Examples Of Obsolete Technology Still In Use

By Philip Yiga | February 19, 2017

Although technology is advancing at a faster rate today, some obsolete technologies are still hanging-on because some people don’t see the need for adapting to new-technologies. In fact, it takes a very long time for some obsolete technologies to fade away from different communities most especially in developing countries and this mainly because most people in such countries find it hard to upgrade to newer and better technologies since they tend to be expensive. So, below are some of the examples of obsolete technologies that are still being used today no-matter the availability of new, different technologies.

 

A List Of Obsolete Technologies That Are Still In Use Today:

1. Dial-up internet: although new technologies of connecting to the internet have submerged today, there are still some people using dial-up modems to gain access to the internet. for example, over 4% of American-adults are still using dial-up modems for internet connectivity and this implies that more than 10-million people in the USA are still accessing the internet at slower speed of about 56.6kbs. In fact, it’s only 6% of Americans that can access to broadband internet and the rest can’t because it’s expensive. on the other hand, in other under-developed regions of the world like Africa, Asia, India and a lot more, most people are still using dial-up modems for internet connectivity and this is mainly because broadband internet-connection is expensive in such regions.

 

2. Old operating-systems like; windows-Xp: although windows-Xp was released on August 24th 2001, it’s still being used on almost 30-percent of all desktop-computers around the world. In fact, Microsoft stopped offering system-support for windows-Xp in 2014 and this implies that windows-Xp no longer receives security-patches and fixes thus leaving computers using this operating-system vulnerable to attacks. Additionally, even most ATM-machines are still running on windows-Xp and this actually puts banks at a great risk. However, Microsoft suggested that anyone running an old operating-system like windows-Xp should consider upgrading to a newer-version like windows-7 or 8 inorder to mitigate any risks related to using old-systems. On top of that, in developing countries there still people using older operating-systems like; windows-98, windows-2000 on their desktop-computers.

 

3. Pagers: in the 1990s, the greatest technological-gadget used by most people was a pager and it actually helped different people time themselves inorder to accomplish different tasks at work or home. However, a decade later cell-phones replaced pagers because they were equipped with reminder-functions and even enabled people to send and receive calls/messages directly. But despite the popularity of cell-phones today, there is still an active market for pagers by different people around the world. For example; it’s said that in 2012-to-2013 Americans spent approximately $7 million on acquiring new-pagers and this implies that almost 10,000 pagers were bought. This is because many hospital-workers like doctors and nurses find pager-networks more reliable especially during emergencies. All in all, if don’t want to be too reachable but available if needed, then pagers will work perfectly for you because they have an inbuilt feature that helps to avoid phone-conversations.

 

4. Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs): PDAs were amongst the greatest technologies in the 1990s which enabled people write, play-games and do a lot more digitally. But PDAs were replaced by the introduction of smartphones which can do almost anything ranging from keeping contacts to connecting to the internet. Surprisingly, PDAs are still being sold in the USA and around the world and this is mainly because some people still love these digital-devices and actually use these devices to organize their data/information. For example, most vertical-markets are still using PDAs for data-collection purposes especially in diverse places like warehouses and hospitals.

 

5. Floppy Disks: floppy-disks were actually introduced in the 1980s and people used to save just a few kilobytes (kbs) of data on these disks. But today technology has replaced floppy-disks with hard-drives, CDs, DVDs, USB-flash drives, cloud-storage and a lot more inorder to enable computer users to store large amounts of data. However, it’s amazing that some companies and people with old-computers are still using floppy-disks today. In fact, Sony actually reported that it sold over 12-million units of floppy-disks in 2009 and the biggest buyers of these storage-disks were companies still using old-computers that only accepted floppy-disks for data-storage. However, such companies will need to upgrade to using new computers inorder to stop using floppy-disk as a storage-medium.

 

6. Dot Matrix Printers: according to research, Americans bought almost 20,000 new dot-matrix printers in 2012 and this is actually amazing because these machines are old-technology. In fact, on Amazon.com you can find a whole section selling dot-matrix printers and even at much higher price than some ink-jet printers. The reason as to why dot-matrix printers are still used today is that some business-systems like; point-of-sale and warehouse-inventory systems still require a carbon-copy and multi-part forms that can only be achieved with a hard-impact of dot-matrix printer and its continuous feed. However, some business have upgraded to using modern-printer like ink-jet printers, laser-printers and thermal-printers.

 

7. Magnetic stripe bank-cards: most people today are still using magnetic-stripe debit and credit cards which are actually an outdated technology when compared with new-technologies like chip and PIN-access to bank-accounts. In fact, magnetic-stripe cards and their systems are not very secure and there has been an increase in data-theft that has affected people using these cards. However, cards that are embedded with chips and use PINs help to cut fraud by up to 80-percent and that’s why Visa and MasterCard have introduced chipped-cards in the USA and around the world.

 

8. Public Pay-Phones: according to the American-Public-Communications-Council, the USA still has over 305,000 working public pay-phones and many people are still using these pay-phones. In fact, pay-phones are mostly used by people who may not afford to buy cell-phone or by people whose smartphones have run out of battery-power yet they need to make an urgent call. Additionally, people who want to hide their identities or remain anonymous while calling also use pay-phones and such people in most cases are criminals like drug-dealers, kidnappers, etc.

 

9. Landline Telephones: although landline phones are an old-technology, they are still being used in most offices and homes today. In fact, according to CEA-data, American bought 5-million corded handsets and over 21.5-million cordless phones in 2012 thus making a total of 26.5-million landline-telephones. However, landline-phones are now designed in different shapes but this doesn’t remove the fact that there old-technologies.

 

10. Phone-books and Business-directories: although people can use their cell-phones or the internet to look for and retrieve certain contacts quickly, there are still some people who prefer using phone-books and in fact in some countries phone-books are still being delivered to people. On the other hand, business-directories are still being used by some people in most countries although the internet can readily provide these businesses-directories.

 

11. Telegrams: telegrams were actually a dominant method of communication in last century just before the introduction of telephones and later text-messages and emails. However, today countries like, USA, Canada and UK have their own commercial telegram-services that help to work on people still using telegrams. In fact, although some telegram-companies like western union ceased telegram-services, there is still a small-market for telegram-services around the world.

 

12. VHS-tapes and Cassette-Tapes: VHS-tapes were once the best-technologies for home entertainment and people would actually go to stores to rent these video-tapes. However, CDs, DVDs and online-streaming put an end to video-tapes and cassette-tapes. However, there is still a market for video-tapes because some people still own VCR recorders/players. In fact, there are still people buying and renting VHS-tapes for media-purposes in the USA. Additionally, even online-stores like Amazon and Wal-Mart are still selling blank VHS-tapes and this implies that there are still people buying them. Lastly, research shows that over 15,000 cassette-based car-radios were sold in 2012 and this is surprising in this technological age.

 

13. Cathode-Ray-Television (CRT) sets: there is still a large market for CRT TVs in Asia, Africa, south-America, India and other countries. This is mainly because these television-sets are cheap/ affordable compared to new flatscreen TVs. in fact, CRT TVs are even favored by some people like gamers because they can handle multiple-resolutions and even have a low-amount of input-lag compared to flatscreen/plasma TVs. this actually makes CRT TVs perfect for fighting and rhythm games that require high-responsiveness.

 

14. Film-rolls for cameras: although today every Smartphone comes with a camera and there are even cheap digital-cameras on the market, there are actually still people using old-cameras that use film rolls/strips to create photos all over the world.

 

15. Fax Machines: fax-machines were first used in offices way back in 1970s but today there still some companies using fax-machines although there are new technologies like emails and instant-messaging that are capable of doing fax-tasks. This is because some businesses require signatures on their contracts and fax-machines actually make it easy to replicate such contracts. In fact, according to research over 350,000 fax-machines were sold in the USA in 2012 and even fax-machines are still widely used in different companies all over the world.

 

16. Vinyl-records (turn-tables): vinyl-records have been in existence for a longer period of time up-to-date. In fact, vinyl-records just made a comeback and this is mainly because some audiophiles preferred the sound of vinyl than that from CDs, DVDs and live-streams from the internet. In fact, research shows that over 4.6-million vinyl-records were bought by Americans in 2012.

 

17. CD and cassette Boombox with radio-function: today, companies like Sony are still providing people with CD and cassette players that are also equipped with an FM/AM radio-function. In fact, these players can be of great importance especially if electricity is not available because they can use both DC and battery-power.

 

18. Analog film-cameras: companies like Nikon and Fujifilm are still selling manual film-cameras although there new digital-cameras on the market and even every Smartphone is equipped with a camera today. In fact, the good thing about film-cameras is that they give the user access and control over manual exposure-controls when taking pictures thus leading to a production of quality-images by creative photography-professionals.

 

19. Wrist-watches: wrist-watches were actually introduced a few centuries ago for time-functionalities but they are still being used up to date. In fact, there have been just a few technological-developments in wrist-watches whereby companies now create smart-watches with several functionalities like; messaging, texting, GPS, time-function and a lot more. However, there are still a lot of people who prefer wearing old-fashioned wrist-watches today.

 

20. Cash-registers: cash-registers have actually been in existence for centuries and they are still being used in most local stores up-to-date. In fact, a modern cash-register is a bit more advanced than older cash-registers but they both do the same purpose. However, with the introduction of new-technologies like ipads and accounting-systems, cash-registers are facing extinction but not very soon.

 

21. Print-media machines: paper printing machines have been around for centuries but surprisingly they are still being used up to date. In fact, printed books have been in existence ever since the nineteenth-century and today there are still several-companies printing books, newspapers, magazines and a lot more. However, today the internet can provide people with digital news, magazines and a lot of information digitally but there are still people who prefer reading printed newspapers and magazines. In fact, in most under-developed countries within Asia and Africa printing-media companies are still working very effectively since only a few people have access to the internet in these regions.

Conclusion: all in all, there are certain technologies that really take long to get extinct but with the rapid technological-advances in the 21-century, a lot of these old-technologies are going to be wiped away and even some of the old-technologies are no-longer being used today. In fact, as new generations of people rise and more old-technologies will continue fading way from our communities than never before.