"Look sir, the first electric clock!" "It's hideous, go away!"

@1123pawel

2 жыл бұрын

3:40

I do like the 'string wrapped around drums' demonstration. It makes a great example of simple serial communication.

@stopthephilosophicalzombie9017

2 жыл бұрын

They end up using a similar device to explain television as well, if I recall correctly. All picture transmission after the fax was based on similar concepts. Even today with pixels the linear scanning is still part of the system.

@fishpond2894

Жыл бұрын

ditto. as a first time viewer i love how coherent their demonstrations are. something about them makes the concepts just /click/, one of my favorites is the 'human sewing machine'.

@MagnusVojbacke

Жыл бұрын

That was definitely my favorite

Tim you have absolutely no idea how happy I am to see "The secret life of machines" series up on KZread, and the commentary at the end is just wonderful. It was one of my favorite programs as a child and certainly inspired me. Thank you (and Rex) so much!

@munokhoi5800

Жыл бұрын

Anyone else hear the theme song just looking at the thumbnail?

I remember when companies used to send junk mail via fax. I got so tired of this particular company sending their junk mail that I got my hands on 25 pieces of black paper and faxed it to them 42 times in a single day. They never sent us junk mail by fax ever again

@toddt6730

2 жыл бұрын

The junk faxes and black paper are the reason my customers have me turn off printing and forwarding the faxes to a folder on the computer, then they decide what to print and what to delete

I love that the FAX predates the phone by 30 years.

I'm happy the cat scenes made the cut.

@andylindsaytunes

2 жыл бұрын

The episode was ahead of its time, with a unplanned cat walking into the shot, like today's youtubers.

@ctdieselnut

2 жыл бұрын

19:00 - the cat vs printer fight is older than one might think.

@procactus9109

10 ай бұрын

Was there an option lol

After all these years, I could finally read the sign at 0:24 -- "You don't have to be mad to work here, but it helps".

@TomOConnor-BlobOpera

2 жыл бұрын

There's some absolutely epic easter eggs in the text of the Utopia stuff in this one, the Word Processor one and the Photocopier one. Also, Enema Drain Cleaners that comes through on the fax always made me smile.

I have a lathe, you have a lathe... let’s send each other a fax!

"It's a job to keep it in synch, but it's not bad for a lathe" 😂 This programme is absolute GENIUS. This is simply THE BEST science communication I've ever seen. Tim, your are mind-blowingly good at this.

@ctdieselnut

2 жыл бұрын

Glad to see I'm not the only one impressed by this. Imagine coming up with the idea of using lathes, getting the components together and making it work at all is amazing to me. Also a great demonstration of the technology.

I was hoping that Tim would discuss the explosion of his homemade Pantelegraph at the end. Part of the charm of the show for me (used to watch it on TLC in the U. S. in the early 90s) was the gaffes and flaws that Tim and Rex left in the show (American TV was always much too slickly produced to do such things). That ending was the quintessential example!

@mumiemonstret

2 жыл бұрын

Me too. It must have been an oversight, he usually elaborates on the ending scenes. In this case he looks so startled that one could imagine that the explosion was a (rather dangerous) practical joke from Rex.

@Trenchbroom

2 жыл бұрын

@@mumiemonstret Hmm, good point about Rex.

@fumthings

2 жыл бұрын

@@mumiemonstret surely a staged explosion with special effects, now we see an early incident of Tim doing his own stunts...

Tim, it's 3 AM and I can't sleep, and here you are. Just like the 90's when your show was on The Science Channel here in The States. Thank you, for justifying my insomnia these days, just as you did 30 years ago.

@SpacewolfDan

2 жыл бұрын

need to turn off the fax machine ;) its all that clacking it makes

@danaitch4095

2 жыл бұрын

And you are not the only one. . .

@croiscant66

2 жыл бұрын

Literally me right now

@steventhehistorian

Жыл бұрын

Checking in, myself

@jean-lucpicard5510

Жыл бұрын

3.50 am

This was actually a really important episode for me and close to my heart. I never really understood clock signals until i saw this in the 90's. Never forgot it.

I loved the "BT Approved" labels on walls behind the lathe-fax!

@tad2021

2 жыл бұрын

Back when unapproved acoustic coupling would get you thrown in to telephone prison.

@obd6HsN

2 жыл бұрын

@@tad2021 I know you're joking, but a major advantage of acoustic couplings was that, without a direct electrical connection to the telephone network, they didn't require approval

@compu85

2 жыл бұрын

Is the big L on the cube wall shown in the intro a driver's Learner's warning sign?

@CyclingSteve

2 жыл бұрын

BABT Approved. Now German owned. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Approvals_Board_for_Telecommunications

@TheManLab7

2 жыл бұрын

@@CyclingSteve Ow FFS. Is there anything in this country that we actually own? Because us tax payers PAID for the Dartford cross bridge (which paid it self off easily within the first 5yrs n then some, SO! They just continued to charge everyone for over 15yrs n to add insult to injury. They took away the booth's (so less people to pay) and now the French own it. I'm pretty sure if the government found a way n the Queen was alright about it. They'd of already sold it to the French. I have NO idea what's been going on with this country recently and when I mean recently. I mean for the past 20+ year's. But the Australians always have the best vocabulary, grammar and terminology to describe what's happened to the UK. "Yeee naaa she's completely and utterly, ROOTED!" or "a complete fluster cuck"

Pause at 20:50 and read the fax. It’s hilarious.

@frankowalker4662

2 жыл бұрын

Ha ha, Cheers.

@0neIntangible

2 жыл бұрын

"...in bed" ha!

@RCAvhstape

2 жыл бұрын

23:08 also. "Enema Drain Cleaners" lol

@elfinvale

2 жыл бұрын

For those who can't quite make it out, I've transcribed the message here because it is thoroughly worth reading: SERVICES [date is quite unclear - I think it says 22 March 1992] To all staff Utopia Services Corporate Headquarters Re: The media In the last few weeks there have been several unfortunate "leaks" to the media regarding Utopia's interests, including a damaging piece in one of the tabloids claiming the paper we produced every year would cover a country the size of Belgium. Only yesterday, I discovered that a large film crew had entirely taken over our Eastern Region Headquarters. In future all media contact must be referred to our public relations division. Any staff co-habiting with a member of the media must henceforth be permanently accompanied by one of our P R representatives, 24 hours a day, particularly in bed where we suspect lapses in confidence most frequently occur,

The Medical industry has been one of the big holdouts on faxing. It was only 2020 when the NHS was banned from buying any new fax machines.

@gregorymalchuk272

2 жыл бұрын

35 years into widespread computers, and 35 or 30 years into digital scanners and computer graphics capable of handling scanned documents, and people are STILL using ancient copper twisted pair phone cables to transmit analog outputs.

@michaelfisher9671

2 жыл бұрын

Same in Australia and the US. The medical industry seems to like fax. No idea why.

@liquidsonly

2 жыл бұрын

I saw I a brand new boxed one yesterday (2021-06-21) in my local UK, pharmacy, so still in use and still being purchased.

@bupobm

Жыл бұрын

@@michaelfisher9671 I think there is some implied privacy and medical record benefit in faxing - a one-to-one device connection that is off of the internet - instead of a network that can be hacked and snooped

Spammers accelerated the decline. Those people who would spam business fax numbers with rolls of unsolicited unwanted advertising. An early look into how things would become.

@crochetemporium

2 жыл бұрын

Crikey, I'd forgotten about that - yep shape of things to come.

@LinuxGalore

2 жыл бұрын

yep. the only reason we kept fax machines around is because the Health authroities are the only entities sending faxes. Today we still get faxes but we use a fax->email service as we have no physical fax machine.

@rooneye

2 жыл бұрын

WOW! I didn't know that was a thing. That's amazing. Thanks for sharing.

@rooneye

2 жыл бұрын

@@crochetemporium CRIKEY! That's a word you don't hear much anymore. How old are you? 😁

@bborkzilla

2 жыл бұрын

How many legit phone calls do you receive as compared to scam calls? I hardly ever answer voice calls any more!

Between this and the episode on Xerography, incomprehensible things that seemed like magic became simple science, and that knowledge changed my whole life. If I had to look back and pick out the most important thing I ever learned, it's probably one of these two episodes.

@matthoward8546

2 жыл бұрын

Yes...I would ask people if they remembered this show...I actually believe this show inspired the people whom are responsible for our now common technologies...The things Tim may describe as inscrutable, he has inspired in others...the ripples he's sent across the pond.

This episode in particular stuck with me for many years. The Huffman encoding scheme and the lathe fax were the strongest memories. Thanks for putting up the remaster!

I remember hearing weather fax on shortwave radio. I got an adapter to convert the audio from the radio and send it to my PC. Sometimes the fax was a Japanese newspaper. Apparently they sent these to ships at sea.

@graemedavidson499

2 жыл бұрын

Weather fax (WEFAX) is still broadcast to this very day!

@drboze6781

2 жыл бұрын

@@graemedavidson499 - Once heard, that characteristic cadence can never be forgotten. "Whee-whee-whee-whir-whir-whir-thump-thump-thump..."

Caught in possession of a sawn off transistor 🤓

@1pcfred

2 жыл бұрын

All semiconductors have the photoelectric effect. Which is why many of them are in sealed packages.

In the 1980s, design of the Volvo 400 series was done out of Coventry in the UK but the designs which were made on paper needed to be sent to engineering in Helmond, The Netherlands. Designer John de Vries cut the designs so it could be fed to a fax machine. In Helmond they taped the long rolls of fax paper together so they had a preliminary design in the office. Today this story sounds crazy because we'd send those by e-mail but then it was quite revolutionary.

@vsvnrg3263

2 жыл бұрын

is this why volvos were box shaped?

@volvo480

2 жыл бұрын

@@vsvnrg3263 Box shaped is not what springs to mind if you look at the Volvo 480 ES.

@gs425

2 жыл бұрын

@@volvo480 bulbous angled and box shaped.

@vsvnrg3263

2 жыл бұрын

@@volvo480 , theres a website called "nice volvo mate" about a certain nissan model brought out in the 90's. ive got one of them and people have told me they thought it was a volvo.

@jwstolk

Жыл бұрын

Did the same with large drawings in the 90s. The machines where not limited to sheet length, it would just send whatever length paper you put in it, and on the other end it was also printed from a roll of paper.

These shows from back in the day really show things in such an understandable form. 😊

I was absolutely captivated by this episode when I was young. I’ve thought about the giant human fax machine once or twice a year ever since.

I remember years ago when my Boss came into the workshop with a new fangled thermal roll Fax machine saying that this is the future, no more Teletex machines now! I will never forget the chiming handshake sounds the devices made when sending documents. Also one day the Boss was annoyed with a rival company so one night he sent them a long blank Fax by making a paper loop on the office machine and the other company no doubt came to their office in the morning to find an expensive pile of thermal Fax paper rolled out on the office floor!

@jagmarc

2 жыл бұрын

And don't forget too those faxes we used to get from that Nigerian prince who is to be exiled from his country and has to urgently transfer 3 million dollars to your account....

Interesting Xerox came up. They ran the Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) and had the mouse and a windowing OS with the office metaphor al within their scope to commercialise. They failed to realise any of this. A young Steve Jobs paid PARC a visit... And the rest, like the fax machine, is history

A great episode! The whole show is of such quality, it´s incomparable to anything existing nowadays, and it has soul - thanx so much for the great stuff!

Machine: Urgent beeping noises Tim: I don't think it likes me fiddling with it. Me: Best KZread channel ever.

Как жалко, что эти передачи не показывали у нас по центральному телевидению😔

This series made such an impression on me as a schoolboy and this particular episode was excellent and really fired my imagination. I'm indebted to Tim and Rex!

Thank you both so much for another remaster. You and Norman spoil us.

"Enema Drain Cleaning" lol Thank you, Mr. Hunkin!

@DFPercush

2 жыл бұрын

Did you read the whole fax at 20:50 ?

It's interesting to see how fast some machines become obsolete.

@TomOConnor-BlobOpera

2 жыл бұрын

Even in 2021, Fax isn't completely obsolete. The legal and medical professions still enjoys fax for some things.

@Tocsin-Bang

2 жыл бұрын

@@TomOConnor-BlobOpera Until 5 years ago I was working for an agency, where I had to fax my timesheets in every job I did.

@mrflamewars

2 жыл бұрын

@@TomOConnor-BlobOpera "Enjoys" 😝

@mfbfreak

2 жыл бұрын

@@TomOConnor-BlobOpera The odd thing is that digital faxes can just as well be hacked, like digital e-mail stuff can. It's all incredibly weird.

Awesome, thank you, I’v enjoyed these videos since I was a teenager

That bit at the beginning is CRAZY. My god you don't see programs taking the effort to do shit like that these days lol I bet that was a NIGHTMARE to film with the wind and shit, fucking hell. Brilliant.

I remember this show and this episode quite well. I think it was on cable here in the states when I watched it. I still remember the animations and the closing music. Thank you for uploading this and letting me relive childhood memories.

Tims videos always get a "like" even before I watch them - you are a very talented man Tim

30-something finding this now. wish I had been given this in my youth... this is some of the best science education/communication.

@bosox2318

Жыл бұрын

There are not enough thumbs up buttons for this absolute gold

These shows were brilliant. The best explanations I have ever seen.

Around the mid 2000s, my Dad was harassed by a fax machine calling our number. The phone rang and all my dad hears is the noise from the fax machine. He thought it's my broadband connection and I had to reassure him it is not. The owner of the machine had put the wrong number in her fax machine resulting calling our number. She phoned my Dad to apologise.

@simplexicated

2 жыл бұрын

Harassment would be right as well. I believe the default number of retries is 8, your father was probably at his wits end by then.

@ThermionicValve

2 жыл бұрын

The worse thing is if you put the phone down, it stays connected until the fax machine hangs up. I picked up the phone around 5 to 10 seconds after I put it down and still hear the noise it makes.

@RCAvhstape

2 жыл бұрын

I had a buddy once who used his computer's dialup modem to continuously redial someone who had pissed him off. This was early 90s, no caller ID and even PCs were not owned by everyone yet. He set his modem to keep redialing while he went to Pizza Hut for dinner.

I used to watch this on television. It's a really interesting series.

I'm 35 years old, I never had the pleasure to see a fax machine in operation, it always seemed like science fiction and the technology of the future. Wow, I didn't know that the idea is that old. Today we have gigabit networks and streaming videos just sail accross the Earth from one end to another in mere seconds but the fax is still a mystery to me. Or at east it was until I watched this video :)

@elfinvale

2 жыл бұрын

I'm 30 and unfortunately had to deal with them while i was a medical receptionist circa 2011. i was very much not a fan lol

I can confirm that fax machines are still in daily use in New Zealand and are used to send scripts from my GP to the Pharmacy. I think they're also still used for secure message transfers between solicitors

29 minutes I didn’t plan for or thought I needed, and couldn’t put it down!

This is another of my favourite episodes, as a kid I reproduced the “wet paper and sawn off transistor” arrangement, took a weeks worth of lunch breaks in the school physics lab to get it working with the help of a very enthusiastic lab technician who thought the idea was wonderful If I’d had access to a pair of lathes I would definitely have gone further!

I love the practical demonstrations of how things work(ed), specially when they simplify electric or electronic devices' functions.

This ep blew my mind when i first saw it back in the day.

How fascinating seeing this technology many years ago on my cathode ray tv, now watching it on computer with all the advances since then, I can only imagine another 30 years from now what we will be viewing this on and how we will see the current technology.

The faxing demo outside with the signaling was very interesting & really helpful to understanding how it works.

Lol the guy jumping the fence in the background when he could go around

RIP Rex

I was watching say you love me a show made in 1995 and they keep using fax machines to communicate and I couldn’t understand how it worked lol. This makes so much sense now.

Now museum pieces for offices. Amazing how quick things advance.

Believe it or not, I still use a fax machine occasionally in 2021. It works fine over the VOIP line. It's easier than emailing at times. Fewer steps.

@mfbfreak

2 жыл бұрын

You can send one, but who will receive it?

@jefferyb3047

2 жыл бұрын

@@mfbfreak Businesses, doctors offices, so forth.

I remember watching your show when I was 5 years old. I am 37 now and takes me back to when I was a kid. I looked forward to your show back then and now seeing your shows takes me back to a simpler time.

excellent episode. Loving everything about it, from the shop cat to the practical models and historical context.

Fax machines are still good as a fallback device when the internet goes down, or when signatures are required, only problem with older style fax machines was the thermal paper would fade over time and need photo copying to preserve it, it's funny how the faxing ability is still present in the current version of Windows 10 and hardly anyone is aware of it.

@mfbfreak

2 жыл бұрын

Since 99% of phone/fax connections go over internet anyway, you cannot use it if the internet goes down. You'd have to have a private radio link.

@imranahmad2733

2 жыл бұрын

HMRC still had analogue lines as a fallback, they still use leased lines while I was there a few years back

@gotsm9959

2 жыл бұрын

@Imran Ahmad: Thermal printer suck. I have a hard time getting decent thermal paper that is also the right size. I normally takes a few tries to get the decent shipping labels because e to dark or to light.

Excellent piece of television!! It is really remarkable, very unusual and creative, we don't see anything like this nowadays

That lathe fax and the homebrew pantelegraphs are some of my favourite memories of the series. Caselli would be proud of Tim and Rex.

In 1996 I was hot for a fax machine and bought a Brother All-In-One unit for the home office computer. It was a way to communicate with the computer to the outside world before we got the internet. In 5 years it was already obsolete.

I work for a city in the United States and we use software as well as physical fax machines still. I just was in a video meeting a couple weeks ago where they were having problems and they wanted me in the meeting for some reason. I do computer support, not fax machine support. They felt that my deduction skills were wanted/needed and so they included me which was nice. But at the same time it was like working for the telephone company and I know about cars so they had me sit in a meeting on how the company maintains our cars and trucks. ??? Within ten minutes we had it all figured out. I played a small roll in that I think though I'm not really entirely sure I added anything they didn't think of themselves, I just said it first. Your show was THE first show that I saw that talked about how machines worked. If I wasn't shade challenged (color blind) then I probably would have gone into electronics instead of programming and computer support. I LOVED, LOVED, LOVED your show with you and Rex to the point that I just recently looked on KZread for your shows and found these remastered versions (the picture quality on the originals didn't hold up very well) and I've been thoroughly enjoying rewatching them even though I remember for the most part how everything works because of you and Rex!

I had no idea the basis for fax tech dates back to the 1840's. Or that it even predates the phone. Unbelievably ahead of its time.

I leased a fax machine on a monthly payment plan, from an office supply company for my upstart business way back, and hardly ever really needed to use it very much, cost me a small fortune to have it at all. I offered to return it to the office supply company, and they told me to keep it as it was obsolete as being a thermal transfer unit, and they were updating to plain paper methodology. BTW...the thermal transfer copies I did keep became faint and illegible after a year or so especially when left exposed to sunlight.

Really nice to see these programs again totally forgot that they were shown… Weather fax is still available on HF radio presumably for the long distance it covers.

Huffman code, time sync, handshake procedure... All this nowadays is used in TCP/IP berkeley sockets, handshake to create the idea of a virtual "stabilized connection" with a client/server and huffman encoding is used to decrease the size of the packages/msgs sended. It's nice to see where these ideas come from. The fax message through the lathe is the coolest thing to see.

The same principle was used in the Gesetner Stencil burner. A light detector traveled across a spinning drum picking up the light and dark areas on the original photo or artwork. On the other half of the drum was a porous piece of paper, coated with a thin coating of wax, this was the stencil material. There was also a plastic stencil material for long run reproductions as the paper stencil would eventually give out. The wax or plastic was melted away by an electric arc, faithfully reproducing the original The finished stencil was fitted to a drum that fed a thick ink through the stencil which transferred the ink to paper. The were used by flyer publishers and school (university) newspapers and other publishing jobs

this upscaling looks INCREDIBLE!!!!!

I wish I saw these.videos as a kid

It’s strange that these shows represent the marvels of what was modern technology at the time, but are somehow irrelevant a few years later. I always enjoy watching content of how things were invented and changed they way we live.

I never got to see the third series back in the 90s, so this is all new to me.

The program is very similar to another BBC series about technology called, " Conne tions". This was hosted by James Burke. And also from the 1980s.

This series absolutely blew my mind as a kid, and ultimately shaped the adult I'd become. You're a (criminally under-recognised) legend, Tim! Thank you x EDIT: Foolishly commented before the extra segment. The Ampex tour would've been bloody epic in itself! Wow! Though, as an acoustician, perhaps I'm a little biased. ;)

This is absolutely amazing! And this is YOUR channel, too? Brilliant! I LOVE the vintage technology strewn throughout an open pasture-like office...incredibly creative and freeing! I've created a playlist now called "Amazing Vintage Computer Ephemera", and this is the top/first video in that playlist...awesome!

I used to work in a print shop where sending and receiving faxes were one of the services. One day I sent a fax for a woman who walked in. When I handed her back her papers she got upset and accused me of not sending it. I showed her the confirmation report generated by the machine but she was unfazed. "I KNOW YOU DIDN'T SEND IT AND I WANT TO TALK TO THE OWNER!" The boss came over and asked her why she thought the fax hadn't been sent. She said "because the papers came out the other side!" She thought the papers would travel through the phone line. 😂 This was around 1989. I also remember spending half a day trying to explain to a customer that an animated GIF wouldn't run on a business card but that's a story for another time 😂

Hi Tim. These 'EXTRA's are wonderful. You mentioned an IBM 'museum' you visited about 30 years ago. I worked for IBM for 40 years in Poughkeepsie, and I was lucky enough to get a tour of the 'archives' in Kingston NY. That was probably close to 30 years ago too. The archives was huge, and it had a lot of US defense department equipment, including a CRT radar display from the 1950's - equipped with a built in cigar lighter and ash tray. Do you remember where the museum was? I've spent a lot of time in all the IBM New York facilities. Thanks!

I remember this show, it was wonderful! So happy to see it again!

I've worked in the "office machine" environment for over 40 years. This episode and the one on the photocopier I remember back in the 90's when American television broadcast the secret life of machines on I think it was the discovery channel. Excellent how you and Rex came up with the way fax is transmitted & received.

Excellent 👍

Wow, it's the Dude, from the tv show, and he's got a youtube channel! :> This was such a good show. Thanks!

Oh I so remember this episode from my childhood. 👍🏻

This is a fantastic presentation. I wish I had this to see back in the late '70s when I was responsible for fixing the very last of the Magnevox "Magnefax" machines, just at the end of the vacuum-tube era. These machines, such as the Model 856, had germainium tranistors to control the drum motor, and a black paper that was coated with a talc-like powder that was banged off by a vibrating stylus to reveal the black.

See, to me the end of this makes me say "He's so cool". It takes a brilliant mind to be able to make things like a Pantelegraph yet also be able to elaborate on the way it works and then animate the show to boot. I love this series and hearing Tim's stories about when he was making the shows! Much thanks for posting Mr. Hunkin, love from America

Hello Mr. Hunkin! I am in Canada, and I hadn't ever seen this show before! I first saw some of your 'components' videos, and then saw one of these restored shows, and I am completely amazed at the inginuity and effort you put into explaining and demonstrating all these things. The human sized sewing machine was an incredible idea! I always found the internal workings of sewing machines kind of mysterious, and you helped a lot with it! And I am 52! This FAX eposode, needless to say, was also full of extremely impressive demonstrations! I spend a lot of time pondering ways to explain some of these types of principles to people, just as an interesting mental exercise. I am just amazed at not only the ideas you used, but the amount of time you clearly put into these episodes! I don't know if you'll get to read this comment, but I hope you are in fantastic health, andI can certainly see why you get the respect you do from your fellow countrymen! Add me to the list! I only wish I had known about the show, and had access to it, when you were making it. I wouldn't be surprized if you had an affect on the average technical ability of your entire country! I am so saddened by the way things are now, people are just happy to know how to use things, but have little curiosity about how they work. Perhaps there are just too many distractions. Anyhow, I just wanted you to know there is a guy in Alberta, Canada who is extremely excited about all your work! Keep it up!

Love the remastered versions of these! I only saw this recently but this is much better!

wow, I devoured this show as a kid but I don't think I ever saw this episode (or perhaps the whole of season 3) what a gift this channel is! Thanks Tim!

Just the faxs ma'am, just the faxs .....

It looks quite nice. I wish all old videos looked this good on KZread.

Absolutely love these shows. So I remember watching (whenever the TV channels had the good grace to show them) when I was in my mid teens and being amazed at the simplicity of the explanations for some of the more sophisticated principles demonstrated - also, the animations really made the shows complete - kind of a more serious monty-python like presentation of whatever was being talked about. Really have enjoyed your contributions so much! And, of course, not forgetting the vital Rex - always adding value to the shows with concrete demonstrations of how stuff worked! Thank You so much!

18:58 - KITTY!!!

All of "the secret life of" episodes I've seen bring me so much joy. Creative, funny, and unbelievably illustrative of the topics they choose. Love it!

This episode has been ingrained in my mind from a young age - Especially the string demonstration. Thank-you so much!

I've not seen this since 1993 at college. I like how Rex's phone that he uses with the lathe is actually a fax machine.

just wonderful most other video tells of history but YOU show how the original mechanism worked the use of red green "flags" was brilliant

Ahh the old Ricoh Fax 1010, haven't seen/repaired one of those since 2007 and clueless was I it was 20 years old at that point. They used a Rockwell 9600bps fax modem on its own plug in card that cost ricoh $700 to buy from rockwell.

That's cool hearing about Ampex. My dad was an engineer there for a long time. That's where the money for my childhood came from. I never knew they had a museum though. Didn't appreciate the history at the time, but I certainly heard a lot about dropout detectors and Z80s as a kid.

This is my favourite episode. The lathe fax machine!

Still in use in the NHS!

Fax Machine episode was one of the BEST. I learned so much from this one. Great to see it again :D

In another 30 years will they be saying, Oh that MPEG compression and COFDM transmission was simple. Inspired by this I attempted to make a camera from a RAM memory, DIL ceramic package with metal topp soldered on. +15, 0 ,-5V . write 1's then read, photon impacts discharge and make a zero. This was the start of PACE who i later worked for, there was someone there who could listen to a modem and diagnose the message . Thank you Tim.

A dirty trick some people played on other offices was to set up a continuous loop made from 7 pages running endlessly through a fax machine over a weekend. People at the other end returned on Monday to find themselves swamped with pointless paper & the memory buffer full as well. Often - the text was simply one huge word running down the paper. Business fax was a crazy technology & I'm so glad it's long gone.

@RCAvhstape

2 жыл бұрын

I would've used "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy" endlessly repeated.

@plunder1956

2 жыл бұрын

@@RCAvhstape That was in a department full of graphic artist & a crazy cartoonist. So they let rip.

Excellent as always..