Time to break the mold a bit and write a bit about myself.
As far as I can remember, I've had some sort of interaction with a computer. Back when I was a kid, I remember our old, large, desktop with Windows 95. I can't recall if I used a computer before that, maybe Windows 3.1, highly doubt it.
Anyways, computers have always fascinated me, because of the various amount of activities that could be done on a computer. I remember playing a bunch of old games on the computer, such as Doom, Putt Putt, some Sing-a-long game, those being my first. I also remember being fascinated by DOS, even though I never understood how it worked. Hell, I don't even remember if I could read back then, I just enjoyed using them. I remember staring at a DOS screen for half an hour, typing random stuff trying to get it to do something. Didn't work, but it amused me.
Back when Playstation came out, I had this great idea that I could play games on the computer, since the Playstation used some sort of CD format, so I figured the computer should be able to run it in some form. I inserted the disc into the computer, and such a bunch of files on the disc. I didn't know what they were, but I copied it over a game folder hoping the computer would recognize it as a game and run it. Lo and behold, nothing worked. So much for Crash Bandicoot on the PC.
I can remember using Netscape as an internet browser, and would go online in the wee early morning to play some Disney flash games. I remember when we got a PC with an AMD Athlon 2200+ CPU, 512 MB of Ram, a GeForce 2 mx 400 (Uh, Maybe?) with Windows XP installed on the system. By then, I already learned how to install hardware into the computer, programs, etc... Just by observing my dad. However, I've yet to learn how to properly maintain a computer and maintain proper security measures. So I had a bunch of programs installed would probably get a few viruses here and there, and so on.
By High School, I was already into online games such as Guild Wars, by 10th grade WoW. I learned how to take care of my computer a bit better, but I still installed clutterware. However, it's around 11th-12th grade when I exponentially began to learn more about computers, especially once I got my own desktop. I began to experiment more with what I can and cannot do. For example, I overclocked my GPU from 400 mhz to 480 mhz, added a gig of ram to my... gig. Experimented around with tweaking programs, tweaking games, and suchforth. On an unrelated note, I took two years of A+ Certification which helped further my understanding, but not so much since I already knew a lot about computers by the time I took those classes.
By the end of Senior year, I got my own laptop. A DV7-2143cl from Costco. I sorta knew what to expect from the laptop. However, I also undertook a new philosophy with my laptop, which was to avoid as much clutterware as I possibly could, and keep my system simple at working at minimal resource usage. It was around that time I started using RSS to read my news. Anyways, I kept and maintained my laptop for a week, stressing it, toying with it. You know, pushing its limits. A week later, a program caused it to have a catastrophic failure. I won't go into too much details, but I had a third laptop the next day, same model. For the next two months and a half, I continued to test the limits of the laptop. Yet, I felt like I could DO better. The CPU was only a 2.00 ghz Intel T6400 with an 833 mhz FSB. I felt that was too slow, and craved more.
I forgot to mention that in the weeks I had the laptop, I did a HEAVY amount of research on CPU's, Video Cards, laptops, etc... At that time, I could tell you the specs of every laptop model you'd given me. Most of them, at least.
Anyways, I ultimately ended up the laptop, feeling dissatisfied. I felt like it was a bad mistake, and went online later that night to look at laptops. I went to look at HP's quickship laptops, and the DV7-2170us caught my eye, the current model laptop I have now. I saw that there was an instant rebate on it that dropped it to around the same price of the laptop I previously had. Then I immediately logged in to my HP Academy account, which gives a nice minimal 5-8% discount on HP products. What I saw, on the price tag, was something that was not only cheaper than the Costco laptop, but also had superior specs. And I knew I could do without the two year extra warranty on the laptop. So, that same night, I brought it. My pride and joy, my DV7. I knew that no one else would have a laptop that compared in terms of spec and pricing, even for the following months, and I was happy that my patience has paid off.
Thanks to the vast wealth of information RSS feeds and my own personal philosophy on taking care of my computer (Keep it simple, minimize resources, use programs that won't impact performance...), along with my obsession with keeping it clean, I've reached a sweet spot in harmonic unison with myself and my laptop, and computers in general.. I haven't reached a unison with dealing with other people's computer problems though, since I find that I become extraordinarily angry with another person's problem on their computer, especially if the fix is simple or the problem was completely avoidable in the first place.
Here are some things I've done to my laptop.
-Installing Mac OSX on my system
-Running Linux
-Straight upgrade to Windows 7
-Fresh install of Windows 7
-Taking apart the back cover to view the components
-Modding the bios JUST a tad. (DOMO-KUN!)
It's been almost a year since I've gotten my laptop, but it runs like I just got it. Even after toasting the hell out of itself a few times, it still works like a charm. Average temperature may be higher, though.
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