Anyone remember TI graphing calculators, which at the time I was using them (90s) I think ran on 8088 processors?

Quite a bit MORE expensive than this. MUCH less powerful, even factoring in Moore's law. AND, they were in no way intended to be an open, hackable design like this is. And even with all those limitations, they became one of the primary "introduction to hardware and software hacking" devices of my generation.

When I was a 16-year-old HS Freshman, I had a TI-81 that I hooked up to a PC with a serial port and "hacked" zShell onto. I learned a bit of assembly code and put on lots of little programs like games etc. onto my calculator. I even got an image display program where you could load up bitmap images that were converted to a specific size and color depth (4-8 grays if I remember right). I got busted in my Geometry class that year looking at a blurry grayscale picture of a topless Pamela Anderson. On my calculator. If that doesn't put me in the running for biggest nerd ever, I don't know what would.

Anyway, I can only see this "Chip" thing (I agree that I'm not too big on the name) as a very cool idea. Sometimes, something as simple as a hackable platform or a blurry 4-bit picture of some boobs can be enough to push someone towards a lifelong interest in IT and other technology. Raspberry Pi and the others are great too, but the price of this one gives it a real leg up in the universal accessibility department!

8088 corruption link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H1p1im_2uf4

There must be pictures of my progression through computers... which were:
Sinclair ZX Spectrum. 1983 Hey... same year, although I was 7 I learned to program on this thing... in Basic. And saved those programs to tape damn you... tape!

Atari ST Didn't have one, but my best friend at the time did... and I coveted it.

Amstrad of some description Again, didn't have it, my uncle did, and we'd use it weekly. Not really a huge leap in power over the Spectrum... but it did have a disc drive instead of tape.

Some form of 8088 based PC

Then a steady progression of PCs, from CGA to EGA to VGA to the now monster power of a dual core, directx 10 beast.

My exposure to Apples? We used Apple IIes in primary school and I think into early high school before they upgraded them all to PCs. And for some reason there was a Commodore 64 in the corner... weird.

I did not grow up on console gaming like most, but the Spectrum and then into the PC... in fact the Wii is the first console I've ever owned.

^ what the hell is a statist?

Anyway QM, everyone in Canada is covered by healthcare provided via our taxes and the government, and my friends who moved from here to down south are now ruing the fact that if you add up health care insurance deductions + taxes in the US, they were actually getting a better deal up north, so I'm not sure how this spiel about 'regulating' the "20% of the economy" eaten up by healthcare makes sense.

Consider the idea that healthcare wouldn't eat up 20% of the GDP if it was more efficiently managed through a single administration instead of 100's of health care insurance companies.


Going back to the cell phone thing, that's hilarious/odd. But $8088 a year isn't much to live on - I'm surprised he even has a car.