20 tech gadgets from the 90s that you probably forgot about

If the busiest person in your life didn’t have a PalmPilot, the busiest character in your favorite movie did. Thankfully, smartphones came alone and eliminated the need for these bulky items. 

MP3s seem silly and outdated now, but it’s important to remember that many pieces of technology are important in the domino effect of progress. If we never had the MP3 player, who knows when we would’ve had music on our phones? 

Forget iOS and Android. Were you using Linux when it first debuted? Linus Torvalds, the man who invented Linux, is a software pioneer who’s partially responsible for everyone's ability to use Google and Amazon. 

Before everybody had the iPhone, everybody had the Nokia 1011. It was like carrying around a home phone, but only slightly less bulky. Still, it was a major improvement from mobile phones before it, as those were absolutely enormous. 

Tamagotchis were the answer for any kid who wanted a pet but was deemed too irresponsible to care for one. Even though these virtual pets could be taken anywhere, most were still neglected. 

Some of the best video games of all time were first released for Nintendo 64. This game console taught many just how disruptive dust can be to technology. If the game weren’t working, simply blowing on the console would often do the trick. 

Beepers weren’t first invented in the ‘90s, and Motorola had been making them long prior. But that decade brought about a renewed love for the technology, probably because Motorola released them in fun colors. A fun color can make anything more appealing. 

Electronic diaries were treated similarly to beepers in the ‘90s. They suddenly became super popular. The days of having to write your diary entries with actual pen and paper like a Luddite were gone, and in were the days of taking much longer and having much less space to document your feelings. 

Anyone who saw Home Alone wanted a Talkboy. Most people who watched it didn’t have anything they needed to record, but that didn’t change the desire to have one. Heck, they’re still appealing when watching Home Alone, and we all have recording devices on our phones. 

Now, it’s just Ask.com, but when it first debuted, it was called Ask Jeeves, and it was awesome. Of course, the advent of Google, Yahoo, MSN, and other search engines rendered it nearly obsolete, but this technology is still kicking. 

You probably haven’t forgotten that GPS exists, but since it’s built into our cars and phones, you might have forgotten that once upon a time, it was a standalone device. The ‘90s were a bulky decade. 

Caller ID is similar to GPS in that it’s something we’re so used to that we forget that it wasn’t always part of our daily lives. Before the ‘90s, if you wanted to know who was calling, you had to answer the call and find out. 

If you haven’t forgotten about DVD players completely, you’ve probably at least forgotten about portable DVD players. Yep, starting in the late ‘90s, we could take our DVDs and watch them wherever we wanted. If you ever judge an iPad kid, remember how much you loved your portable DVD player. 

The internet used to be a very noisy affair. When dial-up reigned supreme, there was lots of beeping involved. And if someone wanted to make a call while you were on the internet, someone had to change their plans. The ‘90s only allowed for one of those activities at a time. 

So many technological advances come down to simply making things smaller. You didn’t want to listen to your music on a regular-sized CD anymore? The ‘90s had you covered, thanks to the MiniDisc. 

The Nintendo Gameboy was released at the very end of the ‘80s, surging into mass popularity in the early ‘90s. It reigned supreme for quite a while, even having a hold on gamers into the ‘00s. 

You can get ahold of anyone you want at any time today, but if you wanted to have a conversation with someone via AOL, you had to hope they were online, too. You could have called them, but what fun would that have been?

The idea of a phone flipping today is crazy — not in the mechanics but in its popularity. What was so appealing about having to open and close your phone? Whatever it was, it had a massive grip on the population. 

Desktop computers have come a long, long way since the iMac G3. But despite being enormous and difficult to find space for at your house, the iMac G3 was a desirable product. And looking at it today, it’s totally understandable. Something about it still looks cool. 

A landline telephone is the only piece of technology that’s worth making transparent. The inventors of the clear telephone knew that, and they capitalized on it. Nothing screams the early ‘90s like a clear telephone in a teenager’s bedroom.