Searching through links on onbsolete computers, I found the California Digital Web site. Apparently, it’s a computer retailer, but it looks like their stock is straight out of 1991, with prices that seem to reflect what you might find in Byte magazine ads from 1978.
A few examples:
HP Laserjet 4+ printer - $1479
21" IBM CRT monitor - $859
ApexData 9600 baud modem - $247
9 gigabyte hard drive - $697
Soundblaster pro 16 bit sound card - $88
So, either the prices are in Zimbabwe dollars, or … there’s enough people out there paying outrageous prices for ancient, laughably underpowered (by today’s standards) computer equipment. What’s the deal?
In looking at the web site I don’t get the impression that they are currently doing business for these items. I get the impression that the site was abandoned as a work in progress a long time ago.
Their host may not have gotten around to deleting it. Until late 2003, a webpage I’d put up for a few months back in 1997 and then never updated/paid for again was still up and running.
Seeing as the fastest modem they offer is a 14.4, I think this is probably the case. It’s just another relic.
There was a doomsayer sitting on www.y2ksafeminnesota.com well into 2002. If I recall correctly the last update was made on January 3nd of 2000 and he still wasn’t sure we were out of the woods yet.
My work group bought several old 2400 baud modems for $417 each.
Why?
We have a legacy miniframe system that expects THAT particular ancient modem. Other systems seem to need them also, as we didn’t push the price that high, they were that high already. We’ve found a couple for significantly less on eBay.
I called the phone number listed for California Digital. There was an answering machine, but they did refer to themselves by name. So, they exist enough to keep a phone line.
I’m glad I know this so next time I’m at the local Best Buy, I can ask the salesman “Well, this 240Gb Serial ATA Seagate drive looks pretty good, but how does it compare to Micropolis?”
The address on the website happens to be only a slight detour from my usual commute home. Maybe I’ll check it out in my 1996 Honda Accord, which I recently purchased for just $19,000.
A few years ago (probably 2000 or so) I went to a local, rather dusty computer boutique. The guy in there figured that since I was just a chick that I must not know anything. I told him I was looking for a cheap computer (I was). His first question was, “Are you looking to get on AOL and get on the Internet?” (I took the use of “AOL” to be his personal codeword for “newbie who doesn’t know anything and who I can rip off.”). He pointed to a 486 with (as the sign in front of it said) a “fast 9600 modem.” This system had a 66 MHz CPU, 16 megs of RAM, and a whopping 168 MBs of hard drive. I forget how much he wanted for it—over $100 anyway. I’ll never forget the sign that claimed that the modem was “fast” at 9600.
I laughed at the modem speed and a few other things, and got him to add other things (like a monitor and a faster modem) and lower the price and I ended up getting it. But he kept on shaking his head and saying, “You’re killing me here! You’re killing me here!” While I am not any computer whiz, I think I shocked him by not being the AOL newbie sucker that he had originally pegged me to be. (And no, while I did not get too bad a deal at the end, I have no doubt that I did not gouge him in any way. I’m sure he did just fine on the deal.)
However, when I was a fresh-behind-the-ears-soon-to-be-AOL-newbie, I got one of those “smart word processors” by Brother (this was late 1997) which could get email if you got an external modem for it. Brother would sell you (special order) a 2400 or 9600 baud modem for about $100 each. I special ordered one through the local electronics store, but fortunately Brother crapped out on me or something and it never came. (In the meantime I got a nice up-to-date Zoom 33.6 external modem at CompUSA.) The thing that kind of pissed me off is that when I told my computer-savvy friends about my purchase and my plans to special order the 2400 or 9600 modem (I wrote to them, asking them about this purchase) NONE of them told me that this was an outrageous price for woefully slow and outdated equipment. They would have just let me buy the modem without bestirring themselves to say anything.
