I don’t think I am old but in computer age, I am ancient.

My first computer was an IBM XT with floppy disks. Then we “upgraded” to hard drives that sported top of the line performance technology with 4 mg! Even then, booting was an affair of its own. You started the computer, had time to go to the restroom, fix yourself a drink and by the time you came back, you saw the green display. Yes, this was before color displays. Don’t blame it on Microsoft, DOS was OK back then. It was an atrophied version of Unix. And back then, believe it or not, Microsoft was a nice little company that was eager to work with its clients. Those were the days of not having to answer to billions of dollars and share-holders.

I actually remember seeing my first 200Mhz computer and thinking: “Wow, that’s fast!”. And then there was Windows 95 which was good for its days. Of course Apple had always been great but forgot to spend as much on marketing as did it’s fierce rival did.

Back then, 1 to 6Gb hard drives were enough, but by the time Windows 98 came out, you had to have a 10Gb drive in order to fit the ever-growing space and resource hungry Windows 98. I remember thinking since my first 2Gb hard drive, who needs more space. I thought the same thing about my 10Gb, and my 20, and 40, then 60. Then I made a huge leap to 125 thinking it would take me years to fill it up. Exactly a year later I was sweating for space. I bit the bullet and bought a 250Gb drive that ran out of space and had to get a 500. After te power chord to my external 250 misbehaved and rendered it unusable (recuperated though) I had to ran out and get a 1 Terabyte drive!

How long with this one last? With 1.75 Terabyte, I should be good for a few years, right? Yeah right! It’s been a fun ride and I never thought I would see computers grow in leaps and bounds like this.

Tomorrow will certainly have different technologies. Apple already innovated with the mass introduction of Ram hard drives. A hard drive that has no spinning parts and very fast, unfortunately, very expensive. Computer chips will get smaller and much more powerful but will grown in numbers as they plateau. Tomorrow’s children will have folding plastic screens and proabably everything wireless. Hopefully by then our human cells will have learned to defend themselves against the intrusion of wireless bombardments.

What an era we live in!