"In the old days we...."

[AndyMH]

Back when I was a poor undergrad I used to lust after a quad valve amp, could never afford it. From what I can remember, 15W RMS, class A. Doesn't matter now, no longer have hi-fi ears.

[MurphCID]

Back when I was a poor undergrad I used to lust after a quad valve amp, could never afford it. From what I can remember, 15W RMS, class A. Doesn't matter now, no longer have hi-fi ears.

Isn’t that just the sad part of getting old?

[Peter Linu]

Yup.

[Portreve]

This is a cousin to the very first modem I ever owned: an Everex Emac MD2400.

During high school and shortly afterward, I got to play around with a bunch of different modems, including actual Hayes modems, US-Robotics, and others.

I'm not sure why, but 9600 baud modems (which effectively were the next common iteration from 2400 baud) were incredibly pricey, going for anywhere upwards of $600 or $700 (maybe more). Needless to say, I never owned one of those, but then Supra put out their Supra FaxModem 14400. And for whatever reason, the 14400 modems pretty universally were SIGNIFICANTLY less expensive than the 9600s were, anywhere down to 25% of the price. I really loved my Supra FaxModem. In fact, I liked it so much that when the 28800 version came out, I bought one of those. They were so cool with that little LED status display on them! They were nice because you could do actual firmware upgrades. I eventually got a Boca 38400 (don't remember the exact model) and then ultimately I bought two different US-Robotics 56K modems: one was a PCI card for a PC I built, and the other was an external for the Mac I had at the time.

Of all the modems I've ever owned, my favorites (regardless of speed) were the Supra ones. There was something about them that was just so cool.



Here's a YouTube video on the 14400 baud model.

This is a video on the 28800 model.

[fstjohn]

Some of us remember valves (or tubes to those of you in the US). I was taught valve theory at university, the last year they did it.

I took an electronics course at the Army Security Agency school at Ft. Devens, MA in about 1963. The instructor held up a little metal device with three wires coming from it and said something like "This is a transistor." (putting it in the drawer of his desk.) "But don't worry about it. It's just a fad and you'll never see it in the field. Now today we're going to discuss how a pentode tube works."

[fstjohn]

Some of us built our own kitset one valve radio, Hikers One. I think I was 12 years old at the time. It was an improvement over my crystal set.

Yeah, I built a Boy Scout Official Crystal Radio kit as a boy. I could listen to WWVA in Wheeling, WV, ("Send in a $5 donation to receive your genuine autographed picture of Jesus Christ") and a 50,000 watt clear channel station somewhere in Mexico but with studio in the US. Thrilling days! Much later I listened live to the final on-air minutes of Radio Caroline as it sank during a storm in the English Channel.

[RollyShed]

I took an electronics course at the Army Security Agency school at Ft. Devens, MA in about 1963. The instructor held up a little metal device with three wires coming from it and said something like "This is a transistor." (putting it in the drawer of his desk.) "But don't worry about it. It's just a fad and you'll never see it in the field.

Transistors -

Pacemaker Transportable ‘58’ model NA3201-112 came out in 1958 in New Zealand. It had an RF stage so was the best available for receiving hard to get stations during the day. We had one.
https://www.nzmuseums.co.nz/collections ... na3201-112

I can't remember working on them much in 1961-68 as they were reliable. When it came to valve radios, the first thing was replace the coupling capacitor (capacitor to the grid of the audio valve) as it would be waxed paper and leaking. Next, probably, replace the audio output transformer as it would have gone open circuit which is why the radio was on your work bench.

Yes, some transistor radios needed transistors replaced. I started my apprenticeship in 1961 so knew or learned what a transistor was.

The crystal set I originally had had a crystal you "fiddled-with" to get it to work. It was replaced with a germanium one about the time I built the valve radio.

[AndyMH]

Much later I listened live to the final on-air minutes of Radio Caroline as it sank during a storm in the English Channel.

A sad day later when the government made it illegal to advertise on pirate radio, I remember listening to Radio 270 (Scarborough) go off air, then Radio London. I think Caroline continued to broadcast but too far away to receive. There was nothing for us young kids then until the BBC woke up and we got Radio One, but it wasn't the same.

[MurphCID]

Some of us remember valves (or tubes to those of you in the US). I was taught valve theory at university, the last year they did it.

I took an electronics course at the Army Security Agency school at Ft. Devens, MA in about 1963. The instructor held up a little metal device with three wires coming from it and said something like "This is a transistor." (putting it in the drawer of his desk.) "But don't worry about it. It's just a fad and you'll never see it in the field. Now today we're going to discuss how a pentode tube works."

That goes along with "No one will ever need more than 640k of ram". Also all the old defunct computer builders like Everex, Compaq, Northgate, Acorn, AST Research, Zenith Data Systems, ComputerLand, BusinessLand....

[Portreve]

That goes along with "No one will ever need more than 640k of ram". Also all the old defunct computer builders like Everex, Compaq, Northgate, Acorn, AST Research, Zenith Data Systems, ComputerLand, BusinessLand....

I remember hearing that sort of reasoning "back when" and it's the same sort of mindset that gets you "I have nothing to hide" mindlessness.

I used to shake my head at all the b***s*** that x86 users had to put up with. How many times would I send someone a sound only to learn they didn't have speakers, or that they couldn't listen to sound if they were using their modem because of IRQ conflicts? Or a hundred other stupid things.

I'll reiterate two things I have posted about before here in LMF: in 1987, Macs had 8 bit color as well as the capacity to have up to six monitors connected with a desktop spread across all of them; and when I was in high school during that time, I was doing network file sharing as well as desktop sharing (1988, 1989, 1990). How PCs could ever be argued as being superior, I'll never know.

[MurphCID]

That goes along with "No one will ever need more than 640k of ram". Also all the old defunct computer builders like Everex, Compaq, Northgate, Acorn, AST Research, Zenith Data Systems, ComputerLand, BusinessLand....

I remember hearing that sort of reasoning "back when" and it's the same sort of mindset that gets you "I have nothing to hide" mindlessness.

I used to shake my head at all the b***s*** that x86 users had to put up with. How many times would I send someone a sound only to learn they didn't have speakers, or that they couldn't listen to sound if they were using their modem because of IRQ conflicts? Or a hundred other stupid things.

I'll reiterate two things I have posted about before here in LMF: in 1987, Macs had 8 bit color as well as the capacity to have up to six monitors connected with a desktop spread across all of them; and when I was in high school during that time, I was doing network file sharing as well as desktop sharing (1988, 1989, 1990). How PCs could ever be argued as being superior, I'll never know.

PC's back in those days were pretty darn limited but it was a different mind set: PC's for business, and Mac's for play. Remember the first PC was from the button down, dark blue suit IBM, and they had a corporate mind set, Apple was developed by a couple of hippies.....

[caz]

Much later I listened live to the final on-air minutes of Radio Caroline as it sank during a storm in the English Channel.

Radio Caroline is back again. I stumbled across it about six months ago on the old AM frequency, I think it's been running again for a couple of years, and it's still on their old ship the Ross Revenge.
I remember listening to it back in the late seventies, early eighties, and some nights when the weather was stormy and the signal would grow loud, and then quiet, I used to think it was caused by the ship being high up on a wave when the signal was strong and down in a trough when the signal was weak.

They're still playing great music on there.

[fstjohn]

Radio Caroline is back again. I stumbled across it about six months ago on the old AM frequency, I think it's been running again for a couple of years, and it's still on their old ship the Ross Revenge.

They're still playing great music on there.

Now that's interesting. My days of listening to Caroline were in the mid 60's when I was in the US Army at Menwith Hill Station near Harrogate. My radio was always tuned to either Radio Caroline or Radio Luxembourg. We moved back to England in 1976, working for Burroughs Corp. and came back to the States in 1985. Of course the pirates were all gone by then so it's interesting that Caroline is back.

[AndyMH]

at Menwith Hill Station near Harrogate. My radio was always tuned to either Radio Caroline or Radio Luxembourg.

Only a few miles from me, Boston Spa, mid/late 60's, so Radio 270 would have been the pirate with the strongest signal.

[Cyberbleuet]

So many memories

My first computer, a 486 DX-2 AMD 4 meg of ram, modem 14,400 baud, video card ati mach-64, floppy 5.25 3.5, screen 14inche svga, windows 3.1, the top at the time...

Salutation!

[fstjohn]

at Menwith Hill Station near Harrogate. My radio was always tuned to either Radio Caroline or Radio Luxembourg.

Only a few miles from me, Boston Spa, mid/late 60's, so Radio 270 would have been the pirate with the strongest signal.

Ah, but you didn't have a radio like mine. I listened at work on an R-390/URR - 32 tube military radio receiver made and designed by Collins. I was in the radio maintenance department at the intercept site. We had some 90 Rhombic long wire antennas aimed at all points of the compass that we could patch into at will. Menwith Hill is still operational but now it's run by NSA and nary a vacuum tube in sight.

[AndyMH]

Yes right, a 6 transistor tranny radio. Back then they advertised the number of transistors trying to convince us more was better.

[fstjohn]

Yes right, a 6 transistor tranny radio. Back then they advertised the number of transistors trying to convince us more was better.

Yep, I remember. They used to advertise not only the number of transistors but also the number of diodes. As a boy I got a 6 transistor and 4 diode AM portable radio one year for Christmas. Used to lay in bed with the radio to my ear (no earphone) and tune carefully to see how far away I could hear a station. It worked much better than the Boy Scout crystal radio!

[Portreve]

Speaking of interesting radio stations:

YouTube:

The USA's Numbers Station Was Traced To This Secret Facility

The Mysterious and Fascinating World of 'Numbers Stations'

5 Creepiest Number Station Sounds Ever Recorded

[fstjohn]

Thought you might be interested in hearing Radio Caroline's swan song...
https://www.mixcloud.com/allan-krautwal ... -the-lady/