I've accidentally managed to find my first electronical comrade which I first met in 1998 - General

[B]Backstory, me talking about stuff regarding mebeing a five year old:[/B] So basically, me, my older brother and sister gota PC to share with eachother during the winter of 1998, I was four atthe time, while my brother and sister were 15 respectively 16 yearsold. A machine pretty impressive in 1998, boasting a 233MHz PentiumII, 128MB Primary memory, a 4GB Western Digital Caviar HDD, and aPowerVR accelerator that I unfortunately do not know the name of, andespecially for the relatively low price we paid for it, roughly 1400dollars with current currency standings. The entire system, and it'slow price, was the result of our neighbor back then, a programmer andthe village's general ”Tech-Guy”, who had tons of contacts fromwhich he could buy hardware with pretty nifty discounts. 1998 was also, thanks to the PC, the year Idiscovered electronical games, and I really liked watching my oldersiblings play Quake on it, and when they were done playing, I alwaystried playing it the way I had seen them do it, but I couldn't, whenit was me who were in control, it simply terrified me :V . Iabsolutely loved SimCity, Transport Tycoon and Rollercoaster Tycoon,though. About a year later, my brother comes home anevening after having visited a friend of his, with a CD in his hand.Him coming home with CD's usually meant that he had visited hisfriend with the magical CD-burner, which could spit out copies ofgames for free, so of course I ask him what it is he's holding. ”Thebest looking shooter game I've ever seen”, he answers. It was Half-Life. The introductional train-ride amazed me so much, Iwas actually convinced that I was watching TV. I found Half-Life absolutely amazing not onlybecause I thought it looked almost exactly like real-life, but alsobecause it wasn't just about running around and shooting at things,it actually had a story behind it that constantly unraveled itselfthrough the gameplay. This caused me to make my brother press F7fairly often, seeing as, as soon as he spoke to a scientist, Iconstantly yelled ”WHAT IS HE SAYING?! WHAT IS HE SAYING?!TRANSLATE IT!” to which my brother always replied ”Shut up! Now Idon't know either!” (It should probably be noted that my sister alsoplayed Half-Life once, but she only made it until right after thedisaster, to the room with the headcrab container things. One of theheadcrabs somehow glitched out of there, and began attacking her. Shescreamed very loudly, shut off the entire computer, and never touchedthe game again) Half-Life, when I tried playing it myself, wasalso the game that terrified me the most. However, it wasn't just the monsters that scaredme, the sound-design and sounds in general actually scared me more. Ifound the ambient sounds especially creepy, for example the one thatstarts at 8:04 and lasts to 8:07 in this video: [video=youtube;jYRgKp2AwH0]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYRgKp2AwH0[/video] And then we have that fucking alarm sound rightafter the resonance cascade which actually gave me nightmares: [video=youtube;wAqnrpDwaCM]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wAqnrpDwaCM[/video] Anyway, yet another year later, 2000, my brotherand sister decides to buy a new graphics accelerator for the PC,exchanging the old PowerVR one with an Nvidia RIVA TNT 2 Ultra, thepreviously mentioned neighbor helping them install it. At the sametime, he also overclocked the Pentium II by 100MHz, effectivelychanging it's frequency from 233MHz to 333MHz. The performance boostwas enormous. Games both ran and looked a lot better, and W98 wasnoticeably quicker thanks to the additional cycles. In 2001, my sister moved out, and in 2002, so didmy brother. I was the only one left, and thus, the PC became mine,and I used it up until 2004, when I built a new one myself. The oldsystem was then left laying under my parent's bed. In 2006, my fatherdecides that it's time to throw the old system away, seeing as it'sso old and weak and not used anyway, and so he dumps it at the localrecycling station. [B]Present day:[/B] Yesterday, me and some friends drove toÖland to catch some sun and take it easy in general. While drivingaround on said island, we drive past a sign saying ”Flea market,electronics and furniture”. We decided to make a U-turn, and visitit. When there, I see the stuff you'd expect from thesign, old TV sets, chairs, record players, and other such things. Butthen, someting catches my eye, a complete PC system! Monitor,keyboard, mouse, speakers, everything, and the case looks just likethe one I used to have! The seller apparently notices my interest in it,and thus we begin to talk. As it turns out, the seller got the systemfrom a friend of his in 2007, said friend had found it ”layingabout”, but had never used it more than turning it on, and up untilabout a year ago, the children of the seller had used the system toplay simple educational games. I ask him how much he wants for it,and he tells me he'll give it to me for free, seeing as I seem sofascinated by it, and no-one's really interested in old computersystems. We put it in the trunk of my friend's car, and Idon't really think any more about it. As I get home, I connect thesystem, and boot it up. It POST's without any problem, I enter theBIOS to get a clear look of what's actually in it. A Pentium IIrunning at 333 Mhz, 128MB RAM, and a Western Digital Caviar with 4GBstorage. ”Nice”, I think, ”A system that's probably perfect forDOS games and such”. I exit the BIOS, and Windows 98 starts loading.For being such an old system, it loads fairly fast, and I open theDevice Manager to find out what kind of accelerator is in it. As itturns out, it's an Nvidia RIVA TNT 2 Ultra. ”Wow” I yet againthink ”So it's just like my first system, then”. I then open Dxdiag and see the network identifiername the PC has been assigned; ”Rickards PC”. I open Windows Explorer and find all of the oldgames; the pirated versions of Half-Life, Quake, Quake II, RollerCoaster Tycoon, Transport Tycoon, SimCity, Need For Speed III: HotPursuit, and Need For Speed: Porsche. So yeah, I've finally been reunited with my oldPC by pure chance. [B]Media time: [/B] The PC itself: [thumb]http://i61.tinypic.com/29cw02r.jpg[/thumb] It's innards: [thumb]http://i60.tinypic.com/1zqrdat.jpg[/thumb] It's very dusty, but that was expected My old KeyTronic keyboard together with the mouse: [thumb]http://i58.tinypic.com/20ozk1.jpg[/thumb] Quake II: [thumb]http://i57.tinypic.com/1zxo6t5.jpg[/thumb] Need For Speed III: [thumb]http://i59.tinypic.com/24ozpsw.jpg[/thumb] And most importantly, due to W98: [thumb]http://i61.tinypic.com/15ouirm.jpg[/thumb] I also discovered that my old ”Drawings” and”School” folders are still present, this thing is like a timecapsule: "The end of the world" - By me in 2002: [thumb]http://i60.tinypic.com/2irlooz.jpg[/thumb] "The deep pit" - By me in 2002: [thumb]http://i58.tinypic.com/vici8n.jpg[/thumb] "The painting in which all colors are allowed to join" - By me in 2003: [thumb]http://i60.tinypic.com/2vdh6s5.jpg[/thumb] Some essay called "The letter to America" I wrote in 2004: [thumb]http://i58.tinypic.com/2yo906r.jpg[/thumb] [editline]10th August 2014[/editline] Sorry about the wordsbeing connected at some parts, not sure why that happened. [editline]10th August 2014[/editline] No, seriously, almost 50% of the words are connected to each other, what the hell?

It's gone all that time without someone formatting the drive? Christ.

the fucking cat lmao

Now how the fuck did you get a hyperblaster on the first level of Quake 2?

Wow! That is luck! Nice !

[QUOTE=xxncxx;45653136]Now how the fuck did you get a hyperblaster on the first level of Quake 2?[/QUOTE] Console: give_all [editline]11th August 2014[/editline] First cheat I learned

That's fuckin' rad, man

Terribly sorry about this, but I just noticed I forgot to post the Dxdiag result, and the edit function causes the entire post to disappear, so: [thumb]http://i57.tinypic.com/2ch2qhe.jpg[/thumb]

See if you can find the guy that gave it to you, I bet he'd like to hear about this.

[QUOTE=Rixxz2;45652954]wow[/QUOTE] And throughout this entire time nobody has formatted it or upgraded it or reinstalled the OS or even NOTICED all of the old files on it. What. How. Also need for speed III holy shit

That's intense.

[QUOTE=mn_chaos;45653587]And throughout this entire time nobody has formatted it or upgraded it or reinstalled the OS or even NOTICED all of the old files on it. What. How. [/QUOTE] Yep, the entire thing builds around that one guy finding it at the recycling station, taking it home, turning it on once, and then putting it in his closet or something

That's it i'm reinstalling NFS3 also wow, ISA slots, I haven't seen those ugly things in forever

This makes me hope someone has somehow salvaged my old PC. What are the odds of this happening :v:

[QUOTE=AugustBurnsRed;45655159]That's it i'm reinstalling NFS3[/QUOTE] We should do an facepunch nfsIII tournament using the online function.

[QUOTE=Rixxz2;45652954] "The painting in which all colors are allowed to join" - By me in 2003: [thumb]http://i60.tinypic.com/2vdh6s5.jpg[/thumb][/QUOTE] That's beautiful man.

Update time: After installing some new drivers for the NIC, and configuring the IP-settings manually, It is now connected to the Internet. Currently writing this post from it. The general browsing experience is actually not that bad, it's not at all as slow as I thought it would be. [editline]11th August 2014[/editline] Time to see if Quake II still has an active online community Also, obligatory: [thumb]http://i62.tinypic.com/24btglc.jpg[/thumb]

[QUOTE=FalconKrunch;45653046]It's gone all that time without someone formatting the drive? Christ.[/QUOTE] My grandfather had a Windows ME machine that went 12 years without formatting. And this was a machine he used almost everyday. He only had two errors on boot when he replaced it, which is a pretty good track record.

I thought you were gonna dig up your old PC from the basement or something, but shit man, that's actually really amazing.

You mind translating "The Letter to America"

[QUOTE=mn_chaos;45655451]We should do an facepunch nfsIII tournament using the online function.[/QUOTE] YES. I was actually going to make a thread asking if anyone wants go back to the past and play NFS3 online. I've been actively playing it since 1998. The game actually looks insanely great on windows 8 with nGlide at 1080p xD We need to do this.

[QUOTE=JoeSkylynx;45668040]You mind translating "The Letter to America"[/QUOTE] Sure, I'll get to it in a little bit

holy shit, that's really impressive.

[QUOTE=TheInvincible;45669097]YES. I was actually going to make a thread asking if anyone wants go back to the past and play NFS3 online. I've been actively playing it since 1998. The game actually looks insanely great on windows 8 with nGlide at 1080p xD We need to do this.[/QUOTE] The only I've seen it been accomplished outside of lan though is hamachi, and I do not know how that works.

[QUOTE=JoeSkylynx;45668040]You mind translating "The Letter to America"[/QUOTE] Alright, the essay isn't called "The Letter to America", but "The Letter [I]from[/I] America" (Amerikabrevet literally just means "The America letter"). We were studying the great depression that Sweden and large portions of northern Europe in general endured during the 1800's, which caused tons of people to migrate to the ~land of opportunities~. (Including some of my relatives on my mother's side. Some of the great-grandchildren and families of whom are currently living in Miami, while some of them are living in Phoenix, Arizona) Anyway, we were basically tasked to write an essay based around a fictional migrating family's experiences in America. [quote=Amerikabrevet] Dear uncle Sandfrid: It's weird to use the word "Uncle" after all these years. Mother usually talked about her family in Sweden, but I've never met any of them, it's always felt so distant. Here in the United States, our family was small, mother, father, and myself. It stayed that way until I got married and became part of a really big family. My wife's mother was one of 9 children. I'm certain that the family-reuinions I've been part of were very similar to those you'd experience in Sweden. It's quite sad that a death is required to get people to write to each other. Mother died on the 19th of June due to uremia after being hospitalized for a week. It was a great relief, seeing as she no-longer had to suffer, and she remained unconscious for the most part of her last week. She hadn't felt well for about a year, but had still taken care of the house, herself, and father until the final weeks. In early january, mother and father sold their house, and moved into an apartment with two rooms, I only lived about 3-4 minutes away, so we could still meet frequently. Until the beginning of June, everything had went smoothly, then mother became weaker and spent more time in bed. The doctor had always thought of her as health herself, apart from her arthritis. She only spent a couple of days in the hospital before getting better. But the sunday before she died, she once again became weaker and weaker. This was when we realized that there were no cure for her disease, and if she didn't become better, she'd just become a prisoner of her own bed. And that's why we admit that it's a blessing that she never reclaimed her consciousness. Mother would never have wanted to be invalid for the rest of her life. Father is now living with us, and everything has went very well, even though he's 80 years old and have problems of his own. He's got issues with his arteries, and have big problems raising himself from sitting. He also can't walk very well, and usually forgets about things. Sandfrid, there's so many things I'd like to know about our family. What I was like when I was still a small boy back in Sweden, locations and names of people which I'm related to back home. Since we moved from Sweden, I've heard less and less and don't remember much of what mother told me, and some of what she told me during the last years was just confusing. She was 76 years old when she died. Last christmas we got a lovely letter from what I believe to be our grand-niece. I had intended to write a reply, seeing as I had just learned to speak English, but we lost the adress among other things when me moved. Mother's things. I wanted to praise her for her English, which was very good and coherent. I also wanted to ask her a lot of questions, and I hope that you can forward her this letter so that we may correspond and keep informed of our situations. I very often regret that I didn't try harder to reach Sweden when I visited Europe in 1948, the nazi's were defeated, and the borders were open. I've since then learned that the ones with more will-power made it there. It's still my dream that once my daughter's graduated, we'll visit. Please, forward the news of my mother's death to the rest of the family, as I don't know what my mother's adress book included. I apologize for not writing earlier, and especially for not replying to the letter you sent last christmas. Best regards Donald Sheers [/quote]

wow that's so cool man. I'm surprised being a kid and all you didn't manage to bloat it out with bonzi buddy and all kinds of viruses. Kind of makes me wish I hadn't made the computer of my childhood so fucked that my brother had to re-format it with fresh copies of XP every time System 32 got deleted, lmao.

To think that you've found this again all these years later. The first machine my family had was tossed out ages ago, it was a Windows 95 machine. I remember playing Math Blaster on it sometimes. I still have a copy of the original Simcity that came with that computer, but alas, the machine itself is long gone now.

[QUOTE=Rixxz2;45652954] [video=youtube;jYRgKp2AwH0]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYRgKp2AwH0[/video] [/QUOTE] Makes me want to play sven-coop again, Secretcity and omg2beta2 Those were the good days.

I remember having an old disk with Half Life uplink on it, good times.

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