The NYT had a short piece last week about retrocomputing. Nothing super deep here but it’s interesting to see this relationship with skills and learning how to rebuild machines:
While modern, ever more efficient computers are selling better than they have in years, vintage computers — impractical old devices in need of repairs and out-of-production parts — are also in demand on sites like eBay. Collectors also flock to message boards, subreddits and Discord servers to buy, sell and trade parts.
People are buying these PCs not necessarily for daily use, but for the satisfaction they get from rebuilding them. It’s a trend one might chalk up to quarantine boredom, though it’s been gaining traction for years.
Why blogging this? Retrocomputing is generally described by showing machines, objects and old artefacts. This is the case here, but I find it relevant to discuss the motivation, and eventually that it is not just about collecting, but also learning how to rebuild objects of the past.