Help me HN: I've become obsessed with buying 8 bit computers

Well, make a rule. If you buy it you have to open it and do something with it. That might slow you down.

Photographers have a similar urge called LBA (lens buying addiction)/ gear acquisition syndrome.

There's many articles online that discuss LBA and how to avoid it. Perhaps those would be of help to you.

If this message is helpful, it is only by way of empathy. I have some amazingly hotrodded Commodores and Apple IIs myself, although you really should consider opening those boxes and playing with the goods. I enjoy discovering games I'd never played, and spending my should-be-work days writing 6502 or 65816 assembly. In fact, I'm pretty sure that if I ever get the chance to retire, the 8/16 bit world is going to see some awesome new warez from me...

We guitarists/musicians call it GAS - Gear Acquisition Syndrome.

It helps me to write down how much time and money I spend on research and acquisition. I also periodically try to go through the stuff that I absolutely, undeniably had to have and then ended up catching dust in a drawer.

If you can find the root cause of this unwanted compulsive behaviour and address it then you won't need to burn through finite supplies of willpower keeping it at bay.

I don't mean to be disrespectful, either to you or to the HN crowd, but you should probably try talking to a professional as self-diagnosis can be somewhat dangerous.

I've got about 11-12 8-bit machines in the loft. My rule is keep the best condition machine of each model and sell anything else.

I suspect the overall task of dealing with them all is just too much. So, what about picking one model type and getting all of those out? Then see what you have working and keep the best 1/2 working models. (just research how well the PSUs survive not being turned on for many years before you switch them on, e.g. http://www.retro-kit.co.uk/page.cfm/content/BBC-Micro-PSU-X2...)

Then sell the rest aside from the best. Next, pick another model and repeat. If you divide the task down into manageable sections, that should make it easier to get started. And write a blog somewhere, I want to see what you have :).

I'm 45 and have a similar addiction. I decided to limit myself to just one system; a C64 decked out with old and modern accessories. I do have C64-SX and Apple II, but that was before I limited myself.

Hell, I passed up (on Craigslist) a PET with dual floppies. Also an eBay within driving distance an Imsai 8080 with dual 8" floppies and Heath H19 terminal, loaded with S100 cards.

It's really more about the room than the money. Most of these things are cheap, but I don't want to turn into a hoarder. I did that years ago (pre marriage) with old UNIX workstations; Sun, HP, SGI. I got rid of them all.

Also helps to know that there are millions of some of these systems out there. How many C64 were made, 20 million? It's not like I have something rare and unique; most would consider it junk.

Also, CRT cost $20 each to recycle now. It's easy for this to become a money pit. My father in law had 10 old monitors in his basement he got for "free". Well it wasn't free to get rid of them.

I have something like twelve BBC Micros and Masters. Getting a bit silly - it's like classic cars, they'll (mostly) sit in my spare room until I'm retired and have time to do something interesting with them all. I have one hooked up constantly to play games on though.

You have inventory. Now is the time to start selling them. See it as an opportunity.

It's better to have a great collection of one brand / type than to have a lot of scattered stuff. Remember: anything you need to maintain is a burden. Cars, houses, pinball machines, old computers.

Did you get a BBC micro ?

Nowadays it has an SD Card reader attachment. I got mine full of ROMs.

It is also possible to make PROMS for it.

I have a BBC FORTH rom in mine. I use it as a test machine because of the fantastic I/O : A/D, D/A, 8 bit parallel bus, serial all with a monitor.

If your 8bit machine has serial you can use it as a Unix TTY and connect it to the Internet : read your email on a C64!

Perhaps separate the nostalgic element from the desired experience of learning to program a simple computer and participate in its development culture.

You could get into the contemporary 8bit scene, which has an advanced homebrew side and a kid-friendly scholastic one:

http://mega65.org/

https://hackaday.io/list/2402-homebrew-computers

http://playpower.org/

Or even Pico-8:

http://www.lexaloffle.com/pico-8.php

If nothing else, it might help you figure out what your obsession is really attached to...

Such machines back in time were much harder to acquire, especially as a kid. Today as an adult you are free to get as many as you want. It is not necessarily bad, unless it is harming you somehow, which seems to be the case.

I have books I haven't had the time to fully read but somehow I still getting more, and I sure that am not alone in this.

This TED talk about addiction from Gabor Mate is very interesting: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=66cYcSak6nE .

Now, I would ask:

What are you getting from your addiction? does it make you feel a sense of happiness, control, success, of comfort (e.g: revisiting your childhood in the 70s)?

I would ask you to not try to satisfy your emotional needs through consumerism but rather through another activity. There are communities about retro-computing, e.g: https://www.reddit.com/r/retrocomputing . You can have conversations with them to know better the machines you already have rather than buying more.

Send me some? :-)

Sell them to me for my museum (well over a 1000 60-80s (with some late 80s - begin 90s ones which I had to have like SGI/Sun) computers) and come here on vacation to play with them :) (including programming, hardware fixing, hardware extending).

Use emulators. Much easier and fun because you don' have to deal with real hardware

(Get and MSX 2+ or a TurboR (16-bit) - as an emulator - btw)

Introduce a struck rule: If you don't touch it for a year throw it out. And do the same thing with all your stuff. Freedom man

Open private museum of computer hardware! Keep buying!

Idea: http://www.computerspielemuseum.de/1210_Home.htm

Here's a thing, how about getting into making biological computers, artificial wetware. Thre are researchers doing this with some degree of success. I' pretty sure you could research the state of the art online and to try to grow your own Manic Miner...

This is HN, not a psychologist forum. I mean most people won't be able to help you as they are not experts on addictions.

They will tell you: "just sell them", but the problem is that you will have an emotional attachment that will make it nearly impossible. I for one sold my Spectum Z80, Atari, and Apple computers without thinking about it and they were part of my life because I care little about things, I care about animals or people.

I will ask those who know: psychologists, specifically someone specialized in breaking habits. If you don't have money you can read self help books or videos audiobooks on libraries, or even pirate them, everything is online, you only need to know what are you looking for.

The other alternative is putting your computers to great use. Create a channel on Internet about old computers history. Donate it to a Museum so other people can watch it and volunteer to explain the history of those computers to audience while they can interact with the machines.

The fact that those machines are useful to other people instead of collecting dust will be a great way of getting rid of...ehem, improving your life.

Find a low-income school in your area. Dedicate yourself to becoming the school's free computer science department. Get yourself background checked, etc., and get all the paperwork in place to that it's legit. Pitch your ideas to principals who understand the importance of computer science education.

When people ask why use these old computers, explain how their simplicity makes them an ideal fit in an education setting.

Use your acquisitions to teach the kids the things you wish you were taught when your were their age. Donate your time and your equipment to the cause.

This feeds two (or more) birds with one loaf. Focussing your attention outward may help to stem the acquisition urge. The kids get an education in something that will change their lives. And you get a lot of those computers out of your house.

I have an old computer.

Xeon 3Ghz 12/24 core with 64GB memory.

I can barely run my games.

It runs TempleOS. God's third temple.

I would suggest finding a project that will allow you to focus upon a particular computer or (limited number of computers), then focus upon discussing those projects with others. There are plenty of online forums for vintage computers, while many excellent books on programming those computers are now freely available. Since you mentioned wanting to learn assembly language programming on those systems, that may help you tackle your acquisitions problem while helping to fulfill a dream.

Is something like the MIST FPGA (http://harbaum.org/till/mist/index.shtml) not an option?

While not the "real deal" it may be good enough and it can emulate a wide range of 8-bit machines. I was thinking about buying a unit to emulate my very first computer (a MSX) and the machine that I also wanted as a kid (Amiga) :-)