From Newsgroup: comp.misc

Every time I see one of these rCLretro-inspiredrCY PC cases <https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-components/pc-cases/silverstones-retro-pc-flp02-case-launches-for-usd220-throw-back-5-25-inch-expansion-bays-meet-modern-360mm-radiator-support>,
I feel a yawn coming on.

Does anybody think of them as the personification of dullness? Like
the Morris Minor was to cars? (My mother had one of those when I were
a lad -- an old, second-hand one with a 945cc engine and the recessed headlamps, when she was learning to drive.)

These cases remind me of the latter 1980s and the 1990s, when MS-DOS
and Microsoft Windows gradually took over most of the PC market, in
spite of their manifest technical drawbacks compared to more advanced
products from Apple, Acorn, Amiga, Be ... just about anybody else,
really. Those were flavourful platforms, whereas DOS/Windows seemed to
me to be just ... porridge.

But then, I suppose most people had machines of the beige, bland, Microsoft-compatible persuasion, so very likely products like this do
evoke feelings of nostalgia in such individuals.

Are you able to explain such feelings to someone like me? IrCOll try my
best not to fall asleep ...
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From Newsgroup: comp.misc

Lawrence DrCOOliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:

Every time I see one of these rCLretro-inspiredrCY PC cases <https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-components/pc-cases/silverstones-retro-pc-flp02-case-launches-for-usd220-throw-back-5-25-inch-expansion-bays-meet-modern-360mm-radiator-support>,
I feel a yawn coming on.

Does anybody think of them as the personification of dullness? Like
the Morris Minor was to cars? (My mother had one of those when I were
a lad -- an old, second-hand one with a 945cc engine and the recessed headlamps, when she was learning to drive.)

Surely that's the point - 'boring beige' is novel, amongst the endless variations of cases with glass sides and RGB lighting, which are pretty tiresome at this point. Of course you can still buy a featureless black cuboid, which is arguably the modern version of dullness. (look at a modern office PC)

These cases remind me of the latter 1980s and the 1990s, when MS-DOS
and Microsoft Windows gradually took over most of the PC market, in
spite of their manifest technical drawbacks compared to more advanced products from Apple, Acorn, Amiga, Be ... just about anybody else,
really. Those were flavourful platforms, whereas DOS/Windows seemed to
me to be just ... porridge.

But then, I suppose most people had machines of the beige, bland, Microsoft-compatible persuasion, so very likely products like this do
evoke feelings of nostalgia in such individuals.

Are you able to explain such feelings to someone like me? IrCOll try my
best not to fall asleep ...

I suppose they might look dull if you haven't been paying attention to case design over the last 10+ years, but the point is they're different to what currently exists in the market. And for a lot of people who build PCs
they're novel because they weren't born when this design was last in vogue.

PS: the Morris Minor is now cool again now that everything is a same-looking crossover/SUV.

Theo
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From Newsgroup: comp.misc

Theo <theom+news@chiark.greenend.org.uk> wrote:

Lawrence DrCOOliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:

But then, I suppose most people had machines of the beige, bland,
Microsoft-compatible persuasion, so very likely products like this
do evoke feelings of nostalgia in such individuals.

Are you able to explain such feelings to someone like me? IrCOll try
my best not to fall asleep ...

I suppose they might look dull if you haven't been paying attention
to case design over the last 10+ years, but the point is they're
different to what currently exists in the market. And for a lot of
people who build PCs they're novel because they weren't born when
this design was last in vogue.

Yup, yet another example of the point of the XKCD "Ten Thousand" comic: https://xkcd.com/1053/

Those of us old enough to have had a great many "beige boxes" for
computers along the way can easily forget that there's a whole
generation that has never seen anything but the clear sided, rainbow
color flashing/rotating LED light cases.
--- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: comp.misc

Rich <rich@example.invalid> wrote:

Theo <theom+news@chiark.greenend.org.uk> wrote:

Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:

But then, I suppose most people had machines of the beige, bland,
Microsoft-compatible persuasion, so very likely products like this
do evoke feelings of nostalgia in such individuals.

Are you able to explain such feelings to someone like me? I'll try
my best not to fall asleep ...

I suppose they might look dull if you haven't been paying attention
to case design over the last 10+ years, but the point is they're
different to what currently exists in the market. And for a lot of
people who build PCs they're novel because they weren't born when
this design was last in vogue.

Yup, yet another example of the point of the XKCD "Ten Thousand" comic: https://xkcd.com/1053/

Those of us old enough to have had a great many "beige boxes" for
computers along the way

I'm posting this with a 1990s beige box right now.

can easily forget that there's a whole
generation that has never seen anything but the clear sided, rainbow
color flashing/rotating LED light cases.

Actually the featureless black monoliths in the photos linking to
other PC case articles around that page are new to me. I've seen
window-sided cases with the LED fans inside (not on my own PCs,
mind you), but those modern cases ironicially seem to be designed
in the ultimate pursuit of _band_. No features whatsoever. How can
you get more bland than that? I'd rather my beige box to one of
those, although I don't care particularly about PC case aesthetics
anyway.

But LDO apparantly conflates old-fashioned with bland. If he
nevertheless wants to understand retro-themed items, that's a
problem I can't help him with.

FWIW one practical thing I *hate* about most modern electronic
enclosures, including some newer PC cases I've encountered, is
the shiny polished plastic finish on them. This is planned
obsolescence in plastic so far as I'm concerned. Unlike the
textured finish on my beige gear, this shiny finish picks up every
smudge or scratch possible. Cleaning without the most extreme care
only causes more scratches. After a few years the finish
inevitably looks worn and dirty, whereas a textured surface would
still look fine (granted they still yellow, but I actually don't
mind that so much). I try to ignore that, and if I bought a more
expensive "retro" PC case just to avoid it I'd also feel conned,
but it does really grate on me.
--
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From Newsgroup: comp.misc

On 20 Sep 2025 14:01:48 +0100 (BST), Theo wrote:

Surely that's the point - 'boring beige' is novel, amongst the
endless variations of cases with glass sides and RGB lighting, which
are pretty tiresome at this point. Of course you can still buy a
featureless black cuboid, which is arguably the modern version of
dullness. (look at a modern office PC)

I donrCOt know from rCLfeatureless black cuboidrCY. I used to be an Apple
Mac man for about a decade and a half, so I was exposed to *some*
design sensibilities. My first non-Apple machine was a Shuttle box.
And then I bought another one. rCLFeatureless black cuboidsrCY they were
not.

My current main machine is in a rCLBe QuietrCY case. ThatrCOs black. ItrCOs
got panels with two different textured finishes, and bevelled edges
with grillework -- rCLunderstated elegancerCY is how I would describe it.
;)

I suppose they might look dull if you haven't been paying attention
to case design over the last 10+ years, but the point is they're
different to what currently exists in the market. And for a lot of
people who build PCs they're novel because they weren't born when
this design was last in vogue.

It was *never* in any kind of rCLvoguerCY. It was what the PC makers came
up with because they didnrCOt know any better. When Steve Jobs rejoined
Apple and came up with the first iMacs and iBooks, that was when the
rest of the PC industry woke up to the idea that, just maybe, it was
time to put some decent industrial design into their products.

Some of those early efforts were hilariously tasteless.

PS: the Morris Minor is now cool again now that everything is a
same-looking crossover/SUV.

The Morris Minor is a horrible design to look at now.

The timeless designs are the ones that combine looks with functional efficiency. That is, hatchbacks and station wagons (aka rCLestatesrCY or rCLshooting brakesrCY). Modern estates look remarkably good, once
designers figured out how to come up with a more smoothly integrated
body design, instead of simply tacking an extension onto the basic
sedan shape.

I guess people movers also offer functional efficiency.

Did you know a single car company pioneered both hatchbacks and people
movers? The first hatchback was the Renault 16, and the first people
mover was the Renault Espace.

Renault was also the company that employed Pierre B|-zier, he of the
eponymous curves so well-known in computer graphics.

Another French car company, Citro|2n, was the workplace of Paul de
Casteljau, who came up with an algorithm for efficiently drawing
B|-zier curves.
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From Newsgroup: comp.misc

Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:

On 20 Sep 2025 14:01:48 +0100 (BST), Theo wrote:

I suppose they might look dull if you haven't been paying attention
to case design over the last 10+ years, but the point is they're
different to what currently exists in the market. And for a lot of
people who build PCs they're novel because they weren't born when
this design was last in vogue.

It was *never* in any kind of "vogue". It was what the PC makers came
up with because they didn't know any better. When Steve Jobs rejoined
Apple and came up with the first iMacs and iBooks, that was when the
rest of the PC industry woke up to the idea that, just maybe, it was
time to put some decent industrial design into their products.

Gah, that's when they started with all the shiny polished plastic
finishes that I *hate*. Impractical computer equipment sold as
fashion accessories. I never bought it from Apple and I don't like
being forced to buy similar junk from every other company who are
stupidly cloning them now.

Some of those early efforts were hilariously tasteless.

Thankfully the important things, the electronics, were deservedly
given more attention, such that they can even still be working 30
years later and save me buying more Apple-clone junk of today.

PS: the Morris Minor is now cool again now that everything is a
same-looking crossover/SUV.

The Morris Minor is a horrible design to look at now.

The timeless designs are the ones that combine looks with functional efficiency.

Right, nothing with that horrible fragile shiny finish that Apple
loves then. Efficiency doesn't mean replacing stuff every year just
because the case is all scratched, chipped and smudged.
--
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From Newsgroup: comp.misc

Computer Nerd Kev <not@telling.you.invalid> wrote:

Lawrence D'Oliveiro <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:

On 20 Sep 2025 14:01:48 +0100 (BST), Theo wrote:

I suppose they might look dull if you haven't been paying attention
to case design over the last 10+ years, but the point is they're
different to what currently exists in the market. And for a lot of
people who build PCs they're novel because they weren't born when
this design was last in vogue.

It was *never* in any kind of "vogue". It was what the PC makers
came up with because they didn't know any better. When Steve Jobs
rejoined Apple and came up with the first iMacs and iBooks, that was
when the rest of the PC industry woke up to the idea that, just
maybe, it was time to put some decent industrial design into their
products.

Gah, that's when they started with all the shiny polished plastic
finishes that I *hate*. Impractical computer equipment sold as
fashion accessories. I never bought it from Apple and I don't like
being forced to buy similar junk from every other company who are
stupidly cloning them now.

Sadly, that is a lot of the 'design'. "Fashion accessory" design and
nothing more.

Efficiency doesn't mean replacing stuff every year just because the
case is all scratched, chipped and smudged.

But it does directly impact the yearly sales treadmill. When the
upgrade treadmill of ten times the performance every nine months began
to slow down, the makers desperately needed some way to keep those
sales numbers artificially inflated.

Enter the "fashion accessory" world where the makers try to convince
everyone to 'upgrade' every nine months, not for performance increases
which are paltry now as compared to twenty years ago, but because the
nine month old look of the prior box is now passe (or scratched,
chipped and smudged).

--- Synchronet 3.21a-Linux NewsLink 1.2

From Newsgroup: comp.misc

Lawrence =?iso-8859-13?q?D=FFOliveiro?= <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:

Does anybody think of them as the personification of dullness? Like
the Morris Minor was to cars? (My mother had one of those when I were
a lad -- an old, second-hand one with a 945cc engine and the recessed >headlamps, when she was learning to drive.)

I want computers to be dull! And much of the time I want cars to be
dull as well. I have had too many moments of terror when they have
become exciting.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."
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From Newsgroup: comp.misc

On Wed, 24 Sep 2025 17:03:00 -0400 (EDT), Scott Dorsey wrote:

I want computers to be dull! And much of the time I want cars to be
dull as well. I have had too many moments of terror when they have
become exciting.

Technology is just a means to an end, agreed.

DoesnrCOt mean you canrCOt come up with a good technological design that
is a pleasure, rather than a pain, to use.
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From Newsgroup: comp.misc

On 24/09/2025 22:03, Scott Dorsey wrote:

Lawrence =?iso-8859-13?q?D=FFOliveiro?= <ldo@nz.invalid> wrote:

I want computers to be dull! And much of the time I want cars to be
dull as well. I have had too many moments of terror when they have
become exciting.

When we eventually have enforced self-driving cars, there will be an
automatic driving mode not called "sport", but "take me seemingly to an
inch of my life". Outwardly, it will be driving at 25 miles an hour but
you will be bricking yourself....

I'm about to ditch a boat load of Windows-XP/7 hardware that is
currently too modern (Core2Duo) to be called retro.

* Will it ever be be retro in future, and worth hanging onto?

* Will there be future refuseniks wanting hardware without the taint of AI?
--
Adrian C
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From Newsgroup: comp.misc

Adrian Caspersz <email@here.invalid> wrote:

I'm about to ditch a boat load of Windows-XP/7 hardware that is
currently too modern (Core2Duo) to be called retro.

* Will it ever be be retro in future, and worth hanging onto?

Probably, but it's impossible to value what hanging onto is worth
to you. As it is earlier this year I sold three motherboards from
around that era on Ebay. Each was tested for a few hours with
CPU stress tests, memtest, GPU memtest, and connecting things to
all the ports, to sell them as working for around $50. But then one
was returned as "was working sorta, now it's not", and another with
photos of it not recognising the (surely way too new for the BIOS
drivers) USB memory stick they wanted it to boot Windows from. In
the end with return postage I broke even thanks to the one (oldest)
motherboard that didn't boomerang. So while they're already worth
something, I've decided there's too much scope for user-error with
selling old motherboards as working, and posting full PCs is too
expensive plus hard to package to survive the post sorters using
them for football. Laptops are better, though with them people want
working batteries.

Where I have done better is with IDE HDDs. After running their long
self-test to weed out duds, I've sold some high capacity ones for
$40-50 and even 40GB drives sell for $20. No returns. I set the
jumpers to "Cable Select" to make them as idiot-friendly as
possible. I thought the retro people would use CF or SD to IDE
adapters now instead of the smaller IDE HDDs like the 40GB ones,
but apparantly not.

* Will there be future refuseniks wanting hardware without the taint of AI?

They'll probably just find ways of disabling it to their
satisfaction, as with the Intel Management Engine.
--
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