I started my single node system on Packard Bell 286 with 1mb RAM and a 20MB hard drive. The modem was Hayes 2400 with the modem circuitry in the wall plug.
I used Telegard, a pirated version of the WWIV source code. My wife was preggers with our first child (who turns 27 in October).
By the time I pulled the plug on Cybernautics BBS in 1996, I had
three dial in nodes on a rollover line, four CD-ROM drives and two 400MB IDE drives. Three Intel 28800 modems with processors that were as powerful as the CPU in the old PacBell.
Two nodes ran on 486 boxes I built myself and the third ran on a 486sx.
What made me hang up my SysOp hat was Doom Deathmatches and dialup internet at 56kbps.
I still play Doom every now and then...