When I started working with computers in 1993, PC motherboards required at least one expansion card in order to display information to your CRT monitor. If you wanted your PC to have sound, you needed a sound card. Connecting to the outside world required a modem. We had floppy drives, optical CD drives, and hard disk drives. The CPU was installed on a motherboard with a pin grid array socket. Those computers had a special toggle switch to activate "turbo" mode. The turbo switch was there to slow the CPU down. Sometimes a slower CPU was required for some games.
In some ways, old computers were simpler. The power connectors were all Molex with yellow, red, and black wires. 3.5 inch floppy drives used a smaller version of the connector. The AT power connectors, P8 and P9, were installed with black next to black wires. The 2013 PC I put together required a lot more power connections. Only one of the case fans used the old Molex.
In other ways, older computers were more complicated. We got to deal with COM port settings and modem initialization strings. We also did more work in the BIOS settings to set the right IRQ for the sound card to work. You had to make sure your serial mouse was not on the same IRQ as the modem. If you wanted to play games, you got to learn how to make multiple settings in your autoexec.bat and config.sys files.
My first used car cost about $600. I got my first PC used from an individual and it set me back $1000. Several months later, because I could not readily afford it, I had to add a multimedia kit to get a CD ROM and a decent sound card. I also had to replace the floppy drive, so the price was actually even higher. Although I could barely afford it at the time, that PC helped me get started with my software engineering career.
I really enjoyed working with that old 486DX2 66 MHz with the turbo switch to knock it down to 33 MHz. I used PC's at school, but it did not compare to owning your own. I liked the way you could customize Windows 3.1's colors, sounds, and background. I thought everyone should get to live in their own pixel produced environment the way that I did.
I liked every upgrade I have had since then, but none of them really compared to that first computer experience. Going from calculators, pencil, paper, and typewriters to the PC world was big. Getting a smart phone and tablet was great, but still not quite the same as my first PC. Those items are just the evolution of personal computers.
A lot of you guys grew up with computers. My first PC was acquired a few years after I graduated high school. Some of you do not even know what the world was like in the Pre-PC era.
I took this trip down memory lane because I am getting rid of some old obsolete computer stuff like parallel IDE ribbon cable, floppy drives, and a serial/PS2 combo mouse. Thank you for reading my long post. Feel free to add your past PC experiences.