Ever had to share a PC? Was it awkward?

[SamanthaSamantha's icon]

Growing up, I had to share our only computer with two sisters, a brother, and our dad (mom, mercifully, didn't know squat about PCs - nor did she wish to learn -).

Dad taught us how to set up different accounts within the same XP build to have some semblance of privacy - or at least the illusion of -, but it was really awkward and inconvenient.

My older sister and I both had MSN Messenger accounts and were big on the whole thing, so we often logged on even outside of our own XP users, which caused us to bicker endlessly and to bombard each other with big words such as "invasion of privacy" and "disrespect", like either of us even knew what that shit meant!

My younger sister wanted to download everything under the sun and was always destroying the PC from the inside like an enemy spy through a variety of shady sites, while my brother just wanted to watch YouTube until his eyes bled.

Dad had to play mediator so much and so often that I don't think he even thought about it after a while — it was just something he had to do, like paying taxes.

But, yeah, it was really awkward and stressful... especially when files just "disappeared" without explanation and we went right back at it (in reality, we ran a VERY aggressive version of CCleaner that didn't fuck around, but we weren't about understanding how computers worked! xD).

You?

 

[ArchienineZXAdventArchienineZXAdvent's icon]

Yes, my brother and me filled it up with games
And basically only we used it.

 

[SamanthaSamantha's icon]

Yes, my brother and me filled it up with games
And basically only we used it.

Sounds pretty idylic, man.

 

[ArchienineZXAdventArchienineZXAdvent's icon]

Sounds pretty idylic, man.

The only problem is that sometimes we accidentally downloaded adware and our PC get filled with annoying pop-ups and antivirus alerts lol.

 

[SamanthaSamantha's icon]

The only problem is that sometimes we accidentally downloaded adware and our PC get filled with annoying pop-ups and antivirus alerts lol.

I feel that happens to everyone.

I nearly clocked fucking Nadia when she got us some shitty ransomware lol

 

[shaggi shaggi]

As a child, I had to share a computer with my siblings because we only had one at home. The only problem was that I was always the one fixing the computer when someone else accidentally clicked something.

 

[Grumpy_Old_Man]

Yes, they were the "whole family computer"(counting me, four siblings and my parents), main problems were: storage, constant reformatting, thanks to indiscriminate downloading and usually could only use it reliably after ten pm.

 

[Nasty]

What a great question, the mention of XP user accounts really took me back to my childhood haha
I did share a PC with my sister as a kid. She was adamant that I stay out of her account or at the very least keep my 'crappy games' on my side but there's only so much you can do with half of a 40gb hdd hahaha good times

I remember playing The House of the Dead together. She was older than me and wasn't as spooked by the visuals but she wasn't very good at gameplay. I was a little kid just about ready to crap my pants but was a much better shot lol

For us, it wasn't awkward at all. Computers didn't play as big a role in our lives back then so there was nothing to get heated about so it was all good for the most part. Except for when something inevitably went wrong it was my fault for 'filling the computer up with all my crappy games' lmao

 

[bombatomba77]

Yes, with my roommate back in '98 and '99. Granted all I ever did on that PC was play Ultima Online (and organize ROMs). It was only awkward because he liked porn and would change the desktop and screensaver at least once a day to whatever he was feeling, and when I would venture out of my room he would inevitably be arguing with his girlfriend about it (who also lived there).

 

[Appiplyer]

Not really i also share my laptop with my sister, sometime she uses it for works. But since she works at night i usually brings the laptop with me then at home it's hers.

That's before she finally buy laptop for her personal use.

 

[Alkider]

Used to be the only one that actually used the family computer as a kid, a bit later it was my little bro and me using it. It was like that for a long time until I scraped something together to get decent rigs for the both of us! We pretty much have been using those since.

 

[TruxtonTatsujin]

used to have to share a computer with my mother a very long time ago, but it very slowly started to just become my computer. She never really used it much so it was pretty much free whenever I felt like it. I really only ever used it to watch videos and maybe look up the odd thing, I kept all my gaming to console. My dad was and still tech illiterate, and I didn't have any siblings to worry about.

 

[Anim8rDude Anim8rDude]

We only had a family computer back in the day, never anything personal. And when I say family I mean we were only allowed to use it for school projects, with the occasional Friday night where we were allowed to play old emulators & watch flash videos. My Dad was pirating music as early as 2008 though

But I mean that was the case with most of my friends too. On the flipside we all had a video game console & a small TV in our rooms!

 

[Michael Frank]

When i was a wee lad? Yes, the pc had to be shared.
Right now? I have my own pc, and i'm free of such compromises.

 

[PrismRed]

Yeah, internet was a luxury back then so we didn't use it as much until much later, we use it almost exclusively for games. In my case though, I spent so much time using MS Paint I can edit pics on it better than photoshop, still do to this day.

 

[Hsp_Kolo_HsP]

Growing up, I had to share our only computer with two sisters, a brother, and our dad (mom, mercifully, didn't know squat about PCs - nor did she wish to learn -).

Dad taught us how to set up different accounts within the same XP build to have some semblance of privacy - or at least the illusion of -, but it was really awkward and inconvenient.

My older sister and I both had MSN Messenger accounts and were big on the whole thing, so we often logged on even outside of our own XP users, which caused us to bicker endlessly and to bombard each other with big words such as "invasion of privacy" and "disrespect", like either of us even knew what that shit meant!

My younger sister wanted to download everything under the sun and was always destroying the PC from the inside like an enemy spy through a variety of shady sites, while my brother just wanted to watch YouTube until his eyes bled.

Dad had to play mediator so much and so often that I don't think he even thought about it after a while — it was just something he had to do, like paying taxes.

But, yeah, it was really awkward and stressful... especially when files just "disappeared" without explanation and we went right back at it (in reality, we ran a VERY aggressive version of CCleaner that didn't fuck around, but we weren't about understanding how computers worked! xD).

You?

Yes, until 2022 "my" PC was the family PC and I had to get off when my sister and mom needed to do something for school, I had to hide my naughty stuff layers of subfolders so my mom wouldn't find it, the PC was also old and slow as a sloth so that added to the time they had to spend on there, also until 2018 I wasn't allowed to play anything worse than angry birds and roblox because my mom thought my sister would see it and be scarred, that didn't stop me in emulating and again hiding violent games in subfolders lololol.

Post automatically merged: Yesterday at 6:35 AM

The only problem is that sometimes we accidentally downloaded adware and our PC get filled with annoying pop-ups and antivirus alerts lol.

I remember once doing that and getting porn adware on our PC

For those wondering, I was into Undertale AUs around 2015-2017 and I thought those all had real games tied to them, so I tried dowbloading them and downloaded said adware.

 

[Boofy]

I wouldn't want to share a keyboard, but if I had to I guess I'd pick the left side

 

[extermist]

I remember sharing a PC, I remember getting blamed if ever it got a virus or acted funny.
No I don't miss any of it.