Search Results
7/10/2025, 5:39:27 AM
>>212539590
Inflation doesn't matter, I'm comparing it to prices at the time in general. Like in 1996 my family bought a Packard Bell computer that wasn't half as good as that lowest Gateway in that ad (>>212522415), and it was $1600 AFTER discounts, and it was 120mhz Pentium with 1.2GB HDD and 16MB RAM and 1 CD drive and no dedicated video. I get shit was getting better all the time but the price range for decent computers, especially for end users only, was high enough that the Gateway 1998 ad wasn't extreme, especially considering the DVD and dedicated video cards, plus 17" monitors included.
A year later, late 99 or maybe early 2000, I bought my own first PC and it was a shitty Compaq that was maybe $900 out the door (so cheaper), but it didn't have a 17 inch monitor and had no dedicated video card either, and at the time getting my own video card was another $120 or more (although in hindsight that was nice, fucking buttcoin assholes permanently ruined video card market years later). So even a year later I had a slightly better computer at only marginally better prices (almost the same cost if I would've got a new 17 inch monitor).
Now sure if you were tech savvy enough you could procure decent components and make an equivalent or much better than those Gateways circa 1998 for probably a grand max, but not everyone was or is like that. And Gateways got even more inexpensive to the end user for the sets later when they went into brick and mortar locations a year or two later.
Inflation doesn't matter, I'm comparing it to prices at the time in general. Like in 1996 my family bought a Packard Bell computer that wasn't half as good as that lowest Gateway in that ad (>>212522415), and it was $1600 AFTER discounts, and it was 120mhz Pentium with 1.2GB HDD and 16MB RAM and 1 CD drive and no dedicated video. I get shit was getting better all the time but the price range for decent computers, especially for end users only, was high enough that the Gateway 1998 ad wasn't extreme, especially considering the DVD and dedicated video cards, plus 17" monitors included.
A year later, late 99 or maybe early 2000, I bought my own first PC and it was a shitty Compaq that was maybe $900 out the door (so cheaper), but it didn't have a 17 inch monitor and had no dedicated video card either, and at the time getting my own video card was another $120 or more (although in hindsight that was nice, fucking buttcoin assholes permanently ruined video card market years later). So even a year later I had a slightly better computer at only marginally better prices (almost the same cost if I would've got a new 17 inch monitor).
Now sure if you were tech savvy enough you could procure decent components and make an equivalent or much better than those Gateways circa 1998 for probably a grand max, but not everyone was or is like that. And Gateways got even more inexpensive to the end user for the sets later when they went into brick and mortar locations a year or two later.
Page 1