<p>Yesterday was the 35th birthday of the Apple ll.
My h had to use a computer in his factory job,& he hated it, so I thought that if we had one at home, it would be easier for him. Our first computer was a Macintosh llsi. I think it had 18mgRam& 80mg hard drive.He probably used it half a dozen times. He still has to use one at work, he still doesn’t like it.</p>
<p>What was our first computer?</p>
<p>Sinclare 1000, it has …1K memory only. You can program it using BASIC, that is how I learned BASIC.</p>
<p>We spent $2500 (per H- I remember $3000) or so for an IBM Aptiva with Windows 95 (when it had recently come out) with 1.6 GB hard drive, 32 Mb RAM, 1.2 MHz processor, Intel Pentium processor, a 15 or 17" CRT monitor (off brand as they were out of the advertised one- combo on sale) and a printer (H here and remembers the specs). We bought from Best Buy and when our son was 6. I remember debating on lesser specs. Tech support was out of Dublin, Ireland. Favorite game (of the few available) of son and friends was Math Blaster- we used a lot of ink for the deep blue award certificate backgrounds when they played it! Dial up internet with 14K speed initially. I think that Win95 wa the impetus for deciding to get a computer, it certainly wasn’t internet speed or content amount.</p>
<p>PC’s Limited 286-8, which was an IBM AT clone that ran at a clock speed of 8 MHz. I think it might have had either a 20 MB or 40 MB hard drive. (PC’s Limited was Dell before it was Dell)</p>
<p>1984 IBM XT. 640k RAM. If I remember correctly it cost around $6500. It ran on DOS. I had to hire a programmer to help us use it to keep track of inventory. By the time we had it programmed and all the inventory data loaded…it was obsolete. I still have it somewhere in my warehouse.</p>
<p>A generic PC clone 386sx16 with 2 MB of SIPP RAM and an 81 MB hard drive running Dos 4.01 and Windows 3.0 in the early '90s. Got it as a Christmas gift from a great-uncle and used it heavily for homework, learning about computers, and playing the occasional dos game. </p>
<p>Ended up going to mom when I went off to college in the mid-'90s with a slightly more capable notebook…a 486sl2/25 Lexmark*…also a gift. </p>
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<li>Ended up being a lemon which broke down at the worst possible times. Dead screen after year one just after the 1 year warranty died. Dead hard drive after year 2. One thing I learned from the experience…discourage relatives/friends…even those with engineering/CS degrees from getting computer/technological gifts. I’ve found I’ve had a better knack for picking technological items with the best price/value ratio…not solely on price. All the subsequent notebooks I’ve had from the late '90s onward are still running to this day.</li>
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<p>Ahh…Aptivas bring back memories…bad ones for one of my startups. Spent hours troubleshooting, RMAing parts, replacing parts, and trying to anticipate when the next machine(s) will have serious issues. Ended up being one factor in the startup’s demise. </p>
<p>Ended up getting one of the better Aptivas as a job-leaving present from the boss. Gave it away to a less-privileged acquaintance so he has a basic computer for job applications/MS Office.</p>
<p>Funny…we had a Timex Sinclair…totally in the wrappings with all the tapes totally in the wrappings. NEVER used. I thought it was a collectors item. DH took it to the electronics recycling at the dump.</p>
<p>Our first computer was a TRS80…circa 1981.</p>
<p>Mine was a Hyundai 286 PC clone with 20 MB hard drive. Amber monochrome monitor. I think it cost about two grand.</p>
<p>TRS-80. Tangentially, I remember my father paying $120 for a hand-held TI calculator. Four functions. Not even a square root.</p>
<p>We’re going to be talking about slide rules before you know it.</p>
<p>Apple II-bought for work to run cashflow projections.</p>
<p>We were just talking about this today at work!</p>
<p>Our first home computer was a Mac. It’s what my two oldest learned on. Have had PC’s since then, but it’s getting time to buy a new computer soon and am seriously considering going back to Apple.</p>
<p>Compaq something or other. We actually still have the tower in our basement. I don’t remember the specs on it but we bought it in about 1999 or so. My college was one of the first to have a “computer lab” and all the Apple II’s in all their glory :D. We thought we had died and gone to heaven moving from the IBM Selentrics with 20 space backspace correction to a “word processor”. I still have some REAL floppy disks somewhere too.</p>
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<p>LOL. We still have H’s slide ruler prominently displayed on the shelf in our living room. It is a great conversation peice. :)</p>
<p>Math Blaster… That was baby kiddo’s favorite game! The kid who did not like math in school could spend hours playing Math Blaster!</p>
<p>My very first experience with a personal computer was at work - our lab got a couple of 286 PCs. Data had to be saved to a floppy, and we had some sort of a word processor and a chemical structure drawing program on it - we felt so high tech. 
I think about that time we got a 200 MHz Bruker NMR…</p>
<p>Zeos PC clone. That’s all I remember.</p>
<p>I did have a great printer: a Laserjet II. It was much better than the newer Laserjet that eventually replaced it. They’ve made everything lighter and smaller, and the quality just isn’t there. Although any Laserjet is still miles better than any Inkjet.</p>
<p>I don’t remember what it was, but it was in the early 1980s and as DOS based</p>
<p>I was a nanny in 1982 when my oldest was born.The mom I worked for was supplementing her income by selling computers at home parties. Don’t remember manufacturer, I think they had backup tape drives.</p>
<p>My brother had a Heathkit thing that he put together, but that was after I was out of my parents house. He was encouraging me to get a commodore 64, but oldest D’s school was making a big purchase of Macintosh LCs for the preschool, :rolleyes: and allowed parents to get in on the order. Her classroom had Mac classic computers, in a loft,that were all one piece & black & white.Cool though. We played a lot of Oregon Trail & KidPix, both at school & home. I later bought her a color classic that we still have. Have to have something to play Loom. ;)</p>
<p>First one I used was some type of terminal attached to a mainframe to play Star Wars game in the library at college around 1975. In grad school I played Zork on the computer center’s terminals… spitting out the clues on a teletype. Oh and my Advisor had an Obsorn (suitcase - the first portable luggable) that we used for text editing. First one I possessed was an Apple III loaned to me by Apple Computer to write my dissertation (based on studying there). Then, when I was briefly a computer science professor I used a smart terminal connected to a Vax and finally… my first purchased PC was an Apple IIe… It was later joined by an original Macintosh in 1984.</p>
<p>First owned computer was a TI 99/4A. Texas Instruments discontinued it a year later, but it launched my interest in the computer biz (at one point, a company I co-founded was the biggest seller to the TI aftermarket, which continued to be active for years after TI pulled the plug).</p>
<p>The first computer I ever used was a Bendix G-21, a custom unit at CMU that one accessed via teletype-style terminals or big decks of computer cards. There were a few super-advanced video terminals - imagine a metal box the size of a chest-freezer with a tiny green CRT and bulky keyboard built into it! (Only a few had access to that amazing technology - they were in a little room behind a locked door!)</p>
<p>An Altos. It was pre-MsDOS, pre-IBM, pre-KayPro (I LOVED MY KAYPROs!) It had been designed originally for dental offices. But we did remote wordprocessing and typesetting with it. It was very slow to start up, and poured coffee on the keyboard several times as it blinked WAIT…WAIT…WAIT. A slow riser.</p>