Going Down the Computer Highway

HP Pavilion Slimline s5310f

This is the system I bought in 2010. The one I bought in 2009 won’t start up. I believe an electrical zap took the brains of it. I did replace the power supply to no avail. So, a practically brand new Slim HP sits in my closet or is used as a door stop on occasion.

My original Compaq I bought in 2000 lasted nearly 10 years.

My humble beginnings in Cyber World.

First Computer

My first experience in the world of computers was in the year 94, well actually 92. Back then it was so alien to me I didn’t give it a second thought. When I visited my sister in Texas in 94 the PC bug finally bit me. On that visit of one week I had a video taken by my sister. I was learning a few things on the computer and the pictures tell a thousand words. I was like a kid in kindergarten. But, I was hooked.

In 1998, I decided it was time to do something about it. I enrolled in a small computer class. I was learning and then I became ill and could not complete the course. I did not give up. I purchased a PC at the local pawn shop for $300. in Jan 2000. Little I knew. It was a great little PC to learn on and LEARN I did. I subscribed to PC Magazine and PC World. Later, I found the best for learning new and old tricks is with Smart Computing, my favorite. First thing I found out is you can’t get very far on the internet with a ancient 486 and 100 mhz. The most I could do was email so I signed on with AOL.

My sister began sending me word files which I still have. They consisted of stories, poetry and Just words mainly.
I decided since I couldn’t be a internet surfer I would finally settle in to writing my story about my life in Tangiers in 1971. It turned out very nice and I have since embedded pictures into it.

Back to the puter. I was learning by trial and error and let me tell you it was mostly errors. For example, when I brought the PC home from the pawn shop, I sit it all up very carefully. The first thing I did was get the online connection which I found to be almost useless. Paying almost $22 a month just to send email!  I then decided that I would check the old machine out. Should have thought of that before… but I was determined to have a puter. In checking it out, I found that it belonged to a man named Richard. The first thing I did was get my name in where his resided. That was a feat in itself and required the assistance of my very own dear computer guru (Yogi). He took me into the regedit (register) and very carefully walked me through the steps to just change my name. I thought this is really going to be a step forward in mind control.

Then, I thought I will see what this little machine can do. The A drive was not functional and I found out later you first have to have a disk in the drive. It was a aha moment. Then a lot of files that I was looking into would just not open. They had some kind of open with popup?

I did not have a clue as to what to open with so I deleted it. I deleted hundred’s of files and thought now I have a machine I can work with. Well, that was the biggest blunder of them all.

I had deleted so many system files that its a wonder the puter even booted. I then unplugged everything and took it to my other favorite guru. His name is Scott. I said I have saved my documents, do what you must. He said the most he could do on such a medieval PC was to reformat it. I said well Ok, can you put Windows 98 in it?  It was running W-95.

He said I will reformat and put W-95 back with a few 98 functions. I said OK. He did finally get it back to me 3 weeks later. I now had a fully functional slow as molasses W-95 PC with only 32 in memory. It was so old he couldn’t add any more memory.

Oh well, I would do what I could and I learned on that machine. I read and studied and practiced and then I was ready.

I started making inquires into computers. I planned on this computer for a whole year. I couldn’t type that well, so I knew I wanted a system that was not terribly expensive but had perks I could work with. I decided on a Compaq Presario learning series PC. I also purchased a scanner and printer. It also came with a cam. I was ecstatic.

The date Oct 5th 2000. The OS system was the just released Windows ME. The first 6 months I thought I would literally go bonkers. I now know that even a brand new Puter with the most recent operating system is old the day it leaves the warehouse. After numerous updates and many headaches, factory restores, system restores, I can finally say on this day Jan 8th 2002 that PC and me are hugely happy.
In closing this little story I would like to say these things to any person stepping up to the keys to any computer:
#1
Do NOT DELETE ANY FILES UNLESS YOU CREATED THEM
#2
DO NOT DOWNLOAD ANY BETA VERSIONS OF ANY FILES
#3
DO NOT EVER RUN A PC WITHOUT UPDATED VIRUS PROTECTORS
#4
MOST OF ALL REMEMBER IT IS A MACHINE
#5
It WILL DO WHAT YOU TELL IT TO DO>>>MOST OF THE TIME
#6
AS YOU BANG YOUR HEAD ON THE KEYBOARD,REPEAT THESE WORDS…YOU ARE A MACHINE…I AM IN CONTROL OF YOU
#7
SHARE AND ACCEPT TREASURES FROM PERSONS YOU KNOW are RELIABLE (HOPEFULLY)
#8
IF ALL ELSE FAILS (REBOOT)AND CONTINUE TO CHANT (WINDOWS PLEASE COME BACK)
WELCOME TO A WHOLE NEW WORLD

P.S

The old computer was given as a learning present to my grandchildren for Christmas 2000. My grandson almost immediately installed programs and filled it up to the max. Then he deleted somethings and the computer died.

Written by Cynthia M-R (ZIMBA SHIMA) on Jan 8th 2002