If you aren’t old enough to remember when computers had front panels, as [Patrick Jackson] found out after he built a replica Altair 8800, their operation can be a bit inscrutable. After figuring it ...

It’s safe to say that the Altair 8800 is one of the most iconic, and important, computers ever created. The kit-built machine is widely regarded as the first commercially successful personal computer, ...

1974: The Altair 8800 microcomputer goes on sale. It doesn't offer much, but it's the small start of a big trend toward small things. A small New Mexico company — with the big name of Micro ...

This is part of a series of posts about the circumstances leading up to the launch of the Altair 8800 in the January 1975 issue of Popular Electronics. In my last few posts, I talked about the ...

1974: The Altair 8800 microcomputer goes on sale. It doesn't offer much, but it's the small start of a big trend toward small things. A small New Mexico company — with the big name of Micro ...

A 1974 MITS Altair 8800 kit computer has been restored to operational condition and has now executed software for the first recorded time, with the milestone dated January 14, 2026. The system had ...

BOULDER CREEK, Calif.--I have seen the world's first microcomputer, and it is not the Altair. For years, any serious discussions about the earliest microcomputers had to include the Altair 8800, the ...

Like many my age, my first computer was a homebuilt. More than 30 years ago Radio Electronics magazine ran an article on building an Intel 8008 based computer. Still in high school, I saved my pennies ...

I'm shamefully ignorant of early computers, although I can admire with an LED-appreciationists' eye the banks of flickering lights and glorious toggle switches. So it's the aesthete in me that loves ...