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Just get an old computer. Old computers don't die - their users do. You can get a nicely specc'ed ZX Next (https://www.specnext.com/ https://www.specnext.com/

Just get an old computer. Old computers don't die - their users do. You can get a nicely specc'ed ZX Next (https://www.specnext.com/ https://www.specnext.com/) or Amstrad CPC6128 for the budget, or find an old C64 and deck it out with some solid-state storage (actually do this for all the machines, they all have it now). My kids learned hacking on an Oric Atmos with a Cumulus drive (SD-card storage), which was just mind-blowing to see and also very, very inspiring for me personally, as a 40-year veteran of the art of programming. These systems are still out there, and still work. AND, they are amazing - just look at the beauty of the 10liner Basic competition, which this year was won by an Oric Atmos program that implemented a fully working Lunar Lander game in 10 lines of Basic, custom graphics, sound and all! https://gkanold.wixsite.com/homeputerium/games-list-2022 https://gkanold.wixsite.com/homeputerium/games-list-2022 (Winning entry here: https://bunsen.itch.io/moon-landing-by-rax https://bunsen.itch.io/moon-landing-by-rax) Failing that, check out the Clockwork Pi options: https://www.clockworkpi.com/ https://www.clockworkpi.com/

noduerme 5y ago
+++++ This is what I always imagined I'd do if I had kids, and I think I'd love every minute of it. Did your kids get bored with those things when they got a look at an iPad? Or did they understand what they were looking at?
- boffinAudio 5y ago
  At first they were all "oh this is crap, look how big the pixels are! <disbelief>" but then after I typed in a 10-liner, the wonder started and they haven't complained a bit since, besides the time the power went out and nothing was saved .. but even that was a valuable experience, because my kids finally were able to properly elucidate the difference between a file and a folder, and in fact had a much better understanding of what a file is, in the first place .. a problem many still don't quite resolve today. Just go for it. Even if your kids ridicule it, you'll have fun. :)

noduerme 5y ago

+++++ This is what I always imagined I'd do if I had kids, and I think I'd love every minute of it. Did your kids get bored with those things when they got a look at an iPad? Or did they understand what they were looking at?

boffinAudio 5y ago
At first they were all "oh this is crap, look how big the pixels are! <disbelief>" but then after I typed in a 10-liner, the wonder started and they haven't complained a bit since, besides the time the power went out and nothing was saved .. but even that was a valuable experience, because my kids finally were able to properly elucidate the difference between a file and a folder, and in fact had a much better understanding of what a file is, in the first place .. a problem many still don't quite resolve today. Just go for it. Even if your kids ridicule it, you'll have fun. :)