Years ago I worked at an electronics store and have seen some very interesting products over the years with some being very useful.
Not sure how to do a poll on here but wanted to see how people matched on the ownership of some of these useful devices .
Have you ever owned a My (answers)
-PDA? Yes, I had a Palm IIIe
-DVD-Recorder? Yes. Successor to VCR sure didn’t last long… 😖
-WebTV? No. Interactive TV in the days of dial-up. 🙂
-3D Television? No
-Raspberry PI? No but I want to.
-Internet Radio Player? No This would be fun especially if it also had am/FM tuner
My parents had a WebTV when I was in highschool. They kept it for a very long time. it was awful.
I also have a Raspberry Pi Zero running a Pi Hole on my network. I don’t think raspberry pi’s are as unusual as some of the other things here. I know a lot of people who use them for various things.
Many PDAs, DVD recorder on the computer (never for TV), no to webtv or 3D TV, many rpis (and banana pis and countless other embedded boards)… internet radio player… not as a separate device.
Despite spending my entire life designing and improving tech, I am actually kind of tech-adverse. A good laptop, good phone and good internet connection, and all the gadgets tend to be left behind. Smart home? Yes, but it runs off of HomeAssistant. Alexa? Yes, but only because the non-hive-mind solutions aren’t quite there yet. Heck, my oven/range doesn’t even have a timer.
edit: 46yo
I’m in your intended audience. I currently have a Pi. None of the other stuff appealed to me.
As a young adult, I’ve grown up with DVD recorders. Internet Radio Players and a Pi or two came along during my early teens. I had never heard of the others until today haha.
Great idea for a post!
-PDA? Yes- Handspring Visor. It was supposed to be the Palm killer (it did have some success, as I remember).
-DVD-Recorder? No
-WebTV? No, but my less tech savvy friend had one. Those seemed doomed to fail.
-3D Television? Yes- spend way to much on two pairs of glasses that were used less than five time.
-Raspberry PI? Yes, but haven’t done enough with it.
-Internet Radio Player? No
I also had some type of smart pen around 2001 that would transfer what you wrote onto the computer. I think you had to plug the top of the pen into a USB port. It was a large pen (probably the size width of 5-6 normal pens combined). I can’t find the name of it. I think you had to have a special notebook with it too.
Did those 3D tvs actually work?
They did. But even at the height of its popularity, there were only a handful of movies that had it.
The glasses were around $170 per (if I remember correctly). That was a big barrier to entry.
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PDA: I loved my Palm Pilot and I can still write using that script (was quite nice when I noticed my Android keyboard supported it)
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Raspberry Pi: this feels weird to be on this list! I still have one in the living room running Kodi
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No to the others, although I did have one of these beauties:
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30yo here. I’ve only owned a Raspberry Pi. I got one in college after a friend won in a contest and didn’t know what to do with it so she gave it to me.
I did have a few toys growing up that were basically PDAs for kids.
I had 3 of those things.
A Compaq iPaq pda that ran Windows ce
An Internet radio alarm clock
I’ve got a raspberry pi that I use for pihole
Over-50 tech-ish. In the brief time I was an IT manager I ordered Blackberries for some of the staff but didn’t use one myself. DVD recorder: not for TV but on the computer. No webtv, no 3d tv (I’m not much of a TV watcher anymore), no internet radio. With some programming help I recently set up a Pico W with a water sensor to monitor a water heater for flooding and ping my phone if it happens. That was pretty nifty.
PDA - Pretty much all the Palm devices from the Original (US Robotics) Palm 1000, III, V, even the m125
DVDR - Just in my computer not standalone
WebTV - Nope but 100% Tivo user (Standalone and Directv)
Raspberry Pi - I have one but it mostly sits in a drawer
Internet Radio - I had a friend work at SimpleDevices that was a standalone internet player (company long gone)I still have a 3D Plasma TV. I haven’t found a reason to replace it as it’s still going just fine.
49 year old here. I still own a 3D tv, but I’ve never actually used the 3D feature. I didn’t even buy the TV. My dad gave my his old one when he upgraded.
I bought a Raspberry PI but never really did much with it.
I’ve never owned any of the others.
PDA: Had a Palm Treo 90. Also owned a second-hand Nokia N810.
DVD Recorder: Obviously had DVD burners in my PCs, but not as a standalone device.
WebTV: Technically Yes, but got it for shits and giggles at a Goodwill and never had service.
3D TV: No. I don’t even like it in theaters.
Raspberry Pi: I have a 3B+ running OctoPi for my 3D printer. I also have a couple of Picos, one in use in a handwired keyboard, but I don’t they count.
Internet Radio: No, but my wife bought an early streaming device, a Muzo Pebble I think. It was annoying and never got used much.
Yes but there was very little content and the concept never took off with the major content providers.
I have (and in some cases still do) all but the WebTV and the Internet Radio Player.
