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Carrying over heaps of computer equipment (including the mega CRTs before their demise) to your friends house for an all night LAN party that you guys had been prepping for. Then having a blast while parents look at you funny for being into computers.
Oh, and seeing a new BBS at a bus stop that you'd need to go dial into and check out.
I'm commenting too much in these replies because I remember too much, but I'm going to share one last anecdote. For a while I had a case with a bolted on handle to bring to LAN parties. Then I read in a magazine where people were building computers into hard shell backpacks to take back and forth and that changed the game. If I had to guess that was 98 or 99.
Those things were super expensive at the time. I took a seasonal second job to buy one and mount my system in it. The cooling was garbage but I sure thought I looked cool dragging it to LAN parties.
In 2004ish I set up a dial up server so my dad and I could play Battle for Wesnoth. We lived across the country from each other and neither of us had reliable broadband available. However, he had free long distance calling so it was (and remains) a way to keep in touch and hang out without actually having to talk to each other because we're both terrible at that.
I really enjoy these types of anecdotes. Was the case with a bolted-on handle military themed? My buddy had one of those!
Not on purpose, but it did look like an extra large ammo can by accident. I had green and black spray paint so I painted it green with black stenciled letters on the side.
Beautiful. That’s exactly what I was imagining!
Oh, no, whatever you're imagining it was much worse. However, I will always love it. I've built a lot of ugly but functional things in my life, but that's probably the first significant one.