Boyd Raymond 'Ray' Borrill was founder of
The Data Domain, a retail computer store in
Bloomington, Indiana
Bloomington is a city in and the county seat of Monroe County, Indiana, Monroe County in the central region of the U.S. state of Indiana. It is the List of municipalities in Indiana, seventh-largest city in Indiana and the fourth-largest outside ...
, and vice-president of
itty bitty machine company retail computer store, December 1975 – 1980, located in
Evanston, Illinois
Evanston ( ) is a city, suburb of Chicago. Located in Cook County, Illinois, United States, it is situated on the North Shore along Lake Michigan. Evanston is north of Downtown Chicago, bordered by Chicago to the south, Skokie to the west, Wil ...
.
These stores have their place in computer history as they are not only among the first several storefront computer retail shops, but also were two of the first computer stores to sell the
Apple I
The Apple Computer 1, originally released as the Apple Computer and known later as the Apple I or Apple-1, is an 8-bit desktop computer released by the Apple Computer Company (now Apple Inc.) in 1976. It was designed by Steve Wozniak. The i ...
computer, the
MITS Altair 8800, as well as numerous other now highly collectible products from microcomputer history. The dealer arrangement was made by
Steve Jobs
Steven Paul Jobs (February 24, 1955 – October 5, 2011) was an American entrepreneur, industrial designer, media proprietor, and investor. He was the co-founder, chairman, and CEO of Apple; the chairman and majority shareholder of Pixar; a ...
. The Data Domain is also believed to be the first to ever use the phrase "Personal Computer" commercially. These stores are the first retail outlets for personal computers. Items could be purchased as either complete assembled and tested, or as kits.
In 1975, Borrill was one of the participants of the Kansas City symposium, which established the
Kansas City standard
The Kansas City standard (KCS), or ''Byte'' standard, is a data storage protocol for standard cassette tapes at . It originated in a symposium sponsored by Byte (magazine), ''Byte'' magazine in November 1975 in Kansas City, Missouri to develop a ...
, a standard format for recording data on audio
cassette tapes. The Kansas City standard format allowed for exchange of data between
microcomputers
A microcomputer is a small, relatively inexpensive computer having a central processing unit (CPU) made out of a microprocessor. The computer also includes memory and input/output (I/O) circuitry together mounted on a printed circuit board (PC ...
. Many pioneers of the microcomputer industry, such as
Bill Gates
William Henry Gates III (born October 28, 1955) is an American business magnate and philanthropist. He is a co-founder of Microsoft, along with his late childhood friend Paul Allen. During his career at Microsoft, Gates held the positions ...
while working for
MITS, were also in attendance.
References
External links
Interview with Ray Borrill, History of itty bitty machine companyA tribute to Ray Borrill
including email and newsletter archives
The Data Domain article on Bloomingpedia
*http://www.thedatadomain.com/ - The Data Domain website, now defunct.
*
*http://mobtalk.net/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=3985 - Discussion about The Data Domain o
mobtalk.net
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1931 births
20th-century American businesspeople
2006 deaths