from TS/ZX81 to HP/dv1000

When I was maybe 11 or 12, my folks bought me my first computer. This was a really smart move on their part. I have been a techno-nerd ever since, though after grad school it really went into the advanced software and modeling end rather than IT/administration (who the fuck wants to admin Windows NT anyway??).


Here is my first machine, Timex Sinclair ZX81, I had the 16K memory expansion module and the tape-recorder "drive". I went to town on this little thing, and have it somewhere. My hands were already to big for the keyboard, so I used a pencil.


My second machine was a Coleco Adam, this 1/2 computer 1/2 game console deal. I was never into computer games (still am not), so I went to town this thing as well learning to "program" etc, I made my own little check book program and all. It lasted me all through High School, and my dad bought me two more used machines for spare parts, so I learned to be hardware guy as well. It was a really good experience.

My senior year I visited my best guy-friend Jim at Williams College (he was a year ahead of me), and played with his Mac SE while he was in class. The mouse took me about a hour to master and, well, the rest is history: I went home and announced that this is what I wanted for college the next year. I got one, it was hideously expensive and had only two 800 K floppies and no hard drive, and that lasted me until sometime in grad school: I put an SE/30 board in it, pimped out to 8 MB of RAM with ram expanders, and a 60 MB external hard drive that sounded like a Harrier Jet.

After all that, I went through a PowerBook 100, Quadra 610 (that was my PhD machine) an IBM Workstation of some sort, a older Sony VAIO, and now my happy little HP Laptop.

I am really grateful to my parents for buying me that ZX81, as silly as it seems to me now as a computer.