[KayBee]

My SGI experiences and goals:

Young kid: Dad took me to "Reprographics" department at the mine where he worked, IBM PCs running Autocad and one SGI visualizing the parts they designed in 3d.
1996: Film school, room full of Indys running PowerAnimator and Wavefront Composer, teacher had indigo2
1998: Hollywood studio, new Digital Film Restoration department: eight R5K O2s, one R10K O2, one Octane. Running Kodak Cineon Digital Film System. I worked here for ten years, restoring old movies and doing film effects (Star Wars restoration, Ronin effects, many more) Attachment is a screenshot I took to show a coworker how I did a shot in Cineon, using the R10K machine "hart"
2008: Movie Trailer Editor and visual effects, Smoke Editor on Octane for 3 years. 
2020: bought Octane from Craigslist, and smashed O2. Traded parts with Kaigan and Chulofiasco, both up and running.

Goal(s): 1. get SCSI2SD working on O2 first, then Octane 2. set up and mess with C++ for graphics (and OPENGL)

How about you guys?

[Intuition]

I told this story on Nekochan and later here.

Moved to LA in 1995.
I did a small graphics logo using a software called Crystal Topas. Was paid very well for it.
Took what I thought was a big $16k to Siggraph 96. Saw Softimage. Wanted it.
Went to SGI office in Santa Monica/West LA on Olympic and Bundy.

Had them Max out an Octane and Softimage in their configuration computer.

They came back with an invoice for $32k for the computer and $20k+ for Softimage full edition with all bells and whistles.

I gulped.. said.. let me check with my measly life and get back with you.

Bought a nice PC and purchased Lightwave instead as a cheaper alternative.
Later that year the office across the hall from where I worked did get an Octane and Softimage.
I was able to use it when they needed  logos and little animations here and there off and on.
Thankfully one of the camera guys was there during later hours and said I could come over and fiddle with it.
I was almost the only person to ever really use it. I think it was there to show clients how high end the shop was.

Life moved on and SGI use faded away in favor of linux and pc machines by 1999/2000 for me.
I kept checking the website for new computers and software because SGI had the coolest designed cases and mystique.

Found Nekochan in 2006. Finally in 2009 I bought an o2 as a gift to my younger self who never got to mess with one.
Later picked up an Octane from Fox (Creator of this forum) and have maxxed it out with dual 400mhz procs and MXE card.

Now I just fiddle around on them here and there making vids of the old software for posterity/youTube archiving.

[GerhardL]

Where do I begin? After looking at the blank page for a while I think I'll go in chronological order.

Born in 1974 I had the chance to grow up in the era of home computers and early personal computers (in the IBM sense). I was a nerd back then and so I read all the more advanced computer magazines I could acquire in my little hometown. I have very fond memories of "mc" which sometimes included market overviews of highend PC workstations and "real" workstations. I think that is where I have become aware of companies like Sun and Silicon Graphics.

Fast forward to 1994: After school I joined our army for compulsory service. It was not my choice but I do not regret the time spent. I made a lot of friends during the months and a couple of them I still see on a regular basis. Technology wise I got the chance to get into something like an IT department. On my first day I was stunned to see a real life Sun workstation in our office that some company "forgot" after doing a presentation. That's when I learned that a Sun IPX already felt slow in 1994.

Another fast forward to ~1999/2000: When I was a student I started to fiddle around with Linux. That's when I figured an old real workstation with a real UNIX could be an interesting option. After a couple hours/days on ebay a full SGI Indigo set with CRT and install media caught my attention. I bought it in 2000 and that's when the whole retro/workstation computing madness started for me. The ride lasted for more than 10 years and it was great fun. My "active times" as an SGI hobbyist ended a while after the real SGI finally died when it was acquired by Rackable.

This is the first Indigo btw: http://www.sgistuff.net/collection/systems/1000.html

Currently I am working in consulting (tax/law) and I have no connection to the IT business other than a couple of clients that do IT consulting. I still have my workstation collection, most of it is in storage though.