Asklemmy

Does a "Red October" piano count?

Got an Alphasmart Neo, it's basically a keyboard with a big enough unlit screen with a printer port and computer port. The original Neo model was made around in 2004-2006 and was made by Apple employees with education and disability in mind.

For the longest time I wrote on laptops and tablets but the fragility, battery power and eye fatigue made them not as suitable for continuous writing. I had the money and saw others talk about the Alphasmart devices as being the best writing tool, so I got it.

It's been 2 1/2 years and the batteries I put in are at 60-56%. The device takes 3 aa for power and a coin cell (like for weight scales) for the memory. I can spend the odd multi-hour writing sessions without ever worrying about the device dying from lack of power. And it takes a lot of writing to get the aa batteries to run down a few percentages.

Features:

• Nearly indestructible exterior
• Turning it on/off and navigating between menus and screens takes seconds
• 8 file (tabs) buttons to keep 8 projects open at a time
• Each file autosaves and can save the projects into named files to keep it in the memory
• All or individual files allow for password protection
• Just words on the screen
• Has find, replace, word count, file storage %, wpm, dictionary, thesaurus and calculator
• Uses basic keyboard commands for text (Mac or windows keystrokes)
• Detects sections in the file by how many blank lines are inbetween (1-9 blanks and is set up by the user for how many blanks count as a section break)
• Change font sizes and 'mod' for custom fonts and set screen contrast
• Stop accidentally turning the device on by setting on to Enter + On
• Allows other keyboard layouts (QWERTY, Dvorak, right/left hand for disabled users) and special characters
• slow and sticky keys
• Allows Spanish writing and dictionary somehow

Most of the features I dont use but they are nice to have. The biggest plus is that it is not tied down to proprietary software or cables. It uses a printer cable (I have a regular one and a c-cable one for my phone/tablet) and all I need to do is select a file button, plug it in, get a blank document ready and hit the send button so it types everything out as a keyboard emulation. It is faster to get files with software but it is not a requirement.

Best device I spent my money on.

haven't checked it in 4 or 5 years but I think my Mac Plus still works.

My clock radio.

Got my game cube still rocking with valid saves still on the memory cards. Brought back quite a few memories when i found it in the basement, lol

Mine’s the 390t with 256mb of storage. So it’s one of the ones that’s triangle in shape with a real smal lcd screen and takes a single AA battery. Suuuuper simple to just plug in with mini USB and drag and drop mp3s over.

Technically my doorbell, it's older than me.

Microwave from the 90's sometime. Still in daily use and shows no signs of stopping.

1986 IBM model M keyboard. Still works clacking great.

A Galaxy S5690 Xcover phone from 2011 as reserve phone, software modded to be nice and fast. Not ancient, but as a reminder of what you could do with 200MB RAM (300MB is reserved for system) and 150MB internal storage. Btw, standby time is measured in semesters.

My dad is farmer, he has a water pump from 1971 still in use.

A singer 29k53 treadle sewing machine from the 1930s. Nearly identical to this one:

It was originally made for sewing leather shoes and boots -- hence the boot shaped tray. I use it for heavy duty sewing and leather working.

I considered adding a motor, but the hand wheel and treadle give a massive amount of control. On repairs I can usually put each stitch through the existing holes in the material without the machine getting away from me.

A 1960s electric meat slicer. Use it every Thanskgiving. That thing is built like a tank and a probable fire hazard.

More recent would be a 720p Samsung TV hooked up to an AppleTV HD we still use in our Master bedroom, mostly for classic movies on TCM. We’ve had it for 15 years and she’s still kicking.