The Silicon Underground

Compute!’s Gazette magazine, 1983-1995

Dave Farquhar — Fri, 03 Jul 2026 11:00:24 +0000

In July 1983, one of my personal favorite Commodore computer magazines of all time, Compute!’s Gazette, was born. An offshoot of the general computer magazine Compute!, Gazette’s first issue was dated July 1983 and quickly proved successful, closely following the

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Jack Tramiel and Atari

Dave Farquhar — Thu, 02 Jul 2026 11:00:43 +0000

On July 2, 1984, Atari got a new owner. After a disastrous 1983, its owner, Warner Communications, wanted out, just a year and a half after Atari had $2 billion in sales. It went from being called the greatest acquisition

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The earliest surviving Tom’s Hardware Guide article

Dave Farquhar — Wed, 01 Jul 2026 11:00:26 +0000

The earliest dated article still active on Tom’s Hardware Guide is dated July 1, 1996. It was an article about CPU softmenus, something we pretty much take for granted today, but at the time was only available on select Abit

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Apricot Computers: An underrated British brand

Dave Farquhar — Tue, 30 Jun 2026 11:00:31 +0000

You hear a lot about Sinclair and Amstrad and Acorn computers. But when it comes to British brands, it seems like we don’t hear a lot about Apricot. But thanks to a television program that aired in early 1990, we

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What happened to Altavista

Dave Farquhar — Mon, 29 Jun 2026 11:00:02 +0000

For as long as I can remember, my home page has been about:blank. But for a good chunk of the 1990s, I would have done well to set it to altavista.digital.com. Here’s what happened to Altavista, the search engine that

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Spyglass: A web browsing pioneer’s IPO

Dave Farquhar — Fri, 26 Jun 2026 11:00:08 +0000

Quick: Who was the first browser manufacturer to hold an IPO in the dotcom era? Netscape? WRONG! Its competitor Spyglass beat it out, holding its IPO June 27, 1995. Its IPO did rather well too, issuing two million shares at

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VA Linux’s transformation after leaving the hardware business

Dave Farquhar — Thu, 25 Jun 2026 11:00:22 +0000

In the wake of the dotcom bubble bursting, the record-setting startup VA Linux made a difficult decision. On June 26, 2001, it exited the hardware business. It was a curious decision but probably the right decision, because it survived nearly

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Windows 98 shipped June 25, 1998

Dave Farquhar — Wed, 24 Jun 2026 11:00:44 +0000

It was late and it was overhyped. But it was better than Windows 95. On June 25, 1998, Microsoft shipped Windows 98, and while it didn’t get the fanfare Windows 95 did, it was better than Windows 95. And if

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What went wrong with 3DO

Dave Farquhar — Tue, 23 Jun 2026 11:00:40 +0000

3DO sounded like a great premise. Several great minds came together to design a game console that they could license to any consumer electronics manufacturer who wanted to make it. It could have been the VHS or the IBM PC clone

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AMD Athlon: AMD’s game changing CPU from 1999

Dave Farquhar — Mon, 22 Jun 2026 11:00:54 +0000

On June 23, 1999, AMD announced its much anticipated Athlon CPU, the successor to its very successful K6. It launched less than two months later, on August 9, 1999. The Athlon proved to be the CPU that separated AMD from

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