My Proud Acquisition
I am sorry for not blogging for so long now. I was busy acquiring and setting up my new Desktop. Before reciting a bit about that, let me go down memory lane and tell you about the first computer I owned.
Back in late 1996, when I had entered 11th standard in the Non medical computer science stream, my father bought a second hand computer at throw-away prices to fulfill his ambition of being a computer savvy banker. He worked at Punjab National Bank all his life and its not one of those tech-savvy organizations, but he always admired the potential in computers and wanted to try it out. He wanted to primarily use the desktop to type out the long EO/PO reports he was working on. He had checked out Wordstar earlier and this machine was meant to do that.
Do the first laptop was actually a 20 MHz Intel 80286 with 640 KB RAM with 40 MB HDD. It could run nothing more than DOS 5.0. 1996 was already a time when Pentium processor was out which could work at 133 MHz. It was a rather outdated beginning to my compute power, but was good enough to get a C compiler running and I was off trying to work out my C programs on it.
A few months later, he managed to acquire a second throw-away computer (and I am guessing this time it was free). This time it was a 80386 40 Hz process with, hold-your-breadth, 2 MB of RAM and an awesome 200 MB of disk. It could run DOS 6.22 comfortably and with some creative help, I even managed to get Windows 3.0 running on that machine. It was a great victory for me and my constant desire for compute power.
I finally managed to finish school in 1998 and ended up in SGTB Khalsa College as a BCA student. Since I was studying computers, I wanted a little more than the 80386 I got, which by that time started looking like a Museum piece by then.
Finally in 1999, with a loan supported by my father and the earnings from the tuitions I was giving out, I ended up acquiring my first "new" computer. This time it was a AMD Athlon 350 Hz processor with 64 MB of RAM and 8 GB of disk. It also brought along a 33.6 Kbps modem which was used to connect to the then prevalent VSNL internet service. This was certainly exciting as this machine, was pretty much contemporary by 1999 standards and could almost do anything I desired out of it.
As of the modern day, last week, I acquired a Intel Core 2 Duo 2.2 GHz machine with 2 GB RAM, 160 GB HDD. With a 256 Kbps Broadband connection, DVD writer and a Ubuntu installation, it completes all the requirements I have of it. I am proud to have acquired it.
I am also proud to have been an active part of the Moore's evolution. :-)
Back in late 1996, when I had entered 11th standard in the Non medical computer science stream, my father bought a second hand computer at throw-away prices to fulfill his ambition of being a computer savvy banker. He worked at Punjab National Bank all his life and its not one of those tech-savvy organizations, but he always admired the potential in computers and wanted to try it out. He wanted to primarily use the desktop to type out the long EO/PO reports he was working on. He had checked out Wordstar earlier and this machine was meant to do that.
Do the first laptop was actually a 20 MHz Intel 80286 with 640 KB RAM with 40 MB HDD. It could run nothing more than DOS 5.0. 1996 was already a time when Pentium processor was out which could work at 133 MHz. It was a rather outdated beginning to my compute power, but was good enough to get a C compiler running and I was off trying to work out my C programs on it.
A few months later, he managed to acquire a second throw-away computer (and I am guessing this time it was free). This time it was a 80386 40 Hz process with, hold-your-breadth, 2 MB of RAM and an awesome 200 MB of disk. It could run DOS 6.22 comfortably and with some creative help, I even managed to get Windows 3.0 running on that machine. It was a great victory for me and my constant desire for compute power.
I finally managed to finish school in 1998 and ended up in SGTB Khalsa College as a BCA student. Since I was studying computers, I wanted a little more than the 80386 I got, which by that time started looking like a Museum piece by then.
Finally in 1999, with a loan supported by my father and the earnings from the tuitions I was giving out, I ended up acquiring my first "new" computer. This time it was a AMD Athlon 350 Hz processor with 64 MB of RAM and 8 GB of disk. It also brought along a 33.6 Kbps modem which was used to connect to the then prevalent VSNL internet service. This was certainly exciting as this machine, was pretty much contemporary by 1999 standards and could almost do anything I desired out of it.
As of the modern day, last week, I acquired a Intel Core 2 Duo 2.2 GHz machine with 2 GB RAM, 160 GB HDD. With a 256 Kbps Broadband connection, DVD writer and a Ubuntu installation, it completes all the requirements I have of it. I am proud to have acquired it.
I am also proud to have been an active part of the Moore's evolution. :-)
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