I don’t mean BETTER. That’s a different conversation. I mean cooler.

An old CRT display was literally a small scale particle accelerator, firing angry electron beams at light speed towards the viewers, bent by an electromagnet that alternates at an ultra high frequency, stopped by a rounded rectangle of glowing phosphors.

If a CRT goes bad it can actually make people sick.

That’s just. Conceptually a lot COOLER than a modern LED panel, which really is just a bajillion very tiny lightbulbs.

  • @[email protected]
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    41 month ago

    Great post! I was thinking about it the other day. I have a Citizen wrist watch from the 60s from my grandfather. It looks like new and functions well (mainly because of its self-winding mechanism). I also have a high-end Garmin watch, which from my personal experience lasts about 2 years, so I decided to start treating modern watches like the junk they are: get the cheapest possible that still has the features I want, because I’d be replacing it in two years’ time anyway.

    I also have an old mechanical typewriter. The drum doesn’t move on the A key, so I’m used to hit the space bar whenever I type an “a”. It moves the drum slightly more, which is something I always notice when I read pages typed on other typewriters. And don’t get me started on the font. No computer can recreate the idiosyncrasies of a good typewriter.

    Damn, now I got all nostalgic again. If you excuse me, I’ll be in the attic, hammering away on my Consul…