The Shocking Price of Old Computers Makes Us Appreciate What We Have Now

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John Summers • Contributor
Aug 31, 2024 9:00 PM EDT

Buying a new phone or computer will always cost a pretty penny, but I don't think we truly appreciate how good we have it today compared to when home computing first started. Back then, computers were considered a luxury, and their prices reflected that. Don't be fooled by the numbers in these old ads. At first glance, $4,495 for a home computer might not seem outrageous, but when you factor in inflation, that's equivalent to $14,650 in today's money!

Can you imagine paying $12,000 for a hard drive? Sure, it had a whopping 10 megabytes of storage, but the ad even suggests you could upgrade to a 26-megabyte model for just $14,500. So… worth it! But seriously, these ads show just how far we have come in terms of computing power, as well as showing how the cost of that computing power had come down exponentially. 

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