website/content/history/building-its-own-s-100-bus-based-system.md

title, date, years, topics, params

title	date	years	topics	params
BUILDING ITS OWN S-100 BUS BASED SYSTEM	1977-01-01	1977	Hardware	when image oc_id source month unknown 1977 /media/history/images/timeline_11-77_s100_1.jpg 19 url date https://web.archive.org/web/20221215134357/http://www.old-computers.com/history/detail.asp?n=19 2022-12-15

In this end of year 1977, when a computer fanatic wished to build himself a powerful and evolutional computer, he'd only have pactically one choice: to purchase a S-100 Bus based system, assembled or in kit form.
Several manufacturers were selling spare parts allowing to assemble progressively and at low cost a basic system.

The first step consisted in acquiring a box with a power supply and a bus card.
One had to choose then amongst several CPU cards available: Motorola 6800, MOS 6502, Intel 8080 and 8085 or Zilog Z80. The cards were provided assembled or in kit form. One had then to solder the components on the card.
A third essential part, the RAM card. It was composed of 2 to 64 Kb of static or dynamic memory chip.

At this stage, the computer was able to operate... providing that one could communicate with it! A teletype or video terminal plugged in the computer's serial port was then necessary.
After a few days of operation, the user noticed that he would most probably need to buy a backup system to save his programs. For a few hundred $ more, he would rapidly buy a card punch or a cassette recorder with the additional interface card.

Though his computer was working correctly and that our fanatic already spent approximately $1500, he's not yet acquainted that he'll have to spend approximately twice the price in the next months to purchase more memory, communication cards, one or two floppy drives, a printer, a modem...

In 1977, when one would like to acquire a real computer, one had to be passionate, very handy... and rich!