First Computer You've Owned?

[Deacon]

My first computer was a frankenstein put together by some gentleman at my church. It ran Windows 95....hard drive...if you want to call it that was probably 200 MBs...I turned it on once, and the hard drive had crashed...solid piece of equipment....


My second computer was a Amex...I think....I can't remember, it had a 2 GB hard drive, a pentium 2 processor, onboard graphics. I think it lasted me a year....

Then I bought an HP cheapo from WalMart, it lasted me oh lord probably 6 or 7 years. Processor finally died on it, then I had a Pentium 4 work station a friend gave me...I modded the heck of out it....ran it for a cpl of years or so...then I built me a new machine...

AMD64 Phenom x4 Black Edition, 4 GB of ram, 1 TB of HDD, (two internals, one 200 GB, and one 500 GB) and a 300 GB external, an ATI 4650 graphics card, runs ArmA II and Operation Arrowhead like butter, and I can multitask like no one's business. I am running Win7 64 and Ubuntu, I am thinking of adding another 4 GB of ram.

 

[cyberlizard]

nice system... similar specs to my own...


Steve

p.s. my drives are two 620GB, oh I neglected to say also got a external drive (USB) but only 250GB. Will get a network enclosure at some point for it and discard the USB caddy.

 

[WalksWithChrist]

My first computer was a frankenstein put together by some gentleman at my church. It ran Windows 95....hard drive...if you want to call it that was probably 200 MBs...I turned it on once, and the hard drive had crashed...solid piece of equipment....


My second computer was a Amex...I think....I can't remember, it had a 2 GB hard drive, a pentium 2 processor, onboard graphics. I think it lasted me a year....

Then I bought an HP cheapo from WalMart, it lasted me oh lord probably 6 or 7 years. Processor finally died on it, then I had a Pentium 4 work station a friend gave me...I modded the heck of out it....ran it for a cpl of years or so...then I built me a new machine...

AMD64 Phenom x4 Black Edition, 4 GB of ram, 1 TB of HDD, (two internals, one 200 GB, and one 500 GB) and a 300 GB external, an ATI 4650 graphics card, runs ArmA II and Operation Arrowhead like butter, and I can multitask like no one's business. I am running Win7 64 and Ubuntu, I am thinking of adding another 4 GB of ram.

I have one gig of ram and need to add another gig. I am jealous!

 

[higherFaith]

I have one gig of ram and need to add another gig. I am jealous!

I have 256 megs of RAM.

 

[mzungu]

My first computer was the Sinclair ZX80. Less than 1k ram. When I bought the 16k ram upgrade I could not believe that I would ever use that much memory! I used to write my own games in basic back then

 

[WalksWithChrist]

I have 256 megs of RAM.

How do you cope?????
*shockedface*

 

[higherFaith]

How do you cope?????
*shockedface*

Easy when you know how a computer and it's OS works.

 

[WalksWithChrist]

Easy when you know how a computer and it's OS works.

Do tell.

 

[Deacon]

Easy when you know how a computer and it's OS works.

Yes do tell...

I am guessing you do no kind of Photo or Video Editing...

 

[higherFaith]

Do tell.

Yes do tell...

I am guessing you do no kind of Photo or Video Editing...

Actually I do use photo and video editing.

To resolve the first questions. I strip down my operating systems to what I want and need, Remove an awful lot of bloat, useless code I don't need, rubbish binaries and keep it light and fast. Easy really. Just strip it down.

 

[WalksWithChrist]

Actually I do use photo and video editing.

To resolve the first questions. I strip down my operating systems to what I want and need, Remove an awful lot of bloat, useless code I don't need, rubbish binaries and keep it light and fast. Easy really. Just strip it down.

Which OS? I'm assuming Linux. Windows isn't so straight forward to strip down or I'd be doing it!

 

[higherFaith]

Which OS? I'm assuming Linux. Windows isn't so straight forward to strip down or I'd be doing it!

BSD. Windows is.

 

[WalksWithChrist]

BSD. Windows is.

Windows is...what? Again, do tell.

 

[Deacon]

It's called BSD Windows....its a very scaled down version of Windows...

 

[WalksWithChrist]

It's called BSD Windows....its a very scaled down version of Windows...

I thought BSD was Unix.

 

[higherFaith]

Windows is...what? Again, do tell.

Windows is easy to strip down.

It's called BSD Windows....its a very scaled down version of Windows...

The only thing Windows has in common with BSD is the fact that they rely on Microsoft modifying BSD code.

I thought BSD was Unix.

BSD is UNIX.

 

[WalksWithChrist]

Windows is easy to strip down.

The only thing Windows has in common with BSD is the fact that they rely on Microsoft modifying BSD code.

BSD is UNIX.

Ok, I'll ask a little more explicitly.

How, exactly, do you go about stripping down Windows?
Feel free to post a link if that would be easier.

 

[Qyöt27]

Stuff like nLite can trim Windows down pre-install (or aid in slipstreaming Service Packs and other updates into the install disc), although you've got to know what things really are necessary or else you could break something. msconfig's Services tab can do it afterward, and is likely far safer than just removing stuff wanton from the disc before installing. Microsoft's TweakUI Powertoy can also handle stuff like that. Managing the system cache and relying on more passive security techniques also cut down on the cruft. I leave the OS Services alone, though - only if there is a clear problem with something do I mess with the OS' stock parts. IMAPI, for example - that thing should be taken out into the street and shot.

I ran both XP and Ubuntu* with only 256MBs of RAM (PC133 at that, not DDR SDRAM) up until this past January - when I got a second 256MB stick and maxed out the motherboard's memory. So, from 2003 thru the end of 2009, it was 256MBs (and onboard video too; I put the GeForce 6200 in about two weeks before I doubled the RAM).

*5.10-9.10; I installed the RAM during Karmic's release cycle.

Pretty much all of my video editing and encoding** tasks were done while it still had 256MBs. You learn to be extremely patient (exporting a 4-minute video at 848x480 can take a half hour or more, encoding it with XviD can take a half hour, encoding it with x264 can take anywhere from 2-6 hours given the placebo-level settings I tend to use, etc.). Although it does help a bit when you're not using the absolute newest versions of the software - I'm still chugging along with Premiere 6.5, not any of the Pro or CS versions.

**encoding what I, myself, have edited. I still do a lot of DVD conversion and other encoding tests on here.

 

[WalksWithChrist]

Stuff like nLite can trim Windows down pre-install (or aid in slipstreaming Service Packs and other updates into the install disc), although you've got to know what things really are necessary or else you could break something. msconfig's Services tab can do it afterward, and is likely far safer than just removing stuff wanton from the disc before installing. Microsoft's TweakUI Powertoy can also handle stuff like that. Managing the system cache and relying on more passive security techniques also cut down on the cruft. I leave the OS Services alone, though - only if there is a clear problem with something do I mess with the OS' stock parts. IMAPI, for example - that thing should be taken out into the street and shot.

I ran both XP and Ubuntu* with only 256MBs of RAM (PC133 at that, not DDR SDRAM) up until this past January - when I got a second 256MB stick and maxed out the motherboard's memory. So, from 2003 thru the end of 2009, it was 256MBs (and onboard video too; I put the GeForce 6200 in about two weeks before I doubled the RAM).

*5.10-9.10; I installed the RAM during Karmic's release cycle.

Pretty much all of my video editing and encoding** tasks were done while it still had 256MBs. You learn to be extremely patient (exporting a 4-minute video at 848x480 can take a half hour or more, encoding it with XviD can take a half hour, encoding it with x264 can take anywhere from 2-6 hours given the placebo-level settings I tend to use, etc.). Although it does help a bit when you're not using the absolute newest versions of the software - I'm still chugging along with Premiere 6.5, not any of the Pro or CS versions.

**encoding what I, myself, have edited. I still do a lot of DVD conversion and other encoding tests on here.

I prefer a post like this to one of the "it's so easy" variety.

Geeks like details!

 

[dawiyd]

First computer ever owned was a BBC Micro, that was followed by an Amstrad 8512 had a pretty cool phosphor screen. Followed on by some Acorn PC but I have totally forgotten model numbers. Then I inherited another Amstrad an CPC 464, this is where my love of Football Manager began, this literally was dots on a screen.

And that was it until x86 years...