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Why the Apple II Didn't Support Lowercase Letters (2020)

(www.vintagecomputing.com)
136 points colinbartlett | 1 comments | 10 May 25 21:15 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
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ourmandave ◴[10 May 25 22:32 UTC] No.43949552[source]▶
Because you we're lucky to even get 40 columns (80 with an expansion card)?
replies(1): >>43949852 #
SoftTalker ◴[10 May 25 23:23 UTC] No.43949852[source]▶
80 columns would have been borderline unreadable on the NTSC televisions they were using as displays.
replies(2): >>43949902 #>>43951931 #
1. TMWNN ◴[10 May 25 23:32 UTC] No.43949902[source]▶
Context for others: Standalone computer monitors per se did not exist at retail in 1977. The only choices were either televisions, or displays for security-camera systems such as the Sanyo VM-4209 <https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O1461694/sanyo-vm-4209/>. The latter, because of its high quality and perfect size for stacking on top of the Apple next to disk drives <https://www.reddit.com/r/VintageApple/comments/3snpqd/i_foun...>, became the iconic Apple II monitor of the early years until purpose-built computer monitors from Amdek and others, as well as Apple's own Monitor III <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Monitor_III>, became widely available.