On Thu, 2009-10-08 at 21:23 -0400, Allen wrote:
> Kevin Kinsey wrote:
> > christopher floess wrote:
> >
> >
> >> All in exchange for taking someones "trash".
> >
> > Indeed, you can run a piece of junk computer on FreeBSD
> > and do things Windows never could ... well, I shouldn't
> > say never, but it can't now, unless you're still willing
> > to install 3.1 from floppy or Win95 from the 14th-generation
> > CD-R copy of your original from 14 years ago.
>
> I wasn't around for those days... Heh, I have a fairly pristine copy of
> Windows 95 and two copies of Windows 98. They're in good condition
> because when I got my VERY first computer, my Mom bought it from my
> Uncle, it was running Windows 95, had I think a 133 MHz CPU, and like 32
> MBs RAM, but I'm not even sure... This was September of 1999.
>
> I know the month and year I got my first Computer, because I had started
> using it, got hooked on the idea of a machine I controlled, and two
> weeks after getting it, without manuals to read, without help, I started
> screwing with it until I figured it out.
>
> Some people who know me think and say "How is it you can fix any
> computer no matter what it's running, without a manual, without
> classes... And you seem to understand how your fix worked?" and it's
> because the night I started, I still remember opening Microsoft Word,
> sitting there for two hours screwing with buttons on it, and then
> figuring out "OK, I highlight the text, and THEN press that "B" and then
> it's in Bold.. Ahh OK!" And then going from there. The next night I
> started messing with Explorer, and saw all the files and so on, and got
> how to move files around. I was lucky enough not to try system files. I
> just used dummy files.
>
> A week later, I was done with everything in the start menu except this
> "weird little box called MS-DOS prompt" which didn't seem to have many
> buttons, and typing stuff didn't help because it just said bad something
> or other"... Yea lol I know, dumb. Hadn't ever seen a command line
> before so cut me SOME slack though ;) You have to understand that before
> this, I had not ever touched any computer except for an AppleII for 5
> minutes at school when I was like 4. So I literally had only touchbed a
> computer for 5 minutes before this and it was an Apple II I knew nothing
> about.
>
> On week two, I had learned what online meant, and "accidentally" watched
> my Uncle type in his Prodigy password to go online.
>
> He left for a week and I had un-restricted access. I still thought
> "Restart your computer" meant restarting it from scratch and I'd lose
> all programs, so I always shut it down and turned it back on after an
> installation, which I figured out myself too. So I wasn't by any means
> good at it.
>
> I saw the Prodigy home page and got online for the first time one
> afternoon, and thought "Wow.... This thing has neat pictures of Pamela
> Anderson" lol... Hey, I'm a German American and damn proud of that, we
> like nudity right? lol. And for a 17 year old punk rocker this was a new
> experience and I loved it.
>
> On week two of having a computer, I signed up for an account on Bolt.com
> and started learning what a social networking site did, and since they
> always said "this person joined on this date" that's how I knew when I
> got a computer; I had memorized it. So, I've had a computer since
> September of 1999, and within 6 months, I screwed up the machine bad by
> opening something by accident.
>
> See, within a few months, I learned what Computer Security meant. The
> idea someone could control a computer from somewhere else, grabbed me
> hard.I LOVED the idea of security in computers. I started slow by seeing
> what those weird DoS tools were, and thought "OK, annoying, but the idea
> is interesting" and then I started a virus collection because I didn't
> collect baseball cards and every boy needs a hobby ;)
>
> That would seal the fate of that PC. A friend I had met who was into
> this stuff too, said he found some great ones for my collection, and I
> grabbed a floppy disk to store them on, and he was like "by the way, one
> of these isn't Zipped, be careful" and I'm like "OK man"....
>
> I was a little side tracked by porn at the moment, and when I went to
> close a Window that had all my new viruses on it, I for some reason
> Double Clicked on the one he warned me about....
>
> OK, just for the record, I was just collecting these. I wasn't infecting
> a Company or something, I just thought the idea of them was kind of
> neat, so I collected them. Just making sure no one thinks I was one of
> "those" kids.
>
> Now, this thing turned out not to be a virus at all. Instead, it turned
> into the ONLY ONLY ONLY .exe I've EVER come across that does PHYSICAL
> damage to a machine.... I'm in no way kidding.
>
> I saw what I had done fast.... I had went to close the window and
> accidentally double clicked on it instead and instantly hit for the
> power switch to shut the machine off.... It was to late though. I saw a
> DOS Prompt come up saying something or other, and when I turned the
> machine back on, it wouldn't even boot.
>
> This machine ran Windows 95, had a lot of MP3s, and some movies and
> pics. When that happened, I couldn't even get Windows 3.1 to install.
>
> A friend and I worked on it all the time, and I was shocked. I couldn't
> do anything.... I managed to install PC-DOS on this thing, and then when
> I tried to install Windows 3.1, it said the drive wasn't big enough!
>
> I the next day, went and bought my first paidfor computer, and used it
> insted which I still have, but the fact that later in life when I
> started using Linux, about a year later, I tried again to install Linux
> on the drive that thing killed.
>
> Linux wouldn't install either, it said the drive was screwed up and
> couldn't even fix it except for a small DOS partition which was like, a
> few MBs.
>
> I remember shutting the power off before it finished running, but it was
> FAST, and this thing actually killed somehow a portion of a disk drive,
> and had it run all the way probably wouldn't have allowed DOS either.
>
> Fdisk couldn't even work on it. I was literally shocked.
>
> 9 years later, I can still remember it, and I STILL have the floppy disk
> I copied all that stuff too he sent me that night. And yea, I STILL have
> that executable that destroyed my first PC lol. I didn't know about
> hardware at the time so the fact that a new drive would have been a
> better fix didn't cross my mind until it was too late and I had given
> the thing to a friend's Dad.
>
> To this day I don't know what's on that thing, and yes, I've popped the
> floppy in since then to look, and saw all those olden days of my later
> teen years sitting there... And the thing that ripped up the disk drive,
> which I've now zipped up and made a tarball just in case lol.
>
> I still have it, and friends have asked for a copy, and haven't ever
> figured it out either how it did all that.
>
> >
> > Oh, and games. It's like heroin. Don't start, or
> > your life gets sucked into the monitor ;-)
> >
> > Thanks, Java, for six months of wasted life over the last
> > 5 years.
>
> Java isn't Heroin, it's Crack ;)
>
> > Kevin Kinsey
> > ________________
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Viruses which flash your BIOS have been done before, and therefore
effectively damage hardware. As for your disk, try filling it with 0s
and then start again.
Jonathan
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