
The “personal organizer” we had before the Newton - protomyth
http://www.appleworld.today/blog/2015/5/28/throwback-thursday-the-personal-organizer-we-had-before-the-newton
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SwellJoe
Whoah. I just had a flashback to a little Sharp personal organizer from
roughly the same era. I had completely forgotten it even existed until this
moment, but I loved it. It died in a car accident I was in (it was in my
pocket, like a phone would be today, and I guess got bent/crushed, though it
looked fine, it wouldn't power on after the accident). I just googled, and I'm
pretty sure it was a Sharp ZQ model of some sort.

That was a strange time in computing, but now that I think of it, I think I
may have been vastly better organized in my life back then, with that device,
than I am now. I had two jobs _and_ was going to school _and_ made time for
playing in bands and trying to flirt with girls. Maybe I should get another
one...

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ChuckMcM
Oh come on. Nobody used the crap BOSS organizer, you either had a Sharp Wizard
(nee Zaurus) organizer or Psion 20. Sheesh. :-)

Its funny because penetration in the organizer market was so feeble in the
early days that the only people who owned them were usually rabid fans who
immediately lashed out at opponents at every opportunity. The Palm Pilot was
the first that got "serious" traction and the world changed. But until then
the Zaurus Wizard line from Sharp was the clear 'king' of the hill.

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MCRed
The Tandy 100 was the one that was really popular-- especially with reporters
who would type out stories during press releases.

[http://oldcomputers.net/trs100.html](http://oldcomputers.net/trs100.html)

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protomyth
I still think a modern version of the 100 would have a market. I just don't
think the Alpha Smart machines really captured the spirit of the 100.

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joshu
Remember the Franklin Rex? It was an organizer in a PCMCIA slot?

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/REX_5000](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/REX_5000)

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ctdonath
Still have mine (two actually, one button-operated and one touchscreen). About
the same size and cost as an Apple Watch. Fabulous idea, brutal to use.

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tudorw
[http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/REX_6000](http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/REX_6000)

This and my psion 5, pcmcia adaptor, gold card, data cable and Nokia, I still
think of fondly :)

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Starwatcher2001
My son still uses a Psion Organizer daily (1984). As it was never Y2K
compliant, he just offsets it by a couple of years to get the day/month day
name to match.

Until about six months ago my Tungsten T3 was still in regular use. Behind the
curve, us? Nah.

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ekianjo
Hum ? No mention of the PSION series?

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coob
I loved my PSION, and the huge OPL[1] programming manuals that came with it.
Excellent devices.

[1][http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_Programming_Language](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_Programming_Language)

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biot
Takes me back to my Casio Databank watch... now that was a serious piece of
geek equipment. :)

