Sound Blaster 16

Acer's cheapest 486 came in at 869 quid, roughly 1,950 in today's money.

If you wanted the full multimedia set up, a 486 with a CD-ROM drive and a Sound Blaster 16 cost 1,260, and that was before VAT, so call it 2,800 now plus the tax.

Two grand 800 in today's money before the tax man's, uh, even had a go is properly eye-watering.

That's why so many families ended up with a PC that was really bought for homework and spreadsheets, and then very quietly, Doom moved in.

Pretty much.

A Sound Blaster 16 card on its own was 136 pounds, about 300 today, and you needed four megs of RAM for Doom, which a lot of home PCs simply didn't have.

And when PC Zone reviewed the full registered game a few months later, it listed it at 31 pounds 45 from British distributors, so about 70 quid now.

The shareware episode, of course, cost you nothing.