Monday, October 16, 2006

Happy Birthday, um, Lenovo

Hard to believe, but the IBM PC is 25 years old. The IBM PC was the first “microcomputer” to take business computing seriously. It turned the personal computer from an isolated, incommunicative curiosity into an information system that changed business forever. (And inspired Dilbert.)

To celebrate this silver anniversary, PC World Canada has compiled a list of “The 25 greatest PCs of all time” – the 25 machines, going all the way back to 1975, that changed the way we look at computers.

My first thought was – someone can actually name 25 different models of PC? But when you go through the list and see Kaypros, Batgirl’s laptop, Apple’s groundbreaking second-generation iMac, and Radio Shack’s beloved TRS-80 (the Trash-80 to some), you recall just how much history the technology has made. And how we’ve all grown up together.

Who remembers the Amiga today? Yet who didn’t want one 20-odd years ago?

Catch the full list here. (No, the PC Junior didn't make the list.)

In case you're wondering, the No. 1 PC on the list is the Apple II. How very appropriate that on the 25th anniversary of IBM’s PC breakthrough, Apple takes the cake. IBM would probably be pissed – if it hadn’t sold out of the industry two years ago.

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