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Anyone remember the early 1990's PC Manufacturer "PC Brand"

I'll add to it...

I remember installing Dual PPro HP NetServer LXe Pro's on a few ships about 1998-1999
Huge, rolling-on-floor monsters, that some genius decided was well suited to put on a shelf in a rack!
Stack of drives in a RAID5 Array, HP RAID controller, running Windows NT 4.0 and Oracle 8.03 dB server.

What a pain those thing were! They were HUUUUGE, but pretty dang fast for the period.
And man, were they EXPENSIVE!

Later on, the Proliant 1850R (which became the DL380 series) was used, as the Dual PIII's were FINALLY able to keep up with the dual PPro's! Took 'em a while, and almost triple the mHz to get there, too!

T
 
My first machine was an early Dell that could barely run ME, took 2 minutes for start up, but the games were fairly fast. I think the cpu was originally a P2, but someone had stuck a P3 class compatibility CPU. I noticed the CPU pipeline was fairly low, and the 20.2 GB HDD was a no-name, so i tossed it about 3 years back
 
I must really be old...ha ha

I must really be old...ha ha

I still have a working 1992 PC Brand model A30750 with serial number 19E02A001217 running 3 operating systems under Boot Manager. Windows 3.1, OS/2, and Warp. I have all the disks for each operating system as well. I don't use the 51/4 drive much....ha ha
 
I still have a working 1992 PC Brand model A30750 with serial number 19E02A001217 running 3 operating systems under Boot Manager. Windows 3.1, OS/2, and Warp. I have all the disks for each operating system as well. I don't use the 51/4 drive much....ha ha
Hmmm, don't you mean dos and two versions of OS/2? Welcome.
 
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I recall messing around with those PC Brand machines at Wal-Mart back when Windows 95 was new.

"Whitebox" PC's like the ATjr are still my favorite. I have had an AMT machine, actually two within the family. One is the 386 my older sister had in college. I don't remember much except it had a 14" AOC VGA monitor, ran DOS 5 with Dosshell, and had a pile of shareware, Monkey Island 1 and 2, Ultima 6, and Freddy Pharkas on it at one time or another. The other one is a 486 I sold to a forum member awhile back IIRC.

The obscure brand that always facinated me was GEM Computer Products out of Norcross Georgia. I've owned two of their machines, seems they loved sticking Baby AT motherboards in full-size AT chassis. One had a cool chassis that was a full size AT clone of a Compaq Deskpro 8086/286/386 chassis. I presently have their 1989-1990 model AT clone. Also, they all used the same Mitsubishi floppy drive, that I verified as 1.44M, that was DOA on both machines when I got them. Seems GEM is still around now too on Jones Mill Road. I'm looking for another Deskpro style machine like the one I had, maybe to build a 486 into.
 
My first 17" color VGA monitor was a 'GEM'. Don't know that it was the same outfit though. I bough it from a dealer in upstate New York @ 1994-5 or so. It seems that I remember that the larger VGA's were very expensive around that time. This one "cracked" the $600 barrier and that's what I was waiting for - got for it $599 (what a bargain -eh).
 
A page back the old Dell servers were mentioned, I was supposed to get 2 of them, one a Pentium Pro and one a Pentium II. The local people were willing to get rid of them as they had been sitting in the (oddest place) telephone room for the last 7 years and hadn't been touched. Just a few weeks ago someone higher up decided to ewaste them and they even had the hard drives shreded instead of wiping them. Now I don't feel so good knowing 20 SCSI hard drives were destroyed instead of being wiped and reused by someone who could make use of them (like me).

As for anyone wondering what I would do with 2 of them, I would make a desk. Who wouldn't want a desk made from servers that probably weigh more than a cast iron legged table?
 
Probably not the same company. After looking at Trademarkia, looks like GEM was owned by MEC (Micro Equiptment Corp.), whom also owned C.More as well. Seems MEC was the home-brand company, GEM was their special brand for Science/Military/Nautical products, and C.More was for networking services. I recall seeing some MEC machines before and now I kind of wish I'd picked them up.

http://www.trademarkia.com/company-micro-equipment-corporation-804878-page-1-2

The First GEM computer I got was the Deskpro clone, which was a 386-20 system with a 40MB ST-506/412 interface hard disk, Paradise VGA, a ProComm Plus hardcard with a 244MB Quantum ProDrive LPS hard disk. The original owner of the computer bought it for $3000 someitme around 1988, and it was used for his Military job.

The Second GEM computer, and the one I still have, is the 80286. Which when I got it it had already been upgraded quite a bit from what it originally was. The MFM drive was gone and replaced with an IDE drive from 1994 (Seagate 540MB). I think it too had a Military history possibly now that I recall BOTH PC's came from towns with Military bases - the 286 from Ft. Worth Texas, and the other computer was owned by the father of an ex-bandmate at Maxwell AFB in Montgomery Alabama.

I find "whitebox" clone makers interesting to say the least. Possibly the oddest name I've seen is "Cactus", which is what my Bro In-Law's old 486 DX-2 was branded. It even had a floppy for it labeled "Cactus Bar" for it which I suppose was some silly utility bar program that came pre-loaded at the shop it was built at.
 
Probably not the same company. After looking at Trademarkia, looks like GEM was owned by MEC (Micro Equiptment Corp.), whom also owned C.More as well. Seems MEC was the home-brand company, GEM was their special brand for Science/Military/Nautical products, and C.More was for networking services. I recall seeing some MEC machines before and now I kind of wish I'd picked them up.

http://www.trademarkia.com/company-micro-equipment-corporation-804878-page-1-2

The First GEM computer I got was the Deskpro clone, which was a 386-20 system with a 40MB ST-506/412 interface hard disk, Paradise VGA, a ProComm Plus hardcard with a 244MB Quantum ProDrive LPS hard disk. The original owner of the computer bought it for $3000 someitme around 1988, and it was used for his Military job.

The Second GEM computer, and the one I still have, is the 80286. Which when I got it it had already been upgraded quite a bit from what it originally was. The MFM drive was gone and replaced with an IDE drive from 1994 (Seagate 540MB). I think it too had a Military history possibly now that I recall BOTH PC's came from towns with Military bases - the 286 from Ft. Worth Texas, and the other computer was owned by the father of an ex-bandmate at Maxwell AFB in Montgomery Alabama.

I find "whitebox" clone makers interesting to say the least. Possibly the oddest name I've seen is "Cactus", which is what my Bro In-Law's old 486 DX-2 was branded. It even had a floppy for it labeled "Cactus Bar" for it which I suppose was some silly utility bar program that came pre-loaded at the shop it was built at.

FWIW this pretty close to the one that I had: http://www.fixya.com/search/p396459-scanport_gem_1770df_17_in_crt/vga_dvi_input_signal
 
This is an old thread (18 years at this time), but back to the original post: YES! I had a "PC Brand" computer! I lived in Ventura County and the company was in Moorpark California just up the road. And the big benefit of this brand , the main way they differentiated their product from their competitors (Gateway, AST, COmpaq, etc.), was they had licensed the IBM Micro Channel architecture from the PS/2 product line. This allowed them to have easily swapped "modules" for the CPU, RAM, FDD, HDD, CD-ROM, etc. Every upgrade came in the same format with a Micro Channel connector and could be swapped without disassembling the computer to access the motherboard. I recall doing the CPU upgrade to go from a 386 to a 486. I believe the original purchase or the later CPU upgrade may have been between 1991-1993. I recall it being painless but expensive, since you could only buy the upgrade modules from the OEM. At the time I recall thinking this architecture was pure genius, but I soon realized the lack of competition for Micro Channel was keeping the prices artificially high. When it was time for an upgrade I built my own PC clone from components and still do today. But I believe that PC Brand computer got me all the way through college!
 
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