Obsolete technology: 40 big losers

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Obsolete technology: 40 big losers

By JR Raphael
updated 4:24 p.m. ET, Mon., Aug 17, 2009

By the time you read this story, the Internet may be obsolete.

OK, maybe not. But you never know. With technology evolving at breakneck speed, no one can say for sure what's around the next corner — to say nothing of the one after that. The circle of life, however, remains constant: When a new high-tech creation is born, something else may die as a result. Sometimes, the loss is a good thing — who wants busy signals or staticky TV? — but at other times, the departure stirs bittersweet feelings (remember saying farewell to your trusty old C:\ prompt?).

We've compiled a list of 40 once-commonplace activities that are rapidly approaching extinction. Some are in danger of disappearing, while others have already vanished. So join us for a spirited send-off.


40 big losers listed at: Obsolete technology: 40 big losers - PC World- msnbc.com


Deaf tech's big losers: TTYs, older closed captioned boxes, SideKick1, etc... feel free to name them here.
 
--1983 Sears 19" Color TV set with Built-in Closed Captioned decoder.

I used to have that for nearly 15 years and I was the first in the Deaf group to have colored CC. Back in 1980's color on caption represent person's emotion like: Angry (red text), Scared (blue text), Sick (green text) and several more. But in the 90's they stopped include color in CC.

--Big Bodyworn wireless receiver rechargeable Hearing aid. I used to have big tan Hearing aid at Elementary school. It had two straps that straps around the body and snaps on big H/A and it have little red block that snap in on top front for matching fequency for teacher's wireless microphone. It was commonly used back in 1970's. Hearing kids at my school think we have big block on our chest. I really hate wearing it every day during class. We take it off and shuck it into the row of charger cells for charging overnight before we go home. I've forgotten to take it off before go home and my brother and sister stare at me wearing it. It's embarrassing!!. Now it's obsolete and dead!

--Remember back in 1980's Optical Disk player that use 15 inches Optical disk in a thin case. You just push the case through the player's slot and pull out then play movie. It went on market but it was short lived. My friend still have them and it's a rare now and he had several disks with movie titles including Star Wars.

--Speech Card with magnet strip and Speech card reader machine. If anyone lived in 70's

Back in 1970's my Speech Therapist used this machine and she write the word on light tan flexible card (made of thin cardboard with magnet strip on bottom) and She place the card on top of machine in upright position and press play or record, the card moved sideway slowly up to 10 seconds from end to end. When she press Record button, I say the word then she take the card out and put back to beginning and play so I can hear my voice. I love that machine and it was fun to play with. It's obsolete now and it'll be a rarest items.

Portable battery powered LED football and baseball arcade game. I used to play with it back in 80's, No longer around today.

Atari gaming console with pair of joysticks. Had fun with it back in 80's at my friend's home. I used to wiggle the power switch until the game glitched and play. It looked so cool with glitch :giggle:

Tennis and hockey video game of 70's, I played with it with my brother or sister. I did the same, fiddle the power switch until it glitched and play. Same coolness!! got extra "paddle" on screen while other don't. I was a big cheater. :rofl:

Portable Speech/Learning machine. I recalled back in early 80's that my neighbor's kids use that as an educational/entertainment. If you have seen ET movie, you've probably seen one that ET wired it to Speech/Learning machine to communicate with others.

I used to have Radio Shack TRS-80 computer with 5 1/2 floppy diskette. My friend gave it to me and I played with it for a while. I somehow accessed to list of private information such as SSN, person name, phone number ect.. Apparently they didn't erase the diskette before handing it over to me. I just erase it myself. TRS-80 is now an antique items.

I used to have Apple IIc computer with fancy dot matrix printer that can print picture (dotty pictures) and external floppy disk drive. The last time I used it was back in 2001 to show my oldest son what I did with Apple computer and sold it on Ebay for $118 (It came with big carrying case).

Catty
 
Reminds of the old Commodore 64 computer eh catty. Boy, in the '80's that computer was the big thing in the computer world. Nowadays, my Gateway FX would pretty much eat the Commodore 64 alive lol.
 
sablescort said:
Reminds of the old Commodore 64 computer eh catty. Boy, in the '80's that computer was the big thing in the computer world. Nowadays, my Gateway FX would pretty much eat the Commodore 64 alive lol.
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Yup, I remember Commodore 64. :lol:
 
Encyclopedia. Who need those bulky books to fill out the bookcase?

Zip disks. Big flop. Thanks to rise of flash drives and CDs. My brother in law still have it, end up as useless junk in old shed.

Photo developing. Professionals still use them due to high-definition photos. My father in law is professional photographer and work at camera and photo store. He use digital cameras but still developing photos from digital photos.

Calculator watches. Replace them with phone watches. France is first to get them!

Arcades? Some old-time gamers build them with hardwares, homemade cabinets, and emulators.
 
I thought that I was so bitching when I got my Tandy computer with the printer that had a typewriter wheel. No dots! That was back in '86.

I got my first cell phone when my first child was born. It was the size of a brick. I used to leave it on the table when I went out to dinner.

Eight track tapes! Fun times.
 
Who has use Mac 68k with System 7 today? It's too way outdated.
 
Deathpit said:
Zip disks. Big flop. Thanks to rise of flash drives and CDs. My brother in law still have it, end up as useless junk in old shed.
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It used to be quite popular among media-related workplaces in the 1990s due to the limited options of storage we were provided. Nowadays, it's completely useless thanks to the external hard drives and recordable discs along with online storage.

Photo developing. Professionals still use them due to high-definition photos. My father in law is professional photographer and work at camera and photo store. He use digital cameras but still developing photos from digital photos
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Yes, it's true that film-based photography is still superior to the digital technology. That's why a lot of movies are still being filmed in 35mm. Back in the late 50s and during the 60s, they started a trend on filming movies in 70mm to give them an epic look to it. But it's rare for a movie to be filmed in 70mm these days due to the high costs. Though they did film some scenes in 70mm for movies like The Dark Knight and Transformers 2.
 
I went lol at this one mainly because I have a math learning disablity ...

18. Wearing a calculator watch
Status: Deceased
Affectionately dubbed "the nerd watch," the calculator watch once served as a proud badge of a person's abiding amusement with mathematics — as diagnostic as a pocket protector or membership in the high school Slide Rule Club. Nowadays, the only sure way to ascertain an individual's true geek quotient is to test their "Star Trek" knowledge.

Anyone remember the silde ruler in high school ?

CALCULATOR - Google Patent Search
 
Remember the 8 track? Deceased for sure! That replaced with cassette tapes...then CDs...now digital...which you can play on ipod or any MP3 player.

TTYs are almost deceased, for now. (Those who are old folks or stubborn folks). Everyone I talk to is on AIM/Yahoo or VP.

FM modules, deceased. I used to have those things to hear loud sounds from a teacher in a classroom back in the 80's.

Cars with analog odometers, deceased. They completly replaced all of them with digital odometers.

Carbeurators, on life support. They still use them in racing cars, in classic cars, etc.
 
sequoias said:
Remember the 8 track? Deceased for sure! That replaced with cassette tapes...then CDs...now digital...which you can play on ipod or any MP3 player.

TTYs are almost deceased, for now. (Those who are old folks or stubborn folks). Everyone I talk to is on AIM/Yahoo.

FM modules, deceased. I used to have those things to hear loud sounds from a teacher in a classroom back in the 80's.
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I used use FM modules for my school before too.

Yes, I fucking hate people who so stubborn for keep outdate technology like TTYs. Ugh!
 
Deaf-related: Headphones being used in classrooms is dead. I don't know if FM is dead or on the way out.
 
Hummm as for Atari consoles I have extra of them if anybody is interested in them, I'm an active... er- was active, now just a member of AtariAge.
 
Mac with PowerPC is closely to be legacy, however Apple still support if they have Apple Care, such as if you buy Power Mac G5 in 2006, it means very closer to expire after 3 years.
 
Foxrac said:
Mac with PowerPC is closely to be legacy, however Apple still support if they have Apple Care, such as if you buy Power Mac G5 in 2006, it means very closer to expire after 3 years.
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At least you still can run software on a PowerPC, for now. It will be probably up to 3-5 years until they become deceased. It's kinda like trying to run a PowerPC application on a 68k Mac in a way.
 
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