Retrojab

After a long while, I'm back with a new review. And this is not just a review... It's the review of the piece of technology I love the most from my entire collection, which also happens to be the oldest one I have. It's the Telefunken Magnetophon 302TS portable reel to reel recorder from 1968. And oh my God, it's simply mindblowing in every way. It uses 13 cm  (5 inch) magnetic reels to record and play audio. You can set the speed at 4.7 cm/s for longer playback but less quality or 9.5 cm/s for higher quality. It can play stereo reels, but won't record in stereo. It also has two buttons for selecting between left and right track. (or both) People consider reel to reel tape recorders to be the highest quality option for listening to music. Mostly because of the analog nature of the recording method, and the ridiculous speeds at which the tape moves in some higher end Recorders. Of course, you could consider this a high end recorder. It depe...

Hello everyone, I'm not dead yet,but my phone's USB C port is. That's why I'm kinda taking a break from this blog, or at least making less posts, until my port gets fixed, because it's really hard to transfer photos. Meanwhile, I have been paying around with some old phones. I inserted my sim in a 2010 Nokia 6600i Slide, which I tried to connect to the internet using bluetooth, but that didn't work. I have also ordered a new battery for my 2004 Samsung V200 flip phone, which has an "Exciting digital camera". Probably the biggest news though, I ordered an original Nokia 3310 from 2000. The legendary unbreakable phone itself. I also tried charging my 2002 Nokia 3410 using some USB cable that had the right jack, although that didn't work. Hope when I'll receive my 3310 the charger will also be compatible with this one. It probably will. I also cleaned it on the insides. Hope I'll get my port fixed to be able to make more...

Hello there! I'm still alive, but I've been extremely busy and I ran into some problems. In the past few days, I started building the Saracia. It's almost finished now. We found an old computer in an attic, and we decided to use the case of that computer because it looked very cool. No cardboard after all😔 Meanwhile, my sony Mavica camera arrived. Not the one I ordered, an inferior model instead, but still absolutely awesome. I took some pictures yesterday with it. If I forgot to mention what's special about this camera, it's that it stores pictures on foppy disks. Also, I fried the USB C port on my phone, so I'm making this post directly on it, because I don't have any efficient way of transferring photos to my computer. So sorry if this post looks weird. I did bother to transfer some pictures taken with the mavica trough email. This is what they look like on "Fine" quality: Also, ...

Well, hello there, everybody.  Today is a big day.  Me and one of my best friends, Mihai (also my neighbor) are announcing our first PC build, the Saracia.  The Saracia will be a computer, designed to be able to run some mid-range games, but mostly low-end ones. (hopefully it will exceed our expectations) Our checklist for this project was the following: -It is supposed to be able to run DOS games. -Have a floppy drive. (3.5") -Run modern games. (Like Starbound, or Don't Starve Together) -Have access to the internet. -4K resolution video. -DVD drive. -Horizontal desktop case. -Legacy ports (like Serial, and PS/2) And most importantly, The case must be made out of cardboard . Yep, you heard that right. This computer sounds crazy and stupid. This is mostly an experiment. It's total price is about 550 lei, which is extremely cheap for a computer. Now, let's see the main specs: The motherboard will be an Acer MG43M. 4 GB of DDR3 RAM. 500 G...

Floppy disks. They're ancient, yet easily recognizable by their modern form: The save icon. Well, well... Floppy disks are the most nostalgic aspect of old tech for many people around the world. Some say they're junk, some say they're absolutely awesome. I'm with the latter group. Floppy disks, also called diskettes, are really similar to cassettes, or even modern hard drives: They're a magnetic storage medium. While cassettes are used to store analog signals, designed to store audio (or video), floppies are used to store digital data, which is readable by a floppy drive in a computer. Tapes are designed to be played from the beginning to the end, which is why they're magnetic material is stored on a reel, and the tape head constantly reads the signal while the material is moving at a constant speed. Floppies, however, are supposed to be able to access data randomly, because a user requires instant access to a file stored anywhere on the floppy. Th...

Hello everyone! Today's review is about my new (24 year old) laptop form Zenith Data Systems! This laptop truly is a technical wonder of the 20th century! In its small (but very thick) form factor, it packs: -A removable Intel 486SL 75mhz CPU. -12 megabytes of ram. (only 4, originally, mine was upgraded when I got it) -A very crisp and clear 640x480 LCD TFT display, with a brightness slider. -A 1800mah battery. (mine is dead, after so many years) -A standard 1.44 megabytes 3.5" floppy drive. -A trackball. -A membrane keyboard with some very interesting function keys. (pretty small, but ok) -A 524 MB hard drive. When I first opened its box, and I plugged it in, it didn't turn on. In fact, it doesn't turn on at the writing of this post either. Its power brick only works when it wants to, apparently. But fortunately, It worked long enough for me to install MS-DOS and windows 3.1 When I booted it up for the first time, after it prompted me to e...