First post, by FFXIhealer
So, uh, gonna just post my stuff because we're all nerds and that's what we like doing - bragging about our stuff. 🤣
Anyway, a list of my old-ass PCs I remember having and the ones I currently still have access to.
1 - 486 (~1990-ish)
CPU: Intel 80486DX 33MHz
RAM: 16MB EDO
HDD: Somewhere around the 700MB range, I don't remember...I was 10 at the time.
OS: MS-DOS and Windows 3.1
I remember this as my father's PC, the first real IBM-compatible PC in the house. I used to write school reports in Word and print them out on an old dot-matrix printer and I remember having to tear the papers apart and pull off the holes on the sides.
2 - Packard Bell (1995)
CPU: Intel Pentium 100MHz
RAM: 16MB EDO
HDD: 1.2GB
OS: Windows 95
This one just had the 1MB VRAM chip and the built-in 2D graphics chip on the MB. The sound card was one of those Packard Bell all-in-one Gamepad, Sound Card, and 14.4 Modem combo cards. I even remember having to replace it once with a SB16 card and a separate 33.6 modem. I also remember having to manually run a long-ass phone cable across the house to get the thing plugged up to the internet. Anyone else remember the old Nintendo Loudhouse? 🤣 I was around 15-16 at this time. That 100MHz seemed fast, and Windows 95 was so "new".
3 - College (1999)
CPU: Intel Pentium II 350MHz
MB: ASUS P2B - Intel 440BX
RAM: 128MB PC-100 SDRAM
HDD: 10GB Maxtor
OS: Windows 98 First Edition
I talked the parents into getting me a custom computer during my 1st year in college in 1998-1999. It was so I could write programs (I still have the Borland C++ Builder 3 software I bought from the college campus!). But what I REALLY wanted was a system that could run my copy of Final Fantasy 7 for PC. I didn't have a Playstation and everyone had been talking about that game for years. I wanted to see what's up. So, let's continue with the specs
AUDIO: Creative Labs Sound Blaster AWe64 Gold ISA (This card is apparently legendary)
VIDEO: Diamond Stealth II G460 8MB AGP (Intel i740 graphics chip)
Modem: 56Kbps
Network: SMC 10/100 Ethernet
By the way, this is the system I have resurrected. It's the first entry in my signature, but we'll get to that later.
4 - Windows XP (2003)
CPU: AMD Athlon XP 1800+ (1.53GHz)
MB: Abit KX7-333
RAM: 256MB DDR (133MHz)
HDD: 80GB Western Digital
OS: Windows XP Home
AUDIO: Creative Labs Sound Blaster Live! 5.1 PCI
VIDEO: ATI Radeon 7500 64MB AGP
Network: SMC 10/100 Ethernet
This was built because my Windows 98 computer was pretty dated by now. And I got my hands on an unused Windows XP disk. My mother's PC at this time was a Windows Me computer and sure, it pretty much sucked because it was a budget PC with weak hardware. But this one was a good gaming machine. I played Final Fantasy 11 on this for a year before I joined the military.
5 - U.S. Army (2005)
Build: Dell Inspiron XPS Gen 2 (laptop)
CPU: Intel Pentium M 2.1GHz
RAM: 2GB DDR2 800MHz
HDD: 80GB (upgraded almost immediately to 250GB)
OS: Windows XP Home
VIDEO: nVidia GeForce Go 6800 Ultra 256MB PCI-Express (yes, the laptop actually had a removable graphics card inside!)
I still have this laptop today. It was my first experience with a 1920x1200 LCD display. I've not had a screen less than 1920x1080 since. I've replaced the LCD screen, the motherboard, the graphics card, the battery, etc. It NOW runs a GeForce 7800 GTX 256MB graphics card, much more power and more stable, though I had to flash the BIOS to recognize the newer card. It still runs to this day and I can play games on it. It's such a beast for a laptop of its day.
6 - Post-deployment (2010)
Oh yeah, lots of deployment money here, so I just had to get something really nice. I did a lot of research into what was out and what was hot. This is what I built (using Newegg purchase history):
Case: Antec 1200 full-tower ATX with clear side door, dual 120mm rear fan ports (so I can mount a 240mm Radiator for water cooling)
CPU: Intel Core i7-860 Lynnfield Quad-Core 2.8 GHz LGA 1156 95W
MB: MSI Big Bang Trinergy LGA 1156 Intel P55 / NVIDIA NF200 ATX
RAM: G.SKILL Ripjaws Series 16GB (4 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3-1600 (PC3-12800)
HDD: WD Black WD10000LSRTL 1TB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5"
Optical: Pioneer Blu-Ray burner SATA (still use to this day to watch movies)
OS: Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit
AUDIO: Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional 24-bit PCI-Express 1x
VIDEO: eVGA nVidia GeForce GTX 480 1.5GB PCI-Express 2.0
VIDEO: Galaxy nVidia GeForce GTX 480 1.5GB PCI-Express 2.0 (in SLI Mode)
PSU: KINGWIN Lazer LZ-1000 1000W Modular 80 PLUS BRONZE
I even picked up a Swiftech Quiet Power MCR220-QP Liquid Cooler Radiator for this, but never used it. It's still on my shelf. I tried overclocking the processor a bit without tweaking the voltage and it was stable at 3.4 GHz, but I was always worried about heat generation using the stock cooling fan. Without direct water cooling, I prefer to leave it stock. But my plan was to do a custom water cooling loop. I have a Danger Dan waterblock for a GTX 480 to put in here, solid copper with nickel finish, but I never used it. I never bought the CPU block, tubing, fittings, or reservoir. I DO have the DD block and the radiator. During the rebuild so my mom could have this PC, I changed up the boot drive config so that a Samsung 850 EVO 250 GB would become the C: and boot Windows 7 and I could reformat the 1TB drive as a storage D: drive. Yes, the motherboard only supports SATAII so I'm only getting about 280MB/s read speeds, but it still much faster than booting from the 1TB, even if it is a 7200 RPM drive. This is also the computer I dabbled with a 500GB Seagate HDD trying to get Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard to work. I did get it working and stable, but the sound card never worked right. And since I couldn't play hardly any games on it except Portal on Steam, I never really had a use for it.
7 - Today (2015)
Case: Antec 1200 full-tower ATX with clear side door, dual 120mm rear fan ports (the same case from above)
CPU: Intel Core i7-6700K 8M Skylake Quad-Core 4.0 GHz LGA 1151 91W
MB: MSI MSI Gaming Z170A GAMING M7 LGA 1151
RAM: G.SKILL Ripjaws V Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) 288-Pin DDR4-3200 (PC4-25600)
Boot Drive: SAMSUNG SM951 M.2 256GB Internal Solid State Drive (PCI-Express x4 M.2)
Primary Drive: SAMSUNG 850 EVO 2.5" 1TB SATA III
HDD: Seagate 3TB 7,200 RPM SATAIII
Optical: Pioneer Blu-Ray burner SATA (same drive as above)
OS: Windows 10 Home 64-bit
VIDEO: MSI GeForce GTX 980TI 6GD5 V1
PSU: EVGA SuperNOVA 1000 G2 120-G2-1000-XR 80+ GOLD 1000W Fully Modular
Jesus Christ, this thing is stupid powerful. Yeah, for a gaming pc I could probably have gone with the i5-6600K and overclocked it to 4GHz, considering I'm running a "Corsair Hydro Series H100i GTX Extreme Performance Water / Liquid CPU Cooler. 240mm". I mounted this in the back of my Antec 1200. I know a lot of people say it doesn't fit, but I carefully filed out the mounting holes properly and just barely got it to fit flush-mount on the rear fans. It's push-pull right now with the high-SPL fans on the front pushing and the stock Antec 1200 fans on the back pulling. This thing runs Tomb Raider smooth on even the highest settings. Games are BEAUTIFUL. Especially on my brand new Acer Predator XB271HU bmiprz 27-inch WQHD (2560 x 1440) NVIDIA G-Sync Widescreen Display. It took a few weeks for the thing to sync up and me to get the settings right, but I can get 144fps in Final Fantasy 14 in even High details and about 100fps at maximum details, full 1440p resolution. Crazy good.
2016
This year, I've taken back ownership of computers 3 and 4 from above and rebuilt them in their ORIGINAL CASES, though the power supply and certain parts have had to be replaced.
3+ - Windows 98 rebuild
CPU: Intel Pentium II 350MHz
MB: ASUS P2B - Intel 440BX
RAM: 256MB PC-100 SDRAM
HDD1: 40GB Western Digital
HDD2: 40GB Western Digital
OS: Windows 98 First Edition
AUDIO: Creative Labs Sound Blaster AWe64 ISA
VIDEO: Diamond Viper V770 nVidia RIVA TNT2 32MB AGP
3DFX: Diamond Monster 3D II 8MB Voodoo2 PCI
Modem: 56Kbps
Network: SMC 10/100 Ethernet
4+ - Windows XP
CPU: AMD Athlon XP 1800+ (1.53GHz)
MB: Abit KX7-333
RAM: 1GB DDR 166MHz
HDD: 80GB Western Digital
OS: Windows XP Home
AUDIO: Creative Labs Sound Blaster Live! 5.1 PCI
VIDEO: ATI Radeon 9550 256MB AGP
Network: SMC 10/100 Ethernet