I am always interested how you all started with your computering skills?

For me it was in 1997, wanted a new challenge so purchased a new Apple Mac 5600 I think it was. What a challenge for me to be sure, unlike my career which was/is sheep and cattle breeding.

I got tuition, one on one to start me off, then found forums which are a God send to the battler I think. Even now if something is beyond me I have a professional techie that looks after the hard stuff instead of me slaughtering my two great systems.



not to mention the stress of it all.

Now, four systems later I am enjoying and of course still learning, marvel at the knowledge of the computer trained who seem to know so much.

Most of all the less knowledged of us appreciate the IT career trained that give of their time so often to make free help forums what they are.

I started late in the 70's when we had an old IBM 360 at work, but my first computer was a Pocket PC1211 in 1980... it was basically a calculator using Basic (Beginners All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code) as programming language.

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In 1983, I used a Prológica CP500 at work, with DBase II running under CP-M80.

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From there, I never stopped to deal with computers.

Chris

I got started with computering in 1997. I didn't get a computer until September of '98, but I became interested in them in the summer and early fall of '97 and did some early computer shopping and I told Mama that I wanted a computer for Christmas even though I didn't know what a hard drive or RAM was. I had seen computers at the library and they seemed to be quite popular with some people who came in to check their e mail (what was e mail I wondered?) Anyway, when my brother said that computers were expensive to maintain, I changed my mind about wanting one for Christmas in '97 but in June of '98 I was thinking that my three neices all knew how to program a VCR (I did too, but I wasn't three years old). I thought, "Emily (the oldest) is already learning to use computers and Sara will be using them soon. I'll be visiting them one day in the future and I'll ask Emily and Sara 'What are you girls studying in school and they'll start telling me only they'll use this computer talk that I don't understand. Why shouldn't I learn how to understand it?'" Then I went to the library. On the way there, I didn't know what I would tell the librarian so I just said to myself, "I'll ask her if I can check my e mail so she'll let me use the computers (I thought that they were only for e mail) and then I'll tell her that I really don't have an e mail account and I'll ask her to teach me how to use them. I told Dot (the librarian) that I wanted to check my e mail and she said, "Do you have an e mail account? I didn't think that you did." I said, "No, I want to learn how to use the computer so she showed me to a computer and she went online to MSN and started helping me set up a Hotmail account. We were almost through when somebody came in to check out a book and Dot had to leave me. She told me, "You know how to do this. If it stops, just come and get me." I trusted Dot and even though I went to another site to set up my e mail account I continued to work with the computer. Those first three days I thought, "What have I gotten myself into? I'll never understand this!" Then under the Help menu of Windows 95 I found a tutorial and spent three weeks on it and with the help of it and Dot I learned how to use the computer. My first computer was a Compaq Presario 5304 with a 366 MHz processor and a 4 gig hard drive and Windows 98 as the OS. For two cents, I'd go back to 98 if I could even now. That is the Windows that I like the best. I now have a Dell Inspiron with 2 gigs RAM. I am not sure of the processor speed yet. I haven't had a chance yet to find the system info and note it down because of all the e mails.My OS on this computer is XP Home.

My first taste of computers was in '86 at Radio Shack. At that time Tandy was king of the heap. I had a Tandy 650 and an EX-1000, later buying one of the most useless computers ever made--a Tandy 600 laptop (which I still have. Only 20,000 were built and only a handful still exist). I wasn't really into systems like now...it was more just playing around. I had one of the first Commodore 64s in the area, followed by a 128, an Amiga (Battle Chess was awesome) and few others. It wasn't until I got an HP 333Mhz in '98 I began to get serious. Actually, it was the tech forums which got me hooked and taught me a lot. I began building my own systems in the early 2000s and later went to school around 5 years ago to begin earning my current certifications.

TRS III-80


EX-1000

Me too! Not the first one I actually owned, but the first one I used and learned to program. The first one I owned was also a Sharp, an MZ700 (CP/M 2.2)

My first computer was an PC XT (or was it an AT? Whichever came first, anyway) running MS DOS. Had to know system commands then to execute programs. I remember getting my first x286 computer. I thought that I died and went to computer heaven. And it had - get this! - a 40 MEG (not Gig) harddrive. What was I going to do with all that storage space??

My first computer was a IBM Aptiva that had a 2 gig hardrive and32 mb of ram because that is all I would ever need that had 95 on it that my son in kindergarden had to help me set up and run.Now 10 or 11 computers later with my A+ cert. and all the other class's I have taken I still finding stuff I don't know.

A fellow Tandy 600 owner, here. I've been feeling nostalgic of late and have been attempting to resurrect it (if that is even possible). Do you happen to still have the Utility Disk that came with it and your manual? If you're willing to part with them, I would be happy to purchase them.

Sorry, I'm keeping everything in the original case. The computer was started maybe 4 times and that was it. It's a bit of computing history in mint condition.

Hi ,my first computer was an Acorn BBC B Micro.I had this in the mid eighties as a teenager and learnt basic and 6502 assembler on it.As a budding electronic engineer it was a great machine as it was well documented and easy to hook things up to.After a while of playing i wrote an assembler program to run my brothers model railway!I also made loads of simple data loggers.I still have this machine in my attic together with its 5.25" twin floppy drives and a 300baud modem for bulletin boards!

I cant remember what year i got my first pc but it was probably around 1990.It was a Tandon plus with an 80286 processor ,20MB hdd and 640kb of ram.I soon upgraded it with an add on memory card to 1.2MB! It also had an EGA graphics card....WOW! This machine ran MSDOS 6 and i used it with Supercalc,a great spreadsheet and Paradox a database program.I also had Wordpefect 5 as my wordprocessor.This machine was in constant use thoughout my studies and a good machine it was too! I was lucky to have a Father who worked as a design engineer with British Aerospace so most of the above software as well as a lot of engineering utilities came from there! Thankyou Ba systems!!!

Those were the days when pcs were stable and needed a geek to operate them!!

I'm in the same league as ranchhand. Late 80's, early 90's. 286 XT, MS DOS 3, 4, or 5? (So long ago I don't remember. Win 3.x came out shortly after I got it.) It had a 5 1/4 1.2 MB floppy, two hard disks, 20 or 40 MB. Each was about the size of three CDROMs (stacked). They were heavy. The power supply weighed a ton as well. It was a (horizontal) desktop. The two memory cards (yes, cards, not modules) were about 12" long and about 5" high. there must have been 50 or 60 chips on each. The case/components weighed near 50 pounds.

(This part is embarrassing.) When I first got it, I though "format" meant to "arrange the files in a nice format/listing". So I typed in Format C:. Bad move I realized when I saw/figured out what was happening. I hit the power switch PDQ (pretty darn quick), and spent two or three hours "rebuilding" the DOS O/S from floppies that I had and borrowed ones. ;>{

It worked though, I didn't have to reinstall DOS, just piece it back together. I learned a lot about the DOS file system that day.

Hey Dan, we be brothers! I did the same thing, and for exactly the same reason! I was at work, figgerin' out this computer, and thought, "heck, format will get everything in nice order and it will probably ask me how I would like all the programs placed!" So I hit FORMAT: C and Enter. After a few minutes I couldn't figure out why I couldn't boot my programs anymore. I had to go tell my boss that all his data and programs went to that great bit bucket in the sky.

We were all learning then.

Yes I bet. Note my signature, still know naught to compare with the Geeks among us.

ranchhand,

Son of a gun. That's some coincidence.

And guess what, another coincidence. I'm originally from Chicago. 1700 North, 3400 West. (1706 N. Kimball Ave. is where I grew up.)

Enlisted in the Army when I was 17 (with my parents signature.) Inducted 10 days after my 17th birthday. Spent 1-1/2 years in Germany learning electronics, Radio & Radio Tele-Type Communications/Repair, Field Radar Service/Repair, and how to drink beer. Mmmmmm.

Then Uncle Sam sent me on a years vacation to sunny Southeast Asia. I came to Canada after my tour in Viet Nam. (I lost a bit of trust in the U.S. government after what I saw/went through over there.) As soon as I hit the West coast coming back, I turned left and came to Canada. Never even went home.

I was young (19), full of anger, and I didn't really understand things etc. Still a kid really. Not the most rational decision I ever made, but I really don't regret coming here. Got married, had two kids (both grown up now), got divorced. Been back a couple of times, but my immediate family is here so, the rest is history.

Geez, almost my lifes history.

My first PC was a IBM with 95 installed. That was about 97 and I still have it.

BG

Started with a 64K Atari in the mid-80s.

Graduated to an Apple in the early 90s.

Windows 3.1 with Netscape on an HP notebook that I still have.

Windows 95 on a Dell 350MHz for many years.