How Old Is Your Computer? Easy Ways to Determine the Age of Your Computer

 Unlike humans, a computer's age is not simply determined by the date it was born. When I was applying for a freelance project, I was asked if I have a "computer less than three years old." At first I thought I was being asked if I own a computer that was released to the market not more than three years ago from the current date. But then as I pondered more about the question, I figured it can have variety of meanings.

Maybe it was asking how long has it been since my computer was used for the first time?

Even if you buy a brand new computer, you are not going to be the first person to use it. After computers are manufactured, computer technicians will have to configure and run tests on them before they are made available on the market. If you want to determine the age of your computer based on the date it was first used, your best bet is to check the windows installation date.

Steps in checking your Windows installation date

Note: This will only work if your Windows has only been installed once on your computer

Step 1: Press "Windows" button on your keyboard or just click Start Menu

Step 2: Type cmd in the search box and press enter to open Command Prompt

Step 3: Type "systeminfo" (without quotation marks) and press enter

Step 4: When the Command Prompt is done listing information, scroll up and look for the Original Install Date of Microsoft.

Was it about the date when the computer hardware was produced?

Check the Hardware: Look for a sticker with the date of manufacture in the computer hardware.  If you can’t find the date, look for a serial number and request the computer's history to the manufacturer. 

If you want to get a rough idea of your computer's age based on its date of manufacture but you cannot rely on its manufacturer,

Check the BIOS:

Step 1: Click the Start button, search for “system information”

Step 2: Choose System Information from the search results

Step 3: With System Summary selected on the left, look for the BIOS Version/Date in the right panel.

(BIOS date on the motherboard comes before the date of manufacture usually by a year or less.)

The best way to determine your computer's age is to secure such information the moment you owned the computer. While the steps above can help you in determining the "approximate" age of your computer, it will be challenging to find the exact age of your computer.