All the Computers I've Owned
I can't remember every computer I've owned since the first one I bought in 1988, but I can try. Almost 38 years have passed since then.
The first computer I owned was a Commodore 64. It was one of the original keyboard computers. I bought it in 1988, after returning from overseas. I replaced it with a Commodore 128 in 1989 because I thought it was better. It wasn't, but I later used it to run a bulletin board service (1992 to 1998).
The Commodore 64 wasn't the first computer I laid my hands on. That honor goes to a Radio Shack TRS-80 (colloquially called a "trash 80") that the computer operators at one of my duty stations used in 1982.
I used a Zenith 248 (an IBM PC compatible) at work from 1987 to 1988, while I was stationed overseas. It wasn't until 1992 that I used anything IBM PC compatible again, and that was only at work.
My First Personal Computer
No one I knew considered anything with a Commodore brand name a personal computer (PC). It had to be IBM PC compatible. Using that reasoning, my first PC was a Packard Bell computer, similar to the one in the photo above. I bought it in 1994. It cost me more than $2000, and it came with a whopping 72 megabytes of memory. It could barely run Windows 3.11, the last version prior to Windows 95.
That computer was the last computer I owned before I retired from the military in 1998. Between then and 2006, when I moved to the Philippines, I owned two desktop computers and one laptop. I built the second desktop computer myself with parts I bought from the now defunct Fry's Electronics. I bought the laptop just before I moved to the Philippines, carrying it with me.
Desktops and Laptops
That laptop only lasted a year. Between 2007 and 2018, I owned two desktop computers and two laptops (that I didn't actually buy). I prefer desktop computers, but I can't carry one with me when traveling to and from the United States. None of those computers lasted long. The heat and humidity in my part of the Philippines does a number on electronics.
My wife, Josie, and I traveled to the United States in 2018 to visit our children. It was only supposed to be for a couple of years, dividing our time between two locations. Our older son and his family lived in Florida. My younger son and his wife lived in Hawaii. I started without a computer at all in Florida, and then I bought a laptop with four gigabytes of memory.
I carried it with me to Hawaii, where Josie and I stayed for much longer than we anticipated. Our daughter-in-law was pregnant, but before she could even give birth, the pandemic happened. When Josie and I were able to travel again (only within the United States), we went to Maryland in 2021. That's where our older son and his family had moved to while Josie and I were in Hawaii. That laptop lasted until I returned to the Philippines in 2022.
While I was in Maryland, I bought a Raspberry Pi 400 keyboard computer. Along with other things we needed, we shipped it to our house in the Philippines. When Josie and I traveled to the United States in 2023, I brought it with me instead of a laptop. A few months later, I bought a new laptop with eight gigabytes of memory.
The battery expanded in 2024, a few months after I returned to the Philippines. I ordered a replacement, which took a few months to receive. One of my daughter-in-laws in the United States had to ship it to me. In the meantime, I ordered a mini PC from China, which I'm still using today. It's the first PC I've owned with 16 gigabytes of memory.
Both the Raspberry Pi 400 and the laptop recently died on me. So... I ordered a new laptop, which was delivered to my older son and his family, who now live in Arizona. We will be visiting them later this month. I will, of course, be bringing it back to the Philippines when I return. It has 16 gigabytes of memory as well.
Image by Spacekid, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons
