Category: Tech

The Great DECline

One of the few remaining vestiges of the once-mighty Digital Equipment Corporation is about to fall.

https://www.theregister.com/2022/06/30/intel_dec_massachusetts_demolished/

In 1986, Fortune magazine named DEC founder and CEO Ken Olsen as America’s most successful entrepreneur.

https://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/1986/10/27/68216/

It would have been laughable in 1986 to suggest that within five years Olsen would be forced out of the company he began in 1957, but that was exactly what happened. By 1996 the end of DEC, the former Massachusetts economic powerhouse, was in sight, after 40 years in business.

https://digital.com/digital-equipment-corporation/

In 1991 there was a recession that hit Massachusetts particularly hard. Every Massachusetts minicomputer company quickly declined, as the PC revolution took over. DEC, along with Data General, Prime, Wang, and Apollo all disappeared, but the Internet revolution came in just as quickly in 1995, and the economy turned around.

https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?arnumber=6777978

Operating a DEC PDP-11 minicomputer required women to wear a miniskirt. The user manual said so.

P.S. Allison Acoustics was another Massachusetts business that went under during the recession that began in ’91, when Roy Allison’s bank pulled his line of credit.

Send for Clarence

Hmm… where have I seen that celestial grouping before?

https://www.wral.com/Classic-film-Its-a-Wonderful-Life-features-angelic-galaxies/18849527/

No Old House

The house across the street is getting a major addition, along with renovations to the existing structure. I told the 30-ish homeowner that when he gets to the front steps, walkway, and driveway, he would do well to hire the same contractors that I did.

As we were discussing the extensive work he is having done, I mentioned This Old House. “What’s that?” he asked. “Uh, the PBS TV series… ?” No reaction. “… on GBH?” Still nothing.

Who doesn’t know about This Old House? A lot of people, it seems, especially Millennials.

Bose Direct Reflecting Sound

Maybe this was what Amar Bose was thinking about when he designed the (discontinued) 901 speakers with Direct Reflecting sound? Here’s the setup at the moment.

The TuneIn app is running on the Roku stick that’s plugged into the 10-year-old Samsung TV on the porch. It plays through the aux input of my Bose Wave Series II, with the TV sound muted. (With the rise of HDMI sound bars, TV’s have dropped analog audio outputs.)

So here’s the thing. Regardless of what source is playing, the left channel is always noticeably louder than the right channel. If I move closer to the Wave then the left and right speakers are equally loud. Another option that works is putting my notebook computer on the arm of the chair, which is how most of these blog posts are written.

The sound must be reflecting off of the door glass, and the computer screen is blocking the reflection, so I am hearing more of the direct sound. Lowering and raising the screen on the computer confirms the change in L/R balance. SCIENCE!