There's music everywhere! Surround sound music formats from 8 Track tape to Blu-Ray

My latest video's the first audio subject I've tackled in a while: surround sound music. I've always had a curiosity about the 1970's quadraphonic era - I lived through it but didn't really experience it at the time. But since then, the industry's released more and better surround sound formats over time, and I look at everything from the quad era up to today's DVD and Blu-Ray audio to see if anything's really worth listening to. (Spoiler: yes!)

This video was actually really difficult to make, not to mention my most expensive video to date. Making videos about sound is not easy - who knew? Tricky to talk about surround sound when you can't actually see it or hear it through YouTube! But hopefully it's an interesting video nonetheless.

Tearing down and repairing my original Apple IIc

My first-ever computer was an Apple IIc in 1985. (Not 1984 as I first thought, and said early in this video.) I loved that machine, but it's been broken for quite a while now.

Well, I finally sat down to fix it. And you can watch!

This video was just a quick one while I work on some more scripted stuff, but it was really satisfying to do.

Is Virtual Reality (VR) worth buying in 2017?

Another new video! In this one, I follow on from my blog post on VR with a video on VR. I think it's actually quite an amazing technology! And spoiler alert: I do recommend it if you can deal with the current headsets with their infernal wires.

From my YT description:

We've heard a lot about the PlayStation VR, Oculus Rift and HTC Vive lately. While the Samsung Gear VR and Google Cardboard make for a good, cheap entry into VR, I take a look in this video at what the experience is like on today's higher-end systems and see whether it's finally worth taking the plunge on a VR system.

Some of the games I show in this video include Rez Infinite, Until Dawn: Rush of Blood, Job Simulator, Here They Lie, Resident Evil 7: Biohazard, Danger Ball, Hatsune Miku: VR Future Live, Driveclub VR, Eve Valkyrie, Battlezone, and Scavenger's Odyssey.

btw, that room scale video is a promotional HTC Vive video, which you can find here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rv6nVPPDmEI

If you're interested in buying one of these systems or games, do me a favor and click through one of my Amazon affiliate links:

PlayStation VR: http://amzn.to/2l8Ajkt
HTC Vive: http://amzn.to/2m49A7O
Oculus Rift: http://amzn.to/2m9UvBS

They have the same prices as everywhere. If you want to help me out, you can actually buy anything on Amazon after clicking one of those links. Thanks!

Subscribe to my channel: http://www.youtube.com/c/ModernClassic?sub_confirmation=1

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The Atari Dig - my souvenir from gaming's greatest urban legend

Just posted a new video - getting back to gaming a little bit for these next couple. Many of you no doubt know about the great video game crash of 1983 and Atari's literal dumping of various games in a landfill at the start of it, and I'll bet a lot of you have actually watched the documentary "Atari: Game Over" (though if you haven't seen it, I've got a link in the video description on YT).

But you may not know that some of the games that were finally dug up in that documentary were put up for sale. I have one, and I talk about it in this short video.

This is the first of a new series of short videos I'm calling "Turbo Mode" - these are basically going to be to keep content flowing while I work on longer stuff. (Hint hint... I am working on a longer video right now.)

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What can you do with a $20 laptop?

My latest video takes a look at a thrift store find - a circa-1998 IBM ThinkPad 600X that I picked up for $20. Is a computer like this still good for anything? Watch the video and find out!

Incidentally, I'm going to be starting a new blog for my YouTube channel pretty soon (in addition to Facebook and Twitter pages), so when I do, I'll probably be posting all of these there. Or maybe I'll do it in both places; who knows.

The Apple II - Apple's most important computer

I mentioned a while back that I've started up a new YouTube channel, and I'm probably going to end up writing up a post here about every video I create. I may eventually split these posts off onto a new blog that's directly tied to the channel, but for now, here we are. I've done a bunch of videos you should check out, including an IBM Model M keyboard roundup, a look at the $99 Nintendo 3DS, the AtGames Sega Genesis portable, and more.

Last night I published my biggest video yet, in which I hold forth on the Apple II.

I grew up with the Apple II and I still have my original machine (that's it on the right). Most of my videos are a little more spontaneous and have a bit more humor, I think, but I guess I just have some reverence for the subject matter here. This was my first computer and I've held a grudge against the company for decades about how they treated it.

Anyway, check it out, subscribe to my channel, and leave a comment if you want. I'm not yet to the point of actively marketing my channel beyond this, but I am trying to rely on advertising revenue to at least pay for the topics I cover on the channel itself :)

I have a new(ish)YouTube channel

I've started a new YouTube channel, so far mostly focusing on vintage computers, tech and games. This isn't my first or latest video, but it's my favorite that I've done so far (of the four or five):

I called the channel "modern classic" mostly because I suck at coming up with names, but also because I basically do want to focus on things (mostly products, admittedly) that I think have stood, or will stand, the test of time. That allows me freedom to cover a whole bunch of different stuff I like, but it should all tie together.

Check out and subscribe to Modern Classic here.

Incidentally, I've also got a long-standing YouTube channel for the stuff I put up as parts of blog posts here... you kind of get one by default. It's pretty random and a lot of the videos in it are just snippets (and some date back to near the beginnings of YouTube!), but if you want to look at it too, be my guest. I'll probably still use it for stuff that really doesn't fit in with the new channel. There are a few things in there that I wish I could move over to Modern Classic, but Google doesn't allow that.

Lenovo ThinkPad P50 Review!

Well I never did quite get to do a proper review for my Dell XPS 15 (I had to do this instead), but I've now got one up on YouTube for my new ThinkPad P50 that replaced it.

I'm trying something a little different this time - I'm starting an actual YouTube channel. (I technically already had one for random stuff I'd shot and I wish I could move a few of those videos over, but YouTube don't play dat.) We'll see how it goes - but I've got a little more time than I used to now, so I've got some more stuff I'm planning to shoot. This video turned out a little more serious and hardcore than I originally planned, but maybe that's just me getting older. I've had this blog for something like 13 years now, so I probably have just entered a different era of my life. I'm no longer one of these kids making fast-talking, quick-cutting, ADD-inspired, seizure-inducing tech or lifestyle videos, which seems to be about 95% of YouTube these days.

Anyway, I love my P50 so far!