"Freakazoid" had dated technology even in 1995.

[Martianinvader]

I remember seeing "The Chip" in its original airing and wondering how Dexter's computer could be suddenly upgraded if it seemed to have no graphical capabilities beyond an Apple IIgs. A blue screen with white words on it, that was all his computer showed in the first season. And when he had to enter a URL, he said "Where's my codebook?" and started looking for something modem users had to use a loooong loooong time ago before electronic bookmarks. Also, only nerds had the Internet on this show, and at the time of airing the Net was growing and this was also rapidly becoming not true.

But at least they called it "the Internet" and not "The Information Super-Highway"!

[John Pannozzi]

Well, F! was created, at earliest, in 1993. Also, maybe they were trying to how poor the Douglas family was, and what a loser Dexter was to have such an out-dated computer.

[J.E.Smith]

Well, F! was created, at earliest, in 1993. Also, maybe they were trying to how poor the Douglas family was, and what a loser Dexter was to have such an out-dated computer.
...execpt for the fact that every computer in the show was that kind.

[Psycho Fox]

Well, F! was created, at earliest, in 1993. Also, maybe they were trying to how poor the Douglas family was, and what a loser Dexter was to have such an out-dated computer.
Being 1993 at the earliest probably has more to do with it. In 1993 Unix boxes had some butt ugly desktops, and the F! staff could have been exposed to it.

[UmmYeahOk]

In 1993 we had a packard bell and even THAT was DATED! But it ran windows. And I dont recall ever having to type in DOS commands in 93 with the new windows. We had an ISP... ...Prodigy... which was the AOL of its time. Like the sliderule, I have never seen an actual codebook in person.

[Psycho Fox]

In 1993 we had a packard bell and even THAT was DATED! But it ran windows. And I dont recall ever having to type in DOS commands in 93 with the new windows.

True but Mosiac wasn't around till Mar. 1993 and it was only for Unix boxes till the first official released in Nov 1993. Before Mosaic if you wanted to surf the web you did it in a terminal window.

In 1993 odds are their access to the internet was via a Unix boxes (in 1993 Unix was still the OS of choice for offices to get onto the internet) like a Sun workstation.

[Sparticus]

*snickers* I know! When he gets the chip and starts talking about it's capeablities, including "16 megabites of ram" I always laugh. I have more than that on my JumpDrive (64megs). :p

[Brainatra]

Also perhaps the fact that the Internet then was still a "novelty" for most Americans (even with the rapid growth of the World Wide Web), and that movies of the time such as (the dreadful) "The Net" showed computer "hackers" as always using text-based commands/terminals...

Of course, there's more to the Internet than just the World Wide Web---maybe Dexter prefered using a terminal-/text-based newsgroup reader and email program...

I didn't get my first computer until 1995, BTW. Which makes this 10 years of at-home Internet usage, hooray for me! (First used the web in either '94 or '95, via computer courses/labs at college).

-B.

[Psycho Fox]

Also perhaps the fact that the Internet then was still a "novelty" for most Americans (even with the rapid growth of the World Wide Web), and that movies of the time such as (the dreadful) "The Net" showed computer "hackers" as always using text-based commands/terminals...

To this day hackers still use terminals alot, this is due to bulk of servers and super computers (that are the big scores) still to this day having no desktop running to save resources plus for the ones with a desktop it is still better to go for terminals since it means the hacker can work faster without having to download the target desktop.

Then there is simplicity, all a hacker needs is the administrator doing a trace while the hackers desktop has bombed and still holding onto the connection.

[UmmYeahOk]

I never thought about it because despite what I had, public schools didnt even have Win 3.1 till 1997. Which also means that not only was the internet already a well used thing by 97, but windows 95 had been out for atleast 3 years!

Perhaps Dexter lives in a crappy commnity behind in the times. Rather than order a chip off line. One had to either order from a magazine or find a computer store that actually sold these things... ...if their town had one.... Why theres still some people out there that dont know what an mp3 is! People in my town

[Sparticus]

I never thought about it because despite what I had, public schools didnt even have Win 3.1 till 1997. Which also means that not only was the internet already a well used thing by 97, but windows 95 had been out for at least 3 years!
Hmmm... now that I think about it, I was still using an old dinosaur DOS based deelie up until about '93 or '94, and didn't even get on the net untill we got a PacBell with 3.1 on it. So the timeframe isn't THAT off, it's more based on the average family computer at the time, I think. Heck, the only reason I HAD a computer at the time was that dad used it for work and he let me type up homework and stuff on it.

I was like the only kid in town with a computer at home, most of the people I knew had only been exposed to the school Mac's and most of those computers were still IIE's.

[UmmYeahOk]

Though we had a Packard Bell in 92, we only got it because everyone else had one, it it was a symbol of progress and success. If you handed in a 5th grade paper off a dot matrix spreedsheet printer, you were cooler than someone who used a typewriter. Even before Win 3.1 we had some sort of GUI software (cant remember what it was) All I remember was it was lame, and DOS was still in. After all, before the schools got Win 3.1 they also had some sort of lame fake GUI.

Well, you must understand that Dexter is suppost to represent the average geeky nerd of that time. If you will recall the 80s wargames, thats what computers were basically like until GUIs. The nerds I knew and know had computers during the times of Wargames. Their games were lame text adventures since again, DOS was all they had. I didnt even SEE a computer till 1989. So these geeks were WAY ahead of us. Dexter had the technology of a newbie.