Computer nostalgia
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From: Baltimore
Computer nostalgia
Ok, so I admit I'm pretty young in some members' eyes, but probably pretty old in some others. But to show my age, here are my computer nostalgia. See if you can relate to each other's nostalgic memories 
- My first computer was an Apple, I don't even remember if it was an Apple II, but it had a TAPE drive (using standard audio tapes). I remember typing in some commands (don't even remember it now), push play on the tape player, and go do some other stuff. When I came back the game was loaded
- My 2nd computer was an IBM XT, it ran DOS 2.x; learning the DOS commands were a PIA, and there weren't as many games to be had. At least it had a 5.25" floppy drive (double density 320k or 640k media, I believe). Green and black monitor.
- My 3rd computer was an Apple IIc (you know, the laptop looking type with a built-in floppy drive), now that baby rocked! I had games galore for it, and for the first time color! I believe that was nothing close to VGA...But I remember playing Carmen (something) where you chase the bitch all over the world...also did a lot of
10
20
30
40
BASIC programming which I can't remember for $hit now...
- My 4th computer was a 386DX-25. It kicked all my friends' 286 (AT) ass. It had a 1MB Trident VGA card, 4MB RAM, and a Connor 40MB hard drive that was very large. First time I ever seen a hard drive It also ran on Dos 5.0, and I had Windows 3.0 which was a POS.
- Anyone remember editing AUTOEXEC.BAT and CONFIG.SYS??
- Anyone remember the first Wing Commander game that required a certain tweak to the EMM386?? That was a bitch to squeeze just that little more memory so I can run the game...
- Anyone remember QEMM386?
- Anyone remember Intel selling the math co-processor for the SX series CPUs?
- I built my 5th computer, which was a 486DX50. Now that was awesome: VESA Super VGA, VESA hard drive controller...the list goes on and on.
- Anyone ever try to copy Windows 3.1 files into your RAM (if you were money enough to do so), and windows ran so fast it was amazing?
- Anyone remember dialing up to local BBS to download porn or games? hahahahaha. 2400 Baud modem was awesome at the time. I remember leaving my computer on all night to download and going to sleep. The next day the download would be ready
- CompuServ and Prodigy were 2 of the biggest "online" communities. I heard that you couldn't go through all of CompuServ's information in a lifetime...
- Anyone tried the original Sierra Online community? It was very graphics based, lots of online games I enjoyed. I even got a date out of meeting one of the girls
- The best Windows version before NT/95 was IMO Windows For Workgroups 3.11 - it was stable, and with DOS 6.x it was fully featured, and very nice.
All of this was before the Internet was popular (it existed, of course, and we all know Al Gore invented it
).
- My first computer was an Apple, I don't even remember if it was an Apple II, but it had a TAPE drive (using standard audio tapes). I remember typing in some commands (don't even remember it now), push play on the tape player, and go do some other stuff. When I came back the game was loaded
- My 2nd computer was an IBM XT, it ran DOS 2.x; learning the DOS commands were a PIA, and there weren't as many games to be had. At least it had a 5.25" floppy drive (double density 320k or 640k media, I believe). Green and black monitor.
- My 3rd computer was an Apple IIc (you know, the laptop looking type with a built-in floppy drive), now that baby rocked! I had games galore for it, and for the first time color! I believe that was nothing close to VGA...But I remember playing Carmen (something) where you chase the bitch all over the world...also did a lot of
10
20
30
40
BASIC programming which I can't remember for $hit now...
- My 4th computer was a 386DX-25. It kicked all my friends' 286 (AT) ass. It had a 1MB Trident VGA card, 4MB RAM, and a Connor 40MB hard drive that was very large. First time I ever seen a hard drive
It also ran on Dos 5.0, and I had Windows 3.0 which was a POS.- Anyone remember editing AUTOEXEC.BAT and CONFIG.SYS??
- Anyone remember the first Wing Commander game that required a certain tweak to the EMM386?? That was a bitch to squeeze just that little more memory so I can run the game...
- Anyone remember QEMM386?
- Anyone remember Intel selling the math co-processor for the SX series CPUs?
- I built my 5th computer, which was a 486DX50. Now that was awesome: VESA Super VGA, VESA hard drive controller...the list goes on and on.
- Anyone ever try to copy Windows 3.1 files into your RAM (if you were money enough to do so), and windows ran so fast it was amazing?
- Anyone remember dialing up to local BBS to download porn or games? hahahahaha. 2400 Baud modem was awesome at the time. I remember leaving my computer on all night to download and going to sleep. The next day the download would be ready
- CompuServ and Prodigy were 2 of the biggest "online" communities. I heard that you couldn't go through all of CompuServ's information in a lifetime...
- Anyone tried the original Sierra Online community? It was very graphics based, lots of online games I enjoyed. I even got a date out of meeting one of the girls
- The best Windows version before NT/95 was IMO Windows For Workgroups 3.11 - it was stable, and with DOS 6.x it was fully featured, and very nice.
All of this was before the Internet was popular (it existed, of course, and we all know Al Gore invented it
).
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From: richmond
i started with a commedore 64, then moved up to a 386 33Mhz, . .i miss the days where i know EXACTLY what every file on my computer did. (when you only have 200 Mb, you need to conserve as much as possible) but i just loved the simplicity of win 3.1 so much, that i wouldnt upgrade for so long, that by the time i finally did i jumped straight to win 98
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From: 3rd bedroom on the right
Apple IIC was my first computer and I was all over carmen's butt for many years Also enjoyed Test Drive, Millionare and best of all......PACMAN!!!! I didn't replace that until '98 when I bought a used IBM thinkpad 380XD which I learnt the basics on and just this year I updated that with the desktop that I use now. Problem is I was I have to learn more so that I can make use of this to its full extent and I really dont have time
Also enjoyed Test Drive, Millionare and best of all......PACMAN!!!! I didn't replace that until '98 when I bought a used IBM thinkpad 380XD which I learnt the basics on and just this year I updated that with the desktop that I use now. Problem is I was I have to learn more so that I can make use of this to its full extent and I really dont have time
Joined: Mar 2002
Posts: 1,485
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From: Hampton
My first computer was a Commodore PET, which I still have. I paid extra to get the BIGGER memory option, a whooping 8K of onboard memory!! The basic model only had 4K of memory. It too, had a built in cassette tape drive.
That one also programmed in BASIC, there were very very few games available, so you had to program your own. I need to get it out and see if it still works.....
That one also programmed in BASIC, there were very very few games available, so you had to program your own. I need to get it out and see if it still works.....
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Joined: Aug 2001
Posts: 1,645
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From: Alexandria, VA
my first pc (1992) was a whitebox OEM:
i386SX 16mhz, 2mb RAM (8x256bk), 40MB Conner hdd and a 256kb oak 8-bit card, 3.5in and 5.25in floppies and 14in ViewSonic 4E monitor with a Panasonic KX1123 - 24pin dot matrix. It didn't even have a sound card...
Now (2004):
2.4ghz P4 w/HT
1024MB RAM
160GB hdd
8X DVD burner
40X CD burner USB
SB live
21in FD trinitron
16MB matrox G400
100mbit + cable modem
how things change....
i386SX 16mhz, 2mb RAM (8x256bk), 40MB Conner hdd and a 256kb oak 8-bit card, 3.5in and 5.25in floppies and 14in ViewSonic 4E monitor with a Panasonic KX1123 - 24pin dot matrix. It didn't even have a sound card...
Now (2004):
2.4ghz P4 w/HT
1024MB RAM
160GB hdd
8X DVD burner
40X CD burner USB
SB live
21in FD trinitron
16MB matrox G400
100mbit + cable modem
how things change....
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Joined: Mar 2003
Posts: 3,962
Likes: 7
From: San Fernando Valley, CA
I mainly used my first computers back in HS. We were pretty ghetto back then.
Several of us in our Junior High School days (1981 or so) would go to the local Rat Shack to mess with the Model III, or occasionally let the school let us use their only computer: A RS Model I.
In HS, they had a computer lab with three computers, a RS Model III, and and Apple ][ and an Apple ][+. I spent most of my time on the Apples. In my senior year (1983-1984) they got a bunch of Atari 800's that they finally installed in the last half of the year. They sat in a storage room for nearly 6 months because the school board did NOT want them installed.
Why? Because they were "Atari" computers. Atari = games to the LAUSD.
I moved on to an XT-type notebook for a brief while, then to a 386DX-25, with DOS 5, QEMM, DesqView, and OS/2 1.2. By that time it was 1989 or so. Then I went off to Desert Storm.
In 1991, I got a screaming 486DX/66, with a Diamond Viper video card and messed about with Windows 3.1, OS/2 2.1 & 3.0, Linux and NeXTSTEP.
In 1994, I rescued a NeXT Cube from my local University. I used this for the next year and bought a Color NeXT Turbostation in 1995. I stayed with these two machines until late 1998 when I picked up a Gateway Pentium II 450.
In 1999 I started collecting older computers and got ahold of: Atari XE, Commodore 64, Coleco ADAM, TI 99/4a, and NEC of some kind, a Sony MSX, and a few others.
In 2001, I saw some Apples over at Fry's and was messing around with OS X. Noticed it was pretty much the same thing as the NeXTSTEP I loved so much. A year later, all the PCs were gone and now we have an iBook, LCD iMac, and I use a DP800 Powermac.
Current specs:
2x 800MHz G4 processors
1.1GB RAM
2x 120MB WD SE drives (8MB cache) in RAID 0.
60MB Maxtor drive
8x DVD-R drive
17" Apple LCD monitor on a Geforce 2MX
15" Gateway monitor on an ATI Radeon PCI
I think I got another year or two before this gets unbearably slow.
Several of us in our Junior High School days (1981 or so) would go to the local Rat Shack to mess with the Model III, or occasionally let the school let us use their only computer: A RS Model I.
In HS, they had a computer lab with three computers, a RS Model III, and and Apple ][ and an Apple ][+. I spent most of my time on the Apples. In my senior year (1983-1984) they got a bunch of Atari 800's that they finally installed in the last half of the year. They sat in a storage room for nearly 6 months because the school board did NOT want them installed.
Why? Because they were "Atari" computers. Atari = games to the LAUSD.
I moved on to an XT-type notebook for a brief while, then to a 386DX-25, with DOS 5, QEMM, DesqView, and OS/2 1.2. By that time it was 1989 or so. Then I went off to Desert Storm.
In 1991, I got a screaming 486DX/66, with a Diamond Viper video card and messed about with Windows 3.1, OS/2 2.1 & 3.0, Linux and NeXTSTEP.
In 1994, I rescued a NeXT Cube from my local University. I used this for the next year and bought a Color NeXT Turbostation in 1995. I stayed with these two machines until late 1998 when I picked up a Gateway Pentium II 450.
In 1999 I started collecting older computers and got ahold of: Atari XE, Commodore 64, Coleco ADAM, TI 99/4a, and NEC of some kind, a Sony MSX, and a few others.
In 2001, I saw some Apples over at Fry's and was messing around with OS X. Noticed it was pretty much the same thing as the NeXTSTEP I loved so much. A year later, all the PCs were gone and now we have an iBook, LCD iMac, and I use a DP800 Powermac.
Current specs:
2x 800MHz G4 processors
1.1GB RAM
2x 120MB WD SE drives (8MB cache) in RAID 0.
60MB Maxtor drive
8x DVD-R drive
17" Apple LCD monitor on a Geforce 2MX
15" Gateway monitor on an ATI Radeon PCI
I think I got another year or two before this gets unbearably slow.
