by Ron Enderland

So, let's talk about old cars.

Antique cars appeal to everybody. Old timers see them, and they bring back fond memories. Youngsters like their classic lines, their funky functionality, and the fact that they have engines the size of nuclear power plants. It seems that most old cars are classics. Some became so instantly. I mean, the 1936 Ford Coupe screamed it the first time it was wheeled out into the showroom. Others took a while. The Nash Metropolitan had to rust in pastures for many years before someone noted that its crackerbox, pull-the-back-seat-out-to-get-into-the-trunk design had a classic feel to it. Unfortunately, the AMC Gremlin may never make it.

The point to all of this is that if you hang on to a bucket of bolts long enough, it will probably cross the line into the classic realm.

As Rich Cunningham pointed out in his January 15 WV News column, there is a real link in the human mind between computers and automobiles. I'm taking this thought a little further.

Friends, I surmise that you may have classics lurking in your storage rooms.

What was your first computer? An '85 Apple IIc? A '78 Commodore 64? Perhaps a '79 TRS-80? It sure brings back the memories. Sort of like recalling your first car, isn't it? My first car, a four-door '65 Falcon, would be worth more than it cost new if it was in cherry shape. Now, what if that Commodore was someday in the same class? You had it sitting out with a 25 dollar price tag the last yard sale, and it got ignored, right? Well, I advise you to bundle it up and set it on the top shelf of the garage.

Ten years from now, when you finally do that major garage cleaning that you intended to do last week, you just might stumble onto a gold mine.

All that has to happen is that public perception of old computers must change from that of old, slow, outdated relics to early day classic examples of the American engineering renaissance.

Don't forget, it was advances in the development of personal computers that finally caused American ingenuity to loosen the Japanese stranglehold on the title of world's technological leader.

What's a mint '55 Chevy worth today? Four or five times its original cost?

What did that Sinclair ZX80 that you gave the dog to play with cost new? 200 bucks? Imagine it pulling in a grand at a 2010 antique auction! Hey, Fido! Bring me that plastic thing! Good boy...

So bag up your old smart boxes and set them aside. Somewhere out there lurks the next Jaguar XKE.

Thanks to Kendall Harrelson for this month's new acronym: CUP: Continuous Upgrade Process. When you buy a system, it quickly becomes obsolete. Hence the need for a CUP. In my case, my CUP runneth over!

Send me your new acronyms, get famous! See ya next month.