To be perfectly honest, I have no recollection whatsoever of my first computer. I was teaching in London and remember when computers first became a thing! This was before smartboards, laptops, flat screens and tablets.
As teachers, we were trained to use computers so that we could impart our knowledge to our pupils. Over the years, technology became a vital tool in the classroom. As a trainer, in the nineties, I used to drag my laptop, projector and speakers to various venues to enhance my presentations.
However, I still can’t be any more specific about my first computer! Can you remember yours?
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I don’t remember what it was…but we bought it in France in 1998 and wanted to install it upstairs, so needed a new ‘phone point. The bright spark came to install the line and Leo pointed out where to run the line…along the outside of the house and through a small hole into the room we wanted to use. Went off for coffee and returned to find the chap about to destroy the plasterwork in the entrance hall and staircase and put the line behind plastic strip. A few strong words, and the line was put where we wanted it to be!
Motto…coffee and computers are not a good match.
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Having had some experience of similar work being carried out in our French house, I’m not entirely surprised!
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Very interesting prompt right here! If memory serves me correctly, we used to have a tower PC that initially ran on Windows 98 — until we ditched that in favor of laptops.
It had all the bits and bobs of computers in the 90s until the 2010s: A fat monitor with a small screen (similar to TVs of old), a CPU that had a 3.5 inch floppy disk drive and USB slots, a keyboard, a mouse that still had the old trackball (you had to clean the rollers inside the mouse with a cotton bud dipped in isopropyl alcohol), and a pair of speakers that sounded like aluminum cans.
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I’m so impressed that you can remember such details and I can picture the computer quite clearly. Thanks for your comment!
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We had a large, not very pretty one, that sat on a computer desk in the small bedroom, which doubled as a study. We used it for years and years. Long past its sell-by. I might even have started my blog on there, but I doubt it.
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I don’t think any computers were pretty back in the day, and they certainly took up a significant amount of room! Thanks for your comment, Jo.
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My first computer was an Osborne 1 that I bought in 1983. https://operasandcycling.com/cutting-edge-technology/
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Your post was fascinating and informative, as well as bringing back many memories. Would you be happy for me to reblog it on my site? No problem if you would rather I didn’t!
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I’d be honored to have you reblog it on your site. No problem.
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It was such a big item, and took up lots of desk space – ugh!
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Computers weren’t very attractive in the past and they took up far too much space! Thanks for your comment.
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It was a microsoft computer but the most frustrating thing was how long it took to connect to the internet. In those days we also had to have two phone lines in the house. If you only had one phone line and were surfing the web, you’d get cut off if a call came in. These were the days before mobile phones.
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Oh yes! I remember those days, too! Thanks for your comment.
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