The irrelevancy is the appeal. It's become something mostly disconnected from everything else.
A world of computing that's not focused around networking or communications where the relationship is between the user and the machine as opposed to the machine being a vessel for a relationship with others.
It is inherently a different kind of computing with a different kind of performance expected between the participants. It's like how people who restore classic cars don't do so because they need a way to get groceries and drive to the office. Anyone with their head on straight would admit modern cars are cheaper to maintain, safer, and have better fuel economy. Doesn't matter, it's not the point.
You nailed it. My attraction to retro-computing is a mixture of nostalgia and a desire to unplug and go "off the grid". Early computers (DOS, Mac, C64, Apple II, BBC Micro, etc.) had a much more intimate feel than today's omni-connected communications devices. It's kind of like reading a book vs watching a live stream (with busy chat scrolling by).
Another aspect to it is the low latency you get when using a machine with very few layers of abstraction between the software and the (usually CRT) display. Using something like WordPerfect for DOS is a dramatically different experience than modern MS Word or Google Docs. Vastly fewer visual distractions as well.
The irrelevancy is the appeal. It's become something mostly disconnected from everything else.
A world of computing that's not focused around networking or communications where the relationship is between the user and the machine as opposed to the machine being a vessel for a relationship with others.
It is inherently a different kind of computing with a different kind of performance expected between the participants. It's like how people who restore classic cars don't do so because they need a way to get groceries and drive to the office. Anyone with their head on straight would admit modern cars are cheaper to maintain, safer, and have better fuel economy. Doesn't matter, it's not the point.