2024's First Posting Battle!

[notabitail]

Tempting, but I think I'll pass. Never had an AOL account when it was "the hotness". Not about to start now.

Then how did you get online? Or were you part of America Offline, the information dirt road?

 

[notabitail]

Tempting, but I think I'll pass. Never had an AOL account when it was "the hotness". Not about to start now.

It's an eMachines! Very reliable, and, even though it doesn't say so on the front, it's NEVER obsolete!

 

[notabitail]

Never had an AOL account when it was "the hotness".

Wait, you used Hotmail.

 

[azurbanclucker]

Then how did you get online? Or were you part of America Offline, the information dirt road?

I had a Dialup account via another telco. PSTN Modem connection to a local POP and if you wanted TCP services you used a winsock client. AOL was just a wrapper on the same internals that abstracted it for people who weren't really technical and didn't know how to actually set up their own stuff. Since 99% of what people were doing on the early internet was text anyway (BBS, Usenet, IRC, FTP, etc...), There was already a well functioning framework in place by the time things like graphical browsers came around. It's where I cut my teeth on unix and linux and I've just kinda stuck around since.

 

[notabitail]

I had a Dialup account via another telco. PSTN Modem connection to a local POP and if you wanted TCP services you used a winsock client. AOL was just a wrapper on the same internals that abstracted it for people who weren't really technical and didn't know how to actually set up their own stuff. Since 99% of what people were doing on the early internet was text anyway (BBS, Usenet, IRC, FTP, etc...), There was already a well functioning framework in place by the time things like graphical browsers came around. It's where I cut my teeth on unix and linux and I've just kinda stuck around since.

This tech stuff just sounds interesting to me. Then again, I'm glad that cable exists and is a lot easier.

Meanwhile, I go and have to wait hours for Windows 98 SE to install. It's a pain.

 

[azurbanclucker]

It's an eMachines! Very reliable, and, even though it doesn't say so on the front, it's NEVER obsolete!

I've never purchased a prebuilt with my own money.

 

[azurbanclucker]

This tech stuff just sounds interesting to me. Then again, I'm glad that cable exists and is a lot easier.

Meanwhile, I go and have to wait hours for Windows 98 SE to install. It's a pain.

I'm surprised you can get 98 to install on modern hardware.

 

[notabitail]

I'm surprised you can get 98 to install on modern hardware.

Shuttle XPC SK43G. It's from 2003. I put a floppy and CD drive in it. Used to be my Dad's.
There were 98 drivers so I used those. I also tried Windows ME.

 

[notabitail]

I've never purchased a prebuilt with my own money.

I might manage to scrape enough money together to get a nice not prebuilt machine someday.

Most of my computers were "one man's trash".

 

[notabitail]