We Used to Be Obsessed With These 25 Now Obsolete Gadgets

Stereo 8 was the official name, but most people, if they still remember it, know it as the 8-track tape. This is what millions of Americans used in the 1970s to listen to music on the go. Then the cassette tape took over, and by the 1990s the 8-track tape was pretty much an antique.

Before cable internet and WiFi Americans used their analog telephones to connect to the internet. After dialing a number, the computer would use the modem, short for modulator-demodulator, to send and receive information to another computer. The downside was that the connection was often slow and often breaking/interrupted. Additionally, the phone could not be used at the same time to make regular calls.

The Wang calculator revolutionized electronic calculators. Invented in the early 1960s, and resembling mini-computers, they made it possible for people to do complicated math, including square root and raising numbers to power.

Remember when rewinding and fast-forwarding took longer than an instant? Walkman players, which played cassette tapes, were the it thing in portable music, selling 400 million devices, way before the iPod. When kids today tried to use a Walkman, they couldn’t handle it and found it difficult to operate.

Sony was the first company to mass-produce portable televisions, called the Sony Watchman. They were never as big of a hit as, say, the Walkman, because of their limited number of channels. They were used in the 1960s and 1970s.

Before cell phones, people used pagers, also called “beepers,” when they needed to reach someone right away. The paging system forwarded incoming calls or emails to the pager in the form of a number to call or text message. Pagers remain one of the most reliable forms of communication available, and some doctors still use them. There is no delay in delivery, the network doesn’t get overloaded, and there are no dead zones.

The discman, or portable CD player, was for those who liked to listen to music on the go. Portable CD players were first invented in 1984 by Sony, and they took off in the mid-1990s. Compared to what’s available today, Discman players were too limited because they could only play one CD at a time and required carrying more CDs for more music variety.

Floppy disk drives were around way before the cloud, thumb drives, and other portable memory devices. Now basically an antique, it was popular in the 1980s and 1990s. As is the case with most personal computing devices, the memory has increased with time. In 1991, for example, floppy disks could hold up to 2.8 MB — enough for the simple text files of the time, but today barely enough for one or two photo attachments.

You may know the gramophone by another name — the phonograph. Created in 1877, this was Thomas Edison’s favorite invention. It was the first kind of recording and playback device. Edison used tinfoil-coated cylinders to record sound. The gramophone was replaced a century later by the much lighter record player.

The Video Home System, or VHS, was an invaluable part of every household’s living room when people realized they could finally record video. VHS could record up to six hours and users could fast-forward and rewind — unheard of features until then. The first home video recorder came out in 1965. The Sony VCR used a reel-to-reel format and could record only in black and white.

What is known as the first practical typewriter was invented in the second half of the 19th century. The writing speed using a typewriter was much faster than using a pen. The first typewriters for mass sale were put on the market in 1874. Nowadays, people just type on their computers or dictate text into their phones. In a few decades, the need for typing in general may disappear as voice-to-text becomes even more widespread.

Believe it or not, there was a time when you had to wait all night to back up whatever information you had on your computer. The tape drive was a data storage device that stores data on a magnetic tape, and the operation took what today’s generation would consider forever. You had to always start from the beginning and roll down until you’d find the file you wanted.

The Simon was the first smartphone. It was invented in 1992, long before people even started using the term “smartphone.” It was the world’s first touchscreen phone, the iPhone would come out 15 years later, in 2007. Simon became available for sale in 1994. Yes, it could send emails. It was the beginning of modern-day super smart gadgets.

Even though it was big, heavy, and required frequent replacement of batteries, the boombox was a popular all-in-one music device. If you have seen music videos from the 1980s, you’ve probably seen people walking around with a boombox listening to music. You can still buy this kind of music player, but today they are much smaller and cheaper.

Invented in 1993, DVD players actually outsold video recorders for the first time in 2002. They became obsolete when online streaming took over. Though DVD and Blu-ray players are still available in stores, the technology is fast becoming obsolete — especially as millennials and Gen Zs are becoming the main consumer market.

The first audio cassette, most commonly known as the tape, came out in 1963 — and for the first time anyone, not just sound engineers, could make recordings. Cassette tapes, though certainly not as popular as during their heyday in the last century, are not dead. For nostalgic or artistic reasons, some people prefer them over downloads.

Before there were apps to remind us of tasks and help manage our days — as well as apps to organize all other apps we have downloaded on our phones — there were personal digital assistants (PDAs). These devices had it all — WiFi, pen-based keyboards, and even voice recognition. They could even send a fax. In the 2010s as smartphones, which were smaller and lighter, became more powerful, they became obsolete.

In the age of flat-screen TVs that seem to be getting thinner, wider, and smarter with every update, it’s hard to imagine that once televisions were just CRT (Cathode Ray Tubes) monitors. In the 1960s, almost every American household had a CRT TV. Sony stopped making them in Japan in 2004 and everywhere else by 2008. Today, the best place to see a CRT TV is in a museum or video game tournament.

The Advanced Research Projects Agency Network, invented in 1969, was an experimental computer network with a cost of $25 million. Some people would call it the very beginning of the internet. Funded by the Department of Defense, its purpose was to connect computers at research facilities funded by the Pentagon. ARPANET hasn’t been in use since 1982.

Invented by Sony in 1975, Betamax was a heavy analog machine that could record audio for up to an hour. Betamax and VHS competed for a share of the recording market in the 1980s. Sony announced it would stop producing Betamax tapes relatively recently, in 2016, even though the format has not been popular since the VHS format was invented and took over the market.

Timepieces have been around quite a long time but for the past few decades, people have been trying to make the watch more than just a watch. Before it was a phone, it was a calculator in the 1980s. It was a very popular device among tech-savvy people. Even Marty McFly from “Back to the Future” wore one.

Created with the intention of selling movies at a cheap price for people to watch at home, LaserDisc Players, or DiscoVision as it was named in 1978, were used by people who had the money until the DVD was created. It was an optical disc with a 12” diameter that contained analog audio and video.

Until the digital recording format came along, sound professionals used reel-to-reel tapes. Audio was recorded on a magnetic tape held on a reel. There may be a revival in the works for both quality and nostalgic reasons. A German company introduced a new reel-to-reel tape machine, but it costs about $12,000.

People used transistor radios to listen to music and the radio on the go and you could see them everywhere in the 1970s. As Steve Wozniak, the co-founder of Apple, had once said: “My first transistor radio… I loved what it could do, it brought me music, it opened my world up.”

The forerunner to fax machines, the telegraph was the first device of its kind that made long-distance communication possible. It worked by transmitting electrical signals over a wire stretched between stations. The telegraph was the foundation of later communication inventions such as the telephone and even the internet.