Dedicated, Retro Devices

[MintyTheCat]

Hello all,

I thought that I'd bring this to your attention as many of us are a 'bit retro' in these parts

https://www.bbc.com/news/business-55808632

I still use a Palm PDA, an ancient MP3 Player that's well over 12 years old and very old Synthesisers - why: because they work well, effectively, consume little power and are reliable.

I have done my absolute best not use PC based music software, preferring only to use the atari and the amiga and only use the Mac to record tracks with.
I like older Synths with hardware interfaces, in fact, the initial reason I began using an atari STE was to allow me to program the yamaha DX7 Synth

Still use dedicated gaming consoles over PCs and what not....it's just annoying to have to fiddle around with a PC and it's not much fun.

I like simple, effective machines

[TransatlanticFoe]

Ha! I still use a Creative Zen for portable music, though it's not getting any use in lockdown. Always found it strange to not have dedicated devices - the battery on smartphones struggle enough without playing music on them too! The Zen gets 20+ hours out of a single charge. Taking the time through lockdown to make sure I have all my CDs ripped and at a higher bitrate than present (storage space no longer an issue), will probably eventually upgrade the old Zen to a Walkman capable of holding all my music.

Although from that article... when I see Psion I don't think of their old PDAs, I think of Horace Goes Skiing on the ZX Spectrum!

[Sengoku Strider]

If I could, I'd still be using my Blackberry 10 smartphone. That was and is the OS with the best interface I've ever used, it was seriously underappreciated. It still functions as a music player for me.

[trap15]

I'll never be without an iPod 5G, it's just too good. Saves storage and power on my phone, lasts an absolute eternity on a charge, great sound quality, nice feel.

[FinalBaton]

'70s tube guitar amp
'80s turntable
'70s imtegrated amp
'70s speakers
'80s cassette deck and Walkman
plentu of old vinyls from '60s and up, cassettes from '70s and up.and CDs from '80s and up.
Crt tv in my living room and one in office room
multiple retro consoles and carts and CDs

yeah vintage is fine.

an interesting one is that I use an early 2000s Boss mini-portable recorder for recording my riffs, when I have a USB interfce I could use with a PC and pull up a DAW and amp sims. But the Boss porta recorder is so simple and quick, I love using that.

sadly I don't think I'll fall down the rabbit hole of vintage synth. a midi controller and Virtual instrument pluggins will do.

[MintyTheCat]

Ha! I still use a Creative Zen for portable music, though it's not getting any use in lockdown. Always found it strange to not have dedicated devices - the battery on smartphones struggle enough without playing music on them too! The Zen gets 20+ hours out of a single charge. Taking the time through lockdown to make sure I have all my CDs ripped and at a higher bitrate than present (storage space no longer an issue), will probably eventually upgrade the old Zen to a Walkman capable of holding all my music.

Although from that article... when I see Psion I don't think of their old PDAs, I think of Horace Goes Skiing on the ZX Spectrum!

MAte of mien still uses a Zen for music - he tells me that the battery life is pretty decent.

Ah, you shoudl look at the very early Palm PDAs - very minimalist they were The Tungsten TX was space-age when I got it

[MintyTheCat]

'70s tube guitar amp
'80s turntable
'70s imtegrated amp
'70s speakers
'80s cassette deck and Walkman
plentu of old vinyls from '60s and up, cassettes from '70s and up.and CDs from '80s and up.
Crt tv in my living room and one in office room
multiple retro consoles and carts and CDs

yeah vintage is fine.

an interesting one is that I use an early 2000s Boss mini-portable recorder for recording my riffs, when I have a USB interfce I could use with a PC and pull up a DAW and amp sims. But the Boss porta recorder is so simple and quick, I love using that.

sadly I don't think I'll fall down the rabbit hole of vintage synth. a midi controller and Virtual instrument pluggins will do.

Not too far from my own 'situation'

I cannot be arsed to faff around with DAWs just to do anything - it gets in the way I find.
I use a very old Mac G5 for recording at this time as it's pretty sturdy and easy to fix - and I only use it to actually record. I can foresee me using hardware sequencers in the not too distant future.

I do agree though: you can spend way too much on audio gear: I set myself limits on what I use: 4 Synths, a few modules and usually only one Synth at a time. Mind you, using a hardware sampler makes life a lot easier. I shall get an older akai to the one I have now as it's dead easy to use, store what you need and use quickly, I find.

Keep it hard, folks

[Specineff]

I still use several MiniDisc and Hi-MiniDisc players with my Etymotic ER-4P Micro Pro. The EH-50, RH1 and NH900's digital amp really bring all my music to life. Yes, ATRAC is an inferior codec, but that's also why those machines can play .wav files, and mp3 in case of the RH1.