Derision wrote to Chai <=-

Me too. I actually find myself using it quite a bit. Part of my job is maintaining my company's elderly computers (the general ledger is still run on the CP/M version of dBase...!) so being able to access floppies
is still super important (though my MacBook Pro no longer supports USB floppies)

I just popped in a floppy disk into Windows 10 (latest update).
Formatting, copying, chkdsk, all still works with floppies.
I imagine Windows will one day omit the ability to work with floppies,
but it's kinda cool that it's still there. I'm honestly surprised that
they still support it, and I'm not surprised that Apple does not.

It's interesting to me that CP/M is still being used in production environments.

Blu-Rays and DVDs are also great for backing up. And while I have an
AUX port in my car, sometimes I just prefer to have a few CDs I can
throw on and not have to worry about plugging my phone into something.

My vehicle has CD, MP3 CD, and AUX. It does not have a USB port, even
though USB ports were in most aftermarket systems at the time.
I keep telling myself I need to update my audio system in my car.

In time.

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MRO wrote to Chai <=-

i'm just more practical in my old age. i dont want shit around if i'm
not using it. and cds and dvds sucked. pain in the ass to load them up
or burn to them when you can use a flash drive or a harddrive.

And flash drives is what I use mostly when working on modern systems.
But I very much have a use case for all of this stuff. Not everyone does.
It makes sense to me that many people no longer use it.

My nephew used to visit my place so he could stream Twitch on my network.
He lives in a rural area, and only has 1Mbps DSL. He had some open source program, I don't know what, that he downloaded on my PC, so he wouldn't
have to download it on his slow connection. He tried to dump it on his
phone, but for some reason his phone would not co-operate. Rather than debugging the problem, or loaning him a $10 USB drive that I may or
may not see again, I just dumped it on a a 50 cent DL optical disc and
sent him on his way. Fortunately, he still uses optical drives in his
system as well.

As for LightScribe, I haven't used that in ages. It was a great technology,

always used a sharpie.

It's certainly faster to use a Sharpie. LightScribe is just nicer looking
for those instances where you're burning a disc for someone else (and
only when appearances matter).



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Re: Retro Computing
By: Chai to Derision on Wed Nov 14 2018 03:29 pm

My vehicle has CD, MP3 CD, and AUX. It does not have a USB port, even though USB ports were in most aftermarket systems at the time.
I keep telling myself I need to update my audio system in my car.

OEM car audio/multimedia systems are usually all pretty bad. I've seen some interesting Android head units that allow you to use readily updated Android apps and hook into steering wheel controls and back up cameras.

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Re: Retro Computing
By: poindexter FORTRAN to Chai on Wed Nov 14 2018 03:15 pm

OEM car audio/multimedia systems are usually all pretty bad. I've seen

I've wondered why that is. I have a car stereo that I bought for its built-in GPS and ability to play music from a USB flash drive, and it has some quirks that bug me a bit, which I think wouldn't have been difficult for them to improve.

Nightfox

poindexter FORTRAN wrote to Chai <=-

OEM car audio/multimedia systems are usually all pretty bad. I've seen some interesting Android head units that allow you to use readily
updated Android apps and hook into steering wheel controls and back up cameras.

Fortunately, most of my purchased audio files have been through Amazon, so I'll be able to listen to all of that via voice control with the new
Amazon Echo Auto, which will be out before long. It connects to your phone
via Bluetooth, and can do things most echos can do.. Open your garage door, use skills, turn house lights on and off. It can also provide audible directions for navigation, make voice controlled phone calls (I can finally answer my phone in my car without breaking the law), play your music, etc.

As long as you have an AUX jack or Bluetooth connectivity in your stereo,
the $49 device will work with your system. It's a cheap upgrade to my otherwise crappy stereo. Although, I still would like an android based stereo. Unfortunately, I've found trying to use my phone directly with my stereo system too distracting.

Amazon Echo Auto:
https://goo.gl/7SNMt4

I'm still trying to figure out why pre-orders are by invitation only.


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Re: Retro Computing
By: Nightfox to poindexter FORTRAN on Wed Nov 14 2018 05:01 pm

I've wondered why that is. I have a car stereo that I bought for its built-in GPS and ability to play music from a USB flash drive, and it has some quirks that bug me a bit, which I think wouldn't have been difficult for them to improve.

My 2014 Prius has a interface that looks like it came out of a kids Leapfrog toy, and updates have been sparse. They just announced that Pandora would no longer work, but they couldn't figure out some way to remove the button (or didn't want to pay for it)

The map uses a DVD that's now showing its age, and updates are $160. I could get a cheap Chinese Android head unit for that price.

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Re: Retro Computing
By: poindexter FORTRAN to Nightfox on Wed Nov 14 2018 06:56 pm

didn't want to pay for it)

The map uses a DVD that's now showing its age, and updates are $160. I could get a cheap Chinese Android head unit for that price.

you can probably just download the update
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Re: Retro Computing
By: poindexter FORTRAN to Nightfox on Wed Nov 14 2018 06:56 pm

My 2014 Prius has a interface that looks like it came out of a kids Leapfrog toy, and updates have been sparse. They just announced that Pandora would no longer work, but they couldn't figure out some way to remove the button (or didn't want to pay for it)

I've never been able to get Pandora to work with my car stereo. Supposedly after connecting my phone with Bluetooth, it looks like the Pandora on my car stereo is supposed to be able to communicate with Pandora on my phone, but it has never been able to.

The map uses a DVD that's now showing its age, and updates are $160. I could get a cheap Chinese Android head unit for that price.

I've tried using the Garmin software to get updated maps for my car stereo, but the software isn't even listing any new maps available.

Nightfox

Re: Retro Computing
By: MRO to poindexter FORTRAN on Wed Nov 14 2018 10:53 pm

you can probably just download the update

There are torrents out there, and some people on eBay selling pirated versions, yes.

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Re: Retro Computing
By: Chai to Derision on Wed Nov 14 2018 15:29:00

I just popped in a floppy disk into Windows 10 (latest update).
Formatting, copying, chkdsk, all still works with floppies.
I imagine Windows will one day omit the ability to work with floppies,
but it's kinda cool that it's still there. I'm honestly surprised that
they still support it, and I'm not surprised that Apple does not.

I found it a bit annoying when macOS stopped bothering with it. I mean, they've bloated the rest of the OS to Vista levels of bloat, while still deleting useful features.

It's interesting to me that CP/M is still being used in production environments.

One of the things I was tasked with was figuring out what to do if the one computer that runs the ledger goes down, since none of the machines made today will run CP/M out of the box; and also to figure out what to do if the ancient Okidata dot matrix printer they used to print it out ever goes south. Priner was easy -- Okidata still makes them, though they're like $900. Finding a machine that'll run dBase on CP/M was a little more complicated, but amounted to running it in an emulator and getting a second-hand Commodore 128 off eBay.

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Re: Retro Computing
By: Derision to Chai on Sun Nov 18 2018 12:36 pm

I just popped in a floppy disk into Windows 10 (latest update).
Formatting, copying, chkdsk, all still works with floppies.
I imagine Windows will one day omit the ability to work with floppies,
but it's kinda cool that it's still there. I'm honestly surprised
that they still support it, and I'm not surprised that Apple does not.

I found it a bit annoying when macOS stopped bothering with it. I mean, they've bloated the rest of the OS to Vista levels of bloat, while still deleting useful features.

Yeah, I thought it was somewhat odd (but not surprising) when Apple stopped including optical drives in their Macs. I also thought it was odd that Apple never included blu-ray drives in their Macs though - as far as I know, they only had DVD drives.

Nightfox

Re: Retro Computing
By: Nightfox to Derision on Mon Nov 19 2018 10:13:47

Yeah, I thought it was somewhat odd (but not surprising) when Apple stopped including optical drives in their Macs. I also thought it was odd that Apple never included blu-ray drives in their Macs though - as far as I know, they only had DVD drives.

From what I understand of it, it was mostly the licensing nightmare of having a built-in method for playing Blu-Ray movies that turned them off. Jobs referred to it as a "world of hurt" or something, and focused instead on digital content, downloading or streaming movies rather than physical media.

macOS itself has the drivers to access and burn blu-ray. I had an external USB bluray that worked fine with it, and later replaced the original DVD-RW with a blu-ray burner which I use sparsely enough that I'm considering replacing it with a second hard drive. And there are some third-party apps that let you watch media on blu-ray discs, but all of those apps cost way more than something like VLC, which'll let you watch almost anything for free.

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Re: Retro Computing
By: Derision to Nightfox on Mon Nov 19 2018 03:01 pm

third-party apps that let you watch media on blu-ray discs, but all of those apps cost way more than something like VLC, which'll let you watch almost anything for free.

I've tried using VLC (on Windows) to watch blu-ray discs, but I seem to recall VLC was unable to play blu-ray.

Nightfox

Re: Retro Computing
By: Nightfox to Derision on Mon Nov 19 2018 15:57:39

I've tried using VLC (on Windows) to watch blu-ray discs, but I seem to recall VLC was unable to play blu-ray.

Right... in order to play Blu-ray you need libraries to decode AACS, and I also think you need to have a key database for region, copyright, whatever. Even then, it'll only play discs for which it has the library and AACS keys. A lot of those just aren't available without shelling out bucks for licenses.

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