Thread: How do Russians and others normally switch between Latin and non-Latin keyboards?

Originally Posted by Anixx

Most of Soviet computers after Brezhnev were copies of Western analogs at least by architecture. Brezhnev is often criticized for the decision to copy rather than develop ourselves. Before that the USSR made computers of its own architecture. Some people even called the politburo meeting where this decision was taken a disaster.

Yes, something went wrong in the USSR - invention stopped and things stagnated. Somehow people lost the spark to really drive things forward. I think it is tragic and I wish I understood what happened. For what it is worth I do not consider the capitalist system to be one ounce better.


URAL computer looks very cool!! Steampunk, LOL.

Wiki says "The computer was widely used in the 1960s, mainly in the socialist countries, though some were also exported to Western Europe and Latin America."

Look, this is the computer that Anixx mum worked with:



Gosh I wonder what they used it for! Gives us some perspective on our laptops for sure!

Originally Posted by Hanna

Yes, something went wrong in the USSR - invention stopped and things stagnated. Somehow people lost the spark to really drive things forward. I think it is tragic and I wish I understood what happened. For what it is worth I do not consider the capitalist system to be one ounce better.


URAL computer looks very cool!! Steampunk, LOL.

Wiki says "The computer was widely used in the 1960s, mainly in the socialist countries, though some were also exported to Western Europe and Latin America."

Look, this is the computer that Anixx mum worked with:

And later she worked at BESM-6:



And then with something like this:

We are 100% dependant on parts that only Asian countries have the know-how to assemble.

AFAIK, it's not a question of "know-how," really -- it has more to do with (a) labor costs, and (b) "exporting" high-pollution manufacturing processes abroad.

In fact, (b) is especially important, because making computer components is VERY FAR from "Green". (For the same reason, we eco-conscious Westerners buy compact-fluorescent bulbs and LED bulbs that are made in China -- these technologies may save a lot of electricity here, but they're quite "dirty" to manufacture. However, it has nothing to do with lacking "know how" to produce these items in our own countries.)

P.S. The photos of vintage computers reminded me of this classic one-liner:

Наши советские микрокомпьютеры самые большие в мире, и советские часы - самые быстрые!
Our Soviet microcomputers are the largest in the world, and Soviet watches are the fastest!

[A "boast" that has been apocryphally attributed to Brezhnev and others, though I don't think there's any evidence of any Soviet leader ever saying it! ]

Originally Posted by Throbert McGee

P.S. The photos of vintage computers reminded me of this classic one-liner:

Наши советские микрокомпьютеры самые большие в мире, и советские часы - самые быстрые!
Our Soviet microcomputers are the largest in the world, and Soviet watches are the fastest!

[A "boast" that has been apocryphally attributed to Brezhnev and others, though I don't think there's any evidence of any Soviet leader ever saying it! ]

Well I cannot compare Ural or BESM to the foreign analogs, but given they were exported worldwide, they were not that bad. The ЕС ЭВМ was a copy of an IBM-produced prototype so it was not larger nor smaller than IBM-produced analogs.

You can also consider a Soviet "pocket-pc" Elektronika MK-90/92/96.




It had a 16-bit processor, graphical display and embeeded BASIC interpreter.

You could also attach it to a dock station and connect to an external display and printer.


Of course this thing was much more expensive than the БК-0010 which had a similar processor and amount of memory.