The computers in my collection

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I have 33 computers in my collection, give or take.

My main PC running Windows 10 alongside my entertainment
PC running Ubuntu Linux
For most people, having 33 computers to one's self is entirely obscene. Few people need more than one or two computers and if I weren't into collecting and playing with older computers, I'd probably have just two computers: a desktop PC, and a laptop. These 33 computers I count here are really just "traditional" computers; laptop or desktop boxes we all know and love.

If you wanted to be really technical and literal, I actually have 43 computers, if you want to count phones and tablets. In the category of phones and tablets, I've got 10 devices. I've got several "dumb" phones like a Motorola Razr, LG Xenon and a Sony Ericsson Z520a. Yes, these devices are computers because they all have a central processing unit and some RAM and are capable of carrying out calculations. 

Left to right: Sony Ericsson Z520a, LG Xenon, iPhone 5,
Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge
In fact, according to Dictionary.com, a computer is defined as a "programmable electronic device designed to accept data, perform prescribed mathematical and logical operations at high speed and display the results of these operations". This means that, by definition, dumb phones like old flip phones (that my Motorola Razr and Sony Ericsson are) are actually computers. 

Rant aside, the main things that set smartphones apart from "dumb" phones (I think they're actually called feature phones) are their obvious simplicity and powerful operating systems but also their incredible computing power and performance for their relative size. In fact, if Geekbench 3 is to be believed, the Samsung Galaxy S6 has a multicore performance score of around 5200-5400, where my 2006 Core 2 Duo iMac has a multicore performance score of around 2000, which means that the Galaxy S6 likely outperforms computers from around 7 to 10 years ago in a dramatic way, and of course newer phones are even faster still. And, with the way I see it, these machines with Intel Core 2 Duos and AMD Athlon X2s from 10 years ago are still very usable and useful even in today's world, as their performance is similar to lower-end machines of today.

I also have a Palm Pre, Samsung Galaxy S3 and Apple iPhone 5 as the proper smartphones I don't use. The phone that I use is a Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge and even though it's two generations out of date, it's still a great phone that does everything I ask of it and is still a great performer too. I also have an older Samsung Galaxy Tab and a Lenovo tablet, both of which aren't very usable because of their old, outdated hardware.

Out of the phones that I have, I've really only used a few of them on a regular basis. My Sony Ericsson Z520a served as the first phone I've ever had and got it when I first started taking the bus to school. I then upgraded to my LG Xenon phone, then to an iPhone 5 and then to my current Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge.

Furthermore, you can also consider video game consoles to be computers as they also fit the dictionary definition of "computer". And, if you wanted to go as far as possible, you can even consider Tamagotchis to be computers as well - of which I have three, in addition to digital cameras and smartwatches. Everything above considered, I have a total of at least 60 computers.

Let's return our focus to "traditional" computers.

Like mentioned above, I have around 33 computers that I've collected over the years. Had I never gotten rid of any in the past, I'd probably have around 40. Some of the machines I've gotten rid of include an iMac G3 which died and was unfixable, an IBM Aptiva which stopped performing its power-on self-test and I couldn't figure out why as well as my IPC machine, a past machine in an RJC case, a Compaq Deskpro and an MDG PC, the last four having been recycled since I no longer desired to have them around, and I kind of regret getting rid of at this point. 

The first computer that I had to myself was my HP Mini netbook. I bought it back in around 2010-2011 for something like $250CAD with money I had saved up. Prior to this netbook, I had been sharing a Certified Data PC with my brother, which is the in-house brand for London Drugs, a chain of retail stores in Canada. While I had this netbook, I was still using this shared PC for playing games, because my netbook was clearly not capable of this. I do still have this machine today, but it's currently in pieces as I have ripped it apart with the intent of replacing the LCD, but never having done so.

Well before I broke the screen on my HP Mini netbook, I got a Dell Latitude D505 as an "upgrade" to my netbook. I wanted a laptop that not only had a larger screen and was faster, but also had an optical drive as my netbook lacked one. Believe it or not, this Dell Latitude D505 was faster and more usable on the Internet than my HP Mini, despite the fact that this Dell had a slower-clocked Intel Celeron CPU from the early 2000s and half the RAM. A number of years later, I gave up this laptop to someone who needed it and I purchased a Dell Latitude C600 in its place.

My dad eventually got a new computer and I got hold of his old PC, another Certified Data PC, entirely identical to the one my brother and I had been sharing. After receiving a new graphics card and RAM upgrade, this machine served as my main PC for a number of years and has appeared in a number of my YouTube videos. This computer had an AMD Athlon X2 4000+ CPU clocked at 2.1GHz which I eventually overclocked to a stable 2.8GHz, 4GB of DDR2 RAM and an ATi Radeon HD 4670 GPU with 1GB of video memory. This machine died, but I'll talk about it down below.

Shortly after this Certified Data PC had become my main computer in around 2008 or 2009, I became interested in older computers. While I was born in the mid 1990s, I don't consider myself to have been a proper 90s kid and I didn't get to experience 90s era computing, I had more experience with early 2000s era computing. I began watching YouTube videos of these older 90s computers. I credit a lot of my interest in collecting older computers to YouTube users like BBISHOPPCM and Uxwbill. 

Screenshot from my video "Compaq Presario 2200 2015
revisit - the best 90s PC audio system"
As time passed I became more and more interested in getting a proper retro computer. In 2010, I got my first "vintage" PC - my Compaq Presario 2200, with a 180MHz Cyrix Media GXi CPU. I was so excited to have it and I played around with it a lot even though I had no idea what I was doing at the time. 

These machines are hard to find, but just because they're rare doesn't mean that they're valuable. I bought this thing for $25 on eBay in 2010, where it was around 12 years old at the time. This machine is now 20 years old, and is currently the oldest machine in my possession, which means I definitely still have it. If I had to get rid of most of my computers and keep only a few behind, this is one that I would keep behind. The only other machine I had which was just as old was my IBM Aptiva, which as mentioned above was recycled as it quit doing its power-on self-test. 

Time passes and I collected more and more computers. As of late, my most recent collection was an eMachines netbook from 2010, preceded by an HP Pavilion PC, preceded by my 2015 Retina Display MacBook Pro. Other machines have changed too, most notably my main PC. In 2012 my Certified Data PC quit booting from any hard drives, much in the same way my brother's Certified Data PC did (I attribute this to failed capacitors on the motherboard). Replacing my Certified Data PC is my current machine - my HP ENVY laptop. 

Interestingly enough though, the case and power supply that my Certified Data PC had still live on. My brother got a new computer a couple years back and has since upgraded everything in it, like the motherboard, CPU and graphics card. I took the motherboard, CPU and graphics card that he was no longer using and built a new computer in the case my Certified Data PC was built in. This new machine has an AMD FX-4300 quad core CPU running at an even 4.0GHz, 6GB of DDR3 RAM and has an NVIDIA GTX 750 Ti GPU. The only money we spent on this machine was to buy the 1TB hard drive that it has. This computer is more powerful than my HP ENVY laptop in every way, so why isn't it my main computer?

This computer isn't my main machine for the simple facts that it runs Ubuntu Linux and has the power supply that my Certified Data PC had (which is around 10 years old now). If it were to become my main PC, it'd have to be running Windows 10 and it would have to have a new power supply, and of course I can't afford either, so it has to wait. 

An actual list of the machines that I have, hopefully in order of acquisition.

  1. HP Mini netbook with a 1.6GHz Intel Atom (I think it was an N270) CPU
  2. Certified Data PC with a 2.1GHz AMD Athlon X2 4000+ CPU
  3. Compaq Presario 2200 from 1997, with a 180MHz Media GXi CPU
  4. (order here is much sketchier)
  5. IPC computer with a 333MHz AMD K6 CPU (No longer have it)
  6. RJC computer with a 266MHz Intel Pentium II or equivalent non-Intel CPU (No longer have it)
  7. Dell Latitude D505 with a 1.3GHz Intel Celeron CPU
  8. HP Compaq d530 convertible minitower with a 2.8GHz Pentium 4 CPU
  9. MDG computer with a 2.8GHz Pentium 4 CPU (No longer have it)
  10. Compaq Presario 4100CA with an 850MHz Celeron CPU (now 850MHz Pentium III)
  11. IBM Aptiva with a 233MHz AMD K6 (I think) CPU
  12. IBM ThinkPad i series 1300 laptop with a 500MHz Celeron CPU
  13. Compaq Deskpro ENS C500 (I think) with a 500MHz Celeron CPU (I had two, now just one)
  14. Apple Power Mac G4 with two 1.25GHz PowerPC 7455 CPUs
  15. Toshiba Satellite M50-MX5 with a 1.8GHz Pentium M CPU
  16. Apple iMac G3 with a 300MHz PowerPC 750 (No longer have it)
  17. Toshiba NB305 with a 1.6GHz Intel Atom CPU
  18. Toshiba Qosmio with a 2.0GHz Intel Core 2 Duo CPU
  19. Late 2006 20" Apple iMac with a 2.1GHz Intel Core 2 Duo CPU
  20. 12" Apple PowerBook G4 with a 867MHz PowerPC 7455 CPU
  21. HP Compaq dc7600 with a 3.0GHz Pentium 4 CPU
  22. Apple PowerBook G3 with a 500MHz PowerPC 750 CPU
  23. 12" Apple iBook G4 with a 1.33GHz PowerPC 7455 CPU
  24. Dell Latitude C600 with an 800MHz Pentium III CPU
  25. IBM eServer xSeries 205 with a 2.66GHz Pentium 4 CPU
  26. Toshiba Satellite P30 with a 3.4GHz Pentium 4 CPU
  27. Compaq Deskpro EP/SB with a 450MHz Pentium III CPU
  28. RJC computer with a 1.0GHz AMD Athlon XP CPU
  29. Dell OptiPlex GX240 Desktop PC with a 1.7GHz Pentium 4 CPU
  30. Dell Dimension 2200 with a 1.2GHz Intel Celeron CPU
  31. eMachines T5026 with a 3.2GHz Pentium 4 CPU
  32. A black and red custom-built PC with a 1.0GHz AMD Athlon XP CPU
  33. A white custom-built PC with a 1.6GHz AMD Athlon XP 2000+ CPU
  34. A Toshiba Satellite that is so broken I know pretty much nothing about it
  35. A custom built PC with an 800MHz Pentium III CPU
  36. IBM ThinkCentre SFF PC with a 3.0GHz Pentium 4 CPU
  37. Dell Latitude C600 with an 850MHz Pentium III CPU
  38. eMachines W6409 with a 3.0GHz Pentium 4 CPU
  39. 2015 13" Retina Display Apple MacBook Pro with a 2.7GHz Intel Core i5 CPU
  40. HP Pavilion a1610n with a 2.2GHz AMD Athlon 4200+ CPU
  41. eMachines 250-1915 netbook with a 1.6GHz Intel Atom CPU

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