Originally posted by Bob Blaylock:
The original IBM PC, IBM PC-XT, and all the earliest clones all had 8088 processors running at 4.77 MHz. In those days, if you were writing a program that was timing-sensitive, you wrote it to waste as many CPU cycles as needed, by executing spurious instructions, in order to run at the desired speed. This, of course, depended on being able to make solid assumptions about what processor you were running on, and at what speed.
Ah, okay. I used to try to play a game called Bouncing Babies on our 8 MhZ 8088 compatible; you controlled two firemen holding a trampoline outside a burning building, and you tried to bounce as many falling babies as you could into an ambuliance. At 8 Mhz it was impossible after the first level. 
--T.J.
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