What old “smart technology” do you still have that works?

[GM Guy]

I picked up an Atari Gamestation a while back. I like the simplicity of the games, none of this modern multi-hour quests.

As for oldest tech, a couple turn of the century Weston meters. A lot of what I have is 70's and 80's era. Working betamax within arms reach of me. Still in regular use is a fluke 79 I bought when I was in highschool (early 80s). Hell, my goto benchtop power supply for when I need 5 or 12 volts is one I built around 1986.

 

[95stepside]

I watched waynes world on VHS last night on my combination vcr/DVD player

 

[ScottRS]

CD drives, 3.5" floppy disk drives, Win XP, Win NT, I still have a working mill with an AB Bandit (1981) controller.

 

[Gbkeith]

8V92TA, 3406E, HTC 8670, 7.3 PS

 

[Joez]

Have a similar 2009 era laptop that I still use for HP Tuners and my ipod classic that I daily drive at the gym and workouts around the house. Still have a few minidisc player/recorders that i use, panasonic plasma TV from 2008ish is what's our primary TV, and run a vintage Yamaha CR2020 receiver from the early 70's for music in the office. Daughter and I play some super Nintendo on an original unit, but the mini that has the pre loaded games and an HDMI port gets used more often just for ease of use.

 

[JR4X]

Apps have licensing deals, once the license expires the app either can't be updated anymore, or it is removed/deactivated. It has nothing to do with the manufacturer wanting you to buy a new TV.

Which is unacceptable BULLSHIT! Samsung deactivated the 3D function of my 3D TV/blu ray player. When I call Samsung to complain and get it fixed their answer is “buy a new one”. So no MF, it does have everything to do with trying to make me buy a new one. With it’s limited license and everything.

 

[bad zuki]

8V92TA

Yes. A modern common rail injection diesel.

I just remembered that my turntable is an automatic and turns itself off after the album is done.

 

[Filthy McChevy]

Lots of stuff.

Im guessing my Singer sewing machine is 80 to 100 years old.

 

[What?]

Plasma TV and Atari somewhere

 

[vetteboy79]

protip; no headphones sound good enough to bother with reasonable bitrate audio

lots more audio comes outta lower bitrate files

I use $300+ headphones on the daily for mixing and mastering, to complement stupid expensive studio monitors.

I don't think we're on the same page there, lol.

But my home studio PC is still a Windows 7 box that began life as a TigerDirect corporate lease return in 2009, then got stuffed with 20 gb ram and a few TB of SSD drives. It's time for a new one for many reasons but this setup has served me so well for years that I really dread having to go to a new workflow. Plus many of my 'updates' for the software will come in the form of subscriptions which I am not looking forward to.

 

[[486]]

I don't think we're on the same page there, lol.

probably not, I did get some headphones with tweeters a few months ago and it is a lot better, has the highs and lows but is entirely missing the midrange

I imagine there are headphones out there that sound decent but I've never encountered them myself, therefore they do not exist at all

 

[Bebop]

Today I turned on an old windows 7 Dell laptop that says it hadn’t been updated since Dec 26th 2013. I’m watching YouTube on it right now despite it giving a prompt that my unsupported Windows may be “counterfeit”. Just because it’s super old I won’t update it fearing any update will brick it. I hadn’t turned this thing on in at least five or six years.

My old 2011 Samsung smart TV and Smart Blu Ray would work fine but Samsung turned off a bunch of apps and features because they want me to buy new ones. I won’t link it to the internet because Samsung will disable more features rendering it useless. Which I consider unacceptable and the reason I won’t give Samsung another pennie as long as I can help it.

I'm writing this from an iphone 7

 

[bad zuki]

I use $300+ headphones on the daily for mixing and mastering, to complement stupid expensive studio monitors.

Got any good recommendations? My old 1odio studios are held together with tape and a hearing protection support band, but still sound better than anything else I've tried.

 

[Levigarrett76]

I'm writing this from an iphone 7

Have you done battery? If so, did you do it?

 

[Motorcharge]

Got any good recommendations? My old 1odio studios are held together with tape and a hearing protection support band, but still sound better than anything else I've tried.

Drop + Dan Clark Audio Aeon Open X Headphones | Open-Back Audiophile Headphones

These Drop exclusive Dan Clark Headphones deliver top notch audio quality. The open-back Aeon Open X headphones utilize Planar Magnetic drivers for an experience you won't forget.

drop.com

I've had my eye on these for a while to replace my Hifiman HE4XX. Need a quality DAC/Amp to drive them though.

Sound quality on the HEs are amazing, but build quality is shit and their support is even worse.

 

[Sandy Johnson]

I bought one of these way back when at circuit city. Still use it to run with since phones these days are like 400 times the size.

I love that SanDisk is still selling them

https://a.co/d/eOeIdjz

 

[Motorcharge]

I bought one of these way back when at circuit city. Still use it to run with since phones these days are like 400 times the size.

I love that SanDisk is still selling them

https://a.co/d/eOeIdjz

I'd love one of those if the capacity wasn't so small. They really need to update them to take a micro SD card. Can get 100+ gb SD cards for next to nothing these days. Last 3 pack I got of 128 gb ones was like $20.

 

[Sandy Johnson]

I'd love one of those if the capacity wasn't so small. They really need to update them to take a micro SD card. Can get 100+ gb SD cards for next to nothing these days. Last 3 pack I got of 128 gb ones was like $20.

I think mine is actually like a 4 or 8 gb, can't remember. I've got quite a few playlists on there and it'll get me through a long-ish plane flight without having to hear the same song twice. Multi-day road trip would be no good.

Would be sweet if they made a new one that was bigger, and could use Bluetooth to send music to car or boat or headphones or whatever.

 

[Lee]

We bought a "top of the line" 1080p 240hz 46" Samsung LCD in '09. I re-capped the power supply on it a few years ago when it quit turning on. It still has a phenomenal picture, it barely had any "smart" features Pandora and a handful of other things, RJ45 only no WiFi, but new enough to still have DLNA, and I can stream most media from any mass storage on my network directly to it. I've ran into some missing codec issues on some more modern stuff, but I run it through Handbrake or VLC and make it a format it understands pretty easily. I don't have anything that can output 4K so 1080p looks great to me. Heck, I rip most video at 720p just to save space, and let it upscale, looks good to me.


For really old tech, I've got a pre-war Majestic 90 shortwave floor standing console that still works. It's pretty too. Not my photo, but same model, mine is in slightly better condition than this.

 

[Bebop]

Have you done battery? If so, did you do it?

Nope

 

[Kwille]

Daughter and I watched IT on VHS a couple weekends ago. Picture is grainy on my 65" plasma but worked fine. It was kinda of a cool throwback.

 

[SLOWPOKE693]

My father still has a Pong? game console at the house that predates Atari and all the rest by a fair bit. You toggled a switch on the fake wood grain console to change the game from something like racket ball, break out and tennis? It was beyond basic with a black screen and green/white "graphics" that looked more like a green screen computer running DOS. We used to pull it out every now and then and play it for old times sake but I bet we haven't done that in at least 20yrs. Wonder if it's still around?

 

[[486]]

I'd love one of those if the capacity wasn't so small. They really need to update them to take a micro SD card. Can get 100+ gb SD cards for next to nothing these days. Last 3 pack I got of 128 gb ones was like $20.

mine takes a microsd card
but it does kinda suck with the 32gb one that's in it, since it takes about two minutes to initialize when you either let the battery go stone dead, or remove the memory card, or add anything to it
think it is only like 2gb internal storage

 

[Ah Pook]

We bought a "top of the line" 1080p 240hz 46" Samsung LCD in '09. I re-capped the power supply on it a few years ago when it quit turning on. It still has a phenomenal picture, it barely had any "smart" features Pandora and a handful of other things, RJ45 only no WiFi, but new enough to still have DLNA, and I can stream most media from any mass storage on my network directly to it. I've ran into some missing codec issues on some more modern stuff, but I run it through Handbrake or VLC and make it a format it understands pretty easily. I don't have anything that can output 4K so 1080p looks great to me. Heck, I rip most video at 720p just to save space, and let it upscale, looks good to me.


For really old tech, I've got a pre-war Majestic 90 shortwave floor standing console that still works. It's pretty too. Not my photo, but same model, mine is in slightly better condition than this.

Came across a tube radio today. Gave me a good feeling in my happy place.

 

[smurfblue40]

My father still has a Pong? game console at the house that predates Atari and all the rest by a fair bit

I remember playing that when it was new (1972)

 

[Alexis700]

I daily drive a dodge with a vp44 injection pump , not if but when it will suddenly fail.

This is the eventual solution

 

[Levigarrett76]

I daily drive a dodge with a vp44 injection pump , not if but when it will suddenly fail.

This is the eventual solution

I did same and had vp44 fail, then cracking injector lines became the failure point

 

[Gdogg]

I have an old sammich maker from the 60's, she still works great, most of my buddies have gotten rid of their sammich makers because they're not working like they were suppose to when they got them.

 

[Lee]

Came across a tube radio today. Gave me a good feeling in my happy place.

I've got a ~'40s "green eye" Zenith in my living room, but it's just a piece of furniture. It doesn't work. I joined an antique radio forum years back and learned a lot. Got the diagrams, some new-to-me improved tubes, but discovered someone has really monkeyed with it in the past. It has a modern-ish speaker in it. It originally had an electromagnet speaker, and someone swapped a permanent magnet speaker in it. The veneer and finish is in great shape and all the knobs/buttons and dial are in excellent shape too. It just needs some new grill cloth. I've considered modernizing the guts, and sticking a green LED in the tuning eye tube window. Would be neat to have it working though. It does a good job of just looking cool in the corner.

Again not my photo, but mine looks just like this, minus the grill cloth:

 

[JohnnyJ]

I have my Amiga 500 from my teenage years in the basement that I can't throw out due to nostalgia, but have 0 time to see if it still functions. One day I might, but let's be real, it was the 90s the last time it booted.