the new computer experience
 

does anybody recall the experience of getting a new computer or finally getting the internet? being an already advanced user that is. basically, the incredible flood of all this oppurtunity all of a sudden becoming available. a similar experience I had was a few years ago, when I became an advanced user on my 486 with AOL dialup and Win95, and eventually on christmas day built my own 1.8 GHz PC and just got a cable modem. My oh my, I don't think I got off that PC for hours on end. I just find it interesting, because I see friends who just first use the internet on their own computer and spend hours on end using it. You know, the wake up in the morning, stay in your sleep clothes all day eating waffles and always have more and more to experience with the boundless internet? OK well this post seems to be getting rather long so let me just ask, any experiences or stories anyone wants to share? =)

Yes. My brother like like that. Until a few months ago he had a P3 and no internet.

yeah, I was just like that back in January of 2000, when my family got a new computer (P3 500mhz), and we got hooked to the Internet. Man, I spent the better part of that year wasting my life on the Net, and playing Jane's Fighters Anthology online. :D

Even now, if I become curious about something I haven't done a search on before, I may end up in a search tangent and spend the rest of the day reading up on new subject matter. :)

It was like that for me in July when I got my new laptop with a 3.4GHz processor, a Gig of RAM and 128mb Radeon 9700. The day I got it and first turned it on, I was like "OMG, this computer is so freakin' fast!" (It was a major upgrade from an old PIII with 128mb RAM and an ancient 64mb nVidia card). Now the thing's a total piece of shit that can't keep up with the demands I put on it daily (full-res, full-AA/AF gaming; super-multi-multitasking, etc.) :p

My only real new computer was my first (that i owned myself, my family had a mac for a few years before that). A 386SX 25mhz with 2mb of ram, 256k oak technologies video card, 100mb hard drive and a 13" vga monitor, running Dos 5.0 and Windows 3.0.

That was in '92, and i spent every moment of spare time for a week playing stunts and a shareware version of wolfenstein (which i think had just been released at the time).

Since then i've never built an entirely new system, i've just upgraded. Even additional systems i build use at least a few parts that have come out of other systems, a case, a hard drive or a monitor etc.

when i first got my dell, from my friend that thought it was broken, when i was trying to get it to work. there's a thread that i made to try to get some help with getting it to start up and then the cd-rom wasn't working for a while after i got it going. the night i got it i was up until about 4 or 5am. i didn't even know i was up that long. i thought it was like 1 or 2am at the latest. it's not the latest and the greatest or anything but it works for me.

I get the feeling with a clean HD.

That was just too hard to read.

Hum... ..My first computer that actualy belonged to me, was an Acorn electron back in the VERY late 80's. After that I got a couple of other dinosaurs for there games untill finaly I got my own true computer.

A Hewlett Packard Pavilion, with 128mb's of ram, a 1.8ghz cellery, onbord graphics and sound and Windows XP. Now it runs 98, has 384mb of ram a 128mb ATI Radion 9200 and a 5.1 soundcard. The Slow provcessor holds it back, but its still a viable machine for my needs.

Now of corse I have my laptop as well, and it dose kinda "pwnt" it on speed, but it has an Nvidia graphics card with the same specs as the ATI (And Ironicaly, games designed for Nvidia cards always run better on the ATI... ..mind you, just about everything so far runs better on the ATI... ..except HL2 for some reason).

My first system with dial out capabilities was a Commodore 128. Used to go BBS hunting all the time.

Lies!:p Hl2 runs much better on Ati. And Doom3 favors nvidia.

Scroll down a bit.
http://anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=2278&p=3

http://anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=2146&p=3

I remeber my first comp and did exactly that. Now it has gone through many transformations over time and currently sits at a 2.8ghz P4 and yes I'm still doing the other bit lol

~ :)

Not in my experiance, but I still prefer the ATI card over the Nvidia anyday.

I was into computers when I was younger and had played around a lot of the old Apple II's and then when PC's started taking off is the time I quit playing around. Years later after not touching a computer for over a decade I broke down in '99 and bought my first PC, a Sony VAIO 450mhz P2, and cable modem service. I was hooked and spent all my free time playing around on the internet and downloading from Napster.

everybody feels the same when starts with internet i think

Ahh, the great feeling of getting a new computer.

My first computer that I actually had in my own room, was, well, i don't even know what the prosessor was, but it had 8 megs of ram, and didn't even run winamp. TORTURE!! But to me, it was the greatest thing ever

And then, my dad got a laptop. One day I asked him if I could have the desktop computer that used to be in his workshop, and after a few days of begging, he said yes. That computer was a Pentium 133, 32 megs of ram. It was such an upgrade from my old one, it was almost like I had died and gone to the world of superfast computers!

Then, a guy my dad works with gave us a computer he didn't need any more for a very reasonable price. It was a Pentium 3, 64 megs of ram. That was the second computer that our whole family used, and also the one we use now. I then got my 3rd upgrade, to the one that our family used to use, the exact same as the one that was in my room, but with a much better moniter, video card, and sound card.

And that is my experience with new computers

I'm sorry, this post got rather long, rather fast!

I had a P3 forfuckingever, man. I think 4 years before getting my current computer.