Technician Tuesday: Two surprises in old technology

Recently I mentioned to some younger friends that certain types of art reminds me of computer screensavers. My friends mentioned they had never really seen the point of screensavers. They were surprised when I told them the purpose is in the name: “screensaver.” Older computer and television monitors would permanently burn an image into the screen if that image was constantly on the screen. A screensaver would vary what was shown on the screen so it would save the screen.

I was surprised to recently read that FM, meaning frequency modulated. radio was much easier with vacuum tubes. The comment I read was FM radio could be set up with far fewer vacuum tubes than it currently takes with modern solid-state technology.