It seems like the name "Packard" is bad luck. HP is one of the worst PC manufacturers today, their laptops are mostly junk

@@CaptainApathetic They work pretty good for me, especially for gaming.

I dunno. I bought an HP with an AMD A8 with 8 gigs RAM (shared video) back in 2011 in celebration of my son's birth. Still going strong, even after coffee was spilled ALL over it. Just disassembled and cleaned to fix. Then again, that was 8 years ago, and build quality is in constant flux in the computer world.

CaptainApathetic I means don’t think HP is that bad. They’re not the premier brand but hey, it works.

@@CaptainApathetic Their laptops are fine. Compared to someone like MSI or Toshiba (RIP) who made absolute shit.

Oh man, does that ever sound familiar! I think all of us who were the neighborhood "computer kid" back in the day has a horror story similar to that. That and being asked to fix a printer that got nuked by a power surge.

Those were the days 97 to 2005

This is very similar in an international level: I'm from Colombia, and of course i was the computer guy in the neighborhood. Not so many families had a computer back then, for a poor/middle class, mid 90's Colombian family that was a BIG investment. So, I was the only kid who had the power to delete viruses, crap software and make everything back to normal when the neighbors "creative hands" were to work lol!

I had a very similar experience, helping a lady who bred dogs build a website, she was a teachers assistant at my school, nice lady, she paid me $100, that would of been about 1997.

There are worse fates than death....

I was so disappointed. Some of the magic went out of the computer at that point.

it's funny how we're nostalgic for em now, everyone i know who had to use one back then Hated them

@@jetcheneau5811Nostalgia is partially defined by inaccurate or incomplete memory (and sometimes by no real memory at all behind it). This will help you understand a great deal of people's opinions on the Internet.

My Favorite line of the video

Ruffled for her pleasure

I wish it tasted and smelled like a potato chip.

I came across this comment just at that part lol

Ain’t nothing wrong with fondling chips.

Terrible he lost all files man

*Presses button*

I like how that quote makes freeman sound like a cluts

i just started playing half life for the first time. always feels weird playing games that came out before you were born

@@totallynotyosuke8660 I'm surprised you care about these old computers any.

Mr Burns? I thought it was Duke Nukem.

Duke Nukem

@@louistournas120 Noo noo no, it's not the Duke Nukem voice he often does. Maybe he's trying to go Duke Nukem but the voice registers differently. There's definitely times he sounds more like Mr Burns than Duke.

I’d sound like mr.burns too if i was in the presence of a $2,300 computer

Mmmmmm ....

I don’t have nostalgia for that because my family was actively using a CRT up until 2019 despite having a LG 4K tv in another room. I still have the CRTs but they’re now in my basement

plonggggg

And the x-ray of my upper body on the wall opposite of my PC desk after de-gaussing a 21 inch Viewsonic CRT

I loooooooooved Degaussing. Every monitor made its own unique sounds and visuals. And one of the best parts is you had to wait for whatever to build up after at least 10+ minutes or so. the longer you wait, the sweeter the degauss!

Still can't get over Microsoft bundled 10 with so much pay to pay shit. Even Solitaire. Such garbage

Why won't windows 10 work? it never ever does what you expect it to based on every previous version of windows. And why are they trying to neuter the functionality of windows by relegating basic functions and settings to "apps"?

@@naneek2 noone knows. Control panel worked perfectly fine...

I'm still wondering why there hasn't been a sea of lawsuits against Microsoft yet for installing proprietary third-party software on windows PCs without the user's knowledge and consent nor a way for the user to opt out of it. At least in the EU there should be massive lawsuits, as this violates the GDPR in every way possible! Also, last time I booted my mom's laptop, immediately when it got to the desktop it showed a giant banner advertising the new chromium-based Edge browser, begging me the set is as default. Wasn't that exactly how Microsoft got a Million dollar antitrust fine in the nineties?

@@danem2215 the thing with solitaire is it OUGHT to be bundled, but they have made it too freemium-ey for solitaire. I've reinstalled the vista one personally.

My first was a PB, my brother talked me into taking it back and getting an Acer.

Someone's needs to create the Packard ball "home" in real life

I love the Packard Bell Explorer. It harkens back to when computing was new and exciting and confounding. Windows was actually good back then

@@pozloadescobar When you didn't need 8 fucking gigabytes to sit there and do nothing... only 16 megabytes to sit there and do nothing LOL

@@tsm688 You are right on the money! My generation grew up spoiled with all that extra RAM. Our newbie engineers often write memory leaks just because they've never felt any serious memory constraints

I was thinking like they knew it would freeze a lot so make the reset button easy

you will only do it for a few times until you either learn not to do that or throw the computer out :D

yup, and this was the days before "hold the button down so the computer can make sure you want to do the thing even though the thing might be stupid" for both the reset and the power button, so when you bumped it, or little fingers poking all the things they shouldn't found the buttons, or even the cat headbutting the case because you're spending more time on solitaire than cat time, SURPRISE!

Still one of my favorite games. Amazing writing and the art style still holds up.

I miss how the 90s felt full of possibilities

Me as well, I miss when exploring what windows 95 could do felt like an adventure.

"What new Twitter nonsense will I discover today?"

At least this one is rubber-dome; the Packard Bell I had back in 1993 had the foam-and-foil BTC keyboard, and that was no fun at all to type on.

Yeeessss

The Microsoft "Natural" keyboard is still one of my all time favorite keyboards. If they were made with modern gaming switches, I guarantee I'd own one. Those things were super comfy to type on once you got used to them.

They’re still making keyboards with that shape, y’know

Any 90s set up could benefit from the addition of 1 of those because they are awesome keyboards. I still have 2 of them (I don't use them anymore though).

MS weren't/aren't the only ones to make those keyboards. There are still companies that make them, as well as keyboards that come apart in the middle

personally don't like it, but I 'get' the charm.

Cheap, but broke a lot. So basically the Kia (esp at the time) of PCs. Or maybe the Yugo.

@@nthgth The thing is, unlike a cheap piece of shit PC made today, you Can fix a Packard Bell with minimal difficulty if you're willing to sit down and read.

No. You could use it to store hearts though. HEARTS OF YOUR ENEMIES.

I bet the inside smells like teen spirit.

Only a negative creep would buy this monstrosity

@@Whipster-Old hearts is pre-installed

So it’s a broken-heart,shaped box?

Haven't we all xD

I think those of us that came in contact with them in their heyday that had one die expressed identical sentiment.

maybe windows movie maker is the other one you're thinking of?

Maybe you were thinking of Microsoft 3D Movie Maker, or some other similar product from Knowledge Adventure?

Knowledge Adventure had those sound effects on Jumpstart, I think. Possibly all of their games with a painting minigame.

Was it Kid Pix Deluxe? That’s what I thought of when he started painting lol

i strongly remember the rainbow pen sound effect too. but idk why

It's placed in the corner because 90% of your computing is reflected from the walls.

What VCR brand were they partnered with?

I particularly love the microsoft money sound effect

It's important to have a color monitor, sound card, CD or DVD drive, USB ports and speakers, 3D video card. I love my multimedia PC!

I'm already thinking of the background music that played in the first-time setup for Windows XP and the installer for some versions of MSN Internet Access.

I agree so much with this

Great observation. You could put your name on it. It’d become Lastname’s Dilemma then you could drop anonymous references to it around social media and start a thing.

@@MOS6582 "The Obsolution Dilenma" "A dilenma mainly PC enthusiasts had in the 90s. A consequence of technology moving so fast that by the time you bought a new PC part, put it in your computer and booted it up, it would already become obsolete."

“My new computer's got the clocks, it rocks But it was obsolete before I opened the box You say you've had your desktop for over a week? Throw that junk away, man, it's an antique! Your laptop is a month old? Well that's great If you could use a nice, heavy paperweight” - Weird Al Yankovic

SLA?

Service level agreement

IBM invented that combo sound card fax modem ironically for there PS/2 and Eduquest systems. They sucked so hard that IBM ended up dumping them on the Eduquest line to clear the stock.

Truly a ‘seal of quality’.

I remember lining up canyon.mid on a number of machines all at once

I would always go into paint and draw stupid pictures and change them to the desktop wallpaper.

same, I remember playing Journeyman and the Spiderman Cartoon Maker. I spent a ridiculous amount of time making crappy cartoons.

@@Jeffmetal42 totally forgot about that spiderman cartoon maker. That was amazing for its time though.

Or outhouse.

Hahaha it sure is a shitty mouse i'll say that

Lmao, stupid engineers! You should've given them shit for a) building a crappy mouse that doesn't even survive a single drop and b) not telling you that it isn't ready for durability testing just yet XD

What? No geos?

CHANGE MY PITCH UP, SMACK MY BITCH UP

Juno

@@laowhy86 Juno had FREE e-mail! No ISP required. Ad-supported, and yep, you could also sign up for their ISP eventually, if I remember right.

How about a video on GEnie, the dial-up online service from General Electronic Information Services that served as a cheaper CompuServe competitor starting in 1985 before AOL and Prodigy were even a thing. GEnie was initially a text-only service like CompuServe and thus could be used on any platform with a modem and terminal program (PC, Mac, C64, Tandy CoCo 3, etc, etc.). It stuck around until 1999, when it closed for good due to the Y2K problem (and a dwindling user base due to the rise of the internet. A couple other online service worth doing a video on are: Apple eWorld - This was Apple’s attempt to get into the dial-up online service market and was Mac only and the Microsoft Network (later renamed MSN Internet Access then Microsoft Dial-up) , which started out as propriety dial-up online service that required special software from Microsoft to access and I believe was Windows 95 only at first (i.e. No Mac or Win 3.1 compatibility). Whit the rise of the public internet/Public ISP’s, Microsoft switched the Microsoft Network towards to standard dial-up service renaming it Microsoft Internet Access then Microsoft Dial-up which still exists today though with only a small user base I imagine. For anyone reading this too young to know what what a dial-up Online Service was, well here’s an explanation: Before the internet was easily publicly accessible (early internet access was for University/Educational, Governmental, and some corperate use only) but this all change as laws/regs governing the network change allowing public ISP’s to spring up around 1995. Before then there was something know as an dial-up Online Service Provider you could access via a dial-up modem. These where basically wall gardens where you could access various services on proprietary networks. At first they where simply text-based services (examples: CompuServe and GEnie) but later gained GUI front ends and graphical based services, thought some Online Service providers like AOL started with GUI interfaces from the get-go. The types of services they offered include message boards, shareware/freeware software downloads, information access including reference sources like dictionaries, encyclopedias, etc., chat services, online shopping, technical support from major hardware and software companies who had a presence on these networks, and in-network email services (Some like CompuServe offered limited email sending between other online service providers eventually gaining full internet email access). Gradually, starting around 1995, online services started to offer internet services such web access, FTP (File Transfer Protocol) access, and full email access causing them to gradually discontinue their proprietary services in favor web-based alternatives or TCP-IP based alternatives that used their own stand-a-alone software like AOL’s AIM instant messaging software or a stand-alone email client. Many of the them eventually lost too many custermers to standard dial-up ISP’s that they closed shop entirely or switched to being just a standard Dial-up ISP.shutting down their proprietary servers and services. AOL is one that continued it proprietary services as a whole longer then others towards then end most had shuttered or moved to the web. They still exists but only as an eMail provider and Dial-up ISP for the few who still use it (and yes, some people still use dial-up ISP’s in 2020 for various reasons such as cost or being rural users without easy broadband access). They were partly a victim of the rise in broadband internet in the late 90’s of which they as a dial-up online service/Dial-up ISP couldn’t compete with since not just anyone can offer broadband internet service unlike dial-up which operates over standard POTS/copper telephone lines. Given that AOL was unable to offer little in the way of desirable proprietary services by the 2000’s you couldn’t get via a standard TCP-IP connection, there was little incentive for AOL users to get a broadband connection and then pay for AOL on top of that so most dropped AOL unless they were sticking with dial-up and AOL made the one remaining AOL service that some former AOL customers turned broadband user had kept AOL for (email) free to use for everyone much like Gmail, Yahoo mail, etc.

Bet someone modded an SSD sound effect with that! You just know someone has to have,

Kind of goes with the modem handshaking sound. Nostalgic, but you kinda don't want to hear it too much.

@@josephcote6120 Similarly, hearing the old modem dial tones is fantastic. I don't want to hear it every time I get on the internet.

@@josephcote6120 Quite,like chalk across a board.Nostalgia should only take in so much! I think the ‘Amiga Forever’ software had a disk-drive sound option,if memory serves.

@@Doobie3010 The WinUAE amiga emulator, yes.

Yea that would make a dope sleeper. Would love to modify that case to build my machine in it.

​@Aidan Slobodian Packaging, you could push the mobo forward and have a cable cabinet but there's no room to do the same for the PSU so it can breathe and allow cables to go that way. You'd be looking at an expensive proprietary PSU or making the whole case several inches larger, both non starters.

@@Broken_Yugo Hmm. True, I still would have considered making it a tad "taller", then placing an existing "back plate", or something like, "under" the thing, with guides, to allow you to also have venting for air.

Yep

It needs the space at the back for exhaust anyway.

In the category "My God what were they thinking?" also goes their practice of enabling retailers -- to keep a good relation with them, never mind the customer -- re-selling 2nd hand/refurbished product as brand new. I remember having to support customers that were 4th or 5th owners of a "brand spanking new" PB.

Damn you, punny human. I now can't unread this!

Boo

They cut something, but it was not the edge.

@@Whipster-Old the cheese?

Little did the public realize, there was actually a cutting edge on the inside, and it forced many a techs to bleed when they installed RAM. Seriously, though. Most PC makers didn't roll the edges of the steel inside their chassis until after 2000, and if something gave way unexpectedly when you were working on, you earned a new scar.

Always and its funny for us old-school fans

Gave me chills lol

😂How funny. I sometimes run chkdsk or defrag on my retro computers for that exact reason. It's just so relaxing! 🤓

Back on the tech support lines we used to call the Navigator "Aggrevator"; it was buggy and obnoxious and yes it was VERY much a selling point.

I can't wait for him to do a full review of the series, or at least the first game.

I got so nostalgic hearing that little flute ditty while wandering around the apartment. I never got very far in the game, but it sure was amazing to play at the time, when CD drives were new. It was the very first CD-ROM game I ever saw in action.

I only ever had a demo of J3 which came with a copy of Ryvn I think. I should play it some day.

@@jasonblalock4429 It was included in a bundle with the computer my family bought in the mid 90s. The music and atmosphere was magical. Took me forever to actually beat it.

Perfectly period-appropriate avatar.

I was going to say congrats Billy! Awesome shout-out and collab

@mike h What? We all did. That's how I amassed my collection of vintage units that I lost in the divorce. Still makes me teary eyed.

@mike h In the 90s companies still chucked their computer stuff in the dumpster. Att dumpster I found my first Pentium, a 75 MHz. While dumpster diving was the first time I got my hands on a scsi raid card and over time the hard drives for the raid. It was an easy way to get parts and about the only way for me to get ahold of server type parts. Dumpster diving is what sparked this individual's imagination setting me on the pathway to go from a family of migrant workers to an engineering manager for one of the premier cpu design/manufacturing corporations. You do what you need to do to succeed & follow your dreams.

Similar to my friends and I and a game we had called Hollywood.

I want to make a loud pc build one day. One of those old HDD, an old AMD cpu air cooler with a old AMD gpu. I will fill the case with fans and max them out also.

@@pleasedontwatchthese9593 😂

@@pleasedontwatchthese9593 IT’S WHISPER QUIET!!! NOTICE HOW GOOD MY SPEAKERS SOUND IN JILL OF THE JUNGLE!!!

Awesome, did the company still have the assembly line in the US?

Those cables tho

Oh shit, i didn't expect you here

I love this design. it way ahead of its time.

Most packard bells from mid 90s had same color sceme and design elements

Yes you are right

Oh man, living the life.