LGR Oddware - The 1997 Audible MobilePlayer System
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- Опубликовано: 8 авг 2019
- Audible (yes, that one) used to make hardware! And their first Oddware offering was the $199 Mobile Player from 1997, capable of playing up to two hours of digitized spoken word audio downloaded from their website.
● Grab the Audible Manager CD-ROM archive here:
archive.org/details/audiblemo...
● LGR links:
/ lazygamereviews
/ lazygamereviews
/ lazygamereviews
● Music courtesy of:
www.epidemicsound.com
#LGR #Oddware #NotSponsored 
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@LGR You should totally contact Audible support and tell them you have problems syncing their device. ;-)
This.
Just do it
420 likes!
I'd do this for the lulz.
They're already giving me their ads before and after this video haha
"Approximately 1,000 people have already purchased the $199 device, according to Sperring.
Sperring sees a time when the demand for the device will overwhelm production"
Oh I just adore that mid 90's tech optimism. "1000 people have *already* purchased" is so glass half full
Today it's the "I have 1000 subs" or "I have 1000 twitter followers" enthusiasm.
@@enlightendbel Lately I've been frequently falling in to the "subs" camp (not even 1000, or 100 for that matter) and I have to remind myself of what an absolute marvel of technology it is that anyone would find anything I do interesting enough to WANT to see it. Even if that person is one in a million, I can reach over 6000 people. It's mind boggling when you think about it.
In 1997 that was a sizable percentage of the number of people on AOL UK... and as an online only deal, 1000 is remarkable.
@@TheBrokenLife That's exactly the kind of mindset you need to reach all those people, everyone starts from 0.
@@kittycoma Thanks! I started my channel for myself as a mechanism to motivate myself to get more work done, and in that regard it's worked well, but everyone likes to be successful too. I'm sure it will come in time!
Animated gif logos from 90's websites are THE best.
*N O S T A L G I A*
"Steve's Website!!!"
*in awesome flashy glowing text*
VideoToaster damn
Those nostalgia days
Rotating skulls, little explosion animations the rotating yellow light with "under construction" written next to it.
Wyatt R. inb4 burn all gifs
I still can't believe they're using the same '' this is audible'' tagline even today
that blew my mind too. i have always complained about how jaring that is at the end. but knowing its the Dead founder .. its kinda sweet
kebabgud Don Katz is still alive, it was the CEO Andrew Huffman who died.
Amazon isn't exactly original. As part of the Corpo species, it's main form of existence is oppression and the classic "buying themselves out of mediocrity".
why...it defines them...it's awesome.
Well to be fair, the tag line is clever. So why not use it :)
An episode of Oddware with a mini Tech Tales built in.
Today is good.
Odd Tales.
The FM transmitter shocked me. It's like the Bluetooth of its day!
As a kid I used to have a microphone that broadcast over AM radio. I'm surprised to see this stuff continue into later years when audio jacks are a better option.
My dad once had a battery powered AM/FM radio shaped just like a pair of headphones... Imagine using that with this
ShadowWing Tronix I suppose it’s to cater to cheaper car stereos that do not have a line-in and tape deck.
@@RAMChYLD In the years before I had a car with a Bluetooth connectable audio system, I used this transmitter that broadcast locally in the FM band. You could plug in an Mp3 player or a USB stick and play things on it so you could listen on your radio. I always set it to a frequency that didn't have a station, though I always wondered if anyone next to me in traffic ever picked up on me listening to my favorite podcasts.
@@Girder3 I still do that, having no connectivity between my phone and car stereo.
3:51 CEO's sudden death jolts Wayne company.
Wife dead also.
Son vows revenge.
Holy decibels Audible Man! The Penguin is attacking, quick! to the AudioCave!
I bet this Audible company is gonna be big someday.
JT LovesCodeLyoko someday... ;)
I wouldn't hold my breath. Audiobooks are just a fad, I assure you.
After seeing THIS device, i highly doubt it
Nah, they're doomed to fail. And what's this Amazon website I keep hearing about? I doubt they'll make it past 2002.
Next you'll tell me AOL will merge with Time Warner and that will fail!
Almost turned into a "Tech Tales" ... good video :) Thanks!
That's just what happens on Oddware, every episode :)
@@LGR On a related note, Company Man just did a video on Napster this week - you can find it here: ruclips.net/video/uzbrVpG90yc/видео.html
Dude! You totally should've pitched this video to Audible. Make that money man!
Seriously just seems like lost money. Unless they just weren't interested.
They sponsor anyone with a pulse so this means LGR has no pulse and instead runs on old PC hardware? Makes sense.
I am glad it is not sponsored to be honest
Eh. Felt weird to be paid by the same company as the subject of the video.
Besides, I know RUclips's ad algorithm will do its job and display Audible ads anyways. So I get indirectly paid by them but without signing a contract with Amazon. Win-win!
LGR, Fair enough!
Ah! now that explains why the audible message at the beginning (and often end) on any audible audiobook nowadays sounds so ancient. it was recorded back then! i love that voice & choice 😍
Oh. They still do that? I never used Audible myself so I don't really know.
Yes, every Audible title ends with that same voice saying "Audible hopes you've enjoyed this program." in glorious retro 8-bit, 8khz quality.
This makes me appreciate audible for holding onto their humble beginnings and remembering what got them to where they are now, from the extensive legacy support to keeping their old tagline and beginning and end messages, great to see a company care about their past.
@@kirbysuperstaruhh3769
What's even more interesting is that they can do all that despite being owned by Amazon.
@@kbhasi I wonder how much longer they'll be able to do all that, before they're being ... smoothed
8-bit U LAW at 8khz is literally the same quality that phones transmit at during phone calls.
For real? :o I mean, phone calls dont exactly sound great (especially when someone uses a car's builtin mic...) but I always thought it was 16-something...
You mean land line phones.
Also the same quality of old samplers from the 80s (think Linn LM-1, Oberheim DMX, E-mu Emulator II)
I was definitely getting hold music vibes from the 8-bit u-Law at 8kHz smooth jazz.
@@terinjokes yeah man it was pretty cool sounding
Somehow the fuzzy compressed sound makes the already-soothing narrator’s voice even more soothing. This is like a vintage instant ASMR machine.
Had to re-listen to that RealPlayer-jingle four times before continuing on with the video. That nostalgia, man.
Kinda funny how you chose music that manages to sound quite decent despite the format
Thought the same. The "wind-down" version actually would work well in an elevator, where nobody pays big attention to detail of the clip, or as a shop BGM. I actually liked it...kinda. o.o Was relaxing to a weird degree, since a lot of other parts of the music was cut out.
@@IngwiePhoenix Totally agree
why does that music make me want to play The Sims?
I felt like I got put on hold
If you want to listen to it more, it's called The Years We Had by Magnus Ringblom
don't know if it's only me, but that 8bit music playback has a certain charm to it.
Reminds me of a radio in Fallout for some reason?
reminds me of hold music without the violent sound clipping
14:33 sounds like being left on hold!
"Your call is very important to us...
Please stay on the line!"
Oh my God I remember listening to Car Talk all the time when my dad was driving with me in his truck as a kid. That brought back memories
I love hearing, "This is Audible." I had no clue it went so far back!
Audible hopes you've enjoyed this program
Me too! I was hoping he'd find ' Audible hopes you have enjoyed this program'
Still the exact same audio quality 🤣 I love it
1997 I was so far from my ISP my 56k connection was between 14.4 and 26.6. There was no way I could download a tapebook.
I loved car talk. Dad would have NPR on Sundays for church, and when we would do our trips to Bragg.
14:33 I dont know, I feel that fuzzy sound quality is how jazz is meant to be heard.
jazz audiophiles triggered
Vaporwave
@@etan838 Yeah it evokes trippy vaporwave imagery
Also, "Opus No. 1"... it almost feels sacrilegious to hear it at high quality.
ruclips.net/video/w-SIManm_Qo/видео.html
That wasn't jazz
And anyway if anything jazz musicians are the most anal of any genre about recording quality
The stories of Steely Dan's recording sessions are legendary, infamous.
Like how Steely Dan literally invented the drum machine, in the *70s!*
It took up two rooms because computers were enormous at the time, and took days to synthesize drum beats. But yeah on their album Gaucho they tried literally hundreds of drummers and spent months on just one song trying to find the perfect sounding drum part, rejected them all, and invented the drum machine so they could make everything exactly how they want. And they were complete assholes to all the drummers and sound engineers they brought in. For the song Babylon Sisters that they took months recording with all these hundreds of drummers, they eventually brought in Bernard Purdie who then managed to nail it in 2 takes. Bernard Purdie for those who don't know (he's not well known to rock fans) is basically the reason John Bonham sounded so good, because he stole from Purdie pretty liberally. Check out Fool In The Rain by Led Zeppelin for example, that drum beat is called the Purdie Shuffle, and is the same beat Purdie did on the Steely Dan song Babylon Sisters. Purdie is arguably the best jazz and R&B and funk drummer ever, and definitely arguable as the best drummer of all genres, but yeah unless you listen to jazz and all that you probably don't know who he is which is a shame.
I remember before podcasts and smart phones or really cell phones, Audible was one way to listen to some shows on NPR.
The wireless output is something I didn't expect and is extremely forward thinking!!! Whoa
I had a feeling that you'd be a CarTalk fan. Great video as always!
Which is the exact episode he plays the clip from? I want to listen to the full thing.
Didn't expect an Aud-ware video today, great video as always!
Underrated pun
Auld-ware?
No more puns please!
I approve of this comment!
Boy did I love car talk! And I'm not even a car fanatic either. Click and Clack were just so entertaining to everyone. They still are old episodes on my local NPR station to!
"digital words to go", "turn downtime into productive time", "www-based"
...It goes without saying, but their copy writing is clumsy as heck!
Odd-ible Wear
What's up check mark
I always wondered what that weird semi-robot voice in the beginning and end of Audible books was. Now I know! It's from the original and that makes me happy to know.
Ah, RealPlayer before it became a huge, slow, buffering P.O.S. Apparently now they focus on streaming. Makes sense.
StCerberusEngel I have nightmares over the times I’ve had to uninstall RealPlayer.
RealPlayer has always been awful. We were just willing to put up with it because there wasn't really anything better :P
Real player! yeesh that is old school. Remember DIVX player?!
True fact: their original plan was to make a system to stream liberal propaganda. That's where the original name of the company, Progressive Networks came from.
I remember when real-player was the standard for audio and video streaming online with a 56k modem. Now they have blended into obscurity and are no longer a major player. I used to love that thing before it became a bloated piece of crap. That and quick time, ahhhh memories from back in the day.
The sound reminded me of older AM radio. Oddly nostalgic.
This is just a Tech Tale episode disguised as a Oddware! (and i'm loving it!)
Hah I remember my first MP3 player - 64Mb USB thing with a terrible interface, powered by a single AAA battery. Still, pretty awesome at the time.
The Kombinator was it the one made by Sony that had the controls on its integrated lanyard?
My first MP3 player was 10mb, clear see through case. I still have it
My first MP3 player was the Creative Zen Touch 2, it had 20gb of harddrive space (Yes, it used a very small HDD).
These days I have a Sony Walkman nw-a45.
"If you want to safe space, 64kbits mp3's are more then enough for good sound."
Thanks, packaging...yeah... good enough. Let's talk about that.
I had a Rio 600 32 MB. It was rad. I thought the amount of mp3s I could stick in there was mind blowing back when I was a kid.
14:32 Sounds like I was put on hold.
In my experience, hold music sounds like 2 bits at 16Khz at best, with the audio cutting out below a certain threshold.
1997 Subaru Brighton. Yes.
Ohh Car Talk my Sundays were never the same Without Click and Clack.
Well, that RealPlayer sound instantly brought me back to Active Channels.
Meanwhile, I found it really neat that Audible's modern software actually had a callback to a previous Oddware episode!
audible. when you're ahead of the curve and behind in the times.
Wait - 2 hours in 4MB of storage? That's 4.4 kilobits per second!
6.5 kbps according to that leaflet
@@JonnyInfinite Interesting. Maybe it's more than 4MB (or less than 2 hours) of storage.
Might be VBR peaking at 6.5 kbps, and being targeted at spoken word Audible accounted for all the silence when determining recording time.
Sometimes I wake up early so I can get to wherever I'm working that day with enough time to spare to sit in my truck and watch old LGR videos. It's like morning coffee but more fulfilling.
Fun device. The early portable digital players always fascinated me. I got a Rio 600 as a teen not long after it came out. A whole 32 megs of music on that puppy. But damn if I didn't use the hell out of it. Still have it somewhere in a box in my apartment.
And I think we all miss Car Talk.
Great find! This is the perfect obscure product for this LGR segment. I'm really impressed it had a built in FM transmitter.
I had one of these when I was younger my brother used to play old audiobooks with that, I really miss this machine too bad it was stolen from me few months ago. Great review LGR 👏
That gold CD-R was not cheap back in 1997...
Yes...the Kodak gold..
It's been 22 years and that CD still works. LGR should consider himself lucky he could have ended up with bit rot with a cheap CD.
Hell yeah Car Talk! I miss that show too, the hosts had such great chemistry and wit.
The “This is audible” recording still sounds the same 22 years later 😂
Aaahh.. It always pleases me - calm voice, good quality content,chill background soundtrack. Thank you.
Greetings from Lithuania
Car Talk! I loved that show! thanks for the reminder to give a listen again.
Wonder if Scotty Kilmer ever starred on there
@@adventureoflinkmk2 like a cross over or maybe a guest spot if one of the tappet bros is out sick. Good question!
14:14 you sound just like the Half - Life NPC scientists.
Ah yes, I love poor quality voice audio in 90s videogames. It adds to the experience
Gordon, start the rotor arms!
It sounds worse. But it's still... Audible.
Did you submit your status report to the administrator today?
simio1337 My god! What are you doing?
i spent a lot of time watching the animation of files being transfered on windows when i was a kid lolllll
Good job as always, sending this warm nostalgia feeling, it clears your head man
Hearing that 8-bit 8 kHz Mono music made me feel like I was in an elevator, and for some reason I wanna hear more.
car talk was funny. i used to listen to it every Saturday morning. now they play the best of car talk.
My local NPR stopped playing them completely as of this year. Sad times.
@@tylereifert2211 They still release a new podcast "best of" episode every week
@@tylereifert2211 if you search CarTalk on your favourite podcast app you'll get the best of episodes each week if you're into that. Depending on your computer skills you may be able to download an entire archive of Click n' Clack!
11:53 i was expecting 'welcome... to ZOMBOCOM'
Pedro Silva everything is possible on zombo.com
Thanks Clint for that lo-fi demonstration at 14:14. I get warm nostalgia fuzzy feelings of 90's cable and early 90's fm sound.
Love the channel Broseph, brings me back for sure.
So, if you bought shares when they where at 15 cent a piece, you would make stupid amount of money.
Video not sponsored by... He should have tried to contact them for that XD
I got an advert for audible before the video started, so yeah.
Who at first thought his voice didnt match his face? Love your channel
Man your choice in music is such a treat Thanks Clint!
It looks like those prox mines from Goldeneye 64.
Omg this is so true !
The mines from the game (and the movie) were based on/modeled from the base of an old PC Commander/Saitek joystick model.
I was so ready for this video to be sponsored by audible.
Another awesome video. Great work, Clint. Thank you.
One of my favourite channels to watch great voice to listen to keep up the videos 😊👍
"the Net"
I miss the 90s
Clint’s voice visualisation has a traditionally dressed Chinese/Japanese guy complete with the bamboo hat standing sideways. I swear. 14:31
Hearing you talk with that Audible compression just instantly took me back to when I was listening to audiobooks of H.P. Lovecraft stories on my iPod and made me all fuzzy inside!
I’ve been a fan of your channel for a while. Your voice is very soothing and your content is amazing! Please don’t stop doing your thing!
That soul reaver box is awesome!
Wanted to say the same thing :)
The 8 bit audio music gave it a kinda sharming sound
The music playback reminds me of the quality of waiting songs you hear on the phone.
I love Shazaming you! You have such nice taste in music! Thank you :D
LGR: puts 320kbps mp3 audio as sample in video
youtube: laughs in AAC
me: laughs in cliché meme format
Gameboy: Laughs in 1bit 16Khz
Yes, this is irrelevant, but it must have been amazing at the time to hear sampled audio coming from a Gameboy.
LGR: starts video almost 6 minutes in
Everyone else: intro ends almost 6 minutes in
Fantastic video, had no idea on how they started off and have been around for so long!
Great video. I'm a big fan of LGR and I really enjoy all your videos. I love how this Oddware had a lot of history like a tech tales episode has. Fantastic as always.
Thank you!
Love your videos! Keep up the good work!
Clicked so fast
That I TRAVELED to the the 90's!
I clicked so fast, I travelled to the 1790's!
@@garethfairclough8715 I clicked so fast, I traveled to 1899BC.
Quick buy Google stock before you jump back to the present!
That's a fast click, 88MPH!
@@TheDeeplyCynical I wonder what would happen if you surpass 88mph?
Awesome video as usual!
Just discovered and been binge watching LGR. I'm 34 and was a late-90s PC gaming purist, and all your videos just take back. Awesome. Would love to see your reviews of Final Fantasy 7 and/or 8. (Their PC versions were infinitely better than the PS releases)
Audible advert before this video!
And afterwards!
Somebody’s getting paid!
Audible -- not a sponsor -- Eric O.
That one video that should’ve been sponsored by Audible isn’t... God damn it.
i agree
Honestly it kinda felt like a conflict of interest. Besides, I know the RUclips advertising algorithm will pair this episode with Audible prerolls anyway, so I make money off of them without the need to sign a contract with Amazon and compromise the content. Win-win 👍
Finally a new ODDWARE. This is my favourite series you do.
As always awesome video! Thank!
Is this the next version of those audible promotions everywhere on RUclips?
This looks much more interesting though. :P
Great. I've seen the word audible too many times due to this video and now it's broken.
Red 32, red 32, set, set HIKE!!!
that should sort itself out relatively quickly.
I could stare at your stereo receiver and listen to that all day. Thanks for a trip back.
They still make "new" best of car talk podcasts. I enjoy listening to them, the segments are rarely repetitive and it is fun hearing them discuss 90s cars as if they are contemporary
Now this right here is some prime Oddware! 😁
Awe man, i was totally hoping for the end credit to just say "Sponsored by Audible" and just thinking Dammit that was one hell of a plug.
your quality is getting so much better. not that it wasn't good before but i am def seeing an improvement. as usual i am thoroughly entertained! good work on the channel!
I've enjoyed every second of this! I always enjoy LGR content to, at the very least, a fair extent, but this was one of those times I get spellbound... And as sb else pointed out, this is a Tech Tale in its own right. Many thanks for what you do!
You should call them and ask for help setting it up. Just pretend you are a senior citizen.
MrKornnugget I bought this brand new audio book device youngin you better help me set it up sunny
I wonder if they'd offer a discounted Kindle or something.
Keiya Too bad a kindle doesn’t have audio books
@@EddieBurke did they take that feature out? My old first gen Kindle touch supported audible
@@keiyakins I have the newest Paperwhite and you can listed to Audible books through bluetooth headphones.
Theres something very satisfying listening to music in 8bit lol
I think that the audio codec they developed is truly impressive. Fitting a few hours of usable audio in a couple of megabytes is truly remarkable if not unbelievable!
Great video! Although I've never heard about this system, it made me travel back in time!
Wait ..really ? You've never heard of audible?
This reminds me of the Logitech AudioMan. I wonder if Clint knows about _that_ oddity.
I have one, somewhere.
Car Talk really was something special
That Soundsystem you have is so nifty
This is like a combination between LGR and Techmoan, nice video, Clint!