Compaq Presario CDS 520 

That startup sound most certainly brings back memories. I have that same keyboard too!

Aw, it was a lot cuter than I remember it. I remember my grandmother gave me one of these back in the early 2000s, I was too young to know how to use it but I just remember Paint, and it having a internal sound card maybe? Because I remember recording my voice without needing a mic or anything.. fun memories with a computer that was a few years older than me lol.

@pomfrit93 Oh, I see what you mean now. That's the floppy drive making that noise, the computer is checking to see if it is there and functional.

Jesus i had one almost the same as this except mine was a 486 sx 66mhz that originally came with 4mb Ram and a 270 Mb hard drive. Top of the line when it was new. This brings back some very fond memories.

The CDS 520 was the first computer I ever had, from 1994 till I gave it to a friends kids to play with in 2001. During that time I did some serious upgrading and turned it into a decent machine far beyond it's original specifications. I installed 64 MB memory, an Evergreen 586 Overdrive CPU that ran at 133Mhz, quite a jump from the original 66Mhz CPU and a 2Gb HDD using overlay software loaded at bootup to get round the 450Kb HDD limitation. The biggest upgrade was adding a 1MB graphics card to vastly improve the screen colors. This involved some major surgery, disconnecting the cable connecting the monitor to the inbuilt graphics chip and making a new cable that connected the monitor to the new graphics card. The last step was getting rid of the 1" black border round the display. Inside the monitor case is a row of potentiometers and by adjusting these I was able to get the image to expand to fill the entire screen. After all this upgrading my old CDS 520 ran Windows 98 very well and was a pretty good computer until I retired it in 2001.

Yeah, Compaq really did make some great long lasting computers. My main computer is a 2004 Compaq Presario SR1320NX, which is technically an HP. At first I was disappointed when they merged with HP, but in retrospect HP really is a great computer company as well.

@duranmedine The speakers are loud, and a bit annoying sometimes because the volume is software controlled and only has like 4 levels(quitest, quiet, quiet,and BLARINGLY LOUD) It's funny you say that it looks like a Macintosh, I remember people used to say they thought it WAS a Macintosh when they first saw it. Macs were famous for they're all in ones. And it's funny, I have a Peforma 5200 all the way to the right of this table and I have a video of it too. (But it's rebadged PowerMac 5500/225 )

I used to have a 500 series. We couldn't get windows 95 on it because of a math co-processer chip or somthing like that. I'm not really sure, I was like 5 at the time. I still have the keyboard from it. I'm typing this comment with it. This video brings back so many memories, thanks for uploading.

That machine is... beautiful, in it's own way.

We were using my Compaq 520 as a main computer for a long time, until about 2002 when it was way obsolete. After we had a Packard Bell, which I used to play The Sims and Midtown Madness on. It was on this computer that I became familiar with the internet. Then we got a faithful Compaq Presario 4660 which was shaped like a rocket ship, unfortunately it was given away in 2005.

Oh my god that was my old computer that I owned. My neighbour give me that computer back in 2002. That computer was so limited with windows 95 it kept on crashing every time I use it.

@gavenusman I agree! I'm glad you finally got yours to work, this computer is my favorite one since it was my first computer ever. It's very common for hard drives to stop working after awhile, this computer is on its 3rd one.

Wow! It's a Windows 95! Good desktop.

OOOOOOHHHHH MAN. Crazy nostalgic trip down memory lane.... insanity. Did your come with Microsoft Encarta '94 like mine did? MAN! That was incredible... you could also hook up a phone cable to the back, and make a phone call from your PC! I'm sorry, but kids these days just don't know how amazing they have it. I was 11 when I got this for Christmas in '94, and it's probably the single most amazing gift I've ever gotten. It truly blew my mind! Thanks for the clip!

You don't happend to have diagnostic disks for this pc? Just bought one but having problems booting...

@dice228YT Awesome! It's amazing all the things they could fit into one box in 1994...

It is because of the AT powersupply. While the OS can remove every session-specific file (swap etc), it can't physically turn off the computer. So the user has to do that manually. ATX supplies fixed that. But ATX came in 1995. so after this hit the market.

Yeah, I broke out the old record player at the same time I was recording this video. My dad has a really nice 80's stereo, and tons and tons and tons of lp records.

NoteTalker from Willow Pond. As for the sound card, it is a ESS ES688 AUudioDrive which is SoundBlaster 16 compatible. It's not that easy to upgrade, because the sound card and video card cannot be upgraded because the monitor and speakers are built in. The only things that can be upgraded are the RAM (To 16mb I think), the Hard Drive (To a certain extent, newer hard drives won't work), and the floppy or CD-ROM drive if needed.

I have the same computer with windows 3.11 and Office installed

That's probably what happened. My dad only has a copy of windows 98. He was probably trying to put that on. I was sure it was 95, but it was years ago. The little compaq programs included with it were fun to play with.

Yes! My old Compaq Presario 4660 had that case as well.

BTW, what was the clicking sound at 0:09?

It's called Chip's Challenge. It came in the Microsoft Best of Entertainment software suite.

OMFG!!! I remember that game, "Chip's Challenge"!!! From "Microsoft Entertainment Pack" or something like this! I didn't played that for 3 or 4 years. I still have that game somewhere =)

Why do very old PCs say "It's now safe to turn off your computer" when turning it off?

Ah, that game was pretty dang addictive! Some levels simply could not be beaten, as strange as it sounds. At least they let you skip ahead if you struggled too much.

Wow, I have the exact same computer. I'm running FreeDOS on it. I've upgraded it to 64 MB of RAM (the maximum it can handle), a 6 GB HD, an NE2000 network card, and a DVD burner (can read CDs and DVDs and can burn CDs but not burn DVDs (can't find a DVD burning program for dos)). I hope to get a Pentium Overdrive soon.

@itzmeoscar Oh yeah, I remember the upgrades. I never did own a copy of them though. Glad to hear that I didn't go out and buy them! Haha. And yeah, my Compaq has been through 3 hard drives. And the old low capacity hard drives are really hard to find these days. I agree with you though, the quality has certainly gone down, but it is nice to see they're still making them (even though they're HP's).

It's actually an Apple PowerMac 5500/225. I do have a video of it, but no comparison video yet.

Wow! Did you find a way to upgrade the graphics card too? Mine goes up to 1024x768 w/ 16 colors, or 800x600 w/ 256 colors max.

hey, I used to have the exact same PC! Parents bought it in 1994 for $2000cdn from Future shop, a Best buy subsidary here in Canada. Anyways, currently using a Phenom X4 9850BE rig with 4GB of RAM and an ATI HD4870 video card while using the original Compaq keyboard!

This too was my first Desktop. I got mine at Circuit City (RIP) and it was 1400 bucks.

@Dariusjat Thanks! I just keep it in a warm environment and make sure to start it up every here and there. It has been through 3 hard drives unfortunately though

What's the program you used to make the computer talk just before you played Chip's Challenge? What kind of sound card does the machine have in it? Because it's an all in one case, how easily can the system be upgraded?

I have a 95 model comppaq 5520 model,someone had put windows 98 on it and forgotton the passwords so i reformatted and put windows 95 on it using the windows 98 floppy with cd rom support for the pc to see the cd.There a vid on my profile of the compter.

Because at that time you hadn't ATX form factor, (in which the power supply can be switched off automatically by the system). Therefore people usually had to turn it off manually in the power switch button. So the system (Windows 95/98) told it was safe to turn it off to avoid data corruption. At the time when ATX power form was introduced, when that screen appeared, the system would cut down the power automatically.

I used to own one of these. I put an AMD 5x86 133 cpu in the upgrade socket, and filled the ram sockets with like 32 mb ram. Ran Windows NT 4.0 sp3 like a champ.

The entertainment pack? Skifree! :D

I agree! Just like old cars.

My first PC (ok, it was technically my dad's...) was a windows 95 compaq presario, and i loved playing SimSafari and TIM3 on it. Shame i can't remember what happened to it.

@fertub26 I know, mine was considered "Multimedia" as well, but it was a lower end model so it didn't do as much as other computers at the time.

@ZVONIMIR111 Not sure, something inside the computer. It always makes that noise

Aww, I would've loved to have some of those old programs. I've spent hours looking for Media Pilot with now luck.

Yeah, I remember when we first got it a lot of people thought that it was a Macintosh.

It’s really cool

that was my first PC!!!

@pomfrit93 I'm not hearing it. It could be music though, the radio was on in the background.

It was my first computer too!!

good computer.

err, that was my 2nd. My first was a Packard bell, if i recall.

at the beginning i heard the song mrs robinson

Yeah, this computer originally had Windows 3.1, then we upgraded to Windows 95. I wanted to upgrade to Windows 98 but that requires a math coprocessor.

Now i repair same machine, put Windows 98 SE with 3GB hard disk and a lot of DOS videogames, run like charm.

@theryan96 Oh gosh, I can only imagine. Funny, I've had people post this at least a dozen times throughout my videos over the years. Great minds think alike!

@Loix404 Your monitor might not go that high. Mine only goes to 800x600 with 256 colors.

do you have the lis of disc that came with it, like descent and magic carpet?????????

I remember this. my second computer. :D If I remember correctly I also got Microsoft Flight Simulator 95 with the purchase.

Really? Is it the original installation of Windows 3.11? I remember mine came with a bunch of neat programs like TabWorks, Operator (telephone), Media Pilot (A neat media player), and neat games like The Incredible Machine. Unfortunately those were a lost 2 hard drives ago.

Yeah, they were fairly common. We had one in my 4th grade classroom too.

Why not to restore the machine into the original state?

@itzmeoscar Haha, Dell, everybody has Dell's these days! Believe it or not, we used this computer as our main computer up until like 2003! By then it was so obsolete though we could never buy new programs for it or do anything online besides E-Mails. Then in 2004 I went half with my parents to buy Compaq Presario SR1320NX for $500, which we are still using. I guess we're sort of Froogle, to say the least!

my screen can go up to 1600x1200 or any resoultion it can support, it has a nvidia riva tnt2 model 64 32 mb agp video card, my pc has no ISA slots, only pci and agp.

Hey that's great; thanks!

hi dear how are you? i have one equal, but do you how was the box of this computer? i´ll try to do a replica

Yeah, I've seen ones like those on eBay. Too bad he threw it out because it crashed! It was probably just a software problem. This computer has crashed on me a few times, and it's on its third hard drive. Other than that the rest of the hardware has lasted and is in good shape.

@smartalex61 Or even Win32s? That would run apps for 95.

@itzmeoscar Yeah, I'm the same way. I never play high end graphics games anymore, but most my friends still do. That's a tough decision to make though! I'm a bit oldschool though (even though I'm only 20 haha). I think it'll be awhile before I get a tablet. I do love the iPads though, but never got used to that touch screen. My main computer is a 2003 HP desktop, and I still have an old CRT monitor from 1997 and a dot matrix printer.

@gavenusman Nah, that's fine. 32mb? That's great for a computer of this age. I've thought about upgrading it, but then I would have to remove the original RAM, which I wouldn't want to do since everything else in this computer is original.

Yeah, Windows 3.1 was too good for it, so Windows 95 is great for now. I would also never get rid of this computer, it was my first one ever and I try to take really good care of it. As for the processor, I'll have to get back to you on that. (I'll check in the BIOS settings.) If you like all in one PC's (I do!) then check out my IBM EduQuest 30 video. (It's pretty much an IBM PS/2).

in years to come i bet we will have super computers the fraction of the cost of computers now adays

because it was cool now days with my windows 8 i unplug after its shut down and when i plug it back in gives me ton of errors like if i unplugged it with out shutting it down.

@KartSeven1 It's called Note Talker, try Googling it to download it.

Thumbes up if you wanna bang this laptop...no one okay..

Sorry, grammar error, meant to say "its" instead of "it's". My apologies.

Fast. Run fine.

@fertub26 Neat, I've tried to install Windows 98 but it says I can't because I don't have a math coprocessor. I've thought about updating the hardware, but I don't just because since this was my first computer I want to be able to keep all of the hardware as ORIGINAL as possible. (Although I've had to replace the HD twice.

I have this computer too.. I added more ram - 24mb. Yeah.. 20 years old computer :)

@itzmeoscar Mine came with Win 3.1 and TabWorks to! I've gone back and forth between 3.1 and 95 twice, but the older this computer gets the more fragile it is, and I just want to keep it as is for now. But yeah, The Incredible Machine was really cool. My Mom was addicted to that back then like most people are addicted to bejeweled these days. I remember that little furry guy saying "Whew!" at the end of a level and at the start of the game. Haha, yeah, Pentium's were "The Thing" back then.

@smartalex61 I'm sure that can be the HDD.

@harlyparlycharlie Yeah lol pretty much because I don't have much on it and it's not used too often. But if you ever try to load Google or something then game over!

i cann't select 1024 screen resolution :(

@CaptainPoovabladoo Sure is!

@CaptainAwesomeness34 Yipes, that's terrible. That must have been a mess, this thing weights like 50 pounds.

@itzmeoscar Wow, your parents are behind the times! We had dial up until 2007, then we got DSL for only $10 per month, and it was actually less than dial up. (And much faster of course!)

@SonicAnimator1 That was just for fun. No way it will run fast.

@ZVONIMIR111 Hmm I could, but Windows 3.1 seems so limited compared to 95. Plus this is my only 95 machine, I have 2 of them with 3.1 already

Because they don't have APM, wich is Advanced Power Management

@itzmeoscar Oh, that's so funny! I bought an Asus Netbook too, for like $260 at Best Buy a few years ago. Mine's an "EE" model though.

@Dariusjat Did you see some guys were running Windows XP on 8 MHz? Check it out on Winhistory.de!

I have a gateway with Windows 98 SE, It has a 800 mhz amd athlon cpu and 256 mb ram

i used to like that part its now safe to turn off your computer. windows 95 was the first windows i worked on i school. that was back in 1997. but still a year later i got to play around with windows 98 and windows 99 well was simler as windows 98

I have Chips Challenge too! Great game

kinda fast for such an old computer :O

My gateway dosen't say "It's now safe to turn off your computer" when I turn it off. When I go to the start menu and shut down and press ok, It says shutting down and turns off, My Gateway has a 800 MHz athlon and Windows 98 SE

yep billy had Packard bell that runs windows 95 now he decided to upgrade to windows 98.

@smartalex61 Maybe 98, sure it will work perfect.

@mies1888 Chips Challenge, it comes with the Microsoft Best of Entertainment Package.

Can't find notetalker, I googled it myself.

@anonymousUser97 Good ears!