Only eso compact went toe to Mark's office, said.

Can we by yourself?

Yep, that's fine.

No problem.

They went to insiders Say it could be by your chip, and Intel said, yet that's fine.

Um, the only probably had was the BIOS.

The BIOS is the chip that links the hardware to the lower level software.

So what Compaq had to do is create something that was a I'm not gonna use that word.

It was extremely similar.

Was very, very similar.

That did the same thing, right?

Basically, what they did is they kind of reverse engineered that chip.

So they had somebody that had never seen or used an IBM PC on they had somebody.

That person creates specifications for exactly what that shit would do.

And somebody else that is also I'd never seen as IBM machines.

Um would then write the code based on that specifications.

None.

Behold, you end up with something that does exactly the same thing as the original idea.

But amazingly, we get it.

So exactly a similar if they hadn't seen, isn't it?

Yes, the law wasn't the same for software as it is now.

I don't think this story could be done today That created a product and a company that was the fastest growing company in American business history.

Compact grew and grew and grew producing.

Then that's not Casey's in the same way as IBM were on, really did make computing portable and compatible.

Everybody that was using these could also share their data with other people that had IBM PCs.

And it blew the market open because then everybody could produce machines that 100 cent compatible as well.

So although the original, you know, reverse engineer, the chip might be a little bit questionable.

Actually, something amazing happened.

We ended up with something that was compatible.

Everybody was using the same system.

We could all share this data.

We are quite a lot holding catch fire is kind of based on the compact story.

Isn't Yeah, Yes.

Reverse engineer.

An IBM PC.

I want to build a computer that nobody else has.

You out of your mind?

What was this machine called thatjust Portable.

It's the Compaq Portable.

Yeah, I mean, compact was No, no, no.

So, you know the term compact so quickly become synonymous with portable computing on dis 100% IBM compatible sort of thing.

That's going so yeah, really important.

Andi later on, compact with emerge with HP in the rest of it.

Got a little bit pear shape now, but a great thing and being PC compatible.

Just put the keyboard back on.

So clever designs.

Yes, really good, because that's the That's the bottom of it.

Yeah, that's the the bottom lip.

You're standing up like that, but the side.

Then you have these little trapdoors that would reveal the power supply on that side.

Came in in there, and then this side.

You have all your io cars, standard PC cars that go inside there so you could expand it.

More memory for insert heart is going to face whatever.

I'm assuming there would be no battery in one of these.

There's no battery.

They would only run off the mains.

Samos, the earlier rose boards as well.

Battery technology was nowhere near capable of doing that sort of thing.

These are all four sides components, really in these things.

Yeah.

Although they shot the screens, they will use the standard floppy drives.

They have fairly high current draw factories were not gonna cut it.

No.

I was going to say that the screen is pretty impressive looking in that, considering Yeah, they got a decent size screen.

So So, Yeah, that those terms was not bad at all.

Certainly a step up from the Osborne.

But then he was born in a similar way, although it had a very, very small screen.

Had a composite video output.

So you could also sit on top of a decent size complicit video monitor as well.

Um, so once in your office, you have a bigger screen.

People do with laptops today was connected to the main screen in the office.

And just use your laptop in the office as well.

So we have all the variations of the compact.

So there was a compact portable, which is this that there was a compact plus that's the compact portable, too, And the three, obviously developing as the PC technology developed.

But then they would like to go on to create the desperate and all the rest of those machines which are more desktop or inside.

That's the plus.

We've got the three and the two and the various other ones down there in the museum.

There's over 1000 different systems.

Different machines in the collection.

That's not multiples with same.

You know, lots of BBC Micro is actually to begin with.

We need to calculate a private key.

Well, private variable.

I'm gonna choose red for Alice.

Ugo probably could use more food.

Coloring is kind of pale red.

Is that red?