computer nostalgia
Continuing on this nostalgia theme... I found the receipt for my very first computer the other day. Not the first computer I used (that was the family computer), but the first one that was all mine. This was 7.5 years ago. The parts we're purchased at the Computerfest that year, and most of them came from 5'oclock computers.
"Full" ATX case w/250W ps. - $89.76 (HA- this case, which I still have, is a small mid-tower)
32x toshiba cdrom - $71.40
Pentium II 333MHz cpu - $576.30 (!! the most expense cpu I've ever bought!)
3.5" 1.44MB floppy drive - $20.40
6.4GB western digital hd - $223.48
MS "Natural" kb - $46.92
asus P2L97 mb - $141.78 (funny, the price of a decent mb hasn't changed much in 7 yrs!)
USR 56k modem - $93.84 (modems .... hahaha)
17" relisys monitor - $324.36 (my sister is using this one right now)
logitech mouse - $18.36
windows 95 OSR2.5 (revC) - $93.84
128MB SDRAM - $204.00 (damn)
soundblaster awe64-value - $63.24
nvidia Riva128 4MB video card ~ $220 (I don't have this receipt since this was purchased elsewhere at CF, but I recall the price was just over 200 bucks.
So it was a ~ $2300 computer system. Holy shit, man.
The biggest ripoff turned out to be that hard drive. The 4.3 and 6.4 GB WD caviar drives were shit. They made all kinds of weird clanky noises, and many of them died after a few years. $223 bucks, and mine is of course long gone.
As I said the monitor is still in use, so I guess I got my money out of that one.
The motherboard was used in my firewall but it died two years ago. I gave the cpu to Christie's dad to upgrade an old machine from a 266 MHz to my 333.
I believe I gave the keyboard to Neal, because he's all about the retro MS Natural.
The case is definately still in use, but I'm pretty sure the ps died. My linux firewall box lives in the case.
Windows 95 is in a big book of old worthless cd's. I think I gave the modem to my grandmother (who still uses dialup). I don't really know what happened to the rest of the components of that computer.
