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Geoj
May 28, 2008

BITTER POOR PERSON

brain739 posted:

i miss you, kodak advantix.

:ssh: they still make the film and most places that do 1 hour processing can run the film because its C-41 process and became ingrained enough that most film scanners can run it in addition to regular 35mm...

Also about half of the disposable film cameras in circulation today use APS.

Geoj has a new favorite as of 04:23 on Jul 14, 2012

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amishbuttermaster
Apr 28, 2009
I ran a photo lab for 4 years. Advantix film deserved to die and should stay that way. It's a terrible, terrible format. Most of the cameras that took the film were awful, the resolution of the film was low due it's size and the cartridges were prone to a ridiculous amount of mechanical problems.

RC and Moon Pie
May 5, 2011

The Smith Corona Wordsmith. A typewriter - with spellcheck! These things had two modes. One was standard typewriter where it would print the letters as you typed like normal, or you could attempt to set margins and type a line at the time and then commit it to paper. There was a tiny display screen that allowed you to make corrections as you typed in this mode. If you misspelled a word, it'd make a very loud and annoying beeping sound. There was a slightly less annoying, but no less loud sound if you made it to the perceived margin. Perceived as in, the margin recognition was horrible.

I used this thing for essays for a bit as though we had a decent computer at this time, the printer was awful and my parents didn't want to spring for another printer that also wasn't going to work (plus being the mid-1990s, it wasn't easy to find a printer for a Mac).

Speaking of that Mac, it had eWorld. I know next to nothing about eWorld, as Dad was the only one curious enough to set it up and that experiment didn't last long as he found out about long distance internet charges. No local number existed until 1996.

This is a photo from the first digital camera I ever toyed with.



It's from 1999. We had the camera in technology lab and this was our school gym. No display on the back, no video capability and it used 3.5 floppy disks.

Pocket Billiards
Aug 29, 2007
.
People were discussing HD-DVD before. I found it interesting that they developed the format so that they could retrofit DVD making equipment to make HD-DVD. Sounds like a good idea but it probably just hamstrung what they could do with the format.

Red_October_7000
Jun 22, 2009

RC and Moon Pie posted:

The Smith Corona Wordsmith. A typewriter - with spellcheck! These things had two modes. One was standard typewriter where it would print the letters as you typed like normal, or you could attempt to set margins and type a line at the time and then commit it to paper. There was a tiny display screen that allowed you to make corrections as you typed in this mode. If you misspelled a word, it'd make a very loud and annoying beeping sound. There was a slightly less annoying, but no less loud sound if you made it to the perceived margin. Perceived as in, the margin recognition was horrible.

I used this thing for essays for a bit as though we had a decent computer at this time, the printer was awful and my parents didn't want to spring for another printer that also wasn't going to work (plus being the mid-1990s, it wasn't easy to find a printer for a Mac).


Behind me on a cabinet is a Xerox 645 Memorywriter, a sort of niche device called a "Desktop Typesetter"; it's basically a highly advanced work processor that uses a Diablo Wheel to make "perfect" characters. It has two 5 1/4" disk drives and a tiny monochrome monitor, and two distinct modes of operation, one that emulates a basic typewriter, and another where the rest of the electronics are powered up and you can do all the "computer" tasks like composing documents on-screen, spell-checking them, format the type and save files and templates and such to disk, etc.

I have LaserDisc! One of my earliest memories of recognizing superior technology was when I went to the shop with my parents to buy a copy of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie, and I saw the giant cover art for the LD version and picked it up, and was amazed that it had chapter stops. Disk media is non-linear, which makes it very convenient, which is why it shows up a lot in education. You'll find tons of second-hand LD players with RS-232 ports on them to interface with computers, and the odd barcode pen interface to scan codes out of a textbook. They also saw limited use as data media, although my knowledge of them as such is second-hand so I'm not sure how that worked out; i.e. were they storing actual digital data or images encoded as NTSC frames (LDs have two "speeds", CAV (Constand Angular Velocity, except it's really Constant Angular Acceleration) and CLV (Constand Linear Velocity). CAV allows 30 minutes a side and perfect still frame and smooth speed changes are possible, they are only possible on CLV discs on players with a frame store), and if it's encoded digitally weather or not it was done as something akin to a data CD or something akin to PCM recording on videotape.

I have CED! It's exactly as bulky and crazy as prior posters have made it sound, and unlike LaserDisc, it doesn't have vastly superior picture quality (a GOOD LD pressing looks almost as good as a DVD); picture is about as good as SuperBeta (An improvement on Betamax; didn't look as good as S-VHS but doesn't need special tapes, wasn't restricted to high-end decks). Also a shitload of the players were real bottom-end units without A/V outs or, peculiarly, the random access that makes disk media so tempting. There's a story to it, though. RCA went through a change in management while it was in development and it got set on the back burner and revived much later on; it's thought that if development had carried on as intended it would have captured the market because it was slated to come out in the 70s, instead of 1981, by which point VHS and Beta were duelling for the mass market and LD had the high end. It couldn't record like tape and didn't have LDs quality, so it sunk. Given what's involved, though, it's amazing that it works at all.

Iomega, the people behind the Zip and Jazz drives, made something called the "Clik!". It was a miniaturized disk drive that fit in a PCMCIA cardslot and took silver-dollar sized disks which held 40 MB each. I bought mine right before inexpensive flash memory made it obsolete. Of course I also bought an Mp3 player that used the disks... It was horrid and slow and the less said of it the better.

Willfor
Oct 6, 2004

Cut Sick

ChlamydiaJones posted:

These are obsolete but I don't know that they actually failed per se;



You can still use chainmail as a wearable faraday cage, to swim with sharks, and on your hand if you are a butcher

b0nes
Sep 11, 2001
What were those "mini records" called?

SkopeDog
Sep 6, 2011
People have probably seen or head of the Harrier, the iconic jump jet. However, in the '70's the Yakovlev Design Bureau of the Soviet Union developed it's own jump jet:



Yakovlev Yak-38, NATO Codenamed "Forger"

When originally seen by Western observers, it was suspected of being an attempt to copy the original Hawker Siddeley P.1127 (Forerunner to the Harrier) but then regarded as an original design once it was learned to be a triple engined and faster. Indeed, the Forger was faster. It approached the sound barrier at maximum speed and could potentially surpass it, given the right conditions.

The Yak-38's V/STOL capabilities differ from the Harriers in that it utilizes forward lift jets and tail exhaust nozzles. The rear nozzles are arranged in a manner similar to the American F-4 Phantom; side by side while tucked infront and below the horizontal stabilizers. These exhausts would pivot downward during the transition from level to vertical flight. At the same time, the forward lift jets would open and a large air scoop on the top would open as well. This would balance the front end of the craft. The Yak-38 also possessed a hands free landing system. The pilot would fly the fighter to an approach fix and intercept it, initiating the ILS approach. From there, the aircraft's flight computer would judge the distance between aircraft and carrier. The pilot would intercept this fix at about 220KTAS and would eventually slow to a speed barely faster than the ship. From the get go, the Forger's designers had access to some of the more important lessons learned by those that flew the Harrier: This kind of aircraft is hard to fly. For added safety, the Forger had an automated ejection system. In the event of an engine failure, the pilot would be ejected should the aircraft roll more than 60 degrees.

The Yak-38 was a very advanced aircraft for the Soviets, at the time. However, it's shortcomings were numerous and crippling. The usage of Lift jets towards the front often meant that the main engine would ingest exhaust from them, causing flame outs. The aircraft itself had an abysmal useful load and, during the hottest days on the Black Sea, it meant that the aircraft would have to omit any arms all together if it were to even get aloft. It did go into production and even saw combat during the Soviet involvement in Afghanistan. It was used in the same manner the USMC uses it's Harriers: As a strike craft and CAS bird. However, the heat coupled with the high altitude meant that the payload was often nothing more than a couple 100KG bombs. The final nail in the coffin was it's upkeep. This aircraft is beyond a maintenance queen. The nature of the engine arrangement meant that it required overhaul with astonishing frequency.

In the end, the Forgers were relegated to land duty before retirement in 1991.

Three production variants were made:

Yak-38 Forger-A. The original run of 140, it first flew in January 1971.
Yak-38M Forger-A. This upgraded version utilized more powerful engines, upping it's max take off weight by about 1,000kg. It was still underpowered.
Yak-38U Forger-B. Two Seat Trainer.

axolotl farmer
May 17, 2007

Now I'm going to sing the Perry Mason theme

I cut my teeth doing DNA sequencing on the Pharmacia ALF-express in the late 90s.





It's so old and obsolete that these are the only pictures I could find of it on GIS.

This machine was really modern for its time, since no radioactivity was involved, and it ran automatically controlled by a regular PC running Windows95.

The trickiest part was pouring the acrylamide gel slab between the two glass panes without getting any bubbles. You had about a minute or two before it started to set.

Then you loaded each lane with a different marked base. 40 lanes meant you could sequence 10 samples at a time, and get 600-800 base pairs read per sample.

Really nice machine, very reliable and decent software too. But every single technology involved is really obsolete. Gel slabs went out almost 10 years ago, and Sanger sequencing is being phased out by next-gen sequencing right now.

Jedit
Dec 10, 2011

Proudly supporting vanilla legends 1994-2014

b0nes posted:

What were those "mini records" called?

Singles?

ChlamydiaJones
Sep 27, 2002

My Estonian riding instructor told me; "Mine munni ahvi türa imeja", and I live by that every day!
Ramrod XTreme

Willfor posted:

You can still use chainmail as a wearable faraday cage, to swim with sharks, and on your hand if you are a butcher


Look a little closer dog; http://www.retrocrush.com/archive/poptoppin/

Red_October_7000 if I locate the copy of Sorcerer I accidentally purchased on eBay I'll mail it to you; http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0076740/

m2pt5
May 18, 2005

THAT GOD DAMN MOSQUITO JUST KEEPS COMING BACK

Jedit posted:

Singles?

Alternately, 45's, because they were played at 45RPM (as opposed to 33RPM for full-sized albums.)

You Are A Werewolf
Apr 26, 2010

Black Gold!

b0nes posted:

What were those "mini records" called?

45s?


Flexi discs?


Fisher-Price music box record player?

Zamboni Rodeo
Jul 19, 2007

NEVER play "Lady of Spain" AGAIN!




brain739 posted:


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

cool-ish idea and i bought into it hard. i had a badass underwater camera that took this film and i still have several of the crappy photos is took. one of the coolest things about it was that you could take out a roll of film halfway through using it and put in another if you needed to use a different iso speed or wanted to switch to black and white or something and it wouldn't ruin your film. however, anyone that was that interested in those features probably wasn't that into the rather basic cameras that took this film. still, i loved that it had built-in frame selectors so you could take panoramic, large frame, and standard sized pictures.

i miss you, kodak advantix.

I worked for a Wolf Camera store when the APS system came out and I got one for my grandma because it was so easy to use. She loved it. APS's biggest problem really was that it came out right about the same time that digital cameras started entering the market. Digital at that time was still a fairly expensive technology and the high-end cameras back then didn't have the high megapixels like the basic point-and-shoot digitals we have now, so the image quality was somewhat lacking, but as a medium digital photography sort of exploded. What ended up happening was the people who wanted a basic, easy-to-use camera ended up going digital instead of using APS. As for me, I'm still a 35mm film purist, although I do own a couple of digital cameras. It's just impossible to get film processed anymore. :(

lazer_chicken
May 14, 2009

PEW PEW ZAP ZAP

Zamboni_Rodeo posted:

It's just impossible to get film processed anymore. :(

Tell me about it. I shoot a lot of black and white film in my cameras and I have to send it off to get it developed. Quite a few walgreens around here actually have real photo labs but they can only do C-41.

I remember the first time I saw a digital camera. I don't remember the exact year but it was sometime in the 97-99 range. Certainly no later than 99. The technology/computer teacher at my school had one and it totally blew my mind. You mean I can see what the picture looks like instantly? MIND BLOWN. It did have a screen on the back but it was about the size of a postage stamp. I believe it was a sony but I don't know anything else about the model. I thought the pictures were great at the time (on whatever awful blurry 800x600 crt we saw them on) but I'm sure they really looked horrible.

Sir Sidney Poitier
Aug 14, 2006

My favourite actor




Have a mainframe. As you can see from one of the screens, this one is currently running. I came across this in Telecity Sovereign House in London. Note also the 3 beautiful keyboards - the one on the left is the IBM Model M that we know and love (and the same as the one this was typed on), but it looks like the other two are the IBM Model M 1397000 122-key versions.

Sir Sidney Poitier has a new favorite as of 18:08 on Jul 14, 2012

hyperhazard
Dec 4, 2011

I am the one lascivious
With magic potion niveous
I used to do that as a kid! I had no idea it had a name. I was very disappointed when I moved and found out that pull tabs were all but obsolete in the US. I still have the first half of a belt I was making. If I ever find those tabs again, I'll have to finish it for old time's sake.

Jedit
Dec 10, 2011

Proudly supporting vanilla legends 1994-2014

m2pt5 posted:

Alternately, 45's, because they were played at 45RPM (as opposed to 33RPM for full-sized albums.)

Some were played at 78RPM, though.

lavaca
Jun 11, 2010
My first digital camera, from late 1998:



Exciting features:
-Rotatable and removable lens!
-"Zoom"!
-4 MB SD card included!
-Serial connection!
-0.3 glorious megapixels!

Here's a sample picture:



The serial connection was the worst part. Transferring a full memory card took 20 minutes, for example. I was very proud of myself for getting it working in Debian Linux back when such a thing involved installing a kernel module.

m2pt5
May 18, 2005

THAT GOD DAMN MOSQUITO JUST KEEPS COMING BACK

Jedit posted:

Some were played at 78RPM, though.

Those wouldn't be 45s then, would they?

Edit: I'm not old enough to comment properly on records since I was born in '77, but I don't recall ever seeing a commercial record that played at anything but 33 or 45.

amishbuttermaster
Apr 28, 2009
Records that played at 78RPM were phased out sometime in the 40s I believe. Much like with movies it took a long time to standardize playback speeds.

Mister Kingdom
Dec 14, 2005

And the tears that fall
On the city wall
Will fade away
With the rays of morning light

lazer_chicken posted:

The cool thing about laserdisc is that, up until the dvd release that contained the original theatrical versions, the laserdisc versions of the original star wars trilogy were regarded as the best. I'm sure true star wars fans have some argument that it's still the best.

I have that trilogy. I bought an LD player in the early 90s and joined the Columbia House Laserdisc Club and that was my "introductory three disc" deal. The LD player (made by Radio Shack) still works as good as new. I also have an industrial model Pioneer player.

olaf2022
Feb 19, 2003
Fun Shoe

m2pt5 posted:

Those wouldn't be 45s then, would they?

Edit: I'm not old enough to comment properly on records since I was born in '77, but I don't recall ever seeing a commercial record that played at anything but 33 or 45.

Most record players I've seen are capable of playing at 33/45/78 rpm.

I don't know if it's the proper term but I'm of the opinion that the smaller 7" records should be called "seven inch records" because they're not necessarily 45rpm; I have a few 7" records that are 33rpm. Similarly, I have plenty of full-size 12" records that are 45rpm.

Then, there are also oddball sizes like 10", 6" and oddly-shaped non-circular records.

Mister Kingdom
Dec 14, 2005

And the tears that fall
On the city wall
Will fade away
With the rays of morning light

olaf2022 posted:

Most record players I've seen are capable of playing at 33/45/78 rpm.

I don't know if it's the proper term but I'm of the opinion that the smaller 7" records should be called "seven inch records" because they're not necessarily 45rpm; I have a few 7" records that are 33rpm. Similarly, I have plenty of full-size 12" records that are 45rpm.

Then, there are also oddball sizes like 10", 6" and oddly-shaped non-circular records.

The 7" records are generally called 45s or singles since the majority of them are 45rpm and have one song per side. There are exceptions, of course.

lazer_chicken
May 14, 2009

PEW PEW ZAP ZAP

Mister Kingdom posted:

I have that trilogy. I bought an LD player in the early 90s and joined the Columbia House Laserdisc Club and that was my "introductory three disc" deal. The LD player (made by Radio Shack) still works as good as new. I also have an industrial model Pioneer player.

I don't think I've ever actually watched a real movie on laserdisc, but as Red_October_7000 mentions I did use them a lot in middle and high school. You'd watch a clip and then answer questions by scanning barcodes with a scanner on the remote and it would play clips based on what you answered. The one I most distinctly remember is "Voyage of the Mimi" which apparently had a young Ben Affleck in it. I think there was some other awful video series about biology or something too.

rockinricky
Mar 27, 2003

Mister Kingdom posted:

The 7" records are generally called 45s or singles since the majority of them are 45rpm and have one song per side. There are exceptions, of course.

One of those exceptions being the single of "With or Without You" by U2. That song is Side A and spins at 45 rpm. Side B spins at 33 rpm and has 2 songs.

Mister Kingdom
Dec 14, 2005

And the tears that fall
On the city wall
Will fade away
With the rays of morning light

rockinricky posted:

One of those exceptions being the single of "With or Without You" by U2. That song is Side A and spins at 45 rpm. Side B spins at 33 rpm and has 2 songs.

That's weird. I've never heard of that being done.

rockinricky
Mar 27, 2003

Mister Kingdom posted:

That's weird. I've never heard of that being done.

I thought so as well when I bought it. My first thought was "That's not going to work in a jukebox."

brain.centipedes
Feb 6, 2010

lazer_chicken posted:

I don't think I've ever actually watched a real movie on laserdisc, but as Red_October_7000 mentions I did use them a lot in middle and high school. You'd watch a clip and then answer questions by scanning barcodes with a scanner on the remote and it would play clips based on what you answered. The one I most distinctly remember is "Voyage of the Mimi" which apparently had a young Ben Affleck in it. I think there was some other awful video series about biology or something too.

We did Voyage of the Mimi in 5th grade. Almost no one i knew ever used LDs for Hollywood movies, but for some reason they seemed really popular in schools. Anyone know why?

Geoj
May 28, 2008

BITTER POOR PERSON
Don't ask me how we've made it four pages without these mentioned...



PDAs

Kind of like a smartphone, only without the phone and a whole lot less capable. Kind of a crude handheld computer that could do rudimentary internet browsing, some multimedia and mostly e-mail and scheduling/calendar functions. I never owned one but knew a few people who did and never really saw the point in dumping hundreds of dollars on one.

Although they definitely were a stepping stone to the smartphone as we know it today so I guess they weren't a complete failure...

8th-snype
Aug 28, 2005

My office is in the front room of a run-down 12 megapixel sensor but the rent suits me and the landlord doesn't ask many questions.

Dorkroom Short Fiction Champion 2012


Young Orc

lazer_chicken posted:

Tell me about it. I shoot a lot of black and white film in my cameras and I have to send it off to get it developed. Quite a few walgreens around here actually have real photo labs but they can only do C-41.

Develop B&W film your self. :argh:

RyokoTK
Feb 12, 2012

I am cool.

Geoj posted:

Don't ask me how we've made it four pages without these mentioned...



PDAs

Kind of like a smartphone, only without the phone and a whole lot less capable. Kind of a crude handheld computer that could do rudimentary internet browsing, some multimedia and mostly e-mail and scheduling/calendar functions. I never owned one but knew a few people who did and never really saw the point in dumping hundreds of dollars on one.

Although they definitely were a stepping stone to the smartphone as we know it today so I guess they weren't a complete failure...

The PDA wasn't a failure at all. Betamax and Virtual Boy were failures. PDAs were really useful before the technology made smartphones practical. There's lots of good, important technology that's just obsolete -- nobody would decry VHS as a failure.

mystes
May 31, 2006

I had a Palm Z22 for a little while. It had no wireless anything and came out when PDAs were already thoroughly obsolete, but for all its faults I think modern smartphones still haven't caught up to it in terms of convenience for actual PDA functionality. The iPhone is the worst at this; you actually have to run the Calendar app to see events you have coming up. I think on the Z22 you could just push one (physical) button and it was completely instant.

Although I ended up using it for PDA functionality, I had originally bought it because it turned out it was the cheapest way I could obtain a portable, electronic Japanese dictionary, and despite the limitations resulting from only having 32MB of flash memory, I still miss that dictionary program. I could hold the Z22 and enter words into it with one hand, probably faster than I can type on a modern multitouch smartphone.

Geoj
May 28, 2008

BITTER POOR PERSON

RyokoTK posted:

The PDA wasn't a failure at all. Betamax and Virtual Boy were failures. PDAs were really useful before the technology made smartphones practical. There's lots of good, important technology that's just obsolete -- nobody would decry VHS as a failure.

Thread title posted:

Post the very best in obsolete and failed technology

Thread is for both obsolete and failed technology...even if you don't think they were failures they still belong here.

Guess its a matter of opinion but PDAs never really seemed practical or useful to me v0v

Geoj has a new favorite as of 04:20 on Jul 15, 2012

dirby
Sep 21, 2004


Helping goons with math

Geoj posted:

Thread is for both obsolete and failed technology...even if you don't think they were failures they still belong here.

Guess its a matter of opinion but PDAs never really seemed practical or useful to me v0v

Significanly before modern handheld gaming consoles, my PDA was a way to play NES/GBC games (flawlessly) and SNES games (fairly well) on the go.

RyokoTK
Feb 12, 2012

I am cool.
edit: this post sucks.

RyokoTK has a new favorite as of 04:30 on Jul 15, 2012

DrBouvenstein
Feb 28, 2007

I think I'm a doctor, but that doesn't make me a doctor. This fancy avatar does.

mystes posted:

I had a Palm Z22 for a little while. It had no wireless anything and came out when PDAs were already thoroughly obsolete, but for all its faults I think modern smartphones still haven't caught up to it in terms of convenience for actual PDA functionality. The iPhone is the worst at this; you actually have to run the Calendar app to see events you have coming up. I think on the Z22 you could just push one (physical) button and it was completely instant.

Android phones can put a "calendar widget" right on your homescreen to show upcoming events/appointments/tasks. If you have the right lockscreen app, then all you would need to do is push one button (power button) to see them.

I guess what I'm saying is yes, the iPhone is the worst, but Android and maybe? Windows Phone can be as good or better than old Palm or WM PDAs were.

TheMadMilkman
Dec 10, 2007

indigenous nudity posted:

Yeah, my wife is a doctor and she uses a pager when whenever she's on call. I'm not sure why they don't just call her cell phone, but I'm sure they have their reasons.

According to my brother, who is also a doctor, having a pager for your contact number helps you avoid pointless phone calls from nurses who are too lazy to read the chart.

He doesn't like nurses very much.

Armyman25
Sep 6, 2005

TheMadMilkman posted:

According to my brother, who is also a doctor, having a pager for your contact number helps you avoid pointless phone calls from nurses who are too lazy to read the chart.

He doesn't like nurses very much.

It's okay, nurses don't like doctors very much either.

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Diametunim
Oct 26, 2010

Geoj posted:

Don't ask me how we've made it four pages without these mentioned...



PDAs

Kind of like a smartphone, only without the phone and a whole lot less capable. Kind of a crude handheld computer that could do rudimentary internet browsing, some multimedia and mostly e-mail and scheduling/calendar functions. I never owned one but knew a few people who did and never really saw the point in dumping hundreds of dollars on one.

Although they definitely were a stepping stone to the smartphone as we know it today so I guess they weren't a complete failure...
PDA's had many good uses, all of them Dopewars.

Diametunim has a new favorite as of 08:56 on Jul 15, 2012

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