your first PeeCee, memories

[s2325]

Around 1995 or 1996 I got my first PC. It was 486 DX 66MHz, Trident 8900CL 1MB RAM (ISA), SoundGalaxy NX Pro 16 (compatible to many, even rare cards), 8MB RAM simm, 200MB HD and MS-DOS (Windows 3.1 was useless for me because of not working mouse for some reason). Weird thing is that I don't remember any game from that time and I didn't know how to unpack arj archives for long time (my cousin stored compressed games on floppy disks, 5.25'' and later 3.5''). My Amiga 500 was already sold ;( No games, and this cold, soulless box in my room. It wasn't easy start so I don't like PC even today. Sure, it can do many things, but there is no warm feeling, even to my laptop from 1987. Sorry for my poor english.

[Muzkat]

I got my first pee cee in 1997. It was a Cyrix 686 @ 200mhz, with 32mb RAM and 4.3 gb of hardrive space. Back then, it was a beast!

I got a few games with it. I was very pleased that I could finally play Doom, because I had always loved FPS games from afar when I had my Miggy. And while I liked the feel of the games that I played on the PC, I agree that these fancy 3d graphics games felt alittle soulless, lacking the charm the Amiga experience had. I was still excited though.

I remember loving Interstate 76 (wonderful automotive combat!) and getting frustrated with Need for Speed II, which I just couldn't master. However, I liked Raptor and absolutely adored Tyrain!

And then Quake came along...and I became addicted. Completed it on all difficulty levels.

By the way, it wasn't long before I upgraded - the Cyrix processor (I think) just kept on crashing, no matter what I tried and even after a complete reformat. *sigh*

[NovaCoder]

I'm glad I waited to get my first PC, I was thinking about getting a brand new Amstrad 286 or even an 8086 which looked great in the adverts. After looking into them a bit more I could see that they wouldn't cut it as a games machine so I saved my dollar and brought...an ST!

A few years later I brought my actual first PC, a 386sx 33mhz with a massive 40mb HD, 1MB of RAM, a SB16 and a fish-bowl 14" monitor. I also got a big wad of floppies from a PC nutter friend...mmm XWing, Dune2, Syndicate and then on to DOOM a year later

[Steve]

I held onto my miggy for a long time before finally caving into peer pressure and upgrading to a new PC in 1998. To be honest I loved it. It was state of the art and I was really excited about it.

It was one of the first PC's to come with a DVD-ROM drive and it had a 333Mhz AMD processor plus a 2D matrox card and Voodoo 2 graphics card.

I bought my first PC game before my PC had even arrived and spent days drooling over the box screenshots. The game was Unreal and it was just mindblowing. I went from playing SWOS and Worms DC to playing the latest state of the art 3D game. Happy days!

[TCD]

Pentium 60, 16 MB Ram, 500 MB HD, 2x CD-Rom, 15" monitor
Have to admit that I kinda liked that machine. Playing Doom, Warcraft, Duke Nukem 3D and Magic Carpet on it was really fun. Since it was still a Dos machine and I had no idea about it, my first config.sys/autoexec.bat startup was edited by my math teacher

[PWLM]

Bought my first PC in 1998, it was a GENUINE IBM! With an AMD processor and 8Gb HDD and a 15" CRT monitor that weighed the same as a truck tyre! I upgraded to an AMD Thunderbird (if you could call that an upgrade!) in 2000 so I could play Half-Life without the machine freezing.

Now I have a laptop with AMD processor, 160Gb HDD and 2Gb RAM, and a PC which doubles as a media centre hooked up to my plasma TV, with surround sound etc. And yes I do use it for WinUAE and yes Gods looks and sounds great!

[killergorilla]

I was a late starter

First real PC was a Pentium II 350Mhz, with a Voodoo Banshee, SB128, 4xCDRW.

Came with Unreal and Incoming to show off the 3D card.

Within a few weeks I'd managed to reinstall windows alongside the current windows installation after I messed it up. No idea how. Wouldn't even know how to do that now.

I've still got most of the bits (gfx card, soundcard, monitor, keyboard, mouse).

[AmigaFriend]

Originally Posted by TheCyberDruid

my first config.sys/autoexec.bat startup was edited by my math teacher

That is what's called great teacher-alumni bondage!

I bought my first PC in 1996 a Pentium 166MMX, 16Mb RAM, CD-ROM, with a S3 Virge graphics card (utter crap), Soundblaster AWE32 with 2MB ram for SoundFont instruments and with a 2Gb HD.


Great machine. Quake was awesome along with GrandPrix 2, the most played game from 1996 to 2000 for me.

[Leffmann]

Bought my first PC in the end of 1998. AMD K6 200MHz with 128Mb RAM if I remember correctly, and whatever was standard at that time for sound, graphics, harddrives and CD. It killed all creativitiy and productivity in me.

[seuden]

First PC in 1996 iirc 400 mhz Pentium II with 64mB ram. \o/

[AmigaFriend]

Originally Posted by seuden

First PC in 1996 iirc 400 mhz Pentium II with 64mB ram. \o/

Maybe 1998? Because the Pentium II 333 was released on January 1998, the 400mhz with 100 FSB some months later.

[s2325]

or he has time machine

[TCD]

Originally Posted by xpect

That is what's called great teacher-alumni bondage!

My math teacher was also the father of a quite good friend It was a bit weird to stop by him and see your math teacher sitting on the couch watching telly

[pmc]

Originally Posted by Leffman

Bought my first PC in the end of 1998. AMD K6 200MHz with 128Mb RAM if I remember correctly, and whatever was standard at that time for sound, graphics, harddrives and CD. It killed all creativitiy and productivity in me.

LOL. Your experience is the same as mine.

I had encountered PC's but never really used them heavily until I started working as a computer networks engineer in the mid '90's.

I remember at the time thinking that they were rather crappy. Even though now the processor speeds and graphics / sound cards etc. are really good they're still cold uninteresting computers compared to the Spectrum / C64 / Amiga 'home' computers that I've owned...

Ironic then that PC emulation of the Amiga hardware is what got me back into the Amiga.

[seuden]

Originally Posted by xpect

Maybe 1998? Because the Pentium II 333 was released on January 1998, the 400mhz with 100 FSB some months later.

I think you're right, it was 1998 I had the 400, I think I had a 266mhz in 1996.

[asm1]

Ah the memories....

Pentium 90Mhz 8 Mb ram, windows 95 1 Gig disk.... 15" monitor

Eventually ended life with a 200 Mhz Pentium MMX overdrive 3DFX Voodoo sometime in 2003 or so. Got for my 15th birthday in 1995.... became addicted to Quake... And Quake II made me get the voodoo card lol. Grand Prix 2 was another of my often played faves.... along with Terminal Velocity heh. Went to see my lecturer at uni a few years (Computing Science) and was astonished to walk into his office and see Terminal Velocity on his PC... turns out he was on the dev team lol.

Went to uni in 98, got a P2 266... stuck the Voodoo in it lol. Played lots of Q2 whilst drinking LOTS of beer with friends hehe.

[DH]

19992-ish 486SX 25/33Mhz me thinks 8Mb Edo ram or was it 4Mb could be 2Mb, some strange but weird pci graphics (1Mb I think) & sound card, An ISA I/O card for the HDD, 5 1/4 and 3 1/2 floppy's etc.. etc..

It still works too Mind the case (Desktop) was built to survive a nuclear blast, it weighs a ton + changing anything inside was a challenge, you needed to be a rocket scientist just to work out how something went in or came out, so many fixing's to screw things too, unlike today's modern towers, nice and simple

[zipper]

Probably '97, I got a 266MMX Toshiba laptop, RRP about £3100, for £800. Huge 1024x768 display! Used it perhaps 10 hours together until finally moved to PC as I bought a digital camera 2004 and a P4 3.4 GHz 17" "laptop" - it broke just after the warranty ran out.

[gimbal]

hm. 1995 I think it was, a 486DX33 with 8mb ram, 512mb harddrive and SB pro clone with a sound driver that took 15 seconds to load :s Also a kick ass video7 graphics card! I was never able to fill that harddrive completely, so much space it had for them days. Too bad that pretty soon after buying it the games shot up to needing a DX2-66 at least, and they really meant it in those days. We didn't upgrade for a long time after that (a Pentium 120 in between, which was the biggest mistake of our lives) as the processor and graphics card needs of games simply raised too quickly for our budget.

We had a 8086 before all that, but I didn't use it (wasn't allowed, it was the "wordperfect machine"). The Amiga was the only machine we (me and my brother) were allowed to touch, and I was perfectly happy with that

[radon_22]

I worked 3rd shift in a major retail chain's electronics department. Spend a lot of hours getting paid to play awesome games like Jagged Alliance, Blade Runner, and Command&Conquer.

I finally broke down and bought a Pentium 2 in '98 due to my 3000 developing a problem with video. I left it at the curb for the trashman to pick up- something I've kicked myself for many, many times.