Honeeey, I’m home!

[fred]

Hi you lot. How ya been? I see that most of you are still here! Sadly, I notice, a few notable characters are not!
Oh! Have I been on an adventure!?!. Hmm! I suppose you are used to me making wild statements and you expect a BIG story eh? Well, those of you who can remember me!! To all you newbies (anyone who registerd after 1970), let me briefly explain that I am a ghost from the distant past of the PcMech forums! That time, as Dok puts it - "the threaded forum days of PcMech". Aaah! Hey! DOK! Not only do I remember the threaded forum, but I remember your first post! (No matter how hard I try to forget, he he!). Aah! Those were the days. The food was bad, the winter was hard, but the shootin was good and the only Spam was the type you eat with beans. Anyway, back to more recent times, a destroyed hard drive, followed by a change in career, and I lost contact with the forum. That's the only story I have. :-( Kinda seemed like you did just fine without me too.... so I never came back…(boo hoo). Buuuuuuuuuuuuut! I couldn’t stay away forever ( Damn! I am back at home with a PC again!!!), and wanted to drop in and say hello, and, of course, happy New Year to you all.

Fred.

[Kubie]

Happy New Year to you too, Fred and a BIG WELCOME BACK!!!!!!
Carl

[cobra]

Good to have you back, Fred.
Long time no post...?

[Paul Victorey]

Welcome back!

Been ages.

[archie]

Unbelievable ... the legend is back! Welcome home Fred.

[M. A. Dockter]

Jesus fred. We had you up as mod of PC Hardware for god knows how long before we gave up hope and figured you were dead.

I'm glad to see you came back home!

Edited: Typo city

[LawyerRon]

Good to have you back Fred, now get busy and post your pic in the new Members Gallery.

[fred]

Luckily, I can't find the members gallery. He he! Well, not yet anyway, I have 123,000 posts to read first!
HAVE YOU ever wondered what would happen if you lost your internet connection? That thought smacked into my face last year, when I realised that I had nothing other than virtual contact with you guys. It's spooky. Lose your connection and you will be amazed how it feels like you just lost a limb you never even realised you had. Even more incredible to think that only one blink of an eye ago there was no Internet.
Anyway, connection restored, as they say. I’m back

[Floppyman]

WELCOME BACK FRED!

Nice to have you around again, I always wondered why you had just quit posting one day, seems like you explained it though. Anyhow, once again nice to see you back!

[fred]

Thanks! I suppose it will take my time to find my way around...things have changed a little. ( Actually, less than I thought they would! But, Dok, you have something in the pipeline? ). AND I have only just run this pile of electronic scrap ends up again. Damn if I didn't have to pull the Athlon out and stick an old PIII 850 in there. An ex Athlon. Hmm. That's one for the "fred's old CPU collection". There's some smoked silicon in that box, I can tell you. Powering up the old PC is like powering up a rocket after a years down time. It kinda don't sound as sweet as it did and it smokes more than it should. Grief! It isn’t even over clocked! Run slow, run hot. Hmm! How technology dates! We can rebuild it. And we are going to. Actually, completely replace is nearer the truth! Ha ha! The first of the boxes of bits arrives tomorrow. Over the next few weeks, fred's silicon Frankenstein will take shape.

Hi Floppyman! Not fully explained. Just before I vanished, I also lost a very good friend on the net. Failing hardware and a new job enforced a break..in retrospect, it was great timing because I really did need to stay away from the net for a while. That, I suppose , is why it has taken me so long to return!

[Floppyman]

Hey fred,

Whatcha gonna put in that new pc of yours? I seem to faintly remember you running SCSI hdd's back then, but I might be wrong. What's it gonna be, AMD or Intel?

[Xayd]

I guess if fred wants his mod spot back one of the new guys like me or Mosquito might have to give up our lucrative $100k per month PCMech, Inc. paychecks to let him back in, eh...

[Charliey]

Welcome back fred! Its been a long time. Dont worry, technology has changed, but you can still overclock it.

[fred]

The first abomination will be intel!! I tried AMD but wasn't very happy. Not so much with the Athlon, but the supporting chipsets. Too many damn incompatibilities and bugs for my liking. Course, I haven't tried a more recent intel chipset yet!! You are right, I was SCSI, but I have abandoned SCSI now. Frankly, the main reason I used SCSI before was because SCSI CDRW's seemed more reliable, but IDE drives these days are 99.9% so the extra "complication" of SCSI hardly seems worthwhile. By complication I mean "simple = less bugs". Adaptec cards always have their own "funnies" and "reactions" to different chipsets. So this time it will be Intel and IDE.
The main machine will be a 2Ghz with a IBM 40Gb hd, GeForce III and two 100MHz net cards. One net card for the "home LAN" and the other for a 1Mb cable modem. I am setting up a wireless LAN for the portable and wired for Machine II! Machine II will be the one I am using now, a "reconditioned" PIII 850. I have a Lynksys Cable Router and Switch, but that's one piece of hardware thats going out the window. Lovely, but totaly rubbish for games....he he! ( As you know, I am a Quake fanatic).
Hi Xayd! You're a star! But I couldn't accept. It would be way out of line to start pushing out the newbies ( or oldies for that matter..!) I will bounce up and down with my hand in the air when Dok add's another forum, but until then, I will wait in the queue!

[Alfie]

Hey Fred,
Welcome back!
If I recall it was Floppyman that reported you missing,search the forums and you'll find people were searching for you!
A lot of people need help copying files to new hard drives,etc.maybe a new forum could be set up and you could be Moderator there.
It could be called "Ghost"

[fred]

Hi Alfie!

The Forum of Shadows !! Good idea! Ha ha!

Remind me to leave a telephone number someplace!
Hey, whats with the animated flags and stuff?? I will have to get one..!

[Toaster]

Fredo?
Holy sheet...tiz you?
Welcome back Fredo!

[fred]

TOASTER!!
Hi! How you been?


By the way, you guys, I adopted YOUR flag for the moment, as a mark of respect and support. Hope you don't mind.

[fred]

Changed it now, anyway!