Soon we'll all be using retro-tech

[mr_lou]

So, year 2019 is coming up. The year of the movie Blade Runner.

Watching this classic movie today, you can't help notice how old all the tech looks like.
And then you might think to yourself: "LOL, what an old movie! They had no clue back then how the future would truly look".

Now hang on buddy. We're not in 2019 yet. We have two more years to go, and it can easily end up exactly like you see in Blade Runner:
Old CRT screens, old computers - though connected to the Internet.
Why?

Well... because we've gotten sick of all the new crap that keeps being produced that only lasts a few years. Combined with all the new hardware we now have available for our old computers. I bet Blade Runner got it right!

By 2019 we'll all be using our retro computers for your everyday chores. You just wait and see....

[CraigsBar]

I use my vampire v2 accelerated amiga 600 for all the fun stuff o  the Internet already.... You mean I am ahead of the trend. Wow that's a first.

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[Bryce]

Retro gear wasn't any more reliable than modern electronics, what has changed is our expectations and that we have changed from a repair culture to a throw-away culture.

Bryce.

[||C|-|E||]

The most amazing thing about their tech was the capacity they had to create androids using real tissues instead of making machines like a Terminator. That is some bloody serious work!  The snake even had a serial number on the scales.

Another awesome thing was the computer that allows infinite zoom on a low res picture. It was slow but hey, it even had a voice recognition system.

[Shaun M. Neary]

Retro gear wasn't any more reliable than modern electronics, what has changed is our expectations and that we have changed from a repair culture to a throw-away culture.

Bryce.

THIS! So much this.
I'll give you a good example. Late 90s, early 2000s, if your computer went slow, you backed it up, formatted the drive and reinstalled Windows to speed things up again and then restored your machine, presto chango, you were back in business. Then the boom hit and all of a sudden, it was a new laptop every year to year and a half "because we could" and the old one either was used as a spare or handed down to someone else. Then the recession hit and people forgot what we did 15-20 years ago.


Same with phones. If one more person tells me their iPhone is too slow to use. Here's a tip, if it's working, DON'T INSTALL THE UPDATE! Apple's updates only give a shit about the current gen of phones, so if you have a previous gen one, it's only going to get slower when you update it, but no, people update it for the "OMG NEW EMOJIS".


Seriously, definitely throwaway culture, common sense has failed to prevail. /rant

[||C|-|E||]

That is actually so true. It is also very true that some of the older devices were made with higher quality standards than now because they were much more expensive. I mean, buying a stereo in the 80s was something that the whole family was thinking for months before commitment (at least in Spain). You were spending a lot of money and getting a quality device in return. They were not so common and built to last for many many years. Nowadays you can buy one for 30 pounds, they are disposable, and therefore the quality standards are terrible in the low end market. That does not mean that if you are ready to pay the equivalent amount of money you were spending in the 80s for the same thing you will not get something better in return 

Miniaturization, on the other hand, has made the things much more difficult to repair. I guess that it contributed quite a lot to the culture of the disposable...

[Shaun M. Neary]

That is actually so true. It is also very true that some of the older devices were made with higher quality standards than now because they were much more expensive. I mean, buying a stereo in the 80s was something that the whole family was thinking for months before commitment (at least in Spain). You were spending a lot of money and getting a quality device in return. They were not so common and built to last for many many years. Nowadays you can buy one for 30 pounds, they are disposable, and therefore the quality standards are terrible in the low end market. That does not mean that if you are ready to pay the equivalent amount of money you were spending in the 80s for the same thing you will not get something better in return 

Miniaturization, on the other hand, has made the things much more difficult to repair. I guess that it contributed quite a lot to the culture of the disposable...

I get sneered at quite a lot because I'm a Mac guy as a result of this and get the whole "You paid how much for a laptop?", but the truth of the matter is, I've had my 13" and 17" Macbook Pro just over five years, only problem I've had with one of them was the SATA cable warping from the heat and I replaced that in two minutes for 15 euro. I'd have probably gone through 2-3 Acers or Lenovos with the amount of use and travel I do with them in that time. Get what you pay for really.


Not to say you can't get a bargain from time to time either, but it all depends on how much you look after things as well. We're all mostly careful here when it comes to looking after stuff, especially when we're tinkering around with 30-35 year old hardware. But this is the generation who yank phone cords out of sockets without hesitation, and then wonder why the cable wears out after a couple of months.


Again, when common sense left the building and stupidity prevails... one has to laugh, really! 

[VincentGR]

I use my vampire v2 accelerated amiga 600 for all the fun stuff o  the Internet already.... You mean I am ahead of the trend. Wow that's a first.

Sent from my ONEPLUS 3t using Tapatalk

Same here on a 030 

[VincentGR]

Another awesome thing was the computer that allows infinite zoom on a low res picture. It was slow but hey, it even had a voice recognition system.

Amazing right!!!
I remember when I saw that as a kid I was impressed, also my father.
Later when I saw that grid magnifier on art studio I just lost my mind!

[CraigsBar]

The perfect setup!

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[VincentGR]