When did you get into computers?

[Ausimax]

Hi Folks,

It's great to hear of others trials and tribulations with their computers, I doubt that there is anybody who owns a computer who does not have a tale of woe to tell. They have now become such a common part of our lives, in a way we could not have foreseen even 25 years ago. Real DISASTER now is when the PC fails and you cannot access PS.

Keep the stories coming, I love them and it gives us something to do till we get some more Pic's to work on.

Max

[glennab]

Hey Max -- This is a great thread.  I've read through it a couple of times, because it's fascinating to learn of everyone's first experiences with computers.  I appreciate being reminded of how far we've come with our electronic friends.

However -- Wrinklies????  I resemble that remark!

I'll look forward to seeing more volunteers jump in to add more about how they started down this exciting road.

Glenna

[Ratz]

Hey guys! Max this is a great thread,
It amazes me when I think about how far computers have come in such a very short time. I bought our first computer for our kids at Christmas in about '88.I don't remember the exact specs, but it was running win3.01 and only had about 16k ram and a cga monitor. It cost us about 6 months wages and when it came time to upgrade, we just couldn't afford it.
Now, almost 20 years later I have just bought a new 320 gig HD and it cost me the princely sum of $140, upped my RAM for $75....AMAZING!
And my son is now a computer tech! Very handy!!!
All in all, I think us "wrinklies" have caught up pretty well considering we didn't have the advantage of computers in our schools and having them at home was a luxury. :up:

Vicki.

[Ausimax]

Glenna, Ratz, Technology has certainly moved forward apace over the last couple of decades and it keeps you fit running to keep up with it, or trying to - I think I have just about lost the race, pick up a computer magazine now and I don't understand half of the things they are talking about.

Blame OPR for that, I am a member of 5 or 6 computer forums and as many photography forums, however since getting involved with OPR and this forum and trying to learn PS, I just seem to have drifted away from them, now if I visit all the people seem to have changed and I can't seem to be bothered getting involved again.

Might also be a sign of advancing old age and shortened attention span.


Max

[Dave]

I forgot to add that my first computer was my first and only PC. My second computer was a PowerMac 8500 and I've been an  Apple man ever since. I even converted Angela from the darkside.

Dave

[Ausimax]

Come on people, there must be dozens of good (or bad) computer stories out there, even Mac's must have their drama's.

Guess I will have to keep the ball rolling, we bought our first Windows based PC in 96, a Hyundai 133 MHZ, 64 Meg of RAM and 1.6 Gig hard drive running Win 95.

We bought it from a local retailer franchised to a National chain, the price and specs were good at that time and getting it locally meant we would not have to travel great distances to get it fixed should a problem occur.

We bought it on a Friday, on Sunday it failed to proceed, Monday we took it back to the retailer who diagnosed the problem as being in the install of the OS, so he would have to reformat the drive and reinstall all the software. two days work - maximum - promised.

Day three, called, he couldn't come to the phone but the computer was not ready yet, day four the same, day five and six still the same story and he still would not come to the phone, we then in desperation called the Australian distributors in Sydney N.S.W ( about a thousand kilometres away) to see if they could get an answer as to when our computer would be ready.

This is how it went on until we finally got it back on day 12, we would ring the distributors, they would ring the retailer/repairer and then call us back to inform us of progress. Needless to say once we had it back in our possession it never got near HIM again, we would take it to the same retail chain in a different town.

This was the beginning of a long string of disasters, the distributors only handled the warranty for the first 2 weeks after that it was farmed out to a third party insurer, each of which seemed to go out of business with monotonous regularity, every time you had a problem you had to do a ring around to find out who you were dealing with now.

The next problem was these warranty agents would not let the repairer replace a part, they had to remove and send the faulty part to Sydney for them to inspect, they would then purchase a new part from the distributor and send it to the retailer, so the average time of any repair was at least a week.

Then the Monitor threw in the towel, off to Sydney, a week later it was back, still with the same problem, off again, back again still the same fault, the repairer the placed tape over the case join in the monitor and sent it off again, back it came once again - repaired, they must have been magicians because the tape had not been disturbed, we finally got a new (refurbished) monitor after 5 interstate trips.

In the first year we owned it, it spent 5 months being repaired or travelling to and from Sydney, finally after 2 years Hyundai finally gave up the fight and gave us a new computer - another Hyundai?  No they had a computer built for us by a local company, showing great faith in their own products.

We are now on our eighth and ninth computers and we have never bought a "Name" brand again and have had no troubles of that magnitude with any of our "white boxes".

Though we have advanced from those days, now we carry out all our own repairs and upgrades, and the quality of service is much improved.

Thats my tale for now, lets hear your tales of woe or great joy.

Max

[glennab]

Max -- I can't give you any great stories of woe, because I've owned two Macs, and they've run like tops from day 1.  (Dave, can I hear an Amen??!)  Software compatibility glitches, yes, but the Macs are so elegantly engineered that they just don't seem to have many problems.  And they're built well enough that even a non-techie like me can open them up and add ram or a USB/Firewire port without fear of mucking up the whole works.

At work, we just upgraded to CS2 and Quark 7, and we've had a number of shut-downs and OS reinstalls, but that's been because of the software.  The Macs have been absolute work horses.

My husband, on the other hand has had 2 PCs, and he gets so angry at them that I'm surprised we don't have several new windows (Windows???) in the house from the times he's threatened to toss them through the wall.  He works as a civil engineering designer on PCs and their system shuts down regularly.  I just sit smugly as he tells me about the horrendous day they had because they couldn't keep the computers from crashing.

Go Macs!

Glenna

[Ausimax]

Thats the trouble with Mac's, they seduce you into thinking you are on top of it all - Then Ka-Boom!  :'(
Remember God warned Adam and Eve about apples, he said nothing about WINDOWS! :knuppel:

Max

[glennab]

Touché Mr. Ausimax!  But I'll still take my MacPro, my OSX, my Widgets and my I-Tunes  -- even if you don't play fair and bring the Diety into our discussion.

However ... have you noticed how many TV shows and cartoons that feature computers have a prominently-placed apple????  I'm always quick to point one out to my husband, who usually ignores me or grumbles something unmentionable.

And so the controversy goes.  Until there's no difference in computer platforms, which I believe is the direction in which we're going at lightning speed!  And then I suspect we'll progress (?) to a heated discourse on whether I-Robot is better than U-Robot.

Glenna

[Ausimax]

Hey Glenna,

When you have a PC running Windows you need all the divine intervention you can get. :funny:


Max

[glennab]

It's the truth, Max!  Hubby just had an automatic upgrade on his operating system, and now he can't get on the internet.  It's bizarre, because he can get e-mail and send e-mail, yet he can't access the web.  I've combed the Microsoft web site and can't find anything to explain it.  We're connected by a router -- his connection is wireless, and he accesses the internet through my Mac.  But my Mac is still able to get to the web.  I'm pretty good at troubleshooting, but this is a real puzzler!  By the time we get to an issue like this, Lon is ready to throw his computer away.  He's spoiled, because he has an entire IT department at work to help him with his problems.  Until the past year or so, I've had to be not only a designer but also always upgraded and maintained my  own computer. (Which is a good thing, because I don't hesitate to do whatever I have to in order to keep the 2 at home running.)

Ah, technology.  Ain't it great??????

Glenna

[Ausimax]

Hi Glenna,

I never use Auto Update myself, I download them and install them myself and test them after installation to make sure every thing works. Is Lon using XP?  If so he should be able to do a System Restore to before it was installed and see if it works again OK.

Other than that go to add and remove programs and you should be able to remove updates there, the other thing is to check the KB numbers of the latest updates and go to the MS site and see if there are any known issues with those updates and what are the work arounds.

Have Fun! and Pray a lot.

Max

[glennab]

Amen, Brother!

We made the mistake of allowing the "Geek Squad" from an unnamed store to install and set up Lon's computer.  Mr. Geek is the one who set up the auto update, so Lon had no idea this would happen.  I have my Mac set to ask me first before I allow any upgrades.  Even then, sometimes I lose settings and have to reconfigure.

I'll check your suggestions this weekend and see if we have any luck.

Thanks!  And "hang" in there (how in the world do you do everything upside down?????!)

Glenna

[Ausimax]

 

We just work smarter Glenna, when you are hanging upside down, nothing goes over your head.  ;D


Max

[schen]

I thought this is a thread that we supposed to share our fond memories  :(

Early this year, an auto update wiped out all the icons on my work PC.  So I did a system restore and that wiped out everything in my computer :D  Fortunately, I had a month old back up, so not everything was lost.  Fear of another disaster, I turned off the auto update.  Now I am bombarded with "Your computer is at risk" messages.

Let me get out of the dark side.  In 1984, one of my coworkers bought a Mac.  He took it to work and we used the MacDraw as our poor man's CAD tool to do mechanical drawings for a project.  It was my first encounter with GUI and nothing came close to that experience since.  Sadly, because of work, I have to use Windows PC most of the time.