Remember back then...........?

[buzz Light Beer]

My 1st box was a 486DX33 w/ an unheard of 8MB of RAM....4MB was pretty
much standard at the time. OS was Windows 3.1 w/ a 240MB HD and a 1200
baud rate modem...had 2 local dial-up BBS(s) with one node ea
Ist app I remember downloading was a free redialer...hehe
The box cost $2,400.00 at Sam's !!!<but it had a math co-processor >

I can't even fathom the fun some of you had w/ earlier boxes.
Anyway, I basically learned how to get totally lost and then work my
way back out w/ the old box and never had to re-install Windows.
Learning how to get that old *new* DOS game to work w/ the limited
resources was always fun and probably taught me more about computers
than most anything else at the time.
Enough reminiscing, I remember<sorta> making a *boost* disk w/ a
floppy that would allow me to play a game that it would otherwise not
play.
Now, to be On Topic, I wonder if there is a free program that would
create a similar *boost* on a CD-R for older machines that have maxed
the mobo out for physical RAM ?
I wish I cold remember how the boost floppy worked...I did then but I
don't now.....so many years ago<sigh>
BTW, if you know what a boost floppy is , then you probably think
<know> that Linda Ronstadt was way hotter than Britney Spears...LOL
bLB

 

[Bob Newman]

I remember I paid $250.00 to upgrade form my 10 meg HD to a 20 meg (yes,
megs NOT gigs).

Bob

 

[Mark Warner]

BTW, if you know what a boost floppy is , then you probably think
<know> that Linda Ronstadt was way hotter than Britney Spears...

Having some talent helps.

 

[James A. Smith]

Wow, that takes me back a bit.
Well my first computer was a broken Altar 8080 with toggle switches.
That I could get to work on and off.

The first "real" computer (by real I mean more like today's
(keyboard/monitor)) was a Atari 800. I remember hours and hours of typing
"basic" programs into the thing and one of my most happy computer moments
was when my mom bought me a tape drive so I could "save" the programs I
wrote!

Last year I found it in a box and it still worked!

 

[Veign]

My first computer was a Commodore Vic 20 with external Tape Drive for
storing the games that took hours to type in...Then upgraded to an Apple IIc
with a 2400 baud modem to connect to various BBS's...

Talk about appreciating advances in technology....

 

[Ben A Gozar]

My first was a Coco Color 16K and tape drive. Was able to run a version of
C way back then. Games were in color and some were a lot of fun. Used to
spend hours programming in basic!

My second was a C128. Had a real 40 column monitor, two 5.25 floppy drives,
and a 9 pin printer. I sure miss M.U.L.E. It was hot stuff at the time.

Used to wait all month for Compute magazine to spend hours typing in code
and days getting it to run!

 

[Chaos Master]

Hey James A. Smith ([email protected])! You wrote in message

Wow, that takes me back a bit.
Well my first computer was a broken Altar 8080 with toggle switches.
That I could get to work on and off.

The first "real" computer (by real I mean more like today's
(keyboard/monitor)) was a Atari 800. I remember hours and hours of typing
"basic" programs into the thing and one of my most happy computer moments
was when my mom bought me a tape drive so I could "save" the programs I
wrote!

My first computer was a TK2000 (Brazilian computer, Apple clone), 64KB RAM,
loading/writing data using an old stereo as tape recorder. I remember typing
LONG music player programs in BASIC, from the manual, just to discover a
READ/DATA pair was wrong and the music won't play correctly. At least it didn't
give me blue screens, illegal operations, segmentation faults, kernel panics or
core dumps.


Then I moved to a 50MHz 486, 8MB RAM, 340MB [1] HD, Windows 95, MS-Office 95
(IIRC)! 340MB was more than enough for me at the time, especially considering I
didn't have Internet access (it was still expensive here in Brazil).



Now I have a 300MHz Pentium with 64MB RAM and 8GB hard drive. Still enough for
me (no games, lots of programming and old MS-DOS software).


[1] It may have been 540MB. I don't remember. I was only 8 years old at the
time.


[]s

 

[Michael]

My first computer was a Commodore Vic 20 with external Tape Drive for
storing the games that took hours to type in...Then upgraded to an Apple IIc
with a 2400 baud modem to connect to various BBS's...

Talk about appreciating advances in technology....

My first computer was a trs-80. I used to save stuff on cassette tapes.
Those were the days.

 

[Semolina Pilchard]

My 1st box was a 486DX33 w/ an unheard of 8MB of RAM....4MB was pretty
much standard at the time. OS was Windows 3.1 w/ a 240MB HD and a 1200
baud rate modem...had 2 local dial-up BBS(s) with one node ea

The first computer I actually owned (as opposed to the ones I used at
work) was an Amstrad PCW8256 running C/PM. Graphics and GUI aside,
there's very little I can do on my present P4 that I couldn't do on
the Amstrad. The supposed advances in computing over the intervening
20 years are almost entirely smoke and mirrors.

 

[REM]

buzz Light Beer <[email protected]> wrote:

My 1st box was a 486DX33 w/ an unheard of 8MB of RAM....4MB was pretty
much standard at the time. OS was Windows 3.1 w/ a 240MB HD and a 1200
baud rate modem...had 2 local dial-up BBS(s) with one node ea
Ist app I remember downloading was a free redialer...hehe
The box cost $2,400.00 at Sam's !!!<but it had a math co-processor >

Same here pretty much. I loved listening to the thing whirl, whizz and almost
clank as it came to life. I bought it from the Computer Shopper for ~$1800.
I added an extra 4 megs @ $45 per meg, to run DeskView and a DOS BBS in the
background. I've still got it, but the 120 meg drive has long been dead. It did
have a 2400 baud modem, so I'm thinking you bought first. The 2400's were all
the rage when I bought.

I can't even fathom the fun some of you had w/ earlier boxes.
Anyway, I basically learned how to get totally lost and then work my
way back out w/ the old box and never had to re-install Windows.
Learning how to get that old *new* DOS game to work w/ the limited
resources was always fun and probably taught me more about computers
than most anything else at the time.

QEMM! The only way to coax many games to run in DOS.

BTW, if you know what a boost floppy is , then you probably think
<know> that Linda Ronstadt was way hotter than Britney Spears...LOL

Britney who?

 

[buzz Light Beer]

Same here pretty much. I loved listening to the thing whirl, whizz and almost
clank as it came to life. I bought it from the Computer Shopper for ~$1800.
I added an extra 4 megs @ $45 per meg, to run DeskView and a DOS BBS in the
background. I've still got it, but the 120 meg drive has long been dead. It did
have a 2400 baud modem, so I'm thinking you bought first. The 2400's were all
the rage when I bought.

hehe
I don't think anyone can really appreciate DSL unless they used a
1200/2400 baud modem...whew!
It was so cool back in the old BBS days just to play online Golf. Porn
was pretty much limited to bikini shots and semi-nude shots.
I guess my love for the old BBS(s) is why I prefer Usenet over the
web....?
As for now, I'm in the process of switching to linux ...kinda like
re-learning DOS commands but different. YKWIM

QEMM! The only way to coax many games to run in DOS.

I know I still have a copy of QEMM somewhere. And you're right...it
was great for getting them DOS games running. I bet I have a world of
old DOS ware on floppies somewhere...prob next to my treasured 8
Tracs. I believe it was one of the early gamer mags that had the info
on how to make a boost floppy...had to have it for one of them pipe
puzzle games to run as I recall ? I may even have that floppy
somewhere...now that I think about it.
I still have my old Windows 3.1 installation floppies. I may load it
w/ VMware <supported> just to play some of the old DOS games.
<might be interesting running Wolfenstein on a 2GHz CPU w/ 512 MB of
RAM, aye.>

bLB

 

[MLC]

lunedì 09/ago/2004 _buzz Light Beer_ in

My 1st box was a...

.... Olivetti M24, bought in 1984 for the equivalent of 5000$.

Monitor black/green, HD 10MB, two 5.25 floppy drives, I don't remember the
RAM amount, only DOS (Windows didn't exist), used mainly with Word 1, IBM
Logo and Tetris )

 

[GigaNews]

same here but I paid $2,000.
and it was a junk drive

 

[Rod]

Mine was a c64 with cassette, somewhere in the early 80's, around the same
time this great new media called 'CD' was launched.

She still is.

Rod

 

[Glenn]

A 486 DX is recent. That's only 4 back. My first one was a Radio Shack
with 48K and a tape recorder. My second one was a Northstar with 2 (count
'em) 5" floppies. Gave $5000. for it. It had 64K. Boy, I was in heaven.
Next was a Mod II RS with 4, 7" floppies and also $5000.

Glenn

 

[buzz Light Beer]

A 486 DX is recent. That's only 4 back. My first one was a Radio Shack
with 48K and a tape recorder. My second one was a Northstar with 2 (count
'em) 5" floppies. Gave $5000. for it. It had 64K. Boy, I was in heaven.
Next was a Mod II RS with 4, 7" floppies and also $5000.

Glenn

Well, before the Web, anyway..<BG>
Wow ! $5,000.
In 1972 I could have bought two (2) brand new VW Beetles and had a
1,000. bucks in change.
I really have enjoyed following this string...always nice to reflect
back on the good ole days...

bLB
=======================================================
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GSpot
http://www.headbands.com/gspot/

MovieID
http://www.geocities.com/cplarosa/movieid/

 

[Terry Russell]

The first computer I actually owned (as opposed to the ones I used at
work) was an Amstrad PCW8256 running C/PM. Graphics and GUI aside,
there's very little I can do on my present P4 that I couldn't do on
the Amstrad. The supposed advances in computing over the intervening
20 years are almost entirely smoke and mirrors.

Oh, I dunno, 97% perhaps, but nowhere near 'almost entirely' ;-)
Though the water in this creek is looking distinctly low.

Same as my second one.
http://www.eddiem.com/micros/micros.htm

everything loaded by hand in binary
came as chips, wire and bare board
some discrete transistors, a few resistors and diodes
no keyboard, no video, no storage, no ROM, no OS
no stack ..no call instruction
yet it could cascade multiprocessors

Some people think assembly code in a sub 1M app is cool.
Hah !!,Real assembly starts at 186 degrees C with BC109s.

Now I have over 1GByte of disc storage in a desktop box
for every byte I had back then.
And I can do almost 10 times as much ;-)

 

[Glenn]

Well, before the Web, anyway..<BG>
Wow ! $5,000.
In 1972 I could have bought two (2) brand new VW Beetles and had a
1,000. bucks in change.
I really have enjoyed following this string...always nice to reflect
back on the good ole days...

bLB

Even worse. I had RS in my trunk one day and parked on a downtown sidewalk
in front of a garage door, turned the car off and stepped inside to tell
them to open the door. I did leave the key inside but I wasn't out of sight
for more than 10 seconds. Stepped back outside and the car and it were both
GONE. The inept city cops never did find it. Admittedly it was a seedy
area but that fast?

Bought a second hand RS mod II with 2 hard drives with it that originally
sold for over $12,000 and I bought the whole package for $2,000. The HD's
were separate of the computer, each in its own metal case, about 4' high by
18" square and weighed around 20 lb each. They were huge though. I forget
but seems like they were 3 or 4 mag.

As I mentioned somewhere before, I was a building contractor and I used them
in my business and they paid for themselves.

 

[Glenn]

Even worse. I had RS in my trunk one day and parked on a downtown sidewalk
in front of a garage door, turned the car off and stepped inside to tell
them to open the door. I did leave the key inside but I wasn't out of sight
for more than 10 seconds. Stepped back outside and the car and it were both
GONE. The inept city cops never did find it. Admittedly it was a seedy
area but that fast?

Bought a second hand RS mod II with 2 hard drives with it that originally
sold for over $12,000 and I bought the whole package for $2,000. The HD's
were separate of the computer, each in its own metal case, about 4' high

(inches, make that 4 inches high [g]) by 18" square and weighed around 20 lb
each. They were huge though. I forget but seems like they were 3 or 4 mag.

 

[Ceg]

Bi-Tran 6. Most people today don't have a clue what that is.