U than I did from 90 miles out, and he was using a Tandy 1000 @2400baud! Don't y'all miss those ol' copper wire days?

--T
 
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gubbish said:
Would it be cheating to use some sort of proxy to strip out the complicated stuff and view/post to the forum with your VinComp in a text-only interface? Kind of like hitching your donkey to the USS Enterprise, but I like when you can actually do real tasks with the donkey..
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Oh, wait. Let's get the rules straight now. Does hanging a TRS-80 M100 off the serial port of a P-II box as a dumb terminal count? Think it's painful to look at this board under lynx on a real screen, try it on a reflective, 8x32 LCD! I'd rather not talk about it...(but I can show ya if you'd like)...uuuugghhhhh!!!

--T
 
OJ said:
If you think about it, there's a lot on every web page that we ignore--much of browsing content is pure noise.
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I hear ya, even I have a lot of trouble with pages that are just too 'busy'.

commodorejohn said:
I fully agree re: minimalist web design. Unfortunately people lost sight of the fact that people visit web sites for content years ago (I don't know exactly when, but it was endemic by 2006 at the latest.) Nowadays finding a site that keeps a simple, unobtrusive visual style and uses Flash and Javascript only where HTML/CSS simply won't suffice is a rare pleasure indeed...
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I first began fighting such trends ~1994, while working with the Michigan Assistive Technology Clearing House. If you think it's tough on us, try accessing this, or any other website using a screen reader, as blind folk have to do. I don't know how far that tech has advanced since '99, when the BB closed down for want of any accessible software that was Y2K compliant, and I moved on to other interests, but it was pretty painful then even with the best SOTA systems and softwares. Some people just don't think about such matters as accessibility for those with disabilities when designing pages, writing software, etc. And of course, every time someone comes up with a solution to a problem, someone else finds a new way to bust the web for others less fortunate.

--T
 
Terry Yager said:
Oh, wait. Let's get the rules straight now. Does hanging a TRS-80 M100 off the serial port of a P-II box as a dumb terminal count? Think it's painful to look at this board under lynx on a real screen, try it on a reflective, 8x32 LCD! I'd rather not talk about it...(but I can show ya if you'd like)...uuuugghhhhh!!!

--T
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Puleeeze!!! 8 x 40, if you don't mind!
 
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