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Thursday, July 27, 2006
As I approach my forty ninth birthday, it has come to my attention that I have become obsolete. Well, maybe not me, but my computer sure has. By today's standards, my trusty little laptop is a dinosaur.
I remember my first computer. I was so proud, it was a brand new Tandy 1000. It had an 8086 processor, 640K of ram and two 5 1/4 disk drives. Plus remarkable for the time, a 300 baud modem. That computer served me well for years. Many stories, both fiction and confessional were written on that machine.
Then I upgraded to a 286 processor. Wow, the speed improvements. And it had 1 Meg of memory. And a huge 10 megabyte hard drive. Ah, those were the days - more stories to write.
As the years progressed, I went through the upgrade process. From DOS to Windows, from 286 to 486 and beyond. Finally, I bought a desktop that was phenomenal. At least to me. It had an 866 processor, a forty gigabyte hard drive and 128 Megs of memory. I could do anything. Oh and it came with Windows 98 SE.
But I wanted portability. I wanted a laptop, so I could write anywhere. So my next purchase was a used AST Pentium 1, with an 800 megabyte hard drive and a card slot for a modem. Problem was, I had been spoiled by the larger hard drive of my desktop and there was no way to upgrade the laptop with a larger one.
Off to eBay I went. Finally, I decided on an older IBM ThinkPad. With a 233 processor, 244 Meg of memory and a 4 gig hard drive. I immediately upgraded to a six Meg hard drive and loaded Win98 SE and my programs and began writing anywhere and everywhere.
I've never had a reason to upgrade. Sure, someday I may put a larger hard drive into my laptop, but that's about it. I see no reason to upgrade the operating system. Win98 suits me fine. I know it, I know how to fix it and we are a good fit.
But, that's the reason I'm obsolete. Microsoft no longer supports Windows 98 - any version. And more and more programs are coming out today that won't work on any thing except Windows XP. I find that sad.
But, it's okay with me. I have the programs I need to do the things I love. And these new products that are coming out, well it's their loss not mine. See, I'm one of those people that do not mind paying good money for software - even if it is pricey. So, if these companies don't want to support Win98, well, then my money will stay in my pocket.
Will I ever upgrade again? Probably not. Personally, I'd love it if the world went back to DOS. Even now, sometimes I still revert back to the old Tandy WP2 machine I purchased years ago as a first laptop. Today, it still allows me to write without having to boot up and go through all the rigamarow of loading an operating system.
Don't get me wrong I love technology. I have almost every gadget that is out there. From DVD players down to a PDA, I have uses for all of them. But, I just don't see a need to continue to pour good money into all the fancy bells and whistles that computer manufacturers and Microsoft try to convince me I need. After all, the most I do is write and surf the net in my free time.
I guess I should confess that there is one modern gadget I don't have. It's another one of those things that advertisers continually try to convince me I need. I disagree. What is that gadget, you ask. A cell phone.
Nope, I don't like phones in general, absolutely hate to talk on one. I do realize that they are needed, but really feel a land line is more than enough. And it has an answering machine hooked to it (along with caller id), because I do believe that a telephone is supposed to be a convenience for me. I don't believe that I need to be available twenty four seven for anyone.
So, a cell phone like a computer upgrade is not in my foreseeable future. Now that I've looked at things, maybe it really is me that is obsolete.
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