[speed_spread]

Cool kids had C64s. I had every other boring, flawed model. Tandy MC-10. TI-99, ZX80 (not even 81!) and some other CoCo with chiclet keys. Now I know the 6809 is actually pretty interesting but back then without video or graphic chips there wasn't much you could do as a 12 year old.

Weirdly the most fun I had was with the BASIC programmable SHARP PC-xxxx line. I still have my PC-1350 somewhere.

[greenbit]

That 6809 bewitched my middle school self. Having already learnt Z80 assembly language, the 6809 just looked so much more elegant. It had index registers that were actually useful! It had position independent code! It could do multiplication in one instruction! So when faced with choosing a CoCo or a C64 .. of course I chose the machine with the MUL instruction. Naturally, within mere months, that horrid 32x16 black on green display forced the harsh realization that a computer is more than just the CPU, that the support chips could actually be far more interesting. Who cares about a multiply instruction, when you could have sprites and 3 voice sound?

[speed_spread]

My worst hardware choice (later) was to save with a monochrome VGA screen to afford a 24pin Fujitsu dot matrix vs the 9pin Epson. It forged the person I am today.