Post the very best in obsolete and failed technology

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Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

titties posted:

I didn't recognize it at first but when I was a small child in the mid-80's I had something very much like this. It went with a series of books that I want to say included Sesame Street titles and stuff.

Yes! I had the same thing (born in '77). I think I had a Sesame Street book, and definitely a Muppet Show book. I clearly remember a bit with Lew Zealand telling a really stupid joke that ended in "I'm a little hard of herring," at which point the player would skip (and skip and skip).

Here it is: http://www.museumofplay.org/online-collections/1/13/110.1011
And here's the Fisher-Price Talk To Me player in action: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AlR053J35B8

I just finished reading the entire thread, having started, oh, a year ago? It's been a wild ride. :allears:

# ¿ Nov 14, 2017 18:42

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# ¿ May 10, 2024 05:40

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

Vanagoon posted:

They need to offer an SSD with a little speaker on it that goes clickety clickety like an old mechanical HDD so you can tell if the computer is working without even looking at it.

In a similar vein, I appreciate that the C64 emulator I use emulates the 1541 drive light (possibly via the Scroll Lock light? one of those, anyway) so you can watch the "drive" work--and even occasionally error out.

# ¿ Nov 15, 2017 21:31

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

SomeJazzyRat posted:

I concur, but it has to be this or this

I've always liked this myself.

# ¿ Nov 16, 2017 21:25

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

GutBomb posted:

I'm 39 and I can hear it but my wife who is 32 couldn't. We found another video with a range of tones and I stopped being able to hear it at 17 kHz and she loses it at 14khz. She loves concerts and I don't like them much so I'm taking that explanation.

I'm 40 and I could hear it clear as a ~~bell~~n icepick. Now I have a headache.

My husband is going on 45 and is deaf (to some frequencies) in one ear, and he can hear it, too. I'm the concertgoer and loud-music-listener. :shrug:

# ¿ Dec 7, 2017 15:38

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

Platystemon posted:

Tokyo imported AEG generators from Germany (50 Hz).

Osaka imported General Electric generators from the U.S.A. (60 Hz).

When radio didn�t exist, all appliances were imported, and the transmission lines didn�t extend beyond the cities, that was no issue.

By the time it became an issue, it was too expensive to fix.

After the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami, eastern Japan was conserving electricity on a widespread scale, so they could focus their electricity-generating efforts on getting the Tohoku region back on its feet. Vending machines were dimmed or off, a portion of bulbs/light banks in public lighting installations were kept off, air conditioning turned up (i.e., not as cool), and train cars were stifling in the summer heat.

Out west, where they couldn't "send" any of the electricity they generated to the devastated east, things went on pretty much as normal. There were huge outpourings of support and donations of money and supplies, of course, but no changes to electricity use. I felt a little guilty enjoying my air-conditioned train rides in Kyoto, but it was such an improvement over the electrical austerity out east.

(It's a lot more common now throughout the country to see energy conservation efforts like vending machines that only light up when you approach or public lights that are only partially lit. There's usually a sign explaining why.)

# ¿ Dec 8, 2017 17:32

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

Sears aired no advertising at all over the entire 2017 holiday season. That can't bode well.

# ¿ Jan 19, 2018 18:32

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

Everything on our network gets a name, and apart from my work computer, I've named them after things in the Hitchhiker's universe. The current main PC/server is always named Deepthought; the previous computer was renamed Eddie when it was decommissioned. My phone is Marvin; my old phones were also Marvin, but are now named Zem and Zem II. My tablet is Lamuella. The Wii is Zaphod and the PS3 is Hotblack. My tiny thumbdrive is Towel and the big one I've since handed off was DotD for Dish of the Day (it came up as D:). My Kindle is The Guide.

Oh, then there are the printers. The Samsung laser is Annyong and the Brother all-in-one is Hermano.

But I come from a naming family. My beloved grandmother, God rest her soul, named every goddamn thing, even her benign tumor (Irena) and the walker she had for a hot minute (Fred Astaire).

# ¿ Mar 19, 2018 13:49

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

Proteus Jones posted:

Jesus, I just had a nasty flashback. For certain people here, these 3 words will strike terror in their hearts.

C1541. HEAD. ALIGNMENT.

That used to such a problem, companies sold kits to fix it. You took the shroud off and adjusted the alignment screws while running diagnostic software. The thing was, the more you �fixed� it, the more often you had to.

I've heard about it, but I somehow never had that problem with my 1541. And I used the poo poo out of it, too.

One of my favorite tricks involving my 1541 was removing the disk halfway through booting a very good but hellishly difficult game (Asylum). The program would basically give up, dump multiple flag messages to the parser, and shove a bunch of goodies into my inventory. I'd put the disk back in and go my merry way. I guess this is the precursor to cartridge-tilting, and both of them have been rendered obsolete by digitally delivered software (and CD/DVD-ROMs--can you hotswap a CD/DVD to bug up a game in interesting ways? Not counting using them in Monster Rancher and the like).

# ¿ Apr 30, 2018 14:26

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

Krispy Wafer posted:

The system is a joke though. My kid deposited her paycheck on Friday and was all like “WTF?” on Tuesday when it still hasn’t posted. You forget how annoying paper checks can be when you have direct deposit.

As a freelancer, nearly all of my clients pay by check--even my biggest client, which is a huge name in the field. But now I can deposit my payments via an app and the money shows up in my account that same day. They warn that deposits made after 4 PM will be finalized the next day, but that seems to be overly cautious CYA stuff, since even late-night deposits go right through.

(I'm in the US and use Charles Schwab for this, btw. They're not my main bank, but their lack of fees and digital deposit thing work really well for us as a secondary bank. Plus the people are lovely, if you ever need to talk to someone there.)

# ¿ Jun 2, 2018 19:51

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

My one (overseas) client who uses bank transfer takes out their sending fee before paying me, at which point I pay another fee for receiving it. Bank transfer--internationally, anyway--is not all it's cracked up to be. Of course, having an understanding/much bigger client who doesn't make you pay the fee for which they are responsible makes a huge difference. It's always the smaller clients paying small amounts that get double-dipped for bank fees, resulting in a net payment of far less than what I invoiced. :mad:

It's my overseas client who somehow kept his US bank account and pays by check who wins the day.

Powered Descent posted:

It has? Since when? I'm in the US and I've literally never seen anyone use contactless payment. Not even one of those gas station fobs they were pushing so hard a few years ago, and certainly not with a phone.

At least one major grocery store has it by us (Meijer), and I've seen people use NFC at Starbucks now and then. I tried Android Pay a couple times at Meijer; it's all right. I think I'm just too used to pulling out my wallet at the checkout for it to make much of a difference. But I'm an old, so take that with a grain of :corsair:

Hirayuki has a new favorite as of 21:29 on Jun 2, 2018

# ¿ Jun 2, 2018 21:26

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

We use checks for our son's school (not tuition--that's direct-debit--but registration fees, various club activity fees, lunches, etc.), for piano lessons (paid to an individual), and for other non-school extracurricular activities (summer camp, etc.). I pay my hair stylist by check because it's probably better for him than paying the salon with a credit card and waiting for them to reimburse him. We donate to our church by check, and if I owe my parents anything (they buy us poo poo with their Costco membership, etc.), I pay them by check. We also often pay for home services by check: repair of our garage door, fence, air-conditioning unit, etc.

If you don't use checks, would you expect all of these people to take credit cards or direct deposit or something? I can't picture the repairman having a Square reader on his phone, for example.

# ¿ Jun 2, 2018 23:57

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

Jabor posted:

For small things like piano lessons or hair stylists, cash.

You have cheap piano lessons and hair stylists. :saddowns:

# ¿ Jun 3, 2018 00:05

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

Jabor posted:

How much does a one-hour piano lesson cost you?

We pay $25 a lesson (I'm not sure how long it is) and pay for a month's worth at once.

Weatherman posted:

Uhh I'd expect most of them to accept cash, you know, that other vaguely paper-like money thing?

I'll be damned if I'm expected to keep $115 in cash on hand to pay my hairstylist, $425 for the garage-door guy, or $325 to get the fence fixed (per my check register). Surely using checks is better than having to remember to get to the ATM before an appointment, especially when my husband and I both work at home and can't swing by the bank during a commute. It's an improvement over cash, but far less convenient than direct-debit or credit/debit cards.

# ¿ Jun 3, 2018 00:23

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

Danger - Octopus! posted:

Yeah, in the UK it's really weird hearing Americans talking about cheques as a thing in common usage. When I was in a banking job a couple of years ago, we had two new folk join the team I was on. Both were recently turned 18 - one of them had never seen a cheque in her life and the other had only ever seen cheques when an elderly relative occasionally gave her one on her birthday.

That's the other time a check has no real better alternative: sending wedding/graduation/etc. gifts. If you want to put a $20 bill in a card for your nephew's birthday, sure, but when you're talking $100 or more, cash isn't always practical. It's inconvenient to send a $100 bill and trashy to stuff the card with small bills.

# ¿ Jun 3, 2018 14:28

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

When consumption tax went up to 5% in 1997, the law also stipulated that displayed prices either had to be pre-tax or be accompanied by a "tax included" notation, which seems fair. Before that, I remember seeing, chiefly on books, both the total price and then the pre-tax price in parentheses. The book I happen to have at hand here says "400 yen + tax", and just to pick two companies at random, Uniqlo's prices are "[price] + tax," but Muji's are "[price] (tax included)".

Japanese receipts will almost always also say, under the total, some variation of "of which x yen is tax".

# ¿ Jun 5, 2018 17:45

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

Antioch posted:

My first car was a 1987 Chevy Celebrity. Came in "runny poo" brown, with a slightly darker brown bench interior.

Aw, reminds me of our old VW Rabbit hatchback. Officially "Inca brown," unofficially "monkeyshit brown". I loved that lovely little thing, even after the gear box rusted through the floor and you could literally see the road through the floorboards. :allears:

(not ours, but one very much like it)

# ¿ Aug 16, 2018 02:28

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

EvilGenius posted:

Do new cars still have CD players?

We thought we might have to replace our 2001 Forester last month and were looking at a Honda CRV. Honda phased out CD players in that model, at least, as of the 2017 model year.

# ¿ Nov 13, 2018 19:33

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

Man, the only place I really saw DATs was in a video game that came out in 1988, but was set in 1997 (Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders). DATs didn't have a huge role in the game, but the implication was definitely that this was the logical evolution of the cassette tape (to be played in an in-dash deck). They had just been introduced in '87.

One thing the game's futurism got right, though, was debit cards--there was no cash money anywhere to be found. It seemed kind of silly at the time as a player to have to use this "cashcard" doohickey everywhere--even sliding it through the reader on the bus as you boarded. Madness! Oh, and the tight security when traveling internationally (as represented by the anti-piracy measure of having to refer to a feelie to input a specific code to continue). The jury is still out on the whole "low-frequency hum causing widespread public stupidity" thing, though it's getting more and more believable by the day.

# ¿ Nov 19, 2018 22:26

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

Here's my nerdy niche obsolete product: a Casio horoscope watch.

Input your birthdate, -time, latitude, and longitude, and you could get, at the press of various buttons, a rating for your day in the fields of love, money, health, work, and relationships:

along with an abbreviated Magic 8-Ball that would ruminate for a bit and answer YES, NO, or ? to any question you asked and another function that reveals your daily lucky color, number, and compatible star-sign. It could do these things for up to four people if you stored all their birth data in there. It could also show you where various celestial bodies were (like, the sun is at 11 degrees in the house of Aquarius). All this on top of keeping time, setting alarms, and all the other normal watch stuff.

http://mygshock.com/casio-manual/1014/

I must have gotten mine in...oh, geez, the early '90s? I recently had a new battery installed, but it seems to be losing time, and one of the buttons is stuck.

I'd love to be able to wear it again just for the novelty of it. (I've worn a watch since kindergarten and have a metric fuckton of them, including a lot of gift Swatches. I splurged on a nice gold solar-powered Citizen ten years back and justified it by saying I really wouldn't need any more watches--and no batteries, either. My watch purchases have slowed down a lot since then; I still wear one whenever I leave the house.)

# ¿ Mar 29, 2019 18:18

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

Grand Prize Winner posted:

I mean sure you don't want it getting into your bloodstream or water supply, but our old mercury switch thermostat worked way better than our new bimetallic one.

I guard our last remaining mercury thermometer like it's a drat family heirloom for this reason: it works perfectly every time.

# ¿ Jun 21, 2019 16:09

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

boar guy posted:

isn't EBT foodstamps?

Maybe EFT(POS)?

# ¿ Jun 28, 2019 20:15

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

Croatoan posted:

That actually sounds like a decent usage. Did you still get hit with a conversion rate?

I remember rates for travelers' checks posted alongside cash exchange rates at Japanese airport banks in the '90s. I don't believe they were that far off from cash rates, and maybe even better. I think I only ever used my checks at banks (to just turn them entirely into local currency), either at the airport or elsewhere. I can't remember using them to buy stuff at stores, though if I did, it would have been a store very much accustomed to tourist traffic that knew how to handle the things.

# ¿ Jun 29, 2019 01:57

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

WithoutTheFezOn posted:

Obviously you weren�t around in 1980, which is OK. The answer is clearly the knee-high athletic socks.

# ¿ Jul 2, 2019 16:01

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

TITTIEKISSER69 posted:

Um that's literally my birth date.

Where's your time stamp?

# ¿ Jul 31, 2019 02:33

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

Peanut Butler posted:

first was boring 2001 kyocera candybar- favorite of the end of that era was deffo the sony-ericsson walkman phone w350:

it was the perfect amount of little, fit snugly in the coin pocket of any pair of jeans

had some dumbshit sony propietary data/headphone connector, but other than that, favorite phone ever

would pay many dollars for a bluetooth handset that is basically that phone

I think this was my last "feature phone" before I splurged on an HTC Incredible: a Sony Ericsson W580i in Jungle Green:

I loved how small it was, back when we valued cellphones for being small. I'd set shortcuts for all my important contacts and barely ever had to slide the thing open. It lived in my bedside table drawer for a long time post-obsolescence to live its second life as a reliable music alarm clock.

(My first cellphone was a 4 or something very much like it, though I don't remember a folding mouthpiece. It was a Motorola, square on the top and pointed on the bottom like a half-assed trapezoid. I had a protector for it that was essentially a thick plastic bag, molded to fit.)

eta: I just learned that the W580i was in You Don't Mess with the Zohan AND Paul Blart: Mall Cop. Wow.

# ¿ Aug 5, 2019 16:38

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

Krispy Wafer posted:

I thought they used the highlighters that revealed each hint as you needed them?

I think that was Infocom. I believe LucasArts had the red gel, though.

[this space intentionally left blank]

# ¿ Aug 18, 2019 17:27

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

Arsenic Lupin posted:

drat, I love iIfocom. Sadly, Douglas Adams's games required the hint books unless you were Douglas Adams.

Hell, Infocom's HHGttG required the original book--at least for me, who had to be no older than ten at the time. It did help a little, but then I resorted to ordering the hint book. I'm glad I did--it was written with as much humor as the game itself.

# ¿ Aug 18, 2019 19:17

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

Zereth posted:

I believe that puzzle was rigged so if you dispensed a fish, then solved the problem and dispensed another one, then solved that problem etc, it'd run out of fish one or two before you could actually get it.

"Click."

Goddamn, did that one word strike terror into my little nerd heart.

# ¿ Aug 19, 2019 01:05

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

Known Lecher posted:

I'm not sure what I'm more offended by, that the left one is supposed to be red-white-blue or the right one is supposed to be purple-white-blue.

It's all red-yellow-green right now because that's the current palette. If you selected red-white-blue, (all) the text would display in red-white-blue.

# ¿ Aug 21, 2019 14:18

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

twistedmentat posted:

A friend of mine still use winamp on his phone for music. I think he still has the same playlist from then as well.

Hell, I still use Winamp on my computer. I never had an Apple product, so I never got into iTunes, and every other music program seems to do way more than I need.

# ¿ Aug 24, 2019 04:20

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

Weatherman posted:

- NHK agents will demand to enter your house to check if you have a TV, connected/working/powered-on or not, inside. If you do, you have to pay.

But you can ignore them at the door and refuse to let them in, right?

These seem relevant (not to the thread, but to the current discussion):
https://soranews24.com/2017/12/18/nhk-repelling-stickers-free-for-anyone-wanting-to-keep-away-japans-public-tv-fee-collectors/

https://soranews24.com/2017/02/16/w-t-f-japan-top-5-ways-to-get-rid-of-the-annoying-door-to-door-nhk-guy-%E3%80%90weird-top-five%E3%80%91/

# ¿ Aug 28, 2019 14:48

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

Kazy posted:

I still use Feedly.

# ¿ Sep 22, 2019 18:24

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

LifeSunDeath posted:

I ride up to my local coffee shop, park my 3 story bike, pull out my music typewriter, and proceed to type out sheet music for my Noise Music DJ sets until I'm asked to leave (I refuse to leave).

Were you listening to this (on vinyl)? https://www.amazon.com/Music-Typewriter-Moreno-Two/dp/B01KHUFSLS/
(it's a very good album)

# ¿ Oct 7, 2019 00:51

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

Neito posted:

Now there's a name I haven't heard in quite a while...

loadhigh mouse.sys

I keep calling poo poo TSR if it sticks around even after you think you killed it. I guess that's a "background app" these days.

# ¿ Dec 5, 2019 20:24

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

My Google keyboard will not auto-capitalize "I". I've gone so far as to remove "i" from its suggestions, but no dice. :mad:

# ¿ Jan 4, 2020 20:39

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

eminkey2003 posted:

If anyone is still in Windows 8 Hell, please do yourself a favor and get Classic Shell. Saved my life. http://classicshell.net/

Hell, it was one of the first things I installed when I finally had to upgrade to 10 (from 7) last summer.

# ¿ Jan 14, 2020 01:14

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

Dick Trauma posted:

This ought to be obsolete, but...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wmekiDniWD4

Thanks for introducing me to this channel--I love this kind of stuff. :cheers:

# ¿ Jan 15, 2020 14:18

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

Toast Museum posted:

Here's another channel you'd probably enjoy:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PuBywc6Lnk8

Yes, thanks! The night-and-day transformations are totally my jam.

# ¿ Jan 16, 2020 15:43

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

The various Apple error chimes gave me the creeps in a major way, and this is when I was in college! Ugh. Somehow Windows doesn't strike the same fear into my heart with its Oops, something went wrong :-(

# ¿ Jan 29, 2020 02:12

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# ¿ May 10, 2024 05:40

Hirayuki: Mar 28, 2010

I haven't given up our sole remaining mercury thermometer yet.

# ¿ Jan 29, 2020 18:42

The Something Awful Forums > Main > Post Your Favorite: Carefully Curated > Post the very best in obsolete and failed technology

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