Being the kind of guy I am, I have a number of different computers of varying brands and vintages:
| CPU | RAM | Disk | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Core 2 Duo @ 2×1.66GHz | 2GB | 320GB | |
| Video | Sound | ||
| Integrated (1024×768) | Integrated | ||
| Operating system | |||
| Windows XP | |||
My main machine, replacing my old Asus Eee. So good to have a reasonably-sized, 4:3 screen again. The fact that it packs quite a bit more power helps, too.
| CPU | RAM | Disk | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Core 2 Duo @ 2×2.13GHz | 3GB | ~1TB | |
| Video | Sound | ||
| nVidia GeForce 8400GS | M-Audio Audiophile 2496 | ||
| Operating system | |||
| Windows XP | |||
My media-storage machine and gaming box; mostly exists to hold my hoard of Stuff From The Internet and play Morrowind with about 10GB of mods, which it does quite handily.
| CPU | RAM | Disk | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pentium M @ 1.6GHz | 1.5GB | 20GB | |
| Video | Sound | ||
| Integrated | Integrated | ||
| Operating system | |||
| Haiku | |||
Not a terribly exciting machine on its own merits, but it meets some important criteria for being my Haiku-acclimation machine: it's single-core with current support for clock-stepping, so it's not continually running at full throttle and scalding my leg, and it has a supported wireless chipset. Needs a little TLC, though.
| CPU | RAM | Disk | |
|---|---|---|---|
| ARM SoC @ 700MHz | 256MB | 2-8GB SDHC | |
| Video | Sound | ||
| Integrated | Integrated | ||
| Operating system | |||
| RiscOS, Raspbian | |||
Nerds' favorite little ultra-cheap ARM board. The optimized Linux is getting fairly decent except for the part where I hate Linux; RiscOS I'm still getting used to. I originally bought it because I wanted to play with homebrew OS development, but I'm still trying to find time for that...
| CPU | RAM | Disk | |
|---|---|---|---|
| PPC 7450 @ 2×1.25GHz | 2GB | 80GB | |
| Video | Sound | ||
| Radeon 9800 (AGP)/Radeon 7000 (PCI) (1280×1024) | Integrated | ||
| Operating system | |||
| Mac OS 9.2.2/Mac OS X 10.4 | |||
As far as I'm concerned, Mac OS X is just gussied-up BSD, and OS 9 is the last true Mac OS. And brother, do I have a lot of nostalgic fondness for classic Mac OS. So I was a little disappointed to find out that OS 9 can't run on any of the G5 Macs. Luckily, Apple had to do a last-hurrah for OS9 by popular demand before they phased it out, and this is the last "Mirrored Drive Door" model that supports it. Not a bad machine! Unfortunately, though, the best AGP video cards for Mac are only supported by OSX (this is actually for the G5s, but you can make it work in an AGP G4,) so the games that need higher performance have to run in 10.4.
| CPU | RAM | Disk | |
|---|---|---|---|
| PPC 7455 @ 1GHz | 1GB | 20GB | |
| Video | Sound | ||
| Mobility Radeon 9000 (1280×854) | Integrated | ||
| Operating system | |||
| Mac OS X 10.4/OS 9.2.2 | |||
And here's where I kind of have to admit that, despite my unkind words for OS X above, I do in fact have a machine running it primarily - since, unfortunately, Apple did not deign to provide WPA support to OS9 users. This is my no-distractions writing machine, and it does a marvelous job at it. Very comfortable for extended lap use since the weight is spread across a broad area and the corners aren't sharp, but not slippery with no grip points like the Aluminum PowerBook models. I just wish they hadn't been starting off the industry-wide infatuation with widescreen laptops when the TiBooks came out...
| CPU | RAM | Disk | |
|---|---|---|---|
| DKB 1230 (68030 @ 50MHz) | 2MB chip, 32MB fast | 4GB CF w/IDE adapter | |
| Video | Sound | ||
| AGA | Paula, Roland MT-32 (MIDI) | ||
| Operating system | |||
| ClassicWB 3.1 | |||
Ahh, the Amiga. It's not like I've written a whole other page about how much I like it or anything. This is my current Amiga, and probably will remain so for the foreseeable future (call me a crank if you like, but the PPC-based "next-gen" systems running OS4 or MorphOS just aren't the same thing. Maybe if NatAmi ever makes it to market, though...)
The 68030 provides a reasonable amount of oomph without requiring me to break the bank on an 060 or PPC accelerator, and I've got plenty of RAM for just about anything I'm going to be doing on it. ClassicWB is a much, much better experience than OS3.9 - boots way faster and doesn't eat up as much RAM, and is very nearly as functional. This baby can even browse the Web ;) It's equipped with a MIDI adapter and will be driving my MT-32 as soon as I can get MIDI-Tracker working...
| CPU | RAM | Disk | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 8502 & Z80 @ 2MHz | 128KB + 512KB REU | C= 1541 (140KB), C= 1581 (800KB) | |
| Video | Sound | ||
| VIC-II (320x200), 8563 VDC (640x200) | 6581 SID | ||
| Operating system | |||
| CBM BASIC, CP/M | |||
As I've related in my Amiga article, the C64 was the machine that I initially became acquainted with Commodore through. Before I got back into the Amiga, I was still into the C64 in a big way, and eventually I opted to trade up to a C128. The sad fact is that there's just not that much software out there that supports the 128's extra memory, faster CPU, and 80-column text display, aside from CP/M software, but it's a neat machine all the same, and a little more convenient for a desk setup than the "breadbox" C64. The 1581 drive is a huge plus, too - it means I can easily transfer files from a PC to my 128.
| CPU | RAM | Disk | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Am386 @ 40MHz | 8MB | 4GB | |
| Video | Sound | ||
| Trident VGA | Sound Blaster AWE32 (2MB) | ||
| Operating system | |||
| MS-DOS 6.22, Windows for Workgroups 3.11 | |||
My DOS gaming box. Surprisingly compact for an early-'90s system, but not too difficult to work in. The 40MHz 386 is a treat, the board has a whole 256KB of cache, and the Trident VGA is quite fast for an ISA video card. The AWE32 is quite nice, having both a real OPL3 and a quality wavetable synthesizer. The only downside is that even a fast 386 isn't enough to run Descent at a playable framerate, let alone Daggerfall, which is why I'm in the process of building a 486 gaming PC.
| CPU | RAM | Disk | |
|---|---|---|---|
| NEC V20 @ 5MHz/Intel 8085 @ 5MHz | 768KB | 2×360KB | |
| Video | Sound | ||
| 8-level monochrome (640x225) | None | ||
| Operating system | |||
| Z-DOS | |||
Believe it or not, there was a time where "MS-DOS computer" did not necessarily equal "IBM PC compatible." The Heathkit Z-100 series came out in that period, and while it does run on an 8088 and include some of the same hardware, it's actually quite different internally - it's not even based on the ISA bus, it uses the old S-100 standard, and in addition to being a DOS machine, it's also a CP/M machine thanks to the 8085. Different externally, too - I don't think I've ever seen a DOS computer in a complete all-in-one form factor before. This thing looks like someone built a PC into an old terminal, which is super cool, and the primary reason I picked it up. The graphics are quite impressive for the time - fully bitmapped and eight shades of amber (optionally, eight colors) at a time when its competitors only did that resolution in monochrome and the PC was primarily character-based. Eventually I'd like to have this serving as a terminal for my PDP/11, but it needs a little TLC first...
| CPU | RAM | Disk | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 8086 @ 10MHz | 768KB (640KB + 128KB video) | 43MB | |
| Video | Sound | ||
| Tandy extended CGA | PSG, DAC | ||
| Operating system | |||
| ROM MS-DOS 3.3 | |||
Tandy's approach of "let's take the IBM PCjr and make it not suck" must have worked out pretty well for them, considering how many follow-on models they wound up producing. The RL model comes in a pizza-box case like the old Mac LCs, and features nicely upgraded hardware, but it's still basically the same deal: a simple DOS PC with a reasonably-okay video chip and three channels of simple square-wave audio! It even has DOS in ROM, for snappy boot times! The downside is that the hard disk is XT-IDE only, and those are a real pain to find.
| CPU | RAM | Disk | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Z80 @ 3.58MHz | 64KB | 720KB | |
| Video | Sound | ||
| TMS 9938 | PSG, Konami SCC, Yamaha OPLL | ||
| Operating system | |||
| MSX-DOS | |||
The MSX was the best home computer the US never had. A solid, well-documented hardware standard supported by multiple manufacturers with broad developer support and a great library of games - most of which, unfortunately, were never translated from Japanese. Luckily there's plenty of them that you don't need to be able to read Japanese for, and with the MSX FlashROM cartridge and a disk drive, you've got full access to the whole library ;)
| CPU | RAM | Disk | |
|---|---|---|---|
| KDJ-11 @ 15MHz | 4MB | 32MB | |
| Video | Sound | ||
| Serial-port text I/O | None | ||
| Operating system | |||
| RT-11 v5.3 | |||
The official coolest thing I own. I've wanted a minicomputer, particularly a DEC machine, for the longest time, but I've never had the space or the budget to get one. I was, however, incredibly lucky in stumbling across a microcomputer version of the PDP-11 (where "microcomputer" means "somewhat smaller than an apartment radiator") at the local recycle center, and nabbed it for nothing more than scrap value! It started life as an 11/23+ with 256KB RAM, but was upgraded to an 11/73 (faster CPU with 8KB cache!) with the full 4MB when I made another lucky find (sadly, I couldn't take the whole system, as it was an EPA machine and they insisted it be scrapped, but I was allowed to remove all the good stuff.) Now I just need to get an Ethernet card for it...
| CPU | RAM | Disk | |
|---|---|---|---|
| KA-46 @ 55MHz | 104MB | 9GB | |
| Video | Sound | ||
| Integrated (1280x1024) | Integrated | ||
| Operating system | |||
| OpenVMS 7.3 | |||
Another strong contender for the coolest system I have, but this time in a more standard microcomputer form factor. I had to spring for a hard drive and a new CD-ROM drive, but overall it was an extremely lucky find to get this loaded out with 256-color high-res video and the maximum 104MB of RAM (though the memory test at boot takes a while!) I'm rather impressed that HP still runs the OpenVMS hobbyist program; I got the base install ISO and a bunch of extra software for nothing more than asking nicely. VMS is quite a different animal than anything in the Windows or Unix world, but as I adjust to it I'm finding a lot to admire about it. Now I just need to get DOOM running on it...