STACK #217 November 2022

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NOVEMBER LIFE TECH Technology has become an integral part of Australian lifestyles and continues to advance in leaps and bounds. From smartphones to smart homes, STACK keeps you up to date on the latest consumer tech in user-friendly terms, along with key points to consider before you buy. If you love tech, you’re in the right place.

STACK ’ s TECH tips

Do you own or are you thinking of buying a smart speaker?You can direct your voice assistant of choice to assist you around the house in many ways. For the absent minded, this one is a doozy. If, like most of us, you have a habit of stashing away important documents or items so well you forget where you put them, turn to your smart speaker. It’s simple, just call out, “Hey, Google/Alexa/Siri, remember my Nan’s recipe/antique ring is in the red tub in the spare room.”When the day comes to locate said Nan’s recipe/antique ring, just ask your smart speaker where you put them, and the location will be revealed.

Do you have a tech horror story? Has tech come back to ‘byte’ you hard? Have you accidentally sent a text to the wrong person or deleted your employer’s hard drive?Well, we want to hear about it. Send your terror byte to editor@stack.com.au This month, Andy. G shares his tech nightmare. L ast month’s story reminded me of my own tech wedding nightmare 12 years ago. Being budget conscious, I searched for a cost-effective solution for every expensive wedding idea my wife had. I thought I’d struck gold when a friend, an accomplished photographer, offered to shoot the wedding as his gift to us. Thankfully, my wife agreed. After the big day, the friend dropped around the memory cards: “Don’t lose these – I don’t have a backup,” he said. I immediately transferred them to my laptop. And then duly misplaced the SD cards. For weeks I kept telling myself, “You’ve got to back this

1982

What was the hottest tech in…

It was 1982, and the arrival of the Commodore 64, when the home computer revolution became a reality for Australians. Computers were still considered the domain of boffins, so having one in the home was like owning a slice of the future today. Looking like a tanned take on sibling the VIC-20, which had paved the way in getting Commodore’s name known, the C64 packed serious power: 64K of memory (huge at the time), 16 colours, a sound chip that’s still in demand

today, and sprite graphics that made it the perfect machine for doing your accounts, storing recipes and programming… oh, who are we kidding? It was also a top-notch games machine! It wasn’t until 1984 that the Commodore 64 really took off in Australia, with the release of the Family Pack into retailers countrywide, packing the computer, a cassette recorder for saving and loading programmes, a (terrible) joystick, and four pieces of software. Coupled with a catchy-as jingle still firmly wedged in ‘80s kids’ brains – “Are you keeping up with the Commodore? ‘Cos the Commodore is keeping up with you” – the primary key to the C64’s success was its price, allowing the machine to bring the tech revolution into people's homes like nothing before it.

lappy up,” and countered it with, “I’ll do it tomorrow.” But there was no tomorrow. A few days later, I left the laptop in a Brisbane airport bar, and with that went the photographic chronicle of our big day. It never turned up. Back then, I had no cloud storage, and my wife went absolutely mental. To this day, we only have other people’s photographs of the wedding, and I live in the hope of one day finding the SD cards.

Ooh, it’s our Christmas issue next month, and of course, that can only mean one thing: a Christmas gift guide! Save your family and friends from unwanted gifts they’ll never use by putting a tech treat under the tree this year. We’ll outline the hottest tech of 2022 across all budgets to make this year a Christmas to remember. On The Radar

28 NOVEMBER 2022

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