# Awesome Older Tech Gadgets



## StarHalo

Post some awesome but little-known older tech gadgets!


Sanyo Sound & Game (1983)







It may look a bit goofy now, but the idea of adding a game to your portable music player technically makes this the conceptual forerunner to the iPod; it probably wasn't a good idea to make the game digital and the radio analog, and it was predictably poorly received and discontinued almost immediately. 


Hewlett-Packard 95LX (1991)






It's a palmtop - 8088 processor, 1MB RAM, MS-DOS 3.3, PCMCIA slot RAM card data storage, software in ROM (Lotus 1-2-3, calculator, planner, telecom [serial port], etc), powered by a pair of AA batteries. Sold for $700 new, can be found for ~$10 used today. 


Toshiba Toscal Desktop Calculator (1965)






In the 60's, $1,700 could buy you this amazing new piece of technology, a 38 pound desktop calculator; 14-digit Nixie tube display, rotary dial decimal placement, one number memory (180 bits capacitor RAM), and "silent operation". But the kicker is what's inside - not a single IC chip in the entire case, just rows and rows of hundreds of transistors, capacitors, and resistors, all painstakingly arranged into the logic circuits needed to make calculations. It doesn't always work, as the machine can't compute very large numbers reliably, can't do negative numbers, but it can attempt to divide by zero if you ask it to; "Division by zero puts the machine directly to the task of calculating the incalculable, with all of the decimal points flickering across the display, likely as a result the machine making a futile attempt to shift the (non-existent) dividend to the high-end of the register. The only way to stop the machine's fruitless attempt to resolve the impossible is to press the [C] key to reset the machine and return it to normal operation."


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## Toohotruk

Very interesting! Especially that sweet Toshiba calculator! oo:


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## ASheep

I love how the toshiba actually tries to divide by zero. I remember those HP palmtops, I didn't realise they're as old as I am...


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## guiri

Funny, I was just looking at this site and then found this thread...weird 
http://www.kosbo.com/index.php?option=com_imagebrowser&view=gallery&Itemid=70

George


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## [email protected]

I remember being as proud as punch having the first Nintendo handheld game on the block back in the early 80's I had this one (Snoopy Tennis) and my brother got "Parachute" :thumbsup:





_Borrowed & re-hosted image_


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## StarHalo

[email protected] said:


> I remember being as proud as punch having the first Nintendo handheld game on the block back in the early 80's I had this one (Snoopy Tennis) and my brother got "Parachute" :thumbsup:



heh, didn't know about those. I see they sell on EBay for ~$50..


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## Vesper

guiri said:


> Funny, I was just looking at this site and then found this thread...weird
> http://www.kosbo.com/index.php?option=com_imagebrowser&view=gallery&Itemid=70
> 
> George



Haha. I was looking at that same site a few months ago. Been wanting to build a Nixie Clock for a while now. Yup, that Toshiba calc is pretty cool. Thanks for posting these.


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## guiri

Ah, good ol' days


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## gswitter

I was a Merlin junkie for a while...


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## gswitter

I loved the Dark Tower game, too. But the tower crapped out literally the day the warranty expired. My parents were not pleased.


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## [email protected]

StarHalo said:


> heh, didn't know about those. I see they sell on EBay for ~$50..



Geez that much? I'll admit I always craved a dual screen Donkey Kong variant, perhaps you'll remember these out of 1978?





_Borrowed & re-hosted image_


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## gswitter

My first "computer"...





Incredibly craptastic, but I sorta learned Basic on it.


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## fyrstormer

Let's see. When I was a kid, I had an original Game Boy, a clock radio, and a handheld racecar game from Radio Shack. Oh, I also had a 130-in-1 electronics experiment board from Radio Shack that looked like...well...damn, I can't find any pictures anymore.


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## StarHalo

[email protected] said:


> Geez that much? I'll admit I always craved a dual screen Donkey Kong variant, perhaps you'll remember these out of 1978?



Nope, still before my time, though somebody on EBay has one with the box and manuals for ~$250. I definitely remember Simon though, and I got a lot of mileage out of my Merlin (though it took too many batteries.) And speaking of taking too many batteries, I also owned a Pac-Man Mini-Arcade:


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## [email protected]

Nice! I preferred the smaller Pac-Man handheld game which came later (and my best mate had), does anyone remember those Gaxxon Space Invader games that peaked out at 199 points (max)?

I had one of these in blue...





_Image borrowed & rehosted_

Being the horder I am I've still got my old Commodore VIC-20 personal computer (with 16K expansion pack & games)


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## Toohotruk

One of my favorites, was the _Coleco Electronic Quarterback_...back in the day, if you had one of these babies, you were considered very cool! 

The graphics were unreal! 








I've still got mine somewhere...


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## ShineOnYouCrazyDiamond

StarHalo said:


> Nope, still before my time, though somebody on EBay has one with the box and manuals for ~$250. I definitely remember Simon though, and I got a lot of mileage out of my Merlin (though it took too many batteries.) And speaking of taking too many batteries, I also owned a Pac-Man Mini-Arcade:



I think I still have a Donkey Kong one of the above somewhere.



[email protected] said:


> Geez that much? I'll admit I always craved a dual screen Donkey Kong variant, perhaps you'll remember these out of 1978?



I still have a Donkey Kong Jr dual flip screen - loved that little game. I even pull it out once in a while and still play a few rounds on it.

Never knew they had such value now.

Still have an original Nintendo 64 that may or may not work anymore.


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## gswitter

I've been trying to dig up a picture of the Panasonic boombox I had as a kid, but I'm having no luck.


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## StarHalo

Possibly the most redneck portable entertainment device ever created, the Cariole 8-Track player featuring an AM/FM and* CB* tuner. When you're done listening to your Merle Haggard 8-track, you can tune in to the truckers..


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## gswitter

Still can't find a pic of my old boombox (or WalkMan).

I never had much vinyl as a kid, but I still wanted a Audio-Technica Sound Burger (essentially a vinyl WalkMan):






They're still fairly popular on the secondary market.


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## Toohotruk

That one is kinds cool... :huh:


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## [email protected]

Sega Game Gear! 







Who'd have thought a little LED technology would seriously extend this little console's runtime (backlight modification)? I just won one off eBay should be en-route soon, can hardly wait... Sonic the Hedgehog - awesome! :thumbsup:


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## gswitter

Wasted quite a few afternoons at a friend's house, tormenting his dog with one of these...






I'm not sure if Milton Bradley's behind it or not, but someone's putting it back in production. Wonder if I can get away with giving one as a Xmas gift to a five year old girl... :thinking:


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## ^^Nova^^

Some memories in this thread.

I remember playing tic tac toe on the Merlin.

Cheers,
Nova


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## fyrstormer

[email protected] said:


> Sega Game Gear!
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Who'd have thought a little LED technology would seriously extend this little console's runtime (backlight modification)? I just won one off eBay should be en-route soon, can hardly wait... Sonic the Hedgehog - awesome! :thumbsup:


You know you can get Sonic the Hedgehog for the Nintendo DS now, right? It already has an LED backlight, and a better screen than the GG will ever have.

Not everything old is worth keeping, unfortunately.


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## Beamhead

gswitter said:


> I loved the Dark Tower game, too. But the tower crapped out literally the day the warranty expired. My parents were not pleased.


 
We played the hell out of that game, the first 2 towers/games failed within the warranty period and then Toys R Us had the game on closeout for $25 bucks and I bought 2, both towers were flawless.
Gave one to my cuz and sold the other complete game on Ebay for insane money.
Those damn Brigands.


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## StarHalo

Room where the first message was sent over the internet (ARPANET at the time) on the night of October 29, 1969; room 3420 Boelter Hall, UCLA:


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## guiri

Beamhead said:


> We played the hell out of that game, the first 2 towers/games failed within the warranty period and then Toys R Us had the game on closeout for $25 bucks and I bought 2, both towers were flawless.
> Gave one to my cuz and sold the other complete game on Ebay for insane money.
> Those damn Brigands.



OUt of curiosity, define insane money..?

George


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## Burgess

Great thread here !

:thumbsup:


i KNOW i commented here, several months ago.

Guess it must've gotten "Lost In Space" during the system crash.
:sigh:


I had a Sharp PC-1500 pocket computer, which i rcd. 10/1982.
Not a calculator, it was a *real computer*, running BASIC !
Took 4 AA alkalines, and had a one-line display of 80 characters !

Radio Shack sold its own variation, which was also mfg. by Sharp.

I learned a LOT from mine.
Considered it to be truly a Modern Miracle of Electronics !
Paid $200, plus some more for the additional memory card. 

Believe it was an 8k card, for perhaps 40 bucks.

29 years ago, i felt this was *Simply Fantastic* !


_


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## guiri

It was. All that stuff was amazing to us then.


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## Toohotruk

I remember your post Burgess...seems like you (or someone) posted a pic of it as well, right? :thinking:


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## Burgess

I believe it was StarHalo who located (and posted) a photo
of the Radio Shack version. It had a few minor changes (keyboard layout ?),
but was also manufactured by Sharp, and fundametally the same device.

They both took the same "memory upgrade" module, too.

And, of course, they ran the same (BASIC) programs.


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## RBR

.....


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## PhotonWrangler

Burgess said:


> I believe it was StarHalo who located (and posted) a photo
> of the Radio Shack version. It had a few minor changes (keyboard layout ?),
> but was also manufactured by Sharp, and fundametally the same device.
> 
> They both took the same "memory upgrade" module, too.
> 
> And, of course, they ran the same (BASIC) programs.



I had one of those Radio Shack basic computers also. I think I paid $70 for it at the time. It was a marvel of engineering in it's day. But then so was the Texas Instruments SR-10 calculator, the first calculator that could do square roots. That was also a big deal in it's day and offered freedom from that damned slide rule. I loved those large tactile 'clicky' buttons and I still have it.


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## StarHalo

RBR said:


> Not sure if these are awesome but here are two pocketable calculators, each with an addition and a subtraction side.
> 
> Both about 80 years old.



Awesome, I haven't seen anything like that; those must've been prohibitively expensive considering the popularity of slide rules.



PhotonWrangler said:


> I had one of those Radio Shack basic computers also. I think I paid $70 for it at the time. It was a marvel of engineering in it's day.



It's crazy to think that the power of supercomputers of that era are now the size of that handheld device (literally - a current smartphone has the same processing power as a washing machine-sized liquid nitrogen-cooled Cray-II); for five bucks, I can download and play X-Plane, a full featured flight simulator, on the Android phone I got for free from my carrier..


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## guiri

RBR said:


> Almost forgot this one here.
> 
> Prussian bushwhacker, called Faschinenmesser, about 150 years old.



That one's for subtracting people's heads, right? :sick2:


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## RBR

.....


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## Candlelabra

StarHalo said:


> Nope, still before my time, though somebody on EBay has one with the box and manuals for ~$250. I definitely remember Simon though, and I got a lot of mileage out of my Merlin (though it took too many batteries.) And speaking of taking too many batteries, I also owned a Pac-Man Mini-Arcade:



Dang, seeing one of these makes me want to see if I can buy one now...nice flashback.


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## PhotonWrangler

Old radios with Magic Eye Tubes for tuning indicators.

More here.


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## SlickSlabMcKnab

[email protected] said:


> I remember being as proud as punch having the first Nintendo handheld game on the block back in the early 80's I had this one (Snoopy Tennis) and my brother got "Parachute" :thumbsup:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> _Borrowed & re-hosted image_



Kinda reminds me of:



Even though I haven't used mine and it's been in the box for a while now, it's still pretty neat.




[email protected] said:


> Sega Game Gear!
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Who'd have thought a little LED technology would seriously extend this little console's runtime (backlight modification)? I just won one off eBay should be en-route soon, can hardly wait... Sonic the Hedgehog - awesome! :thumbsup:


 
I still have mine. XD Surf Ninjas and Sonic were my favorite. Add the TV tuner that you once could pop into it and it was beyond a BEAST!


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## Toohotruk

Those Magic Eye tubes are cool! I've never heard of them, but I could see how they could be pretty handy way back in the "olden" days of non-digital radio tuners.


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## StarHalo

There's a Chinese company, VAL Shenzen, that makes high-end tube radios that still feature the Magic Eye tuner:


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## tam17

My old boombox, the legendary Grundig RR621 Elite:






Back in the Eighties it wasn't sleek and fancy as Sanyos were, but I just loved it. Guzzled primaries like hell... Excellent sound quality, though.

Cheers,
Tam


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## LEDAdd1ct

Those were the good ones! Back then, Grundig was Grundig, and not Eton.


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## Groundhog

Toohotruk said:


> One of my favorites, was the _Coleco Electronic Quarterback_...back in the day, if you had one of these babies, you were considered very cool!
> 
> The graphics were unreal!
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> I've still got mine somewhere...



I used to save every dollar bill I earned in a little recipe card box with a lock on it until I finally saved up enough for my most coveted game ever.


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## RBR

.....


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## PhotonWrangler

Wow, look at the heavy glass lens on that light. They don't make them light that any more!


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## PapaLumen

gswitter said:


> Wasted quite a few afternoons at a friend's house, tormenting his dog with one of these...
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> I'm not sure if Milton Bradley's behind it or not, but someone's putting it back in production. Wonder if I can get away with giving one as a Xmas gift to a five year old girl... :thinking:


Wicked, i had a bigtrak.


Also my first computer -http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/31/Sinclair_ZX81.jpg


Your image is too large and has been replaced with a link. Please resize and repost.
See Rule #3 If you post an image in your post, please downsize the image to no larger than 800 x 800 pixels. - Thanks Norm


It had 1k of memory. Thats 1000 characters!!! I got the 16k rampack for it to play 3d monster maze  - http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...rampack.jpg/607px-Sinclair.zx.16k.rampack.jpg

3D Monster Maze -


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## Toohotruk

WOW! The graphics are so good on that game it's scary! 


Love the old blowtorches too! :thumbsup:


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## RBR

......


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## ewmccraw

Toohotruk said:


> One of my favorites, was the _Coleco Electronic Quarterback_...back in the day, if you had one of these babies, you were considered very cool!
> 
> The graphics were unreal!
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> I've still got mine somewhere...





I had on e of these! Loved that thing.


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## RBR

.,,,,


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## Toohotruk

Never seen one of those...bet it's worth something.


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## tam17

USSR-made pocket video game from the Eighties.






Main characters, rabbit and wolf, are from a popular Soviet era kids' animated series "Nu Pogodi". 

Manufacturer info here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elektronika

Back in those times I had Nintendo's Donkey Kong II, too :naughty:

Cheers,

Tam


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## ericjohn

Toohotruk said:


> One of my favorites, was the _Coleco Electronic Quarterback_...back in the day, if you had one of these babies, you were considered very cool!
> 
> The graphics were unreal!
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> I've still got mine somewhere...




my dad had one of these in the late 80's/early 90's. batteries leaked all over it and ruined it. i bought him a replica of it in 2007.


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## StarHalo

Commodore is back..


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## Obijuan Kenobe

Electronic QB for the win.

Sent from a long time ago...in a galaxy far, far away.


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## Sub_Umbra

I often think about the guy who invented the first *Fire Piston* in some hot, steamy, prehistoric jungle.


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## Toohotruk

Those new Commodore computers look pretty cool! :naughty:

A bit pricey though for the models with more options.


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## buds224

Groundhog said:


> I used to save every dollar bill I earned in a little recipe card box with a lock on it until I finally saved up enough for my most coveted game ever.



My all time favorite too! I still have mine somewhere.


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## Wrend

I use my TI-89 (non-Titanium) calculator still, and actually prefer it over other options. I talk about it in another thread here somewhere. I know it's only a little over 10 years old, but I mention it here because it uses the Motorola 68000 processor, which is the same kind used in some of the first home computers such as the Apple Lisa, Macintosh, and Commodore Amiga, and also in the Sega Genesis, I believe.

To this day I still occasionally play NES video games on a top-loader Nintendo with a dog-bone style controller hooked up to a Nintendo Satellite remote control system, which I now power by 6 AAA Eneloops instead of C cells, and installed a hard on/off switch on it to keep it from draining the cells when not in use.


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## StarHalo

This still-working original Apple I computer, originally sold in 1976 for $666.66, was sold at a Sotheby's auction on Friday for $374,500.


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## biglights

Awesome :thumbsup:


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## zenbeam

[email protected] said:


> Nice! I preferred the smaller Pac-Man handheld game which came later (and my best mate had), does anyone remember those Gaxxon Space Invader games that peaked out at 199 points (max)?
> 
> I had one of these in blue...
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> _Image borrowed & rehosted_
> 
> Being the horder I am I've still got my old Commodore VIC-20 personal computer (with 16K expansion pack & games)



I had one of those in blue too! I played the living heck outta that thing!




[email protected] said:


> Geez that much? I'll admit I always craved a dual screen Donkey Kong variant, perhaps you'll remember these out of 1978?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> _Borrowed & re-hosted image_



Oh yes! My neighbors had this one and I remember the TV commercials to a certain extent even. They used to really push these and other board games on TV a lot back in the day.


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## kramer5150

Any Gallactica kids? I used to play this for HOURS at my cousins house. we were both members of the radio hack battery club and she used the 9V batteries for this game.


*See Rule #3 Do not Hot Link images. Please host on an image site, Imageshack or similar and repost – Thanks Norm*


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## reppans

Some really old tech tools that are considered state of art by their key user groups: Novelists - Alphasmart and Investment Bankers - HP 12c.

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3004/2952810866_0156ee6e97_z.jpg


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## [email protected]

How about the "Classic" Atari 2600?







I came across one of these years ago with a damaged RS-232 controller (and an assorted box of games), well the port cost $5.00 a little time & solder BUT the nostalgic trip down memory lane was priceless... I turned in the now 100% working console at a opportunity/charity store and hopefully someone got as much enjoyment out of it as I did...


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## AnAppleSnail

So far it's been all electronics. I will have to find my planimeter. It is from my mom, who got a math degree before computer science existed as a choice there. A planimeter calculates the area of an arbitrary closed shape. She used it for analyzing radio tower broadcast patterns to ensure FCC compliance of nearby structures.

Wiki Planimeter

It reminds me of old navy fire control computers, where a group of cams and levers could calculate windage, distance, and speed to give arc and bearing for artillery fire from a moving ship. Hers looks like a squat box with a pen and a needle on an arm, like a compass.


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## SaraAB87

The Go.Video. I just bought one for a very cheap price. Its a VCR that has 2 decks side by side so you can copy tapes easily. Unfortunately it doesn't copy commercial tapes so its only useful for home movies, but its still very cool. This thing was really expensive when it came out, like $300.


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## StarHalo

30 years old today:


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## Burgess

Wow !

Time Flies ! ! !


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## fyrstormer

StarHalo said:


> 30 years old today:


And I'm only a month behind.


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## guiri

StarHalo said:


> 30 years old today:



Ah, the good ol' era of the plastic coasters...I remember it well


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## Bullzeyebill

We don't need anymore quotes of StarHalo's image.

Bill


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## reppans

Very first Blackberry? And a British Psion PDA. Both still work.


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## guiri

I wanted the Psion but it was too expensive at the time


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## StarHalo

1950's Crouse & Hines explosion-proof wall clock; vapor-resistant mechanism, shatterproof bolted cover. 40 lbs.


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## Toohotruk

So, in what situation would an explosion-proof clock be necessary? I mean, I get that they may be used in explosives plants and whatnot, but if the place blows sky high, who's going to be around to give two sh*ts what time it is after the explosion? :thinking:


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## Bullzeyebill

It was a different time then, and the world had been through a huge war. 

Bill


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## tam17

I still have Casio Personal M-1 calculator in my drawer, manufactured circa 1977. It's harder on alkalines (2xAA) than most of my flashlights and won't work on rechargeables. Just love the green glow of its LED display...

Link to image (not mine):

http://www.vintagecalculators.com/CasioPersonalM1_1.jpg

Cheers


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## Swede74

I can't tell you much about this, all I remember is that a relative / friend of the family gave it to me when he (she? no it looks more like it's been handled by the greasy hands of a man) bought a new one for work. I was probably about ten years old, and assuming the label maker was a few years old when I got it, I'd say it's 30-35 years today. I think the contemporary version is essentially the same product that has undergone a facelift.


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## idleprocess

I have a vague recollection of mechanical handheld/pocket "video games" in the early 1980s. 

The one that I have the firmest recollection of was a windup Missile Command variant (or knockoff) with an amazingly intricate mechanism. It was a simple timing game with the "aim point" osculating through a 90-degree cone - press a button and the missile would "launch" with a film reel and hit or miss on the target would be recorded (I forget whether your supply of interceptors was limited). I eventually disassembled it one time too many and it stopped working, at which point I likely disposed of it. Unfortunately, I don't remember the exact name nor the manufacturer, so I can't find any information on it. I'm sure it would cost me a pretty penny to re-acquire...

A friend in the early 1980's had Space Turbo and Zaxxon.


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## Toohotruk

This is the very first calculator I ever owned...I was in Jr. High, seventh grade (I think), and it seemed really cool to have a math class that required you to bring a calculator. My mom bought this one for me...it's a "Lloyd's Accumatic 311." It ate AA Alkies, four at a time and they didn't last very long (IIRC). HUGE by today's standards, but to me it was AWESOME!






Not sure whatever happened to it...but that was nearly 40 years ago. Damn, I'm old!


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## PhotonWrangler

I loved those calculators with the big tactile clicky buttons!


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## Cannybar

I've still got an old Sony models direct drive and I used to have one of those all in one turn table, cassette deck and tuner things encased in wood which were about the size of small tank.


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## ericjohn

I have a Radio Shack Realistic 12-636 from 1985. It is an AM/FM Transistor Radio. Mine says MADE IN HONG KONG on the back among other things. I wish they still made radios like this because it outpreforms all of my "modern" radios. I have a youtube video of it in action.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FxKcgb7QzLM

This thing is very rugged and lasts forever on a Rayovac Industrial Alkaline 9 Volt battery. Nice to have something older than me that still works wonderfully!


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## Bullzeyebill

Sorry, I did not get much from the video as sound did not come through too well. Maybe problem on my end. Would you post your comparisions with other radio's that you own. What was really better than "modern" radio's? Sensitivity, selectivity, speaker, etc?

Bill


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## StarHalo

40 years old today:


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## Jumpmaster

Some of my favorites...
Atari 800
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atari_800

2-XL
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2-XL

Vectrex
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vectrex


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## StarHalo

Not just a Watchman, but a Watchman with an 8mm recorder on it; watch and record your favorite shows on the go. So you know there's some guy out there who has a library of 8mm tapes of weird things he caught over the air years ago..


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## Sub_Umbra

I marvel at the old *Curta* hand held crank calculators. Like the old ARC flashlights they are both _'pets for the hands'_ and highly collectible.

Vids and many pics linked below:

http://www.vcalc.net/cu.htm


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## Toohotruk

That Curta calculator is cool! oo:


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## inetdog

Toohotruk said:


> That Curta calculator is cool! oo:



I actually used one a few times. I can't recall for sure whether it was a Type I or Type II. The feel of the precision internal gearing was impressive. Made a cute noise too. (It was a prize in a high school math contest. The school kept it and gave all the team members slide rules instead. I wonder where it is now?)
Division by repeated subtraction was tedious, but better than longhand.


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## Burgess

Just think . . . .


in a couple decades, we'll be talking about:


" My very first ipad ! "

or 

" the first ipad mini ! "


" I thought that was SO COOL, with its 1024 x 768 screen resolution ! "



_


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## Arm and Leg

Burgess said:


> Just think . . . .
> 
> 
> in a couple decades, we'll be talking about:
> 
> 
> " My very first ipad ! "
> 
> or
> 
> " the first ipad mini ! "
> 
> 
> " I thought that was SO COOL, with its 1024 x 768 screen resolution ! "
> 
> 
> 
> _


Sadly, you're right.


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## StarHalo

30+ years old, the most badass arcade cabinet ever:


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## ericjohn

StarHalo said:


> 1950's Crouse & Hines explosion-proof wall clock; vapor-resistant mechanism, shatterproof bolted cover. 40 lbs.



Which NEC Class and Division is it approved for, lol? Or maybe it is MSHA approved. I was being silly...BUT...On a serious note; does it really carry any such approval?


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## ericjohn

StarHalo said:


> 40 years old today:



Ran on the AMPS 1G analog system which is no longer available. Damn shame

My first "REAL" cell phone was a Nokia 3360 my parents got me in May of 2003. If you were to turn it on today, there would be no signal as it ran on the old AMPS/TDMA system. 

I now EDC a Pantech Link 7040p. Bought it at CVS Pharmacy as New-Old-Stock. It's made in Korea (not china ) Poor man's smartphone and about 3-4 years out of date; but I still like it very much.


----------



## StarHalo

50 years old today:


----------



## N8N

Toohotruk said:


> So, in what situation would an explosion-proof clock be necessary? I mean, I get that they may be used in explosives plants and whatnot, but if the place blows sky high, who's going to be around to give two sh*ts what time it is after the explosion? :thinking:



Hah... the idea is that it is suitable for use in potentially explosive atmospheres, e.g. a flour mill or propane storage facility.

I'll have to snap a pic of my old Leeds & Northrup "galvanometer" - 1940's version of a multimeter. Unfortunately the instruction card is long gone and the battery holder is a little munged up... I found it on the shelf at an old employer when I was told to "get rid of all these old tools" - actually found the wooden case separately, another employee was using it as a toolbox! I bought her a new toolbox and everyone was happy  Unfortunately I sold the bead roller and a set of chassis punches at a swap meet because I needed the space and the money. I stupidly did not take the old variac that was also on the shelf, not knowing at the time that it was oh so handy for powering up old tube equipment safely. I still have a lifetime supply of drill bits... in some sizes.


----------



## RBR

.....


----------



## Zeruel

Still keeping these.


----------



## StarHalo

RBR said:


> One really old tech gadged i rediscovered is the good old notebook, i mean those paper ones where old guys like me make notes in using a pen.



I get a specific brand/model number modest-sized ~6"x8" notebook at the start of every on-campus college semester, and each section holds my notes for each class; I've got these paper notebooks from a few years ago, whereas I've gone through a couple of notebook computers in the same time. No pen though, gotta use a pencil to fill out test fill-in-the-bubble scan forms, so I use a mechanical pencil used like a pen, to note things down faster, and so everyone can see the eraser is unused..



Zeruel said:


> Still keeping these.



Strange to think that those were the templates for the future DS and GameBoy..


----------



## HaileStorm

What a cool thread! I've lots to post here tomorrow for sure!


----------



## tam17

Zeruel said:


> Still keeping these.



Ahh, darn, memories! I was the first kid in the neighborhood to own portable Donkey Kong. It was a big thing back then (especially when you're living in a socialist country, he he...). IIRC in the same Nintendo series there was also Oil Panic, and another one I can't recall. Many thanks for posting this, Zeruel! :thumbsup:

Cheers


----------



## dc38

tam17 said:


> Ahh, darn, memories! I was the first kid in the neighborhood to own portable Donkey Kong. It was a big thing back then (especially when you're living in a socialist country, he he...). IIRC in the same Nintendo series there was also Oil Panic, and another one I can't recall. Many thanks for posting this, Zeruel! :thumbsup:
> 
> Cheers



Used to have a stack of old game and watches.... My old tech was a Commodore 64! Dunno where it is though


----------



## StarHalo

Microsoft Windows is 30 years old today:





And long-distance calling is 62 years old today. Celebrate by asking anyone under 18 years of age if they know what "long distance" is..


----------



## PhotonWrangler

StarHalo said:


> Microsoft Windows is 30 years old today:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> And long-distance calling is 62 years old today. Celebrate by asking anyone under 18 years of age if they know what "long distance" is..



For that matter, ask them if they know what a landline is.


----------



## Flying Turtle

That's the phone I grew up with. You could actually dial pretty fast with those. And, if you dialed 9-8-5, waited for the "bing, plop" noise, then a 6 you could make the phone ring. 

Geoff


----------



## StarHalo

Flying Turtle said:


> That's the phone I grew up with.



There's one just like it in my great-grandfather's cabin; the receiver is ridiculously heavy, feels like a solid slab of metal..


----------



## N8N

Actually Bakelite. I have the wall version hanging in my kitchen.

Sent from my XT897 using Tapatalk


----------



## PhotonWrangler

Here's a source for all of those old telephone system sounds from the mechanical stepper relay days. This sound (sometimes called the 'mosquito') used to frighten me as a kid. I thought it was a monster at the other end! :laughing:


----------



## idleprocess

Those Western Electric rotary phones can survive a direct hit from a multi-megaton nuclear device.


----------



## zespectre

Back in the very very beginning of my IT career I worked at a place that was migrating all of it's data from IBM 2311 "Disc Packs" over to....Floppy Discs.

People can sneer at the venerable old 3.5" Floppy disc but in the late 80's pre-network society, the ability to save your data, put it in a case, and take it with you wherever you went was AWESOME! (In it's era, the Disc Pack was pretty amazing too).


----------



## Sub_Umbra

idleprocess said:


> Those Western Electric rotary phones can survive a direct hit from a multi-megaton nuclear device.



They were *trans-generational.* Once I accidentally knocked one off a table and it fell into a five gallon bucket of water, blood and pig livers. I rinsed it off and dried it out and it started working again in 2-3 days.

I miss the days when you could kill someone by hitting them with _any part_ of a phone and then the phone would go on to work for decades...


----------



## idleprocess

zespectre said:


> Back in the very very beginning of my IT career I worked at a place that was migrating all of it's data from IBM 2311 "Disc Packs" over to....Floppy Discs.
> 
> People can sneer at the venerable old 3.5" Floppy disc but in the late 80's pre-network society, the ability to save your data, put it in a case, and take it with you wherever you went was AWESOME! (In it's era, the Disc Pack was pretty amazing too).



Often missed in the sneering at 3.5" floppies is the fact that prior to their late-maturity phase where the margins were squeezed out and they were oftentimes WORN memory (Write Once, Read Never), manufacturers used to produce _quality_ disks that were reasonably durable so long as one didn't flip the door open constantly or abuse them.

It's funny how the wheel turns because now that USB keys have gotten so cheap, they're commonly suffering from some of the same quality problems as floppy disks in the mid-late 90s.


----------



## PhotonWrangler

I remember when 3.5" floppies first came out, and this was the first format where the outer disc wasn't technically "floppy," so they were called stiffy discs for about 20 seconds.


----------



## ElectronGuru

PhotonWrangler said:


> For that matter, ask them if they know what a landline is.



Or a collect call.




Sub_Umbra said:


> I miss the days when you could kill someone by hitting them with _any part_ of a phone and then the phone would go on to work for decades...



I was talking to Henry about this. It seems the entire system was expected to last many decades. They just had no concept of obsolescence, and financed accordingly. When the value of the hardware collapsed, the value of the phone companies did too!

My fondest floppy disk memory was backing up the HD to a stack of 25 or so, when half way into the verification (which was a separate/second step, so 40+ disk insertions), the active disk kicked out with a notice on the screen that the whole job was worthless and I needed to start over


----------



## StarHalo

My fondest floppy disk memory was my first digital camera, the Sony Mavica; this was back when digital cameras were still a brand new thing, so the sight of a big one that resembled an SLR drew people like flies. They always assumed they were too complicated or required some sort of superhuman computer skills, but the minute I'd pop that friendly, familiar floppy disk out of the camera, they'd just marvel at what convenient simplicity technology had wrought..


----------



## Toohotruk

I actually have a Mavica...I remember taking pics with it and you'd have to wait for the info to be written on the disk before you could take another shot, or look at the pic you just took.


----------



## PhotonWrangler

I had a computer that used 5-1/4" floppy disks, and we had one device at the office that used the old 8" floppies! And I remember seeing those disc packs on the old mainframe. Good times.


----------



## StarHalo

The Sony Walkman is 35 years old this summer, so to celebrate, some current-day children and teenagers are handed one to determine A) what it is, and B) how to operate it. Hilarity ensues:


----------



## idleprocess

StarHalo said:


> The Sony Walkman is 35 years old this summer, so to celebrate, some current-day children and teenagers are handed one to determine A) what it is, and B) how to operate it. Hilarity ensues:



My initial thought was "that's staged", but then I recall some of my conceits about LP's and 8-tracks when the walkman was _the shizz_ and had to admit that save for the editing it was probably all spontaneous. In a few short years they can go for easy hits and repeat the segment with the discman.


----------



## caddylover

my toys from when I was a kid back in the 80's. I am the original owner of 90% of the stuff in the display.


----------



## PhotonWrangler

idleprocess said:


> My initial thought was "that's staged", but then I recall some of my conceits about LP's and 8-tracks when the walkman was _the shizz_ and had to admit that save for the editing it was probably all spontaneous. In a few short years they can go for easy hits and repeat the segment with the discman.



I'd like to see those same kids react to a vinyl record. It might actually teach them a bit about the physics of sound reproduction.

Yeah it makes me feel old. Now all you kids get off my lawn.


----------



## StarHalo

Of course it's not staged, the kids in that video who are ~8 years old were born around the time of the second-generation iPod Nano - not the original iPod, the smaller one with a color display and color anodized case (or if you couldn't afford that, the clip-on iPod Shuffle was also in its second generation.) The iPad was introduced when they were in kindergarten. So the idea of a music device that's all hardware would be extremely confusing.


----------



## Jumpmaster

Nevermind.


----------



## Monocrom

That Walkman and kids vid. is the most popular thing on a number of different forum sites I belong to. Damn I feel old!


----------



## mitymouse

PhotonWrangler said:


> I'd like to see those same kids react to a vinyl record. It might actually teach them a bit about the physics of sound reproduction.
> 
> Yeah it makes me feel old. Now all you kids get off my lawn.



Along those lines, I'd like to see them react to my old boom box. (JVC-DC7L)





The real kicker was the linear tracking turntable that slid out on a motorized platform when you opened the door. The downside? Weight, size and the 8 D cells used to power this thing if you wanted it to be 'portable'. This was the first device that I owned that made me seek out rechargeable batteries (Ni-Cd of course at the time, which I recall didn't impress me that much...)


----------



## PhotonWrangler

Mitymouse, that's a classic.


----------



## LedTed

+1 for Potter's Scientific Instruments or Nothing!


----------



## StarHalo

A quarter century old today:


----------



## Monocrom

I had one of those.

You always find a way to make me feel old, S.H. :sigh:


----------



## StarHalo

Monocrom said:


> You always find a way to make me feel old, S.H. :sigh:



Mine's in a zippered case next to my nightstand (an original one, not the updated one in the drawer.)


----------



## StarHalo

Let's grab a screwdriver and upgrade this 386SX, in a TV piece from 1991:


----------



## Steve K

wow... I forgot that we were still using 5 1/4" floppy drives back then. The 200MB hard drive sounds familiar.. when you start out on IBM XT machines with just two floppies, it's a big deal to just get any hard drive! In the days before mp3 or digital cameras, it was fairly hard to fill up 200MB. Not any more!


----------



## Monocrom

Steve K said:


> wow... I forgot that we were still using 5 1/4" floppy drives back then. The 200MB hard drive sounds familiar.. when you start out on IBM XT machines with just two floppies, it's a big deal to just get any hard drive! In the days before mp3 or digital cameras, it was fairly hard to fill up 200MB. Not any more!



I remember floppy disks.... Ridiculously fragile things beyond what many consider to be ridiculously fragile, that _*never *_should have been introduced to the market.


----------



## idleprocess

Just unearthed a circa 1986 Sony Walkman and a >15 year old Sony discman. Both appear to have weathered more than a decade of non temperature controlled storage without complaint. The discman in particular came out looking almost new ... and played fine. I lack any cassettes to test the Walkman with.


----------



## THE_dAY

idleprocess said:


> Just unearthed a circa 1986 Sony Walkman and a >15 year old Sony discman. Both appear to have weathered more than a decade of non temperature controlled storage without complaint. The discman in particular came out looking almost new ... and played fine. I lack any cassettes to test the Walkman with.


Is that discman a metal or plastic version?
I remember having one of there early 90's all metal versions. That was a nice piece of tech. 
Beautiful design and had that yellow Mega Bass logo which I liked.


----------



## idleprocess

THE_dAY said:


> Is that discman a metal or plastic version?
> I remember having one of there early 90's all metal versions. That was a nice piece of tech.
> Beautiful design and had that yellow Mega Bass logo which I liked.


No, it's one of the later models near the end of its reign after Sony grudgingly admitted that mini-disc wasn't going to take off in the US, and as such supported MP3. In retrospect, it might be newer than 15 years old _(Edit: 2002 copyright date on the manual Sony is miraculously still hosting)_.


----------



## THE_dAY

idleprocess said:


> No, it's one of the later models near the end of its reign after Sony grudgingly admitted that mini-disc wasn't going to take off in the US, and as such supported MP3. In retrospect, it might be newer than 15 years old _(Edit: 2002 copyright date on the manual Sony is miraculously still hosting)_.


Ha, good for them to still have the manual available. 
While searching for pics I came across a site called sonyvintage.com that has info and pics on the older walkmans and discmans.


----------



## fyrstormer

I have one:







That blue heatsink is attached to the top of a nitro engine -- a two-stroke combustion engine that runs on a mixture of alcohol and castor oil, with 3 moving parts. Once the engine is started, the glowplug heater is removed, and the engine runs with no electrical power whatsoever -- even the fuel pressure is provided by siphoning off a little bit of the exhaust gases, instead of having a fuel pump. The piston has no rings, and instead relies on a slight taper at the top of the cylinder to provide a tight seal during the first few milliseconds of combustion, when the pressure is highest.

The rest of the car has plenty of new tech -- digital servo motors, 2.4GHz encrypted multi-channel radio, lithium batteries -- but the engine itself is just a slightly-more-refined version of a design first developed in the late 1800's, and first adapted for toy use after WW2.

Here's a larger one, that my girlfriend's nephews had great fun with during Memorial Day weekend at her parents' farm:






They put about 12 tanks of fuel through the engine over the course of the weekend, 6 tanks per day, back-to-back. As good as batteries are nowadays, it still wouldn't have been possible for them to have that much continuous fun without me spending hundreds of dollars on battery packs. The fuel they burned that weekend cost about $10.


----------



## orbital

+






NASA is rollin' old school again.._________^ 460GHz tube


----------



## PhotonWrangler

orbital said:


> +
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> NASA is rollin' old school again.._________^ 460GHz tube



460 GHZ? In a vacuum tube? Wow. Even those tiny acorn tubes can't do that.


----------



## idleprocess

PhotonWrangler said:


> 460 GHZ? In a vacuum tube? Wow. Even those tiny acorn tubes can't do that.



Story seems to be a little more involved than just raiding the polished-cherry tube amp sitting front-and-center on many an audiophile's equipment stack. Or in old Russian nuke tech.


----------



## PhotonWrangler

idleprocess said:


> Story seems to be a little more involved than just raiding the polished-cherry tube amp sitting front-and-center on many an audiophile's equipment stack. Or in old Russian nuke tech.



Thanks for the article. So it's actually a transistor in a vacuum. This makes much more sense now. I couldn't see them achieving those frequencies with anything larger than a nano scale device.


----------



## erehwyrevekool

Hey *Toohotruk,
*I own a Lloyd's Accumatic 304 (Made in Japan) w/ the original pouch. This was my dad's calculator, used in the workplace, it's in overall good conditions and still works. 






And this was my mom's typewriter Olivetti Lettera 22 (Made in Italy), still works flawlessly!


----------



## StarHalo

erehwyrevekool said:


> And this was my mom's typewriter Olivetti Lettera 22 (Made in Italy), still works flawlessly!



Yesterday I found a small pile of new typewriter ribbon in the Amazon warehouse, so some folks are still typing away..


----------



## PhotonWrangler

I always liked the older calculators with the large tactile clicky buttons. That one reminds me of my SR-10. :thumbsup:


----------



## Monocrom

erehwyrevekool said:


> Hey *Toohotruk,
> *I own a Lloyd's Accumatic 304 (Made in Japan) w/ the original pouch. This was my dad's calculator, used in the workplace, it's in overall good conditions and still works.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> And this was my mom's typewriter Olivetti Lettera 22 (Made in Italy), still works flawlessly!



Back when companies made products with pride, and to last! I bought an older 24 oz. Hydroflask about two months back. Yesterday, I was looking for a 21 oz. version. The older one was made with a quiet plastic screw-top that was perfectly smooth on the outside. The newer 21 oz. one? I had to pick through several on the store's shelves to find one that didn't have a damn seam running down the middle of the cap, and one that didn't squeak loudly as Hell. (Like a cheap $5 sports bottle.) Found one, but took quite awhile. I was fortunate that it was a big store with a huge inventory out on display. Very diasppointing the difference after just a handful of years.


----------



## erehwyrevekool

The _planned obsolescence_ is part of every production system and we all are victim of it. Customizing our stuff, sometimes (when possible), is the only way to extend their life span and/or toughness.


----------



## Monocrom

erehwyrevekool said:


> The _planned obsolescence_ is part of every production system and we all are victim of it. Customizing our stuff, sometimes (when possible), is the only way to extend their life span and/or toughness.



The "planned" part I get. I just don't see why quality has to be lowered to such an obvious point for experienced buyers of a particular brand.


----------



## fyrstormer

The first version of any new product is overbuilt to ensure reliability, to establish the product as useful and desirable. Over time, the design gets pared-down to remove extra durability that isn't needed based on actual customer experience, to make the product affordable to as large a market as possible. After this happens, it's fairly common for premium brands to re-introduce more-durable versions of the product for so-called "prosumer" customers. The price almost always appears to be higher than the original price of the first version, but that's usually because inflation by that point has significantly reduced the buying power of the currency.


----------



## Toohotruk

erehwyrevekool said:


> Hey *Toohotruk,
> *I own a Lloyd's Accumatic 304 (Made in Japan) w/ the original pouch. This was my dad's calculator, used in the workplace, it's in overall good conditions and still works...



That's cool! I wish I still had mine. Maybe I'll run across one on ebay or somewhere someday.


----------



## idleprocess

fyrstormer said:


> The first version of any new product is overbuilt to ensure reliability, to establish the product as useful and desirable. Over time, the design gets pared-down to remove extra durability that isn't needed based on actual customer experience, to make the product affordable to as large a market as possible. After this happens, it's fairly common for premium brands to re-introduce more-durable versions of the product for so-called "prosumer" customers. The price almost always appears to be higher than the original price of the first version, but that's usually because inflation by that point has significantly reduced the buying power of the currency.



Also forgotten whenever we don the rose-colored glasses and look at decades past (typically the 1960s and earlier) when everything seemed to be so much more durable, we often forgot how much less competitive the marketplace was - there just wasn't as much pressure to cut costs.


----------



## StarHalo

You might recall the Apple I auction story from a few years ago; another copy has since sold for $900,000+. 

Two months ago, a Bay Area *computer recycling center found an Apple I casually dropped off* by a woman. It turns out her husband had passed away and she had simply taken in his collection for recycling not knowing what any of it was. The center has since auctioned off the computer for $200,000 and is still looking for the woman to share the profits.


----------



## StarHalo

1953, moving a *5MB *IBM hard drive:


----------



## Toohotruk

WOW!!


----------



## Steve K

Dave Jones, on his EEVblog, tore apart an old mechanical analog computer that is part of the Kollsman Instrument Corporation MD-1 Automatic Astro Compass as used in the B-52 bomber. It appears to be designed to perform non-linear calculations, and is an amazing collection of cams, synchros, and precision machining. 

https://www.eevblog.com/2016/02/24/eevblog-854-b52-bomber-automatic-astro-compass-teardown/

The video itself is here: https://youtu.be/hzGaO4Kdz2Y


----------



## DaveC1964

Some of that old crap can be quite collectable too:


----------



## erehwyrevekool

WOW, very nice stuff!


----------



## nightshade

DaveC1964 said:


> Some of that old crap can be quite collectable too:



Very nice! Beautiful collection!
It's not really old, it's just that we don't live very long.


----------



## PhotonWrangler

I remember at least two of those radios, maybe three of them, and one of the tape recorders. Nice collection!


----------



## DaveC1964

PhotonWrangler said:


> I remember at least two of those radios, maybe three of them, and one of the tape recorders. Nice collection!



Most of that stuff wasn't really too expensive (except a few). That recorder in the middle (white case in back) is actually a wire recorder made in Germany. It records on very fine wire and uses micro-tubes, not transistors. Many of these were used in spy operations during the Cold War.


----------



## Monocrom

I know there's no film for it anymore, but I'd love a Minox camera. Great spy gear. Ironically, most films that show it being used by actors pretending to be spies; leave out the included chain. That little bead chain was vital for taking photos of actual secret documents.


----------



## StarHalo

DaveC1964 said:


> Most of that stuff wasn't really too expensive (except a few). That recorder in the middle (white case in back) is actually a wire recorder made in Germany. It records on very fine wire and uses micro-tubes, not transistors. Many of these were used in spy operations during the Cold War.



The mini Sonys are worth a penny (bearing in mind that they're unusable as actual radios since they had proprietary batteries that are no longer available,) and the big-speakered Zeniths are hot items. The rub with all older radios like those is that they are functionally dismal when compared to any modern unit, but they sure are pretty..



Monocrom said:


> I know there's no film for it anymore, but I'd love a Minox camera. Great spy gear. Ironically, most films that show it being used by actors pretending to be spies; leave out the included chain. That little bead chain was vital for taking photos of actual secret documents.



$200, but you can get a significantly better regular-sized camera for that price.


----------



## DaveC1964

StarHalo said:


> The mini Sonys are worth a penny (bearing in mind that they're unusable as actual radios since they had proprietary batteries that are no longer available,) and the big-speakered Zeniths are hot items. The rub with all older radios like those is that they are functionally dismal when compared to any modern unit, but they sure are pretty..



Probably the most significant radio in the picture is the Regency TR-1, the first all transistor radio made.


----------



## Monocrom

StarHalo said:


> $200, but you can get a significantly better regular-sized camera for that price.



True, but it wouldn't be THE spy camera. Also, sorry for the misunderstanding, but not that particular model. The rectangular silver-greyish one.


----------



## StarHalo

DaveC1964 said:


> Probably the most significant radio in the picture is the Regency TR-1, the first all transistor radio made.



Yeah, I saw the gold dial hiding back there  Hard to believe that was the iPhone of it's day..


----------



## brighthead

StarHalo said:


> Post some awesome but little-known older tech gadgets!


* Sony Hi-MD. (MiniDisc). MiniDisc always had a near-flawless cartridge design and great chemistry. It's a pity that Sony killed it and allowed Apple to take over. This is what happens when you buy CBS and start to focus on anti-piracy rather than cool usable technology.
* DVD-RAM in cartridges. I have a fine Panasonic DVD-RAM computer drive (that accepts DVD-RAM in cartridges). I have never experienced a more robust and flawless 'floppy' than this, even though writing is slow compared to today's standards. I freaking love DVD-RAM in cartridges. The chemistry and data integrity of the format was thought out really well (over-engineered) and the data didn't need to be written in a linear fashion like DVD-R/W & DVD+R/W. My only regret is I didn't buy another 10 drives.


----------



## musichelle

I remember my dad had a programmable pocket computer about 15-16 years ago (either Sharp or Casio) which he used for work. Whenever I get hold of it, I would erase the programmed code and write my own (it was running BASIC) and get into trouble. I didn't have a personal computer back then.

And I'm a software developer now.


----------



## jabe1

I still have an HP-25 programmable calculator. I can't remember when I last used it, but it does work. Fantastic machine when it was introduced, my dad used it to crunch testing data for work. Them
n he moved on to a Sharp pocket computer. IIRC it used magnetic strips to program it. That was very cool. We had a PC in the house as far back as '79. I also remember having an old cradle modem to communicate with the mainframe down at the university.
my favorite was the T RS-80 4P. The P was for portable, it packed up into what looked like a small suitcase, handle and all. This was sometime in the early eighties. I remember playing pong on it and learning some of my "basic" programming on it.


----------



## walterr839

The chain was used to measure distance 
Manuel focus had to be set
I inherited several minox The later model had a light meter


----------



## Monocrom

walterr839 said:


> The chain was used to measure distance
> Manuel focus had to be set
> I inherited several minox The later model had a light meter



The focus is one thing. The very end of the chain simply happened to be the perfect distance to photograph one full standard document page with one click of the camera.


----------



## StarHalo

The 1972 Panasonic RS-296US, 20-cassette carousel with individual cassette selection and wired remote; no record or FF/RW, must play side A-then-B, weighs 40 lbs., $179 ($1,000+ dollars today.)


----------



## Toohotruk

WOW! Never seen one of those. That was probably a big risk for them to develop a gizmo like that based on cassettes...IIRC, that was about the time cassettes just started to gain popularity. 8-Tracks were still very much king in the early '70s...looking back, that's pretty laughable, LOL!


----------



## PhotonWrangler

Wow. That must have been a beast to maintain that thing.


----------



## fyrstormer

I have never been so desperate to avoid manually changing albums that I could even justify a CD changer, much less a far-more-complex cassette changer.


----------



## fyrstormer

StarHalo said:


> The Sony Walkman is 35 years old this summer, so to celebrate, some current-day children and teenagers are handed one to determine A) what it is, and B) how to operate it. Hilarity ensues:


You know, looking back on this a couple years later, it annoys me how these videos only show the most ridiculous reactions. The kids who aren't weirded-out by old tech just get cut from videos like this. This is really just the first step of Generation X into old age, wherein they will complain endlessly about how easy Kids These Days have it, and how ungrateful they are, just like Baby Boomers have been doing about Millennials for years now.


----------



## Imon

fyrstormer said:


> You know, looking back on this a couple years later, it annoys me how these videos only show the most ridiculous reactions. The kids who aren't weirded-out by old tech just get cut from videos like this. This is really just the first step of Generation X into old age, wherein they will complain endlessly about how easy Kids These Days have it, and how ungrateful they are, just like Baby Boomers have been doing about Millennials for years now.



Happens every generation.
Then they say, "No, this time it's different."
Which is the same thing that's said every generation.


----------



## idleprocess

fyrstormer said:


> You know, looking back on this a couple years later, it annoys me how these videos only show the most ridiculous reactions. The kids who aren't weirded-out by old tech just get cut from videos like this. This is really just the first step of Generation X into old age, wherein they will complain endlessly about how easy Kids These Days have it, and how ungrateful they are, just like Baby Boomers have been doing about Millennials for years now.





Imon said:


> Happens every generation.
> Then they say, "No, this time it's different."
> Which is the same thing that's said every generation.



I gather that this tradition goes back at least as far as the ancient Greeks.


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## vadimax

fyrstormer said:


> You know, looking back on this a couple years later, it annoys me how these videos only show the most ridiculous reactions. The kids who aren't weirded-out by old tech just get cut from videos like this. This is really just the first step of Generation X into old age, wherein they will complain endlessly about how easy Kids These Days have it, and how ungrateful they are, just like Baby Boomers have been doing about Millennials for years now.



Those videos show how stupid modern kids are. This is a paradox: technology steps forward, but average human beings become more and more stupid. And only one girl which is not so nice turned out to be the most sane.

Just a comparison: you all know modern Lego, but this is an old school iron game:







And this is kind of final result:






How do you think which one is more educating of them?

Of course, there is a modern equivalent -- Meccano, but how often do you see kids playing with it?


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## Toohotruk

The old Erector Sets were cool! Do they even make them anymore? It was definitely a toy that made you think and use your imagination.

You're right about technology making people stupid...people can't figure out a damned thing without their phones these days. I remember way back when we actually figured stuff out with a pencil and paper, LOL!


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## Bullzeyebill

The Meccano Mountain Rally, 25 Model Set will be one of my grandson's birthday presents. Thanks for pointing Meccano out.

Bill


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## vadimax

Bullzeyebill said:


> The Meccano Mountain Rally, 25 Model Set will be one of my grandson's birthday presents. Thanks for pointing Meccano out.
> 
> Bill



You're welcome  Let your kid enjoy the thrill of creation!


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## vadimax

BTW, that's how real KV-2 (heavy Russian WW2 tank) looks like:






Main gun is 152 mm (~5.98").


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## Bullzeyebill

vadimax said:


> BTW, that's how real KV-2 (heavy Russian WW2 tank) looks like:
> 
> Main gun is 152 mm (~5.98").



I want one of those gadgets. Lol.

Bill


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## Toohotruk

Bullzeyebill said:


> I want one of those gadgets. Lol.
> 
> Bill


It would be an awesome older tech gadget to play around with!


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## Monocrom

Toohotruk said:


> It would be an awesome older tech gadget to play around with!



Works great for chasing off hippies.


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## Toohotruk

Monocrom said:


> Works great for chasing off hippies.


You sound like Cartman, LOL! :laughing:


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## fyrstormer

vadimax said:


> Those videos show how stupid modern kids are. This is a paradox: technology steps forward, but average human beings become more and more stupid. And only one girl which is not so nice turned out to be the most sane.
> 
> Just a comparison: you all know modern Lego, but this is an old school iron game:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> And this is kind of final result:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> How do you think which one is more educating of them?
> 
> Of course, there is a modern equivalent -- Meccano, but how often do you see kids playing with it?


Yes, let's examine the skills of small children who have only experienced those things which are in their parents' houses and in their elementary school classrooms, and call them stupid compared to fully grown adults with decades of experience. That seems fair. 

This mentality reminds me of my girlfriend's sister-in-law complaining about her children slowing down her shopping because they run around looking and grabbing at everything in the store. I told her, "Of course they do, they've never seen those things before. To you it's a store, to them it's a museum." She gave me a look that people normally use when they aren't sure if they're listening to a prophet or a madman.


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## fyrstormer

idleprocess said:


> I gather that this tradition goes back at least as far as the ancient Greeks.


It goes back much farther than that. Young people are stupid because they don't possess the skills old people have, and old people are stupid because they don't possess the skills young people have.


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## Monocrom

Toohotruk said:


> You sound like Cartman, LOL! :laughing:




I'm even worse!.... The adorable hippie girls can stay. But not the smelly dudes! Yup, I'm sexist too.


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## Lex Icon

Monocrom said:


> I'm even worse!.... The adorable hippie girls can stay. But not the smelly dudes! Yup, I'm sexist too.



......leaving us all to wonder how the non-dudes fit into your plans if you consider them as being both adorable and smelly.


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## Toohotruk

Monocrom said:


> I'm even worse!.... The adorable hippie girls can stay. But not the smelly dudes! Yup, I'm sexist too.


 LOL!!!


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## Monocrom

Lex Icon said:


> ......leaving us all to wonder how the non-dudes fit into your plans if you consider them as being both adorable and smelly.



I just let them skip and dance barefoot in the fields. So adorable...... Like watching butterflies flutter around.


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## Lex Icon

Monocrom said:


> I just let them skip and dance barefoot in the fields. So adorable...... Like watching butterflies flutter around.



In case you haven't made plans already, you need to go lurk at the Oregon Country Fair near Eugene (in Veneta) next summer.


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## vadimax

fyrstormer said:


> Yes, let's examine the skills of small children who have only experienced those things which are in their parents' houses and in their elementary school classrooms, and call them stupid compared to fully grown adults with decades of experience. That seems fair.
> 
> This mentality reminds me of my girlfriend's sister-in-law complaining about her children slowing down her shopping because they run around looking and grabbing at everything in the store. I told her, "Of course they do, they've never seen those things before. To you it's a store, to them it's a museum." She gave me a look that people normally use when they aren't sure if they're listening to a prophet or a madman.



You don't get my point. A game like Meccano has plenty of screws and nuts. It requires to use tools (a screw driver and a wrench) not bare hands to join parts together. A child has to play with many small parts what educates hand and finger control. That employs child's brain ten-fold against Lego.


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## Going_Supernova

vadimax said:


> You don't get my point. A game like Meccano has plenty of screws and nuts. It requires to use tools (a screw driver and a wrench) not bare hands to join parts together. A child has to play with many small parts what educates hand and finger control. That employs child's brain ten-fold against Lego.



Sheesh! That's what video games do these days. 

Back in the early 2000's, I took an Intro. to PC's class with a bunch of older folks who were not familiar with computers. Their hand-eye coordination was terrible--they could not get the cursor to go where they wanted it to. The instructor would stop the class to help them, and it ate up the class time. The kids take to PC's and video games easily--great hand-eye coordination.


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## Monocrom

Going_Supernova said:


> Sheesh! That's what video games do these days.
> 
> Back in the early 2000's, I took an Intro. to PC's class with a bunch of older folks who were not familiar with computers. Their hand-eye coordination was terrible--they could not get the cursor to go where they wanted it to. The instructor would stop the class to help them, and it ate up the class time. The kids take to PC's and video games easily--great hand-eye coordination.




I had trouble with the cursor too when I bought my first computer. Adjusting the cursor speed-sensitivity setting is all it took. I slowed mine down quite a bit.


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## StarHalo

Image taken January 2016: 1982 Commodore 64 (1 Mhz processor, 64 KB RAM,) still in use at an auto repair shop in Poland.


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## Going_Supernova

StarHalo said:


> Image taken January 2016: 1982 Commodore 64 (1 Mhz processor, 64 KB RAM,) still in use at an auto repair shop in Poland.



Hmmmm. Anyone remember what country the Commodore was manufactured in? We don't know, that could be the 50th one that they have had in use there, or it could be the only one that they've ever used...it would be interesting to know!


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## PhotonWrangler

if I recall correctly they were made in West Chester, PA. Or at least designed there.


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## Toohotruk

WOW! That's pretty crazy!


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## PhotonWrangler

Spring reverb unit. If you've ever heard the boing-ey metallic sound of 60s' surf guitar, you've heard one of these babies in action. Audio is fed into a transducer at one end of the springs and it's picked up by another transducer at the other end. The reverb audio is then mixed with the "dry" sound for the final effect.

Hammond also used them in their organs to produce that big, lush cathedral sound.


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## Toohotruk

So that is actually inside the guitar? Interesting.


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## PhotonWrangler

It's inside the guitar amplifier. If you've ever bumped a guitar amp and it let out a whangngngngng, it has a spring reverb inside it.


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## gotothelight

Pontiac put spring reverb units in their GTO's back in the 60's.


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## ven

StarHalo said:


> Image taken January 2016: 1982 Commodore 64 (1 Mhz processor, 64 KB RAM,) still in use at an auto repair shop in Poland.




That was my 1st computer...............memories!!!! Barry McCguigan boxing and fist/fist2 ! to name some of maybe 30+ games on tape. Did not always work though...........the anticipation of if a game would load or not watching the load screen still haunts me today

load"*",8,1


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## PhotonWrangler

gotothelight said:


> Pontiac put spring reverb units in their GTO's back in the 60's.



Wow. That must have sounded like a thunderstorm when you hit a bump in the road.


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## Burgess

I'm still using all my Original
Sanyo Eneloop AA rechargeable NiMH batteries.

They were manufactured " 06 08 "
which means August 2006 .

I bought 'em October 2006, at Circuit City.

Been using them quite heavily
for the past * DECADE * now !

:wow:

Certainly got my money's worth, eh ?

Truly nothing short of AMAZING ! ! !

:thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup:
_


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## Toohotruk

They are amazing batteries! I don't think I've had one go bad yet, other than one AAA that doesn't seem to hold as much juice as it used to, they all still work!


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## Alaric Darconville

ven said:


> Barry McCguigan boxing and fist/fist2 ! to name some of maybe 30+ games on tape. Did not always work though...........the anticipation of if a game would load or not watching the load screen still haunts me today
> 
> load"*",8,1



That's loading from the diskette drive-- the cassette would be device 1. The ",1" appended to the command is to specify that the contents of the file should be loaded starting in memory described within the file header itself-- usually done with machine language programs.

'Course, dealing with the "Wheel of Fortune" 1541 drive you might still wait and wait to learn that the file still didn't load. Those 1541s got out of alignment easily.


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## ven

Your memory is far better than mine Alaric, thinking back i was around 12, maybe 13 when my dad bought one with lots of games on cassette. My 1st real experience of a computer other than the BBC type i had used a little(next door had one). 
When I was 16 I got a sega megadrive which is a pretty cool old tech gadget. Super shinobi, golden axe , strider to name 3 games Having a cartridge to stick in, instant on and the jump up in graphics(16 bit iirc) was amazing back the, real cutting edge stuff that worked. Back in 1991 the games then were £40 which is not much different to today's ps4 game pricing, so quite a luxury i guess.


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## StarHalo

Televisor 1929 Television kit; watch TV as it was [rarely] broadcast in glorious 30-line resolution from the BBC in 1929. Kit is ~$35.


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## Toohotruk

That's cool...never seen that before.


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