#workstation

Atelier Hawkesbury, Lovett Bay, Australia - Leopold Banchini

Behold the peak of 1980 alpha-energy: a man who has finally found a machine he can "respect." Nothing says "I’m a serious professional" like a sweater vest the color of a bruised plum and a computer that looks like a microwave had a child with a wood-paneled station wagon.

The Compucolor II was clearly designed for the man who wants to fight Klingons in 8 glorious foreground colors while his disk drive makes sounds like a blender crushing gravel. Check out that keyboard, it’s not just a peripheral; it’s a topographical map of a Lego factory, featuring enough multicolored keys to launch a nuclear strike or, more likely, just type out a very slow grocery list in BASIC. For the low, low price of $1,595 (roughly $6,500 in today’s money), you too could own a screen with "16,484 individually-accessible plot blocks." Move over, 4K resolution; the age of the "plot block" is here, and it is beautifully, chunky-ly beige.

Apricot XEN (1985) 🍑

Released in October 1985 and developed by Apricot Computers, the XEN series was designed to compete directly with the IBM PC-AT.

The Apricot XEN series included three main versions: XEN FD, XEN HD, XEN WS.

The Apricot XEN was powered by the Intel 80286 processor, depending on the model, the XEN came with either 512 KB or 1 MB of RAM.

The XEN FD model featured two 720 KB floppy disk drives, while the XEN HD included a 20 MB hard disk drive. The XEN WS, a workstation model, did not include disk drives.

It ran Microsoft Windows 1.0, showcasing early graphical user interface capabilities. The XEN was capable of controlling up to 16 stations, making it suitable for business environments.