• Please review our updated Terms and Rules here

What is the most useless vintage computing item?

I have a Shugart 3 1/2" floppy disk drive. The drive was rare, but the actual disks for it are even rarer. I only know 1 person who has floppies for it, and they're on this forum. The other place is the Computer History Museum. Too bad I can't just cut a 5 1/4" down to size. :p
 
No, I think you have a Shugart Venture 3 1/4" disk drive. I wonder if 3.5 inch media could be modified to word (i.e. use a different hub). The envelope should be easy after that.
 
olePigeon said:
I have a Shugart 3 1/2" floppy disk drive. The drive was rare, but the actual disks for it are even rarer. I only know 1 person who has floppies for it, and they're on this forum.
Click to expand...
Hope you don't mean me (assuming you mean 3 1/4); I just gave mine away a little while ago although I think I saw one more somewhere a few days ago.
 
I've just caught up with this thread; I've been busy elsewhere. I probably have the most useless keyboard key. My first PC had a key-operated switch in the case which disabled the keyboard input. I got rid of that PC a long time ago but still have the key to unlock the keyboard. At least I think ... OH NO!! Surely I haven't lost it!!
 
My vote for most useless vintage computing peripheral in today's world would be hand scanners. There is simply no reason to ever use one; they don't do anything that a modern scanner can't do better.

For most useless vintage peripheral that was useless the year of its release? Cauzin Softstrip. If it had come out maybe 3 years earlier than it did, it would probably have done well.

Some peripherals weren't useless at launch but quickly became useless due to non-adoption and/or abandonment by the company. The msound parallel-port adapter comes to mind -- think "Covox on steroids". Had a reprogrammable DSP that could handle stereo at CD quality (made possible by feeding it ADPCM data, since raw data would be outside the bandwidth of a parallel port of the time), but only a handful of titles ever supported it. Links: The Challenge Of Golf is the only notable title that can drive it.

Some vintage peripherals that others probably find useless and stupid, but which hold a special place in my heart, are Stacker compression boards and 3.5" DSDD-to-DSHD second-hole punchers (and I supposed 5.25" notchers as well).
 
Trixter said:
My vote for most useless vintage computing peripheral in today's world would be hand scanners. There is simply no reason to ever use one; they don't do anything that a modern scanner can't do better.
Click to expand...

You're probably right about it being the most useless, but it seems to me that even that does do something useful if you wish it to. For example, a desk scanner does not fit well in one's pocket so does not work well as a portable device which can scan library codes, barcodes, long numbers, and other bits of input while one walks around a library, warehouse, or other site. Perhaps I'm stretching it, but it is indeed hard to think of something which does not have some practical use, albeit small, in some situations.

Edit: Do happy face stickers count as a "computing peripheral". if so . . .
 
Trixter said:
Some vintage peripherals that others probably find useless and stupid, but which hold a special place in my heart, are Stacker compression boards and 3.5" DSDD-to-DSHD second-hole punchers (and I supposed 5.25" notchers as well).
Click to expand...

Trixter,

I have read your page on the Stacker compression board and I have to agree with you. I think the Stacker board has finally come into its own for those of us keeping our systems original. For example my stacker board resides in my trusty XT286 w/ a 20MB Seagate MFM HDD. It is perfect for that system.
 
patscc said:
just what is the purpose of the auto-repeat function on keyboards ?
patscc
Click to expand...

Let me defend auto-repeat, at least historically. It was important to smooth transition to word-processing by millions of typists and secretaries who used that function on electric typewriters, mainly for formatting such as continuous horizontal lines and spacing. I well recall ex-typists, in the late nineties, still formatting tables by holding down the space bar - even when word-processors offered SOOOOOOO much better methods.

Programmers also used it a lot making borders for ASCII text boxes in pre-graphic programming - which takes us up to the 90s. Also legibility in source code - I still use it for lines of ************* or ______________. Better than hitting * eighty times every time you wanted a horizontal divider!

Rick
 
Ole Juul said:
For example, a desk scanner does not fit well in one's pocket so does not work well as a portable device which can scan library codes, barcodes, long numbers, and other bits of input while one walks around a library, warehouse, or other site.
Click to expand...

I would agree with you if I didn't need to strap my 5160 to my back to drive the scanner as I walk around scanning things... ;-)
 
RickNel said:
Let me defend auto-repeat, at least historically.
Click to expand...
Defending auto-repeat is like defending the use of the keyboard. As you explain, one simply can't practically use one without the repeat. I suspect that the person suggesting the uselessness is a mouse user and willing to go to a lot of complicated, and time consuming, contortions to make use of one instead of typing. I'd like to add that cut/paste, as well as any function that requires blocking, wouldn't work without the repeat either.
 
Shadow Lord said:
For example my stacker board resides in my trusty XT286 w/ a 20MB Seagate MFM HDD. It is perfect for that system.
Click to expand...

Wait what? Somebody actually bought one of those? I remember reading about them in the back of the Stacker 4.1 manual. What I do wonder is if anyone bought the Microchannel Stacker MC/16 board.
 
njroadfan said:
Wait what? Somebody actually bought one of those? I remember reading about them in the back of the Stacker 4.1 manual. What I do wonder is if anyone bought the Microchannel Stacker MC/16 board.
Click to expand...

Well I bought mine 2nd hand a couple of years ago for the princely sum of 5 usd. Of course it cost 15 to ship it from the UK... but very acceptable to me...
 
Our goodwill had something that is borderline useless. Sorta cracked me up when I saw them trying to sell the failed Radioshack Cuecat scanner lately. I suppose one could use it as a generic barcode scanner but still to charge for something that was free is sorta morally degrading.
 
Ole Juul said:
Defending auto-repeat is like defending the use of the keyboard.
Click to expand...
It can't be long before the keyboard itself is a candidate for this thread as a perfectly functional useless device considering all the other HIDs on the scene now. Touch screens, voice recognition and motion detectors are becoming so sophisticated that its days must be numbered. I suppose the touch screens will always have a QWERTY layout though. Personally, having suffered RSI from typing and laryngitis from dictating I may eventually resort to banging my head on the screen in morse code. Perhaps ultimately the most useless peripheral devices in the world of computers are us.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top