Posts Tagged ‘Cambridge museum of computing history’

Thoughts on the Cambridge history of computing museum

Posted: January 20, 2014 in Uncategorized
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I posted on my other blog about visiting the Cambridge museum of the history of computing. But I wanted to talk as about it from a personal view point now, why I think it’s so important and my ideas for their future.

When I went to visit I immediately thought it was amazing. Having all these computers and consoles in one place that you can sit down on and play. They really focus on making everything interactive where possible which is brilliant. Just having them in display cabinets would be really boring, but actually being able to sit down on a C64 and play old games is great and really helps to make you understand how the technology has changed over the decades.

The thing I did keep thinking though was how they can split games from applications. Right now the majority of the hardware is showing old games and not much in the way of applications, so maybe they could split applications into a separate area. This would allow for an Amiga in the games area with a flash drive loaded with old games, and then a separate one in the applications area running Deluxe paint or Octamed (music tracker software).

I also think it would be cool to have screens above each systems showing videos of all the best games on them and more in information on how each system has been used in the past (such as the Amiga being used to generate the 3d effects in the Babylon 5 TV series)

And maybe when you walk in, there could be a timeline on the floor that you follow with the exhibits on either side of you going through the decades. So the PDP 1 showing space war would be at the entrance ending with a PS4 at the exit of the main room.

Then maybe in a side room, there could be a “future of computing” exhibit, showing things like the oculus rift headset for visitors to try out and interviews showing on video screens with developers and hardware designers talking about the future of computing.

That’s just my thoughts anyway. I’d love to hear from anyone else who’s visited the museum and tell me what you think. And what would be your ideas for a fun and interesting computing museum?

A new mini documentary just popped up on Youtube for the museum:

You can find my original post on the museum here: http://coffeeinduced.wordpress.com/2013/10/29/centre-for-computing-history-review/