How old is your current desktop PC?
5You know. If you still have one.
I’m honestly curious about this because I spent lots of time on 386/486s clones.
Even when we had better hardware you could blow the dust off one to lan and play age of empires 2 in someone’s basement.
Convinced my dad to buy an AMD K6 Compaq . They were acceptable at the time.
Assembled/maintained P3 at school.
Bought AMD when Intel was getting its ass kicked cause P4. Barton. Overclocking was real
My current/previous was a phenom x2 550. BUT it unlocked to a phenom x4. In 2010. It lasted 14 years/finally the ASUS ROG or it just threw in the towel.
I bought a new ryzen 5 board and 78003d. Memory. My GPU is NOT 14 years old. 5700 is fine. I still need to do Witcher three. PSU cause it’s been at least 10 years on that. SSD. Parts
I’ve had them sitting here a month and I can’t be arsed to click pieces together…
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Dell XPS 8700 64-bit O/S, with an Intel Core i7-4790 processor, still running Windows 7 Professional Service Pack 1. Looks like I purchased it in 2014.
My new computers are a Raspberry Pi 5 and a Minisforum UM790 Pro.
Mine is about 8 years old, but it was a build to order so most, if not all, of the insides have been replaced at some point, including the mother board and CPU, most recently clean and update (was the CPU) was about 6 months ago. I love my cherry red tower. You will pry it from my cold dead hands
it does not have a fancy CPU but it does the job. I also have a less than 6 mos old ASUS ROG laptop.
@Cerridwyn What case? Cherry red is cool.
@blaineg NZXT Phantom 410 Red Mid-Tower Case
And since I found the specs for it it was ordered in early 2015 so it’s 9 years old
@blaineg
@blaineg @Cerridwyn That’s gorgeous!
@blaineg @Kyeh you no the old joke about the red sports car being midlife crisis. I joked it was my midlife crisis computer
@blaineg @Cerridwyn I love it!
Which part? It’s the computer of Theseus. The case may be the newest, the old Corsair “Stormtrooper” case looked cool, but had no USB 3 ports, or much support for 2.5" drives, so I replaced it with a boring black slab from Phanteks.
@blaineg The CPU is an ancient (in computer time) GTX 1070, but still runs my games fine. Z390 MB, and i9-9900, so no Win 11 without hijinks. Loads of RAM that only gets fully used when I let Chrome’s tabs get out of control (always).
@blaineg Now do you want to talk about the server, the NAS, the NUCs, or Pi’s?
@blaineg I mean mostly that your CPU is a GTX 1070.
I want to talk about that
But sure other shit. I’ve got a raspberry pi running the DNS. My God I used to run a whole computer running pfsense just cause it was there.
I’ve got a mini running home assist.
I have a dual CPU Intel 3.4GHz… something recovered from circuit city that takes 74.4 GB or whatever was the max SAS drives. We used it as a L4D2 server at one point
I again feel old
@unksol
I blame my fingers, and the 5 minute edit window.
Or it’s groundbreaking research on an entirely new computing paradigm.
I’ve been half-heartedly considering this one, just because it’s so darn cute.
https://www.amazon.com/GMKtec-Nucbox5-Desktop-Computer-Windows/dp/B0B75PT2RY/
@blaineg Thankfully I have bicycle parts I need to buy or I would have a few of these things.
@blaineg It’s hard to tell from just the pictures (and I don’t feel like trying to read through the nominally-English Amazon description to get the full story), but do I see a single USB-C port there, and it has to be used up as the power in?
Seems kinda weird that they’d put modern tech in it, but then tie it up in the least useful way possible.
Or is that not really USB C, just designed to look like it for the purposes of appearing more valuable? I did see that the actual description somewhere on the page says “Type-C Power Port” which is a funny way to describe it if it’s really USB.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
@blaineg @xobzoo It really is a USB C port. It is a power only port that is USB C shaped. USB C is a port size not a speed ability. The USB A shaped ports are USB 3.2.
@blaineg @xobzoo @yakkoTDI I have a similar sized one. A little bigger. Running home assistant. It would have been nice if it was usbc powered. The dongle to pick up radio signales that other things use like temp sensors or water leak sensors is as long as the entire box. Mine is 3 USB A across the front so that’s definitely smaller
I build a new gaming rig ever three or four years. I built my current one about 3 years ago when the Gen12 i9 dropped. It’s running at 5.2Ghz with 64Gb of DDR5 RAM. Water cooled. I’m a dork. My previous rig was handed down to my daughter (with some upgrades) and it can still play Icarus. So we game a bit when she’s not doing softball things. My previous, previous rig is about 10 years old but still works well as an arcade machine. Also still rocking an Apple IIe. I’m not even sure how many computers are in my house, but I’d say at least a dozen.
@capnjb that’s nice. Sincerely.
Age comes for us all eventually
@capnjb @unksol Says one of the younger guys in the forum …
@unksol Hell… I’m 53 and made a career out of working with computers. I don’t ask my wife how many pairs of shoes she has, and she doesn’t ask how many computers I have.
That’s how marriage works 
@capnjb @Kyeh lol I’m more commenting on… I don’t know. a 7800x3d is right there. The whole build is planned. But I’m… IDK. I was going to make a comment about less interested in gaming… or… How systems can last… Or… IDK. Maybe I just don’t care about anything anymore?
IDK. Maybe that’s it…
@capnjb @unksol Oh dear. That sounds kind of like depression.
@capnjb @Kyeh yea… I’m well aware of that.
@capnjb @unksol
@capnjb @Kyeh I was trying to decide whether to whisper this. But
I’m fine. I think. I’m not sucidal or anything.
Although if you think nothing you do matters/is worth doing. and dependant on their views of the afterlife. I kinda get it. If everything seems pointless. Well…
I’m not going to finish that chain of thought. Cause to me it’s just pragmatic.
Also sorry not where I intended any of this to go
@capnjb @unksol Well, I can relate in some ways, but I hope you don’t feel that way for too long!
@unksol I’m just some random guy on the internet. Our only real connection to each other (that we know of) is that we both bought stuff from Meh and are both former goats.
I don’t know what you are going through — and “I am not a doctor” &c. — but I (mostly) know what I am going through, and it sounds like they may be similar.
I don’t really have any good advice on the topic. (if I did, I’d use it on myself first) But I have some memes. A metric buttload of them. (full disclosure: I do not carry any of them around in my butt, that’s just the unit of measure)
In the interest of brevity and all that, I’ll only post a few of them here right now. The hard part is deciding which ones…
Fwiw, a large part of my experience was large amounts of being numb. Not feeling much of anything at all, except tired. (I think I’m past that point now, which is probably good. Pain is not fun, but it’s a reminder that I’m real.)
Society has (accidentally?) taught us that crying is weakness or something. Hopefully you’re healthy enough to know better. But also, crying is optional, not mandatory. I don’t tend to physically cry much, so the big shift in my mindset was letting myself admit that I didn’t like how things are, and that’s okay. And also letting myself feel other things (like anger, grief, or anything else) for a while.
I like this one ^ because it reminds me that most bad situations are not permanent. The risk with that, though, is believing that “feeling sad” is just a temporary thing that will go away on its own. That’s actually one of the incorrect things I learned as a kid. It was frequently said (to school-age kids) that everyone gets depressed for a little while, but that’s not “real” depression, and they’ll grow out of it. Something on those lines. It was probably well-meaning, but secretly very harmful. I grew up thinking that everything I experienced was completely normal, and I was just a little more cynical than most people. Decades later … nope, not “normal” or typical or common. Too bad I didn’t learn any coping skills decades ago, or even any way to identify problems. I guess that’s what I get for paying attention in school?
Anyway, I’m just a random guy on the internet who, despite not actually knowing you personally, wants you to know that I care about what you’re going through. I can’t fix it, but I can assure you that you’re not alone. And what I won’t do is say “cheer up” — because I’m pretty sure you’ve probably already thought of that, and it didn’t work.
Like this “helpful” advice:
(But now I feel bad for flooding the page with stuff. Sorry everyone!)
That last picture in particular is especially tall. I wish I knew some way to cause pictures to be rendered smaller until clicked/tapped on. But I imagine that’s a very low priority for most forum software.
@xobzoo I appreciate the thought. IDK. The site is named meh. I’m… Very meh
@xobzoo also thank you for sharing your experience. You can’t flood a page on the Internet. They just keep going. I hope you’re doing ok
Oh I forgot does meh still do pagination? You can turn that off
@unksol I think I’m doing fine, but that doesn’t necessarily mean much.
I recognize I’m not as good as I was 10 or 15 years ago, but immensely better than 2-4 years ago. I still sometimes wish it were possible to not wake up, but it’s not daily like it was a few years ago. And I’ve never intended to do anything about it, so I haven’t worried about that. Duty helps to push me through some of the lowest points.
Meh defaults to hiding more than 10 comments or replies … I assume that’s what you’re talking about with pagination. I’ve thought about turning that off (since I almost always click to show them all anyway), but it’s useful sometimes on a page where I just want to check on the newest.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
@xobzoo the setting is in your profile page/display setting. If you just want to see the entire thread it’s “firehose”
If you’re getting multiple pages that’s pagination.
If you go through your profile it’s will have any responses to your posts so you can just go straight to any @ in any thread
@xobzoo @capnjb @Kyeh
I finally got around to building it last weekend. Cause I hadnt had a desktop in 2 months.
@capnj you may relate to this more. I had followed the steps to relate my windows 10 license to my windows account. Per their instructions.
Then reverted to a local account like a sane person. They refuse to transfer my license to a new build. It does not exist if you revert to a local account to save a license…
Been shuffling back and forth for a week trying to get the old platform to boot on the 14 year old legacy broke machine. Won’t do it. Or boot half broken and restore. Or do mmbr2gpt.
Nothing works. Yes I know of the alternatives but since windows 11 is only preferences and I can manipulate the registry for display. And they stole my license… But they do not care if you activate… --:)…
2tb WD nvme and a pair of 1TB and 1.5 TB Samsung. 14 years old in Raid 1. And a 5TB non raid and 4TB being scanned for defects. And a new 2TB NVME to replace the 256GB Samsung 830 running off a PCIE card cause the sata ports were a bottleneck. And I have a 7800x3d up from a 5200x2 unlocked to x4. AM5 670
Admittedly the gpu is a 5700. Xt I think. But. I never finished withcher 3…
And I have just cause 3 and 4. Farcry 4 and 5. Fallout 4. Civ6. All the free epic games and steam sales. Lots of good shit in the queue. Oh and control. Not Alan wake 2 yet. But. Alan wake was amazing.
Since you say you’re still up to it. What would you pick to get back in?
Sup com force alliance forever is a thing.
I guess we also had a sick L4D2 crew on teamspeak back in the day. Just friends from highschool. But you know. You all grow up.
I do not have baulders gate three. Last one I spent major time in was skyrim to grind out the quests… Which got boring.
My inclenation is witcher 3… It was epic. Need to complete/continue the story after 1 and 2.
The desktop where I’m sitting is a refurb W7 box bought around 2010 (I think). It’s shortly going to be replaced by a W10 Ryzen box I built in 2017. I don’t do gaming, so I have old-school 19" monitors.
2 years old. I replaced my slow as hell 6 year old laptop with the desktop I inherited from my uncle that he bought unfortunately right before he had to go live in a nursing home. It has a tiny hard drive though so I have an external hard networked to my router. That way I can still use the slow laptop until next year when it goes end of life since it’s not windows 11 upgradable
@ironcheftoni To me, “not W11 upgradable” is a feature.
/image trs-80
Got rid of as soon as could replace w a nice 286.
Not current
I do remember when my 286 laptop was effing gold
Before that was a “desktop” Friedan 5610 computyper.
Punched tape input medium.
Tho I never owned it.
/image Friedan 5610 computyper
—-
Current desktops
Mac mini w M1 chip
And a variety of inherited machines in the closet. Mostly v old. Still there since I want to harvest media off the drives someday
@f00l
/image apple III
The computer I’m typing this on is from 2015, though it’s technically a laptop (with extra mouse, keyboard, and monitor).
But my first computer was a Mac 512K (upgraded to a 512Ke). Well, in actuality it was my parents’, but since I was a little kid, I thought everything was mine.
I’m pretty sure they still have it, and it still runs (but feels
painfully old, even though it isn’t quite 40 yet — interfaces were very different back then). Double-sided internal floppy drive with a single-sided external floppy drive, and a tiny screen, and a brick mouse, and …
“big” computer is a few years old. went 13 years on it’s predecessor, but didn’t make sense to replace the motherboard again (with another board of the same vintage).
I have one that still works (marginally) that is old enough that the one I am currently using is likely it’s grandchild.
I started down the computer ownership path with a mac 128k when the only choices were that, a PC junior and an Apple 2e. What sold me is spell check and then menus vs commands and the Apple 2e seemed to be geered for K-12. . Of course that thing (not even comparing to today’s dollars where I don’t even want to see what that would be) cost me twice what my current laptop cost me.
@Kidsandliz Just remember that the Apple IIA proceeded the Mac by a very long time Period and that The Mac was not even the first Apple computer that used the small drives period
I built mine new the end of last year! I The PSU is actually out of my previous PC as it was still working (and the one I ordered to replace it in my new PC wasn’t). So part of my new PC is 10 years old… but most of it is fresh and new.
My main desktop is probably at least 12-14 years old. I have another one about 2-3 years old and set up on a desk in my office with the intention of transferring everything over to the new rig. Someday I’ll actually get around to doing that! I hate migrating to a new desktop, but I also love having a desktop. To me that’s a much more productive and comfortable space to work in.
Old desktop will probably get relegated to being a Plex server.
I’m currently sitting in the living room on my phone, and a cat is sleeping on my lap, so I’m too lazy to get up and go check on actual dates.
@chienfou Haha you lied when you said these kitties would not become indoor cats One point to the cats.
How many computers (possibly including Arduino/Raspberry PI/etc.) do you have laying around unused/not even plugged in, waiting for a cool project that you’re going to get around to any day now?
I refuse to answer, on the grounds that it will absolutely incriminate me.
@blaineg
Maybe 10-20?
Stored various places. Unsure of total count.
The oldest one might be the one that shipped running windows 2k.
Or there might be an older one somewhere.
I’m a bit behind on the anti-clutter task list.
/giphy procrastination.
@f00l That’s a relief, I thought I might have a problem.
@blaineg
Perhaps hardware-digital-neurodivergent lives?
Perhaps the next edition of the psych DSM will include a category for folk who hang onto lots of quasi-obsolete computing or info devices and hardware from decades past.
Or perhaps that description of habit and behavior will include “everyone except for extreme-decluttering types”.