25 Years of Technological Change - Rusty n Edie's reddit / bbs ---------------------------------------------------------------------- G_Porgie · 2016-11-07 14:29 I came across [this short story](http://timeline.textfiles.com/1987/05/11/1/FILES/page-22.htm) on the origins and growth of Rusty n Edie's BBS (obviously written before the big FBI bust) and did a bit of a comparison of the technology and effort that went into that BBS (one of the largest in the world, prior to being shut down by the FBI in 1993) to the technology of today. Breaking down the list of computer parts in the story (and being somewhat simplistic in adding up those parts), the total storage, speed, and bandwidth of Rusty n Edie's hardware would be as such: - Speed (total MHz by adding up all processors): 3.089 GHz (spread across 183 desktop systems). - RAM: 375MB - Storage: 16GB - Modem Speed: (adding up all modems, plus assuming that Connect USA ran at the fastest possible 115kbps) - 3 Mbps - Total Lines Serviced: 128. Max speed on fastest line: 115kbps. This system took up an entire basement, with hardware at an approximate value of over $200,000 when seized by the FBI. By itself, it drew about 140 amps of power (more than double the typical household power service of the day of 60 amps), and also required a large air conditioner and humidifiers to keep cool and to control static. The system was maintained by a team of sysops (Rusty, his wife Edie, and their neighbor). Today, a short 25 years later, you can run a BBS on a Raspberry Pi. A computer system that would fit in the palm of your hand and run off of USB power. At full power, the Pi draws approximately 1.3 Amps of power on a 5V USB adapter. Here are the comparative specs: - Speed of four cores: 4.8Ghz (simplistically adding 4 cores at 1.2GHz each). - Storage: 128MB (if using a larger flash drive) - RAM: 1024MB - Total Comm Speed: 10Mbps - Lines Serviced: 255 (limited only by Mystic BBS software). - Max. Speed on a single line - all 10Mbps. I was deep into BBSing in the early 1990s when Rusty n Edie's (and many other BBSs) was at its peak. The specs on that BBS were mind- boggling at the time. It is incredible the scale of change 2 and a half decades has brought. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- G_Porgie · 2016-11-07 14:33 Just a clarification on Comm Speed of the Pi - I based that on the upload speed of my Cable service. The Pi's wireless networking can handle much faster speeds than that, but BBS users wouldn't be able to take advantage of that. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- A_Downboat_Is_A_Sub · 2016-11-07 19:14 I never logged on but I remember Rusty n Edie's because of two things. People would post porn pictures on local boards far away from them that were watermarked by Rusty n Edie's with their name and telephone number. Second, when CD-rom technology first came on the scene, booths at computer shows sold CD-roms with .txt and .doc files that had ads for their BBS. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- cdtoad · 2016-12-04 02:49 I had a pay account on that BBS. It was an all out copyright infringement system. Remember downloading a beta of windows 95 from them in like late 93. Not to mention every thing else.