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I had a 486DX laptop that I ran Linux on from about 1995-1999, I probably tossed it around 2001 when the battery was pretty dead and the HDD was dying. In some

I had a 486DX laptop that I ran Linux on from about 1995-1999, I probably tossed it around 2001 when the battery was pretty dead and the HDD was dying. In some ways that was some of the best times for Linux on the desktop in my experience. Windows and Mac were such an unreliable mess at that point that Linux seemed very competitive at the time. A lot of the advanced hardware integration in Win/Mac hadn’t happened yet and Linux was very lean and mean and reliable. Both KDE and Gnome appeared in 1997 IIRC and the desktop was decent even if some apps weren’t as good. My machine was 75mhz, 12MB RAM, 250mb HDD, 800x600 color LCD that had poor refresh. It got me through most of my college CS programming projects, though I eventually built a Linux tower too. X was good on that laptop the first few years but was really slow by 1998.

300bps 5y ago
I had a similar machine in 1996 running Slackware as a server for qmail. Hard not to be nostalgic over that time but things are so much better now. One command with AWS CLI and I can spin up a Linux box in 3 seconds today.
- mmcgaha 5y ago
  Sure, its great now if you want to get actual work done, but which is more fun?
  - xattt 5y ago
    There’s opportunities to open up actual sheep farms if sheep shaving is your thing! :)
wruza 5y ago
Yep, everyone had stock-ish pc components and then came winmodems, custom-protocol printers and other oem hardware.
- asveikau 5y ago
  I was reading a bunch of these comments thinking "winmodems were terrible". Thanks for that. I remember carefully selecting modems. Most of the PCI modems in popular retail shops were winmodems so getting one that used the ISA bus was the first step. But even that was not the safest bet. Online shopping was nothing like it is today, so getting a known good model was more difficult.
  - flyinghamster 5y ago
    Back in the day, I specifically chose an external serial (RS232, not USB) modem precisely to avoid Winmodems. I still have my V.92 Zoom somewhere, though I no longer even have a landline to use it. Somehow, I don't think anything fancier than 1200 bps would work over a VoIP connection, and even that would probably be unusable without error correction.
    - bayindirh 5y ago
      I think the frequency filters on the VOIP stack will kill all the communication.
  - int_19h 5y ago
    The safest bet was to use external serial modems. Which usually meant Zyxel or USR, hence $$$. I remember having to settle on 28.8k USR Sportster (as opposed to the then already-common 33.6k - USR wouldn't fit the budget then).
    - asveikau 5y ago
      I'm having flashbacks. Then USR merged with 3com and that was tricky because 3com sold some winmodems? Google images on those external ones from USR took me back a bit though. I didn't have one of those but I saw them.
      - bayindirh 5y ago
        I had a USR 56K V90 non-voice external modem. That thing was reliable as a tank. Never powered off, never dropped when connected. Remember guessing the download speed by looking at the blinking speed of lights on it.

300bps 5y ago

I had a similar machine in 1996 running Slackware as a server for qmail. Hard not to be nostalgic over that time but things are so much better now. One command with AWS CLI and I can spin up a Linux box in 3 seconds today.

mmcgaha 5y ago
Sure, its great now if you want to get actual work done, but which is more fun?
- xattt 5y ago
  There’s opportunities to open up actual sheep farms if sheep shaving is your thing! :)

wruza 5y ago

Yep, everyone had stock-ish pc components and then came winmodems, custom-protocol printers and other oem hardware.

asveikau 5y ago
I was reading a bunch of these comments thinking "winmodems were terrible". Thanks for that. I remember carefully selecting modems. Most of the PCI modems in popular retail shops were winmodems so getting one that used the ISA bus was the first step. But even that was not the safest bet. Online shopping was nothing like it is today, so getting a known good model was more difficult.
- flyinghamster 5y ago
  Back in the day, I specifically chose an external serial (RS232, not USB) modem precisely to avoid Winmodems. I still have my V.92 Zoom somewhere, though I no longer even have a landline to use it. Somehow, I don't think anything fancier than 1200 bps would work over a VoIP connection, and even that would probably be unusable without error correction.
  - bayindirh 5y ago
    I think the frequency filters on the VOIP stack will kill all the communication.
- int_19h 5y ago
  The safest bet was to use external serial modems. Which usually meant Zyxel or USR, hence $$$. I remember having to settle on 28.8k USR Sportster (as opposed to the then already-common 33.6k - USR wouldn't fit the budget then).
  - asveikau 5y ago
    I'm having flashbacks. Then USR merged with 3com and that was tricky because 3com sold some winmodems? Google images on those external ones from USR took me back a bit though. I didn't have one of those but I saw them.
    - bayindirh 5y ago
      I had a USR 56K V90 non-voice external modem. That thing was reliable as a tank. Never powered off, never dropped when connected. Remember guessing the download speed by looking at the blinking speed of lights on it.