Old Technology

[Semisweet]

7 hours ago, ryn2 said:

Whew, someone else who pays by check!!  

 I still do too.  

[thylacine]

I still pay by checks; I know people who have had their plastic hacked into and lost a lot of money.  So far I have not heard of anyone hacking cash or a check.

[Spotastic]

I pay my bills through my credit union, who in some cases send a check in my name. I handle as much as possible electronically, though. I hate person to person interaction in meatspace.

[Karst]

I don't use the internet function on my phone. My 'net addiction is bad enough as it is. *laughs*

[ryn2]

1 hour ago, Ardoise said:

I don't use the internet function on my phone. My 'net addiction is bad enough as it is. *laughs*

...whereas I can’t look at any non-work content on my work computer and am not often working at my laptop at home, so the internet function on my phone is nearly the sole outlet for my ‘net addiction.  

[AndrewT]

On ‎7‎/‎30‎/‎2018 at 12:53 AM, thylacine said:

I still pay by checks; I know people who have had their plastic hacked into and lost a lot of money.  So far I have not heard of anyone hacking cash or a check.

I guess you never worked for a bank, Cheque (English spelling) Fraud was massive (i no longer work for a bank so don't know if that is still the case).

People would write cheques that they knowingly did not have the money to cover.

People would write to cheques to themselves from a different bank and use their instant withdrawal feature knowing the cheque they had written would bounce

 

 

I'm in favour of new technology if it replaces an inferior technology or brings benefits, but not for just having something new

so much new technology has made the lives of people with disabilities and illnesses better.

[ryn2]

Most of the check/cheque fraud I back in the day was individuals against the banks (similar to what was described above) rather than individuals against other individuals (identity theft) but where there’s a will there’s a way...

[Hammerhead]

On 7/21/2018 at 2:37 AM, uhtred said:

I like old technology that is still as good as the new stuff. Saturn Vs for example.   I own a 50 year old airplane, but there has been so little progress in light planes that it is as good as a brand new one.

I own a 40 year old airplane and you're right little has changed over the decades.  I did add a GPS since I had an empty spot in the instrument panel.

[Hammerhead]

I still have and use a VCR (VHS).  It's a VCR/DVD combo which I bought after my old VCR failed.   I planned to copy all my VHS tapes to DVD.  Only did a few so I still watch movies on VHS tapes.

 

I have a 400+ vinyl record collection so I still use a turntable.  My 30+ yo turntable finally failed earlier this year so I had to buy a new one.  The new one has a USB port so I can digitize my records.  As with the VHS tapes I only digitize a few of my albums.  I just like playing albums on the turntable for some reason.

 

I do use modern technology like my iPhone SE and my Apple Watch Series 1.  I find the Apple Watch to be quite handy.  I get e-mail notifications, I use the timer app for cooking, and the workout app when I exercise.  The workout app monitors & records my heart rate and calculates calories burned.

[Gentle Giant]

@Hammerhead Which turntable did you get?

[Hammerhead]

9 minutes ago, Gentle Giant said:

@Hammerhead Which turntable did you get?

audio-technica at-lp5 direct drive turntable.  Software to digitize is Audacity.

[cavalier080854]

I have a flip phone, LPs, CDs, Lazer Discs, Board games, slide rule and addiator, I even have a book of Log Tables

[cavalier080854]

Hi-Fi is a B&O which is 34 years old with linear tracking for LPs, the radio is analogue

[Karst]

I wouldn't mind owning an old Nokia phone. I think the only way to destroy one of those things is to drop it into the caldera of Mount Doom.

[thylacine]

I had dial up internet for over 10 years...  it worked fine until a few months ago when suddenly it stopped working and Earthlink's customer service people were no longer helpful (they were bought out by a bigger company I think so they have gone down hill).  I now have wi-fi and I like it much better but it costs more.  I guess it's worth the extra cost so I can see cat videos!

[Guest Jetsun Milarepa]

Log tables ! Long time no see @cavalier080854! Loved using them at school.

[Tabula Rasa]

I used a rotary phone until 2007. I’m glad I know how to use them! Now I have an iPhone 6S Plus.

[slyllama]

I always wanted to be that hipster who used a slide rule at school. But they were too clever for me.

[thylacine]

On 8/4/2018 at 10:38 PM, Hammerhead said:

I still have and use a VCR (VHS).  It's a VCR/DVD combo which I bought after my old VCR failed.   I planned to copy all my VHS tapes to DVD.  Only did a few so I still watch movies on VHS tapes.

 

I have a 400+ vinyl record collection so I still use a turntable.  My 30+ yo turntable finally failed earlier this year so I had to buy a new one.  The new one has a USB port so I can digitize my records.  As with the VHS tapes I only digitize a few of my albums.  I just like playing albums on the turntable for some reason.

 

I do use modern technology like my iPhone SE and my Apple Watch Series 1.  I find the Apple Watch to be quite handy.  I get e-mail notifications, I use the timer app for cooking, and the workout app when I exercise.  The workout app monitors & records my heart rate and calculates calories burned.

I still have a VCR and a bunch of old tapes that I watch sometimes, too.  I love my old shows.  I have a few vinyl records, too, and cassettes & a cassette player.

[Skycaptain]

Gatwick Airport (the world's busiest single runway airport) had to resort to putting all flight arrival and departure information onto white boards the other day after an IT failure 

[thylacine]

18 hours ago, Skycaptain said:

Gatwick Airport (the world's busiest single runway airport) had to resort to putting all flight arrival and departure information onto white boards the other day after an IT failure 

Where I live, we get a lot of crazy weather...  last winter, we had a really terrible storm that knocked out electricity all over everywhere...  I went to the supermarket and the lights were on but they had to toss out a lot of food...  also, they could only take cash for a few days...  the storm did something to their computer system and they could not take credit cards.  I was like one of the few people who could get milk and bread and peanut butter...  so the lesson in that is always have some cash stashed somewhere.

[seneca]

One good thing about wall phones, they still work when the power goes out. 

[Ortac]

I like a mixture of new and old.

 

Modern products just don’t seem to be built to last as long as they used to be. My parents had a washing machine bought in the early 1980s that lasted over 25 years. You would be lucky to get one that lasts that long nowadays.

 

Unless you have a bottomless pit of money and you don’t mind wasting it, I find that it never pays to be an early adopter of new technologies. If you jump straight in and buy a new innovative product as soon as it is launched, what inevitably happens is that after a year or two a new improved version will be brought out AND the price will have come down as well. So you will have only a short period of time during which you can show off that you own this amazing new product, and after that you will be stuck with your inferior first generation of the product whilst many more people will have their superior second and third generation versions which they will have paid less money for.

 

I am glad that I resisted jumping on the electric gear shifters for road bikes band wagon when they became available around 2010 or 2011, because the newer versions have smaller and longer lasting batteries, and they are cheaper.   

 

I don’t like what has become of television sets in recent years. Around a decade ago just before the smart TV era came in, the flat screen TVs that were available all had a mat screen and decent built in speakers. The modern TVs all have shiny screens, so you can often see reflections of lights and lamps in the TV screen when watching it which is annoying. Also, because the TVs are now wafer thin with screens that go right to the edge with no surrounding frame, the quality of the built-in speakers is really bad because there is very little room for them. You are now expected to fork out separately for an expensive sound bar! I think if it was suggested 10 years ago that in the future, TVs would no longer have good speakers in them and you would have to pay extra to buy your speakers separately, people would have though that was outrageous. Yet it has happened, and consumers seem to have blindly accepted it without question. I want to be able to buy an all in one decent TV set with a decent picture AND decent sound. I am even trying to source a second-hand TV for this reason, but I am struggling to find one in good condition.   

 

Computer games these days are all about amazing graphics and being as realistic as possible, but I don’t think that is necessary to get enjoyment out of a game; I like many old games from the 1980s. I had an old computer from the 1980s which plugged into the TV and for which games were sold and loaded on cassette. Sadly it no longer works but I was using it occasionally up until about ten years ago.

 

In terms of cameras, I think digital photography is amazing and I have no desire to ever use a film camera again. I know that there are still some aficionados of 35mm film cameras and some people enjoy the satisfaction of developing their own photos in a dark room. However you could only get 36 photos on one film and every photo taken cost money. Compare that to digital where you can get thousands on one SD card which can be used again and again, and you can see your photos immediately and not have to wait for development, I think that film photography will eventually disappear completely.

 

What I do like with cameras however are fully manual setting and the traditional SLR set up with the small dial on top for setting shutter speed and the large dial around the lens for setting aperture with another for setting the focus. I don’t like the modern cameras with convoluted features loads of fiddly buttons. Fujifilm make cameras which are modern digital cameras with a screen on the back, but which resemble the traditional SLR camera as they used to be before digital photography came about. This is on my wish list:

[Ortac]

On 7/21/2018 at 9:01 AM, E said:

Everything else of mine is old. I appreciate older stuff as it was made with durability in mind and generally, ease of use and repair. But I suppose the cost of that in this day and age is that parts are a pain to come by or expensive due to rarity.

I don't like it that it is so difficult to repair things these days and that we are often advised that it is cheaper to replace something rather than repair it. This disposable, throw away culture that we are now living with frustrates me.

 

Especially when it comes to smart phones. The phone and network providers are probably some of my least favourite companies, because they have instigated this culture where it has become the norm and everyone seems to expect to have a brand new hand set every single year. People are so obsessed with wanting the latest and most advanced version of everything. In fact, it is even worse than that; some of the phone companies are promoting that you can upgrade your hand set every six months! I think that sort of thing reflects very badly on society. We have to remeber that the world's resources are finite, and this sort of attitude where it is acceptable to get rid of a perfectly funtional bit of equipment because someone wants something six months newer is not going to be sustainable in the long term.

[afiero85]

I'm the guy all my friends come to when they need stuff off an ide hard drive or a floppy disc. I can convert 8mm to digital while watching a betamax movie. I only bought my current phone (Nexus 5x) because it was broken and I wanted the challenge of fixing it.  Also as a car guy I like to try to bring modern technology into older cars with a factory look. Come to think of it from typing this out, I like broken and forgotten technology I can put my hands on and make useful again. 

[Ortac]

On 7/29/2018 at 5:28 PM, ryn2 said:

On 7/29/2018 at 5:07 PM, utca said:

... I still use checks to mail in my bill payments, which all my coworkers make fun of me for...

Whew, someone else who pays by check!!  

 

I think that the need for checks/cheques has not completley gone away just yet. I have a check book which I still use occasionally.

 

I think that where it is possible to pay a bill by direct debit or pay for something in a store by bank card or credit card, checks are completely unnecessary. I know that in the US and the UK most stores no longer accept checks. In France, most still do and I can't wait for stores here to stop accepting them like in the US and UK, because for reasons I just cannot understand, there are still many people who will insisit on paying by check in the supermarket, and it annoys me because it takes so much longer than paying by debit or credit card.

 

However, if the options for payment are to make a bank transfer with online banking or to send a check through the mail, I will always opt for the check. This is because I don't believe that banks have yet developed a robust and safe enough system for online bank transfers. Firstly, there are not enough safety nets in place to ensure that you have got the payee account details correct, and it would be all too easy with just one click of a mouse to send money to the wrong place in which case you have lost it with practically zero chance of getting it back. This has happened to people before and it will in all likelihood happen again.

 

Secondly, the system of referencing is insufficient to ensure that the person or company receiving the money is always able to know what it is you are actually paying for. When you mail a check, you enclose a copy of the relevant invoice with the invoice number in the same envelope, or an entire written letter if you need to, so the recipient knows categorically why you are sending the payment. With online transfers, the number of characters you can type in the reference field is currently limited, and I have no faith that the reference will appear on the recipient’s statement anyway.

 

So until such a time when the banks have addressed these issues and made improvements to the online bank transfer process, I will be sticking with my check book.

 

[Tanwen]

I would NOT want to go back to life without central heating, I was always so cold in the winter, and we literally had to scrape the ice off the window to see out of it. At school, the toilets were outside and we'd sit there with our legs crossed rather than go, milk was frozen and we had to stand it in warm water to defrost it.

I was first home most nights and it was my job to light the coal fire - how on earth I didn't set fire to myself I'll never know and it was magical when we moved into our new house and we had a gas poker - made life so much easier!  . In the old house, I missed the range when they removed it and put a standard cooker in, 

[ryn2]

3 hours ago, Ortac said:

However, if the options for payment are to make a bank transfer with online banking or to send a check through the mail, I will always opt for the check.

Yes, this is where (and for the same reasons you describe) I use checks too.  I haven’t used one in a brick-and-mortar retail store for 30 years.

[Semisweet]

3 hours ago, Ortac said:

This disposable, throw away culture that we are now living with frustrates me.

Agreed. I'm especially disheartened by planned obsolescence, which ultimately forces you to replace older computers, etc., when they're no longer supported. 

 

3 hours ago, Ortac said:

My parents had a washing machine bought in the early 1980s that lasted over 25 years. You would be lucky to get one that lasts that long nowadays.

My refrigerator, original to my home, is 35+ years old but still does its job, so I'm keeping it for the duration. And at this point I'm curious to see how much longer it lasts.   

[Ortac]

15 minutes ago, Semisweet said:

Agreed. I'm especially disheartened by planned obsolescence, which ultimately forces you to replace older computers, etc., when they're no longer supported. 

Yes, I hate that too. If I could boycott products with planned obsolescence, I would, but unfortunately it is not that simple. Manufacturers that make products don't exactly openly admit to doing it, although I think we can be pretty certain that planned obsolescence exists in all smartphones. 

 

In fact, I think that it would be a good marketing point if a manufacturer did the opposite and made a product upgradable and as future proof as possible. I would certainly buy that product, even if it was more expensive.