Originally aired (I think!) September 9, 2002 on TechTV.
I found this video on, of all places, archive.org (http://archive.org/details/TechTVSept2002) I would like to say thank you to the original uploader and on the page was some more information about the video:
This is episode of The screen savers from September 2002. This is also has a full episode of TechLive in it too. This was found on newsbin. Here is what was on the nfo file:
Source:———————–VHS tape from analog cable in 2003
Video Codec:——————XviD
——————————NTSC Aspect 4:3
——————————29.97 frames per second
——————————640×480 frame size
Bitrate:———————-Approx 2000kbps/sec
Audio Codec:——————MP3 190kbps 48KHz
Number of AVI files:———-1
AVI file size:—————-2.0GB (approx)
Runtime:———————-2 hours approximately
RAR Files———————39 x 50MB + 1 x 28MB
PAR Files———————15%
A 2002 episode of “The Screensavers” and an old episode of
TechLive from same date. I love looking back at these old
tech shows to see where we’ve been.
I thought others might also find this interesting. How things change in
8 short years! I found it by accident. I’m glad I make it a practice
to quickly scan tapes before I discard them.
Content:
Tech TV show “The Screensavers” (1 episode from year 2002 [approximately Sept 2002])
Tech Live (1 episode from same date)
“The Screensavers” – an episode from 2002:
0. I don’t know the exact date it was aired. My VHS recorder
doesn’t tag its analog recordings. They speak of the release
of SP1 for WinXP as being available on the day this was recorded
so it could be this was recorded on the SP1 public release date
which was Sept 9, 2002. The included “TechLive” episode recorded
on the same date speaks of the year 2003 in future tense so I know
this was recorded no later than 2002. I’m sticking with Sept 2002
as a really good guess for the recording date.
1. Leo and Patrick announce Service Pack 1 for Windows XP is
a whopping 130MB and is now available for download. It’s a
serious burden for most people to download that “massive” file
on dialup.
2. A serious flaw in Windows XP allows web sites to delete files
on your computer. Leo shows how to rename a file to fix it in case
you need to avoid that “massive” and potentially troublesome
service pack for now.
3. A 4 Megapixel camera is now available from a prominent manufacturer.
The show asks: “Do we really need a camera with that many megapixels?”
4. Computers are still beige in 2003!!! The show demonstrates
Microsoft’s bold marketing move in the release of a keyboard
with matching mouse in a two tone motif: blue and beige!
5. 5 things to know about Leonard Nimoy elucidated. A clip
shows 1970’s Nimoy singing “The Ballad Of Bilbo Baggins” for a
kids’ show. (Disturbing)
6. Commercials include that taco company’s chihuahua.
Reno 911 star, Carlos Alazraqui, did the voice of that chihuahua
named “Gidget.” How about that? The taco dog confronts the
insurance gecko in the commercials. Also interesting is
a commercial for a new computer with a 2GHz processor.
On a path that began with DOS from ATT and IBM,
it has taken about 30 years for Microsoft to deliver
an operating system that doesn’t crash all the time Finally,
Windows 7 works “pretty well.” Periodically, I like to
look back to old tech shows to remember the moans and groans
I uttered along the way.
To me, these old techie/nerdie shows are funny and
overwhelmingly amazing at the same time. I love ’em.
Back before G4/TechTV/ZDTV became all about the
girls’ spreads in Playboy/FHM/Maxim, we could actually
watch a TV channel that focused on information rather
than ratings. It served a need.
I wish I had some of the older ZDTV shows like from 1998
and before. Those would be amazing. There are lots of bits and pieces
on YouTube and such. Those are nice.
(I think in 1998 I was trying to decide if the expensive upgrade
from 4 MB of RAM to 8 MB of RAM was worth it for my
133MHz Intel processor based computer.)
