VOGONS

Common searches


Reply 20 of 53, by BitWrangler

User metadata
Rank l33t++
Rank
l33t++

I guess I gave up "hanging out in ICQ" some time in the late noughts, before it became impossible at all in the last year.

Unicorn herding operations are proceeding, but all the totes of hens teeth and barrels of rocking horse poop give them plenty of hiding spots.

Reply 21 of 53, by Namrok

User metadata
Rank Oldbie
Rank
Oldbie
BitWrangler wrote on 2024-12-04, 14:06:

I guess I gave up "hanging out in ICQ" some time in the late noughts, before it became impossible at all in the last year.

Man, I remember for years hanging out on chat apps. ICQ way early on, then AOL IM around highschool because that's what the girls I wanted to chat with used. I want to say around college is when Google Chat became more of a thing. And for a long, long while you could use something like Trillian to log into all of them from the same application. At some point Google Chat just took over, and it became more and more difficult to get Trillian to work with it, until there was no point. Now nobody even uses Google Chat anymore because it's blocked in their offices, but that might just be my professional circle.

Win95/DOS 7.1 - P233 MMX (@2.5 x 100 FSB), Diamond Viper V330 AGP, SB16 CT2800
Win98 - K6-2+ 500, GF2 MX, SB AWE 64 CT4500, SBLive CT4780
Win98 - Pentium III 1000, GF2 GTS, SBLive CT4760
WinXP - Athlon 64 3200+, GF 7800 GS, Audigy 2 ZS

Reply 22 of 53, by gerry

User metadata
Rank Oldbie
Rank
Oldbie
Namrok wrote on 2024-12-04, 14:39:

Now nobody even uses Google Chat anymore because it's blocked in their offices, but that might just be my professional circle.

that made me think of another habit from the earlier-mid 90's at work that's long gone - the casual ignorance of "security" in offices such as playing a game from floppy from the workstation at lunch, and no one from IT or some such compliance department blocking everything. Seems naïve and innocent now and pretty sure a fair few office computers got ruined from disk borne viruses back in the day, those were the early days of PC's at work - often not networked, featured DOS and Win3.1 plus some variety of dos and early windows office applications

Reply 25 of 53, by Jo22

User metadata
Rank l33t++
Rank
l33t++

Replacing all CRTs by LCDs. It was a foolish mistake of mine.

There was a time when LCD monitors were new and I admired them for their pixel-sharp image, their lower radiation and more compact construction.

Then I re-discovered the 16-Bit days of computing and how much fascinating stuff there was that I have missed out upon.
I realized that LCD monitors don't do the old technology justice.

Meanwhile, I saw LCD monitors changing from beige/lab style to silver and black everywhere around me.
Everyone bought them. That's when I set out to get CRT monitors and beige 4:3 LCDs (by NEC, Belinea, Siemens-Nixdorf etc).

"Time, it seems, doesn't flow. For some it's fast, for some it's slow.
In what to one race is no time at all, another race can rise and fall..." - The Minstrel

//My video channel//

Reply 26 of 53, by BEEN_Nath_58

User metadata
Rank l33t
Rank
l33t
Jo22 wrote on 2024-12-04, 21:15:
Replacing all CRTs by LCDs. It was a foolish mistake of mine. […]
Show full quote

Replacing all CRTs by LCDs. It was a foolish mistake of mine.

There was a time when LCD monitors were new and I admired them for their pixel-sharp image, their lower radiation and more compact construction.

Then I re-discovered the 16-Bit days of computing and how much fascinating stuff there was that I have missed out upon.
I realized that LCD monitors don't do the old technology justice.

Meanwhile, I saw LCD monitors changing from beige/lab style to silver and black everywhere around me.
Everyone bought them. That's when I set out to get CRT monitors and beige 4:3 LCDs (by NEC, Belinea, Siemens-Nixdorf etc).

I was about to have a same mistake. In 2020, I put my PC for sale over an online store: I got over 20 offers over a week, those who were positive offered less than 33% of the price, some wanted to discuss back later but never returned.

The PC is now my station for bare DOS and GPU features like dithering

previously known as Discrete_BOB_058

Reply 27 of 53, by StriderTR

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member

So many things I used to do religiously, I don't anymore for various reasons, like technoogy moving past the point of it being necessary, or really even mattering anymore. The biggest ones for me would probably be...

* Defragmenting (SSD!)
* Cleaning up uninstalls (Deleting "left-behind" files and registry entries, now I just do it if I happen to come across it)
* Run a 3rd Party anti-virus tools (Don't see the point, many are no better than Windows tools, and many more are even worse)
* Run a 3rd Party Firewall (Same reasons as above, plus, Pi-Hole!)

One thing I still do is segregate all my data into different physical storage devices. Meaning, I have drives just for games, software, and general storage. The only apps that go on my OS drive are the ones that need to be there, so not all that many. I'm one of those people who hates having all his eggs in one basket. So a combo of data segregation and backups means hardware failures are less of a pain to recover from. I've been doing that for a very long time.

Retro Blog: https://theclassicgeek.blogspot.com/
Archive: https://archive.org/details/@theclassicgeek/
3D Things: https://www.thingiverse.com/classicgeek/collections

Reply 28 of 53, by chinny22

User metadata
Rank l33t++
Rank
l33t++
Tripredacus wrote on 2024-12-04, 20:36:

Initially resisted using WASD for movement in games and used the arrow keys on a full keyboard up until maybe 10 years ago.

I'm still holding out, but I wouldn't call myself much of a gamer either.

StriderTR wrote on 2024-12-05, 00:27:

One thing I still do is segregate all my data into different physical storage devices. Meaning, I have drives just for games, software, and general storage. The only apps that go on my OS drive are the ones that need to be there, so not all that many. I'm one of those people who hates having all his eggs in one basket. So a combo of data segregation and backups means hardware failures are less of a pain to recover from. I've been doing that for a very long time.

I'm starting to drop this now, at least on my main laptop.
All my retro rigs at the very least have separate partitions, Helps with organizing as well as reinstalls.
but the laptop that gets used to download everything just has 1 large mess of a download folder.

Reply 29 of 53, by badmojo

User metadata
Rank l33t
Rank
l33t

I used to take some interest in the Windows menu contents and structure but I haven't looked at it for years - I have no idea what's in there. Menu search is the main thing I miss when messing around on my XP machine.

Life? Don't talk to me about life.

Reply 30 of 53, by zyzzle

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member
Azarien wrote on 2024-12-04, 12:03:

I used to require a so-called "big ass Enter" keyboard (which combines the shape of horizontal Enter with vertical Enter to one big reversed L shape), to the point that I started stockpiling my favorite Chicony KB-9810 keyboards (an ordinary membrane keyboard except it has the one and only "perfect" layout).

I went one step further... I eschewed the keyboards with the Windows keys, because they took up valuable room for a large spacebar. I stockpiled PS/2 keyboards which had true mechanical keys and the "perfect" layout of the Big Enter key and without other superfluous, crowding keys.

Still use them today. These old keyboards were built like tanks, weighed a ton, and will outlast me...

Other habits that I no longer do include defragmentation on newer SSDs. But, I'd argue that deleting temporary files has become *more* important today, as there are so many of them being generated -- crap and rubbish fragments left all over your drive as intentional breadcrumbs. So, a habit I started 30+ years ago on all Windows systems is creating a RAMDRIVE at initial Windows load and setting TEMP and TMP there, as well as all temporary browsing files (eg, set the Default directory of Google Chrome's browser cache there), but unfortunately I need to keep cookies on the main SSD / hard drive, which is something 99% of people should do for the "convenience." Now, the 2GB or so RAMDRIVE I create at OS load is peanuts compared to the 32 or 64GB of total system RAM. Back in the day, I stuck with 64 - 128 MB at most.

I also used to turn off Javascript entirely, but of course with the garbage Web 2.0, that's impossible today. Browsing the web even at 56k back in the day with Javascript of was very bearable. Now, it's slower at 50 mbps with the virus of Javascript turned on than it was back in the good old days of no ads, captchas, automatically playing videos, or crappy fluff at 56 kbit / 128 kbit. But ublock Orgin helps keep the crap minimized, thankfully.

I also no longer scan for viruses, with the RAMDRIVE automatically setup and most temp files going to it, and uBlock Orgin running and a good hosts file -- and the "built-in" windows Defender (which can't be disabled easily), there's no need if one browses the web wisely and uses common sense.

I always turn my systems off at night, never leave them continuously running. Waste of power, and even with a "smart" live internet connection, exploits can occur. Why tempt fate, even if your system is battened down well?

Reply 31 of 53, by sydres

User metadata
Rank Newbie
Rank
Newbie

Lots of things! Slashdot used to be my home page still have the account user six hundred thousand something or other but started reading it pretty early on. it just became a hang out for whiny trolls and excessive politics so I stopped.
Also constantly trying new Linux distros, alternative operating systems. I have systems for that but my everyday system has to stay somewhat static.

Reply 32 of 53, by BitWrangler

User metadata
Rank l33t++
Rank
l33t++

Yeah I had a few site habits I lost, read Wired for a couple years in the 90s, and it went... I dunno where it went but it wasn't anywhere good. Then the Register to keep up with IT news but that got so damn depressing.

Unicorn herding operations are proceeding, but all the totes of hens teeth and barrels of rocking horse poop give them plenty of hiding spots.

Reply 33 of 53, by Martli

User metadata
Rank Newbie
Rank
Newbie

In the early days I used to close every window individually before shutting down 😂. I definitely don’t bother with that any more

Fenrir Pentium MMX 166 | Voodoo1 | YMF719 | AWE64 | SC-88ST pro | MT-32
Neptune PIII 600 | Voodoo3 | Vortex 2 | YMF719
Thor P4 3.0ghz | 4200ti | Audigy 2 | YMF 754
Jupiter i5 3470 | GTX 670 | X-Fi

Reply 35 of 53, by mtest001

User metadata
Rank Member
Rank
Member

Switching on all peripherals (screen, printer, etc) BEFORE the central unit....

/me love my P200MMX@225 Mhz + Voodoo Banshee + SB Live! + Sound Canvas SC-55ST = unlimited joy !

Reply 36 of 53, by Nexxen

User metadata
Rank l33t
Rank
l33t
Unknown_K wrote on 2024-12-05, 07:44:
Nexxen wrote on 2024-12-04, 17:06:

Optical mice.

You don't like optical mice?

I made a mistake, it's "non optical" mice!
🤣
I have to edit that.

PC#1 Pentium 233 MMX - 98SE
PC#2 PIII-1Ghz - 98SE/W2K

Reply 37 of 53, by gerry

User metadata
Rank Oldbie
Rank
Oldbie
Tripredacus wrote on 2024-12-04, 20:36:

Initially resisted using WASD for movement in games and used the arrow keys on a full keyboard up until maybe 10 years ago.

i think i gave in earlier than you, but i also stayed with arrow keys for a long time 😀

BitWrangler wrote on 2024-12-05, 04:08:

Yeah I had a few site habits I lost, read Wired for a couple years in the 90s, and it went... I dunno where it went but it wasn't anywhere good. Then the Register to keep up with IT news but that got so damn depressing.

bookmarks, i dont as much now - i have had several periods in which i would tend to looks a the same websites daily and then something changes (like a job) and the habit breaks and if i look at the same website it suddenly feels less relevant or strange to be there. i don't even remember some of the ones i used to visit so often, just some memories of the kinds of forums, articles and newsfeeds they had

mtest001 wrote on 2024-12-05, 08:55:

Switching on all peripherals (screen, printer, etc) BEFORE the central unit....

just.... having peripherals beyond monitor, keyboard, mouse. that's it now, no printers and any zip drives, external readers/burners and so on are long gone

Reply 38 of 53, by Errius

User metadata
Rank l33t
Rank
l33t
chinny22 wrote on 2024-12-05, 01:01:

but the laptop that gets used to download everything just has 1 large mess of a download folder.

haha, one day I'm going to sort out my Downloads directory

Attachments

  • Image7.png
    Filename
    Image7.png
    File size
    15.27 KiB
    Views
    367 views
    File license
    Public domain

Is this too much voodoo?

Reply 39 of 53, by Grzyb

User metadata
Rank l33t
Rank
l33t

Parking HDD heads - sometime in the 90s, when I switched from a stepper drive to a voice-coil one.
But of course I still do it on old machines that still use a stepper HDD !

Zaglądali do kufrów, zaglądali do waliz, nie zajrzeli do dupy - tam miałem klimatyzm.