DIGITAL L.A. : OLDEST PC GOES INTO RETIREMENT.

Byline: David Bloom 

Sometimes, being off the bleeding edge, even way off the edge, can pay. It did for an Illinois lawyer who won a contest by Dell Computers to find the oldest PC in the country, held in conjunction with the 25th anniversary of the PC.

Attorney John Shepard of Winnetka, Ill., was using a 23-year-old MITS Altair 8800b to create wills and other documents. Dell gave Shepard $15,000 worth of notebook and desktop computers, a server and other equipment.

Shepard's old machine - which Dell donated to the Computer Museum of America in La Mesa - was a successor to what is considered the world's first personal computer, the Altair. It was sold in kit form through Popular Electronics beginning in December 1974 in the first halting step of the PC revolution.

Fans of the brief history of computing may recall that MITS was the New Mexico company that cut a deal with a couple of Harvard boys to write an operating system that made the computer go. You might have heard of them and their little start-up: Bill Gates, Paul Allen and Microsoft Corp. (then known as Micro-Soft).

Notes from the gaming underground: Tired of replacing the worn-out batteries on your child's, or your, Game Boy Color ? Nyko has come out with the Shock'n'Rock, which not only provides up to 10 hours of continuous play with its built-in rechargable battery but also adds rumble effects and much better sound to your handheld.

The engineering isn't as elegant as on the somewhat similar Game Buddy from BTI, which allows you to plug the unit directly into the wall and serves as a night light while recharging - and giving more hours between charges. And I don't much like that the Shock'n'Rock requires you to remove the back panel where the batteries would normally fit (it's virtually guaranteed you'll lose that panel.)

But the Shock'n'Rock's configuration also allows you to play while the unit is plugged in the wall, and having the rumble effect and better sound are terrific additions. For more information, go to www.nyko.com.

With Sega's Dreamcast hitting store shelves Sept. 9, the competition is waving bargains galore. This week, Nintendo cut the price of the Nintendo 64 gaming machine to $99.95 (Sony began advertising the same price drop from $129 last week) and cut the cost of several top titles - 1998 game of the year Zelda: The Ocarina of Time; Banjo-Kazooie; 1080 Snowboarding; Star Wars Rogue Squadron; and Yoshi's Story - to $39.95.

Sony's PlayStation 2 may have voice-recognition capabilities built into its controller so it can react to your words as well as your actions, according to an interview with Sony vice president Phil Harrison in Underground, the PlayStation CD-ROM magazine. The PS2 also will likely use USB and PCMCIA jacks to connect external devices such as modems, digital cameras, keyboards and joysticks. The machine is supposed to hit American stores late next year, though knowledgeable insiders say even Sony's formidable abilities will have a tough time meeting that tight deadline.