I remember when I first got into PC building (this was like 2005 or so), it was a serious faux pas amongst enthusiasts to use onboard audio. To be fair, those sound blaster cards were REALLY good at creating spatial audio.
The usual snide remark about onboard audio was "do you really want to hear data going across your USB bus when you put on your headphones?"
When I first got into PC building around 1990, there was no such thing as onboard audio. The SoundBlaster really was revolutionary. The equivalent thing being built into motherboards was actually really convenient: most PC users don't really care about a bit of noise in their audio.
I remember that Altec Lansing (the speaker company) around 1998 came out with a line called "True Digital Audio". The idea was that the audio stayed digital and went to the speakers over USB, so your digital-to-audio was carried out in a dedicated audio device completely separate from your PC. That's the way to do low-noise, for sure. Frustratingly, the lowest-end "True Digital Audio" speakers, which I bought, turned out to only use the USB connection for volume control, and you still had to use a 1/8" cable for the actual audio, which of course is not "True Digital Audio" at all. False advertising and I've hated them with a passion ever since.
I remember when I first got into PC building (this was like 2005 or so), it was a serious faux pas amongst enthusiasts to use onboard audio. To be fair, those sound blaster cards were REALLY good at creating spatial audio.
The usual snide remark about onboard audio was "do you really want to hear data going across your USB bus when you put on your headphones?"
When I first got into PC building around 1990, there was no such thing as onboard audio. The SoundBlaster really was revolutionary. The equivalent thing being built into motherboards was actually really convenient: most PC users don't really care about a bit of noise in their audio.
I remember that Altec Lansing (the speaker company) around 1998 came out with a line called "True Digital Audio". The idea was that the audio stayed digital and went to the speakers over USB, so your digital-to-audio was carried out in a dedicated audio device completely separate from your PC. That's the way to do low-noise, for sure. Frustratingly, the lowest-end "True Digital Audio" speakers, which I bought, turned out to only use the USB connection for volume control, and you still had to use a 1/8" cable for the actual audio, which of course is not "True Digital Audio" at all. False advertising and I've hated them with a passion ever since.
Great story. I remember reading somewhere (maybe an article in Maximum PC?) that much of the noise reduction advantages of the dedicated audio card literally just came from the fact that the card was elevated off the motherboard and physically distant.
I used that audio card to hook up my first set of 5.1 speakers to play Counter-Strike: Source. Sigh. I miss being a teenager.
I remember when I first got into PC building (this was like 2005 or so), it was a serious faux pas amongst enthusiasts to use onboard audio. To be fair, those sound blaster cards were REALLY good at creating spatial audio.
The usual snide remark about onboard audio was "do you really want to hear data going across your USB bus when you put on your headphones?"
When I first got into PC building around 1990, there was no such thing as onboard audio. The SoundBlaster really was revolutionary. The equivalent thing being built into motherboards was actually really convenient: most PC users don't really care about a bit of noise in their audio
Great story. I remember reading somewhere (maybe an article in Maximum PC?) that much of the noise reduction advantages of the dedicated audio card literally just came from the fact that the card was elevated off the motherboard and physically distant.
I used that audio card to hook up my first set of 5.1 speakers to play Counter-Strike: Source. Sigh. I miss being a teenager.
Ha! Thanks!! I will have a fun time browsing these!!
The first PC I remember ever seeing in my life was an Apple II in my childhood home.
We went from that to:
- IBM Aptiva with a 486 DX2 and 4MB of RAM
- Dell desktop with an Intel Celeron (300MHz?)
- eMachines desktop with a 2.93GHz Celeron and 256MB of RAM. (I eventually upgraded it to a 3.2GHz Pentium 4, 1GB RAM, and a Geforce FX5500)
- After that I started to earn some of my own money as a teenager and at one point I'm pretty sure I had like half a dozen machines in my room alone lol
- After that I started to earn some of my own money as a teenager and at one point I'm pretty sure I had like half a dozen machines in my room alone lol
As a teenager!!!!
Above provided by: Vinny, who always says: "I only regret that I have but one lap to give to my cats." AND "I'm a more-is-more person."
Smith1776 wrote: ↑Fri Jan 20, 2023 4:04 pm
- After that I started to earn some of my own money as a teenager and at one point I'm pretty sure I had like half a dozen machines in my room alone lol
As a teenager!!!!
It's not hard to afford computers when you're buying secondhand thinkpads for $200 haha!
- After that I started to earn some of my own money as a teenager and at one point I'm pretty sure I had like half a dozen machines in my room alone lol
As a teenager!!!!
It's not hard to afford computers when you're buying secondhand thinkpads for $200 haha!
I became a quick convert at computer shows when I saw you could buy desktops for $45! I was a combination of shocked and pleased. I think I bought three of them at one show.
Above provided by: Vinny, who always says: "I only regret that I have but one lap to give to my cats." AND "I'm a more-is-more person."
Back in the day, Age of Kings was the go-to game. The best RTS I've ever played. I've never played Starcraft, but since it's still alive and kicking, I'd imagine it's probably the greatest.
Smith1776 wrote: ↑Sat Jan 21, 2023 12:50 am
There are some old games I really want to play.
Shogo, Rainbox Six, Swat 2, Warcraft 2, and others.
I was thinking of buying an old Windows XP machine so that I could play them natively again.
Have you used an emulator and played them non-natively?
Yeah... it's just not the same. There's almost always some kind of frame rate, stuttering, crashing, or glitching issue. The game's responsiveness just doesn't "feel" the same. During my move from Vancouver to Edmonton I dumped that old Windows XP desktop at value village. Definitely regretting that now.
buuut.... OMG.
Some of the games I listed are re-released on Steam!!
Smith1776 wrote: ↑Sat Jan 21, 2023 12:50 am
There are some old games I really want to play.
Shogo, Rainbox Six, Swat 2, Warcraft 2, and others.
I was thinking of buying an old Windows XP machine so that I could play them natively again.
Have you used an emulator and played them non-natively?
Yeah... it's just not the same. There's almost always some kind of frame rate, stuttering, crashing, or glitching issue. The game's responsiveness just doesn't "feel" the same. During my move from Vancouver to Edmonton I dumped that old Windows XP desktop at value village. Definitely regretting that now.
buuut.... OMG.
Some of the games I listed are re-released on Steam!!
What did you sell yours for? You should be able to buy a similar one at about the same price?
Plenty of them available on eBay:
Capture.JPG (90.09 KiB) Viewed 2514 times
Above provided by: Vinny, who always says: "I only regret that I have but one lap to give to my cats." AND "I'm a more-is-more person."
What did you sell yours for? You should be able to buy a similar one at about the same price?
Plenty of them available on eBay:
Capture.JPG
Nice! I might hop down to a local used computer store this weekend too, just to check things out.
I didn't get any $$$ for mine. I was happy just to get rid of it without having to pay, never mind getting paid.
I took all the hard drives out of about six computers. Also took out all the CD-ROM drives. Then put then at the end of my driveway. I was shocked at how quickly they were taken.
Above provided by: Vinny, who always says: "I only regret that I have but one lap to give to my cats." AND "I'm a more-is-more person."
yankees60 wrote: ↑Sat Jan 21, 2023 2:28 pm
I took all the hard drives out of about six computers. Also took out all the CD-ROM drives. Then put then at the end of my driveway. I was shocked at how quickly they were taken.
I remember seeing a fellow doing something like that in Vancouver... no one took the machines because it rains so much in Vancouver and water damage already got to them.
Smith1776 wrote: ↑Sat Jan 21, 2023 12:50 am
There are some old games I really want to play.
Shogo, Rainbox Six, Swat 2, Warcraft 2, and others.
I was thinking of buying an old Windows XP machine so that I could play them natively again.
Have you used an emulator and played them non-natively?
Yeah... it's just not the same. There's almost always some kind of frame rate, stuttering, crashing, or glitching issue. The game's responsiveness just doesn't "feel" the same. During my move from Vancouver to Edmonton I dumped that old Windows XP desktop at value village. Definitely regretting that now.
buuut.... OMG.
Some of the games I listed are re-released on Steam!!
yankees60 wrote: ↑Sat Jan 21, 2023 2:28 pm
I took all the hard drives out of about six computers. Also took out all the CD-ROM drives. Then put then at the end of my driveway. I was shocked at how quickly they were taken.
I remember seeing a fellow doing something like that in Vancouver... no one took the machines because it rains so much in Vancouver and water damage already got to them.
I took an old Macintosh off the street, played with it for a day or two and then put it in my basement. It took awhile before I rid the house of cockroaches.
sorry if some of these posts are out of order. It took me four tries to move them from ‘Signatures.’
Monstres and tokeninges gert he be-kend, / And wondirs in the air send.
sorry if some of these posts are out of order. It took me four tries to move them from ‘Signatures.’