Post your computer experience timeline - what machines you used.

[linuxyogi]

2003 Celeron 1.7 Ghz
2005 Cleleron 2.13Ghz
2010 AMD Athlon 64X2 5600+
2018 Intel(R) Core(TM) i3-6100 CPU & Raspberry Pi 2

[DeadEnd]

In class we would write a program in basic, punch it out on 8 bit wide paper tape, then once a week take the tape to the local college where we had some time reserved for a mainframe located on the other side of town.
Teacher would ring a number place the phone inside a black box and then we would feed our program using a tape reader to the mainframe the result would magically be typed out on the teleprinter.

After school I downgraded working on Jacquard looms.

[poet1]

1992(?) Compaq (Windows 3.1, DOS, & Unix, latter was SunOs or Solaris)
CPU upgrade made my pixellated first person shooter make real human voices instead of bleeps and blips, winning.
Also: the modem sounded like a digital 1's and 0's going through a digital blender. Times have changed, uh.

1996 Gateway tower computer (Windows 95 & DOS > 98 && DOS)
Ethernet cable consisted of a USB adapter, oops.
HDD 8GB or something
HAHA && IS A COMMAND LINE JOKE hahaha ha ha

1999 Dell XPS tower (Windows XP > Xubuntu > Lubuntu > Xubuntu)
Still running, suckah. With a few changes.
2.8 GHz CPU, 2nd cheapo PNY video card (original fried), 3 GB RAM, 80 GB x 2 hard drives

2006 Dell Inspiron 15" laptop (Windows XP > Windows 7 > Ubuntu 6.04 > Fedora something something > Ubuntu, probably > FreeBSD > Lubuntu > Xubuntu)
Friend tossed Ubuntu 6.04 at me, and it hit my head. Ow.
2GB Ram, 2.4 GHz dual core CPU, 2nd bottom-range Nvidia graphics card (original fried), 120 GB HDD replaced with 1 TB

2016 Acer Aspire V3 17" laptop (Windows 8 > 8.1 > 10 > Ubuntu > Lubuntu x.xx> Xubuntu 18.04)
Core i7, 16 GB RAM, 1 TB HDD, mid-range Nvidia 750M

2018 Dell Business Desktop (Work computer, Windows 10)
120 GB SDD, Core isomething

Now that my Android phone is in my brain, I can watch my favorite movies on YouTube from the comfort and privacy of my eyelids.

Edit: DOS and jokes

[iggywrite]

Fun topic!

I started with an Apple IIgs back in elementary school.

The first machine I ever owned was an IBM PS/2.

Moved on to a IBM Thinkpad in high school. Replaced that with a Lenovo Thinkpad later. Part of the reason that I used IBM products as a kid was my aunt worked for them and we always got really great deals on refurbished models.

Then I went to a Dell Insipiron 15 for a few years before replacing it with an HP Pavilion. I hated the Pavilion and quickly sold it and bought my first Macbook Pro in 2011. The Macbook Pro was later replaced by the Air a few years later when I decided I valued portability and extended battery life over power. I was in college at this time and thought it made more sense.

I replaced it with a Surface about a year ago. Had tons of issues with the Surface and really never connected with the device. It had some nice features, but for the most part it didn't suit me as a user. I also wasn't crazy about running Windows. Almost all of my previous machines ran either Unix or Linux, so I grew up practically with zero experience with Windows.

I'm currently using a Dell Latitude E6400. It's an older laptop that's running Lubuntu 18.04. I sold the Surface because I needed money and the Dell is sort of a stand in for the next machine. I'm planning on getting another Thinkpad soon.

So, complete history + OS running is as follows:

Apple IIgs - Apple OS
IBM PS/2 - Can't remember but ended up installing Novell's SuSe on it later
IBM Thinkpad T42 - Debian
Lenovo Thinkpad (Can't remember the model) - Debian
Dell Inspirion 15 - Debian and later Ubuntu 11.04
HP Pavilion - Ubuntu 12.04
Macbook Pro - OS X
Macbook Air - OS X
Microsoft Surface Book - Windows 10
Dell Latitude E6400 - Lubuntu 18.04

I also briefly had a Apple ibook G3 for fun. It was a nice little machine. I'd love to get another one.

[grimaldo]

well I started with a Dell Mini 10 experimenting ubuntu, then I become a developer so many of the best environments are based on unix, so I used to have a macbook pro, really good core i5 and video nvida 2gb until I been robed. Htenk I get I new mac from work and this is aweful, all the time like of space, so so graphics and many more, the worst part is you can not upgrade because apple. I had the chance to get a Surface Pro 4 and I try elementary, it works but the new Juno is kind of wierd in the screen area, so I start an ubuntu 18.04 in this pc/tablet... everything chnage.

Excelente management of the ram and the battery is good, no issues, just the cameras not work by firmework but is ok, I did not use them. Also this thing can handle a virtualbox with windows 10pro run fine not laggy but nice and solid I can test and run node, affinity designer, visual code and it works.

I think this could be very good in surface 6... with a nicer graphic card, I play dota, and street fighter 5 using steam and works fine, not amazing but fine.

Hope find the webcam drivers soon, but the rest of the computer is amazing

[Tadaen_Sylvermane]

Wish I could remember them. I do know that I've only had personal access to 5 over my life, being my own. One a Commodore 64. Another Pentium 3 from eMachines for Everquest. Then I built my own, Athlon 64 Clawhammer I believe. Then an AMD 1055t that I played world of warcraft on. And now just my Dell laptop (i gave up gaming so i didn't need a real big machine).

I didn't start my Linux journey until I got my laptop though. Before that I had tinkered occasionally, and I can admit my first experience with Linux involved Virtualbox as a safe environment for.... inappropriate things

[freemedia2018]

Timex Sinclair 2068 followed by a PCjr with DOS 3, worked up through DOS 5 and 6, Windows 3.0 and 3.1, 95/98/SE, XP, Xubuntu.

XP was my last version of Windows. I've used far too many distros to list here, though the majority were Debian-based (because forays into other distro families were not as pleasant.) Since I'm no fan of a certain init system, I am still exploring the ecosystem. I really thought Debian would continue to be what I wanted, and perhaps someday it will be ideal again.

As to what I use now, I mix live distros together, using automated scripts. I use icewm for pretty much everything-- I sometimes mix in a few pieces of other desktops when needed. If i want to try my own software in the latest version of Xubuntu for example, I just download Xubuntu and run a script to modify it the way I want. This works for most things, and theoretically for everything.

[agklimit]

(Most of these were personal, and some from work - that's why there are devices overlapping in certain time periods.)


YEAR COMPUTER
1986 ZX Spectrum (borrowed)
1989 Amstrad CPC 464
1990 Schneider CPC 6128
1993 PC XT
1994 PC AT 386 DX
1996 IBM PS/1 486SX-25
1997 Compaq Contura Aero
1998 Pentium MMX desktop
1999 IBM PS/2
2002 Psion Series 5mx
2003 IBM ThinkCentre
2006 Dell Latitude
2006 Compaq Presario V5000
2011 HP Pavilion dv6 6136tx
2012 ThinkPad T400
2017 ThinkPad T430
2017 ThinkPad T400 (another one - very cheap!)
2018 ThinkPad Yoga 260

[portalhavoc]

Here is my computer history:

2003 - Custom Built with Windows XP
2004 - Gateway Tower with a Pentium 4 processor and Windows XP Professional
2006 - Dell Inspiron E1505 with Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005
2009 - Dell XPS Laptop of some kind with Vista
2009 - Two HP Compaq's running XP
2009 - Asus EeePC 901 with Ubuntu
2010 - Dell Studio XPS running Windows 7
2011 - HP Compaq running Ubuntu 11.04
2012 - Custom built PC running Windows 7
2014 - Dell Precision 690 with Ubuntu 14.04 LTS
2014 - Custom Built Gaming Rig (Originally ran Ubuntu 14.04 LTS, Then Windows 7 now it's running Windows 10.)

[oldrocker99]

VIC-20, then C=64, then Amiga 1000, i386, Athlon, Athlon 64, FX series. I am trying to assemble a Ryzen 5 2600, when I can straighten out 5 bent pins. I'm a little timid, worrying that I'll clumsily hose the CPU. I do have the spluge,