Well, my name is Ryan. Been into gaming since the early 70's, Arcade mostly back then, but on computer, my first beginnings started with the ZX-80, and ZX-81, then later on bought the Timex Sinclair 2000, with the 16kb ram expansion. I'm sure there are a few people out there remember those days. BTW, I played Frogger on the ZX / Timex-Sinclair computer I remember very well. Year or two later, I got into the Commodore 64. Bought it with a Datasette. Couldn't afford the floppy drive at that time (1541). I went big and heavy in reading books on the ins and outs of the C-64, and a few months later, or a year, I bought the 1541 drive, the old version with the push-in lever.

I books I bought, like Peeks and Pokes into the inside, changing background colors, or fast reboot of the OS, and making fancy menu screen tricks to make it look pretty, and moving, changing colors, etc.

Well, there is a lot more that can be said, so I'll start sumerizing more now, Got a Pet 8050, or 8250, forget which, with 500 kb floppy drive. Also got and SFD-1001, that has a 1 mb storage cap on a 5 1/4 floppy. BTW, the Pet computer I had used 8 inch floppys, and yes, I do know there were other computers that used 12 inch floppies.

Using a C-64 and an SFD-1001 IEEE drive and interface, I ran a BBS board for a while, with the dialup number ending with the number (1541), easy number for people in the commodore community then. Mid 1980,s, Commodore Amiga 1000, later on, the 2000. I started into PC's in the Early 80's, but didn't own one, I only worked with people building PC compatible using the NEC chip, I think it was 1.44 or 1.47 MHz speed. That was really fast back in those days, using DOS, before Windows 3.0 came out, 3.1 being popular for a good while on 3 1/2 inch floppies. During those times, also got a C-128, and used a few CP/M OS programs, which some may heard of, or used a Kaypro, or Osborne (semi-portable PC's), also Owned an SX-64, which was great taking it with you to Commodore club meets, instead of carrying large handcart to hual the monitor, C-64 computer, etc.

My first owned PC was in the later part of the mid 80's, but it was not a name brand, PC compatible, using the old cards back in those days, XT, and AT ISA slots. Well, there is a lot more that can be said, but by the look of things I've typed already, its probably lot long then most.

I came to this site after finding out about a remade version of Elite First Encounters, which I started playing the Elite series long ago on the C-64 with the first "Elite". then Elite II, also came later on a little bit inproved (Elite II + (plus), if my memory servers me correctly. It was Elite First Encounters, I played on the PC, which I still happen to own it from back then. I still have the box to Elite II:frontiers, not sure if I still have the other box , to Encounters tho. Stuff in storage in basement. Had been a long time player of the X series of space simulation games, but after the not so great release of X-Rebirth, and wanting to play a space sim again, with other games being modded to make them better then the original, I had wondered if someone had done the same for any of the old Elite games, which I knew that Encounters had a better chance of that happening, since it already used better graphics then the old wire-frame graphics of the older versions of Elite. There is only one main feature I liked  in Elite that I've never seen yet in any other space sim, is the fact of you can go into a different star system without going thru gates like in the X series of games. Too me that was much more realistic. In real space, not going to find space gates to go into another system, I'm looking forward to Elite Dangerous. I'll most likely will be playing single player tho, and I'm very busy with my personal life.

My wife I was married to0, past away about 3 years ago, so , been busy with work, and in time, hope to find a decent, new companion. Nuff said here.

God bless,

Ryan - aka Dragonspirit