Why mess with perfection?
On Friday we talked about tidbits of technology that the entire world tells you are wonderful and marvellous, but you just think are generally crap. Let’s flip that whole picture around a little bit.
Let’s face it, we’re here because we’re a little different than most. We tend to look at the world in a bit of a different way, and don’t always agree with the general consensus. I’ve lost track of the number of times I’ve been shown the newest, the latest and the greatest, and shrugged indifferently and gone back to my old standby. I use quill-tipped fountain pens almost exclusively when given the option; I have one of the six-blade powered razors, and would have a straight-razor shave every time if given the chance. I was rebuilding carburetors long after everyone said the only way to go was electronic fuel injection.
Other than AtomicToasters, obviously, what piece of technology do you cling to and love dearly, even though the rest of the world tells you it’s outdated garbage?
I still keep my roll film Nikon at hand for times when only the depth that film provides will do.
I own the last rotary-engined car and the most powerful carburetted production motorcycle ever made. If my film camera hadn't croaked, I'd still be using that too (although I still do have my toy Diana Fisheye). I'm a straight-up tech OG.
<img src="http://www.dianacamera.com/storage/DianaMini_Fisheye_med.jpg?__SQUARESPACE_CACHEVERSION=1262166053778" />
Which bike?
2003 Kawasaki ZZR1200: it produces around 165HP, which is now normal for 1000cc fuel-injected sportbikes.
Are we excepting manual transmissions from this discussion? I loves me a three speed stick. And drive one daily.
I think it's gotten to the point where the people who are cranky and defensive about their transmission choice on Hooniverse are the A/T drivers.
I thought it was assumed. But extra points for your three speed. Feel free to look down on me with my 5 speed (I do love my overdrive, though).
'…the people who are cranky and defenseive about their transmission choice on Hooniverse are the A/T drivers.'
That is a stupendous description of why Hooniverse is awesome!
Funny that you mention 5 speeds, I was just contemplating whether driving something with more speeds would be the same level of daily fun-ness, or just different fun-ness. Most of my standard vehicles have been 3 speeds, and I get a kick out of accelerating up a freeway onramp in second, and boom, into third and out into traffic we go! But maybe a couple more shifts in there would be fun too?
Mostly I debate the to myself because I have a project I'd like to get on the road that is an automatic, and I need to figure out what sort of transmission swap to invest in.
Have you ever felt the manual in a Sonata? The linkage might as well be wet cardboard and it feels like you're rowing in cream of wheat to get to the next gear. Get off my back!
My air popper. Microwave
poisonpopcorn has ruined the art of popcorn making in the home, and robbed us of the ability to control the salt and butter levels.I loved the air popper that my family used to have. The whirring and popping, ahh good times.
While I confess to having an air popper in the house, it hasn't been used in years. On movie nights, we use even older tech than that to pop our corn.
<img src="http://images.owneriq.net/download/images/3/343a71a4-2c92-cdb4-fde1-4566d1aa1ccf-000001.png">
We have one of those as well. It's wonderful.
I wanted to get one of those, but with my short attention span I'm afraid I'd just end up filling the house with smoke time and time again. So instead we spent a little extra and got a slightly more automated version.
<img src="http://www.best-grills-reviews.good-stuffblog.info/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/cuisinart-popcorn-maker-price.jpeg" width="500">
I've only tried it once — just no room to store the thing in the old house — but I'm really looking forward to it. Any tips for making popcorn in them? It's basically the same system as you have there, but the rotator arm is automated. The one time I tried it, it tasted delicious, but the popcorn popped very quickly and came out small and very hard, so the texture sucked. Any techniques I should be experimenting with? I have a huge jar of coconut oil to experiment with, so I don't mind trying this a few times to get it just right.
I don't see what your disgusting proclivity for coconut oil experiments has to do with delicious fluffy popcorn.
I'm talking about popcorn. Those "oil experiments" are just for you, and I told you if you told anyone about those, you'd be on the receiving end of another round of "experiments" the next time you came to visit.
So, see you next weekend?
Thankfully I'll be staring across a lake at Montana next weekend.
Which lake if you don't mind my asking? I'll be in Whitefish.
I'll actually be in a few places around the Glacier National Park / Waterton area for a few days this week. Doing some hiking and driving the Going-to-the-Sun road.
Damn, I haven't done that drive in years due to the fact that I run down after work on friday and come home late on sunday.
At least you get out of Dodge on weekends!
We tend not to use any oil in the popper, but I guess that's a preference thing. Use good quality popping corn. Unless you pop corn frequently, buy the smallest package of corn so that you use it before it gets stale in the opened package.
It's better to have a few unpopped kernels than a burned batch. Shaking/cranking the popper will get the smaller, denser unpopped pieces to the bottom, out of the way.
Coconut oil? Ewww…you don't actually eat that stuff do you? I use it for lubricating throttle linkages and bushings.
It's fantastic. It creates that movie-theatre popcorn smell that fills the house and creates the atmosphere, and adds the right flavour to give it that signature theatre taste. SO good, albeit expensive.
I have the same unit. We always use Coconut Oil in it, and you need to buy good popcorn. Not all popcorn is created equal. The misses buys some fancy all natural stuff now, but Orville Redenbacher is a good choice.
My Blackberry!
/Too soon?
While not that old (released in 1995), I'd be lost at work without it.
<img src="http://casio.ledudu.com/images/pockets/casio%5Cboites/cfx9800g.JPG">
I still have, and regularly use, my TI-85. Also, 1995 tech.
I was going to make that joke about how it is the only computer related device whose price hasn't decreased in its two decades of existence but then I found this:
http://www.amazon.com/Texas-Instruments-Calculato…
Glorious.
And I wouldn't trade my TI-85 for the NSpire. The TI-85 is simple. Fewer buttons, and the UI is optimized so that the common things are easy, and the less common things are still pretty convenient. I don't want a thumb keyboard or fancy icons on the display. It's just a great calculator.
Also, it doesn't do everything backwards. Yeah, I went there, HP guys.
Finally: r = cos θ + cos(11*θ)
How does it keep you from getting lost at work? They didn't have civilian GPS in 1995.
I programmed the route in BASIC so all I have to do is it the "Enter" key upon completing a turn and it prompts to the next direction
I still have my old TI-65 around here somewhere. That's 1980's tech.
Many woodworking tools, along with a bunch of other old stuff.
<img src="http://www.prowoodworkingtips.com/images/lie-nielsen-planes-2.gif" width="300" border="2" style="border:2px solid black;" alt=" " />
I have no problems with my projection screen "HDTV Ready" 4:3 format Hitachi TV. I have to jump through a few hoops to make everything work, but not enough that I see a need to replace it.
I'm sure there are some on here that still use a tube radio or at the newest a 19" B&W Tube TV.
I'm also quite happy with my first gen Zune MP3 player (I got it cheap).
For my desktop GUI, I still use X-Windows with a bare Window Manager. There are no icons on my desktop. There's no task bar thingy. My graphical environment has a feature set from the mid-90s, and I don't miss any of that drag-n-drop, autolaunch BS that comes with WinXP, MacOSX, KDE or Gnome. Instead, I have a desktop environment that is lightning fast (to the point where those full Desktop Environments all feel sluggish on the most cutting edge hardware).
I also use a double-edge safety razor. Getting a straight razor shave is great.
Get off my lawn.
For a while I was using Windowmaker (sic) as my WM, OpenStep as the general interface. Absolutely glorious. Bonus – non-Linux users had no clue how to operate it. "Where's the Start button?"
Security through obscurity – It Just Works ™
You're talking to the right man about that. I did a stint on Window Maker around 10 years ago. I spent a few years using KDE, got tired of it being slow and went to my current setup, which I have yet to see anyone else successfully navigate, even other Linux users. It is supremely user-unfriendly.
I'm running Enlightenment with a custom, ultra minimal them: no title bars, no window buttons, just a 4 pixel border that can be used to resize a window. Want to move a window? Best remember what alt-click does in X (most other functions you'd normally find with buttons on the title-bar are aliased to chorded key commands, which one has to memorize). The root window menu has been eviscerated. There are no runnable programs there. If you want to launch anything, the F1 key pulls down an ever present borderless xterm, quake style. Watch out, my xterms auto-launch screen and I have set +o vi in my bash .profile.
Speaking of which, that profile has a bunch of aliases for launching Firefox and xterms. Need something else? Better remember what it's called. Oh, and Firefox? I'm currently running it with AdBlock+, FlashBlock, NoScript and Vimperator (planning on swapping that out for pentadactyl) with a dead minimum amount of screen real estate used for normal FF GUI elements.
The kick in the nuts? My keyboard is a normal US-QWERTY, but I pulled the keys off and scrambled them when I put it back together. Don't take your hands off the home row, and don't look at your fingers.
Nobody else uses my computers. I find the whole setup to be wildly efficient.
VHS VCRs. Well, actually, S-VHS. Screw VHS and its 230 lines of resolution. Despite having a fairly cutting-edge DVR setup that I use every day, I do still own and operate three VCRs. One is a coveted Panasonic AG-1980, which still fetches serious money on eBay. The other two are Mitsubishi "prosumer" grade units, both "F-decks" for those in the know. One is an HS-U69, which is in my opinion the best Mitsu ever made.
Well yes, I have done the brown bag version of microwave popcorn when I want a smaller batch, but it's also hard to control the unpopped kernel factor. A friend of a friend (allegedly) has figured it out, but hasn't shared the secret with me.
I usually go with 1/3 cup of popcorn, drizzle some canola oil on it, shake on some salt and a pinch of white sugar, dump it in the bag, fold, shake to coat all kernels, then stand it up on a plate. A little over 2 minutes and it's done, but lots of leftovers in the bag.
My girlfriend. Many people suggest without provocation that I upgrade to wife. I tried that once. Didn't work out.
Don't do it, there are a lot of bugs in the upgrade to Wife 2.0. Unknown inputs cause race conditions, audio input gets mistranslated, child processes spawn catastrophically unless kept in check early, and maintenance costs rise on a logarithmic scale.
Stick with what works.
As much as I'm a believer in the old technologies, I'm also a diligent scavenger of the new ones. Most of what I have that's old school I only have because I'm such a diligent scavenger. People may think it's quaint that I'm on a genuine IBM desktop the size of a Volkswagen engine (and just as warm), but it was free. My stereo receiver is quadraphonic and weighs 57 pounds, also free. I scored a reel-to-reel deck but I don't actually use it. There really isn't anything I won't give up if something free comes along to replace it.
Although, just this weekend one of my friends was surprised to hear that I had ordered 10 CDs online. He thought that was old fashioned, said he 'owned' a bunch of digital music files in a cloud somewhere. But this is San Francisco, the Higgs Boson is considered a bit long in the tooth around these parts.
Carburetors and twin rear shock motorcycles aren't really a must have for me. The Scout I keep around as a project, and the Laverda I've just had for too long to give it up.
I'm not sure I'd say I cling to it but my 20-year-old Sony Betamax SLHF-870D VCR is still hooked up and functioning perfectly long after my VHS VCR and all of my VHS tapes are long gone. Sure I could re-buy the movies and TV shows I have on Beta (well most of them) on DVD or Blu-Ray but I'd rather save the money and keep the old trusty Beta going for a few more years. Besides the old TV shows are more interesting with their vintage commercials than commercial-free DVDs would be.