just a random through I was having....
do you remember when you could buy computer parts like hard drives and cd-roms in bookstores like BDalton
how times have changed........
Large multiple-colored store-brand-label floppies 😁
multimedia "kits" with sounds cards and CD-ROMs
Barnes & Noble sold SPI wargames back then too.
Products came with proper user manuals.
When you paid by the minute for being online. Not something I miss!
Getting to 99% of an hour long download from your favorite BBS, only to have a family member pick up the phone in another room.
Life? Don't talk to me about life.
how do I say this... seems like back then PCs were a little more "hobby friendly".... now they are just disposable
wrote:Getting to 99% of an hour long download from your favorite BBS, only to have a family member pick up the phone in another room.
...
This is the worst thing ever. Thankfully, we moved to ISDN very quickly and I didn't experience that that often.
I do remember calling my best friend on mornings and his brother cursing because he was traversing dungeons in WoW.
A 20MB HDD cost over $200.
Motherboards had nothing but RAM and CPU, the rest you had to buy (video, network, sound, I/O floppy, HD controllers etc.).
Backing up your downloads to QIC tapes connected to your floppy controller (or a separate high speed ISA card if you had money). SCSI if you were rich.
Keyboards that clicked.
Defragging your HD for speed every week.
Collector of old computers, hardware, and software
VLB video cards..........
wrote:Motherboards had nothing but RAM and CPU, the rest you had to buy (video, network, sound, I/O floppy, HD controllers etc.). […]
Motherboards had nothing but RAM and CPU, the rest you had to buy (video, network, sound, I/O floppy, HD controllers etc.).
Backing up your downloads to QIC tapes connected to your floppy controller (or a separate high speed ISA card if you had money). SCSI if you were rich.
Keyboards that clicked.
Defragging your HD for speed every week.
My 486 board was that way. Remember not liking it when they started putting everything on the motherboard - now anything else seems like a real pain 😉
wrote:how do I say this... seems like back then PCs were a little more "hobby friendly".... now they are just disposable
Building a PC used to mean sliced fingers, risk of electrocution, hardware incompatibilities which required arcane rituals to resolve, and potential for blowing one's life savings with the slip of a screwdriver.
I miss all that stuff - putting together a PC today is child's play.
I liked those big box games which were stationed next to the books section at shopping malls long time ago. I still remember one of the games that were being sold at one mall at that time: Gunship 2000. I was drooling at that time but had no money to get the $59 equivalent currency at that time.
Speaking of games.... how about games that came with maps, trinkets, thick manuals, complete product catalogs (SSI anyway) ,keyboard overlays, etc. Now you just get a DVD and some advertisement.
Collector of old computers, hardware, and software
wrote:...putting together a PC today is child's play.
But not a retro one:)
...FPS games were played with arrow keys.
Subject lines were decently written.
Ellipses only had three periods.
😵
do you remember when you could buy computer parts like hard drives and cd-roms in bookstores like BDalton
Wow... B. Dalton's. I haven't heard that name in 20 years. The one around here never carried computer stuff... that was all in the Software Etc. store (a subsidiary of B. Dalton) which was right next door in the mall.
Then there was also Babbage's, and Electronics Boutique, before it turned into a shitty video game store. I still use a toolkit I got from the latter...
