Author Topic: Snake oil  (Read 11283 times)

Beardy

  • Shedist
Re: Snake oil
« Reply #100 on: 10 July, 2020, 09:14:23 pm »
I bought a Portable minidisc player for my eldest, and then a micro Hi-Fi system with a minidisc player in place of a tape player. She was anti apple at the time for some reason.
For every complex problem in the world, there is a simple and easily understood solution that’s wrong.

ian

Re: Snake oil
« Reply #101 on: 10 July, 2020, 09:29:02 pm »
I've still got my original iPod (I think 3rd generation, with the click wheel) – I remember buying it in Santa Monica in the early 2000s because I was sick of lugging around one of those cases for 40 CDs.

Let's face it, it was awesome squared. Well, after I spent an entire winter ripping my record collection. That was less awesome.

Pingu

  • Put away those fiery biscuits!
  • Mrs Pingu's domestique
    • the Igloo
Re: Snake oil
« Reply #102 on: 10 July, 2020, 09:31:20 pm »
In a minute someone is going to mention Laser Discs (I've seen em but never used one)

They are mythical aren't they? Never seen one in the flesh.

I think Mrs P's elder brother had one.

Kim

  • Timelord
    • Fediverse
Re: Snake oil
« Reply #103 on: 10 July, 2020, 09:37:58 pm »
I think our school had one of those BBC Domesday laserdisc setups gathering dust in the computer room.  No idea if it worked.

ian

Re: Snake oil
« Reply #104 on: 10 July, 2020, 09:43:37 pm »
I completely forgot to add the 'in the flesh' joke to my previous message about homemade parental porn. I apologize. That's what two hours of trying to explain how to navigate BIOS menus to your parents does (answer: please just post me the laptop, please... now I have to send them bubble wrap and a box).

If you need me, I can usually be found mid-swoon outside the window of Everest Typewriters on the A217, somewhere north of Cheam.

redshift

  • High Priestess of wires
    • redshift home
Re: Snake oil
« Reply #105 on: 10 July, 2020, 09:50:50 pm »
It's a weird Top Trumps set, but here goes my audio list:
Cart Machines (Sonifex)
Dolby A in a 3U rackmount which you had to lug from area to area because we could only afford one*, and worked in a room with but never had to use SR
Technics SLP1200B which in its ASC modified version (fader start) was without doubt the 'Rolls Royce' of CD players at the time
Whatever those skookum Gram decks were that the Beeb put into nice wooden cabinets with rotary fader start - EMT, I think
Studer B67 (the little one)
Revox PR99 (the plastic one)
Done tape edits with a razor blade and sticky tape.
Nagra T and Sony APR5000 timecode lockable 1/4" machines
Otari MTR99 24 track
Sony PCM-7030(?) DAT machine with timecode lock
Sony CDP-something CD player
A brief dalliance with the AMS AudioFile, which we won't talk about

...and I didn't even work in Sound - so don't get me started on video and film...

"Do notte buye Betamacks"
Professionals never listen to advice, so the world used Beta formats (Beta SP, DigiBeta, SX, HDCAM, HDCAM SR) until the death of tape, and there are still HDCAM SR and DigiBeta machines at work for archive use.

Oh, and I have a laser disc at work with the Sony BVH-2000 maintenance course on it, but no means of playing it.

*Dolby A was almost always required when transferring record company promo videos, which arrived on "G-Spools" - tiny plastic 1" VT spools with about 6 minutes of tape on them.  They were so light that you had to put a weighted flange onto the machine with it, or the machine would either sulk or tear the tape into little tiny shreds trying to sort its tensions out.
L
:)
Windcheetah No. 176
The all-round entertainer gets quite arsey,
They won't translate his lame shit into Farsi
Somehow to let it go would be more classy…

ian

Re: Snake oil
« Reply #106 on: 10 July, 2020, 09:54:25 pm »
My father-in-law is still holding out for the betamax renaissance. Mind you, he used to be a Tory MP.

Feanor

  • It's mostly downhill from here.
Re: Snake oil
« Reply #107 on: 10 July, 2020, 11:12:18 pm »
On a local popular cycling route, there's an old garage in the village of Auchleven.
It seems the owner just shut up shop one day in the late '70, never to return.
You can look in the window, and everything is exactly as it was that day.

There's an 8-track cartridge player in the window.

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@57.3100925,-2.6240762,3a,75y,213.52h,85.71t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sVDeEXYAFmmrSSuP1cWYoxw!2e0!7i13312!8i6656?hl=en

One day you're going to get in there  :)

I think that's highly likely!

Re: Snake oil
« Reply #108 on: 11 July, 2020, 12:10:44 am »
If you need me, I can usually be found mid-swoon outside the window of Everest Typewriters on the A217, somewhere north of Cheam.

<FX: Sound of Google image search>
Oh my...

Jaded

  • The Codfather
  • Formerly known as Jaded
Re: Snake oil
« Reply #109 on: 11 July, 2020, 01:18:54 am »
It's one of those generational things, I have to explain cassette tapes to young people. People born after c1985 don't have a clue. There will soon be a generation left to scratch their heads about CDs.

But I just had to google 8-track tapes. Chunky monkeys. Never seen one.

On the other hand, does anyone remember minidiscs? No, thought not.

Minidiscs - I think were the storage media in the ICL OPD (One Per Desk) sort of a PC/phone that was around in about 1985/6 - I had one to try when I was managing and developing the "videotex" activity for one of the (former) large building societies named after a town and a city in Gloucestershire.

Rob

It was MicroDrives, better ones than in the QL, which, I think, were better than the ones for the Spectrum.
It is simpler than it looks.

Jaded

  • The Codfather
  • Formerly known as Jaded
Re: Snake oil
« Reply #110 on: 11 July, 2020, 01:20:40 am »
In a minute someone is going to mention Laser Discs (I've seen em but never used one)
Now, my brothers flat mate had one. He and I watched a Jenny Agguter film on it (Logan’s Run?) Try as we did, the freeze frame and resolution wasn’t good.
It is simpler than it looks.

Re: Snake oil
« Reply #111 on: 11 July, 2020, 09:17:15 am »
In a minute someone is going to mention Laser Discs (I've seen em but never used one)

Saw one once, a Phillips one, used for interactive video training.
We are making a New World (Paul Nash, 1918)

Cudzoziemiec

  • Ride adventurously and stop for a brew.
Re: Snake oil
« Reply #112 on: 11 July, 2020, 10:21:08 am »
In a minute someone is going to mention Laser Discs (I've seen em but never used one)

They are mythical aren't they? Never seen one in the flesh.
Pretty sure I've seen one in the Science Museum in London. No idea whether it's still there.
Riding a concrete path through the nebulous and chaotic future.

Re: Snake oil
« Reply #113 on: 11 July, 2020, 11:54:27 am »
Back in the 90s I knew an American chap who was a massive film buff and had a collection of just about every home video system known to humanity; he had a collection of laserdiscs, and I'm sure I may have watched something from one (can't recall the film, mind). IIRC he worked as a contractor on US military bases in Europe, and was able to get the kit cheap through the base PX.

Thor

  • Super-sonnicus idioticus
Re: Snake oil
« Reply #114 on: 11 July, 2020, 12:12:22 pm »
I believe TEAC are still* cranking out new cassette decks, though no-one knows why.

The TEAC machines are apparently rubbish.

Tape's not dead!

And of course you can still spend a fortune on a high-end cassette deck from the golden age thereof.

I experienced a bit of a nostalgiafest a year or two ago when I realised that I had nothing on which to play or digitise old tapes and acquired a nice direct drive Technics deck from fleabay.  It is still working admirably, or was, last time I looked.  Has features like Automatic Tape Calibration that they didn't have Back in My Day.

But the novelty kinda wore off after a while...
It was a day like any other in Ireland, only it wasn't raining

Mr Larrington

  • A bit ov a lyv wyr by slof standirds
  • Custard Wallah
    • Mr Larrington's Automatic Diary
Re: Snake oil
« Reply #115 on: 11 July, 2020, 01:09:45 pm »
In a minute someone is going to mention Laser Discs (I've seen em but never used one)

A former flatmate had one.  Those were the days before integrated A/V receivers, so he had it hooked up to an impressive array of amps to drive the surround speakers, and had just got it all nicely dialled in when a consortium of Oriental Fiends invented DVD.  There was a degree of karma in this, as he worked for a hi-fi magazine at the time :demon:  I still have the Rotel CD player he blagged and sold me for half the list price though.
External Transparent Wall Inspection Operative & Mayor of Mortagne-au-Perche
Satisfying the Bloodlust of the Masses in Peacetime

Tim Hall

  • Victoria is my queen
Re: Snake oil
« Reply #116 on: 11 July, 2020, 02:43:47 pm »
I vaguely recall Dad having what looked like a forerunner of a compact cassette player tucked away in his "work room"*. It had reel to reel tape spools joined together in some kind of plastic moulding. Or I dreamt it.

Once I've completed the Great Photo Project I've got to turn my attention to digitising a couple of 1/4 inch tape reels. I suspect they'll be stuck together in a crumbly mess though.

*A room full of tools, 35mm film canisters, and tqt.
There are two ways you can get exercise out of a bicycle: you can
"overhaul" it, or you can ride it.  (Jerome K Jerome)

Re: Snake oil
« Reply #117 on: 11 July, 2020, 02:48:41 pm »
Laser disk: a friend had one in about 1984. Came with 12 disks, only one of which he wanted to watch, which was Carrie.  On the evening he was showing it, I was more interested in his home-brew cherry beer (ordinary beer, then you add cherries and re-ferment). The following day was the only time I have ever bunked off work due to alcohol. I didn't wake up until around noon.
Minidisk. MrsC got one to take to sessions for recording of tunes and so on. We did use it to record her playing for our morris team so we could make a CD for the team. Since then, not a lot. The mic it came with is sitting on my desk as I've used it with the phone and it may be useful for zoom meetings when we want two video streams, but need to use the same mic.
Does anyone ever remember a 16 rpm record? All the record players of my childhood had 78, 45, 33 1/3 and 16 settings.
"No matter how slow you go, you're still lapping everybody on the couch."

Kim

  • Timelord
    • Fediverse
Re: Snake oil
« Reply #118 on: 11 July, 2020, 02:49:42 pm »
In a minute someone is going to mention Laser Discs (I've seen em but never used one)

They are mythical aren't they? Never seen one in the flesh.
Pretty sure I've seen one in the Science Museum in London. No idea whether it's still there.

I've seen that one too.

Tim Hall

  • Victoria is my queen
Re: Snake oil
« Reply #119 on: 11 July, 2020, 02:52:32 pm »
In a minute someone is going to mention Laser Discs (I've seen em but never used one)

They are mythical aren't they? Never seen one in the flesh.
Pretty sure I've seen one in the Science Museum in London. No idea whether it's still there.

I've seen that one too.
I was in a museum in Edinburgh, probably the Museum of Scotland, some years ago. They had an exhibition of electrical stuffs, including a Pioneer PL12D deck. Just like the one over there > in my flat.
There are two ways you can get exercise out of a bicycle: you can
"overhaul" it, or you can ride it.  (Jerome K Jerome)

Kim

  • Timelord
    • Fediverse
Re: Snake oil
« Reply #120 on: 11 July, 2020, 02:53:35 pm »
Does anyone ever remember a 16 rpm record? All the record players of my childhood had 78, 45, 33 1/3 and 16 settings.

I'd guess those would have been mostly used for speech.  I'm picturing language lessons, radio playout, early automated telephone systems, that sort of thing?

Mr Larrington

  • A bit ov a lyv wyr by slof standirds
  • Custard Wallah
    • Mr Larrington's Automatic Diary
Re: Snake oil
« Reply #121 on: 11 July, 2020, 03:44:02 pm »
Does anyone ever remember a 16 rpm record? All the record players of my childhood had 78, 45, 33 1/3 and 16 settings.

I'd guess those would have been mostly used for speech.  I'm picturing language lessons, radio playout, early automated telephone systems, that sort of thing?

Mr Google says:
  • early audiobooks
  • background music
  • Chrysler's notably rubbish in-dash record player
External Transparent Wall Inspection Operative & Mayor of Mortagne-au-Perche
Satisfying the Bloodlust of the Masses in Peacetime

Feanor

  • It's mostly downhill from here.
Re: Snake oil
« Reply #122 on: 11 July, 2020, 03:56:21 pm »
When I was working offshore in the '90s, the helichopper briefing videos you had to sit through were shifted to Laserdisk after all the VHS ones became unplayable!

Re: Snake oil
« Reply #123 on: 11 July, 2020, 07:15:55 pm »
Does anyone ever remember a 16 rpm record? All the record players of my childhood had 78, 45, 33 1/3 and 16 settings.

I'd guess those would have been mostly used for speech.  I'm picturing language lessons, radio playout, early automated telephone systems, that sort of thing?
You may be right - I have a vague recollection of a 16rpm disc we had, although I can't remember for the life of me what it was, it may have been 'funny' sound effects.
I /think/ you could make voice-letters on 16rpm discs in booths at places like stations. Correction -  http://colinville.blogspot.com/2013/09/make-your-own-record-in-3-minutes.html shows they were 45rpm

Back to ancient technoloby - what was so special about Zip Discs? - I've got a Zip Drive and a few Zip Disks stored away, but can't remember why.
Too many angry people - breathe & relax.

Kim

  • Timelord
    • Fediverse
Re: Snake oil
« Reply #124 on: 11 July, 2020, 07:21:47 pm »
Back to ancient technoloby - what was so special about Zip Discs? - I've got a Zip Drive and a few Zip Disks stored away, but can't remember why.

Couple of orders of magnitude more space than a floppy, and drives were cheap enough that they proliferated to the point of becoming useful for file exchange rather than simply as a backup medium.  They maintained that edge into the writeable CD era, on account of being quicker and easier to write to (no mastering process needed).

Meanwhile, decent flatbed scanners had become affordable, installer files had bloated to several floppies worth, and PDFs were starting to become common, so people needed some convenient way to exchange files in the low tens of megabytes.

Eventually, flash memory became cheap enough to do the same job without the Click Of Death.