An Atari 2600. Actually it wasn't me, it was my mum who did it *facepalm* when I wasn't around. I guess she did not knew the value it had...
"Design isn't just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works."
JOBS, Steve.
READ: Right to Repair sucks and is illegal!
Thankfully I didn't throw out much. The only things were my Atari 2600, Colecovision (well, didn't actully throw them away, but gave to a relative 30 years ago and never saw them again), and my original 486 DX-50 which I stupidly threw away once I upgraded to a Pentium 233 MMX. Then I wised up and decided to never throw away PC components again. I've kept everything else, including 2 Apple IIs, a C64, Amiga 2000, XT, 386, all Pentium, Pentium Pros, and p2 / p III hardware, memory, video cards. Kept all the floppy drives as well (8 ", 5.25", 3.5"), thankfully, as even back in the day I knew they'd never be around forever and would eventually get scarce.
It was maybe 15 years ago, I was around 16, give or take a year, still living at my parent's naturally. My father said I have to throw out half of my "trash". There were a couple of socket 3 and 7 motherboards and a full socket7 PC, a Deskjet 520 printer and 3 CRTs that had to go. It still pains me when I think about it.
zyzzle wrote on 2021-07-14, 04:43:Thankfully I didn't throw out much. The only things were my Atari 2600, Colecovision (well, didn't actully throw them away, but gave to a relative 30 years ago and never saw them again)
I had 2 SNES 6 controllers, 40 games that kinda went the same way, (They were boxed together) was this century even, relative "loaned" them to a girl he was trying to impress, and they were never seen again. 🙁 Kinda extra salty about it, because there were about 5 duplicate games, so one system, 4 controllers could have stayed the hell here with them, no need in the first place to have taken the whole fragging lot.
Unicorn herding operations are proceeding, but all the totes of hens teeth and barrels of rocking horse poop give them plenty of hiding spots.
Well, now that old CRT TVs have become difficult to find in my area, I regret getting rid of my parents' old Sharp 25" CRT TV (manufactured on Dec. 1999). To be fair, both of its input jacks (rear RF coaxial and front Composite AV) broke, rendering the TV useless without any repairs, but now that my dad knows how to solder, we could've given that TV a second life by replacing its input jacks as well as RGB modding it. Granted, I was able to get a 20" Sony Trinitron CRT TV for my retro gaming consoles, but it'd still be nice to have a backup CRT.
I also sold the majority of my Gamecube game collection over a decade ago, which I really regret doing now that Gamecube games have gotten expensive. 🙁
I had two Sony 15 inch CRT monitors I threw out (although not both at once). I regret it...but then I don't. Haven't missed them (aside form the occasional fit of nostalgia). Maybe there is a time to let go of things....
My mom motivated me to toss the Channel F I bought for a $1 as a 5 year old with it went the 12 games.
Not worth much but disappointing I tossed it
Once upon a time a long while ago, I let go of an original Amiga 1000, matching RGB monitor, and a ton of game disks. I also remember having an Atari 130XE (8-bit Atari with 128K RAM) and floppy drive, but no disks..also eventually given away.
As a result of recent COVID19 related economic struggles, my collection of original Apple CRTs ,an Apple Mac IIsi (plus multiple ADB keyboards + mice) a Sparcstation ELC with Sun keyboard and matching grid optical mouse, and quite a bit of 90s PC hardware (286, 386DX +SX, 486 and Pentium mobos, some ISA sound cards, and a huge number of modems!) was lost when I found myself unable to catch up with payments on my storage unit. :'(
Hopefully whoever bought that storage unit's contents on auction will know what to do with the contents..
Lian Li PC60 case in around 2008. It actually wasn't a very ergonomic case and had horribly noise front fans that seemed hard to replace. Still, it was pretty and would have made a nice DOS build today, what with the dual floppy bays etc. The case I replaced it with is still my main PC case today (although the internals have been replaced at least twice).
My first computer, which I assembled myself. Not necessarily the motherboard, since it was crappy, but particularly the AT mini tower with its distinctive design, including a turbo switch, dual 7-segment display for the clockspeed, and the lovely big grey tumbler-style plastic power switch. Also the Tseng Labs ET4000 video card that I had in that machine. Maybe also the Sound Galaxy card that I initially had in that machine, before I sold it to my cousin and replaced it with a GUS. (I believe I still have the GUS somewhere.) Everything else about that machine was replaceable, in hindsight.
Also, although I technically didn't throw it out, a Diamond Edge 3D (OEM) card, powered by an NVIDIA NV1 chip, complete with Sega Saturn controller and the additional backplate and ribbon cable with Sega Saturn ports. Years ago, a friend wanted it as a collector's piece and traded some stuff for it. I don't exactly remember what I got in return. Actually, good on him, since he knew even then how special that card was. My loss.
and...
Yeah, I know. "But that was like ten years ago!!1"
Technically not done myself, but my parents threw away my very first computer sometime in the early 2000s. It was either an IBM 5150, XT, or some clone. I don't remember exactly because it was so long ago, I just remember it having the case design of a 5150/XT. Pretty much all I remember about it otherwise is that it booted into X-Tree at startup, so it had to have a hard drive, and it had an amber monochrome monitor (probably an Amdek). I'd kill to still have it today, I really wish I could see it again. At least I still have my second computer, my NEC Ready 7022 Pentium 100 from 1995 which I got in 2004. To be fair that computer did get far more actual usage. I never had a current at the time computer until some years later.
In the 90 i had a LEO XT computer. Sold it because i hadnt any use for it anymore.. And didnt know how to install a harddisk on a XT class machine.
Further more i didnt had any regret of other things that went away.. But if i know sooner i had kept some CRT monitor which are nowdays are hard to come by.
~ At least it can do black and white~
A "not for resale" boxed launch edition of Windows XP Home Edition that I received during a Microsoft Windows XP launch event in Amsterdam, that I was invited to, along with my coworkers from the computer store where I worked at the time.
I know I remember some of us lamenting the fact that they didn't give us a copy of the Professional Edition.
I ended up selling it along with a self-assembled PC of mine, since I had built another system to replace it. Now, years later, I realize now that this "not for resale" box, given out to retail workers during the launch of the OS, containing the CD in a fancy foldable booklet, with a retail license that was transferrable without being tied to any specific hardware, would make it quite a unique collector's item today. Oh well.
Perhaps at some point you start to realize you can't save everything...
ncmark wrote on 2021-08-01, 12:52:Perhaps at some point you start to realize you can't save everything...
Good point.
I was a kid during the x86 Home Computer Revolution days, so I went through a lot of hardware that I could now make use of for retro gaming. Apart from several PCs, I had a Gravis Ultrasound that I never got to use because it just didn't work out of the box like other cards, and it would have been nice to do something with it, but I got it and never got it working, so it went in the trash one day, and I replaced it with a SoundBlaster and never looked back.
Going through my parts box I found a couple of Venus T80 video cards (PCI, 2Mb RAM, trident chipset).
I got rid of those old computers - guess I kept the video cards.
They weren't bad for the era.
ncmark wrote on 2021-07-31, 19:58:I had two Sony 15 inch CRT monitors I threw out (although not both at once). I regret it...but then I don't. Haven't missed them (aside form the occasional fit of nostalgia). Maybe there is a time to let go of things....
there are certain things i felt i was wasteful letting go of - a couple 486's,a cyrix system and a few parts, I should have found people who'd appreciate them
but i cannot feel the same way about CRTs i've thrown away, i know others would like them but i just don't miss them really and don't value them, at the time they were just too bulky to take when moving places
and printers, even old ones - just no real interest in them
there's a general regret or sense of waste i always feel when throwing out anything that still works or anything from which working parts can be salvaged but that's not vintage pc specific
My Creative blaster Riva TNT PCI 16mb, I gifted it to a friend, that's my biggest regret. They are expensive and difficult to find nowadays. For me a perfect mach for a PCI only system.
