I try to keep at least one of every cable. For the rest of the obsolete cables I know I’ll be unlikely to need I’ll dump them into the electronics recycling bins at work.
What’s really annoying are HDMI cables since they are still ubiquitous but they all look the same but they don’t work the same. If I find any that look old or I can’t tell if they are high speed I just get rid of them rather than risk compatibility issues.
Heeeeyyyy, I still use my 5th gen iPod in my 2002 and 2009 cars! Why is a thing with storage capacity several times greater than most phones in your archeological tech display? (yeah, yeah, get off my lawn as you pay Apple a monthly fee to provide minimally adequate amounts of storage for your pictures.)
I’ll have you know that my iCloud storage is full.
I would use the companion to the iPod in that photo in my FarmWagon, but I haven’t yet gotten around to soldering in a new headphone jack; while I am a committed leftist, I still very much prefer to hear both channels of my audio.
ETA: I meant that my unpaid iCloud account is perpetually full. When you’ve got DSL and a NAS, localhost is where the 
is.
I remember circa late 2007 when I was looking for a cheap laptop on eBay to run Linux on, how much a shitty Windows 98 or possibly even late Windows 95 laptop (think 32 MB of RAM) someone slapped a wifi card into would sell for. Like, think $400.
I have been collecting electronic components, connectors, and devices since about 1959 and while I have managed to off some of it - like the Quadraphonic, CED, and reel-to-reel stuff, as well as whatever actually failed that I didn’t cannibalize for parts - such hoards are dwarfed by a shitload of cameras and lenses that are now unusable because my vision is almost gone.
I passed from ‘collector’ to ‘accumulator’ long ago.
At first look I thought those were tiny dioramas of offices. So cool!
Quadraphonic! I love looking through old Stereo Review magazines and it’s a surprising reminder of just how hard that was being hawked in the ads when that was the Next Big Thing. I keep thinking to myself reading those ads “oh, if you only knew how hard this was going to fail”
And yet, in a way, it lives on as 5.1 or 7.1 surround sound. On the other hand, that’s almost exclusively used for video; prerecorded music these days is more often than not just plain two-channel stereo.
SACD and DVD-Audio provide surround capability, but SACD in particular was more about DRM and gatekeeping than anything else.
I used to be like this. Now I am acutely aware storage has a cost, be it a storage bin or how much more effectively you could be using your living space.
As well, time has a cost. If you can’t resell it for more than your time is worth, fucking toss it.
I think there’s some buzz in the tech industry right now about, “Separating Storage and Compute”. Now is the time.
Just toss it.
I dont know if this still applies but back in the day, one could go to a gate off Lawrence Livermore Labs and buy cheap, discarded gear like high-power lasers, cyclotrons, and other groovy systems. I knew a guy who bought and horded this stuff. And I’ve known geeks who aren’t satisfied with less than discarded JATO units (available at the Ontario CA Air Nat’l Guard base). If ya gotta horde stuff, horde big bad stuff…
EMPs. Some of that stuff might work afterwards. How old though?
I’m not sure if I have ADHD, but I very much resemble that slideshow. I could reproduce most of the pictures, but on a larger scale. I have a particular obsession with wall warts and DC fans. One plastic tub of fans. Three tubs of wall warts, sorted by AC/DC and voltage output.
From my desk I can see 5 laptops, 2 netbooks, 5 tablets; all heading to the bin until I intervened. A tub full of old cables (SCSI, parallel printers, etc.) And adapters. So many adapters. I like to think I can connect anything to any other thing.
I like to think I’m doing something useful. Every so often someone will mention a need for some obscure thing, and I’m often able to provide. At which point I loudly proclaim my success, especially to my long-suffering wife.
I use the wall warts a lot; if a battery-powered device enters my home, I immediately find a wart in the right voltage range, perhaps in-line solder a DC buck PCB to adjust the voltage, and batteries are eliminated.
The other good think I do is strip everything down to recycling friend bits, salvaging anything I might use later. I keep cardboard boxes for plastics, metals, PCBs, and “unknown” stuff. When boxes are full, they go to the recycle center.
I’ve promised my wife if we ever move again, she does not have to touch any of this collection. If I want it, I have to pack it and get it onto the truck. Joke’s on her though, as I plan to die in this house, so she’ll have to deal with it anyway, and won’t be able to bitch at me!
From my lounging couch in the morning room I see 2 laptops, 5 phones, 20 guitar-like objects, a few drums, etc – the cameras, lenses, tripods, printers, empty frames, amps, and more laptops and guitars, are in the storage room, formerly the office.
I don’t consider our accumulations to be ‘hoarding’ as much as “saving stuff so we need not buy more.” Think of it as material conservation.
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