Old Tandy laptops

And does anybody remember sending stories at 300 baud? Just a bit different than a wireless connection.

 

I've never used one, but after reading all this, I'd like to have one also, just to see what it was like back in the day.

 

Try explaining what baud is to someone who's entered the business in the past, oh, 10 years.

 

Or better yet, hand them a Teleram Portabubble and tell them to go cover a game.

 

1997, I'm covering cross country in NYC while staying with the girlfriend's family. So we get back to her place, and I prep to file. Her dad's a computer techie. I take out the Trash 80 and the dude was mesmerized by that flippin' thing. He couldn't believe those things still were in existence.

 

I'd send you the one I used to use that failed me on deadline three times after a football game at Pitt, but I threw it off the top rim of the stadium.

 

Could you at least post a photo?

 

I always wanted to toss mine from the pressbox but was afraid it might damage the bleachers.

 

Amazingly simple, durable and occasionally exasperating. Had one blank out on me on deadline one night about 20 years ago. After bouncing it off the walls of my hotel room for about five minutes, thing inexplicably returned to working order.

Nothing like trying to file by way of a pay phone in the pouring rain.

 

How did that work?

 

My senility's kicking my ass today, but for any of you old-timers: What the hell was the name of the old sort of pre-fax contraption (pre Trash 80) that weighed a ton and you had to lug around in a Samsonsite-type suitcase?

You'd type a page of copy on your manual typewriter, feed it into a roller, call the office and stick the phone in the coupler as someone in the office stuck their phone into an identical machine at the same time. If you wanted speed but poor quality, it took four minutes to scan a page. (Slightly) better copy took six minutes to scan. Even "good" quality transmissions sucked.

Can't believe I can't remember the name of those things. They damn near killed me. The Trash 80s were a Godsend after those.