I pay about $1AUD or less for my HDD's, either Quantum or Seagate, 2X 180GB at the moment, but twin 500GB Hitachi SATA's are on the top of my list when I get a MB that supports SATA.

I had an old Unisys 386 for my first useable computer, complete with Commander Keen and Doom!, but technically my first computer was an 80086 I picked up off the side of the road during one of my scrounging trips when I was 10 years old it didn't work and I still have the CPU somewhere in my collection of old processor chips.

The computer itself had an orange monochrome monitor built into the case and wasn't equipped with a disk drive of any kind.

I was given a box of old HDD's about 8 years ago, most of them no more than 200MB and many in 5 1/4" form that took up two drive bays and contained up to six aluminum hard disks and magnesium head assemblys. I stripped them all down for scrap Aluminium then, but today I'd be inclined to keep them as antiques!.

I'm 20 and my first decent computer was a P75(that I OC'd to 120mhz) I built a few months after getting my 386, so I don't have much experience with using primative computers, but I've certainly scrapped my fair shair of them (more than 100)

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My much loved machines...
1990 E32 BMW 735i - Daley Driver
1983 Okuma LB15 Twin Turret NC turning center - Money Maker!
1985 Suzuki Sierra - Off-road thrasher and mobile shooting platform
1981 HMT NH26 20HP 30" Gap Bed Engine Lathe - Money Maker!
1966 Lancia Flavia 1800 Coupe - Weekend toy
1941 South Bend 9" Model C Workshop Lathe - Antique restoration project.

wowow Abacus! i remember working with those.

my first Pc had 4.7mhz cpu and a 20mb HD and 640k ram, and a monocrome monitor then i upgrade to a 16 color monitor and that was nice back late 80s early 90s

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Every job is a self-portrait of the person who did it.
Autograph your work with excellence.

One of my first jobs was to design a floppy disk interface for a home computer. Way way before PCs. Before that it was all tape drives (or cards at college). It is amazing how you could put the card bits back in and repunch if it was only a small change? My second job was to design a colour card to drive a colour TV.

Showing my age!!

john

I think I beat all of you. My first computer was a Commodore Vic20 with only 5KB of RAM memory (purchased at CircuitCity for $250). No cassette tape, floppy, or hard drive to save your program and Basic was the only language available.

http://www.old-computers.com/MUSEUM/computer.asp?c=252
http://www.cedmagic.com/history/commodore-vic20.html
http://www.commodore.ca/products/vic...ore_vic-20.htm

i picked up 2 320gb drives at bestbuy for 99 bucks WD 7200rpm 16mb cache Sata.

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E53 '04 x5 3.0 6-speed manual

THe computer I worked on doing hardware and software was the NASCOM! It was a home computer but never marketed properly. I worked for LUCAS who owned it at the time.

John