I miss early 2000's computer and internet

Post Reply New Topic

I miss being on the computer and internet during the early 2000's. I am not sure what would be considered the "golden age" of the internet, whether that would be 90's/early 2000's, or today with social media and other technological advances. Technology can't remain the same forever, I guess. The only thing I don't miss is dial-up.

I miss my early 2000's PC cases that had style! Not the blandness of today.

http://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/ ... ter-cases/
If you don't like these designs, you could make your own designs--perhaps there are some makerspace resources in your area.

http://renovatedlearning.com/makerspace-resources/

I really missed the golden age of online forums. I wish they were more popular.

Facebook, Twitter and other quick-shot social media were some of the early driving forces for many people to use the Internet as part of their daily lives. But, they pretty much killed off email lists and forums. It's a shame, because sometimes people want to have actual conversations about complex topics, not just post a pic or spout their opinion in 140 characters or less.

Insofar as computer cases go, the better ones back then were sturdy and never cut your fingers. They were TANKS! But there have been some very good shifts, such as modern tower cases putting the PSU on the floor & fans on the top, as well as tool-less drive slots. The airflow in some newer cases also outperforms anything from the 2000's. With a micro-ATX board, it even allows for mostly passive cooling and practically zero noise. But don't fret about today's cases being bland and identical and well, all looking like they belong in the Bat-Cave. There has always been a thriving case mod community. A few nice examples:

Steampunk:


Dieselpunk:


Art Deco / Rivendell Elf:

That stained glass looks really cool! I sort of like a minimalist design myself. Function over form for me.

That's what rack servers are for.

You could also use woodgrain to decorate an old school PC case like the 486 in this build:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fbjYkPKRm-8

I don't know that I'd say I miss it but I have nostalgia running Doom 3 with low to medium textures on 800x600 on my decent but low end video card. The computer I had during that time was low end to decent but it was very well loved.

I love the one I have now too though. I hated the PC I had in the late 2000s and the one I had in the begin of the 2010s was decent to high end and I really don't have an opinion of it. It got the job done but it lack both the thrill of tweaking stuff to work on low end PCs and the thrill of being awesome like my current one.