November 1966 Popular Electronics
Table of Contents
Wax nostalgic about and learn from the history of early electronics. See articles
from
Popular Electronics,
published October 1954 - April 1985. All copyrights are hereby acknowledged.
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You just
never know what names you will find in vintage electronics magazines. Incredibly - assuming
of course that this is who it likely is - I ran across Steve Wozniak (aka "Woz"), later
to be co−founder of Apple Computer, in this November 1966 issue of Popular
Electronics. "Woz" first met Steve Jobs five years later in 1971 while working at
Hewlett Packard. If this is "Woz," he, having been born in 1950, would have been a 16
year-old high schooler when his entry was published. The article does not specify who
is responsible for which quote. Woz was a Ham radio guy, so maybe one of the Off the
Air comments was from him. My favorite implausible comment from Sequel 2 is this one: "Don't waste
money on 5 amp fuses - buy 15 or 20 amp fuses - they cost the same and you get more fuse
for your money."
BTW, I have to say that to some extent the comment about the meter with the longer
needle being more accurate does have some validity. Assuming equal sensitivity and accuracy
of each meter movement, a longer needle would allow a more precise interpolation along
a more spread out scale.
See also the
first installment,
sequel 1,
sequel
2,
sequel 3, and
sequel 4.
Electronics Implausible Remarks
Since our last report in the September issue (page
81), we have received about 600 additional entries for the contest on nonsensical remarks
about electronics. If you have not been following this contest, Popular Electronics is
sending a soldering gun to every reader who submits a publishable "quote" that he or
she has overheard. The "quote" must be a wild, inane, or implausible explanation of something
electronic. Entries should, be addressed to: "Gun Contest," Popular Electronics, One
Park Avenue, New York, N. Y, 10016. Postmarks will determine the winners of duplicate
entries.
Back to the Store. One reader writes that he overheard a little old
lady explain to a clerk what was the matter with her defunct AM receiver in this way,
"There's nothing too much wrong with it - if you plug it in, you'll see that the motor
is still humming loudly, but the set won't talk."
Another reader stood silently by while a dumbfounded clerk heard a customer tell his
friend, "Don't waste money on 5 amp fuses - buy 15 or 20 amp fuses - they cost the same
and you get more fuse for your money."
In a hi-fi salon, a wife who expressed interest in a transistorized FM receiver but
was perplexed by the term "solid state" was told by her husband, "Oh, that's the latest
name those manufacturers are using for high fidelity."
Off the Air. Hams and CB'ers have a lot of fun telling tales on one
another. Last summer two CB'ers were comparing signal strength reports and one told the
other, "Okay, your meter is probably right - a 3-inch meter is always better than a 2-inch
meter because the needle is longer." And one prospective ham exclaimed on hearing his
first SSB signal, "How in the world do they learn to talk like that?"
The son of the father who made the following prize remark was probably left speechless
by the irrefutable logic of "If that VOM reads infinity at full scale, then half-scale
must be half of infinity."
Winners. This month soldering guns went to Ralph Burbank, Tom Garrard,
G. Linwood, Philip Taylor, and Steve Wozniak. More "quotes" and a new list of soldering
gun winners next month.
Posted April 6, 2018
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