A Filler Chapter As I've probably not made any effort to get that legacy hardware like I said I was planning on as of yet, if ever --- and: the real reason why Modern OS aren't the primary environment I want to do everything in --- even going so far as to just want to go to something so primitive as Windows for Workgroups 3.11/95/98.
OK, so you probably were thinking I was going to talk about some other pointless thing, or how come I want to get a computer that way back in the day, the majority of the time in its life would've just been in use primarily for productivity duties, going on the Internet to go look up the origins of hot dogs IDK and, maybe if there was some time left over from doing that Internet stuffs & e-mail, perhaps dropping down to MS-DOS mode to play a game of Doom or Jazz Jackrabbit or Indycar Racing. Well, I technically may be talking about pointless things. Like how the lil' shits in the 2020s era kind of think kids from prior to when they would've been born, (About 2011 or 2013) they're dead and buried already. That they are from a more primitive time. Like they would've played with rocks and dirt or something instead of actual toys.
Well, I ain't even over the hill yet. You want to find people over the hill? I think I may know at least one - perhaps one who remembers when the song was released by David Seville - the stage name for the original performer who would later be behind Alvin & The Chipmunks - Song in question being "The Witch Doctor," which came out about forty years prior to the version made by The Cartoons.
I guess this is probably why I'm not married and having stupid little snot nosed brats at 32 right now. I'm too stuck in the past and I'm unable to see anything bad anymore, (considering I don't go to the public school facilities much further than standing outside not being sus on the property since I don't want to enter the building because I believe that after having been inside a Public School Facility for 13 or so years out of my life --- After I've seen one, I've pretty much already seen each and every one of them all. There aren't any more left for me to see inside.)
Look, I don't really like the modern Internet, alright? I mean, sure it was bad when Adobe killed the Flash standard at the end of 2020 - the same year on which January 14th marked the end of support for Windows 7, and also when I was wanting to migrate up to Windows 10 - (Why I didn't do it sooner, I don't know to be telling the truth. I guess I was held back just by that much so much so that until the "Claymore" was built, my OS progression after Windows 7 was:)
- Mac OS 9.2.1
- Windows 98 (On a computer mostly rebuilt out of scrap parts, likely First Edition which was a mistake, and I installed that OS on top of MS DOS 7.1)
- After a bit, finally just use Windows 10 for (censored) sake.
- Windows 11.
I mean, to be fair, not every "modern" OS environment which exists has an Internet browser. Well, not an option to load one by default anyway. Because:
- FreeDOS (can load Arachne if you need an Internet Browser).
- Batocera (Emulator OS so Internet Browsing isn't really applicable to the actual situation for what the OS is intended for.)
- Lakka (Emulator OS similar to Batocera which like Batocera has no Internet Browsing capabilities - but is actually more based on Retroarch vs. Batocera.)
Of course, people who assume things about "BC" or 1985 BC or 1990 BC when people alive didn't know what a computer is, just proves that like certain people from the former independent republic of the United States of America called California that have quite severe intellectual challenges, because they literally have 0 IQ anyway in my mind - I suppose the TV they have in their house isn't a TV but rather a bookcase or something like that? They may be right about some people needing to touch grass. Not me though. I still hate Annapolis Valley Girls, because I was born hating Annapolis Valley Girls, I grew up hating Annapolis Valley Girls, and I shall die hating Annapolis Valley Girls.
Modern vs. Vintage Games, why the latter have been surprisingly holding more of my interest.
I'm going to now talk about why I've been wanting to play more vintage titled games as many of the more modern titles haven't been holding so much of my interest. Like, a long session in Overwatch or Minecraft (I haven't even really touched Valorant yet, it's undetermined if I will) would more than likely be three hours to three and a half hours a week at absolute maximum.
Of course, some may think I'm conveniently ignoring technological progress by refusing to play many games that have more and more recent release to the public dates, instead preferring titles that are mostly accessible by the Internet through means of emulation, or requiring in some cases to be installed using software such as Virtual PC on Windows versions from XP to 7, and VirtualBox, VMWare, and DOSBOX on operating systems from Windows XP to 11, and other non-Windows operating systems that are as simple as Windows to use day-in, day-out, such as MacOS, (both PPC and Intel, I'm not even going to touch hardware that has the Apple Silicon M1 or M2 chip, even if this type of computer chip is actually superior in performance than the competing cellular Android chip or anything AMD or Intel has in terms of microprocessors), or distributions of Linux such as Ubuntu, Linux Mint, and Peppermint Linux, more commonly released after I think either version 9 or 10 as Peppermint OS, which although based on Ubuntu, is more lightweight versus Ubuntu, and likely more heavily based on Lubuntu (but other desktop environments such as my favorite desktop environment, KDE Plasma can be used as the default environment, and the Windows 3.1 skin can be used in Xubuntu.)
But, without further ado... Here are some reasons I heavily favor the older titles more than I do modern ones.
1. The Update Screens.
One of the main reasons that I'm not that into more modern games is because they take a very long time to update. Like seriously, a long time. True, you might not become a skeleton and have spiders & cobwebs go on the wall due to how long the update takes, and of course many modern games do tend to have this as a feature, not a bug.
One potential reason that newer games always tend to have all these updates is likely due to the fact the developers had to publish them and get them out of the door as fast as they possibly can. This is much unlike the 1990s, when an updated version of the game would be later re-released as an "Ultimate" version of the same game, due to the fact that then vs. now, there wasn't an "always-On" internet connection in most people's homes. In fact, not everyone and their dog had a PC, and PCs back then for those individuals that did have them, were, big, beige, expensive, and sometimes slow, and never having enough hard disk space - plus the majority of stuff that people saved on their computers back then they likely just kept on floppy disk anyway so the hard drive wouldn't get cluttered up.
2. Graphics < Story.
This might not necessarily always be the case; but the graphics of a game aren't always an indicative of the game's story quality. (If your game in question has a predefined storyline, that is.) Usually, the worse the game's graphics, the better the story was. You can disagree with me if you want, but if you're just going to say that I'm just an old man yelling at clouds:
OK, now that I got that out of the way... I just have to say that the worse the graphics of a game are - the less bits it has. And the more it ends up leaving to the imagination. Probably why I'm not too fond of the current generation, since the games (the majority of, anyway - I mean, Minecraft you can build almost anything you want provided it is in your imagination to, anyway) don't really leave much to the imagination.
Basically, I am preferential toward 16-32 bits as the peak of gaming technology, 64 bits being the absolute cutting edge provided of course it doesn't annoying update every random time you want to just jump into the game and play. "BuT tHe GaMe IsN't sEcUrE iF i DoN't UpDaTe iT eVeRyDay." you say. No, the older titles are secure enough, since most of them don't have online capability. And some titles from the 1990s and 2000s that did have online capability, the server shut down for the final time over 20 years ago, so chances are even if you did have a title with a supposed "online capability", you would still be able to play the offline modes, even if the game has offline modes, which it actually should. I suppose that's the case.
Also, bits are what make the graphics look either photo-realistic or blocky. Of course, since 64 bits have been the standard since the turn of the millenium, if not the 2010s decade, most games that are released & in existence today, and probably for the foreseeable future will be 64-bit. It likely will not be upgrading further to 128-bit, 256-bit, 512-bit, 1024-bit, 2048-bit, 4096-bit, 8192-bit, 16384-bit, or Infinite-bit any time at all soon, since the technology (1.) doesn't exist, and (2.) It's probably for the best that bit technology stays at 64-bit from now on, despite the possibility that 64-bit may become dated and primitive in future decades or centuries.
3. Sometimes, new games get released for older platforms.
Although it's not entirely common, new games do occasionally get made for older platforms which have long since been regarded by most of the consuming public as abandonware, and not worth putting much money or time into tracking down older examples of hardware just for playing older games, since that's simply the equivalent of not buying a newer car, and going for buying a classic instead. So, to put that into perspective --- Instead of buying a new car off the dealer lot at driving cost, that is, the list price + license + tax + title, you would be instead buying an older model for private sale.
So, say, instead of getting yourself a 2022 Chevrolet Bolt EUV for example, which is complete with all the bells & whistles...
You could be getting a 1969 Camaro, which is less practical than the 2022 EV, and probably doesn't have the creature comforts, but probably have more character vs. the newer car. Oh, and if you're a smother-mothered kid of the 2020s era, you probably won't ride in one, since your stupid parents will probably prefer you steer clear of screaming metal death traps that cars from the pre mid-1990s era all were.
But, those things are besides my point. What I'm saying, is that sometimes, newer games do get released for older platforms, and not everyone will be going to be putting any money down on getting a new game for an older platform that the manufacturer of said platform doesn't support or offer warranty or repairs for anymore, likely going to end up having the third-party console market being the ones that get used instead. Basically, mainstream isn't exactly what I exactly aim for in life. I mean, I guess I wasn't really encouraged when I was younger to follow the mainstream gaming trends that most of my peers at the academia institution did.
Of course, this had two effects on me. One, it actually didn't really encourage me to always try to get the latest AAA games, since some may think that wasting money on the latest and greatest isn't such a good idea. Probably getting on a popular bandwagon while it's still popular as opposed to --- well, let's just say I never toiled for popularity since I was never encouraged to, and I feel that nonpopularity is something that I regret every day. I mean, sure, in life, living with the attitude of "**** popular opinion" I have made probably a few genuine friends, in retrospect. Of course, this doesn't mean I didn't make any foes --- No, no. Far from it.
I've made plenty of foes, so many so, that there are times I feel like I want to crawl into a hole. Or, rather, disconnect myself from the majority of the outside world, and tell them all that I've left home, for maximum effect, probably self-exile myself in some rural community where the nearest anything, be it grocery-store, doctor's office, and/or other services are more than a half hour away.
Today's chapter is the very reason why I keep saying that I want to sweat about a Microsoft "boogeyman" that may/may not exist from the very get go. In other words;
Quest For The Packard Bell, Chapter VI:
I try to go find an older model of computer, so that the other members who haven't already of Serenity Gaming don't have to.
Now, I'll keep today's chapter short, and probably not go into too much detail more than I already have to, since I kind of already am working creatively on another project where I am writing something about the sixth iteration of a Quest for the Packard Bell. For now, finding such a rare computer for myself is not going to be a sprint race, and have my parents worry about how I'll cover my life's basics, but a marathon, where I'm probably going to be crossing the finish line when I've moved out of the bedroom where I spent years 21-31 sleeping in, and into where I will be spending my 32nd year's balance forward and that's when I will be designing it from the ground up - often telling my parents I won't be designing it for them --- since I just said that they aren't going to be using it, so no sense designing it for them if they won't end up using it. There's literally no sense. I mean, I'm probably going to continue making several downloads with a [REDACTED] account that I will never admit to my parents to even having, just going to put that out there right now.
Now, I've often said that I've gotten a little unduly paranoid about Windows 11, considering that some would say that it is more, "bad" than Windows 10. I mean, in a lot of ways, it's changed how I use Windows personally at home. Prior to this, and when I had used Windows 10 so much, I would've just preferred to use Windows 10 both at home, and in the workplace, favoring it over Windows 7 and saying that Windows 7 would be the larger security hole in the corporate network, and personally saying that any "main-role" PC not have Windows 7 on it, since that is automatically a security hole.
I've changed my mind, however, and now say that Windows 10 is now the computer that I have to keep out of the "main-role" that Windows 7 once held from 2015-2020, and that's when I regretted upgrading to. On the one hand, I was glad to leave ODD games behind, and in another, I realize now that progress came with a price. Also, some might think I just was letting the Claymore stay on my floor, collecting dust and spiderwebs, but I didn't want to use the computer for Zoom - I had built it precisely for a game machine. Oh well, I sold it two years into its service life, but only because I had crashed it. I guess I'm just going to have to get another gaming rig if I can swing it and probably take a little bit better care of that one.
I mean, I absolutely don't knock modern hardware or software by any means. I think it's absolutely great that we have more modern hardware than what we would have had anywhere from five, to ten, to fifteen, to twenty, to twenty-five, to thirty, to thirty-five, to forty years ago. However, I can't help but think we've kind of just had to make some compromises in the name of progress and that can either be a good, or bad thing --- depending on how you look at it.
Example 1: Computer external media from the 1980s/1990s/2000s/2010s vs. now, in the 2020s.
1980s: Most computers sold had no internal disk drive, so software was loaded off of floppy disks. This was likely either the floppy floppies, or the hard floppies.
Early 1990s: Although computers started to have things like hard drives and compact disc drives in them, the floppy floppies from the 1980s stuck around for just a bit longer. This would be phased out by later in the decade.
Mid 1990s: Computers sold, usually IBM clones or Apple Macintoshes, even the Mac clones that did exist for a brief period around this time, had either just the floppy disk which took the hard floppies only, the hard floppy only combined with the CD drive, and that was pretty much it. Although some hobbyists may add the floppy floppy drives to their computers.
Late 1990s: The colorful iMacs were the first all-in-one PCs which totally made floppy disks go the way of the floppy floppies. Although you could still add that connectivity back by means of external drives, which was a standard that persists even to today, as more computer manufacturers gradually adapted their manufacturing standards.
Early 2000s: A continuation of the latter half of the 1990s, Macs continue to not have the floppy diskette drives in them, and PCs continue to have them --- for the sake of legacy compatibility. Of course, low capacity memory sticks (Think 64-128MB) start to be sold around this time.
Mid 2000s: All computers across the board stop having the 3 1/2 floppy diskette drive offered as an option, similar to them all having DVD-R and ROM drives instead of CD-ROMs like they had since the early 1990s.
Late 2000s: Similar to the early 2000s, no more floppy disk option, but the option was there if you really needed it to use an external.
Early to Mid 2010s: Similar to the latter half of the 2000s, DVD drives stuck around, in a lot of senses.
Late 2010s: DVD drives soon fell out of popularity in favor of USB drives.
2020s (present day as of October 24th, 2022): Computers sold have no external media drives like floppy or disc drives at all. But if the user wishes to add that capability back, they can use externals on computers with no slots, or build custom ones that have those legacy capabilities back if they want to.
True, the advances in OS capability and security may not be a terrible loss, and games from way back when, can be played with DOSBox. But, according to some game purists out there on this Earth, it's not really the best option to use emulation to play games of any era, old or new.
I did mean to write this blog post yesterday, but I kind of let the hours kind of fly by for me. Literally. I guess time flies when I was having fun, but this blog isn't so much a job for me, as it is kind of something I do in my spare time, but with that out of the way, I think I will just insert the usual "I made a mistake" theme.
But, really, I have been having so much fun maining D.Va on Overwatch it isn't so important that I forgot about the "Quest For The Packard Bell" Blog Posts. In fact, I felt that it would probably be good for me to take a break from something like this for a while, just so I don't get eventually burnt-out from continuing to write things like this.
Right, enough delaying things. Onto today's Blog Post...
Quest For The Packard Bell
Chapter V
I haven't Windows 10'd at all recently...
But, to tell the truth, as 2025 comes closer --- I perhaps should never consider Windows 10'ing again!
OK, so you probably may ask me "What does this have to do with the Packard Bell?" Well, the answer to that question, to be completely honest is nothing. I figured that since I mentioned that in a discussion with someone about how my daily Windows use has been changed more to Windows 11 (despite me not wanting to originally) It has pretty much grown on me in a way. I mean, the versions have cycled between good and bad as long as I've used Microsoft's operating systems.
And not so much as a daily driver, OS, but daily drivers throughout the years from my first PC, which was a generic 486 with nothing special about it, to the present-day RedEye, which I later decided would be probably the new OS standard for me, despite some "technicians" saying I am revoking purchase & ownership rights for my PC supposedly.
So, by way of effective example... Windows 3.11 for Workgroups, despite being the first Windows I personally used, I didn't really get much of a chance to get familiar with it when it was the "current" version of Microsoft Windows, due to it being the first OS on my Dad's PC of the time. I would later be revisiting this OS in programs such as Microsoft Virtual PC, VMware, VirtualBox, whatever the Android VM software was, and DOSBox, long after the days that the software would be considered "abandonware." Sure, I couldn't really get it to work like the Packard Bell Dad had when it had Windows 3.11 for Workgroups, but I still pretty much had a basic idea on how to Windows 3.11.
Windows 95 was actually my "real" first Windows, and pretty much the only version of Microsoft's OS I did use for three years from 2001-2004 until I got the AOpen PC and upgraded from Windows 95 to XP.
I really didn't use Windows 98 a whole lot except for the brief time it was on my sister Candace's computer in Saint John, as well as the computers in High School. I pretty much decided that 98 would be a better version of Microsoft Windows for my personal use than XP, because it could probably do almost everything that XP could, with the exception of course of being a Meme OS and over-rated in literally every sense of the word and I guess Memes weren't exactly my cup of tea.
On the one hand, I know I didn't really use Windows Millennium Edition a lot, since it was not a very good version of Windows OS that Microsoft had developed. On the one hand, I would've rathered that people in the real world had just stuck with 98 until XP came along. On the other, at the time of its first existence, I had literally zero idea that there would be even worse versions of Windows OS to be pooped out of Redmond's buttocks after XP hit.
I didn't really do a whole lot of use of Windows 2000, but I personally thought that 2000 was better than XP, even wanting to downgrade the PC that was my high school daily driver from XP to 2000 after donating it to the Valley Community Learning Association in Kentville, and offering to leave with a Mac Performa which I had misdiagnosed instead, and it continued to be my toy until the clunker finally broke for good and I regret letting it go from my life because if there was a Mac that was the absolute closest to the one I would've nostalgized over from my school career, it would have been that particular one. And of course, since retro hardware purchases may be in or out of my budget for the present time, considering that I am renovating an old room to be using for my new sleeping quarters, I may consider getting away with purchasing something like that if I can convince my rotten to the core old parents that I am only going to be spending the money on it for the sake of say, one of the new supplies for the new room, or a piece of decor which has a functional aspect of it, at least.
Windows XP, I both loved and hated it. I loved it in the sense that it was one of the most useful Operating Systems for playing the game, Monopoly Tycoon and primarily that game, as versions of Windows (R) released after XP, such as Vista, 7, 8.1, and 10, and most recently 11, cannot play Monopoly Tycoon. I'm also aware that I can load it into a VM the next time I want to play it, and I may consider doing it when I feel kind of like doing that.
Windows Vista was kind of a special case for me. I hated it when I got it on the Hewlett-Packard laptop that I got as a graduation present for somehow managing to survive all twelve grades of horrors of public school with honors, and I would frequently switch between Vista and Ubuntu. I believe Linux was the last OS I originally ran on that PC before upgrading to my MacBook Pro which I had for over a decade before finally deciding to sell it.
Windows 7 was the next Windows I actually liked. Sure, some who hate 7 might just say, "It's just Vista with improvements," but to be honest, 7 actually makes Vista not look quite so bad, as compared to the next version of Microsoft Windows.
Windows 8 is so bad that I under absolutely no circumstances speak of it in this household.
Windows 8.1 is the only "Windows 8" I speak of when I even talk about "Windows 8." So, if you hear me talking about "Windows 8" or even speaking about installing and/or using "Windows 8", chances are the OS in question is actually, Windows 8.1.
Windows 10 is... Or, rather was... Kind of a special polarizing OS for me. On the one hand, it was just an "OK" operating system, but, on the other hand --- It actually did damage that Windows Vista and 8 (not 8.1 in THIS context) had already done, but ten-fold. I mean, sure... In 8.1, the use of a Microsoft account, basically an e-mail address with @hotmail.com or @outlook.com as it is now, Microsoft set it up so you could use it to log into your computer instead of using an offline account, and the concept was so that you could synchronize between devices.
However, with Windows 10, the "Out-Of-Box" experience once setup is completed, is almost expecting you to immediately sign into a Microsoft account - even if you do not plan to use the device to send/receive electronic mail messages. True, you can avoid it, and not fall victim to the telemetry, but if you have use for the UWP apps and not the traditional side-load EXE programs only, (especially so if your device is on 10 S mode, which means you kind of are just restricted to UWP apps, and not EXE programs) then falling "victim to the telemetry" is less of an unavoidable inevitability, and more of a necessary evil.
If Vista and Windows 8 had put me on an "open-source" kick before, then Windows 10 is the absolute cherry on top of the pain in my rear end sundae. Depending on the hardware I put 10 on, it either ran beautifully as long as it didn't crash, ran like a dog, absolute total garbage, and I could've probably switched some of the bloat features off, but I didn't know which ones precisely to switch off without suffering functionally, or simply put, I better finish what I plan to do on Windows 10 in the environment in 1 hour or less, because the BSOD would end it for me at a random time, probably due to some unreliability in the hardware, which in theory could be simply & easily fixed, but considering I wasn't the one that bought the motherboard that runs the OS and just using mostly spare parts to run the PC anyway, the computer with the issues can just in reality be replaced instead of me even willing to put the effort in to repair it, perhaps using 100% of the hard drives linked to it --- both internally & externally, and then after probably copying it umpteen times over to external hard drives which do not require their own external wall power like some sort of leaching parasite, just park the computer in storage and remove its battery, and take it out once a year, put a fresh CMOS battery in if the battery I removed is dead, just to be sure nothing corrupted or seized up during the time offline.
Of course, in retrospective, I think Windows 10 for me personally is about to become the new "Windows XP." Why? Well, let's look at a few reasons as to why that is.
Reason 1. It would eventually grow to become an overrated Meme OS.
Although in the real world, Windows 10 might not have become as overrated and meme-y as its ancestor, Windows XP, This doesn't mean that Windows 10 has become the butt of some people's Internet jokes. Some have made it become a new sort of PC benchmark, in a category of its own --- Like running DOOM, or Crysis. But, unlike DOOM or Crysis, it is an entire OS, which could run DOOM or Crysis on it, depending on the hardware configuration you have it on - and if you even want to try running DOOM or Crysis on it in the first place.
Reason 2. Because it became an overrated joke, I can't take it seriously anymore.
Well, because of how much of an overrated joke it ultimately became, if someone tells me that I have to take Windows 10 seriously as an OS, then I shouldn't do that. Instead, I'll just take "YoU hAvE tO tAkE wInDoWs 10 SeRiOuSlY" as code for, "I just purchased a brand new Apple iDevice, laugh at my face, please!"
Reason 3. Most of the stuff I would've done on Windows 10 from March 2020 - January 2022 (shortly before I purchased the RedEye) I can do just fine on Windows 11 anyway.
Well, it's true. Of course, I can do pretty much most of the productive stuff and fun stuff on Windows 10 PCs, on Windows 11, since supposedly it still identifies as Windows 10, but I know better than what Microsoft would like me to believe. The only thing I will likely consider not doing on 11 is Zoom, since I pretty much wanted to run Zoom in Linux exclusively, under the KDE desktop environment, which means not using a CD to install my Canon Pixma Printer Driver, because the manufacturer only distributed Microsoft Windows and Apple macOS drivers with the printer itself in the box. Which, as we come closer to the end of the 2020s decade, I shouldn't be prodctivity using anything made by Microsoft in Redmond, Washington, U.S.A., or Apple, in Cupertino, California, U.S.A, in a modern version seriously. The former probably wanting to focus more on certain abilities of the Windows modern environment which I could not have formerly in versions prior to 10/11, and the latter due to branding it as a fashion accessory.
Of course, I will be using Windows 10 to continue to run Zoom as I still have 9 Microsoft License Spots Vacant on my account that I only filled up with free trash games from the app store. Not games that would be capturing much of my attention, unlike Indivisible or Minecraft mind you, no, no. But, basically the same games that have their annoying ads on during the loading screen of Microsoft Solitaire Collection.
"Quest for the Packard Bell - Chapter V" will be published on Sunday, October 16th, 2022. Today, I'm going to give myself and probably the blog readers a bit of a break from how I've been searching for the same sort of Windows 3.11 for Workgroups and 95 and maybe 98 machine that I remember my father using during the very early years of my life, and probably first few years of my elementary school career, and instead think about rebranding my gamertag.
My tags that I've had over the years don't really make much sense to a whole lot of people. Considering that the tag I chose pretty much always made me seem like a female or something and nobody understood the "xxxxxxxxx" before what I typed.
One potential idea would be branding myself the same as my Twitch handle, but I pretty much have decided to elect against that choice, since, I'd have to explain that I was probably thinking of being kind of a Doom Slayer type of v-tuber, probably sometimes playing DOOM and mostly playing visual novels and Japanese types of games. But, not many people would understand why someone like me kicks so many zombie butts. Well, it's not like I'm not being nice to those zombies, but the only ones that really deserve to be nice to are the H-Doom zombies, (We're not going to go into too much further discussion here.)
Another potential idea is giving myself the handle "@Bootleg_MC" like I did when I used Twitter with that very Twitter name. But there are a few reasons why I will not choose to write my handle like that. First of all, I may hear from the "California Idiot" again, and I don't need that type of toxicity and negativity in my life - and nor do I want it. I would sooner not have that in my life than have it in my life. Second, people may not entirely understand what I was thinking, and even if they have played Doki Doki Literature Club! before, they may assume that I'm some sort of disingenuine [Protagonist] character.
So, the third and final option... Well, I won't reveal too much for now, but I certainly will reveal it when the time is right. And it will likely be involving another branding of a certain network handle, and perhaps not have any "1dI0t$" bother me.
You may wonder why I chose to write today's title as "almost a victory, certainly a defeat..." But, if you haven't been following this story from the beginning, here's why I want to say it was most certain that it was almost a victory, yet certainly a defeat in this quest of story.
You see, I found a tower which was in considerably better shape than that Legend Force 2020, and to be honest, it looked much more similar to my father's first computer. Now, why anyone would be wanting to get their own Packard Bell computer that was just like the one that sat on their old man's desk from 1995-2001, some may scratch their heads. But apparently some noobslayers may just think I suck at more modern PC games which are more MMOs than anything else, which to be honest, I do. I may have to git gud, perhaps have some of the more modern titles on newer hardware to practice up so that I don't end up getting my ass handed to me so much, but the truth is, I'm not really seriously interested in taking the full rank of competitive matches. If I have to be someone else's floor to mop, then I should probably accept that. (And perhaps don't use the RedEye to play Overwatch since I have noticed some input lag playing the game.)
However, I experienced a few major hurdles as to getting this off of the ground. First of all, the system I bought was a parts system, only powering on and not booting to anything, and I had no recovery media which would've been compatible with the device in question. Second, I did have some limited time at the Kings County Courthouse Museum that I was planning to keep working at over the majority of July that year, since I was dreading having to share the Transit bus to (or from) Kentville with a load of day-campers at a pre-pandemic (in other words, pre-COVID) amount. And, finally... I was likely discouraged from the pursuit of this project, although I personally may have thought it quite a noble venture in my mind, was probably talked out of it, because apparently certain nerdy friends in my association would prefer I don't spend all of my time playing games in MS-DOS, Windows 3.11 and 95, and in even some cases 98, but just because that has stopped me from the pursuit of this for now, doesn't mean it will stay that way forever.
I've still made this a personal aim of mine, irregardless of how pointless, impractical, or grasping at straws this might seem, for at least one of two reasons. (1.) Sometimes modern games make me rage so much, and it doesn't help that some more veteran players who probably spend all-nighters at the computers which they refer to as "their battlestations" say that I'm mad because bad, which isn't too far an exaggeration of the truth, I kind of have been too discouraged from attempting further games of competitive Overwatch 2. (2.) I may be in 2022, but my mind is perennially in 1980-2006, which the majority of games which I did have some interest in were made. Sure, there may be some made after 2006 which I'm interested in, and I pretty much group the games that were made from 1977-1979 as games of 1980, but as for games released after 2006, I'm not quite as interested in THOSE games as I would've been, say, one released with a release date of 2005 or prior.
Also, I've realized now after some thought that I will be writing a book kind of doing an over two (or more) month commemoration of the fact I quit having a "private" Facebook account as of last summer, during the month of August 2021. Title TBD and not to be published on either the currently active "Weeb Cafe" or the soon to be scrapped as a blog, "Project Excalibur - 2019-2020 Computer Build."
For a brief while, I did have a working and running Packard Bell EasyNote A8, a British specimen of a laptop, which would've probably compared itself to something that Acer made at around the time in the 2000s on this side of the pond. Now, why am I mentioning this particular computer? Well, even though it is a "Rebadged Acer" It too has the Packard Bell name, and it also is a part of this story.
So, what made me think getting a Rebadged Acer would be such a good idea to begin with? Well, for starters, I was bored with the idea of commonly available Aspires that were sold by electronics stores on this side of the pond. And, of course, in time I would be getting a more modern Acer, even if it would be the trim "Nitro" even though this series of blog posts makes me seem less like someone writing a
thing out of a general interest, and more like someone that is just wanting to be ridiculed by an Adonis man for keeping my dick small and muscles somewhat weak, eating a mostly Jeffrey diet and if and when I do get my own car, instead of buying some fancy Acura or Lexus, deciding to go with the cheaper, but mechanically identical Honda or Toyota, considering most millionaires who are suggesting they are secure until they die prefer German Luxury cars, such as Volkswagens, Mercedes-Benzes, Audis which are the exact fucking same as Volkswagens, except some Audis can leave certain VW models in the dust, Porsches, BMWs, and probably some other German luxury cars which I don't exactly know about.
And second, I was feeling particularly adventurous, but I wasn't exactly going to be asking my parents for a plane ticket to Europe any time soon - considering that my life in the constantly destabilizing country may be becoming ever more so unlivable living in "real" society, and probably like walking on a tightrope so to speak, the only things balancing me are the fact I could have hobbies that would keep my mind occupied off of trying to satisfy the carnal needs I would've gone and gotten satisfied in my 20s, because apparently Watchtower ministers aren't supposed to get laid and married as young as possible despite having some pent-up sexual urges, if they have those urges and desire matrimonial desires in time. On top of that, the only thing European in my life I'm going to allow is chocolate from a Swiss company, and furniture from a Swedish one.
(Oh, it was just recently that I learned that the building block toys that I spent my childhood/youth playing with were Danish, and of course I obviously knew that despite its being owned by the Microsoft corporation now, Minecraft, like IKEA, is also Swedish. I'm considering building my own IKEA tower when I get back into playing Minecraft somewhat more seriously when I feel I have the time to devote to it & I have no projects that will be taking up my time/attention.)
But I've digressed long enough from the topic of today's post. I feel that my Easy Note A8 when it worked actually did whatever I could throw at it just fine. I mean, at the time, I wanted a Windows XP laptop that I could just carry around. Some may argue there's not much of a point in doing that, but I personally don't agree with those people that want to have that much negativity in my life. Now, before you ask me the intellectually challenged question of, "NaThAn, DiD tHaT pAcKaRd BeLl RuN wInDoWzE 10?" I will have to tell you, "No, It doesn't run Windows 10. But, to be completely honest, not everything has to run Windows 10 anyway. And, of course, notwithstanding any possible global cataclysm apocalypse scenario within the near-ish future of 7-8 years or potentially less, I don't think anybody should be running Windows 10 ever again, considering that Windows 10 as it ages as a platform will eventually gradually become even more of a security hole, and everyone except my absolutely sworn foes that still use computers based on the x86_64, or ARM platforms anyway, that don't want to use the Apple fashion accessories Cupertino vomits out of Cupertino, which if this is true about you, then I at least do have some respect for you, and I would never consider laughing at you or ridiculing you. I mean, I've pretty much felt convinced that despite my initial suspicions of Microsoft re-inventing the wheel that Windows 11 is going to be my one last version of Windows that I plan to use. And if anyone asks - What happened to my want to use Linux devices by midnight on December 31, 2029? I'll just tell them, I've experienced a small setback for now. I'll be sure to continue this when I feel more like it will be more in line with my eventual goals."
The Packard Bell EasyNote A8 was just a mere stepping stone to a much larger puzzle, but one that was a more interesting piece than anything else.
(No, I know this computer in the picture is not the Legend Force 2020, which also was a Packard Bell model!)
Well, about sometime in mid-June 2018, I felt myself get briefly bitten by the nostalgia bug. I guess the transparent Windows in Windows 7, and probably soon Windows 10, and the rounded curves of Windows 11 would eventually remind me that I just wasn't made for a modern era, where for the time being, I could go into what is wrong with this era, but for the sake of my own mental health and sanity, as well as not wanting to sound like an old man yelling at clouds (just yet) I believe that will be another tale for another time and not wishing to elaborate on things like this any further.
During 2014-5, I also have been watching retro tech YouTubers such as uxwbill, vwestlife, and Roadgeek/The Nostalgia Mall. However, it was the third channel that really gave me the most interest in old computing hardware, and my PowerBook G3 "WallStreet" was pretty much the only old 90s era PC, (despite it being a Mac from around that era) that satisfied my retro hunger. For now, anyway. I mean, it's not a terribly useful laptop to carry around since the battery literally holds no charge, but it can be used for specific tasks which I don't feel the files of should be saved on computers that can connect to the present day (2022) Internet. Not that I want that computer on 2022's Internet anyway, because I pretty much already said I kicked the Facebook habit after COVID, and in a similar manner to how I decided I wouldn't be going back to Tim Hortons for coffee ever again before COVID. (Except I didn't go and leave any login credentials at the doorstep of my cousin's bachelor "pad" one night, I left two Tim Hortons mugs and a Timmies gift card instead.)
I know that some may argue that a venture such as this; trying to resurrect a prehistoric dinosaur back from when saying "POG" was referring to one of those cardboard circles that used to be all of the rage in schools way-back-when, when slime was used as a punishment as a game variety show mechanic on YTV; and companies such as Nickolodeon, Disney, and Microsoft in certain circles were regarded as less atrociously evil back then, versus as to right now, and even then, it would only be looked upon that way in certain contexts.
Oh, I guess I should also add Nintendo and Apple to that list as well, by the way, but again... That's likely beating a dead horse already, and proving a tired point where twenty-five or so years ago, I would've somewhat respected the brand, but now, probably due to some questionable business practices, which even if the company in question is in the legal right to do so, any respect they do have prior to me saying I liked that brand, automatically makes me go 180 and want to defecate all over the brand, saying that they probably do some immoral and ethical things. But, I'm not some woke person that calls out everything wrong with the world front and centre, and loud and clear, otherwise I'd be doing no business with literally anybody ever again.
So why did I want to resurrect a "fossil" in the first place?
Short answer, a little bit of sadism, mixed with a touch of masochism. I mean, what I was saying is that I do love a challenge, perhaps even going so far as to say anything "too" easy is too boring for me. The example I may then specify may not have anything exactly to do with retro computer hardware; but I will likely say, that, if something is too easy, it just makes me feel bored. There has to be some challenge in life, or else I'll just tire of it all and want to sleep more. Of course, in wanting there to be some challenge in my life, I must also be careful not to go too far into the other direction, and I'm liable to just ragequit & probably not try again --- Until the next time I'm that bored out of my skull, if ever.
So, if I want to try to mess around with trying to figure out which OEM Recovery CD + Floppy Diskette will work with the particular computer, so that my OS of choice plus all the drivers will be installed, (Forget going on the WWW for the drivers for hardware that's old enough that the website probably is buried on http;//web.archive.org/) and don't even touch Vanilla OS CDs - (Basically just vanilla install media of an OS that had CDs from 95-Windows 8.1) then, I feel like needing a greater challenge than just playing the "Normal" Super Mario World Game for the SNES, as I've beaten that game so many times to 94 (sometimes 96) exits that it is literally sad. I know pretty much all the secrets that I can easily get to, and I finally have the patience to get to Valley Fortress and Back Door in the Valley of Bowser, after years of just skipping that secret exit altogether, and I've beaten the Super Mario World Special Zone so many times that I turn the Chocolate Island into Mint Chocolate Island, and turn the Vanilla Dome into Chocolate Dome, and turn the Valley of Bowser's color-tile palette brown.
Playing Super Mario Wuss, a de-edit of the 96 levels of Super Mario World doesn't provide that challenge, since it might actually make me play all 96 levels of Super Mario World almost as fast as a speedrun. And give me over 99 lives (even if the life counter does NOT under any circumstances, tick over to higher numbers than 99.)
However, playing Super Mario Kaizo world on the other hand -- I'm not up to that challenge, and I'm forever done with it. I mean, I'll do anything else, but that.
But of course, the eternal enemy of certain hobbies...
People may believe I'm crazy for wanting to go down this path, but believe me... I'd rather go down this path; as I live in a geographical area where I feel some virginity protection is needed. It's not like I ever didn't feel satisfied after watching some tentacle hentai... But rather, I'd feel unsatisfied with any Annapolis Valley Girl, &, I'd still live with regrets every single day after the fact.
Some Background, and early attempts to recapture something of the brand that the first computer that I used.
Before we begin today's post, we're going to start by mentioning a few things that I am willing to only cover here once. First, I will explain a little about the background of why I have been attempting to rebuild the setup of the Packard Bell, which was in my Dad's den originally, and why I of all people would want to not be favoring an OS that is not only "up-to-date" like Windows 11, but I would be willing to go back to Windows 95, and 3.11 for Workgroups, and in some cases, even be willing to run systems that have Windows 98 on them.
Some Background
Packard Bell
Although my first two computers were generic IBM 486 clones with no Packard Bell branding, which I kind of honestly deserved back when I didn't know how to properly use a computer, both of those systems running Microsoft's Windows 95 Operating System, which was probably at the time dated and likely incompatible with the majority of the computer games on sale at every Staples and Wal-Mart ever, the first computer that I ever used wasn't really my own personal one, it was one that my dad bought for my eldest sister, Candace, to help her primarily with her schoolwork.
The Packard Bell in the picture at the top of this blog doesn't look too different from the system my father had back in the day, however, it originally was sold to him from Wacky Wheatley's back then with Windows 3.11 for Workgroups, and later upgraded to Windows 95.
When I could use it, I played games primarily on it, which I could, like Math Blaster Ages 6-9, Indycar Racing, and probably trying to figure out how to actually figure my way out through Journeyman Project:Turbo. Now, I could attempt to easily install these titles in a Windows 98 VM in a more modern version of Microsoft Windows, which I have done in the past, but I noticed that the screen real-estate was a little too great for what I was intending to do. Also, I did attempt to install Windows 98 VMs on the "RedEye" (what I call my Acer Nitro 5) and I noticed that many times, none of the VMs I installed were terribly stable at all. They likely just crashed out, and since I'm usually a pretty patient person, I can tend to have my patience tried pretty easily, and my limits of patience can be met.
Of course, one of my problems I realize now; I was attempting to use virtualization to emulate older hardware, which I figured in theory would work magnificiently, as my virtual "hardware's" Motherboard, BIOS, RAM, and hard disk would all be self-contained as files on my computer, and the RAM that I used virtually would be simply taking that much off of my real computer's RAM, and I would not be so worried about having some junky hardware around just for the purposes of running Windows Operating Systems from that era, as I have had a much more difficult time emulating a Macintosh computer trying to get it to run a Mac OS system newer than 8.6.x. I could go on to as why I wanted to emulate the same equipment I used back when I was a student in public academia from 1995-2008, but I believe that is another tale for another day.
My point is, that my Dad's first PC was a Packard Bell Multimedia series tower (I forget which model number) and it was his main PC from 1995-2001, until that computer was replaced by an AOpen Series PC, which would continue to be his main PC for another thirteen years. After those thirteen years were over, he would alternate between an ASUS P5KC generic tower in an Antec case, a generic AMD case which was my system for a while, and most recently a Lenovo ThinkPad after the ThinkCentre he was using suffered mechanical failure and I had decided the ThinkPad I was using was no good for me as a computer, as I had prior used it as a Linux system for a while, which for him, it runs the best OS for his needs in my opinion, at present, Windows 11 Home Edition.
Why do you not like Windows 11?
I never said that I liked it, nor did I say I hated it. However, for someone who has a tough time focusing on stuff most of the time, and often feels that a lot of modern operating systems can be filled with distractions, such as Windows 11, Windows 10, Windows 8.1, and particularly 8.1 since I do not speak of Windows 8 in this household...EVER! Or Windows 7, Windows Vista, and in some cases --- Windows XP.
Which brings us back to the main point. Why do I not want to use Windows 11 all of the time, which should be a more appropriately rephrased question...
Why do I not want to use Windows 11 all of the time for everything?
As I was saying, I do not wish to use Windows 11 all of the time for everything, since I have officially run out of systems to consider as "sullied."
So...?
Well, in other words, I will be willing to go back to computers that run the OS systems of Windows 3.11, 95, and 98 if I have to do transcription for productivity.
Some may argue that there literally is no point of me doing this, but I don't care
what "some" say. Most of the music I listen to, isn't played on Magic 94.9 in Kentville.
Hello, and welcome to a series of blog posts that will be released until the end of when I write these posts, namely, the "Quest For The Packard Bell." Some may wonder why I am doing something like this, or what is so special about the marque of computers referred to as "Packard Bells." This post will give a brief brand history, as well as telling (somewhat) of what would be so special about "Packard Bells" that I absolutely feel that I must have a computer made by this manufacturer, (again if I hadn't had one that worked to as close as factory new as reasonably possible since the one that was my Dad's unit since the 1990s.)
Introduction
Why are you doing this?
Why am I doing this? Well, supposedly I'm supposed to be living in a place where wi-fi services for the Internet are supposed to be kind of semi-reliable, which they are usually, but sometimes I get worse signal quality than others, and I kind of sometimes can play certain games offline - but on the other hand, others... Just refuse to load/connect.
Although I'm a fairly patient individual (most times), Sometimes, things can just try my patience to the absolute limit and I want to do something else. This may also be due to the fact that growing up, I was a kid with ADHD. Or on the Asperger's syndrome, which I think probably might be not the different thing, because I seem like my focus isn't the greatest most times anyway.
And, if my parents seem to think I'd be better off working in some sort of transcription job than trying to start a business, I will start a transcription business out of my new bedroom and probably not want a terribly contemporary version of Microsoft Windows, because Office 2019 or 365 or 420 (whatever) can still open Documents that were created using Microsoft Word 95-2003.
Tl;dr - Modernity is distracting, and in some cases abandonware may be more of something that I can apply employable under my hobby, even if such desires are met with some resistance from other members of my own family. Or people from the Serenity Gaming crew.
A Brief Brand History
Packard Bell is a Dutch-registered computer manufacturing brand and
subsidiary of Acer. Originally an American radio set manufacturer,
Packard Bell Corporation, it was founded by Herbert A. Bell and Leon S.
Packard in 1933. In 1986, Israeli investors bought the brand from Teledyne which had taken it over much earlier.
This explanation, taken from Wikipedia (http://www.wikipedia.org), shows the history of the name that it was originally based on. Which is why some of the early Packard Bell computers had the message as the computer was turning on, "America grew up listening to us. It still does."
Another way it makes sense, is that Packard Bell computers were a subsidiary of
Acer which were sold alongside Acer computers throughout the 1990s. Although mostly across-the-pond sales are made now, there are rumors of it coming back, although the new Packard Bell systems are not the same as the beige ones similar to the ones I remember sitting on my Dad's desk in 1995-2001.
What are so special about Packard Bell computers that I absolutely have to have one?
Short answer, nothing! They are just all in this particular context, a generic beige-box IBM clone PC from the 1990s, which the supposed version I am looking to have would be the oldest having as the OS which it would have shipped with from the factory in Freemont, California, Microsoft's Windows 3.11 for Workgroups, and the latest being Windows 95.
My belief that Windows XP is also a meme OS and that makes it over-rated, also contributes to my wanting to have a computer that would have been from before the Windows XP era, so I guess that counts for something. Plus the activation feature of Windows XP and versions since, (Like Vista, 7, 8.1, 10, and 11 for instance) make me even further interested in turning back the clock (in a sense) for me from the 2020s to the 1990s. I mean, I have no time machine, but I'll take the next best thing. Plus, I don't believe tablet apps have a place on the desktop or laptop computer, and I will use my gaming PC running Windows 11 to play XBOX games, considering that the Windows license was indeed just a license, not a sale, plus an XBOX framework extra.
So, the story is not yet over. On Post #13, we will be looking at past attempts to get the Packard Bell, that was like I always wanted, and the two defeats and one near victory.
