2023-07-09 11:00:00
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It is 2200 NABU brand computerswhich is probably unknown to you and with good reason, which had been waiting quietly in the barn of James Pellegrini for more than twenty years
NABU
You probably don’t know the company Natural Access to Bi-directional Utilities, or NABU, and that’s normal. Indeed, it is a Canadian computer company born in 1982 which went bankrupt in 1985.
The machines in question, which we will call NABUs for simplicity, use the processor Z80 – a common chip in arcade machines like Pac-Man, for example. These computers had an architecture very similar to the MSX platform, which was the most widespread microcomputer at the time.
The NABU is in fact the equivalent of our good old Minitel national, with the exception of course that it did not enjoy the success and usefulness of its French counterpart.
A retro-computing treasure
James Pellegrini, a retired computer designer, has had 2,200 NABU computers in his barn for 20 years. Purchased in the 1990s for the Z80 processors they contained, which James wanted to use to create “a telephone exchange system” as reported Techspot, they ended up being abandoned in the enthusiast’s barn, the project deemed too ambitious and too complicated.
20 years later, the barn in question having become too dilapidated to house the computers in complete safety, Pellegrini began to sell them on Craigslist at a price of 20 dollars each, to quickly turn to the eBay platform on which they will leave as buns at $60 each. Very quickly, the machines increase in price from regarding $100 each.
The rebirth of a network
This is thanks in particular to the video of a famous YouTuber specialized in technology, Adrian Blackthat the NABU, and therefore the stock of James Pellegrini, came out of anonymity.
For his part, DJ Sures, programmer and early NABU enthusiast — his father and two of his uncles participated in the development of the machine — decided to develop a network adapter for the NABU as a tribute to his family.
Since then, the “NABU community” has continued to grow: the network is back online, and a website has been created for the preservation of the NABU RetroNET. If you want to learn more regarding this fascinating story, the Vice site wrote a very complete article on each stage of this true renaissance.
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