What's your oldest electronic device that you still use?

[lxskllr]

Speaking of vintage audio, a buddy of mine actually owns a Victrola. It's one of the console style ones. All mechanical. Nothing electronic inside. I saw it at his cottage and I've been meaning to ask him about it. Must be almost 100 year old. Looks to be in rough shape so I doubt it works.

Victrolas, as of the 1990s when I was looking, could be had very reasonably(~$250). I never did get one. I don't really have the extra space, and it would end up just being a dust collector, but they're super cool things.

As it stands, I have about 35Gb ripped 78s; all "pirated" of course. Fuckers... The material is from the weasel lawyer's grandparent's day, but still under copyright. Proof that the government hasn't worked for the people in decades :^S

 

[spaceman]

sansui reciever and speakers
70s or smth

 

[Ichinisan]

Did they eventually start making decent versions of the hardware late in the NES's lifetime? Because everyone I ever knew who had an NES had it go bad after about a year of use; e.g., getting stuck resetting over and over, having to pull out and push the cartridge in 10x before it would work, and so on.

Aside from the cartridge connector, practically every NES is 100% perfect (electronic components and everything). The cartridge connector pins lose springiness over time. You can easily replace the cartridge connector for a few bucks. It slides right off the board and the new connector slides right on.

No special screws or anything. Just Phillips.

They did make a top-loading NES with a better connector, but the video output quality is bad (interference) compared to the original's and it doesn't have composite video output at all.

 

[Ichinisan]

Have a sony Dac from 1996 that I still use to digitize analogue sources.

Sounds like an ADC then.

 

[Ichinisan]

Problems with the 10NES lockout chip caused the system to go into a reboot loop. They released a top loader late in life which removed the chip. It also fixed the issues with the cartridge connectors. The original's used to tarnish.

Well, the 10NES was doing exactly what it was supposed to do; resetting the system when it has trouble talking to its counterpart CIC chip in the game cartridge. The root cause of that problem (blinking reset loop) was also the cartridge connector.

 

[CZroe]

Did they eventually start making decent versions of the hardware late in the NES's lifetime? Because everyone I ever knew who had an NES had it go bad after about a year of use; e.g., getting stuck resetting over and over, having to pull out and push the cartridge in 10x before it would work, and so on.

Your friends must not have known that a swab of rubbing alcohol would always fix that right up. Yes, the game pak labels said not to use alcohol, but the official cleaning kit said to use it diluted if water didn't work. It could be done easily without the kit. The only thing the kit helped with was inserting and removing the alcohol-soaked card connector while pushed down, but you could just wiggle a normal cartridge while down, swab again, and repeat a few times. The only cart connectors that would continue to have problems were those that were ruined by a Game Genie (super-thick card to make contact even without being pressed down) or by other tricks to increase compression (cramming two game paks in, for example).

 

[Ken g6]

I used a 9-year-old Celeron M (not to be confused with Core M) laptop for TV recording until two weeks ago. I think it wasn't the laptop that failed, but the external Seagate drive mad so I may use it again soon.

HP48GX. I use it daily a calculator and data collector. If you count it's predecessor, the SX, I've used one since 1991.

I have one of those, but I don't use it. (I also have an SX with a cracked screen. ) Did you know you can now put one on your phone? I did - still don't use it, though.

 

[shortylickens]

I had an original NES for years and it never acted up.
Maybe you guys just werent taking care of yours.

 

[CZroe]

What device was the OP trying to use with the SIM?

 

[lxskllr]

I have one of those, but I don't use it. (I also have an SX with a cracked screen. ) Did you know you can now put one on your phone? I did - still don't use it, though.

I have that. I just downloaded the latest release, but haven't tried it yet. The previous release would crash on KitKat if you pressed buttons too quickly. My ultimate goal is rip a rom card I have, and load it into a virtual port, so I don't have to rely on old hardware that's getting harder to get every year. So far, I haven't been able to get the rom card ripped. It's been a long time since I've done this stuff, so I don't know if it's me, or if there's some kind of copy protection on the card. I need to find an older version I've successfully ripped before, and see if I can get that going.

I do have an old cogo program installed I hacked on years ago. It's very basic, and I'm missing some modules I wrote, but it'll do in a pinch. Instead of screwing around online, I should probably refamiliarize myself with hacking on HPs, but that's work :^D

 

[John Connor]

Had this old vintage Windows 98se HP Omnibook monitoring my router, but the cat knocked it on the floor and hasn't worked since. I'm thinking about buying another. It has no USB ports and the way I got Internet to work on it was with a PCMCIA modem card. I had to use a free dial-up connection to transfer the LAN drivers from my FTP to the computer.

Got to love Goodwill.

 

[T9D]

I still use a cheap calculator I used in school. Canon LC-22. For some reason I always thought it was solar. But I just looked it up and it's not. (how the heck does the battery even still work??).

Probably from 1991 or so? Can't remember what point in school though. Mine is black however:

Aside from that. I guess my canon digital pocket camera. Battery is gone in that though. Need a new one. That is from 2006. Only bought that because the old one broke.

Powershot sd600:

 

[TheSlamma]

I've got all kinds of tools from the 60's and 70's. They all work better than the china made crap they sell these days.

I have a hammer drill that cannot be stopped by anything on earth.

 

[shortylickens]

OH, i forgot.

I still have my Sony DSC-P50.
It gets used once in a while. Like when I dont feel in the mood to carry around my nice camera.

 

[IronWing]

A friend sold me this in 8th grade for a dollar. I don't remember getting rid of it but I know I should have kept it.

 

[Raduque]

sansui reciever and speakers
70s or smth

I like old audio gear too. I have a Sansui DB8080 ('78) sitting at home that need some refurb work and a Sony TA-AV521 ('91) that's my computer audio system.

It poweres a pair of mid-80s Akai speakers that I got at a Goodwill for ~$30. The graph on the front says they start rolling off just below 50hz and I believe it. They pressurize my entire apartment.

 

[Bubbleawsome]

We've got an NES that still works perfectly. It's got the original mario, duckhunt, and mario 3.

 

[FelixDeCat]

A friend sold me this in 8th grade for a dollar. I don't remember getting rid of it but I know I should have kept it.

Please stop bragging Ironwing. Im sick 'n tired of hearing about your high and mighty ways.

 

[Gillbot]

What's nice about those is the LED readout is MUCH easier to see in almost any condition, heck the only reason they switched was LCD based systems require far less battery power to operate.

I used mine through high school and college. The looks I still get when I pop that thing out are priceless.

I had an original NES for years and it never acted up.
Maybe you guys just werent taking care of yours.

We've got an NES that still works perfectly. It's got the original mario, duckhunt, and mario 3.

Same here, my nes still chugs away. :whiste:

 

[IronWing]

Please stop bragging Ironwing. Im sick 'n tired of hearing about your high and mighty ways.

It's RPN.

 

[lxskllr]

It's RPN.

I didn't even notice that. I didn't know anyone aside from HP had RPN machines. It's the superior way to calculate. I don't have a single algebraic machine in use, including my computer desktop. I can even type "BOOBS" without needless abstractions :^D

 

[Mayne]

probably my ancient ibm keyboard from '96

 

[MrSquished]

a set of M-Audio studio monitors that i've had for close to 20 years. those I use. I also still have 2 Technics 1200 turntables from about the same time and am saving them for future use, but don't currently use them.

 

[MongGrel]

I'd kinda forgotten this one, an old anniversary Singer sowing machine.

Mostly sits in the entry way as a table these days, the motor was still functional as far as I know last time was used, but some of the parts are needing reworking.

It was in an old house I bought about 35 years ago, and have hung onto it, my grandfather used to repaint a lot of things and do murals and art in general, he painted it for me before he passed away.

Is an interesting old piece of electronics.

I remember my great grandmother having a treadle one.

 

[SKORPI0]

I'd kinda forgotten this one, an old anniversary Singer sowing machine.
Is an interesting old piece of electronics.

That's a electric sewing machine, show which part are electronic.