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Comment by uberalex | Hacker News Reader

You're right. For me, it does point to the fact that most predictions are wrong at some point, right at some point, and irrelevant before and after. The things that was a laptop then (5kg beasts like this http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sharp_PC-5000) were nothing like today's machines. The T1100 seems to have been the first close thing.

It's impressive to think that it took 20 years from that article for notebooks to outsell pc. http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2009/oct/28/laptops-sa... also fun to see how net books are a focus of attention for that article. I wonder what level of accordance will be needed for a wearable to seriously compete with the current mode of computing.

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The TRS-80 model 100 had a bit of a following of the 1983 crop as I recall. Journalists could write a story and file it by modem. The luggable Compaq had some use cases but I think was sort of a novelty. The others of that generation didn't really take off. The Toshiba T1100, might have been announced in 1985 but I think came out later. I remember them as a new thing after I started my first job in late '86. So I could see laptops as something that had been hyped in '83 and by '85 still not ready for mainstream adoption. Those later Toshibas were usable for Lotus 1-2-3 and text-mode MS-Word. First Mac portable around '90 was still not ready for prime time.

- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TRS-80_Model_100

- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compaq_Portable

- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toshiba_T1100

Here's a story that came out when all the doom and gloom was around Radio Shack, about a sportswriter and his love of the model 100.

http://www.startribune.com/sports/blogs/291145401.html

Wonder if he would get a kick out of the Hemingwrite.

https://hemingwrite.com/

I always wondered how useful things like the Poqet PC and HP 95LX actually were. I remember seeing them in electronics stores and trade magazines, but they were really compromised in terms of resolution and memory.

I had an HP200LX (still have actually) and it was fabulously useful - a full CGA DOS computer that ran on 2 AA batteries for 40 hours and fitted in your pocket.

It had XIP (Execute-in-Place) applications built into the ROM which ran instantly, including Lotus 1-2-3.

I kept all my finances on the (built-in) Pocket Quicken and organised my Calendar, Address Books, Writing, you name it. Even printing was a doddle - I just pointed its Infra-Red port at the Office Laser Printer and it printed quite happily.

I used it as an e-reader, turning it on its side like a book, before e-readers even existed.

It was so fabulously useful I find it hard to believe that they weren't more widely used!

Yes, I used that TRS-80 model while haunting the stacks at the Library of Congress in the 80s. A lot of people would ask me about it. It was great for basic text entry, and made life so much easier. It was a fantastic tool for the time.

I keep my Model 100 handy at work, just in case:

http://www.realms.org/pics/IMG_20150406_080041.jpg

I don't think it's accurate to say that those early laptops were nothing like today's machines. For starters, we've still got laptops that are every bit as heavy as that PC-5000. I think it's just been a clear gradual trend of reallocating the bulk and weight from the under-the-hood electronics to the display, and the minimum size necessary for a functional machine has been steadily dropping.

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