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k3vb0t · #1 Post by **k3vb0t** » Mon Dec 06, 2004 12:21 pm

Not sure if there is a thread on this deeper down in Off-Topic, but I thought I would see what everyone's background/history is dealing with computer.

I'm 20 years old, Management major, graduating in December 05. In school in northwest Georgia. First computer was a 386 machine my Dad had. Ran Windows 3.11. Then moved up to a Dell 166mhz (I think it was Dell), on Windows 95/98, then to an 866mhz 'beast' from Dell on Windows ME (ugh). But hey, it played Starcraft so much better than the 166!

Last summer I built a computer from parts (Antec, AMD 2600+, ATI Radeon 9500Pro), and just last month my parents helped me purchase my first laptop: ThinkPad T42 (2378-FVU). Loving the portability of the laptop, I use it primarily to take notes in class, and to enjoy the rest of my apartment.

I'm mostly a gamer, took C++ as a sophomore in high school and hated it, dual boot Ubuntu Linux on my desktop (with Win2kPro), I blog, interested in photography and BMWs, and (long shot) I'm interested in an internship in the Birmingham, AL area for this summer.

Who are you?

admsteiner · #2 Post by **admsteiner** » Mon Dec 06, 2004 12:38 pm

Why not...I'm bored and have finals in a week

23 years old, Computer Science major and graduated in August '04. Currently attending Cardozo Law School (class of '07) in the great city of New Yawk (New York to you out of towners).

As for computers, who can remember. 286/8 with DOS 3 I believe (took over 2 hours to load Wing Commander II off the 10 floppy disks. Those were the days!), and then a 386/33 (i think) and then when that died a Pentium-75.

Currently my IBM TP T42 (2378-FVU) and my desktop PC (a P4 2.53 which sits there reading my mail and waiting for me to log in from school).

--Adam

JHEM · #3 Post by **JHEM** » Mon Dec 06, 2004 12:51 pm

I think you'll soon find that there are some on us here in the Forums who hark back to the days of steam-powered mainframes and hand chiselled stone punch cards!

My first hands on experience with computers was at university when my school got their very own IBM 360 (one of the first) in 1965.

It's been downhill ever since!

Regards,

James

DavidNZ · #4 Post by **DavidNZ** » Mon Dec 06, 2004 2:20 pm

1965? That would have been a good time to watch the developments in computing. Back then, I was nothing more than an itch in my fathers....never mind.

Growing up in Canada, my first was a VIC-20. I remember needed the 8K expander because I was running out of memory. My geeky cousin, the show-off, taught himself machine language and made a few games. I was pretty much computer-less (aside from an Atari 1040ST) until I got to University in 1989, when I just used the lab computers to check email (using Pine - anyone remember that on Unix?) and using that Unix-based, text-only www program (can't recall what it was called).

Got my first email account in 1989 as well. Back in the day, we used to destroy guys' email accounts (and the entire server at the same time) by attaching "C:\Windows" to an email. It was sensational, but boy did we get in trouble a few times.

I went through a few Macs in the early 90s. I think an LC II, a IIci, and a Powerbook 160. Before that I had a 386 laptop, can't recall the model, that ran Windows 3.1 I think. I think I only had it for a few months before I got the Macs. Used Macs until about 1998 when I went to work for a consultancy firm and they gave me a 770ED, at which point I was hooked. That 770ED followed me to New Zealand, at which point I gave it (!) to a buddy who still uses it. Picked up an R32 in 2002 and an X40 a few months ago.

admsteiner · #5 Post by **admsteiner** » Mon Dec 06, 2004 4:08 pm

DavidNZ wrote:...until I got to University in 1989, when I just used the lab computers to check email (using Pine - anyone remember that on Unix?)

I'm *still* using Pine to check my email (when I check mail away from my desktop).

DavidNZ wrote: Back in the day, we used to destroy guys' email accounts (and the entire server at the same time) by attaching "C:\Windows" to an email.

See? Today we've improved. You don't even need to attach c:\windows, you just need to be running it

--Adam

hausman · #6 Post by **hausman** » Mon Dec 06, 2004 5:38 pm

JHEM wrote:My first hands on experience with computers was at university when my school got their very own IBM 360 (one of the first) in 1965.

You've got me beat by a couple of years, although "my" S/360 was probably larger than yours

(A model 75 at University of Waterloo.)

My first "personal computer" was a model 30 that I had standalone access to as a co-op student on Sunday nights from midnight to 6am Monday.

t's been downhill ever since!

In more ways than one

#7 Post by **AlphaKilo470** » Mon Dec 06, 2004 8:03 pm

My first computer was an IBM ValuePoint that I got back in 1995. It had 486DX (can't remember speed) in it, a hard drive that I can't remember the size of, just that it was small, Win95, 8 megs of RAM, a 2x CD drive and a 28.8 modem (this was 1995, 28.8 was as fast as it got.) Later, I replaced the IBm with a slightly nicer Compaq Prolinea midtower (can't remember CPU, just that it was a 486 of some sort), a small hard drive, size which I can't remember, 16 megs of RAM, 28.8 modem, 2x CD and Win 95.

Next up, torwards the end of 1998, I got my first ThinkPad, a used but still in good shape 350c. It had a 120mb hard drive, 20mb RAM (that wasas much as it would take), and Win95. I also replaced my Compaq ProLinea with a Pentium 166 tower with a Voodoo Rush video card, 96mb RAM, 8x CD, 10mbps ethernet, no modem (I moved on to broadband at this point), Win98 and a few other things.

Late in 1999, I got my first computer that was not used by someone before my, I got a nice Celeron 300a (overclocked to 450mhz, later replaced with PII 350), 64mb RAM (later upgraded to 256mb) , Win 98 (later 2000 then XP), 16mb TNT2 graphics, 10/100 ehternet, 42x CD, 8gb HD, and a few other things. That computer FLEW back when it was built.

In December of 2002, I got my current desktop, my Athlon XP 1800. It has 1.06gb RAM, a 32x32x48 CDRW, Firewire, USB2.0, 10/100 ethernet, 40gb HD, 128mb Radeon 9000, SoundBlaster Audigy, internal Zip100, a 19" Samsung 997DF flat CRT (got the monitor earlier this year, first monitor of mine worth bragging about) and Windows XP.

In 2003, I got an old ThinkPad 760ED from a neighbor, it had 16mb RAM (later to be 48mb ), 1.2gb HD (later to be 3.2gb), Win98, video inputs and outputs, the notorious mWave soundsystem and the coolest keyboard I have ever seen (aside from the 701c, only that was cooler), you could flip up the keyboard to upgrade the unit.

A few weeks ago, I got a 380ED from a friend, the 760ED died in January. I currently have 32mb RAM and a 3gb HD in it. I'm going to upgrade it soon to have a 6gb HD and Windows 2000.

Oh yeah, I almost left this one out, back in early 2001, I had found an old, but somewhat working Acer Anyware 1120NX laptop at a local junk sale. Firt day I had it, the hinge for the LCD popped, luckily, I was able to repair it, the NiCD (yes, NiCD, NiMH was not popular when this was built) was deader than dead, the 10mb hard drive could not boot because it was degraded so much, you could barely store data on it, so I always booted from a floppy disk, the screen was a decent sized monochrome screen, the cpu was a 386, and eventually, the floppy drive died, so I could no longer use it. I used it for about 2 months. I beleive the thing was built in 1991.

#8 Post by **JaneL** » Mon Dec 06, 2004 8:13 pm

>hand chiselled stone punch cards!
>

Punch cards and paper tapes here, baby, but a little later than you. I didn't get into IT until 1974.

Age? Older than dirt.

Experience? Initially, coding using an in-house language on a Honeywell mainframe, then moved to COBOL on an IBM S/360-something.

My first PC was an IBM AT, then I got a PS/2 Model 60 - 2MB of memory and a 40MB HDD! I was the envy of all my peers until the first Model 70 came in-house. I used the Model 60 to co-write a PC version of one of our smaller mainframe apps using DB III+ and Clipper.

The first ThinkPad I ever saw was my brother-in-law's 750 monochrome. Then we got a 750Cs for our team notebook. I was traveling a lot and fighting with my teammates over who was going to be able to use it. I managed to convince my manager that I would be more productive if I gave up my desktop and just got a notebook that was powerful enough to run everything I needed. The newly-released 755CE was the solution to my problem, and I left the rest of the team to fight over the other one (and to make up their own business justification to get one of their own). It's been a steady progression from then on.

I've done Levels I, II and III hardware and software support and also done a little network admin work along the way. The best job I think I've ever had, though was about 5 years as the product manager for desktop and mobile hardware for a Fortune 500. That job was great fun as everything that made it to our standards list came through my lab first. I had sales reps from every company you can think of trying to get me to bring their products in-house for evaluation. Every day, a new toy...

And now I've come full-circle and am back on the application side of things working on a system that is partly green-screen mainframe and partly web-based.

#9 Post by **jdhurst** » Mon Dec 06, 2004 8:23 pm

hausman wrote: You've got me beat by a couple of years, although "my" S/360 was probably larger than yours (A model 75 at University of Waterloo.)

I think I used that machine (as that is where I went to school). I also used the IBM 7044 computers at the Ontario Department of Highways when I was a student to write the programs that did the vertical and horizontal geometry on the curved bridges across the 401 in Toronto and elsewhere. DOH switched to the IBM 360 series while I was writing and maintaining these programs.

However, I switched dispciplines after three years to Pure and Applied Mathematics. I liked that better, and always preferred the logic around differential geometries to computer science back then.
... JD Hurst

immaculate · #10 Post by **immaculate** » Wed Dec 08, 2004 1:00 pm

i'll hop on. been mainly posting in the x40 forum since i've been needing tips/advice over the last few weeks but i finally bit the bullet and bought a dothan x40 last week. merged hidden partition, reformatted/repartitioned everything and am dual booting xp pro sp2 and mandrake linux. thanks for the help guys!

anyway i'm 22, 4th year computer engineering and pure math double major hoping to go to law school afterwards. work during the summer as a CS instructor at UC Berkeley and during the year as an applied cyrpto intern (actually i quit not too long ago) and part time model for dkny. have too much computing power/wifi in my room (alienware p4 3ghz machine, raid 0+1 server w/480gigs, 2 PDAs, powerbook g4, old sun machine and now x40)

main hobbies now are modifying bmws and ferraris (http://7er.aaronliao.com is my current project) and putting them to use on the track. i like fashion, but there isn't much room for that given my studies hah. since school is taking up most of my time now i'm spending a lot more time shooting photos with my eos 10d (old, but still good!) first REAL computer was a 286 when i was a kid. before that i had a radioshack trash80 and an atari *grins*

cheers!

aaron[/url]

admsteiner · #11 Post by **admsteiner** » Wed Dec 08, 2004 2:01 pm

hey aaron,

where are ou planning on going to law school?

I remember my Commodore 64....

I also remember the Apple IIE's they had in elementary school, but by that time I was typing too quickly for the computer to keep up.

--adam

selvan777 · #12 Post by **selvan777** » Wed Dec 08, 2004 4:03 pm

Currently my background is a wall painted white...

immaculate · #13 Post by **immaculate** » Wed Dec 08, 2004 9:27 pm

admsteiner wrote:hey aaron,

where are ou planning on going to law school?

I remember my Commodore 64....

I also remember the Apple IIE's they had in elementary school, but by that time I was typing too quickly for the computer to keep up.

--adam

adam,

currently i'm hoping to go anywhere that will take me! haha no actually, i have a few places in mind (hopefully either in southern california or on the east coast) but i've already made plans to work for a year so that i have some money and don't have to loan my way all throughout law school *cringes*

seeing as you come from a similar background, could you tell me how that's working out for you? my hope is to do intellectual property/patent law. essentially i'm positive there's no way i'm going to cut it as an engineer (i can't stand it anymore! programming at school, programming at work, CS CS CS arg!) but i don't want it to go to waste, so this seems like the logical path...

aaron

admsteiner · #14 Post by **admsteiner** » Wed Dec 08, 2004 9:41 pm

immaculate wrote: currently i'm hoping to go anywhere that will take me! haha no actually, i have a few places in mind (hopefully either in southern california or on the east coast) but i've already made plans to work for a year so that i have some money and don't have to loan my way all throughout law school *cringes*

seeing as you come from a similar background, could you tell me how that's working out for you? my hope is to do intellectual property/patent law. essentially i'm positive there's no way i'm going to cut it as an engineer (i can't stand it anymore! programming at school, programming at work, CS CS CS arg!) but i don't want it to go to waste, so this seems like the logical path...
aaron

Don't worry so much about the loans. As long as you do well in law school you'll get a job and pay them off. And if you do well on your LSAT you'll get a good scholarship too. I'm in school straight out of college, and while I'll have a nice amount of loans, I figure I'll be able to pay them back

I'm in Cardozo right now (its in NYC) and the IP program here is rated 5 or 6 in the country. The professors are great, students are great and I'm really enjoying it. We have a nice group of CS/Engineering/Science people too.

If you're on the east coast ever, you should come by for a visit and tour of the building and sit in on a class. If you'd like to discuss this off board, my email address is ajsteine at yu dot edu.

--Adam

BILLCROCKER · #15 Post by **BILLCROCKER** » Fri Dec 17, 2004 6:06 pm

I'm in Cardozo right now

How many kids do you find have very high LSAT scores but average grades? That's where I stand right now.

JHEM · #16 Post by **JHEM** » Fri Dec 17, 2004 8:37 pm

BILLCROCKER wrote:How many kids do you find have very high LSAT scores but average grades? That's where I stand right now.

Maybe you're BORED!!

Seriously. I've seen it in both my own life as well as my son's.

Pursue outside interests. Learn to fly. Take SCUBA lessons. Learn to sail. Become a tutor for your local HS district. SOMETHING!!!

Regards,

James the Elder

BILLCROCKER · #17 Post by **BILLCROCKER** » Fri Dec 17, 2004 8:56 pm

Good advice, but that's not the issue...I'm already pretty involved. I'm not the typical applicant who starts watching law and order and then suddenly decides to go to law school....I've wanted to practice law since middle school.

JHEM · #18 Post by **JHEM** » Sat Dec 18, 2004 1:54 am

When I first came ashore for good a Phila. based Admiralty law firm wanted to pay for me to attend law school.

They'd pay all of my school costs, they just wouldn't pay me a salary while I was attending school full time.

That was almost 30 years ago and I often wonder if I should have scratched that itch.

Regards,

James

ian · #19 Post by **ian** » Sat Dec 18, 2004 4:16 am

Born in International Geophysical Year it was natural that I should become a geophysicist (?) and my first 'hands on' contact with IBM (or any computer for that matter) was in '74 when I was using our 360/44 and 370/65 systems - we were the first in the UK with Array processors. Graduated to TSO (Remember that ?) and got to a Cray when I was working overseas...coding using Fortran lV etc. 15 year halt when I came to France and decided to semi-retire - now back in the saddle as the "IT Man" for a small association in a very laid back (but well connected - 8meg ADSL for most people in town) country town in SW France. I gave the people here HPs and Compaqs but bought my own T42...built the only free (public) wireless network in town as well...love gadjets, Fiat UNOs, Volkswagen Golfs and Britney Spears tummy...

Bruce Guttman · #20 Post by **Bruce Guttman** » Sat Dec 18, 2004 6:39 pm

I guess I'm one of the more senile .. oops, I mean senior .. members. I'm more of a hobbyist, since I'm a (currently out of work) Chemical Engineer.

My first exposure to computers was an IBM 1620 in college. Fortran (with format). Had about as much power as a VIC-20! Mostly made Snoopy Calendars.

I had a "personal computer" in one job. It was a DEC PDP-11/03. Rolled it up to my desk, had a dumb terminal and a pin-printer. Used it for BASIC and word processing using a line editor. Ugh!

Then I worked with a Trash-80.

We bought a VIC-20 for home use, but only to practice BASIC.

Got in the PC revolution with a "Bleeding Edge" 8088.

First portable was a Wang. 5MB hard drive!!

I've been through the 286's, 386SX, etc.

Bought an old PS/2 Model 60 and got hooked on the design. Wound up becoming a Sysop on the old CompuServe IBM PS/2 forum. Then I started my PS/2 collection: 80, 40, 30, 77, 95. Fastest of the bunch was the 95, Pentium 60.

Then I got some Ambra's. A P-60 desktop (with math error) and then a laptop with a 486SX. Thought I had the poor man's IBM, until IBM dumped them like a hot potato.

CompuServe merged my forum with other IBM forums, so I started buying a bunch of IBM Iron to be able to continue to help.

First Thinkpad: 760E (thin) with Dock I. Then a 760EL, 760XL, 765D, 770, 770X, 770Z. All but the E were bought dead and revived. Also a 600E, which I upgraded to an X with a new bottom half. Still using the 770Z.

Currently using an IBM Intellistation M-Pro, dual 600 MHz processors. Trying to resurrect a Z-pro with dual Xeons.

But I still have some floppy disks for my PDP-11/03! (some day ...)

admsteiner · #21 Post by **admsteiner** » Sat Dec 18, 2004 6:56 pm

BILLCROCKER wrote: How many kids do you find have very high LSAT scores but average grades? That's where I stand right now.

Plenty.
There are a number of students with LSAT scores of 160-161 who had good GPA's. If you have a 165+, even if your GPA is a 3.0 you're pretty much a shoe in (just don't wait for the last second to apply, do it now).
LSAT score trumps GPA by a lot.

--Adam

skyfish · #22 Post by **skyfish** » Sun Dec 19, 2004 10:30 am

k3vb0t wrote:...
Who are you?

I don't have much besides an MS in CS and 2 laptop + 2 desktop.

admsteiner · #23 Post by **admsteiner** » Sun Dec 19, 2004 11:43 am

skyfish wrote:I don't have much besides an MS in CS and 2 laptop + 2 desktop.

So that's one machine per hand and foot...wish I could type with my feet...

--adam

benplaut · #24 Post by **benplaut** » Mon Dec 20, 2004 2:05 pm

I started out with an old B&W DOS, don't remember what kind, then in '94 got a MMX 166MHz win96 (32mbRAM), then a Dell 4550 (which i am typing this on) P4 2.0, 512mb RAM, then (i know, a step backwards) a 701c, and my T40 is currently 2nd day fedexing to me (in hawaii, it takes 4 days

leoblob · #25 Post by **leoblob** » Fri Dec 24, 2004 3:53 pm

Guess I'm one of the --ahem-- older guys here...

First computer experience was with a DEC PDP-8 in 1969... also an IBM360 mainframe (via batch-processed punch cards), both during high school. At college (MIT, electrical engineering) a variety of DEC "minicomputers".

My first PC was a Kaypro 2, with a 4MHz Z80A running CP/M, with 64K of ram, a 9" mono screen, and dual floppies (no hard drive). Used that machine from 1984 - 1993.

Then got a Gateway 486/33 desktop, then the TP360 (still in service, now my wife's), then an IBM P90 desktop (model 6586-47H), then the TP365 (still in service). The IBM P90 desktop was my primary machine until a year ago (upgraded many, many times!). A friend gave me a box with an ASUS motherboard in it, not much else. Now is a PIII 1200/256/133, and is my main computer. Have since acquired two more PIII desktop computers, all 3 used for my home office. All my machines are running WIN98SE (my wife's runs PC-DOS 6.3).

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