"What kind of computer is everybody using these days?"
July 2001
Note: This survey was initially posted by Carl Parlagreco.
Sharp laptop, vintage 1997? maybe late '96. Pentium, 120, 8 mb ram
upgraded to 40, 1.1 hard drive, 6X cdrom. State of the art at the
time, and proudly purchased -- right before the price really went down for
laptops. As all the roadsters speed by laughing, I just listen to the horses'
hooves, hold the reins loosely, and say placidly, "I'll get there."
-- Maria Bellamy
Primary workstation: Homebuilt PIII/550 Intel machine running
Win2K. Studio scanner box: Elderly 486/25sx running Win95 (it _can't_
run Win98) that drives a scanner and serves as an ssh client and not much
else. The scanner software requires Windows of some flavour. Upstairs print server/SETI box/secondary scanstation/digital camera interface: P166 running Win98. (It has to run a flavour of Windows for the scanner, again.) Mail server, router, web server, listserver (that this list runs on), ftp server: P166 running Linux 2.1 (Debian).
I also still have the Amiga 4000/040, the Commodore 128, the
Atari 130xe, the Amiga 500 (that became the wooden computer below, with
slots and processor acceleration and stuff), and the Timex/Sinclair 1000.
All but the Sinclair can be powered up at literally any time. Oh, and I
have a MacSE that I got for $2 at a garage sale. Massive 40 meg hard
drive! Boots System 7, has Word on it, can be powered up at will.
Hm. Now that I think on it, I _may_ have an rf modulator lying
around. I could get the Sinclair running.
(And if you're wondering, most of those, plus the print server
and SETI box, live in the Hall of Obsolete Architectures upstairs.)
-- R'ykandar Korra'ti
Hey, I'm not laughing. I'm using a Compaq laptop that Carl fished out
of the trash at work. 486, 32 mb ram, no cdrom at all, 324 meg hard
drive (does that sound right?). I'm strolling along watching the carriage
trot past me....
On the other hand, they just bought me a new desktop at work. I have
no idea what it is or has, but Temple usually buys one generation old.
-- Cathy Fiorello
Asembled it myself. AMD 900, I forget the motherboard, 256 Meg,lots of fans, Geforce256
with 32 meg vidieo ram. several hard drives. Lots of fans...AMDs run hot
connected to the house network
-- John Brantley
If it does the work you need of it, it's fine.
Until recently I was using a nameless, numerous-times upgraded
Pentium 125. Whoa! And I had a Compaq 486-75 laptop that i used for my writing
computer. But then I got a terrific deal, and upgraded to a Compaq Armada M700.
It's replaced both of those systems, and is turning out to be an excellent
purchase.
-- Carl Parlagreco
I'm using a Gateway Essential 400c (Celeron 400), Mid-tower, wtih
128MB RAM,
2 HD (the 6.8GM that came with it, and a 20 GB I bought myself for
Christmas), Internal Zip 250 Drive, external CD-RW, and very-low end
(these days) printer & scanner (Lexmark Z11 & Mustek 600).
I'm currently working on restoring a P100 to working order, as a
"ancient
games" system (stuff that won't work well on modern systems).
-- Stan Bundy
Mine's an E-machine E-One..I call it my Fischer-Price
computer..because
it sort of looks like a toy. Tasteful two-tone Aqua-Velva green and
milk jug
white. An Acer scanner sits off to one side, a cheapie UPS on the
other, a
field phone atop the UPS. All on a small cheap student desk.
-- Scott Thomas
I'm using a Pentium 233 that my housemate Ben put together for me, running Windows 98. I use Netscape Navigator 4.77 as a browser, and Eudora Light for e-mail. Netscape
has a few issues; but generally speaking, they both work. And I've had no
problems with viruses coming in on either one. Eudora seems to have
a habit of not decoding viruses back to executable form, so I get them
as text. Usually they come through as unreadable text, although that
last one on the LexFA list came through as readable code. And I've never had
a virus steal my address book to propagate itself, which is often a
problem with Outlook.
-- Cync Brantley
I am using a Gateway PII 266 mhz that I purchased used about 2 years
ago. My Gateway P5 60 mhz is being used by my father - mostly for playing
games. My Gateway 386 25 mhz is in Bedford with my friend Vonda. She is a
computer newbie, and for the most part it is good enough for the journal she
keeps and the games she plays. She also has loan of my Thinkpad (720 166
mhz I think). She might be trying for another type of job in the fall. I
want her to have some practice in filling out forms on a PC. She is using
templates in Access to practice on.
-- Linda Wyatt
At home I use an eMachines 500MHz system. I've added
more memory, but otherwise straight from the
manufacturer. It is both cheap and decent quality.
If price is a strong selling point, I recommend them.
At work I have a host of Dell computers. I can't
recommend Dell enough - their quality and
ease-of-maintenance is excellent, even unparalleled,
IMO. My laptop's a Dell Inspiron 8000, which I love.
It's fast, well laid out and has lots of features.
They have a different laptop model that's a "business
class" model, although as far as I can tell it's 20%
less function for 15% less cost.
-- Thomas Samples
I have a TRS80 Model II.. Nah nah nee nah nah!
and a Sinclair ZX81... (built from the kit)
and a Black Apple II+ ...
and 2 regular ones ...
and a vic20 ...
and a commodore 64 ...
and a digital rainbow ...
and a Kaypro ...
and....
