Community poll forum: I started to use a computer regularly at the age of:

My first chance to use a computer was in 1961 with a Univac SS80 when I was 22. if you just meant any kind of computer. If you meant personal computer, it was a Commodore 64 in 1984 when I was 46. First PC was an IBM PS/2 55SX in 1989 at the age of 51. I've been around a good while.

I started using the Univac 1050-II in 1972 entering data while serving in the USAF, Supply, then went on to personal computers with the TRS-80 Mod-I in 1978. I would say for each 2080 hours of work I've done each year, I've probably logged another 2080 hours per year since 1978 equaling 33 years using and programming computers for various causes and simple utilities and web pages, and their databases. Both of my sons can say they have been influenced by my efforts at being a computer user, and a major part of their educations came from the use of computers. My youngest son is now working in IT and computer programming in Southern California. Many members of my immediate and extended family are, in some way, computer professionals. (I'm not sure of the implications of that.)

I worked on an IBM 1620 in college in 58' with typewriter and punched card input. I think it had 20k memory which was later upgraded to 60k and punched cards were a big upgrade from paper tape. First personal computer was an Apple II bought for our son. What huge leaps technology has made from those days.

My first was a BBC B

The mention of punch cards made me remember the earlier times I had in computing or doing research. In 1968, I started with a huge desktop calculator... I had to enter data, statistical formula and then hand crank the large lever on the machine. If I was not careful, I sometimes had to start all over because I was not sure if I had entered the last data. I was working on my doctoral dissertation with this approach but at the end of my research in 1971, I was able to use punch cards..

It was a Monrobot.
input was punched paper tape, storage was on magnetic cards the same size and shape as IBM's punched cards.
Also had an IBM Selectric and a Model B output devices.

The first personal computer I used was a Digital VT180, aka a Robin. Computer and memory cards added to the VT100 terminal. Had a double bay floppy disk drive that sat on top - 5 1/4" floppy discs. CPM os.

Marie

My first experiences were working in the computer lab in college. The
machines read Hollerith cards that were punched first.

Later I used a mainframe with a keyboard and printer.

A year or two later, early 80's I had a commodore 64 with a tape drive.

Since then I have upgraded ever few years and now have laptop, desktop and
soon a tablet.

I retired early at age 50 in 1985. The p.c. was just getting popular so I bought an IBM computer and monitor. This had dual floppy drives and no Windows operating system. The screen display was in black and white. This was the latest technology I could obtain and bought it from the university from which I retired. As the years went by, I upgraded or changed to the newer technologies. At present, I have two desktops and a laptop with OS XP, WIN 7 and Vista. I learned almost all that I know now from the internet. Looking ahead, I am wondering what mobile devices will be used by the ordinary person in everyday life because "things" are changing so fast. I think that one year into the future will reveal tremendous changes with a big swing away from desktop computers.

Actually, you could have just asked us: "How Old Are You?" because that is going to govern a lot of this. For example, anyone born in the last 20 years, probably started using a computer at an early age, while some of us who are over 60 years old, probably started at a later point in time. For example, I was 17 when I started using a computer. But, that was back in 1967 and I was the first person in my H.S. (Brooklyn Technical High School - Class of '68). It was a General Electric computer somewhere else in the country (Georgia comes to mind) and I was programming in BASIC on a TWX (Teletype) machine. Then I worked on a strange IBM "mainframe" that was really small - about the size of a large desk). I also worked on TAB equipment: card readers, punches and sorters and developed a student registration system using them. In college, I used an IBM 360/30 (OS/PVP) followed by a Univac 1108 MP mainframe.

I never got a personal-sized computer for myself until there was something interesting to do with itbut I did work on Commodores and Atari. At work, I got an IBM PC running DOS. My first "home computer" was a Gateway desktop (386) with a Stacker Co-Processor.

OK, I did start using an adding machine when I was really little. My mother also bought me a "toy" that was actually a binary calculator before she had any idea what that was.

My first computer was locally assembled. It had Pentium IV with windows 98. I had some difficulties learning how to operate it. But I wanted it for my business and so I learnt .

My first computer I got for my 6th birthday, however my dad despite being a TV engineer was always too busy to put the plug on, so I had this computer sat there for months that I couldn't use.

Finally at about 7 I thought forget this I'll give it a go, it can't be that hard to put a plug on, just follow the instructions and it should work.

It was then at age 7 I realised how simple electronics is! Live (Brown), Neutral (Blue) and Earth (Green) and how easy it is to wire up a plug - this was something that not even my mum could do, she was really worried I was going to blow up the house or something.

I put the plug on my computer and voila that was my first ever computer.

It was a Sanyo MSX, my dad got it me from the TV firm he worked for at the time, they were selling them cheaper than the British versions like the C64 or Spectrum to try and get their foot hold in the door.

I actually like the MSX it was a good computer, and was very easy to program. The main thing with the MSX was it contained Microsoft Basic (hence the name MSX = Micro Soft X - why do Microsoft like the letter X - MSX => MS X-BOX/MS X-BOX 360)

The only bad thing about the MSX was the actual computer was a flop which was a real shame.

I liked the MSX, and always thought the best things about it was that many of the games were coded in basic and not machine code. So games like Vicious Viper (Snake) and Toshiba Golf could be loaded up then you could press the Break key and have a look at how the code worked, and modify the code for some fun - for example on the Golf game I ended up with things like Blue golf courses instead of green, just by modifying the code slightly. It was great how basic it was and how easy it was to learn different things from it, very much like modern day Open Source programming.

I still have my MSX today, although quite often use an emulator rather than the original machine. It was a very nice computer to use. After the MSX I was given a C64, which I was never overly impressed with, and then a ZX Spectrum, which I always thought that even though it didn't have the same graphics capabilities than the C64 it was far more better, and was easier to program, the C64 you had to get a hefty manual out to find what the basic commands were, where as on the Spectrum they were on the bottom of the keyboard (on the MSX they were on the Function keys).

And then finally I upgraded to the Commodore Amiga - which was amazing, I still prefer the Amiga now to the PC. Workbench was so simple, and entire operating system on one 880k floppy disk as opposed to Windows which takes up nearly 10Gb to do the same thing, and dedicated GPU's and APU's which took PC's many years and a company called 3DFX and Creative to invent.

Commodore 64 bought in UK linked to a Sony 14inch TV
I added their disc drive and cassette player as most games were on tape cassette at that time.
The dot matrix printer was very noisy and used tractor paper.
However, I did learn basic and had a lot of fun at home as well as being a few steps ahead of my colleagues professionally. At work, in R&D, there were Commodore desk top computers supplied, 1 between 8 people.....

The first computer I used was a Z80 powered machine with 96K of RAM. Digital Research CP/M was the O/S, it had to be loaded every time the machine was switched on from a 720K 5.25" floppy disk. I learnt to program it using Basic and dBase 2.

The first computer that we used was a TI 44-9A. It was fun to use and had several casset programs.

The next one was an IBM Aptiva with a 1 Gig hard drive, using MS DOS 3.1.

My first computer was a Commodore 16. I also owned a Camputers Lynx, Amstrad CPC464 then an Amstrad PC1640 before moving on to Windows 3.1 on a 386 based PC. Now happily running Windows 7 on a tailor made PC.