I just bought a Lime G3 iMac from eBay, and found AmiBay when searching for info.
This will be the latest of many retro PCs I've bought and used for as long as I enjoyed them.
I was into PCs since I was very young. I had heard my sister talk about the night she and some friends spent messing around with a Commodore PET, and the paper tape printout.
I think I signed up for a summer enrichment course in 1980 or 1981, I can't remember if we used TRS80s or TI99/4s. I was enthralled, and was smitten when the VIC20 came out. I rode my bike many afternoons to the local Clover department store, and typed in programs in the VIC20 on display. If I was out near a Sears, they'd have the Atari 400/800s, and usually a Colecovision. My brother had his Sinclair with a ton of expansions, and the neighbors, who already had an Atari 2600, got an IBM PCjr - so lucky! I spent hours in Zork and other Infocom games there.
If weather was bad, I'd sit in my room and type programs up on a typewriter. Really.
My parents had taken me to a local computer store a couple times, and I really like the Franklin Ace line, but in 1983, my parents bought me a C64 and thought I'd finally be quiet and happy (as an aside, I thought when I looked at the Franklin that there was a switch to run it in a non-Apple mode, but that doesn't seem to be mentioned anywhere).
They didn't realize I'd now want to monopolize the one TV in the house, and that the C64 couldn't save any data. Eventually, I saved my money, and bought my own Datasette and Okidata printer; I was on my way. A few years later, I had a whole retro battlestation in the basement (before it was retro). I had two C64s, each with dual 1541s. One was hooked up to a big color console TV, the other was hooked up to an amber monitor, and the printer. I had GEOS, and did my school papers, as well as typed up papers for other kids.
Eventually, I lost most of my gear, and my brother offered me a 486 motherboard. I ran my first IBM-clone PC out of a cardboard box, and disliked Windows 95 so much that I deleted explorer.exe, and used Windows that way for months. Really.
I worked in tech support for a small chemical software company for a little while, then taught MS Office and math to adults, and then was an instructor at a small private school, with a small budget. That was when I started getting into making the most of old PCs, and just like I love older cars, I love old PCs. They may not be the fastest, have all the features, or even be reliable, but the ones with the endearing quirks are usually the ones I miss most.
So, in something like a chronological order, here's significant PCs I've used:
Grade School - Ti99/4, TRS-80, Apple II, VIC20, Sinclair (ZX80/ZX81?)
High School - IBM PCjr, TRS80, C64, Apple II
Adult life - While others were being entranced by the pretty pictures on the Macintosh, my brother gave me an Ampere, and my mind was blown by APL. You can read a little more about that here.
I stepped away from computing for a few years, and then, as I mentioned above, started by literally building my own PC, starting with a motherboard and a cardboard box.
Since then, I've owned a lot of beige box PC clones, with little distinction. My first "storebought" PC was an eMachine eMonster, which I kept running for quite a while.
Significant machines since then...
Kapok laptop - sub-Pentium or Pentium (can't remember), first in a long line of dependable, low power laptops I've owned.
Fujitsu 435dx laptop
Apple Powerbooks (520 and 540c) - literally pulled the first one out of a dumpster
Dell Latitude D510 - My current line of "household appliance" laptops - I'll buy when I see a good price, and use them around the house. I've had them in the laundry room, garage, kitchen, wherever I might want Pandora or basic web browsing capability.
I also just bought a Samsung refurb laptop, but that's no where near the retro point yet.
This will be the latest of many retro PCs I've bought and used for as long as I enjoyed them.
I was into PCs since I was very young. I had heard my sister talk about the night she and some friends spent messing around with a Commodore PET, and the paper tape printout.
I think I signed up for a summer enrichment course in 1980 or 1981, I can't remember if we used TRS80s or TI99/4s. I was enthralled, and was smitten when the VIC20 came out. I rode my bike many afternoons to the local Clover department store, and typed in programs in the VIC20 on display. If I was out near a Sears, they'd have the Atari 400/800s, and usually a Colecovision. My brother had his Sinclair with a ton of expansions, and the neighbors, who already had an Atari 2600, got an IBM PCjr - so lucky! I spent hours in Zork and other Infocom games there.
If weather was bad, I'd sit in my room and type programs up on a typewriter. Really.
My parents had taken me to a local computer store a couple times, and I really like the Franklin Ace line, but in 1983, my parents bought me a C64 and thought I'd finally be quiet and happy (as an aside, I thought when I looked at the Franklin that there was a switch to run it in a non-Apple mode, but that doesn't seem to be mentioned anywhere).
They didn't realize I'd now want to monopolize the one TV in the house, and that the C64 couldn't save any data. Eventually, I saved my money, and bought my own Datasette and Okidata printer; I was on my way. A few years later, I had a whole retro battlestation in the basement (before it was retro). I had two C64s, each with dual 1541s. One was hooked up to a big color console TV, the other was hooked up to an amber monitor, and the printer. I had GEOS, and did my school papers, as well as typed up papers for other kids.
Eventually, I lost most of my gear, and my brother offered me a 486 motherboard. I ran my first IBM-clone PC out of a cardboard box, and disliked Windows 95 so much that I deleted explorer.exe, and used Windows that way for months. Really.
I worked in tech support for a small chemical software company for a little while, then taught MS Office and math to adults, and then was an instructor at a small private school, with a small budget. That was when I started getting into making the most of old PCs, and just like I love older cars, I love old PCs. They may not be the fastest, have all the features, or even be reliable, but the ones with the endearing quirks are usually the ones I miss most.
So, in something like a chronological order, here's significant PCs I've used:
Grade School - Ti99/4, TRS-80, Apple II, VIC20, Sinclair (ZX80/ZX81?)
High School - IBM PCjr, TRS80, C64, Apple II
Adult life - While others were being entranced by the pretty pictures on the Macintosh, my brother gave me an Ampere, and my mind was blown by APL. You can read a little more about that here.
I stepped away from computing for a few years, and then, as I mentioned above, started by literally building my own PC, starting with a motherboard and a cardboard box.
Since then, I've owned a lot of beige box PC clones, with little distinction. My first "storebought" PC was an eMachine eMonster, which I kept running for quite a while.
Significant machines since then...
Kapok laptop - sub-Pentium or Pentium (can't remember), first in a long line of dependable, low power laptops I've owned.
Fujitsu 435dx laptop
Apple Powerbooks (520 and 540c) - literally pulled the first one out of a dumpster
Dell Latitude D510 - My current line of "household appliance" laptops - I'll buy when I see a good price, and use them around the house. I've had them in the laundry room, garage, kitchen, wherever I might want Pandora or basic web browsing capability.
I also just bought a Samsung refurb laptop, but that's no where near the retro point yet.
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