Retro Zer0 Hacker’s Handbook

2021

Editor's note: I am still really interested in permacomputing, preserving the technology we have, and reexamining and mining what came before. This manual for an heirloom computer using the CP/M predecessor operating system to DOS is interesting, though I haven’t yet delved into trying out such a system much myself.

A manual originally created for the Retro Zer0, a CP/M compatible computer meant to be easy to learn, modify and preserve.

Hosted at Internet Archive

CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

We look back at older computers with rose tinted spectacles, but can we look forward with them? What might a computer with a 100 year lifespan look like, and how do we build it?

Steve Lord writes about HEIRLOOM COMPUTING in his article The 100 Year Computer.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

Copyright ©2021 Raw Hex Ltd. All Rights Reserved. Retro Zer0 is a trademark of Ring Zer0 Training. Raw Hex is a trademark of Raw Hex Ltd. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. Raw Hex Ltd reserve the right to make changes or improvements to equipment, software and documentation herein described at any time and The Retrozer0 is a fully functional CP/M compatible computer you can understand, use and modify. It runs professional software from programming languages to word processors, spreadsheets and more. An SD card slot lets you move files between this and more powerful computers. The Retrozer0 has few enough parts that its inner workings are easy to understand. If taken care of it will still function decades from now. We hope you’ll have many years of fun with your Retrozer0!