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We're back from a long 5 days at the NEC in Birmingham. As much hard work as it was and although most of us feel like we've been run over by tank it was all completely worth it !!

The show was a huge success with over 31,000 visitors flooding through the doors - literally ...

We spent Wednesday and Thursday building the 110 square metre stand. A luton van full of equipment was unloaded and set-up. Computers and gadgets were cleaned, the Asteroids machine was polished and the Sinclair C5 was revved up.

Then Friday happened. The official opening at 10 o'clock came and within minutes the stand was inundated with visitors all which had huge grins and pointing fingers claiming "I had one of those!". It was absolutely brilliant.

We arranged the exhibits in decades starting with the 1970's and classic retro gadgets like the Akai reel to reel, the Sony Colour TV, the Apple II and Commodore PET computers. Each decade had two featured games consoles at the front on the stand. For the 70's we had a Binatone PONG game and the classic Atari 2600 games console.

For the 1980's we featured the awesome BBC Micro, the original Apple Mac, the Osborne 1, Asteroids and Simon hand held games and the Betamax video recorder. The two games machines featured were obviously the Sincair Spectrum and the Commodore 64!

Lastly, the 1990's featuring the Atari ST, Commodore Amiga, Apple iMac, Psion Organisers, Kodak DC-120 Camera and a Toshiba Satellite laptop. Representing gaming gadgets were the Atari Jaguar and the fantastic Sony Playstation.

We've had some great feedback about our stand :
"The museum of computing history stand was really interesting."
http://www.avforums.com/forums/shows-events/928597-gadget-show-17-19th-april-nec-3.html

"It was by far the MOST popular booth at the Gadget Show."
http://www.cpu3d.com/article/7577-2/the-gadget-show-live-birmingham-nec/the-retro-zone.html

"People of Centre for Computing History are very nice and they have a Sinclair C5. Someone sponsor their museum." - Jane Douglas
http://msnuktech.spaces.live.com/

"The Gadget Show Live lived up to the hopes of being UK's largest interactive technology event"
http://www.weirdandbeard.com/features/2009/4/gadget_show_20093

"A really, really interesting trip through 30 years of computing."
http://mrteabelly.wordpress.com/2009/04/20/go-go-gadget-show/

"Thank you so much for coming along and putting in so much effort to create an amazing experience for our visitors. I know everyone was really impressed and it was definitely one of the most popular stands/features at the show." - Iain Wood - Upper Street Events (Show Organiser)

"You guys easily have the coolest stand here"
A guy from the PC World stand!

"One of the main attractions at the show is the Centre for Computing History"
ENT TV
http://www.youtube.com/watch?hl=en-GB&v=jfrLLT-RZaM&gl=GB

The show was a huge success, not only for us, but the show in general. Excellent organisation, great atmosphere and an event well remember for a long time. Just a shame the Gadget Show presenters didn't come and see us !! :-(

Hey ho, we're looking forward to the Gadget Show Live 2010 - We'll have a whole new decade on show and some great new new interactive exhibits ... See you there ...

Click To View the Video >>>

E-Mail Link: info@computinghistory.org.uk