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What kind of collector are you?

tezza

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What kind of collector are you?

I’ve just read an interesting article in “Vintage Technology” issue 3 (www.vintagetechnology.co.uk) about the different types of vintage technology collectors. I’ve condensed the descriptions for brevity’s sake and made them specific to computers. Individuals will overlap but see if you can recognise youself? They list these types…

  • Investor – Mint condition. Collect computers purely in the hope they will appreciate and they can sell at a later date. Must be in mint condition preferably with original box. Even better if it is unopened!
  • Finishers – Complete collection. These folk will seek to collect every item of a certain type. E.g. All Amiga models, all TRS-80 model 1 peripherals etc. They want to get everything item of whatever they have decided to collect.
  • Speculator. Buy what seems to be of value cheaply, then sells it again hoping to make a quick buck. These people can follow fads and can cause price spikes.
  • Repairer – These are rare but vauable folk. Collects broken machines to fix and resurrect. Main enjoyment is seeing something dead spring to life. May then resell.
  • Personal Use – These people have vintage computers because they perform a useful function. Why change?
  • Caretaker. – Just ended up with it and feel they shouldn’t throw it away. No real emotional attachment
  • Historian – Someone who feels these items have historical value and future generations should know about them
  • Part time collector – Just pick up something because it seems interesting. Don’t really understand the true value of it.
  • Hoarders. – Collect anything and everything and just can’t throw any of it away. Have a strong attachment to the past
For myself, I’m mainly Historian, with perhaps a hint of Hoarder. :)

How about you?

Tez
 
I'd call myself a cross between "personal use" and "investor." Being who I am (a computer salesman, repairman, and businessman) I cant help but invest my money in stuff. The way I see it, in 20 years the 1980s computers will be just as rare as the IMSAI and I'll be pulling in $1,500 off stuff I paid $10 for.

On the other hand, I always find use for the systems I buy. I also want them to be as complete and mint condition as I can find them, for personal collection purposes mainly.

For instance, I have a 100% complete AT&T PC 6300 next to me(well, I'd really like to find an official hardware service manual, versus my preliminary version). I dont let it just sit in the box and collect dust, or just sit on display. I dont hesitate to upgrade it either(as long as it doesn't go beyond adding in ISA cards). I put it to use typing documents(sometimes I use the typewriter instead), calculating my financial data, and also for less professional things like playing Flight Simulator, PCMAN, and of course Tank. I do fun experiments, like hooking up a null modem cable between it and a new machine just to make them talk. All while using 2 360K floppy drives.

I was going to type more about what my plans are for my 486 rack-mount server, but now find myself wanting my morning coffee. Just ask if you desire to know what is in store for my hunk of metal American Aerosystems server.

--Jack
Thinking about it, I am a bit of a finisher, too. I love coming across systems that people left for trash and reviving them back to the elite state they were once in. Even funner if someone you know gave it to you, so you can flaunt the system and your skill in their face.
 
I think one type that's missing are those who collect machines that they have once either owned, used, or even better - lusted after - in the hope of recreating the thrill they first experienced. It certainly works for me.

Whenever I fire up one of the old beasts I always try to imagine how cool it would have been to have one of these on your desk when it was brand new.

I certainly have no illusions as to their actual monetary value. To me they are worth thousands while to most they are hardly more than hazardous waste.
 
What about the people like me, that don't go too out of their way to get stuff, but jump on anything on freecycle/craigslist or cheap stuff at goodwill/yard sales? Which category is that?
 
Within these parameters, I am a repairer/historian. I believe that to be able to teach and truly understand computer history one should know how to support (or at least witness) the historical computers too. It's one thing to see a video about teletypes - it's a whole other thing to take an hour of your time to enter a 7-page program listing in HEX and then run it on the teletype for the experience. To hear the machine running, the smell of the oil paper, etc. Then you really understand what kinds of technology people were using and how they used it.

I might add to the "types"
The exhibitor - People who like to display / demonstrate their computers

Lastly, I don't know what you'd call them but there are a lot of people who have a lot of books about computers, collect ephemera, etc. and are experts in computer business/history but do not actually have any of the computers themselves for whatever reason.

Bill
 
"Hoarders. – Collect anything and everything and just can’t throw any of it away. Have a strong attachment to the past."

That would be me in a nutshell. I definitely share the properties of the Historian category as well though.
 
I don't think any of those categories define me well.

I collect systems that I read about when they were new and interesting, but never had the funds or the use back then to try them out.

Most of the time when I get a machine I want I try to get the various software and manuals for it along with usefull (to me ) hardware upgrades. If I have to I will fix anything that is not working, or hunt down information on how to get it working.

Generally I don't pay much for the stuff, and do not consider it a good investment. I do think the value to me is in getting things to work, and to keep my mind working trying to figure things out (engineering background so I am the curious how does it work type).

Thankfully one of my areas of interest is in old analog video capture/editing hardware and software which few people care about. Makes it easier putting together systems that were $50K new when everyone has moved on to new hardware.
 
Repairer: Yes, I really do get enjoyment from resurrecting something from the trash pile back to functionality. I do the same with automobilia.
Personal Use: What's wrong with that? ;) I like running old software in it's native environment. Most old computers will do about 90% of what a new one will. And I like the sound a dot-matrix printer makes.:)
Caretaker: I have four computers that were given to me in lieu of going to the landfill, three of which fit in the 'repairer' catagory.
Historian: Hey, these young whippersnappers need to know it wasn't always GUI point-and-click.
Part time collector: If I like it, I try to get it. Value really doesn't figure into it.
Hoarders: Well...maybe a little bit, ashamed to admit it though.;)
 
Finisher - Need to get all 8-bit Commodores...
Historian - Yep, the young ones must be educated about computer history!
Hoarder - How can I throw something away? It might come in handy some day?

That's what kind of collector I am. I think...
 
I fit into the NOSTALGIAN category.

What? "There wasn't any 'nostalgian' category", you say.
Well let's stick one in there then. :)

I thought about lumping myself into the HISTORIAN category but then I realized I'm not into vintage machinery to pass things along. No one else in my family feels the way I do about vintage gear - so it will most likely be given away after I'm gone.

Actually Paul hit the nail on the head with his description, and I feel 'exactly' the same way.
Paul said, "Whenever I fire up one of the old beasts I always try to imagine how cool it would have been to have one of these on your desk when it was brand new."
or if you DID have one -
"in the hope of recreating the thrill first experienced."
That says it all :)

Example - I now own a very nice, minty condition Commodore 128. It's just as cool a machine as I always imagined it must be back in the 80's when I wanted, - but never had one. That's one of the cool things about vintage computers. You can now have what you 'once' wanted, at like 1/10th the original price, or less - maybe even free. I also now own an Apple IIc - that I once wanted. I'm very fond of the dozen or so vintage machines in my possession.

I understand 'hoarders' - Collect anything and everything and just can't throw any of it away. Have a strong attachment to the past.
I do have a strong attachment to the past, but I can't hoard because I don't have room - besides, being a 'nostalgian', my fewer possessions are appreciated more on an individual basis.
 
I agree with Paul that a few distinct types seem to be missing, but it wouldn't be as much fun if the categorization was made to be perfect.

Myself, I started off as a combination of Personal Use and Part time collector, hoping to be helpful as a Repairer. Lately I've become a small scale Hoarder due to an increased interest in becoming a Speculator! Not that I sell things quickly, but if I win one auction on eBay I always look for more auctions from the same seller so I can combine shipping and sell off the other stuff at break even or a small profit. Sometimes it doesn't work as well, thus the Hoarder aspect.
 
Within these limits I would be a personal use first then a repairer. But there ought to be a category like tinkerer, cause sometimes I'll see something that I read about and pick it up just to try one experiment on it. I don't get rid of them after that is over, though, so Tinkerer should be a category. May then trade for another project.

Nathan
 
I'd say it was a safe bet to say that I was a repairer. I trained to do it, I like doing it and I'm damn good at it.

Any other category that I may accidently fall in to is incidental and I DID play with most of this stuff when it was brand new.
 
Paul's description hits it well with me, too. Although, I wasn't around until 1992, so I dont know how it would've been. But when I buy stuff, I like to pretend I'm in 1986 and that it is brand new(works well if the box is included). I like to imagine how it would've been to be around back then, and just go into a whole 'nother state of mind, as I day dream. Thats why I sqeeze as much usefulness out of my computers as I can. I like to use them as much as possible for the sensation. I've said it before...The only thing keeping me using a newer computer is eBay and the forums. If someday the forums are available in dial-in BBS form, I'll sell all my new stuff and be cruising along at 1200BPS on my vintage machines, the same way I check my e-mail. That'd be wicked.

Oh, and as for exibitor, I LOVE to show off my computers Although the ONE chance I've gotten so far to show off my theoretically most complete AT&T PC 6300 in the world, it failed on me. I booted it up, only to get no dissplay whatsoever. The guy left, I reseated the ROM, and lo-and-behold, it's worked perfectly ever since. It'd be just my luck that the day I get to go to VCF and show off my computers, one of them (probably my best, the PC 6300) will fail and not work until the event is over. Oh well, thats how pride works.

--Jack
 
How about "artist"?

How about "artist"?

I like to preserve things for future generations and that is one of the reasons that I keep part of the stuff I've got which I will never use, such as the Apple IIc that I just picked up and will probably never even fire up. There is another reason I collect computer stuff - it's art.

My (daily use) DOS machine is made of favourite cards, cables, drives, and misc. parts, put together in a way that I like. That includes the complete file structure and the style of usability. Even the frame (I don't like boxes) is unconventional. You can really only do this properly with old stuff. I'd use CP/M software or midi hardware, whatever, if I had the skill. People do the same thing with cars and they use model Ts and the like. They're called hot rods and it can't be done with new stuff. I don't paint flames on the sides of my computers, but they're still hot rods and I still call them art.
 
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