You know you're a geezer when.......................

[JaSAn]

. . . . . this was your first computer:

 

[Wandering Sagebrush]

My first computer... the 1010 Power Trig...



I still have it for times my MacBook might be down. It’s in a glass case with a sign that says...

“In Emergency, Break Glass”

 

[buckland]

Mine was a TRS 80 Tandy

 

[Foy]

KayPro 64 here. Then the office upgraded to a TRS-80.

 

[ski3pin]

..................fingers and toes here.

 

[Wandering Sagebrush]

..................fingers and toes here.

...but, can you count from 0 to 31 on just one hand of that “Digital Computer”?

 

[craig333]

Thanks for making me feel young! I started with a 486sx 33.

 

[JaSAn]

Thanks for making me feel young! I started with a 486sx 33.

Young or late to the game?

 

[Foy]

Thanks for making me feel young! I started with a 486sx 33.

Our first office "network" was a "sneakers network" where most everybody had an 8088 desktop. We had one "server" which was a 286 machine running at something like 25 mhz (correct clock speed term?) "server" was the only desktop (actually full tower) connected to a high speed printer, a Xerox machine which was about the size of a damn coffin. When the various accountants finished tax returns or financial statements on our desktops, we'd print to a floppy (a real 5" floppy, not those newfangled hard cased 3" floppies) and we'd walk the disc down the hall to the "server" operator. Hence the "sneaker network".

After a couple of years doing that, we upgraded to our own self-installed LAN which we ran on Windows 3.0. Hilarity ensued, but that's an entirely different story. Suffice it to say I still experience blood pressure spikes every time I see Bill Gates' face on TV or on the Intertubes.

The "sneakers network" years were roughly 1987-1989, and the self-built LAN fiasco was roughly 1990-1992. I've tried my best to erase most memories of those years.

Foy

 

[Optimistic Paranoid]

My first computer was also a TRS 80. My first attempt at networking was to use Desqview 386 to tie two computers together as a computer BBS, running Wildcat software. And I ran the Mace Utilities rather than the Norton Utilities. Peter Norton may have invented the UnDelete command, but Paul Mace invented UnFormat . . .

Back when computers were fun, and not just another household machine like a TV or a refrigerator . . .

 

[PaulT]

I still have an Altair computer with 768 bytes of memory ( couldn’t afford any more memory) . Plus uncounted numbers of SBC’s (Single Board Computers).

That’s the hazard of having a vocation that is also an avocation & being unable to throw old friends to the recycler. Who knows? Some old customer may want a new feature.

May the FORTH be with you.

Paul

 

[Casa Escarlata Robles Too]

My first computer... the 1010 Power Trig...

C0A2CA78-60A5-4CE6-977C-6B27891A0D3B.jpeg

I still have it for times my MacBook might be down. It’s in a glass case with a sign that says...

“In Emergency, Break Glass”

I also relied on one these,but had to "up date"it as it wasn't working for e mails.
Frank

 

[buckland]

I still have and it still works the first Macbook 140 with (upgraded to 2 mb ram!) and a 40 mb hard drive and the screen black and white (grey).... the battery is shot but plugged in it still fires up... it had the super advanced ball and clicker cursor.... man I was way advanced in 1991.... peoples jaw dropped. AND it cost a fortune... luckily I had a good job back then.

 

[Mighty Dodge Ram]

One of the first high school business classes I taught in ‘87 was “Computer Accounting”. We had a lab with a dozen TRaSh 80s as they were called. I knew accounting, but my computer skills were less than stellar. But I must have impressed the principal enough that he asked me to fix/rehab a “ditto” machine. Whoa! Now we had two on campus for 35 teachers!

 

[Casa Escarlata Robles Too]

Wow a "ditto" machine that's really ancient history.
Frank

 

[buckland]

Ah the ditto machine... I’d go into the bank and the teller would say “so how’s teaching?” .... how’d you know I was a teacher I asked..... says”you’ve got chalk all over your back and a blue ditto sheet smear on your forehead”

 

[camelracer]

My first computer experience was during my senior year when the engineering department got its first analog computer consisting of many differentiating and integrating amplifiers connected with jumper cables.

 

[buckland]

That one had a rope start didn’t it?

 

[JaSAn]

Our school used Mimeograph machines (competing technology). I can still remember the unique smell.

My only experience with an analog computer was in a controls class. We had to use one to balance an inverted pendulum on a motorized cart (1 DOF).

 

[Bigfoot Dave]

My laptop says "Etch-a-Sketch" across the top and when it locks up I hold it over my head and shake it! Never fails!!
Bigfoot Dave