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Mak0rz posted:That's the one I had I think. I remember renting playstation games and going hog wild. Ah, CloneCD and subchannel data. Fun times.
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May 30, 2017 06:01
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JnnyThndrs posted:I still have a one of them lying around, a RealMagic board, but I don't think I ever put it in anything. Since, at the time, you could only watch a postage-stamp-size .mpg video without your poor CPU bogging down, doing it in hardware was an obvious improvement, but they were expensive and really didn't have a niche. Sure, it might have been nice to make the window bigger than a postage stamp, but then the video would have just had huge pixels because it was low-res anyway - with the codecs of the day, if you'd used a decent resolution then the file size would have been huge and it would have taken way too long to download over  dial-up .
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May 30, 2017 06:21
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EVIL Gibson posted:There were still problems especially with the ever increasing burn rates. Finding a good burner drive and then the media that works well with it (that could handle the burn speeds) was like trying to find two specific needles out of a haystack of needles of too many brands and types. I think the biggest problem my CD burner ever gave me was just installing the thing. I talked my mother into buying one when we were at Sam's Club and didn't realize that it was internal and not external. It was the first component I had ever put into a computer and I was paranoid that I was gonna gently caress it up. I tried to get a friend to help me out since she was taking a class in A+ certification, but couldn't reach her. So another friend and I tried what we could. The Compaq computer that my family had was a tool-free case so taking the case off was a mother fucker to do, but we got it in there, set the stock CD drive to be slave, and I was burning video game soundtracks in no time. Then in 2007, I was playing Diablo II and the disc exploded in the drive and destroyed the drive as well. By then I had a DVD burner so it wasn't the end of the world.
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May 30, 2017 06:31
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Buttcoin purse posted:Sure, it might have been nice to make the window bigger than a postage stamp, but then the video would have just had huge pixels because it was low-res anyway - with the codecs of the day, if you'd used a decent resolution then the file size would have been huge and it would have taken way too long to download over I still have the Star Wars Christmas Special on a stupidly small .rm file.
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May 30, 2017 09:21
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WebDog posted:Most editing systems usually operated "off-line" that is a low resolution capture of the tape's analogue signal was made into a digital file, usually something low res with the Cinepak codec, and then edited in the program then outputted via edit decision lists (EDLs) to fed into a machine that would copy the relevant chunks off the master tapes; "on-line". I was a coder on a non-linear editor, circa 2000. The combination of these two things was a tremendous headache. The fact was that most consumer Firewire videocams of the era were pretty terrible about accuracy. If you commanded an external tape deck to go to a particular frame and stop, if it was a proper professional deck that took directions via RS-422, it would go to exactly the specified frame and stop, ready to start playing back or whatever you wanted. Give the same command to a Firewire consumer camcorder, and it would fast-forward (or rewind) at full speed until it hit that time signature, and only then hit Stop -- and overshoot the target by at least several seconds as the tape reels physically slowed to a stop. This was a big problem, as the EDL specified exactly where the recordings needed to begin and end., which needed to be frame-precise. A few seconds off wouldn't cut it. We ended up having to write algorithms that would "sneak up" on a specific spot in several steps. I am so glad analog media (like tape) is a thing of the past.
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May 30, 2017 10:04
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A Pinball Wizard posted:There's no words for how infuriating this was. You pop in a CD, hit burn, then hold your breath for 30 minutes. It gets almost all the way to the end before popping up a "Buffer underrun!" error and ejecting your brand new $2 coaster. It was a $30 coaster when I was making them, and that hurt a lot.
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May 30, 2017 11:56
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Powered Descent posted:I am so glad analog media (like tape) is a thing of the past. I do miss the days when I had to fully restore a project in AVID from decks. Most of my projects would be 4-10 tapes roughly and it meant a day of inserting tape and walking away to get some food or screw around on my phone. Only to come back to the inevitable TC break.
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May 30, 2017 12:16
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Humphreys posted:I still have the Star Wars Christmas Special on a stupidly small .rm file. I had a small collection of South Park eps in rm files lol
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May 30, 2017 12:21
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Last Chance posted:I had a small collection of South Park eps in rm files lol Seasons 1-8?
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May 30, 2017 12:29
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Buttcoin purse posted:Sure, it might have been nice to make the window bigger than a postage stamp, but then the video would have just had huge pixels because it was low-res anyway - with the codecs of the day, if you'd used a decent resolution then the file size would have been huge and it would have taken way too long to download over If you weren't using a shareware version of GetRight you were doing it wrong! Growing up, my max speed was something like 4.5 KB/sec.
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May 30, 2017 13:18
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Gromit posted:It was a $30 coaster when I was making them, and that hurt a lot. And now optical media is pretty much dead. Good riddance.
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May 30, 2017 16:11
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I still collect and burn CDs and now I have a small vinyl collection. gently caress the police.
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May 30, 2017 16:39
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Collateral Damage posted:And now optical media is pretty much dead. Good riddance. I still burn audio CDs to play in my 12 year old car. 
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May 30, 2017 17:30
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Powered Descent posted:I still burn audio CDs to play in my 12 year old car. I have a respectable cassette collection in mine because the cd player broke. Lets see if someone whips out an 8-track now.
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May 30, 2017 17:54
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Star Man posted:By the time I had a CD burner in 2002, the issue with bad discs and being unable to do anything seemed to be gone. I rarely had any issues with the CDs that I made. I think I had the Yamaha CRW8424S which puts it at around the same time. It wasn't too bad, but I definitely had to be careful and not do anything stupid in parallel, and I've still made my fair share of coasters. Powered Descent posted:I still burn audio CDs to play in my 12 year old car.
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May 30, 2017 18:13
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Pham Nuwen posted:So the best use for something with a 4x40 character screen would be reading ebooks? Do you do a lot of typing while reading Project Gutenberg books? JnnyThndrs posted:I still have a one of them lying around, a RealMagic board, but I don't think I ever put it in anything. Since, at the time, you could only watch a postage-stamp-size .mpg video without your poor CPU bogging down, doing it in hardware was an obvious improvement, but they were expensive and really didn't have a niche.  "TotalLossBrain posted:Hey I remember those. I think they were sort of popular in the late 90's. Most of the time that functionality was packaged with TV Tuner/recorder cards, though. Anyone remember the ATi AllInWonder cards? EVIL Gibson posted:I still have those mp3s and listen to them. One of them has this weird audio effect of like a tiny skip but just really sped up music for that part because the encoder was just garbage doing that part. I got so used to it that when I listened to the album digitally later on from Google play, it felt off when it got through that part without the skip. 1000 Brown M and Ms posted:Speaking of CD burners, has LightScribe been mentioned yet? It was a burner that, with the right CDs, you could burn a label into the top side of the disc with its laser. I had one on my first laptop (circa 2006) but I never had the right discs so I never tried it out. I'm curious to know if they worked well/at all. Obviously I don't think they ever caught on. WebDog posted:Editing video in the 90's was impossible without one of these, or at least a higher end variant. Platystemon posted:This is a company that hired women of tiered heights to optimise efficiency in wiring their machines.  Humphreys posted:I do miss the days when I had to fully restore a project in AVID from decks. Most of my projects would be 4-10 tapes roughly and it meant a day of inserting tape and walking away to get some food or screw around on my phone. Only to come back to the inevitable TC break. This post was too long and now nobody will read it and that is just how the world goes man
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May 30, 2017 20:04
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I just got this baby fired up, and I copied a CD to a Minidisc with a single button press Onkyo FR-435, a top of the line CD/Minidisc receiver from the early 2000s.
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May 30, 2017 20:48
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One of these is still lurking in my closet...  Terrapin VCD Recorder. Last time it was used was probably 2001.
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May 30, 2017 22:55
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Humbug Scoolbus posted:One of these is still lurking in my closet... hell yes. would have loved to have that back in the day. it reminds me how happy I was when I realized DVD players could play VCDs and I could burn my... off-air.. recordings to normal CDs and watch them in my living room
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May 30, 2017 23:40
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Humbug Scoolbus posted:One of these is still lurking in my closet... That era of industrial design is so barf-worthy but i still miss it
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May 31, 2017 00:12
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Dr. Quarex posted:I had a Computer Science professor who pretty obviously was sick of it all and ready to retire, and he eventually told us the story that I think explained why: "when I started here I would start my compiler and it meant I had at least the rest of the day off. By the late 1980s starting your compiler only meant you had enough time to go grab lunch and maybe do some shopping. Now I start my compiler and I don't even have time to go downstairs and get coffee before it's finished. Technological advancements aren't always positive developments." Kinda true, when things run too quickly for you to take a break, it feels like you should just keep "working", but actually it's good to take a break anyway and think about what it is you're doing. As a hoarder of junk I find stuff that prevents you from piling more junk on top of it infuriating 
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May 31, 2017 02:46
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Regular Nintendo posted:That era of industrial design is so barf-worthy but i still miss it I love how easy it is to place that (era-wise). Its literally the tech equivalent of a 1997 Ford Taurus.
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May 31, 2017 03:00
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jojoinnit posted:I love how easy it is to place that (era-wise). Its literally the tech equivalent of a 1997 Ford Taurus. Gah fffffuck yeah. And then it was supplanted by the equally tiresome "make everything translucent and candy-colored, yanno like an iMac" era.
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May 31, 2017 03:31
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Humbug Scoolbus posted:One of these is still lurking in my closet... Just pulled it out and turned it on for the first time in 16 years. It works! Played my VCD of Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon and recorded off my DVD player. Yes, the image looks like complete rear end, but dammit it works!
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May 31, 2017 05:02
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I forgot that the whole iffy CD burning thing and underpowered hardware was one reason I made it a habit to always have two optical drives in my desktops. Put the source CD in one (originally just a player, not even a burner) and the blank in another one. Back in Pentium II 350mhz days this actually sped the process up quite a bit. I think I added more RAM to that machine and got it to a whopping 96mb of memory. 
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May 31, 2017 05:22
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Radio Shack is liquidating a ton of stuff in an auction. From the looks of it, they are selling everything that was leftover at their corporate headquarters. There's cool tech stuff like assorted radios, TRS-80 and Tandy computers. There's also random Radio Shack/Tandy corporate debris, like framed photos of executives, catalogs/newsletters, and various sales awards. Radio Shack Auction
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May 31, 2017 05:40
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So I guess it's too late to go to the Tandy Museum? Also, no one better snipe me on that James L. West portrait. He's my favorite Radioshack Executive.
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May 31, 2017 06:05
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Last Chance posted:hell yes. would have loved to have that back in the day. I got a CD/DVD machine that played normal vcds and DVDs (region less after a button combo on the remote which was awesome) but I paid more since it was able to "play" Xvid and divx videos from burned discs. The word play is in quotes because if you thought you could dump Matrix.avi on a DVD and get it to automatically play oh ho ho wait a second there, is that audio VARIABLE BITRATE MP3? How dare you, I only accept constant bit rate so your audio will be 4x as large without any added quality. Okay, that audio is good but HOLD THE gently caress UP, did you expect me to PLAY something not using the standard Main Profile DIVX codec? You want to try Xvid? Well, hold on a bit there, this WAS proper Xvid Patented and NOT that hacked one with customized profiles and poo poo? Next you'll be telling me you are going to use DVD+R or something rewritable...
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May 31, 2017 07:47
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Cojawfee posted:So I guess it's too late to go to the Tandy Museum? Also, no one better snipe me on that James L. West portrait. He's my favorite Radioshack Executive. I pass Tandy Leather on the way to work every day. They should do fine since leather will be in such stylish demand in our Mad Max future.
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May 31, 2017 07:53
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Clitch posted:I pass Tandy Leather on the way to work every day. They should do fine since leather will be in such stylish demand in our Mad Max future. Man, between Tandy and Coleco, I'm starting to think the entire 1980s computer revolution was done by BDSM leather daddies.
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May 31, 2017 09:22
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Maybe there was some similarity between early circuit board manufacturing tools and leather cutting equipment? I'm reaching here but yeah, that weirds me out too. Maybe it's just that Tandy and Coleco were big enough to try to jump into unrelated fields on spec?
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May 31, 2017 09:47
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With Coleco, they manufactured some leather toys, moccasin stitching kits and the like, and they became they're best selling items. They then dove into the toy business, making plastic toys. So they were already going whole-hog in the toy business well before they went after electronic toys and video games. Tandy sort of branched into handicrafts, and after they became quite successful and had a cash hoard, the owner decided electronics were the future and bought an existing electronic mail-order company called Radio Shack. Bloody Hedgehog has a new favorite as of 10:15 on May 31, 2017 |
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May 31, 2017 10:12
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Grand Prize Winner posted:Maybe there was some similarity between early circuit board manufacturing tools and leather cutting equipment? I'm reaching here but yeah, that weirds me out too. Maybe it's just that Tandy and Coleco were big enough to try to jump into unrelated fields on spec? Both companies wound up investing in computers (and other electronics, like handheld calculators) when that poo poo started taking off in the '70s because a lot of companies were. We remember them mostly because their forays into home computing and game consoles were more successful than, say, semiconductor firms Fairchild and Texas Instruments, and a lot less successful than erstwhile toy manufacturer Nintendo.
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May 31, 2017 10:15
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Edit: Solidly beaten. Skimming quickly through wikipedia, it looks like Tandy moved from leather to general arts&crafts, and then saw that electronics looked like it could be profitable; they then bought RadioShack (who were a mail-order company from the pre-war radio craze) and turned that into a store chain. Making their own computers when they already had an electronics chain wasn't that large a jump, I guess? Coleco came to it from toys - they started with shoe leather, moved into toys, and then had a lucky early gamble on vacuum-formed plastic toys and inflatable vinyl toys (biggest maker of inflatable pools in the 70s, apparently). This was apparently profitable enough that they had money burning in their pockets - they made snowmobiles for a while. The game side wanted to make some profit on electronics and sold a pong clone, then some handhelds and eventually a console. When the console crash hit they tried turning the console into a home computer. So, yeah, leather was a big and general enough business in the first half of the 1900s to let leather companies branch into whatever they wanted, apparently.
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May 31, 2017 10:23
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Holy poo poo! Some of the things in that auction... https://ubidestates.hibid.com/lot/32247922/gridcase-model-1530/?ref=catalog https://ubidestates.hibid.com/lot/32247925/gridpad-model-1900-with-case/?ref=catalog https://ubidestates.hibid.com/lot/32222672/gold-album--put-the-hammer-down-/?ipp=100&ref=catalog https://ubidestates.hibid.com/lot/32247970/historical-artifacts--box-1-of-2---/?ipp=100&ref=catalog https://ubidestates.hibid.com/lot/32248000/cue-cat-samples/?cpage=2&ipp=100&ref=catalog https://ubidestates.hibid.com/lot/32248182/bust-of-charles-tandy/?cpage=4&ipp=100&ref=catalog
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May 31, 2017 12:02
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Looks like some kind of prototype from their proposed Thor-CD CD data storage format  https://ubidestates.hibid.com/lot/32247931/thor-cd-exhibit--box-5-of-5-/
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May 31, 2017 12:18
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Some of the stuff in that RadioShack auction is legitimately cool but then I got to the page with what is clearly just stuff from the kitchen in the office.  One (1) August 2012 Sports Illustrated, $3
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May 31, 2017 14:03
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suuma posted:Some of the stuff in that RadioShack auction is legitimately cool but then I got to the page with what is clearly just stuff from the kitchen in the office. There is a nude, signed photograph of Rhonda Rousey in that auction. Office decor, huh?
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May 31, 2017 14:19
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There's also beds. Did Radioshack have a gently caress room?
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May 31, 2017 15:51
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Cojawfee posted:There's also beds. Did Radioshack have a gently caress room? Maybe they had a guest house for visiting execs or something? gently caress room is more likely.
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May 31, 2017 15:57
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