# Who remembers **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [August 11, 2020, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers/917822 "2020-08-11T16:29:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![purplehorseshoe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/purplehorseshoe/32/2996_2.png) [@purplehorseshoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/purplehorseshoe)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2020, 1:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers/917822/121 "2020-08-27T01:44:19Z")
> [@aruvqan](#): > > I have a Wang Archiver floating around the barn somewhere =) Scrolling idly & scanned this post quickly, then had a “WTF” moment, picturing some poor Doper having to archive porn footage. ---
**Author:** ![nightshadea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7ba0ec/32.png) [@nightshadea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nightshadea)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2020, 2:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers/917822/122 "2020-08-27T02:12:23Z")
i remeber the day we gave up 3.5 disks…we were trying to play “return to zork” which came on something like 45 disks and wed been installing the game for 2 hours and all of a sudden on disk 28 something messed up and we had to delete everything and start over so we did and same thing happened but on disk 35 we went to circuit city where we bought the game and while we were there waiting my cousin seen a 2x cd rom with a 16 bit soundcard and 6 or 7 games and zork was one of them and since they were giving us a gift card … he decided to buy it at 220$ i bought one a couple of weeks later for 1 25 from walmart … ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2020, 2:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers/917822/123 "2020-08-27T02:22:24Z")
> [@Si\_Amigo](#): > > And a single 10MB floppy drive that you had to physically swap 10 megabyte floppy drive? Seriously? That is at least six+ times larger than any floppy ever made. ---
**Author:** ![Si\_Amigo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/si_amigo/32/2877_2.png) [@Si\_Amigo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Si_Amigo)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2020, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers/917822/124 "2020-08-27T03:04:34Z")
I may have it confused with our 1st upgrade which was a 10Mb Hard drive. 1983 was lifetime ago. ---
**Author:** ![nightshadea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7ba0ec/32.png) [@nightshadea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nightshadea)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2020, 4:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers/917822/125 "2020-08-27T04:37:14Z")
i remember buying a 1.2 gig hard drive and put every game i owned it and only used 2 percent … and i remarked i don’t think they’ll ever make games big enough to fill them … i think the biggest game i had was civilization 2 and that was maybe 150 mb because it had video clips in it ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2020, 5:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers/917822/126 "2020-08-27T05:43:52Z")
Speaking of calculators, anyone ever use a [Compometer Calculator](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comptometer)? We had one in the computer lab of my high school, more recent than the pictures in the wiki article. Quite large, and you could put it in an infinite loop by dividing by 0. We also had an Olivetti slightly programmable calculator - big but not as big. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2020, 5:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers/917822/127 "2020-08-27T05:58:54Z")
> [@eschereal](#): > > 10 megabyte floppy drive? Seriously? That is at least six+ times larger than any floppy ever made Not quite true. There were 2.88 MB floppies. And Superdisk drives could format 3.5" floppies to 32 MB. With its own disks (debatable whether you want to call them floppies, but they did contain a flexible magnetic disc), it could store up to 240 MB. ---
**Author:** ![jaycat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jaycat/32/3015_2.png) [@jaycat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jaycat)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2020, 12:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers/917822/128 "2020-08-27T12:28:52Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > Speaking of calculators, anyone ever use a [Compometer Calculator](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comptometer)? I used [something pretty close](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comptometer#/media/File:Comptometer_Model_WM.jpg) when I worked at Filene’s in the bookkeeping department, circa 1972 or so. ---
**Author:** ![What\_Exit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/what_exit/32/10652_2.png) [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2020, 12:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers/917822/129 "2020-08-27T12:53:05Z")
Hunt the Wumpus is familiar but I feel like I played it on a different platform. I had TI Invaders, a Soccer game, some basic dungeon exploration game and I forget what else. Plus I wrote 2 text base games and a 8 bit horse race game in basic. All very simple. ---
**Author:** ![Son\_of\_a\_Rich](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/son_of_a_rich/32/5439_2.png) [@Son\_of\_a\_Rich](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Son_of_a_Rich)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2020, 2:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers/917822/130 "2020-08-27T14:25:59Z")
What are those almost impossibly complicated calculators that look like pepper grinders, with a crank on top? I want one and I have no idea why. ---
**Author:** ![beowulff](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beowulff/32/542_2.png) [@beowulff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/beowulff)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2020, 2:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers/917822/131 "2020-08-27T14:26:21Z")
[Curta](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curta) ---
**Author:** ![ThisIsTheEnd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thisistheend/32/4713_2.png) [@ThisIsTheEnd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThisIsTheEnd)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2020, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers/917822/132 "2020-08-27T19:44:03Z")
Defragging. ---
**Author:** ![What\_Exit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/what_exit/32/10652_2.png) [@What\_Exit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/What_Exit)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2020, 8:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers/917822/133 "2020-08-27T20:02:13Z")
Argh, defrag could take so long. Chkdsk (Check disk) was almost as bad. ---
**Author:** ![Si\_Amigo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/si_amigo/32/2877_2.png) [@Si\_Amigo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Si_Amigo)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2020, 9:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers/917822/134 "2020-08-27T21:21:36Z")
Defragging is no longer a thing? 💔 It was a great way to get free time at work. Sorry boss, but the damn computer was so slow I had to defrag the drive. Got you at least an hour of BS time and sometimes you could defrag it twice just for good measure. It must be gone because even spell check doesn’t recognize defrag as a word. 😫 Damn I’m old. ---
**Author:** ![ThisIsTheEnd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thisistheend/32/4713_2.png) [@ThisIsTheEnd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThisIsTheEnd)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2020, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers/917822/135 "2020-08-27T21:50:53Z")
I don’t think it’s much of a thing anymore unless you’re a real pack rat. My machine is almost 8 years old and I still have 300 of 500g free and I’ve never even thought about defragging. But it did have an effect when you had a 500MB drive. ETA: Whoops, I just checked and it’s scheduled to run once a week in the middle of the night when I have the machine shut off, lol. I wonder if that’s what’s running when I turn my machine on in the morning on that day of the week. I’ll have to wait until next week to find out. Disk shows as 0% fragmented. ---
**Author:** ![EinsteinsHund](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/einsteinshund/32/8400_2.png) [@EinsteinsHund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EinsteinsHund)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2020, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers/917822/136 "2020-08-27T21:53:27Z")
Yeah, I think automatic defrag as a background task is standard since Win 7. ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2020, 10:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers/917822/137 "2020-08-27T22:00:07Z")
Defragging was to reduce the seeking and latency issues relating to having a file in a thousand different sectors on a disk. These days, the rising popularity of SSD storage has greatly reduced the mechanical issues related to fragmentation. There are other overhead issues with structural fragmentation on a SSD, but for the most part they have much less of an effect on performance (speed). ---
**Author:** ![BippityBoppityBoo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bippityboppityboo/32/5745_2.png) [@BippityBoppityBoo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BippityBoppityBoo)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2020, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers/917822/138 "2020-08-27T22:03:19Z")
> [@jaycat](#): > > when I worked at Filene’s in the bookkeeping department, circa 1972 or so. Ahhh, sigh…Filene’s. I miss it so. Have you ever tried to explain Filene’s Basement to someone who hasn’t been there? Thanks for stirring up the memories. (Boston denizen 1973-1985) ---
**Author:** ![jaycat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jaycat/32/3015_2.png) [@jaycat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jaycat)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2020, 12:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers/917822/139 "2020-08-28T12:59:02Z")
> [@BippityBoppityBoo](#): > > Ahhh, sigh…Filene’s. I miss it so. Have you ever tried to explain Filene’s Basement to someone who hasn’t been there? Thanks for stirring up the memories. > (Boston denizen 1973-1985) I will tell one of my Filene’s Basement stories. About 15 or 20 years ago I was working in an office about 4 blocks down Washington St. (near the corner of Essex St.) My co-worker, “Rick” called me into his office. “Jaycat,” he said in a hushed and frantic voice. “I have split my pants!” Now, Rick was quite a rotund little fellow. Maybe 5’6", 240 lbs., something like that. He asked me if I would take his pants downstairs to the tailor shop to have them mended. “Rick,” says I, “wouldn’t it be quicker if I just went up to Filene’s Basement and bought you a new pair?” He agreed, and informed me of his pants size, which was something like a 46 waist and a 28 inseam. He gave me $50 and sent me on my way. It was a beautiful summer day and I didn’t mind getting out of the office for a while. So I sort of dawdled, window-shopping up and down Washington St. Finally I climbed down the stairs into Filene’s Basement. It’s important to note that Filene’s Basement operated on the “continuous markdown” system. The longer an item went unsold, the further it got marked down, until the stuff that nobody wanted was practically free. I corralled a salesperson and described what I wanted, dark dress pants, 46x28. She looked doubtful. “Let me see what there is in the back room.” I waited maybe 15 minutes. Sure enough, she found a pair in Rick’s size! And for the princely sum of $4, drastically marked down. Rick was greatly relieved when I returned to the office, new pants in hand. And he was astonished when I handed him $46 in change! ---
**Author:** ![GaryM](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/garym/32/241_2.png) [@GaryM](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GaryM)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2020, 1:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers/917822/140 "2020-08-28T13:40:12Z")
In the '60s, Curtas were used by a lot of rally drivers to do their time/speed/distance calculations. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers/917822.md?page=6) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-remembers/917822.md?page=8)