The seller said the CD player and cassette deck powered on, but hadn't been tested, and the receiver didn't power on. I offered $40 and he accepted. I figured if either the CD player or tape deck worked, it'd be worth it.

After bringing them home, I confirmed the receiver is dead. And neither of the players in the tape deck work.

The CD player works great. It's a model PD-5700, a couple years older than my other Pioneer CD player PD-102. They look similar, but have different button layouts. I will use both players for my Twitch stream. Now I can alternate between them and even do some radio-style DJ sets with them if I want to, playing specific tracks from CDs in my collection.

I was really hoping the tape deck would work, as the single cassette Sony player I'm using only sounds good playing tapes in the reverse direction. I have another deck in my closet that works and sounds ok, but it has a bit of interference noise that bugs me. It's also silver and doesn't fit with the style of the other equipment, which is black.

I don't know enough about electronics to attempt repairs myself, so I found a local electronics repair place. Their website says they repair audio equipment and consumer electronics, so I'm going to contact them and see if they will even look at these old systems. If so, and I feel their rates are fair, I might take a chance and see if they can get the tape deck and receiver working again. It'd be a shame to scrap them.

Mostly, I just hoped to have some redundancy in place if any part of my current HiFi stack failed. It's getting harder and harder to find good quality vintage HiFi components for cheap.

Discuss...

#100DaysToOffload (No. 109) #music #retro #nostalgia #hobbies #physicalMedia

Sometimes, when we were in the mood to watch a tape, one of us would stand or sit in front of the VHS shelves and read off titles until there was a consensus among everyone present on something to watch.

Every so often we'd go to a video rental store like Blockbuster or Hollywood Video and bring home a few movies to watch – that was always a treat.

For a while, we lived in a house with a neighbor who had the biggest VHS collection I've ever seen. They gladly lent out tapes to their neighbors – they even had a sign-out sheet and log to keep track of who had checked out which tapes.

I still have a VCR and a very small VHS collection which includes just a few of the tapes from my family's old collection. I even have a tape rewinder. Occasionally I'll bring home a tape from the thrift store to add to my collection.

The picture and sound quality of VHS tapes can't compare to DVDs, of course. But it's not about the quality, it's about the nostalgia. It's about the intentional experience of watching a movie on physical media. It's about the memories, the feelings of peace, comfort, and safety I had in my youth watching movies at home my family.

As convenient as it is today to watch video on-demand, I miss those days when we were limited to watching what being broadcast over the airwaves and what was in the collections of family and friends and video rental stores – and we were happy all the same.

Discuss...

#100DaysToOffload (No. 103) #nostalgia #TV #movies #retro

I recently wrote about the first smartphone I ever owned and the first cell phone I ever used. But the first cell phone I ever owned was a Motorola V60 flip phone.

It was early 2003 and I had just returned home to the United States after serving a full-time mission for two years in Brazil. My mother took me to the Alltel store to pick out a phone and add me to the family service plan.

I knew I wanted the V60 when I saw it. Sleek, metal finish. Replaceable battery (of course they all were back then). Extendable antenna. It even came with a belt holster clip and you better believe I used it (I miss holsters and phones small enough to fit holsters). It was a great little phone. Solid and dependable.

And my favorite feature? Programmable ring tones. You could use the settings to create your own ringtones note for note. I had the Star Trek and Star Wars themes, of course. I know I had several other fun tunes but can't remember specifics. Probably popular songs of the time.

And don't forget that satisfying sound and feeling when you closed it after a call. CLOMP.

Discuss...

#100DaysToOffload (No. 88) #tech #retro #nostalgia

Topics of Focus

#faith – thoughts related to my religion #tech – self explanatory

Other Topics

#100DaysToOffload #accessories #AI #automobiles #Bandcamp #books #business #cassette #charity #Christianity #Christmas #ChurchOfJesusChrist #climate #community #compactDisc #contention #COVID19 #decentralization #DigitalMinimalism #economy #electronicMusic #EveryDayCarry #eWaste #family #FOSS (free-as-in-freedom and open source software) #friends #gratitude #haiku #health #hobbies #HomeOffice #humor #intentionism #internet #laptop #LessConvenient #libraryMusic #life #Linux #loneliness #media #meditation #mentalHealth #misc #movies #music #news #nostalgia #physicalMedia #planning #poetry #politics #privacy #prophets #retro #smartphones #SocialMedia #synthwave #travel #TV #Twitch #unity (not the game engine) #Utah #vaporwave #writing