X-Nico

unusual facts about personal computers



Socket 370

Socket 370 (also known as the PGA370 socket) is a common format of CPU socket first used by Intel for Pentium III and Celeron processors to replace the older Slot 1 CPU interface on personal computers.

V3 Gaming PC

V3 Gaming PC is a manufacturer of custom-built personal computers headquartered in Lomita, California.


see also

0x80

0x80 is a hacker interviewed by Brian Krebs of the Washington Post about his lucrative business in running "botnets", or networks of remotely controlled personal computers without the owner's consent.

Brute Force: Cracking the Data Encryption Standard

In this book, the author accounts his involvement in the DESCHALL Project, mobilizing thousands of personal computers in 1997 in order to meet the challenge to crack a single message encrypted with DES.

Cassette magazine

Early home and hobby users of personal computers in the late 1970s and early 1980s sometimes typed in programs, usually in the BASIC language, which were published in the computer magazines of the time.

Code page

When, early in the history of personal computers, users didn't find their character encoding requirements met, private or local code pages were created using Terminate and Stay Resident utilities or by re-programming BIOS EPROMs.

Dada Entertainment

Formed in October 2007 and based in New York City, Dada Entertainment was the first company to offer both ringtones and DRM-free full-length MP3s for mobile devices and personal computers paid via the mobile phone.

Ed Esber

After Esber’s pioneering work in Personal Computer Software, Esber has been on the leading edge of the integration of computers and multimedia at Creative Labs, the integration of computers, toys and learning at Creative Insights, the integration of computers, communication and telephony at SoloPoint; the mobilization of email and internet access at Poqet Computer, portability of Personal Computers at Poqet Computer and tablet computing at Motion Computing.

FCX

FCX file compression, an older file compression utility and format used on VAX and personal computers.

Graphics tablet

In 1981, musician Todd Rundgren created the first color graphics tablet software for personal computers, which was licensed to Apple as the Utopia Graphics Tablet System.

IBM OfficeVision

The server could run on OS/2, VM, MVS (XA or ESA), or OS/400, while the requester required OS/2 Extended Edition running on IBM PS/2 personal computers, or DOS.

Legions of Death

Legions of Death is a one or two-player strategy video game published for the Commodore 64, Amstrad CPC and ZX Spectrum personal computers.

Malware

The first worms, network-borne infectious programs, originated not on personal computers, but on multitasking Unix systems.

Maryland Institute for Technology in the Humanities

MITH is the host of the Deena Larsen Collection, a personal collection of early-era personal computers and software.

NEC PC-9801

Despite having hardware specifications far inferior to the Fujitsu FM Towns and Sharp X68000 personal computers, the massive install base and steady flow of game titles (in particular "dōjin" style dating sims and RPGs, as well as early games of the Touhou Project franchise) kept it as the favored platform for PC game developers in Japan until the rise of the DOS/V clones.

Panvalet

Unlike open-source solutions such as CVS, SVN or Mercurial, Panvalet is a closed source, proprietary system for versioning and control of source code such as Microsoft Visual SourceSafe on personal computers.

Space Hawk

The game was re-released as part of the Intellivision Lives! collection for personal computers and newer-generation game consoles, and in March 2010, Space Hawk was one of the launch titles for Microsoft's Game Room service on its Xbox 360 console and on Games for Windows Live and soon Windows Phone.

Suicide Silence EP

The EP is released as an Enhanced CD and contains a QuickTime file for “Destruction of a Statue (Live)”, a video that is viewable on Mac and Microsoft Windows personal computers.

The Elektrik Keyboard

In the late '70s it added personal computers and MIDI music to its lineup, and began publishing Apple II computer software written by programmer Chris Oberth. The software, advertised in the company's catalog and sold on cassette, largely consisted of games including some that emulated popular arcade titles.

Twin Transistor RAM

TTRAM should not be confused with TT-RAM, Atari's name for a special bank of DRAM in Atari TT030 personal computers.

WMV HD

These low-complexity codecs make it possible to watch high definition movies in 1280×720 (720p) or 1920×1080 (1080p) resolutions on many modern personal computers running Microsoft Windows XP or Windows Vista, although the hardware requirements are steep.

The technology was considered a stepping stone to true high definition optical disc formats (HD DVD and Blu-ray Disc) and Microsoft never intended the discs to be played on anything but personal computers.