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"if you can still use it, it's not obsolete"

 
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A subset of this article was printed in AmNY yesterday. He does say (in the online version) that if you are a serious techie it doesn't apply to you. Here's my favorite snippet.

Let's say you have a BlackBerry Curve from 2007. If you bought it for email, phone calls, and texts six years ago, and it's still capable of performing those same tasks today, then it's not obsolete.

A new iPhone 5S can surely do more, but that takes nothing away from the ability of the Curve to get certain tasks done.

Now what does qualify as an obsolete product?

Well, a Polaroid camera with no film would be one. A typewriter that you can't find ribbons for would be another. And that Curve would be obsolete if the battery stopped working and you couldn't fix or replace it.



I think back to the last few gadgets I've bought and why:
iPad Air - The only "problem" was created by Apple. That the iPad 1 was no longer receiving updates for the OS and several apps. This one was not obsolete.
iPad - I bought the iPad 1 right when it came out because I wanted the ability to read (technical proofread) PDFs outside. I'm not willing to carry my laptop as many places as I'm willing to carry a tablet both because of size and theft worries. This was filling a legitimate need.
TV - I wanted a bigger TV and a second monitor for my MacBook. This solved both although arguably it wasn't really needed.
ChromeBook - I bought my mother a ChromeBook to replace her computer which was creaking of old age.
MacBook - My old machine no longer had enough RAM to function. It was of a good age so time to replace.

Anyone have any interesting gadget replacement stories?
 
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My altimeter I use when skydiving was always sticky on the way up. Always had to tap it. I ended up replacing it when it started getting sticky on the way down.
 
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