Obscure Technology

The IBM 5150, the pinnacle of Moore’s law. The IBM 5150 is one of the first computers that really brought the keyboard and processor to the home. It revolutionized the market and help set the standards that other computer of the past and even now follow. It is hard to believe that a decade before computers were the size of a bedroom room, needing to be cooled with an air conditioner and run by a group of 20 men to being able to sit on top of a desk with double the processing power. The IBM 5150 was released on August 12, 1981 with relatively positive views. It was the first for the major computer company because they mostly dominated the office space, but began to be interested in the home market as IBM saw the growth of consumer pc. There was 40,000 IBM 5150 pc order on the day of the announcement and the numbers grew. This was a major blow towards IBM new competitors Apple and Atari and other smaller companies as IBM would also take over the new personal market as well as the o

Betamax, the official device of  “is that a VHS?” question. The Betamax format is one of the earliest form of box office movies in the home. It was introduced in the United States by Sony in 1975, two years before JVC’s iconic VHS format. The “superior” Betamax always lagged behind VHS in terms of sales until Sony threw the towel in 1988. Yet there is not much of a difference between these two formats that would put one with a larger advantage than the other. The Betamax format is almost impossible to tell without mentioning the so called “Format Wars” that was between VHS and Betamax. It consisted, as you may have guessed, of the two format duking it out for dominance in the living room. What further helped encourage this was the backing of retail stores, manufacturers, etc picking sides to see who would win and become the default format people would use, I am sure you already know who won. What ultimately came down to that lead VHS to win was cost. JVC would allow other companie

Eight-track, the official device of avoiding potholes and bumps while driving to prevent your jam from becoming interrupted by distortion and static. Eight-tracks once dominated in the car and home market, up to them even being used in radios stations for jiggles and such, now remain a distant memory which only a few would recollect. What did happen to the mighty eight-track and why did it vanish for popularity as fast as it came in? Before we can answer that here is some quick history. Although tape media existed as early as the 1940s, in the way of reel-to-reel, it failed to capture the casual market as the machines were expensive and a lot more complicated than vinyl records. It was not until 1964 Bill Lear of Lear Jet Corporation and other corporations like Ford Motor Company, GM, and Motorola helped to develop the 8-track. The reason for the backing of motor companies for 8-tracks is because the desire to get high quality audio removable media in cars, as FM radio