I’ve been hacking together my own PCs from spare parts for years. It started when I was 16 and finally scraped up enough cash to replace my old Commodore 64. It wasn’t much cash, though, and in order to get the most bang for my buck, I wound up piecing parts together from old used computers. There was a lot of pride in that first 286, 12MHz PC. No hard drive, and not much RAM, but plenty of pride.

Every upgrade I’ve done since then has included at least one or two parts from the computer before it. Often it was nothing more than a video card, or a modem, or some memory, and eventually there were no remaining parts from the original PC. But somehow it always felt as if that first computer was always a part of whatever the latest one was at the time. Maybe not any of the same physical parts, but hey, this hard drive was in the last box, and that one’s video card was in the PC before it… My computer had its own lineage, and it, too, was proud.

So you will understand that it is a bittersweet time that finds me announcing the passing of that once illustrious line. But not too bitter, because LOOK AT THIS HOT NEW MAC!

I’ve already mentioned how much I love my new iBook. Ever since I got it, I’ve known that my next desktop would have to be a Mac as well. I’ve been patiently waiting, though, for the proper convergence of events, and with the recent release of Tiger and the (admittedly disappointing) updates to the PowerMacs, the time was ripe.

Unfortunately, everyone else in the bay area thought so too, and I had to call four different Apple stores to find a dual G5 2.0 GHz in stock (man, I love that I live within driving range of four-plus Apple stores!). But I managed to find one in the end, and took home this brand new powerhouse of productivity. You wouldn’t believe how much more efficient I am now at wasting time!

I don’t think many people realize this, but Apple has as much to offer the super-geek computer user as it does the technophobe to whom it seems to target most of its marketing. Darwin means that I can have all of the Unix tools on my desktop that I’ve become so attached to on my servers. That, and the second-to-none UI, bundled software, and professional-level software availabile combine to make this my dream machine.

Sorry if this sounds like an Apple ad, but I’m just excited. I get that way. Right now, I’m busy exploring the world of development for Mac OS X. It’s a slightly different world than Windows, and there’s a lot (Cocoa, for one) that looks very cool. I’m eager to share some of those experiences with you here as they happen.