In 1986, I got my first computer: Zenith Z-248, based on IBM PC-AT 286 processor. Purchased at the Air Force Academy, during their development of what was then the largest LAN in the world.

In 1991, I upgraded to a 486 DX 33 MHz custom built machine with 8 Mb RAM.

Started upgrading component parts on my own, and since then have built all my computers, using mainly Intel CPUs, but a couple of AMD processors along the way.

Favorite build so far was a Home Theater PC, in 2005. Most of its internal components are new and improved now. It is my home theater blu-ray player, DVD player, music library, HD-DVR, in addition to being a fine computer.

In high school I had an Atari 800. The good one with 16k RAM!
I still have it. Assembly language cartridge and all.

Everything after that was same old same old x86 stuff.

The only one worth mentioning was my Celeron 300a overclock to 450 back in 1998. Now that was a deal. A $80 CPU that beat the $500 PII in many applications due to it smaller but full speed on-die cache. And it was the beginning of the overclocking craze we see today.

- Mark

All we had were slide rules and log tables. I've often said if we only had electronic calculators, I'd have increased my beer consumption 3 fold!!!

I spent a year in Numerical Analysis learning how to calculate to 10 digits precision using only a slide rule and a piece of paper. Immediately after that, the HP-35 Scientific Pocket Calculator was released, and all that work was for nothing.

Well, sort of. The HP-35 was so expensive, only the richest kids could afford it (something like $2500 in today's dollars). And it was all so new, that I frequently beat them to the result (and my result was correct whereas theirs was often off by an order of magnitude (just from lack of familiarity and common sense), not to mention that I think the first version said 2*2 = 3.999999999.

Early days...

I talked to one guy who traveled the world for Compucorp scientific calculators. On one flight, he happened to sit next to a guy who had the same job working for a competitor.

Both of these guys were engineers and knew a lot about their products. The other guy asked him what algorithm Compucorp calculators used for, I think, arcsine. He responded with the name of the algorithm, which was the same used by all manufacturers. The competitor became really big-eyed, and asked how come Compucorp's calculators were the only ones showing the correct result for the special case where the algorithm failed????

He smiled, and said, "That's proprietary."

So how did they do it?

(....drum roll...)

They hardcoded the displayed result for this special case.

:O)

" not to mention that I think the first version said 2*2 = 3.999999999.

That would be 2 <enter> 2 <*> wouldn't it? He asks in his best reverse Polish syntax.

Grinning,
...Jerry

Proteva Pentium II 233 purchased from Sun Retailers
Dell inspiron 8600 laptop
Dell Inspiron E1505 laptop (actual warranty replacement for the 8600)
All other desktops have been Home builds
Pentium 3 2ghz
Pentium 4 3.2Ghz
Dualcore E6600
Quadcore Q6600
Quadcore Q9550
Current build is i7Core 920

not only a lot of sinclare & commodore's but a complete lack of apple products. :D

That would be 2 <enter> 2 <*> wouldn't it? He asks in his best reverse Polish syntax.

Betcha.

And I still love RPN. It is way SAFER for mental arithmetic.

Interesting thread!

Subject: RE: Your Computer Chronology


Heyyyy! I had a Mac... ((;

Macintosh SE (I loved this machine!)

ABIT BX6, PII (Home Built)
Intel SE440, PIII (Home Built) - Still in use. Gave to my mom.
ASUS P4P533, P4 (Home Built) - Web surfing / test apps machine & Linux machine.
ASUS P5VDC-MX, P4 Micro ATX (Home Built) initially used for a multimedia PC, then gave to my dad
ASUS P4P800, P4HT (Home Built) - Dedicated Cubase Audio / Vegas editing machine

Laptops:
Dell Inspiron 4150, P4 - Web surfing / test apps / video conversion / Linux PC
Averatec, AMD64 - Linux PC
HP Mini - newest addition to the family.

Soon to come... i7, 1156 machine before end of the year (;

Well, sort of. The HP-35 was so expensive, only the richest kids could afford it (something like $2500 in today's dollars). And it was all so new, that I frequently beat them to the result (and my result was correct whereas theirs was often off by an order of magnitude (just from lack of familiarity and common sense), not to mention that I think the first version said 2*2 = 3.999999999.Years ago, I wrote about this over at the HP Calculator Museum. It is almost exactly the same as your story:

HP-35 Unfair Advantage

The only difference is that, unlike you, none of us without the calculator had learned those tricks you knew.

In that story I talk about how HP gave me an HP-67 as a going away present in 1976. Next week, I'm going to a reunion and will see many of those people for the first time in thirty-three years. That will bring back as memories as this thread.

A 286 10Mhz machine, mfgr unremembered
A Micron Pentium at 90 MhZ (still gathering dust under a table)
Several Dells in the 1.4Ghz range (home and kids) Still running
Two Dell P4s still cranking in the 3 Ghz range
One HP laptop

October will bring a new i7 or i5 machine for me.

The biggest inpression with all these machines is the day I finally threw the 286 in the trash recalling the nearly $2000 I had spend for that system. That was a bad feeling. Balancing that is the knowlege of what $2000 will buy today.

John Meyer: Not only is the HP-67 not obsolete, there is still nothing better than my HP-67.

The world seems to agree with you, because many of HP's calculators from the 1970s and 80s are still sold today exactly as they always were, and there is indeed nothing better!

COSMAC Elf - 1976 homebuilt (wirewrapped) from Popular Electronics (toggle switch input, 256 BYTES of memory, two-digit hex display)
MOS Technology Kim-1 - hex keypad, 7-segment display
Sinclair ZX-81 built from kit - around 1982
several Timex-Sinclair TS-1000's
Timex TS-2068 circa 1983
Sinclair Spectrum (via ROMSwitch in TS-2068)
Apple II clone with Z-80 coprocessor board to run CP/M & $700 20mb hard disk - 1985
Morrow MD-II (CP/M)
TRS-80 - 8" disk drives with Pickles & Trout CP/M
Kaypro 4-84 (CP/M)

486-66 (1992) - don't remember the vendor (my first PC-compatible)
ABS Computer 700mHz Athlon (2000)
HP 6642f -- 500mHz Celeron (given by my employer, Ford Motor Company) (2000)
850mHz Athlon replaces burned out processor in ABS computer above (2002)
1.3gHz Duron replaces 850mHz Athlon in ABS computer, 2002
new homebuilt w/Athlon 2600+, 2003
used HP notebook -- given to my by a co-worker, 2004
another homebuilt with Athlon 3000+, 2006
another homebuilt with Athlon 64 3500+, 2007
ASUS Eee PC netbook, w/linux & solid state drive, 2009 (kept for 2 weeks)
Acer One netbook, w/Windows XP, 160gig hard drive (2009 -- replaced ASUS netbook)

Still have most of 'em!

I see a trend here...

Start with a Sinclair, end up with a homebuilt.

I guess it's time to sell the Sinclair stock and buy some Newegg stock (grinning!).

...Jerry

Wow, brings back a lot of memories. And bills.... ;-)

I think of the Heathkit computer kit of the late 60's as the first "home computer kit", but it was not based on a microprocessor but discret logic .

Analog computers was still big into the 80's especialty for realtime complex apps..... a blend of analog and digital, until DSPs speed and realiable improved

""RCA 1802", what's that for?" was my comment during a NASA/Lockneed discussion group in the 70's about "building" an advance simulator to run on a Cray instead of IBM hardware.

"HP67" was a nice improvement over the HP65. loved the magnetic strips,...... linking programs... during the 70's, if HP made it, I had to have it. these calculators were more toys(for me) than tools but "RPN" was a second language during the late 70's for many scientists and engineers , many papers were written and debated about proper "form" for advance equations....... its like watching the "Big Bang Theory" thru rose colored glasses. ;-)

"Slide rule" between chemistry and quantum physics, a major work tool and was a requirement plus memorization of countless "tables" before the HP35.


P.S. I should note that RCA 1802 was fairly popular with the DOD and space programs, something that I was not fully aware when I made the above comment. I knew of the processor because of SOS process being done by TI for RCA under contract. Many "harden" ics and a few processors where being put on SOS, but 1802 was the little kid in the room, but it survived.

""Slide rule" between chemistry and quantum physics, a major work tool and was a requirement plus memorization of countless "tables" before the HP35."

This is getting way Off Topic, but "what the hey", as long as we're reminiscing... I remember taking a "Physical Chemistry" (aka pchem - quantum mechanics, thermodynamics, etc.) that required a 1 credit lab. The lab write-ups were so involved they allowed you to "check out" a mechanical Friden Calculator (ker chunk, ker chunk) - but they only had 4 of these guys and unless you were first in line, you ended up using a slide rule & paper/pencil. It was not uncommon to spend an entire weekend on one lab write-up - all for a stinkin' one credit course.

...Jerry

PS: For those of you who are not chemists or ChemE's, you cannot appreciate what a "nasty" course pchem was in '60s. I recall receiving a test where I got a 20 / 100. The professor then announced he was going to curve the test - a 20 was a "B"!!

"PS: For those of you who are not chemists or ChemE's, you cannot appreciate what a "nasty" course pchem was in '60s."

As an EE, I remember all too well. I think I must have taken that same test as well.

I also recall SCADS - Simulation of a Combined Analog-Digital System, running on linked Bendix mainframes. Have no recollection of why that was thought to be helpful. Probably so we didn't have to think in binary...

Sorry, mind veers off topic several times a day.

"pchem" & Organic Chem "live" by the curve and I think many professors enjoy crushing students' attitudes and dreams..... ;-)

for many years into the 80's in the lab, desktop computing meant HP, WANG, TK desktop calculators more than computers, especially the PC . I must admit, that I consider the PC of 80's-90's more toys for gaming or simple office operations. But that didn't stop me from buying them, especially laptops....... and disassembly them for "fun".

Ah, this brings back the old memories !! First system was an 8080 based (Morrow's Microstuff CPU/front panel) with a wire-wrapped cassette interface, video card (my design) and my own OS hand assembled (I can still do 8080 assembly in octal ).
- moved up to installed CP/M with a floppy disk
- did a bunch of SBP9900 processor stuff at work - TI 16 bit rad-hard (I2L) not the TMS version used in some of the Radio Shack computers. Interesting processor.
- AST 286 system with 80 meg !!! drive
- Gateway 486-50 mhz system
- Dell Pentium 233 mhz system - 700 megs HD
- Dell Pentium 500 mhz system with Matrox video capture (mjpeg) card - first video editing computer !! Hey, this is cool !!!
- built - P4 - 1.8ghz system 2gig ram, 2 TB storage
- several other P4 systems for wife/kids

.... NOW I really feel old !! Still have a paper tape reader downstairs and my old model 28 teletype that was my printer !!
(when I was in college at the University of Washington in the early 70's, we did all of our computing with punch cards -- you punched your program up, stuck it in the "input bin" and waited for 1-2 hours for it to run (or not run). Too much beer waiting for programs to run :-) )


mikey

Like others, too many to recount but ...

Ha ha! Am I the ony one whose first computer was the COLECO ADAM!!

Man, looking through the lists and reminiscences in this thread, I'm surprised to find that I'm one of the younger ones using Vegas -- I'm only 52 and got started in the video production business in 1976. It appears that most others here have been around this industry a lot longer than me! It's encouraging to see that I might still have a future doing this sort of work ;-)

.... NOW I really feel old !! Still have a paper tape reader downstairs and my old model 28 teletype that was my printer !!Wow, except for the name of the school, I could have written almost every line!

The one I couldn't have written was the bit about the Teletype still being in my basement. You have a Teletype machine?? Cool.

I did have to design and build an interface to a Teletype machine, shown here:

We used all 60 wpm teletypes (7) model 28 and I had to fix them without schooling. The engineering was unbelieveable with the red dye on the parts when they were worn out. That was part of the old Ma Bell legendary accomplishments even if they did buy it. Tubes that would last for 20 years, wire spring relays that would last for 20 years. Filters that were 70 db down at the 3 db points. 37B VTVM specs +- .2 db from 0 to -120 DB, 12KHZ to 4 megs. Their shipping crates for electronic equipment were so good that people would steal the 2 x 4's because they were absolutely perfectly straight. Flourescent light fixtures with ballasts that would last forever and so the bulbs. The stools and ladders were custom made and would hold a 400 pound dude and would not break. Norm Abrams would crap his pants seeing the construction of those items. And there was something called UNIX.
JJK