Halt and Catch Fire: Up Helly Aa
July 28, 2014 6:47 AM - Season 1, Episode 9 - Subscribe
Complications menace the PC at Comdex.
Even with that foreshadowing, I didn't see the Slingshot twist coming.
posted by drezdn at 6:03 PM on July 28, 2014 [2 favorites]
posted by drezdn at 6:03 PM on July 28, 2014 [2 favorites]
These last couple episodes have really turned me around from morbid fascination to genuine near-enjoyment to the point where now I am almost sad at how colossally it's probably going to fail.
posted by SharkParty at 7:40 PM on July 28, 2014 [1 favorite]
posted by SharkParty at 7:40 PM on July 28, 2014 [1 favorite]
Yeah, this has turned into a good show after such a rough start, and I hope it's enough to keep it alive for another season if this quality can be maintained.
posted by Pope Guilty at 3:30 AM on July 29, 2014
posted by Pope Guilty at 3:30 AM on July 29, 2014
I was curious when the actual Mac 128k showed up at trade shows. Wikipedia has it as "announced to the press" in Oct 1983 and claims it shipped in Jan 1984. Dan Bricklin of Visicalc has about 90 minutes of video of Comdex 1983 up with Windows, HP touch screens, wallpaper in the suites even worse than H&CF, and the Gavilan SC in Sorcim's booth which has a similar form factor to the Giant, though with a vertically squished LCD. The GRiD compass had a squarer screen, but it was EL and it was fantastically expensive.
There's one CRT "portable" in the video with a price of $1900. Under $1000 for a 15 pound portable PC with full 16 bit memory (8086 not 8088 like IBM PC XT) and a hard drive seems a little low to me.
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The Cameron/Joe and Donna/Gordon relationships developed nicely this ep. Plenty of actually dramatic stuff in their lives with some believable reactions and less off-the-wall flailing and screaming was a nice development.
posted by morganw at 7:58 PM on August 1, 2014 [1 favorite]
There's one CRT "portable" in the video with a price of $1900. Under $1000 for a 15 pound portable PC with full 16 bit memory (8086 not 8088 like IBM PC XT) and a hard drive seems a little low to me.
--
The Cameron/Joe and Donna/Gordon relationships developed nicely this ep. Plenty of actually dramatic stuff in their lives with some believable reactions and less off-the-wall flailing and screaming was a nice development.
posted by morganw at 7:58 PM on August 1, 2014 [1 favorite]
Thinking about it some more, the only thing surprising about the Mac was that it was positioned (unsuccessfully*) against PCs and clones at $2500 without a hard drive. The Lisa was shipped at least a year earlier (I saw one at the University of Rhode Island as a faculty brat when a road show invited faculty to come see it). The Xerox Alto was in Byte in 1981. LISP machines were being built around the same time. They were crazy expensive, but people knew they were coming. Cameron being wowed by WIMP and OO talk from Xerox guys? Smalltalk was the cover article for Aug 1981 Byte.
So why's Joe's jaw dropping?
*It took the Mac Plus and the Laserwriter (1985) to really get the Mac off the ground. Dang, so much happened so fast in those years. I guess a little shuffling for the sake of plot is reasonable.
posted by morganw at 8:13 PM on August 1, 2014 [1 favorite]
So why's Joe's jaw dropping?
*It took the Mac Plus and the Laserwriter (1985) to really get the Mac off the ground. Dang, so much happened so fast in those years. I guess a little shuffling for the sake of plot is reasonable.
posted by morganw at 8:13 PM on August 1, 2014 [1 favorite]
I loved the hustle they pull on the printer dudes.
It was cute the way Donna and Gordon reconnected. Too bad it didn't last that long.
Ferret Face from next door is lucky that Gordon didn't come completely unhinged. We already know he can dig a grave.
I'd love to know if Apple really demoed the Mac by candlelight.
P.S. So amusing to see Atlanta and environs stand in for the road to Vegas and a Vegas hotel.
posted by ob1quixote at 7:37 PM on August 4, 2014 [1 favorite]
It was cute the way Donna and Gordon reconnected. Too bad it didn't last that long.
Ferret Face from next door is lucky that Gordon didn't come completely unhinged. We already know he can dig a grave.
I'd love to know if Apple really demoed the Mac by candlelight.
P.S. So amusing to see Atlanta and environs stand in for the road to Vegas and a Vegas hotel.
posted by ob1quixote at 7:37 PM on August 4, 2014 [1 favorite]
This was just....a great episode. I'm watching this on Netflix, so I can binge and also no commercials. It's really good this way.
IT SPEAKS. Joe's expression when the guy turned on the Mac. Loved it.
I don't know if I can take many more episodes of Cameron as she is now. I just can't stand her petulant toddler ways for 29 more episodes. She doesn't know how to act around people, yeah, but she also doesn't seem to know how to eat, or drink, or sit still, or...pretty much anything. Here's hoping her character has a lot of growth between season 1 and season 2...... 0_o
posted by the webmistress at 2:44 PM on August 11, 2019
IT SPEAKS. Joe's expression when the guy turned on the Mac. Loved it.
I don't know if I can take many more episodes of Cameron as she is now. I just can't stand her petulant toddler ways for 29 more episodes. She doesn't know how to act around people, yeah, but she also doesn't seem to know how to eat, or drink, or sit still, or...pretty much anything. Here's hoping her character has a lot of growth between season 1 and season 2...... 0_o
posted by the webmistress at 2:44 PM on August 11, 2019
This episode was a lot of fun. Joe working on his speech and Cassandra getting her sandwich on his notes. Those poor printer guys never knew what hit them. Joe creating an event using the shrimp layout and then creatively stalling for time when the Giant wasn't ready for its demo. And then the twist no one saw coming... Texas Instruments creating a rip off of the Giant. (I'm not clear on how they got all the schematics for it, and how did Donna never get wind up such a project at Texas Instruments?) Gordon then saves the day by ripping out Cameron's OS to make the computer cheaper and faster. I don't blame her for being upset, but she should have been able to see they had no choice.
I was very meh on this show for at least the first four episodes. I kept going partially from inertia, and partially due to my thinking that if lasted four seasons, it had to get better. Now it's definitely finding its stride.
I'll just say too that although I have known who Lee Pace was for over a decade, I have never seen him in anything before, nor been particularly interested in doing so. Now that I have... he's really striking me as hot. I love his speaking voice, his body is to die for, and he moves like a panther.
posted by orange swan at 8:39 PM on July 7
I was very meh on this show for at least the first four episodes. I kept going partially from inertia, and partially due to my thinking that if lasted four seasons, it had to get better. Now it's definitely finding its stride.
I'll just say too that although I have known who Lee Pace was for over a decade, I have never seen him in anything before, nor been particularly interested in doing so. Now that I have... he's really striking me as hot. I love his speaking voice, his body is to die for, and he moves like a panther.
posted by orange swan at 8:39 PM on July 7
I'm not clear on how they got all the schematics for it
Donna's boss intercepted a fax containing the industrial engineering schematics, and his partner had visibility into the old design, plus cliffnote versions of updates fed to him through Donna and her boss. It's not clear how they got the BIOS working -- wasn't there someone offering Cameron a ton of money in a very early episode?
and how did Donna never get wind up such a project at Texas Instruments?
There wasn't a TI project. It was canned, and he quit to launch his own company at COMDEX. The Slingshot product poster shows the company name as "Hunt Whitmarsh Whitwell" computing. Presumably two of the three were crossed by Gordon and Donna, unclear about the third. Maybe they did the BIOS deal with Cameron?
And he wasn't exactly great at his TI job (but perhaps moonlighting like this affects your capacity some), so they were getting dead end support work jobs on product lines Donna said should be EoL'd.
Gordon then saves the day by ripping out Cameron's OS to make the computer cheaper and faster.
I really thought the writers were going for a two product line solution -- the cheap standard DOS "station wagon" and expensive chatbot "sports car". But Joe didn't even attempt to make the connection in order to keep Cameron on board. But the Apple demo cliffhanger leaves it open.
posted by pwnguin at 10:06 AM on July 13
Donna's boss intercepted a fax containing the industrial engineering schematics, and his partner had visibility into the old design, plus cliffnote versions of updates fed to him through Donna and her boss. It's not clear how they got the BIOS working -- wasn't there someone offering Cameron a ton of money in a very early episode?
and how did Donna never get wind up such a project at Texas Instruments?
There wasn't a TI project. It was canned, and he quit to launch his own company at COMDEX. The Slingshot product poster shows the company name as "Hunt Whitmarsh Whitwell" computing. Presumably two of the three were crossed by Gordon and Donna, unclear about the third. Maybe they did the BIOS deal with Cameron?
And he wasn't exactly great at his TI job (but perhaps moonlighting like this affects your capacity some), so they were getting dead end support work jobs on product lines Donna said should be EoL'd.
Gordon then saves the day by ripping out Cameron's OS to make the computer cheaper and faster.
I really thought the writers were going for a two product line solution -- the cheap standard DOS "station wagon" and expensive chatbot "sports car". But Joe didn't even attempt to make the connection in order to keep Cameron on board. But the Apple demo cliffhanger leaves it open.
posted by pwnguin at 10:06 AM on July 13
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posted by Small Dollar at 3:13 PM on July 28, 2014 [2 favorites]