Ask any kid who grew up in the 80s who the best member of G.I. Joe was, and they’ll unequivocally say Snake Eyes. Not that goody-two-shoes Duke, not that crazy drunken pirate Shipwreck, not even the Tae Kwon Do-master Quick Kick. More »
For anyone raised on the retro-futurist notion of flying cars, this literal-minded, nuts-and-bolts incarnation should make for some incredulous swooning. Looking much like a 1950’s interpretation of a subcompact that wandered into the wrong alleyway and wound up in a Wright Brothers-sponsored chopshop, the Taylor AEROCAR — one of five made — is a very real vestige of American auto engineering’s past and, more importantly, it’s up for grabs. At $1.25 million, this relic of a bygone era’s mainly an exorbitant lure for the deep-pocketed collector, but as a rare curiosity, it’s free for all to gawk. It’s a hybrid in the truest sense, melding a cozy two-seater with front wheel drive, a Lycoming O-320 4-cylinder engine and a wingspan of 30 feet, all conspiring to get it off the ground at 55mph and up to a cruising speed of 100mph. Should you want to merely take it for a test spin out on the open road and not accidentally take flight, rest assured, those mighty wings can be folded out of the way with relative ease. But that’s not why you’d want to part ways with a cool chunk of cash, if you’re so inclined. This bit of memorabilia’s a make-good for all those broken, scifi promises from once upon a TV time. This was the future — as ridiculous as it may seem.
Filed under: Transportation
For sale by owner: 1954 flying Taylor AEROCAR, yours now for only $1.25 million (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 11 Jul 2012 16:22:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Do you love 80s computer tech? Well then you’ll love Ben Heck’s BBC Micro-inspired Raspberry Pi keyboard computer. He managed to put the $35 DIY Raspberry Pi computer into a nice keyboard that definitely has some retro style.
Ben Heck thinks that the possibilities with the diminutive Raspberry Pi are endless. His keyboard computer features a vintage enclosure, cartridge slots and an add-on experimenter kit. The keyboard has a lot of wood in it, which comes as no surprise. The retro keyboard computer opens up like a desk drawer when the keyboard is lifted up. It’s possible to add an on/off switch, Ethernet connectivity, video/audio composite, DC 5V input and a USB hub. C++ programming was implemented to run tests via the experimentation kit.
He hopes that this mod will inspire kids to start coding again like many of us did back in the day. You can check out his mod over at The Ben Heck Show.
[via Ubergizmo]
Are you interested in becoming a videogame collector? What if I told you that you could become one of the top collectors with just a single purchase? I’m not talking about one rare game or console. I’m talking about 22 complete sets of rare games and consoles. And then some.
eBay seller collectors_king is currently auctioning off the sets as a bulk purchase. It includes complete collections of past games and hardware from Nintendo (Famicom, Super Famicom, Virtual Boy, N64, DD 64 and Gamecube), Sega (Master System, Mega Drive, Game Gear, 32X, Mega CD, Saturn and Dreamcast), PC Engine and the Pioneer Laseractive, a system only collectors could love.
Bidding for this set of sets starts at €999,999.99 (~$1.2M USD) on eBay. You can also inquire about buying just one of the complete sets, which technically still makes you an accomplished collector. As gameSniped noted, this is mainly a publicity stunt by collectors_king to attract people to his store, but I wouldn’t be surprised if someone actually buys it. Stranger things have happened.
[via gameSniped]
If you’re a disgruntled clone trooper and you’re just sick of fighting other people’s battles for The Empire, why not quit and get a new job as a photography model. Actually, these photos were created by a Canadian art teacher using Star Wars figurines (and he didn’t use Photoshop!)
These images are part of David Eger’s 365 Days of Clones. He started this project as part of a New Year’s resolution, and I have to say that it’s pretty cool. I’ve never seen clones do so many interesting things before. Usually, they’re just slumming it for The Empire. Each photograph was taken on the anniversary of the original work. He even recreated paintings, like Pablo Picasso’s Guernica and Leonardo Da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man.
You can check out all of his photographs on his dedicated site, 365 Days of Clones.
And here’s a bonus image that has nothing to do with clone troopers, but it’s awesome anyhow.
[via designboom]
In Insert Coin, we look at an exciting new tech project that requires funding before it can hit production. If you’d like to pitch a project, please send us a tip with “Insert Coin” as the subject line.
With its GameDock, Cascadia Games has a new twist on iOS arcade play — it lets you use your TV and two classic controllers. While retro games are popular on iPhones right now, an intense session can go haywire if your digits start slippping around on the screen, and head-to-head play is literally that if you’re sharing a small device with a foe. That aforementioned situation inspired the GameDock, which turns into a full-blown console when you plug in and pair your iPhone, iPad or iPod using Bluetooth, then connect your TV, along with a couple of USB game controllers. Just like that, you and a buddy are playing big-screen Asteroids, Centipede and 100 or so other iOS games that work with iCade. With 43 days remaining, just shy of 10 grand has been offered toward the $50K goal, so check the source if you want to revel in the gaming days of yore — eye or thumb strain-free.
Insert Coin: GameDock lets your iPhone interface with a TV and controllers, game it old school originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 04 Jul 2012 16:57:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
A StarTAC saved my life. Well, not really. I wasn’t accidentally transported to the World War II trenches, and saved from a bullet to the heart by an artfully placed Motorola in my jacket pocket. But the StarTAC – a phone dating back to 1996, and in fact the very first cellphone I owned – gave me a very necessary wake-up call: it showed me just how lucky we are with today’s smartphones, with a serving of delicious nostalgia on the side.
Enough of any treat and you’d get inured to its charms. People working in chocolate factories – many a kid’s fantasy job – often find the sweet stuff loses its appeal after a while; I guess the same is probably true for pilots, that initial enthusiasm at take-off getting watered down as what once was special gradually becomes routine. I’m sad to say it can be the same with new gadgets.
Don’t get me wrong, I still get excited about new technology (and yes, this is the definition of a #FirstWorldProblem, and yes I’m hugely grateful for the job I have), but that tightness-in-the-chest feeling when you’re opening something you’re truly excited about isn’t quite there when you’re dealing with review samples. Just as there’s really no such thing as an “awful” smartphone today, the proliferation of Android on broadly identical hardware leaves you picking through the minutiae to find whatever differentiators you can. In the process, it’s all too easy to forget quite how amazing these computers-that-fit-in-your-pocket really are.
I tried to recapture the lost innocence of the StarTAC, not with my original phone – I accidentally sat on that and snapped it many years ago – but with a slightly newer version. The StarTAC 85 I had as a teenager used a full-sized SIM card, basically accommodating a credit-card scale slice of plastic into a huge slot on the underside, whereas the StarTAC 130 sensibly switched to the miniSIM we’re familiar with now (and which has, of course, been supplanted by the microSIM in the iPhone and other handsets, itself soon to be replaced by the nanoSIM) and meant I could take the chip out of my current smartphone and drop it straight in.
“Forget about a browser, you don’t even get a calculator”
For a while, a felt sixteen again. Or, if not quite sixteen, then certainly retro in a not-entirely-hipster way. The aged Motorola demands some compromises of its owners; in fact, even cheap feature-phone users will find themselves missing features they previously took for granted. While modern phones are offering pentaband 3G and LTE, the 1998 StarTAC 130 makes do with a single GSM 900 band. Forget about a browser, or even WAP access; you don’t even get a calculator. There’s a clock, but not an alarm, and you’d better get used to thumbing out SMS messages (MMS? Forget about it) multi-tap style, as T9 predictive text didn’t arrive until later. In fact, Motorola avoided T9 in its phones altogether, pushing its own (awful) iTap rival instead.
And yet… there’s still something deliciously ridiculous about pulling out an extending antenna when you answer a call. You’ve not ended an argument with a loved one if you haven’t angrily snapped shut a clamshell phone when the vitriol gets too much. The StarTAC’s shell may have been skinny when it first launched, but in modern terms it can accommodate an earpiece with some serious lungs on it; similarly, call reception was great (probably irradiating my head nicely in the process).
If using the StarTAC as my primary device convinced me of anything, though, it’s that I hardly need a “phone” any more. I use email, sure, and SMS, and mapping, and browsing, and the camera, and Twitter, and Facebook, and Google+, and various other apps, but I actually do as much as possible to avoid speaking to people in real-time. It just feels inefficient and intrusive.
It didn’t take long before I returned my SIM to a smartphone and got back online. The warm, tender embrace of HSPA+ never felt so welcoming. Yet none of the excitement about today’s new handsets – the Galaxy Nexus, the Galaxy S III, the upcoming iPhone 5 – quite musters the same visceral feel of the nostalgia-fueled anticipation when that StarTAC box arrived on my desk.
A Motorola StarTAC saved me is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.
Want to one-up the douchebags who flaunt their fancy Bluetooth headsets while talking into space? Bring this bad boy out and they’ll know how OG you are. It’s also a Bluetooth headset, but it’s in the form of the classic 80′s brick phone that your elders – or you – used to rock back in the day.
I don’t know if creator Brad Helmink made it extra large for effect or if it’s just been a long while since I saw one of these, but my goodness. You might need a building permit to own one of these.
Like most Bluetooth devices, all you need to do is pair the brick phone with your phone and you’re ready to go to John F. Kennedy High School and participate in insider trading.
If your testicles meet the minimum weight limit needed to carry the 80s Bluetooth Brick Phone, head to indiegogo and pledge at least $45 (USD) to be one of the first to own it if and when the fundraiser meets its goal of $55,000. That’s chump change for a teen star or a stock broker.
Atari is celebrating its 40th anniversary by giving away 100 of its most popular retro games for free on iTunes. Each iOS version pays homage to the original and is designed to mimic the gameplay that Atari fans remember. The games are in an app called Atari’s Greatest Hits, which normally costs $9.99.
The 100 games are based on the classic versions made for the Atari 2600. They are arranged in alphabetical order and by category along with their original cabinet and box art. Each game is downloaded separately from within the app and is unlocked across all your iOS devices. Popular titles include Asteroids, Centipede, and Pong.
Some of the games, such as Warlords and Tempest, feature Bluetooth multiplayer capability, while others can be played using the Atari’s Arcade Duo Powered joystick, sold separately. However, the games only remain free if you do not uninstall the app. Once you do so and have to reinstall, you will have to pay for the app.
Atari offers 100 iOS games free for 40th anniversary is written by Rue Liu & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.
If you fancy yourself skilled at the art of hacking—and have an appreciation for retro technology—the creator of this impressive Nixie Tube chess set soon plans to sell a DIY kit that’s apparently not for the faint of heart. More »
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