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Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013


a betamax cassette just labeled AMBULANCE WRECK is absolutely in the top 100 haunted artifacts

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Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

Grassy Knowles posted:

That's betacam, which was standard for local news recording for the better part of three decades. There are assuredly hundreds, most likely thousands of betacam tapes with that label. Sorry to ruin the fun.

You say that like the world isn't full of ghosts with room for millions more

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

Gann Jerrod posted:

What do you mean, Wil.i.am created many successful inventions, such as the Puls "smart cuff" and the "genius-phone" camera case.

let's not forget CNN checking in with noted political correspondent and not at all all-around embarrassing human being "will.i.am" via hologram on election night 2008



since that groundbreaking moment we've been seeing marginal talents appearing live via hologram just about nightly on the more reputable cable news networks so it's clear "will.i.am" has always had his finger on What Works in Tech

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

Oh, it matters. If you bought a tape on the basis of a big yellow explosion on its cover that promised three hours of all-out anal action, and the anal action was only all-out for an hour at best, you're a loving chump if you don't return it for a full refund.

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

First of all that wasn't a "store" and second of all I started locking my doors at night

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

Collateral Damage posted:

If your computer isn't a solid black monolith with a single faint, omniously red LED on the front it's too garish.

the only case mod I'd ever spring for would be one that made my computer look like a tiny version of the WOPR, and even then it would have to make those great thrumming noises

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013


yesssssssssssssss

IT WAS BEING INSTALLED ON THEIR CAR.

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

Horace posted:

here's an 819 line signal generated by a computer:





delicious

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

Checking in to say I'm in my late 30s and I would have punched a child in the face to make that sound go away

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

Trabant posted:

The Russians used a pencil candle.

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

the greatest fabric technologists of the 1970s: "we have to go further... we have to find a way to bisect a clitoris, but gently"

FORTY YEARS LATER

"I will eat a handful of mulch for every like and subscribe"

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

Pham Nuwen posted:

Low-power AM and FM transmitters are allowed under Part 15: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Title_47_CFR_Part_15#Unlicensed_broadcasting

The specifications of Part 15 allow those little FM transmitter dongles you used to play music from your phone in an old car. The kind of power they're talking about means you could set up a little AM transmitter in your house and listen to music as you moved around the house and yard, but nobody past your immediate neighbors will hear you.

It's still illegal to set up a proper AM broadcasting station without a license from the FCC, and they literally refuse to accept applications (https://www.fcc.gov/media/radio/how-to-apply#AM scroll down and see the same "no applications" message for AM, commercial FM, noncommercial FM, low-power FM, and FM translators).

Ever since I found out I could set up a teeny-tiny TV broadcasting station to stream over the air from videos on my computer - https://antiqueradio.org/HomeTVTransmitter.htm - I've wanted to, but :retrogames:

and yeah but speaking of radio, the neat-o shortwave radio I bought a few months back seems more or less castrated unless I build or buy a much bigger antenna setup, which :retrogames: and also :smith: since there is still a lot of pure listening pleasure bouncing around out there without car dealership commercials every seven minutes

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

ReidRansom posted:

You can definitely get an ok-ish wind-up shortwave antenna for like $10. Or build one for <$1. But hell I've picked up HF stuff some nights from as far as the Pacific NW with just the built in aerial on mine, and I'm in SE Texas.

Tell me more. Pretend like I don't know anything, because in this case, we can make your imagination a reality

(NB: My radio has both your standard, pull-on-it-til-its-big antenna, and a wire antenna that plugs into the side. I've duly plugged this into that, and clipped the end of that wire antenna to a blind on the window at the highest point of my house. And sometimes I can get neat stuff, but it's not reliable and not nearly the cornucopia I'd imagined.)

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

ladron posted:

yep, a 90's throwback movie about technical drafting will surely pack them in the seats

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

this is the funniest commercial I have ever seen and I would 100% watch a feature-length version

I am also 1,000 years old

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

kids love it just for doodling

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

Tunicate posted:

Yeah I know his girlfriend, Rachel From Cardholder Services

I AM GOING TO KILL HER

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

Trabant posted:

Came across this site error and just loved the Amiga callback:



I never used an Amiga, so I only know Guru Meditation from the error screen the channel guide our local cable provider ran in the early 90s would sometimes throw up.

I want to say it looked something like this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z59ZBFSkls4

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

Danger - Octopus! posted:

If you've watched Deutschland 83 or 86, you'll have seen the scenes set in Stasi headquarters complete with 70s/80s brown and green everything and lots of old rotary phones, heavy East German typewriters etc. The scenes in Stasi HQ were filmed on location because parts of the old Stasi headquarters have been preserved exactly as they were with furnishings and fittings intact. They're well worth the trip if you're around Berlin and into that period. So not only obsolete technology but a sort-of failed state too!

If I had $Texas I would throw huge amounts of cash at researchers/set designers to make my home early-80s municipal in just this sort of way

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

Boy oh boy, I hated this commercial, and this device was a gigantic flop:

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

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

ryonguy posted:

Speaking of obsolete classroom equipment, filmstrip machines. No, not 16mm or whatever film projectors, individual frames of film used as slideshows.



I loved filmstrips. They're an artform that hasn't really been digitally preserved in any real capacity. There are several from my childhood I remember quite vividly, and would love to see again, but most libraries have (rightly) weeded them from their collections and I've got enough weird obsessions and hobbies without starting a god damned filmstrip collection from odd lots on eBay.

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

The Deion Sanders Hot Dog Express.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zZyGaVNihK0

I do so dearly wish this video existed in higher quality, but it seems this is it, internet-wise.

Pancakes! Yes, pancakes.

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

I had completely forgotten that some arcades would have multiple cabinets of the same game side-by-side because the demand to play them was just that high. :allears:

Popeye's a great little game, too.

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

when your home computer only had a 3.5" floppy drive but the game you wanted was only available on 5.25" discs :argh: but also :corsair:

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013


If I could somehow play my mp3s through a lovely old clock radio from 1992, I'd be delighted.

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

I never had a flip clock, but I think they're more beautiful than LED displays. Anyway, check this out, basically SMARTPHONE 198X

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013



an obsolete graphics card isn't exactly going to set this thread on fire in terms of being interesting but I could not resist posting the world's most perfect print advertisement

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

I had never heard of the (Tandy) Memorex VIS before today, but this promo video for it is extremely 90s and very bonkers:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oc5JTBbZ_Kg

Having done a little looking, this system looks like it is the textbook definition of "early adopter's remorse."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p9FpJFjs_7Y

Everything about this system feels like it's out of a weird dream.

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

My phone corrects "around" to "arundel" constantly. Arundel is, as far as I've been able to tell, a proper noun and one I have certainly never used.

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

Toast Museum posted:

Or someone with good spelling is talking about a side-character in the decades-old computer game Icewind Dale :v:

oh lord it would be embarrassingly on-brand for me to have a Mr. Robot that spent all night texting with internet randos about abandonware :negative:

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQMd06fWkHI

This is homebrew running on a console released in 1979.

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

LifeSunDeath posted:

Oh at PAX this last weekend they were selling brand new games for NES on cartridges, it was pretty amazing. Didn't play them but watched for a while, can't remember the name of the game that was pretty prominent but still, love to see that.

People are making amazing games for dead consoles both out of affection and a curiosity about those consoles' limits and it's really wonderful to see.

They also tend to get limited physical print runs, which gets weird, because the authors are like "I'm not going to sell the ROM until [x condition is met]." Which is fair, because maybe they want a taste of honey for their work, but it's also sort of unrealistic as to people still using their dead systems and hungry for a fresh cartridge.

anyway, people are bonkers and the Intellivision was the first true 16-bit system (look it up) and no further questions unless that question is "do you want to play Biplanes in Triple Action"

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

barbecue at the folks posted:

I've tried to explain to younger folks that back in the bbs days we just traded (badly) written sex novels and ASCII tiddies. Sometimes you hit gold and got some extremely low res gifs of an almost naked lady. I treasured those pictures for years. Those really were the days, huh!

I had to look up the exact quote from this 2002 interview with Tristan A. Farnon, because it's so perfectly put:

"If someone is legitimately interested in the contents of an image called 'blowjob.gif,' I promise you they'll sit there and wait while it slowly unfurls like a flag down their screen."

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

Humphreys posted:

Me and my boss had to upgrade to ISDN to card-share our payTV piracy endevours back in the day. Was almost as expensive and just paying for the proper subscription.

Sometimes it's the principle of the thing.

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

LifeSunDeath posted:

early physical computing became possible...from there it accelerates

because the salvage from the Roswell crash made possible the quantum leap in technology from vacuum tubes and diodes to the silicon wafer transistor

:tinfoil:

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

LifeSunDeath posted:

Post the very best in obsolete and failed technology: Hamcrimes Division

Here's how to make your very own teeny-tiny illegal TV station that you can even broadcast your illegal MKVs over: https://antiqueradio.org/HomeTVTransmitter.htm

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

less than three posted:

ham crimes and misdemeanors

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

Zereth posted:

I believe the original said "Ninja", not "Ham"

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

speaking of "doot noises on tapes," one thing I remember is how some of the cassettes I owned had a series of tones at the very beginning and end of them — I was able to find this spot-on remake of them that some kind soul produced and uploaded back in the far-flung year of 2006

Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

give me teletext and NAPLPS until I die

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Pastry of the Year
Apr 12, 2013

On the subject of portable music players l, I had a Rio Karma and I adored that little thing; it served me well for years and I'm sure it's in one of the four thousand boxes in the basement and I know using it now would be a completely impractical affectation, but it was just such a pleasing object, a perfect little piece of design.

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