Retro Computing Archives

Windows XP on SSD

Dave Farquhar Retro Computing June 21, 2023June 10, 2023

A perception exists that you can’t use an SSD with Windows XP. Although it is true that Windows XP was not designed for SSDs and did not specifically support them, that doesn’t mean you can’t use them together. In this blog post, I will talk about the pros and cons of using an SSD with Windows XP.

Dave Farquhar

David Farquhar is a computer security professional, entrepreneur, and author. He has written professionally about computers since 1991, so he was writing about retro computers when they were still new. He has been working in IT professionally since 1994 and has specialized in vulnerability management since 2013. He holds Security+ and CISSP certifications. Today he blogs five times a week, mostly about retro computers and retro gaming covering the time period from 1975 to 2000.

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Packard Bell Corner PC

Dave Farquhar Retro Computing June 13, 2023June 11, 2023

The Packard Bell Corner PC is an oddball PC from the 1995 to 1996 time frame. It was Packard Bell’s attempt to make something that looked a little different from the traditional boxy desktop or tower PC. The exact model number varied between retailers but I know it was sold as the Axcel 459CD or as the PB 2000. But if you just call it the Packard Bell Corner Computer or Corner PC, almost anyone familiar with that era knows what you’re talking about.

The Packard Bell Corner PC sold for $1,299 without a monitor. The least expensive monitors Packard Bell offered sold for around $250, but you could get as much as a 20-inch display for it, which added $1,700 to the price. Yes, the top of the line monitor cost considerably more than the computer.

Dave Farquhar

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Pentium MMX retro gaming PC

Dave Farquhar Retro Computing May 8, 2023May 9, 2025

The Pentium MMX represents a sweet spot in retro computing. Prices aren’t too far out of hand yet, and with one system and a utility, you can slow it down to match speeds with various other vintage systems, including the 386 and 486 generation, for running speed-sensitive games. This means one system can run DOS games going back to approximately 1987 or 1988, and still do relatively well with DOS and Windows games up to approximately 1998.

It also means you can use relatively inexpensive and still-plentiful PCI cards. PCI-based 486s exist but they are uncommon and getting expensive. And 386 PCI motherboards don’t exist.

Dave Farquhar

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MFM vs IDE hard drives

Dave Farquhar Retro Computing May 3, 2023April 30, 2023

IDE was the standard PC hard drive connection type for around a decade and a half. The only standard that outlasted it was SATA, which is a direct descendant. IDE was a much greater departure from the standard it replaced, which we commonly call MFM.

IDE was an acronym for Integrated Drive Electronics. The earlier standard, which we colloquially call MFM but would more properly call ST506, put most of the drive control logic on the host interface, which was whatever controller card you connected to the computer to interface it to the drive.

Dave Farquhar

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Insignia RCA to HDMI converter review

Dave Farquhar Retro Computing May 2, 2023September 8, 2023

Best Buy sells two devices under its Insignia house brand to help you use HDMI equipment with older devices. One of them is intended to allow you to connect old game consoles, VCRs, video cameras, or other devices with RCA outputs to an HDMI TV. This is my Insignia RCA to HDMI Converter review.

Note that Best Buy has another device that does the opposite. When you are buying one in the store, be very careful that you are buying the device you intend to get. The RCA to HDMI converter has a model number ending in zero: NS-HZ330. There’s a device with a different model number that does the opposite.

Dave Farquhar

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Miniscribe Brick: A hard drive scandal

Dave Farquhar Retro Computing April 28, 2023December 24, 2025

The Miniscribe Brick refers to an accounting scandal perpetuated by Miniscribe Corporation, a defunct manufacturer of hard drives. CEO Quentin Thomas Wiles and CFO Patrick J. Schleibaum served time in Federal prison as a result of fallout from Miniscribe’s accounting practices, which included counting bricks as hard drive inventory.

Dave Farquhar

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Blowing into NES cartridges

Dave Farquhar Retro Computing April 18, 2023April 18, 2023

Blowing into NES cartridges is something almost any member of Generation X can remember doing at some point. The schoolyard wisdom was that when your NES cartridge didn’t work and console gave a flashing red light, blowing into a Nintendo cartridge helped it work. In this blog post, we’ll explore why it became a common practice, and why it is not a good practice and what you should do instead.

Dave Farquhar

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The Bell and Howell Apple II

Dave Farquhar Retro Computing April 7, 2023April 16, 2025

The Bell and Howell Apple II, also known as the Darth Vader Apple II, was a slightly modified Apple II for the education market manufactured by Apple but distributed and supported by Bell and Howell. It is a curiosity for collectors today, and a potential pitfall.

Dave Farquhar

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Microsoft Softcard: How it transformed the company

Dave Farquhar Retro Computing April 3, 2023September 16, 2024

The Microsoft Softcard, released April 2, 1980, was Microsoft’s first hardware product. Not only that, it was a hardware product that made two products from two of its historical rivals work together. For those reasons and more, it is a historically very important product. But even more important was how this hardware product from a software company changed Microsoft’s trajectory dramatically, and in unexpected ways.

Dave Farquhar

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Desktop keyboard drawer: Unheralded retro accessory

Dave Farquhar Retro Computing March 31, 2023March 9, 2026

I don’t look for vintage computers in the wild nearly as much anymore as I look for vintage computer accessories. I was very happy to find a vintage desktop keyboard drawer less than 6 miles from home. And I bought it straight out of the room its previous owner probably used it in for a good three decades.

Dave Farquhar

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