How old were you when you got your first PC?

[MatteRB26]

I got my first real pc at the age of 7 in 2001 from old parts my dad and my brother kept over time. I was late to the general computer scene but arrived at the modern era at a pretty good time.

Wondering how old other people were when they got their first kind of computer? One of the guys at work got into programming by reading programming books while writing for his cassettes to load.

 

[Junglist]

Had my first own PC for my 8th birthday in 1998. My uncle built it for me and for some reason saw fit to install Doom 95 on there. The following year he installed UT99 for me and the rest was history.

I did used to play on the 'house' PC prior to that but the PC for my 8th Birthday was actually my own personal computer.

 

[DanTheMan]

I was 13, in year 8 in high school. 2003.

Nobody in my immediate family had ever owned a pc and it took a lot of convincing before my parents would but me one for a combined birthday / Christmas gift. I must have been asking for about 2 years prior to getting one.

I don't think even I expected pcs in general to become such a big part of my life back then. I just wanted to play some mmos!

 

[Tom_ed1987]

I bought my first PC when I was around 14. Used/shared the family PC up until then.

 

[Bluecube]

I was 18 when I got one for university. Over £2k for a top of the range P133 with an upgraded 8Mb of memory and a 2Mb Diamond video card! It came with a whopping 15” CRT monitor.

 

[Megahurtz400]

Used to play doom and worms on my dads PC back in the mid 90s, then finally built a PC with my dad in 2003 when I would have been about 11.

Miss the days of CS1.6/CSS/BF2 with friends, having friends bring their PCs round and set up the dining table in my bedroom and having LAN parties till 3am, as well as the sense of community back then online.

Now it just seems super toxic and everyone is trying to prove something online

 

[Lysander]

It was 2004, so I would have been 24 when I got my own PC. It was a Dell Dimension, but I can't remember which. Up till then I had been using my mum's/dad's.

The first thing I did was put a 9800Pro in it so I could get better graphics in Bloodrayne.

 

[Lopéz]

How old were you when you for your first PC

I was 5 or 6 when I for my first PC, but it was a family Commodore VIC-20 rather than specifically mine.
I was about 11 when I for my first PC, but it was a family IBM x86 rather than specifically mine.
I was 19 when I when I for my first PC which I built myself.

 

[MatteRB26]

Used to play doom and worms on my dads PC back in the mid 90s, then finally built a PC with my dad in 2003 when I would have been about 11.

Miss the days of CS1.6/CSS/BF2 with friends, having friends bring their PCs round and set up the dining table in my bedroom and having LAN parties till 3am, as well as the sense of community back then online.

Now it just seems super toxic and everyone is trying to prove something online

I used to watch my dad playing Doom pretending I was helping. I played it too, but I was terrified that if I died, I'd die for real so IDDQD was the only way I'd play.

My friend and I used to do semi-regular LANs together at my parents house during the CSS days. He'd often fall asleep by about 3 or 4am, but he'd wake up to me still playing

I also remember sneaking downstairs as a young child to play Apache on my Dad's pc I got caught most of the time.

 

[Lysander]

I was 5 or 6 when I for my first PC, but it was a family Commodore VIC-20 rather than specifically mine.
I was about 11 when I for my first PC, but it was a family IBM x86 rather than specifically mine.
I was 19 when I when I for my first PC which I built myself.

Just goes to show that people read what they think a sentence says rather than what it actually says.

 

[Freakbro]

Just goes to show that people read what they think a sentence says rather than what it actually says.

Reality is probably just a controlled hallucination

https://www.ted.com/talks/anil_seth_your_brain_hallucinates_your_conscious_reality

First home computer was a C64 when I was probably ~12 or 13, first 'PC' was a 333mhz with a voodoo2 in the mid 90's in my mid 20's

 

[roddypoddy]

Late starter here, bought my first pc in 1998, and i'm 67 next month.

 

[Worthy]

My first "kind" of computer was a Spectrum +3 when I was 5.

I was 12 when I got my first PC.

 

[arc@css]

26 (PC).

 

[peterwalkley]

13 - it was an Apple II in 1980. The spectrum, BBC micro C64 etc didn't exist until a couple of years later.

 

[Vimes]

IIRC I was 20 when I bought my first computer, a ZX80 in kit form. I think that would have been around 1980.
My first PC, following other 8 bit home computers of the Sinclair, Oric, Commodore etc varieties, was a 386 SX25 in 1985 or so at 25 years old.
Five years or so later the game Comanche was influential on me upgrading to a 486 DX2 66.

I never really stopped "upgrading"...............

 

[Lysander]

I don't think even I expected pcs in general to become such a big part of my life back then. I just wanted to play some mmos!

For anyone who grew up in the '80s/'90s, their PC is definitely one of their most prized possessions, if not their most prized.

It's generational, in comparison to people who grew up in the e.g. '60s, whereby it would be something like their house/car.

 

[Wizzfizz]

C64 bought from Index on release

First PC around '97 that I built myself

 

[Jenz]

IIRC I was mid-20's which is 26 years ago. It was an IBM PS2 and Wing Commander. Happy days!

 

[R.P.L]

The first computer I used at home was our family Amiga 500 when I was in primary school. I was then a console scrub until I bought a Q6600-based PC from PC World - that was probably around 12-13 years ago so I would've been about 26, and that was the first PC that was actually mine. The first PC I built was a 2500k / GTX570 build to replace the Q6600, and I can see I ordered the parts on OcUK in May 2011 so I would've been 29.