![]() Some personal computers on an interactive display | |
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Established | 2005 |
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Dissolved | 2018 |
Location | Brantford, Ontario, Canada |
Coordinates | 43°09′26″N80°15′54″W / 43.15720°N 80.26501°W |
Type | Personal Computer museum |
Curator | Syd Bolton |
Website | http://www.pcmuseum.ca/ |
The Personal Computer Museum was located in Brantford, Ontario, Canada, in a building formerly owned by the municipal government. The building was built with bricks reclaimed from the Brantford Opera House.
Over fifty interactive personal computers were on display, from a wide variety of manufacturers, including Apple, Atari, Commodore, IBM, Radio Shack, Timex, Mattel, and others. The museum also had a large library of original software and a huge archive of computer-related magazines.
The museum's mandate was to preserve computer technology and, more importantly, to offer interactivity with older machines. It welcomed private tours from schools and other groups. It was open to students, to study the origins of computers and the various technologies involved. Parents were welcome to bring children, to see computers which the parents may have once used, to get a sense of the ancestry of today's technology. Admission was free.
The museum first opened to the public in September, 2005. [1] It was run by Syd Bolton, its founder and curator, and by a group of dedicated volunteers.
In 2018, the museum closed permanently following Bolton's death. At that time, it had been open to the public only one day a month. Its contents were transferred to University of Toronto Mississauga library in October 2020. [2]
The Personal Computer Museum engaged in computer recycling. Local residents would bring computers to the museum almost every Monday evening for safe, proper recycling. Computers that were still viable for redistribution were given away to needy families through the computer giveaway program. [4] The museum also has an annual 'Spring Cleanup' event with a special focus on recycling that brought in over 400 pieces of electronics in 2008. [5]
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: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)The Atari 2600 is a home video game console developed and produced by Atari, Inc. Released in September 1977 as the Atari Video Computer System, it popularized microprocessor-based hardware and games stored on swappable ROM cartridges, a format first used with the Fairchild Channel F in 1976. The VCS was bundled with two joystick controllers, a conjoined pair of paddle controllers, and a game cartridge—initially Combat and later Pac-Man. Sears sold the system as the Tele-Games Video Arcade. Atari rebranded the VCS as the Atari 2600 in November 1982 alongside the release of the Atari 5200.
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