What was your a) 1st PC and b) 1st PC you built?

[DrPepper]

My first pc was a compaq something. It had a 700mhz AMD Duron (could be pencil modded to a Athlon) 128mb Ram. Nvidia Vanta TNT and a 20gb HDD. First pc I built was a AMD athlon X2 6000 2gb RAM 160gb HDD and x850pro.

 

[InTeL-iNsIdE]

My first pc was a compaq something. It had a 700mhz AMD Duron (could be pencil modded to a Athlon) 128mb Ram. Nvidia Vanta TNT and a 20gb HDD. First pc I built was a AMD athlon X2 6000 2gb RAM 160gb HDD and x850pro.

Ah pencil modding proccies, those were the days, also there was the wire trick too anyone remember that ?

 

[TIGR]

The first computer I had to call my own was a vpr Matrix 2020. I got it in June 2002 in a deal with a Canon printer and Samsung 17" CRT monitor for $1100. It had a 2GHz Pentium 4, 512MB of DDR memory, GeForce2 GTS-V with 64MB of memory, Sound Blaster Live! 5.1, in an Intel D845BG motherboard with a 300w PSU. At the time, it was a decent system, though not top-end. Those were the days of Delta Force 2 and Need for Speed High Stakes!

The first one I built, however, was before that, in 1999. I don't remember much about it, but it had a 733MHz Pentium 2, 128MB (I think) of RAM, a CD-ROM drive, and I don't really remember what else. I do know that at the time it cost something around $1300.

 

[Shadowdust]

My parents bought our first PC when I was 15. It was a Packard Bell with a 75 MHz Pentium and 4 MB of RAM. I remember the salesman trying to talk us up to 8 MB but it was already $1300 and we couldn't afford much more. It had a massive 1 GB hard drive as well. I don't know about the video though. I didn't know much about that sort of thing back then. I remember it came with a 14" monitor too.

The first computer I built though was:

AMD Athlon XP 1800 @ 1.53 GHz with stock heatsink-
MSI K7T Turbo motherboard
384 MB of PC100 RAM
128 MB nVidia Geforce FX5200
80 GB Hard Drive

I remember buying the motherboard specifically for the PC100 RAM since I had some extra modules laying around. It was my first build so I was pretty afraid of of destroying everything so I kept it pretty cheap where I could. I ended up giving most of the parts to ChiSox last year.

EDIT: Oops, I forgot that our actual first computer was a Macintosh Plus given to us by my grandpa. It only got used for a few months though so I always forget about it. He gave that to us in 1994. I guess they were old comps that the schools were getting rid of so he picked up a few. I do remember having to swap floppies like crazy since we didn't have an extra floppy drive or a hard drive.

 

[Bo$$]

a) my first pc was in 1986. my family bought a Tandy 1000 EX. It was uber leet as you can see by the following pic

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/80/Tandy1000HX.jpg

no harddrive, but it did have the 3.5 FDD which was WAY ahead of its time.

b) the first pc i built was a 450mhz intel with 128 megs of ram and a solid aopen motherboard. it had an 8 meg ati graphics card as well.

now this is EPIC

 

[blkhogan]

Wow. Blowing off the cobwebs on the brain for this one.
It was a DX66 chip, not sure if Intel or AMD. A few weeks later I was already looking for more speed, upgrading it to the fast 100MHz Overdrive chip.

 

[CDdude55]

Back then i only cared about gaming, so all i asked for my parents to buy me were Consoles.

Eventually i started playing UT'04 on my crappy Dell PC, but Consoles were still my main platform. I don't remember the specs of that Dell. But the first computer i built wasn't till a while, it was a Socket 939 build with an AMD Athlon 3200+, Some MSI motherboard, 512MB of some cheap RAM, a Ati X300 SE and a WD Caviar 80GB EIDE HDD. If you ask a person into IT how they got into computers, they'll probably say they have always liked to tinker with things. But for me, gaming and hardware have always went hand in hand since that day, upgrading my system and drooling over what was next for boosting my gaming performance is what got/gets my blood pumpin.

 

[t77snapshot]

My first (living on my own) was a Compaq with a Sempron 3200. My first build which is still my current rig is the Tempest with a Phenom II 920.

 

[Polarman]

1st PC ever was Coleco Adam (not kidding here! and yes, i`m that old)

1st build was Athlon 700.

 

[SystemViper]

my first computer was a

sinclair zx80 and that was in 81

I also remember playing around with a trs80 and a atari400, i liked the atari 400 for it basic programming capabilities but the downfall was that the storage was on casette tape and 1 out of every 4 saves were lost.... it was very frustrating.


then i build a 8088 clone system a few years later, then a 286, then 386 and so on, still building today

 

[MRCL]

First PC was a Maxdata. 800MHz Intel Celeron CPU, thats all I remember lol. I think it had a 4Gb HDD. That was 1998.

My first PC I built was ten years later. Pretty much shortly before I joined TPU. It was a mix of parts I bought and from an Aldi PC, but the first PC I built entirely was the evolution of that. Asus P5B Premium, E6300, Zalman 9700, Value RAM, Thermaltake case and PSU.

 

[JC316]

My first computer was some POS 486 laptop. My first good computer was a Packard Bell Pentium 166MHZ with MMX technology, 32MB of ram, 4GB HDD, 33.6 modem and a 2mb video card. Played Doom, Duke Nukem 3d and Warcraft 2 nicely. My dad had won $800 in the Texas Lottery and went to Wal-mart and picked it up.

 

[cdawall]

Ah pencil modding proccies, those were the days, also there was the wire trick too anyone remember that ?

what do you mean remember i have a pin modded chip still to this day

 

[(FIH) The Don]

1st pc was an old Scumpaq Presario something, i think it had a pentium 233mhz, a voodoo2card, 64mbram and a 8gb hd, and that thing cost me/my family around 2000$,

the 1st i build that was when the p4 s478 came out,

i think that this was the mobo i had http://www.gigabyte.com.tw/Products/Motherboard/Products_Overview.aspx?ProductID=1823

with a p4 2.8ghz with the HT, and 1gb kingston 400mhz mem,

a 40gb IDE drive, a cd drive, later cd-rw

and a MX440 128mb AGP, it should have been the 64mb version but i got the 128mb for some odd reason, not that i complained, which got upgraded to a fx5200 128mb i think?

and if my memory is correct i had a chill 400w psu, and this case http://www.techwarelabs.com/reviews/cases/raidmax_scorpio_668/ the black edition with a ton of cathodes, fans and what not.

then i stopped build/playing with pc for a couple of years,

then i got myself this setup

C2Q 9400,

gigabyte ga-ep45-ud3r http://www.gigabyte.com.tw/Products/Motherboard/Products_Overview.aspx?ProductID=3013

2x2 gb Corsair XMS 1066mhz ddr2,

1tb spinpointf1

dvd rw,

gtx-280

650w corsair psu,

antec 300 case

that was a HUGE leap from what i used to have

then i got i7 setup

GB GA-ex58-ud5
i7 920
3x2gb hyperx 1600mhz cl8
gtx-295 s pcb
1tb hd
750w corsair
and a thermaltake v9/antec900

and the current is the one in my sig

 

[zithe]

First PC ever owned. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16883114004

First PC I ever built entirely new:

G31MX-k + E2180 + X1800XT + 2GB DDR2 800 G. Skill + 80GB WD IDE drive.

 

[digibucc]

IBM 486/66
200MB HDD
8MB RAM
played gorilla toss and tanks in DOS all day
then when I got up to Win 3.1 I started to use sound recorder
then finally 3.11 got me online with Netscape Navigator.

good memories
_______________________
First PC I built (4 yrs later, after taking that and the following 2 apart)
AMD Athlon 800MHz
256MB Ram
20GB HDD
Nvidia GeForce MX 400

 

[TotalChaos]

My first PC was a Packard Bell 486SX25 with 4MB of RAM
My first build was an AMD K6 based system with ATI Rage card and 16MB of ram

 

[Indra EMC]

My First PC is

25 Mhz (Turbo 50Mhz) Pentium MMX, 2 MB ram, i didn't know what graphic card is, but that's onboard with the motherboard, and using DOS to operate.

Buy in 1989 (I'm just a year old) this is my father first PC, but also our first PC.

 

[Nick259]

First PC: pentium 2, 64mb ram, integrated 8mb graphics, 3.5gb hdd.
Second PC: bought 1.5 years later: celeron d 2.93ghz,ati 9250, 160gb hdd, 512mb ram

First build, 2007: athlon x2 4200x2, x1950 pro, 2gb ram, 500gb hdd

Current pc, in specs.

Back then i only cared about gaming, so all i asked for my parents to buy me were Consoles.

Eventually i started playing UT'04 on my crappy Dell PC, but Consoles were still my main platform. I don't remember the specs of that Dell. But the first computer i built wasn't till a while, it was a Socket 939 build with an AMD Athlon 3200+, Some MSI motherboard, 512MB of some cheap RAM, a Ati X300 SE and a WD Caviar 80GB EIDE HDD. If you ask a person into IT how they got into computers, they'll probably say they have always liked to tinker with things. But for me, gaming and hardware have always went hand in hand since that day, upgrading my system and drooling over what was next for boosting my gaming performance is what got/gets my blood pumpin.

pretty much same here man. Got fed up running ut2004 on my integrated graphics so bought the 9250 (didn't have any idea about agp/pci ect) luckily tho i bought an agp and it worked fine. Ut2004 on max setting Only then I realised it was really easy to upgrade so I bought some more ram and eventually upgraded to x1650 pro. Then went on to build a whole new pc.

 

[Soylent Joe]

I don't remember the actual specs of my first computer, we got it when I was probably 4 or 5 years old. I do remember that everything about it was massive, it was made by Hewlett-Packard, we got it in a big package deal from Sam's Club (computer, huge ass CRT monitor, printer, etc.), everything was that same creme color that dominated computers made in the 1990's, and it all came up to about $2700.

The first computer I actually built was the one I'm using right now, the first in my sys. specs.

 

[InTeL-iNsIdE]

How lucky are we now to grow up in a time where what a basic home pc would of cost you 10 years ago, we can now build a high end machine for and still have some change, I mean I look around on tpu and see the average ram being 4gb and a hell of a lot of people having 6-8gb not being that uncommon, hell for $1000 you have yourself a highend rig and can consider yourself in the top 1% of pc owners, I fricken love computers, and all the advancements that come with them, I really cant wait for the next 10 years in the home pc market !!!!

 

[Frogger]

Can't recall ,old fart, how long ago !! but it's http://forums.techpowerup.com/showpost.php?p=246469&postcount=10

 

[3volvedcombat]

My first PC was a laptop, had a celeron pentium 4 at 1.8Ghz 512mb of DDR memory, and a intel graphics chip, in there wierd codenames. It was able to play 1 game, Halo PC, and there was no texture detail, it was in 640x480 resolution, and lowest settings with costum low settings at 45-60 fps .




The completely built costum PC was
ep45-ud3p
GTX260
530wattpsu
e5200+darknight cooler.
crapy 60 dollar thermaltake soprano case
2gb of value ram.


Its basicly the resemblence of my PC ATM
ep45-ud3p
TWO Gtx 260's
750watt TX corsair PSU
q9550 E0 Water cooled
4gb of OCZ gaming memory
and a 140 dollar Antec 902 case.

Pretty pimped out now, and im getting ready to move up to i7.



The sad thought is though, ive never baught all my PC parts at once on newegg, and have them all come through new in box and i just have a working PC at the end of the day.

But when i ever get 1500-2000 dollars to spend on my new computer im going to be buying at once

 

[MN12BIRD]

My first PC was an IBM PS/2 Model 50 286 desktop with one of those awesome model M "Clicky" keyboards! Man I miss that thing. I grew up playing Monkey Island 1, 2, DoTT, Wolf3D and Out of this World on that little 286. Man it was like.... 11 MHZ of power if I recall! It was a little slow on some of those games but it held its own!

I had several PC's in between (duhh) inc an AMD 80MHZ 486 with CD-ROM (GASP!) that I parted together from most of the original, a Celeron 333 that was upgraded to a Celeron 533 and then a PIII 667. One of those good ones with the 133FSB. The Coppermine EB ones! That baby flew compared to the Celeron it replaced.

But the first PC I built from scratch was this...

Now my first build was funny. My Friend at the time owned a PC shop and he had some parts lying around. It was a Socket A motherboard I can't remember the brand but it was red PCB and that was so fancy for the time! I got the motherboard for some ridiculous trade that included a 2L bottle of Coke, a pack of Cigarettes and some KFC chicken. No I'm serious! The Video card was a Geforce 4Ti that was like the top of the line Geforce 4 but he upgraded to the brand new at the time ATi 9800 Pro. Now the 9800 Pro was the like best of the best when it came out but the GF4 Ti was still pretty damn good. He could have sold it for quite a bit but what did I pay for it? Well a SNES system I bought at EB Games used (obviously) for $20! Yep a used $20 SNES for a GF4 Ti! RAM? Well my buddy gave me 2x Samsung 512MB sticks of DDR 400 for FREE!! He said they didn't work (crashing) so he bought some new RAM and gave me this stuff for nothing. I used it for years and it worked perfectly! Sound card was given to me by the same guy I got the board from who owned a PC shop. It was one of those OEM SB Live 5.1 cards. Was awesome for free!

The only parts I actually bought new from the store was the CPU, Hard Drive and the case/PSU. The CPU was an AMD Athlon XP 2500+ and the case was some Raidmax something with the fancy window. The HD was like an 80GB IBM (Hitachi) Deskstar (Deathstar)

Man that thing rocked. I couldn't believe I had a new(ish) PC and most of the stuff was given to me for free or next to nothing! This was right around the same time the original Call of Duty came out and it ran that game perfectly!

 

[p_o_s_pc]

The sad thought is though, ive never baught all my PC parts at once on newegg, and have them all come through new in box and i just have a working PC at the end of the day.

But when i ever get 1500-2000 dollars to spend on my new computer im going to be buying at once

I have only had 3 rigs that came all at once from newegg and all of them AMD rigs most got sold before i could even use them for more then a day or to.(to my friend and his cousin)
all of the other rigs have came in different times