Look back in vapor: Shoddy Goods 067
1What’s your first memory of some now common-place tech? We got an Apple II very early, but I was so young I don’t really remember not having it. I remember renting a movie in 1984 (Yentl, for some reason), where we had to rent the VCR as well. It took us forever to figure out how to rewind the thing.
- 6 comments, 6 replies
- Comment
I have a lot of memories of tech you don’t see anymore. We had an apple ]I[ because the price was right. I think it was about 1981 or 1982 give or take. Had an odyssey for a video game system. But I actually my dad had a beta Max Sony
@Cerridwyn if you had that Apple new in the box you could probably buy all the inventory of Meh.
But that might not be a good thing.
@pmarin Until she got married and left the state, the ex still had it, not new in box but. Dunno what happened to it.
My father made our first color tv from a Radio Shack kit. Worked pretty well but was medium-size in CRT terms. Nevertheless a mind-opening event at the time (late '60s?)
An early microwave called an “Amanda Radarange” that was built like a tank. (Also see the reference in the Airplane! Movie)
/youtube Airplane! Check the radar range
@pmarin
Close… Amana (no ‘D’)
A VHS player that split into 2 parts. The tape part had a battery and carrying strap, so you could use it with your wired camera as a “portable” cam-corder.
I did early home computer stuff (1970s) and there were already really crude text-to-speech devices where the computer could “talk” to you but it was almost unintelligible. There was already talk of “AI” coming soon.
Had a “portable” cell phone that was in a bag with a battery pack. It was phone made to install in cars but this one was rigged-up to be carried on its own and run for a few hours on battery. The antenna would extend from the bag but for better coverage you could connect it to an external car-type antenna. (Remember when those were the “cool” thing and people would buy fake stick-on antennas just to appear important? The ones with the curly bit.)
/image 1980s car cell phone curly antenna
@pmarin Had a friend, who many many years after they were ‘the thing’ had a car phone. Looked like a handset from an old school table top phone. At that point it still actually worked.
@Cerridwyn yeah, the handset lifted off the base and the keyboard lit up. It was very impressive. And it did work. Since it was made to run on 12V I also modified a power connector so it would get power directly from the car. It would sit behind the passenger seat.
@pmarin Yeah
but this was long after I had a smart phone. Not a sophisticated one like today, but