What was your first (PC) computer, 286,386?

=XDC=FluphyBunny · 9 Feb 2017 at 18:49

First PC was first year at Uni in 1995 :eek:

(back when I thought my life was going to amount to something

)

Think it was a 100Mhz pentium? Must admit I can't remember anything else

Computer plus printer monitor etc for £1300!

I do still think it was the best use of my first year student loan

ubersonic · 9 Feb 2017 at 18:59

Amstrad PC2086 baby.

8MHz CPU, 640k RAM, VGA graphics. And mine had an added 27MB HDD plus a HD floppy drive

jsmoke · 9 Feb 2017 at 18:59

If you call a zx81 a computer then that, around 1983/84.

Rannoch · 9 Feb 2017 at 19:01

First computer was a VIC 20.

First pc was a 486/33 with 4mb ram. I found out a week after I bought it they used a 486/66 CPU but only charged me for a 33mhz version. Instant massive free upgrade by changing a few jumpers lol

Whitewater · 9 Feb 2017 at 19:27

Our first computer was an Acorn Electron, the first that could run Windows was an Olivetti 486 - 133MHz I think.

silversurfer · 9 Feb 2017 at 19:39

Vargas thats smart as hell for a new user, nice.

PC is trademark of IBM so it is a reference to intel chip clones only. Vic20 is the first computer I used as well but is not exactly qualifying.
Not sure how harshly OP may admonish you or not

Craig321 · 9 Feb 2017 at 20:23

Pentium 2, old IBM thing (my Dad worked there at the time)
Pentium 3 (as above)
Pentium 4 (as above)
Pentium 4 (first build)
Core 2 Duo
Core 2 Quad
i7 2600k (current)

Evosparki · 9 Feb 2017 at 20:53

My first computer was the Amstrad CPC 464 with the green monitor when I was 8 back in year 1989, ditched it for the SNES and GameBoy original in 1992.

Bought my first PC when I'd just turned 18 back in year 1999 and got this thing that barely anyone was bothered about it - the internet! via 56k dial up modem.
Pentium 3 800Mhz.
128MB ram
12GB HDD
Windows 98, then later upgraded to ME.
£2k from Evesham computers.
Main game played: Age of Empires 2 online multiplayer when 99.99% of everyone's fastest pings started at 240ms.

Then I built my own PC almost 5 years later with Windows XP.

ChrisD. · 9 Feb 2017 at 20:53

Mine was an IBM XT at the age from 7 to around 13 when it was upgraded to a 3086. Lost days playing XCOM TFTD.

lego · 9 Feb 2017 at 21:02

Family computers were had commodore vic 20 / amigas / 286 ect

My first personal pc was a Mitac 486, SX-33, 4 meg ram, 512k trident VGA, 260 MB HDD, oh and my parents splashed out for the sound blaster card and dual speed CDROM. All this outputting to a whopping 14" CRT.

Dem were the days!

Orionaut · 9 Feb 2017 at 21:16

Can't actually remember whether I have already contributed to this.

First computer experience, PDP8E

First computer (Owned), Commodore 128.

First Intel/MS a 386

Which was actually very disappointing compared to the C128 really,

CBM was on a different planet compared to Intel/MS in the early days. Full "windows" (WIMP as it was called back in the day), decent sound (It was capable of text to voice) and hi-res graphics at a time when the typical PC just went "Beep" You had to use the DOS CLI, and the graphics looked like minecraft on a bad day. :eek:

In the 1980's, CBM was 10 years ahead of IBM (And compatibles) easy!

Why is it that time and time again the progress of technology has always been the triumph of the crap!?? :confused:

Diddums · 9 Feb 2017 at 21:19

I started off gathering bits and bobs from wherever I could scrape them. PCs were asspensiff when I was young and built probably 100+ PCs over the years. 286s, 386s mostly. Then my grandparents saw how much I loved PCs and commissioned a family friend to build me a Pentium 120 with 16mb of RAM. Daaaayum that thing was sweet. I even bought a sound card for it and remember my first "proper" PC game: Dark Reign, which I loved to bits and also edited the hell out of the files to make my units unstoppable. Rail tanks for 5 credits? Hell yes!

FoxEye · 9 Feb 2017 at 21:48

linktoinsanity;30487433 said:
486sx 25Mhz, 20MB RAM, 105MB HDD, Evesham Vale.

Almost the same as me!

Ambra Sprinta 486 SX 25, 4MB RAM, 100MB disk. No CD, just a floppy! Not even a sound card!

Shortly after I persuaded parents to buy a sound card for it - SoundBlaster 2 no less! - and then a CD ROM drive. Fitted both myself as a 12 year old.

You had to learn fast in those days. Config.sys, memmaker, loadhi, EMS, XMS, Dos=High,LMS .... haha!

The next PC at 16 was a self-build. Cyrix 166 or something. Stupid thing over-heated and crashed in Quake

stewski · 9 Feb 2017 at 21:50

FoxEye;30488564 said:
Almost the same as me!

Ambra Sprinta 486 SX 25, 4MB RAM, 100MB disk. No CD, just a floppy! Not even a sound card!

Shortly after I persuaded parents to buy a sound card for it - SoundBlaster 2 no less! - and then a CD ROM drive. Fitted both myself as a 12 year old.

You had to learn fast in those days. Config.sys, memmaker, loadhi, EMS, XMS, Dos=High,LMS .... haha!

The next PC at 16 was a self-build. Cyrix 166 or something. Stupid thing over-heated and crashed in Quake

cyrix processors were great value for the time but had horrible float performance.

hornetstinger · 9 Feb 2017 at 21:51

stewski;30488574 said:
cyrix processors were great value for the time but had horrible float performance.

Remember mate had one of them, Formula 1 didn't work. Replaced with a Intel chip and the game worked.

They were crap CPU's.

FoxEye · 9 Feb 2017 at 21:58

hornetstinger;30488584 said:
Remember mate had one of them, Formula 1 didn't work. Replaced with a Intel chip and the game worked.

They were crap CPU's.

Thinking back it might have over-heated because back then we didn't even have heatsinks on our CPUs! Imagine that....

stewski · 9 Feb 2017 at 22:59

hornetstinger;30488584 said:
Remember mate had one of them, Formula 1 didn't work. Replaced with a Intel chip and the game worked.

They were crap CPU's.

If you boughy a cyrix for F 1 I wouldnt blame the chip, price v performance for productivity was good floating point issues were known by techies.

Rannoch · 9 Feb 2017 at 23:25

Phate;30487210 said:
An off the shelf PC from "Comet" - not sure on the CPU it had, quite possible a 286, 386 or 486 variant. It didn't come with Windows though. It had something which I remember being like a file-a-fax type file explorer where the apps were located inside.

Then a guy we found in the paper upgraded it to Win95 for us and we had Encarta 95, which I remember taking up 1/4 of the available space - A quick google suggests approximately 3.5-5mb of space required to install. So it sounds like roughly a 20mb hard drive! phwoar!

After that parents bought another "off the shelf" from "Tiny" - god that thing was awful. Never met the spec requirements for anything I wanted to install game wise, it also had a 19" CRT monitor which at the time was ENORMOUS. The motherboard died 3 times, twice under warranty, the 3rd time it was binned.

Around that time I started getting into custom hardware and a close family friend introduced me to you 'orrible lot - he still browses here!

My first PC which was mine and I built had:

P4 3.0 with hyper threading and 800FSB yo!
Abit IC7 Max-3 Motherboard
512mb OCZ RAM
Radeon 128mb 9800pro
Audigy 2 Soundcard
Dual 17" monitors
External watercooling - cannot remember the name. EXOS something.

Was a beast of a machine

Ah I got goosebumps retyping that spec out. Many an hour lost on these forums discussion that build!

Tiny lol a name from the past

Rannoch · 9 Feb 2017 at 23:28

silversurfer;30488040 said:
Vargas thats smart as hell for a new user, nice.

PC is trademark of IBM so it is a reference to intel chip clones only. Vic20 is the first computer I used as well but is not exactly qualifying.
Not sure how harshly OP may admonish you or not

Do you remember Blitz on the Vic20? About 100 years ago now

Better get back on track with PC talk lol

Akagi · 10 Feb 2017 at 00:22

Was it the original version of that game?