We at PC Gamer have developed a passion for bears rendered by our computer systems, be they a party of bears in Pillars of Eternity or the outcomes of putting all your skill points into “bear” in Diablo 4, however what if the pc itself was the bear? Prolific retro {hardware} YouTuber LGR engaged in a cross nation effort to safe simply that: a flip of the millennium desktop encased in a large Ikea Teddy bear.
LGR was alerted by his followers to an LA Craigslist publish for the ursine contraption, put up on the market by its creator, Case modder and computing fanatic Peter Isaacson. Isaacson created the “Bear-a-Byte” for his spouse, documented on his private web site through the Wayback Machine. Isaacson hollowed out a now-discontinued “Varlig” Ikea jumbo stuffed bear simply sufficient so it might encase an outdated PC tower, then coated the entrance plate with a number of the leftover fur only for good measure.
LGR viewer Charles Lai stepped as much as make the pickup and ship the Bear-a-Byte to the YouTuber, and thus historical past was made and the cyborg bear preserved. In the remainder of the video, LGR goes about taking the mechanized apex predator aside, giving his innards and coat a a lot wanted clear whereas additionally changing drawback elements like his mismatched floppy drive and borked energy provide.
Curiously, some mishap or the sheer weight of the Varlig-brand jumbo bear urgent down over time appears to have warped the case barely, but when he is made it 20+ years already, he ought to be fantastic for a number of extra no less than. LGR opted to put in the marginally cursed Home windows Millennium Version OS to jive with the charmingly cursed nature of the Bear-a-Byte, and by the top of the video the system is even up and working appropriately ursine video games like Fatty Bear’s Birthday Surprise and Mechwarrior 2: Ghost Bear’s Legacy. The Bear-a-Byte nonetheless wants a brand new sound card to repair his crackling audio, nonetheless, and Unreal Event proved an excessive amount of for the system’s 500 MHz Pentium 3.
The Bear-a-Byte, in the end, is formed like a buddy, and it warmed my coronary heart to see his new lease on life. Shortly after Bear-a-Byte’s unique building, the Varlig line of huge boy bears appears to have been discontinued, leaving LGR’s Bear-a-Byte the one identified instance of such a rig. Although, an intrepid trendy case modder might theoretically do the identical with Ikea’s DJUNKELSKOG-brand jumbo bear, the T-1000 to Varlig’s T-800 Terminator.
As a remaining completely happy observe, Isaacson himself is an LGR viewer, and popped into the feedback to precise his approval: “I am so insanely happy that of all of the individuals who might give this factor a loving dwelling, it seems to be LGR! Yay!”
