Your Computer(s)

[Holdfast]

How do you people remember this stuff? Or do you keep a file somewhere to keep track?

Party trick.

Some party...


I notice the BBC micro on your list; we had one of those too. Did you catch the recent TV drama on one of the beeb channels about the war between Sinclair and Acorn in the early 80s? I think it was called Micro Men or something like that. It was really very good - the guy playing Clive Sinclair was dead-on, and there were some hilarious scenes too (imagine Clive Sinclair getting hit on by - surprisingly attractive - MENSA groupies...)

Worth tracking down if it's on iPlayer. EDIT - Yes, it is.

 

[Zulu Romeo]

How do you people remember this stuff? Or do you keep a file somewhere to keep track?

Party trick.

Some party...


I notice the BBC micro on your list; we had one of those too. Did you catch the recent TV drama on one of the beeb channels about the war between Sinclair and Acorn in the early 80s? I think it was called Micro Men or something like that. It was really very good - the guy playing Clive Sinclair was dead-on, and there were some hilarious scenes too (imagine Clive Sinclair getting hit on by - surprisingly attractive - MENSA groupies...)

Worth tracking down if it's on iPlayer. EDIT - Yes, it is.

I have heard about it - Alexander Armstrong and Martin Freeman were the stars, if I recall correctly. I will catch it post-haste.

 

[Jadzia]

Worth tracking down if it's on iPlayer. EDIT - Yes, it is.

Enjoyable to watch. Thank-you for the link.

 

[Robert Maxwell]

Holy shit! I have the exact same thing. 584KB RAM, 10MB hard drive. The stupid keyboard cable is always spontaneously disconnecting from inside the keyboard, too.

I set it up on a table and have it play chess against itself. People think it's awesome. I even got it online once, installing a packet driver and hooking up a 33.6 modem. It was kind of ridiculous, just a "can I really do this?" sort of thing. It worked, it was just slow as shit and basically useless.

You got it online? Awesome!
Now I'm going to have to try that experiment just to see what will happen. I have an old Lasat modem around here somewhere, I'll make this puppy run.

J.

Yeah, I think this is the packet driver I used: http://www.simtel.net/free/TCPIPIPXODI-packet-drivers/dosppp05zip/25392.html

If it's not that one, it's definitely one of the ones available on Simtel. I downloaded their entire MS-DOS archive onto an external drive as fodder for my ancient computers.

 

[USS Mariner]

If you must know:
eMachines W2785

• Intel Pentium 4 @ 2.5 GHz (replaced the AMD 2700+, which was fried by a lighting strike a few years ago.)
• 80GB HDD
• 1GB DDR RAM (increased from 512MB)
• Geforce FX5200 (replaced the shit Intel driver at the time, simply because I wanted to play Elite Force II. Guess which one was a huuuuge waste of cash. )
• KDS AV-7TF 17" Flatscreen CRT (which might be at the end of it's lifespan ATM, as it's making funny noises over the past month and refused to work until I gave it a gentle bitchslap, but it's served me very well over the years.)

I bought that in 2004. I'm amazed it still runs any of the newer programs.

 

[Captain Ice]

Current system started life as a PII 433Mhz Dell with 4.3G HD in 1999. It was rebuilt when the original processor and motherboard failed in the spring of 2003.

Currently:

Asus MB
Intel PIV 2.4Ghz
2 Hard drives (30G from about 2001 and 120G from 2005)
48x CD-Rom drive
32x DVD Writer
3.5in floppy
Audigy2 audio card
Extrenal DVD writer
ATI Radeon x1050 video card
Microsoft wireless mouse and keyboard.

 

[The First Joel]

Have two computers, but now only use this Acer Aspire 5536 laptop. The old desktop is still here, but I've unplugged it for the moment, as I haven't used it since I got the laptop.

 

[Chris3123]

I only have the one, and I got it in 2003 as a high school graduation present. The CPU is pretty much the same, with the exception of added RAM (to 512. Yes, I only have 512 RAM ), and a new video card. It's getting kinda slow, and I'll often get lag. I'd like to upgrade, but I'm not made of money, and it still works and does what it needs to do so it wouldn't feel right to ask for a new one as a bday/Christmas gift.

 

[Zulu Romeo]

I notice the BBC micro on your list; we had one of those too. Did you catch the recent TV drama on one of the beeb channels about the war between Sinclair and Acorn in the early 80s? I think it was called Micro Men or something like that. It was really very good - the guy playing Clive Sinclair was dead-on, and there were some hilarious scenes too (imagine Clive Sinclair getting hit on by - surprisingly attractive - MENSA groupies...)

Worth tracking down if it's on iPlayer. EDIT - Yes, it is.

I have heard about it - Alexander Armstrong and Martin Freeman were the stars, if I recall correctly. I will catch it post-haste.

I just finished watching Micro Men on the good old iPlayer - thanks for the link. And yes, I still appreciate the irony of watching a drama about the early computer industry, with its seemingly overblown ideas and pipedreams, on a portable computer via the Internet - something dreamed of back then and now taken for granted.

Wonderful programme - appealed to my geek side in so many ways. Seeing the old Sinclair Spectrum and Acorn technology and advertising again brought back some nice memories. Liked the brief mentions of the BBC Master and RISC technology (used in the Archimedes series). I sided with the BBC Micro back then when I was very young, and I felt much sympathy towards Chris Curry (Freeman) in his scene in WH Smith with the games (classic WH Smith logo ahoy! ). That final shot of Sir Clive (Armstrong) in his C5 was quite poignant yet hilarious at the same time. Great 80s soundtrack too.

And yes, the groupies were very attractive.

 

[Finngle Bells]

How do you people remember this stuff? Or do you keep a file somewhere to keep track?

All I know is that my laptop is a few years old now and a Sony Vaio. I can't remember any of the tech details about it and certainly can't remember the spec of my previous computers any more.

Somewhere in my dorm room is a binder with a list of that kind of tech info for my desktop computer with all kinds of CDs and information as a back up in case the computer crashes or something. The guy (brother of a guy I used to work with) who built it made the binder. I think it's great idea for people with a computer to have such a binder. Unforunately, I don't have one for my laptop.

It runs great but after the internet service my university uses created havoc on my desktop computer's antispyware/virus programs, I've been skittish about putting such programs in my laptop only to have it screwed up when I'm on campus.

 

[Small White Car]

(That mean 2 chips, each with 2 cores.)

I'm somewhere between 4-6 TB of space floating around a bunch of hard drives, but I don't feel like adding it all up right now.

I also have a 2007 Macbook Pro and my wife has a 2009 Macbook.

 

[StolenThunder]

^ I'm outclassed!

I'm considering buying a netbook too. Not sure.

 

[Kataaran]

I've got a white iMac, a mac mini running as a media centre and a Dell Mini 9 running OS X. Computers gathering dust include an Apple TiBook, a shuttle and an Atari ST

Somewhere at my parents place there is an old Speccy too.

 

[Small White Car]

I'm considering buying a netbook too. Not sure.

Blah. Even Michael Dell says not to buy Dell netbooks.

Own a good laptop and a great smart phone (or iPod touch if you don't want monthly fees).

There's no need for something in between those two.

 

[StolenThunder]

I'm considering buying a netbook too. Not sure.

Blah. Even Michael Dell says not to buy Dell netbooks.

Own a good laptop and a great smart phone (or iPod touch if you don't want monthly fees).

There's no need for something in between those two.

I know. My first choice second system would probably be a MacBook Pro. My ideal choice would be a MacBook Air.

I might just fit into the appropriate demographic though.

It would be a system I travelled with and only used for short spells, mostly for Internet access and word processing. I don't have a great deal of money either. A £300 Asus fits the bill, moreso than a cheap laptop which would drive me bananas.

Not a pressing concern at the minute, just a thought tickling the back of my mind.

 

[Robert Maxwell]

I have an ASUS Eee PC (netbook). I loves it!