Popular Science
The $15,000 A.I. From 1983
Why Do We Put Holes In Our Head? Before responsive, voice-controlled assistants like Alexa and Siri, we had the “Butler in a Box” — which its maker Mastervoice and its creator Gus Searcy described as “The world’s first artificial intelligent environmental control system for the home.” It… wasn’t very intelligent, despite claiming it could control…
Popular Science
The Mind Control Glasses That Ended in Lawsuits
Thank you to Perplexity for sponsoring this video! Check out Perplexity for all of your holiday shopping at Warning: This video contains flashing lights which may not be suitable for photosensitive epilepsy. Flashing Lights Begin (6:46) Skip Flashing Lights (6:59) Can a pair of flashing retro tech glasses and some CDs sync your brainwaves, train…
Popular Science
The Man Who Lived with No Brain
Thanks to DuckDuckGo for sponsoring this video! Try Privacy Pro free for 7 days at Further Reading/Viewing: “The Man with a Shattered World: The History of a Brain Wound,” by A. R. Luria. THE MAN WITH A SHATTERED WORLD: THE HISTORY OF A BRAIN WOUND by A. R. Luria; Translated from the Russian by Lynn…
Popular Science
How to Make a YouTube Video in 1987
Decades before software like Premiere and iMovie made video editing cheap, easy, and accessible for everyone, the only option was chaining a conglomerate of vintage 80s technology – multiple camcorders or VCRs and a TV – to craft custom analog video. Then the Videonics system changed tech history forever. With professional-grade setups costing up to…
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@felino86
March 6, 2024 at 4:41 pm
This was so interesting, and incredible too. Thank you! I really hope there will be more videos on obscure technologies!
@popularscience
March 6, 2024 at 6:44 pm
Hey felino, thanks! And yep, more on the way, a new video on the channel every week, spreading the obscure technology videos out a few weeks apart
@asg7861
March 6, 2024 at 4:45 pm
The Donna is is better
@popularscience
March 6, 2024 at 6:43 pm
The Donna, from Suits?!
@croc_hound
March 6, 2024 at 4:47 pm
my man gus really did it all 💀
@popularscience
March 6, 2024 at 6:36 pm
Gus Searcy has one of the wildest stories ever, and a lot of it checks out
@ViceroyRoyer
March 6, 2024 at 4:54 pm
Hate the zooms, tell the editor not to do it
@eminemfan50098
March 6, 2024 at 6:15 pm
I like the zooms. Editor, keep it up.
@popularscience
March 6, 2024 at 6:32 pm
putting both of you in the Thunderdome, two will enter, one will leave
the fate of zooms are at stake
@hunter8822
March 6, 2024 at 5:00 pm
This is a very well constructed video essay. The sign off and conclusion was very well written.
@popularscience
March 6, 2024 at 6:28 pm
Thanks, hunter — the conclusions tend to write themselves as we get deeper and deeper into a topic. That always works out better than deciding what point you want to make before you write up a video
@Ibs123
March 6, 2024 at 5:17 pm
Ah you bring me nostalgia
@popularscience
March 6, 2024 at 6:02 pm
Isn’t it funny how the devices that made big promises they couldn’t really deliver on, cost a ton more money adjusted for inflation, and never quite worked right somehow generate nostalgia?? It’s like we understood how hard they were trying to make us happy
@kae3037
March 6, 2024 at 5:19 pm
Great video 👍
@popularscience
March 6, 2024 at 6:00 pm
Thanks, kae — there’ll be a new video every week, so please subscriiiibe
@kae3037
March 6, 2024 at 7:24 pm
Already haaave, I mean diiid 😁 @@popularscience
@ddturnerphd
March 6, 2024 at 5:22 pm
I love lamp. The end of this video was illuminating.
@popularscience
March 6, 2024 at 5:59 pm
please make a Zork “GET LAMP” reference to complete the trifecta
@ddturnerphd
March 6, 2024 at 6:31 pm
@@popularscience Sorry, the GET LAMP reference was…
Taken.
@GoodGamer3000
March 6, 2024 at 5:26 pm
Does it really say “You’ve just hired a butler who is slightly hard of hearing [and] knows no language…”? In the MANUAL? Gee, that would’ve been nice to know _before_ I spent $15,000
@matt.willoughby
March 6, 2024 at 5:33 pm
It wasn’t $15k, that was how much it would cost with enough modules to control “everything” in your house, about 40 objects
@popularscience
March 6, 2024 at 5:49 pm
Yep, and Gus Searcy used the phrase a few times in interviews. But even that is pretty remarkable compared to the alternative of… nothing, really.
@GoodGamer3000
March 6, 2024 at 6:04 pm
@@popularscience, cool piece of tech, for sure, but you were definitely paying the early adopter tax. The Clapper might’ve been better value lol
@PhoneLosersofAmerica
March 6, 2024 at 5:28 pm
At the time this thing came out, Radio Shack also had a home automation system which used the same rebranded modules. I bought a bunch of it when I was a teenager, and for less than $100 I could control lights and appliances all over the house. The only difference, besides the price, was that I used buttons and timers to control things, not my voice.
@popularscience
March 6, 2024 at 5:47 pm
That’s awesome, do you remember what it was called?
@BrontoByteStudio
March 6, 2024 at 5:30 pm
Who else came from Vsauce?
@dumbassprogrammer
March 6, 2024 at 6:08 pm
Here!
@popularscience
March 6, 2024 at 6:15 pm
i did
@maple22moose44
March 6, 2024 at 6:40 pm
i did
@Master_Sword_From_BOTW
March 6, 2024 at 6:44 pm
i did
@DiwosSunar
March 6, 2024 at 6:47 pm
I did
@matt.willoughby
March 6, 2024 at 5:31 pm
I would be interested in hearing about the biography of its inventor
@popularscience
March 6, 2024 at 5:46 pm
Gus Searcy’s story is incredible, it legitimately could be a Netflix series
@talha.256
March 6, 2024 at 5:40 pm
Demon Seed is crazy
@popularscience
March 6, 2024 at 5:46 pm
Of all the films to base a virtual assistant on, Demon Seed seems one of the least likely. For probably 300 different reasons.
@pedroplays3681
March 6, 2024 at 5:40 pm
You are unacceptably underrated. The editing is awsome and the structure of the videos is to dream of! I cant believe that videos like this doesnt get picked up by the youtube algorythm. Videos like this deserve to get millions of views. Keep up the good work
@popularscience
March 6, 2024 at 5:45 pm
Thanks, Pedro, it is really nice to hear all that. Hopefully the algorithm gets friendlier soon — and in the meantime, we’ll be putting out a new video every week, so subscribe if you like what you see!
@damnsonwheredyoufindthis
March 6, 2024 at 5:50 pm
@YouTube y’all better stuff this in the algorithm immediately
@popularscience
March 6, 2024 at 6:24 pm
we will overwhelm the algorithm with good videos over time (one per week), our assault will be unceasing. we will be victorious
@Dementia69
March 6, 2024 at 5:58 pm
Who got chills from this video?
@popularscience
March 6, 2024 at 6:17 pm
if thinking about retro tech and future tech doesn’t give you chills, you’re not going deep enough
@HealthFoodRx
March 6, 2024 at 6:19 pm
In a roundabout way, comments are back on PopSci!
@popularscience
March 6, 2024 at 6:28 pm
We read every single comment, always, and respond to as many of them as possible. If someone takes the time to write something, we should take the time to read it
@mood1075
March 6, 2024 at 6:40 pm
We. want. more. paradoxes!
@popularscience
March 6, 2024 at 7:02 pm
there must be paradoxical technology that exacerbates the problem it’s meant to solve
well, mobile phones have done that to some degree, connecting us efficiently while sometimes encouraging isolation
@MichaelErnest666
March 6, 2024 at 6:47 pm
I Love You 🌹
@popularscience
March 6, 2024 at 6:55 pm
“And I love yous, too!” — Rocky Balboa, Rocky II
@Connor_Kirkpatrick
March 6, 2024 at 6:56 pm
Hard to call it “taking risks” when the inventor was that successful before even hitting 20 lol. You gotta be eccentric AND have money to burn
@nytugre
March 6, 2024 at 6:57 pm
I watched this then realized it just came out 😂 cool video!
@Master_Sword_From_BOTW
March 6, 2024 at 7:00 pm
Gus thought he could make Demon Seed 2
@edattacks
March 6, 2024 at 7:08 pm
Wow. Great video. “This isnt a tech video. This is a GHOST story” GOODNESS MAN. Way to throw water on the frail wires 😂. Thanks to Vsauce for putting me on to thie channel
@nobody7204
March 6, 2024 at 7:13 pm
Vsauce truly has interesting tastes
@twix9221
March 6, 2024 at 8:02 pm
Facinating story, so sad to see this great invention that made way for so much tech be forgotten and not talked about (untill now) 🙂
@AveriV1
March 7, 2024 at 6:37 am
bro thinks he is 079
@groznyentertainment
March 7, 2024 at 6:52 am
As soon as you said magician I became sceptic of the product being a scam. Maybe that’s why no one paid attention to it
@devilbat_gg
March 7, 2024 at 7:40 am
Absolutely insane that this legitimately worked over twenty years before this really became a thing. How does it work?? I have so many questions about both this device and its creator, fascinating video!
@ItsNotLookingGood
March 7, 2024 at 7:51 am
Well consider my mind blow
@LookingBackwards
March 7, 2024 at 7:51 am
Absolutely brilliant video!
@1objection
March 7, 2024 at 9:09 am
Wow, amazing video!
That was insanely entertaining and educational.
@geramer
March 7, 2024 at 9:16 am
At least they didn’t pay to be spied on.
@Ki11ami11a
March 7, 2024 at 9:45 am
Before I watch the full video to answer the questions about why or why he did the things he did well look at the era it was the crack boom homie Definitely rolled some bowls
@tonye.5661
March 7, 2024 at 10:04 am
wow that blew me away, never heard of this device before, for its
time it was the future!
@noobkanon2
March 7, 2024 at 10:20 am
Yeah but…. How does it work?
@darkawakenings77
March 7, 2024 at 10:28 am
What a cool video/article!!
@popularscience
March 8, 2024 at 11:41 am
Thanks! There’s so much good material in the old archives of Popular Science that virtually any topic has something interesting written about it. There was a lot of trepanning stuff we couldn’t fit in
@amsie02
March 7, 2024 at 10:48 am
great video:)
@popularscience
March 8, 2024 at 11:41 am
thanks, amsie — new video next week!
@davepov
March 7, 2024 at 11:01 am
As a TV news reporter in the 1980’s I once did a story on a new home being built. As part of it, there were special electrical outlets put in all through the home. Then, a special panel was installed next, and connected to, the electrical circuit box. That panel was attached to a control box in the house, usually close to the entrance from the garage to the home. The reasoning was most people come into their homes via the garage after work, etc. When you entered, you had to be close to the control panel that included a microphone and you would say clearly and somewhat loudly, “Turn on the lights,” or something like that. I don’t recall if you needed to say a name first like Alexa. Anyways, the lights you had left in the “on’ position would then all come on via the electrical wiring and the special outlets. You had to program the control panel and it could turn on/off different lights after programming. Keep in mind, it was actually turning the outlet on and off so, no electricity was running through the outlet when you turned off the light. I don’t know what the system was called and it had to be built into a new home, no retrofitting, plus, it cost a ton, thousands of dollars but it did seem so futuristic!
@popularscience
March 8, 2024 at 11:40 am
This is such a fantastic story, Dave. It’s remarkable how much the tech has changed while being essentially the same. That must have cost an absolute fortune…
@NerdyMeathead
March 7, 2024 at 11:15 am
LMAO how is nobody else talking about how that HoMart Should come back in business 9:44
@popularscience
March 8, 2024 at 11:39 am
Ohhhh boy. It looks like there are people currently using the name but they style it as HomArt which is probably… necessary
@katobrucelee08
March 7, 2024 at 11:27 am
These read like stereo instructions
@popularscience
March 8, 2024 at 11:37 am
Yes, if stereo instructions were written by the first beta version of ChatGPT and then photocopied 200 times and turned upside down
@noavb
March 7, 2024 at 11:49 am
19:51 thats not how you say that 💀
@popularscience
March 8, 2024 at 11:36 am
I TRIED
@panosdotnet
March 7, 2024 at 12:57 pm
As a kid, i had read about this in a computers magazine and was amazed. They had artistic pictures of a much bigger device. I though this thing was big as a refrigerator. Good to hear about this one more time.
@popularscience
March 8, 2024 at 11:36 am
When it gets totally stripped down, it’s got similar tech to an answering machine. The reality of that probably would’ve underwhelmed people
@catherinebaldwin6580
March 7, 2024 at 1:10 pm
I never even heard of this channel. But Kevin hosting it is all I need.
@popularscience
March 8, 2024 at 11:35 am
Hey Catherine — there will be a new video every week. A weekly dose of Popular. A weekly dose of Science. A weekly dose of Kevin.
@idea2go
March 7, 2024 at 1:25 pm
Here’s to the crazy ones
@popularscience
March 8, 2024 at 11:34 am
What would we do without them?
@thalesdinmilet2590
March 7, 2024 at 1:30 pm
Suoer cool
@popularscience
March 8, 2024 at 11:34 am
ty ty, new video every week from now on!
@_Deeto
March 7, 2024 at 3:11 pm
That ending went hard af. Great video
@popularscience
March 8, 2024 at 11:34 am
it’s amazing what you start to think and feel when you get deep into a piece of old tech and the people who invented it
@7thboss931
March 7, 2024 at 4:41 pm
Is “Mastervoice” “His Master’s Voice”? HMV was a record label and producer of oddities like this back in the day. Take a look at Technology Connections for more
@zeroxdan
March 7, 2024 at 5:28 pm
this was amazing, thank you!
@popularscience
March 8, 2024 at 7:55 am
Thanks, zeroxdan — many more to come, new video every week. The next retro tech video will be on the entertainment side
@bowsed
March 7, 2024 at 6:43 pm
I have to know, was the last part of this video done in a single take?
@popularscience
March 8, 2024 at 7:55 am
yepppppp. just 1
@fauveothon3068
March 7, 2024 at 7:37 pm
YouTube Is dead
@popularscience
March 8, 2024 at 11:33 am
we are very much still alive
@aL3891_
March 8, 2024 at 1:09 am
Man that’s seriously impressive for the time.. I really hope these things become more widely know and people can hack and reverse engineer them 🙂
@popularscience
March 8, 2024 at 7:52 am
We’re pulling for CelGenStudios to figure out the PIN problem.
Also, thank you OG TCU Enjoyer. 😉
@itsukishuun
March 8, 2024 at 7:04 am
*Lightning strikes*
Me: SEBASTIAN! NOOOO!
@popularscience
March 8, 2024 at 7:50 am
the Butler in a Box’s AI will save us from Gmork and the void
@barteomiejwojciak3106
March 8, 2024 at 11:27 am
I dont need Gus
@popularscience
March 8, 2024 at 1:22 pm
… or do you?
@barteomiejwojciak3106
March 8, 2024 at 1:56 pm
@@popularscience
*Moon Man.mp3*
@androidken
March 8, 2024 at 12:56 pm
Using the wires in the wall is how some WiFi or network extenders work. I found that very cool first time I heard about it.
@popularscience
March 8, 2024 at 1:22 pm
if we only knew all the things swirling around us as we sit on the couch and watch Evangelion for the 83rd time
@BrickTsar
March 8, 2024 at 4:02 pm
You could be a 911 operator. Low volume trouble I get all the time. Loose nut in the keyboard. Not like this thing was “user” friendly
@peonyattache
March 8, 2024 at 5:06 pm
RS-232 is a data protocol and not a connector type. That port was for DB9 Subminiature connectors. And as a commercial AV installation technician who has been working in house of worship, education, and corporate office installation environments for nearly a decade, I can tell you that DB9s and RS-232 control are still extremely common today—especially in Crestron systems.
@Kattakam
March 8, 2024 at 8:43 pm
yep, still use 232 in a few critical systems that just can’t be or is too expensive to build a whole solution for. DB9 cables didn’t fail as much as it seem to be the case today and you knew what to expect as far as orientation and rx/tx signals reliability. We can repin and repurpose cables as needed.
@ezelleze6264
March 8, 2024 at 5:35 pm
The butler sounds better than google
@Conrad500
March 8, 2024 at 5:35 pm
Who else came from TCU?
@TheTortuga22
March 8, 2024 at 7:54 pm
Why is this guy purposely cracking his voice when he talks. Pretty weird
@charlesmotiff
March 8, 2024 at 8:25 pm
Great video. So excited for this channel!
@Kattakam
March 8, 2024 at 8:36 pm
Wonderful video! Really enjoyed watching something I was very curious with back in the days.
@odaharry
March 8, 2024 at 9:07 pm
This is so interesting. It just sucked me in.
@ariseira_
March 8, 2024 at 11:04 pm
23 WATTS??
@Kyle22
March 9, 2024 at 1:23 am
Dang, it’s still not on the Home Automation wiki. Crazy
@notsure6942
March 9, 2024 at 2:37 am
Holly had an iq of over 3000
@IsaacFoster..
March 9, 2024 at 4:08 am
“I’m Gus Searcy but you can call me Gus”
@thomas2024_
March 9, 2024 at 7:48 am
Damn! Sounds like a crazy device – albeit incredibly over-marketed and definitely not for your average consumer… As you said – a “first-mover disadvantage”. The first commercially-available resistive touchscreens or VR headsets come to mind – imperfect, but paving the way towards future innovation…
I can imagine Alec over at Technology Connections talking about this!
@Ripoldworld
March 9, 2024 at 10:39 am
Best video ever
@aqua-bery
March 9, 2024 at 1:19 pm
You know what’s funny? Even today, assistants like siri, google and alexa suck. They constantly misunderstand you, often times they activate accidentally and other times they just ignore you.
@user-ji9le3bp8r
March 9, 2024 at 2:38 pm
Normal people: so he said 1983 Fnaf fans: nah bro
@aAlbertEinstein
March 10, 2024 at 1:55 am
Lack oak of peel
@erwinvb70
March 10, 2024 at 12:23 pm
What a cool device, too bad of the power consumption and all the, probably unobtainable, necessary accessories, but it’s still futuristic and cool to have installed
@theonlycatonice
March 10, 2024 at 2:42 pm
This is sick holy moly
@FlorianLinscheid
March 10, 2024 at 5:28 pm
It’s a little more chill and I think Kevin doesn’t feel the need to shout as much as in VSauce videos. I really enjoyed that style! This channel will be getting bis as well.
@MakeSomething
March 10, 2024 at 5:38 pm
Excellent ghost story!
@NuclearWolf69gaming
March 10, 2024 at 5:48 pm
I don’t understand this entire video you have just crapped on this thing I’d rather have this than Alexa Siri or Google the whole thing because it doesn’t connect to the internet. And is that why you haven’t used it because you can’t figure it out
@RetrovexAmbient
March 11, 2024 at 4:30 am
Ah yes BUTLR from halo infinite 👀
@RobertSpangler
March 11, 2024 at 4:53 pm
Loved the content, but please chill with the fake camera pushes on just about every other word when you’re on screen. I realize you’re trying to emphasize your point, but it was well over three top IMHO.
@nitrogenairship7189
March 12, 2024 at 5:29 am
Mr. Belvedere is a good bot who loves lamp.
@robertklund3201
March 12, 2024 at 12:41 pm
Kind of reminds me of Roby the robot; the AI in the 1950’s sci- fi classic “Forbidden Planet”.
@GothGuy885
March 12, 2024 at 1:49 pm
got to admit this was pretty awesome tech for the 80’s
but the price was geared towards high income households for sure!
reminded me of the long gone Xanadu houses of the future .
never got to see one in person, but have watched Vids about them, here on YT.
@Mexmex1975
March 12, 2024 at 8:15 pm
That ending!
@watchwithkedrick214
March 12, 2024 at 9:31 pm
siri was released at 2011
@halfrhovsquared
March 12, 2024 at 10:16 pm
I still have a box full of MANY various X-10 modules including appliance modules, lamp modules, wireless pushbuttons, a couple of “computer modules”, one of which was connected to my alarm system and another to a Linux box which ran my own software, PIRs, and a learning remote control.
I automated my home with a system that dimmed out lights in rooms after I wasn’t in them for a while, turned on the kettle and music when I got up… Shut everything down when I went to bed and woke me up in the morning. When my alarm went off, waving (to trigger the PIR in my bedroom) would cause it to snooze and it would not fully cancel until it detected me in the living room (at which point, it would turn on the kettle and music). It would shut down the house when I left (as I armed the alarm) and bring things back when I came home and it would turn on and off lights when I was away to mimic activity of someone being there. Even my doorbell was X-10 operated and it caused my system to make the StarTrek Next Gen Ready Room doorbell noise.
I used it for a number of years, tweaking it and building on it… until I got married and my wife hated it because she kept switching off lights (at the normal light switch) when she left a room and couldn’t break the habit…. and I hadn’t written the code to cope with two people living there… Eventually, I decommissioned it, but I still have all of the hardware.
@dr.mikeybee
March 12, 2024 at 10:43 pm
LOL! <3
@tadpoleslamp
March 13, 2024 at 3:03 am
Absolutely awesome 😎💯😎 video 📷📸!! You could have bemoaned ripped off pioneers about 30% more, Imnsho, though, frankly. I think it’s a crime that Wikipedia doesn’t mention it, even in a footnote; especially since it clearly made, not just one, but a few waves, in it’s rather extended day!
@RafaelFlagg
March 13, 2024 at 6:01 am
I thought it was actually Open Says me not sesme 2:26
@stevieroach
March 13, 2024 at 8:46 am
OMG I had one these. I had completely forgotten about it until seeing this video. I have no idea what I did with it.
@marknesselhaus4376
March 13, 2024 at 9:39 am
I remember connecting my TRS-80 computer and then later my C64 to several X10 modules. Turning devices on and off was cool at the time ( Back in the 80’s ) but the programming was always a royal pain and after a while the novelty would wear off. Still, it did start the ball rolling for home automation and control. My TRS-80 did have speech synth and voice recognition but very crude compared to today.
@billtwok6864
March 13, 2024 at 10:28 am
I toured a house in the mid 90s running off this system. They had a dozen or so functions working. It ran a bath and switched on lights. It was amazing at the time. The house was $8 million then and the butler only worked for the realtor.
@-Tsquare2023
March 13, 2024 at 12:47 pm
Clap on, clap off kept comming to mind as I watched this amazing and interesting video. The clapper and clapper plus are much cheaper and easier to use devices than the Butler. It was also advertised a lot. The clapper came out 1n 1984. I never owned one. I have some remote contol switches that use 12volt batteried like some car fobs have which work at about 50 feet to turn on lights or appliance. These are also very inexpensive.
@lnk77
March 13, 2024 at 12:53 pm
very cool, old gadget a “Back in time”
@mariuscg
March 13, 2024 at 3:45 pm
Bet you anything that modern days hackers can’t hack into that 😎
@liberatumplox625
March 13, 2024 at 4:34 pm
For some reason, I imagined your dad pointing out the volume pot, and then reprimanding you in the manner of Rip Torn’s character in Freddy got Fingered.
@hegedusuk
March 13, 2024 at 5:34 pm
Interesting video, well produced. Fascinating story – never heard of this either
@MilitaryIndustrialMuseum
March 13, 2024 at 5:44 pm
Thank you! I won one on eBay today for $150 ish and will study and experiment with it. Google Gemini Advanced and Amazon Alexa user and a sucker for retro-futurism!
@smugshrug
March 13, 2024 at 6:41 pm
this was made by engineers for engineers. no other way around it. your voice cracks a lot , might wanna work on that.
@monopalle5768
March 13, 2024 at 7:07 pm
You can train it to react to FARTS….. Now THAT would be a video.
@Sir-Dexter
March 13, 2024 at 7:44 pm
🤣🤣 nice box
@lc285
March 13, 2024 at 9:49 pm
This was very interesting! Appreciate all your dad and dad’s buddy went through to get rhis running to show us all.
@ZOMBIEHEADSHOTKILLER
March 13, 2024 at 11:35 pm
WRONG!
its not “open sesame”
its “open says me”
@ZOMBIEHEADSHOTKILLER
March 13, 2024 at 11:49 pm
so youre saying this is the AI’s version of John Connor, and we need to go back in time to destroy it for a better future?
@adriancoanda9227
March 14, 2024 at 6:07 am
wow what that thing is from a paralel universe since no wiki page
@MSPaintOfficial
March 14, 2024 at 8:07 am
ChatGPT anyone?
@Joeyzoom
March 14, 2024 at 1:57 pm
Mr. Butler, turn on the hotdog roller.
@mickgatz214
March 14, 2024 at 2:52 pm
What about Max Headroom?… 😂
@jeremyhardy4996
March 14, 2024 at 2:53 pm
Love the video. It gave me goosebumps at the end.
@TheAeijingBuffoon
March 14, 2024 at 3:50 pm
Really? I thought the world started yesterday!
@user-yg3rq4di6y
March 14, 2024 at 5:01 pm
Why is michael not posting videos?
@DihelsonMendonca
March 14, 2024 at 5:16 pm
Excellent 👌. Congratulations for the incredible text and the whole video. 🎉❤❤❤❤❤
@Howei1337
March 14, 2024 at 6:30 pm
Awesome video !
@zenmasterjay1
March 14, 2024 at 7:37 pm
Who else is being forced to watch a 5-minute commercial on a color wheel?
@gomergomez1984
March 14, 2024 at 8:02 pm
It’s hilarious watching young ones of today total perplexed with 1980s tech. Just think a generic 286 with 1 meg of memory and 40 meg hard drive retailed for about $1500.00 in 1987.
@CelGenStudios
March 14, 2024 at 8:14 pm
I’m still working on trying to decode that pin, too! 😛
@joshuascholar3220
March 14, 2024 at 8:19 pm
I guess that was sort of interesting. It wasn’t AI at all. Also I didn’t have any trouble understanding the instructions for using the keypad. That’s a you thing. On the other side of clickbait, you could have found ACTUAL AI that old. SHRDLU from Terry Winograd, for instance, from 1968.
@jaygardener181
March 14, 2024 at 8:42 pm
Like the video but a ps4 150 watts an hour 6 times as much as the butler box use in standby Alex uses up to 4 watts an hour in standby which is less then the box it would be 6. Something times more watts then Alex bested from the electricity market on my own Alex and ps4
@robertkerr4199
March 14, 2024 at 8:44 pm
I got my clapper for $19.95. It does the same thing, better.
@JohnChrysostom101
March 14, 2024 at 9:00 pm
That’s a strange face that guy has
@VernGraner
March 14, 2024 at 9:03 pm
Heh. I had one once.. I bought it used at a pawn shop.. it used X-10 but it really was a device that didn’t work very well.. at all. ¯_(ツ)_/¯
@JohnChrysostom101
March 14, 2024 at 9:15 pm
When i was a kid we had these electrical boxes and 1 you would plug your land line into and the other as long as it was on the same circuit you’d plug into the wall and plug a land line phone into it was for hooking up a phone where their was no phone line jack, mine was for a cordless phone running on an extention cord mounted on the wall in my closet which i made into a very cool hangout phone room with pillows,TV and my Sega. For sure he could send those signals through the sockets, shoot he could of sent any data
@ESSBrew
March 15, 2024 at 12:41 pm
“How would people read an instruction manual before the advent of the home computer?” Ill give you 3 guesses. People had a lot more time on their hands though.
@christianremboldt1557
March 15, 2024 at 1:12 pm
How don’t you have a landline?
@Joe-jv5mm
March 15, 2024 at 1:48 pm
Your next video “The Apollo flight computer” 😉
@faustasazuolasbagdonas123
March 15, 2024 at 2:22 pm
Would be interesting to see what is inside of it, what chips it uses 🙂.
@ninehundreddollarluxuryyac5958
March 15, 2024 at 2:38 pm
A friend and I had something similar about the same time. It doesn’t recognise words, it recognises specific sound patterns. Thats why each user needs to train it on their voice and the language spoken doesn’t matter. One application was a voice activated lock that only responded to the specific sound of your voice. No one else could open it even if they knew the phrase. It may have been the first biometric lock.
@paulnunnink7338
March 15, 2024 at 2:44 pm
Oh wow! Jan Romeijn! This Dutchy feels proud 😂
@SilverSpoon_
March 15, 2024 at 2:49 pm
8:40
And that’s the people who call me all the time and call me a genius because I READ THE FUCKING MANUAL.
«Whoa you’re a genius, how do you know so many things?»
…just pay me.
@vikki399
March 15, 2024 at 3:11 pm
I love that you admitted to your user error
@JohnDlugosz
March 15, 2024 at 3:47 pm
I think you confused the price: “whole system” probably included those additional modules, and was not just the base unit.
BTW, the price for fancy X-10 compatible light switches from a name brand designer company was something like $70, which was scandalously expensive for the late 1980s! The classic X-10 branded switches had come down in price, but I found a box of used equipment which made all the difference for me.
There were a couple “open mike” systems available in the late 1980s, that were based around standard P.C.s. It was also seen as a passing fad, that “open mike” had too many problems.
I really liked little remote controls. I could turn off the bedroom lights or adjust the fan from the controller on my nightstand. I could set up room lighting for theater mode with the same remote I used on the A/V equipment. I could control lights from a different location from where the switch was mounted, in a home where it seems every switch was on the wrong side of the room necessitating walking through the dark room to turn on the light!
I even installed lights without any conventional controls; e.g. a patio floodlight above the grill plugs in in the attic, but is easily controlled from the kitchen or next to the patio door; A sconce light up on the wall did not need to have lines run to a switch somewhere in reach! I used cheap motion detectors to turn on lights in stairwells for safety, and in the bathroom for little ones who can’t reach the switch yet.
@danielkyte5124
March 15, 2024 at 4:29 pm
Nice ending!
@ShiroKuroh
March 15, 2024 at 4:29 pm
I decommissioned one in 2011, and we replaced it with an iPhone and Siri. The location was a House on Hutchinson Island in Jupiter, Fl. I refused to install it from its prior location in 2001. Not sure whatever happened to it.
@Ac66Power
March 15, 2024 at 4:42 pm
god dam good Future
I have an papper when i vas like 10 (1978) and it say that yeare 2000 all car shall fly.. so i gues wee are att 1999 then 😉
@Killerspieler0815
March 15, 2024 at 5:39 pm
This thing is more advanced than the Alexa, because it doesn’t need internet/servers
@andysplace
March 15, 2024 at 5:40 pm
Seems like you got the wattage wrong a playstation consumes between 160 and 200 watts so 23 watts is not too bad considering back when this was made a light bulb used way more power.
@ahmedzm8793
March 15, 2024 at 6:12 pm
loved every bit of this
@paulwright8378
March 15, 2024 at 6:20 pm
This is so ccompllicated
@buriedbits6027
March 15, 2024 at 6:23 pm
This was fascinating!
@Collidewithinfinity
March 15, 2024 at 6:41 pm
So much of pre-2000’s tech was trying WAAAY too hard to convince us we had reached “The Future”
@fixelheimer3726
March 15, 2024 at 7:07 pm
Jeez this is so hilarious and I’m just at the beginning of the video..
@CarthagoMike
March 15, 2024 at 7:13 pm
great doc!
@BVSchaefer
March 15, 2024 at 8:12 pm
I think the generation of the 80s understood how to work these devices more easily simply because we were exposed to Ill written instructions all the time. You didn’t have to be technologically sophisticated. You just needed to be determined and competent to use the process of elimination. Cordless phones, Vic-20, Commodore 64, Betamax wired remote, DIY 8088, Radio Shack TRS-80, 3D chess boards, acoustic coupling 300 baud modems, Microsoft BASIC, DIY car cruise control, shortwave radio assembly, crystal radio units, clothesline radio antennas…
The 1980s built the modern world starting with everyday average people.
@secondlifearound
March 15, 2024 at 8:29 pm
A w e s o me V i d e o !
@geraldpiwowar4088
March 15, 2024 at 8:48 pm
Very sad. Almost made me cry.
@jameszheng4455
March 15, 2024 at 8:51 pm
did you get to the court case or did I miss that?
@electrogestapo
March 15, 2024 at 9:15 pm
The instruction manual part kinda gave me shell shock (called PTSD now, apparently) to a time when I was figuring out how to change the clock on our betamax around the same era.
@mbunds
March 16, 2024 at 11:23 am
THANK YOU! A sales rep demonstrated one of these back then, and with the advent of LLMs I was trying to find this information about this device!
@TheExileFox
March 16, 2024 at 11:25 am
Fun fact: KNX is modern-ish automation of commercial buildings, like lights, ventilation and etc. But holy hell. it’s giving “Butler in a Box” a run for it’s money in terms of frustrating moments with usage and configuration. It’s so smart that devices auto-pick their addresses in system and these often conflict, requiring you to take the entire system offline and reprogram every single device in all of the different chains, unless you happen to find the specific behavior pattern for this particular building, only then, it tends to work as expected. At least on sunny days. On rainy days, forget about configuring things, that only works half the time and I do not understand why there are no lawsuits against this garbage that companies pay for. Companies are so worried about keeping expenses low and they they keep buying into garbage like this. It’s no wonder the consumer world is going to hell…
@MikeHarris1984
March 16, 2024 at 11:29 am
Thus guy is starting puberty. Lol. The squeeking voice drives me insane.
@MikeHarris1984
March 16, 2024 at 11:48 am
That was nothing more the. An x10 interface. X10 was already around a d you could do the voice controls already wirh the x10 software on a computer. So it seems like this was just putting thst in a horrible box
@ronniepirtlejr2606
March 16, 2024 at 11:48 am
I remember Butler in the box from when I was a teenager. I read about it around 1983. I was 13 years old at the time. The magazine said it was $1,000
I always wanted to know what happened to it? I’ve tried Googling it and always got nothing.
It is awesome that you found it!
@germanshepherd6638
March 16, 2024 at 12:12 pm
Who makes a movie about a robot raping a woman, that’s what I want to know
@AiOinc1
March 16, 2024 at 12:43 pm
This guy seems less and less bright as the video goes on. When he started criticizing clear instructions about 8 minutes in, that’s when I knew his opinions were not to be trusted. You can really tell he has an attention disorder really early on.
@Dysphoricsmile
March 16, 2024 at 1:22 pm
Vsauce here – was my first thought
@blackryan5291
March 16, 2024 at 2:39 pm
19:48 – 20:49 For some reason….my mind took this section as a model and ran it applied to music. I thought of Dubstep and Rap. If you search for Original Dubstep artist….Skrillex pops up first. Not actual originals like Oris,, or Zed Bias, Bassnectar, Datsik, and Skream. How soo many know about Skrillex though? Soo many honor Cardi B for making “Rap” music. They don’t even know the originals. Its changed soo much that it don’t even resemble its origins. Cardi B is not what the target audience for Rap is looking for but that is rap now. Now genres are like a Brand. No longer the art is was. 20:49 – 21:10 In music that would be when corporations got involved cause they saw an opportunity to make money rather than art. A genre turns into a brand then. You make the art that will pay you then rather than the art you wanted to make just because. Maybe I am taking it deeper necessary but its similar mechanisms in there. I won’t die from this. But its sad when this thing don’t even get a footnote, when when I type in a Google search “original dubstep artists” and Skrillex if the first in line and El-B ain’t even in the list, or “Rap” that used to take the form of 2-Pac, Big Pop, and Rah Digga, now take the form of Rick Ross, Drake, and Cardi B. Same genres but the differences soo vast its basically as different genre. Great video as usual.
@christopherdavis9137
March 16, 2024 at 2:43 pm
Awesome! I’d plug that thing into biggest UPS battery backup I could get. Not sure if those were prevalent back then?
@rubenkoker1911
March 16, 2024 at 3:30 pm
19:53 the presenter tries to pronounce the dutch “W” and “A”, two sounds not in most english dialects
@IMRROcom
March 16, 2024 at 3:42 pm
I recall the add, but had no idea what it was or did. As for the parts, it looks like classic X10 stuff and years ago in the late 90’s to around 2010 to 2015. I ran my house on a X10 system with the entire brains of the operation running on one of those small notebook computers. In a way it was better than what we have now. if the internet goes down it still runs on the notebook computer and lights can still be turned on and off and the alarm system still works. The systems we have now need to call to the mothership/cloud and if the internet is down they do not work.
@UltraJamie70
March 16, 2024 at 4:50 pm
Very surprised to see Demon Seed in this report. I was a very young boy when I saw that movie. I entered the Information Technology industry at age 14. I’ve had a life long fear of the machine talking over our lives.
@stevelaw2000
March 16, 2024 at 4:53 pm
That was a long time ago. I was a technician with the company that created the packaging for the Butler in a Box. It was very revolutionany for its time. I met Gus and was proud to work on the project. I will never forget the time I worked there. It was a magical time before most home computers. It did have it’s issues but worked well enough for lots of people that could not get up and change the channel or turn on a light. And the voice training actually trained me how to speak better. That made it work better too. Thanks for the trip down memory lane.
@bubbleboy821
March 16, 2024 at 7:56 pm
How did he achieve voice recognition with the Butler?
@stevelaw2000
March 16, 2024 at 8:23 pm
@@bubbleboy821 it was all digital encoding and they compared one word with the list of words. It was a bit more complicated than that but. If I told you I would have k… You 😜
Also, you can buy integrated circuits today that do it very cheap.
@mikerentiers
March 16, 2024 at 5:55 pm
I guess this is the time when being of the age where I experienced the rise of tech. I understood the instructions after a couple sentences. Texting used to be on T9 system where you had to hit #2 x 3 to get C and so forth.
@RichardNugentNow
March 16, 2024 at 6:38 pm
Hold on – this guy reminds me of Coffeezilla? Is it?
@sterling1989
March 16, 2024 at 6:59 pm
Great video!
@pplwizard1
March 16, 2024 at 7:22 pm
So, I’m Gus Searcy
Thought you did a good job on the video but you didn’t know is there is a device called a rampak that you could plug in and store the memory for up to 7 years without having to change the battery and would restore the memory voice and all in 5 seconds
@sammyfromsydney
March 16, 2024 at 7:45 pm
Memories of Dragon Dictate PTSD. “I’ll just ****ingy type it myself then!”
@mirko46381
March 16, 2024 at 7:58 pm
Wow goosebumps at the end of the video. Great storytelling, amazed this guy made this just few years after personal computer.
@indridcold8433
March 16, 2024 at 8:07 pm
There is no such thing as actual artificial intelligence. I wish the term would stop being misused. There has been a few very rare experiments using actual artificial intelligence in laboratories. What the general population is using is nothing but very fast computing, it is enhanced computer control, not artificial intelligence.
@legendarystuff6971
March 16, 2024 at 8:09 pm
That’s a good vid bro
@TheNomadicMagician
March 16, 2024 at 8:11 pm
Lol thats my father. Weird seeing videos about stuff like this.
@daviddavidson2357
March 16, 2024 at 8:39 pm
23 watts wasn’t that much back in the day, considering a lightbulb would draw 40, for the standard intensity ones, so half a lightbulb in standby isn’t a big deal, also faulty caps _may_ increase the power draw.
However the Butler in a Box is better than an amazon echo or any similar device, because instead of translating language into words it works on sounds, meaning that your privacy is practically guaranteed. The always online cloud nonsense probably transcribes everything you say, google/android does by default (you can turn it off, it’s buried deep in settings), I can almost guarantee there are hidden transcripts kept for “marketing and advertising” and ones kept on “persons of interest”, I’ll take a $15k crippled Amazon Echo over the real thing any day.
@jabrowski_
March 16, 2024 at 9:23 pm
777
@iblackfeathers
March 17, 2024 at 12:55 pm
you could do a follow up video on this one with the home makerover reality show where it was featured. i’d imagine the homeowners investigating the source of their high electricity bill and all the problems this butler in a box may have caused.
@pplwizard1
March 17, 2024 at 2:15 pm
Actually it’s the inverse it only use 23 Watts remember back at that time people were using 50 and 100 watt light bulbs in their lighting there were no LED bulbs and because it was an automation system and it was smart it had the ability to control and actually would cut electric bills by remembering to turn off lights that were left on fans that were left on knowing when to water when not to water Etc it would generally cut an electric bill by 30%
@JD_Mortal
March 17, 2024 at 1:06 pm
Radioshack had a microchip for $30 that used voice activated functions. It was intended for toy robotics. It could detect forward, back, left turn, right turn and stop. It detected the first and last commands “sounds”. F-D for forward, as an example. It was no butler, but it did work well.
@pplwizard1
March 17, 2024 at 2:13 pm
Well that is true that they had that chip they didn’t have it from 1983 to 1986 when this was created
@byrons8956
March 17, 2024 at 1:08 pm
I reember this Butler thing. I messed with X10 and its related products in the early days (dedicated book sized PCs running some home automation software with voice contro, unfirtanately X10 not being that reliable I switched to other systems and finally stuck with the one I’ve had for years.
Put that Butler on a large UPS Battery Device.
@GreenAppelPie
March 17, 2024 at 1:57 pm
It could’ve use a built in cassette tape drive for programming backup
@jsgeugdyegd5125
March 17, 2024 at 2:10 pm
vsause2 🙂
@stabilini
March 17, 2024 at 2:10 pm
Why are you so angry? hahaha
@pplwizard1
March 17, 2024 at 2:17 pm
You know I kind of misinformed you it’s been a long time ago it was a Rockwell 6501 Q which is a brand new microprocessor that had just come out I was actually the first person to actually use it in a production product
@ChrisHarmon1
March 17, 2024 at 2:50 pm
For years I tried out phones with keyboards and promises of being a computer phone, but it wasn’t until I tried a friend’s iPhone that I thought “Holy crap, this would be useful” and I didn’t wanna give it back to him. Best part was, $200 and a simple 2 year contract with at&t for phone service I paid for anyways got me this amazing device. Of course, I went android around 2011 and pop over to look at Apple once in awhile, but my fold is light years ahead.
@AfonsoBucco
March 17, 2024 at 2:57 pm
I still didn’t find utility to now-days voice-controlled assistants.
If I don’t even like to talk to people why would I like to talk to bots?
Save the buttons, switches and knobs!
@Synthematix
March 17, 2024 at 3:13 pm
Wrong, we DONT NEED any of this, life was better without it.
@supralapsarian
March 17, 2024 at 3:59 pm
6:25 Doubting X10 is going to work through a surge suppressor.
@jakubkrcma
March 17, 2024 at 4:18 pm
Actually very impressive!
@jtveg
March 17, 2024 at 4:31 pm
Thanks so much for sharing. 😉👌🏻
@tomannangie
March 17, 2024 at 4:48 pm
Ahh… The BSR X10 system… Radio shack had an 8 bit board compatible with these modules, and Votan made the VPC-2000 that did speaker dependent voice recognition. I basically built this with a pc in 1985…
@LugeoOrbis
March 17, 2024 at 5:05 pm
Hey so i havent watched this yet but crazy story… i grew up in a house that actually used this thing. Ours was named Diane and she could turn on and off various devices. We had an entire room dedicated to the wiring caused by the then x9 switches.
@fontendet
March 17, 2024 at 5:17 pm
i don’t like the nervous hysteria way presentation in this video review, is it made to tiktok people? Hard to watch “karen style” talking non-stop facts. Is it possible to use just calm voice?
@SequesterOfPonderance
March 17, 2024 at 5:30 pm
He who has ears to hear, let him hear!
Psalm 107 KJV
1 O give thanks unto the LORD, for he is good: for his mercy endureth for ever.
2 Let the redeemed of the LORD say so, whom he hath redeemed from the hand of the enemy;
3 And gathered them out of the lands, from the east, and from the west, from the north, and from the south.
4 They wandered in the wilderness in a solitary way; they found no city to dwell in.
5 Hungry and thirsty, their soul fainted in them.
6 Then they cried unto the LORD in their trouble, and he delivered them out of their distresses.
7 And he led them forth by the right way, that they might go to a city of habitation.
8 Oh that men would praise the LORD for his goodness, and for his wonderful works to the children of men!
9 For he satisfieth the longing soul, and filleth the hungry soul with goodness.
10 Such as sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, being bound in affliction and iron;
11 Because they rebelled against the words of God, and contemned the counsel of the most High:
12 Therefore he brought down their heart with labour; they fell down, and there was none to help.
13 Then they cried unto the LORD in their trouble, and he saved them out of their distresses.
14 He brought them out of darkness and the shadow of death, and brake their bands in sunder.
15 Oh that men would praise the LORD for his goodness, and for his wonderful works to the children of men!
16 For he hath broken the gates of brass, and cut the bars of iron in sunder.
17 Fools because of their transgression, and because of their iniquities, are afflicted.
18 Their soul abhorreth all manner of meat; and they draw near unto the gates of death.
19 Then they cry unto the LORD in their trouble, and he saveth them out of their distresses.
20 He sent his word, and healed them, and delivered them from their destructions.
21 Oh that men would praise the LORD for his goodness, and for his wonderful works to the children of men!
22 And let them sacrifice the sacrifices of thanksgiving, and declare his works with rejoicing.
23 They that go down to the sea in ships, that do business in great waters;
24 These see the works of the LORD, and his wonders in the deep.
25 For he commandeth, and raiseth the stormy wind, which lifteth up the waves thereof.
26 They mount up to the heaven, they go down again to the depths: their soul is melted because of trouble.
27 They reel to and fro, and stagger like a drunken man, and are at their wits’ end.
28 Then they cry unto the LORD in their trouble, and he bringeth them out of their distresses.
29 He maketh the storm a calm, so that the waves thereof are still.
30 Then are they glad because they be quiet; so he bringeth them unto their desired haven.
31 Oh that men would praise the LORD for his goodness, and for his wonderful works to the children of men!
32 Let them exalt him also in the congregation of the people, and praise him in the assembly of the elders.
33 He turneth rivers into a wilderness, and the watersprings into dry ground;
34 A fruitful land into barrenness, for the wickedness of them that dwell therein.
35 He turneth the wilderness into a standing water, and dry ground into watersprings.
36 And there he maketh the hungry to dwell, that they may prepare a city for habitation;
37 And sow the fields, and plant vineyards, which may yield fruits of increase.
38 He blesseth them also, so that they are multiplied greatly; and suffereth not their cattle to decrease.
39 Again, they are minished and brought low through oppression, affliction, and sorrow.
40 He poureth contempt upon princes, and causeth them to wander in the wilderness, where there is no way.
41 Yet setteth he the poor on high from affliction, and maketh him families like a flock.
42 The righteous shall see it, and rejoice: and all iniquity shall stop her mouth.
43 Whoso is wise, and will observe these things, even they shall understand the lovingkindness of the LORD.
@ZiggyMercury
March 17, 2024 at 5:35 pm
Why rant about this device for 19 minutes before you get to to real point – which is that this device was actually pretty interesting and probably amazing for the time?
@LugeoOrbis
March 17, 2024 at 5:40 pm
This was interesting. I hadnt seen one of these since I was a kid. Some interesting things to note is that it was a pretty reliable device once working. Also if your voice was similar enough to one that was trained already you can use your voice as well. I used to use ours that was trained to my dads voice. We had ours in the early 90s and for the 90s it was a pretty awesome device. Our whole town thouvht i lived in a future house because of it.
This was a pretty cool episode and you have earned yourself a subscriber 🙂
@LanDiEvil
March 17, 2024 at 6:35 pm
Do the Honda navigation system that cane out b4 gps
@iHoudini
March 17, 2024 at 6:47 pm
I have this equipment “Butler in a Box” in New Condition with New X-10 Modules and Ram Packs
@user-gl3wu6ie2y
March 17, 2024 at 7:01 pm
I’m so here for jessie pinkman explaining electronics
@Littlefighter1911
March 17, 2024 at 8:44 pm
Now that you say it, I’m wondering if it’s possible to create an entirely mechanics-based voice recognition system,
that could be used for a door.
Given, that most things, that can be solved electrically can be directly converted to mechanical structures,
it would appear possible to make a mechanical “sesame”
@junaidtariq7466
March 17, 2024 at 9:12 pm
This is a very innovative product wayy ahead of its time.
@SteveL_kb9mwr
March 18, 2024 at 2:33 pm
Not much difference with Dragon Naturally Speaking traning from the late 90’s. GOOG-411 was the first that I know of attempt collect samples from a wide varirty of speakers.
@savage5757
March 18, 2024 at 2:46 pm
0:15 There was such a thing in Robert Sheckley’s short story “Cost of Living”
@agranero6
March 18, 2024 at 2:56 pm
Interesting, I am a mixed bag, a neoluddite in some terms (I don’t have Facebook, Twitter or Instagram, never did), I got a CRT TV for a long time when LCD TVs were common, but I was the first person I knew to have two LCD monitors on my computer, I never wanted an iPhone, I didn’t like the proprietary and closed way Apple treated it, making it seem they own everything, I had some phones with Windows though, but I was the first person I know to have a Palm Pilot, an Android phone (an incredible HTC Hero) and an Android tablet (a Motorola Xoom at the first day they launched it) and a Amazon Kindle that I had to import in a convoluted way as it was not possible to imported them (I bought from a guy on eBay that bought it this way: with an address from Argentina, put in the notes to deliver to Brazil it took eons to arrive, but it did and I he paid an huge amount of taxes for it what was included in the price I paid).
I like new tech, but I am very critical of them too.
@MultiMediaMikes
March 18, 2024 at 2:58 pm
see 80s Radio Shack X10 “Plug N Power” was Radio Shack’s brand name for products that used the X10 power line communications protocol. X101 was developed in 1975 by Pico Electronics, Ltd. to control [ights, appliances, anything to same white box modulres for $15 to $30 each.
@444knuffelmac
March 18, 2024 at 3:15 pm
19:53 just want to tell you this, its dutch, and the way it is spoken out is a bit funny, i don’t mind it but it is pretty fun as an dutch person
@boogerboo4271
March 18, 2024 at 3:28 pm
User error 😂😂😂😂
@TheBendixSA
March 18, 2024 at 3:43 pm
That outro was damn good!
@TheDroidsb
March 18, 2024 at 3:52 pm
Never thought there would be such a cool lead up to turning on a lamp but this video accomplished that 😂
@Knooblegooble
March 18, 2024 at 4:27 pm
Nothing has changed, Alexa still hears like an 80 year old man but instead tries to sell me stuff and buy stuff for me that I don’t need or want. Okay maybe it’s worse, let’s go back to the Butler Box platform please.
@jasonvonhaartman3325
March 18, 2024 at 4:51 pm
i think i herd it on a program but never got its name, 10 years later i had a parrot on my pc that acted the same…:) good video
@BryanEnsign
March 18, 2024 at 4:58 pm
I thought it was “Open Says Me” ?
@QuantumRift
March 18, 2024 at 5:15 pm
Uh, if you didn’t notice those control “modules” were available off the shell at Radio Shack and they were not $36 each. I have a BOX of them down the basement along two of the brain units (the Mini Control Center box with the switches to turn the lights on and off).
@bprzy852
March 18, 2024 at 5:54 pm
To be fair… it only looks about as annoying as Alexa.
@pplwizard1
March 18, 2024 at 9:23 pm
Actually I think it’s the other way around Alexa looks like it given that it is from 1983! 😊
@ristube3319
March 18, 2024 at 5:54 pm
0:18 that’s where Jeeves has been?!
@MorganSullivan
March 18, 2024 at 6:05 pm
You find a hurdle on how we used to type sms… Hahaha iPad generation!!
@Imperial_Dynamics
March 18, 2024 at 6:13 pm
Hi from Greece. Nice video. That device was ahead of its time.
@pplwizard1
March 18, 2024 at 9:10 pm
22 of them were sold in Greece!
@ristube3319
March 18, 2024 at 6:17 pm
My VCR and Answering Machine in the 80’s had the same screen!
@stevesteve8098
March 18, 2024 at 6:21 pm
ok so it seems obvious….
1. read any embedded chips
2. find any links on hte board.
Take any butler box and then replace/ reflash chips & make links.
The same code should then work on any box.
Finally compare the two sets of information to decode it.
It should not take ANY competent hacker 8 years…..
As for loosing the settings, it’s not surprising, Re-writable non powered storage in those days was.. .shall we say rudimentary….. and usually involved a UV lamp…. for 20 minutes….
there were devices you could program ONCE…, but generally you had to nuke & reprogram most of the others.
Next time for really added interest in your channel….. , take it apart let’s see inside with a close up of the chips & back of the pcb..
It would be an interesting thought experiment to reverse engineer it .
@pplwizard1
March 18, 2024 at 7:35 pm
If you had opened up the box he would have found that there is 3 inch by 3 inch by 1 inch thick potted hockey puck where the microprocessor and the voice recognition system are stored all of the voice recognition happens inside the hockey puck. Only command signals are sent from it and if you try to open the hockey puck itself destructs
@cuttinchops
March 18, 2024 at 7:38 pm
Moist
@thedoctor323
March 18, 2024 at 8:17 pm
this thing looks like an SCP.
@Seonyatseng-ds8mj
March 18, 2024 at 8:27 pm
I watched hoping to se it do something.😢
@pplwizard1
March 18, 2024 at 9:09 pm
He shows it working at the very end.
@aseriesguy
March 18, 2024 at 8:41 pm
Not A.I. It was just automation. The wet brain still made the decisions.
@aseriesguy
March 18, 2024 at 8:43 pm
Back in the ’80s there was a spurt of A. I. referred to as Expert Systems that ran on Unix midframes. The software was basically a set of rules to help clerical workers make complex decisions.
@Psyphyn
March 18, 2024 at 9:06 pm
For archival purposes, would you be willing to scan in the manual?
@Psyphyn
March 18, 2024 at 9:21 pm
In IT we would call the volume set to 0 PEBKAC or Problem Exists between keyboard and chair! 😜
@wheelieblind
March 19, 2024 at 1:36 pm
I used to laugh about that 70’s movie it was so crazy.
@f13ldfx
March 19, 2024 at 1:49 pm
«x3mar1x»
@coreym162
March 19, 2024 at 1:58 pm
I think this kind of task oriented computing will make a comeback with robotics and A.I. Just like how Altair is making a comeback for A.I. for basic task execution. It’s just reliable. The Voyager probes use Altair. That’s why at least one still works permitted how much power it has left. It uses less power on stand-by but, always listening for commands. A.I. will bring back the 80’s in dependability.
@j.wright5918
March 19, 2024 at 3:07 pm
This guy is agro af… hahahaha Def ain’t no Gus.
@frequentflyer56
March 19, 2024 at 3:09 pm
Knew a guy in the late 70’s who did this exact thing. Not sure of the hardware he used, but anything electric he could control in his house. As I recall he some kind of an engineer working in silicon valley. I don’t remember him having anything that interfaced thru a phone line.
@scottgardener
March 19, 2024 at 3:48 pm
It is fluent in over three forms of communication!
@MrKillerno1
March 19, 2024 at 4:10 pm
Way to go Mr. Belvedere! 💡
@DragonFiesta
March 19, 2024 at 4:19 pm
less than a minute in and I remember a horror movie about something like this from around then, not demon seed. a guys apple 2 computer took over
@ethanlittle776
March 19, 2024 at 4:45 pm
I remember my dad in the early 2000’s having to record his voice over and over again to get his Sony Ericsson to call my mum.
@user-sr5sn8bl3n
March 19, 2024 at 4:50 pm
i983 / I983 NO–T 1983
@DustinRodriguez1_0
March 19, 2024 at 5:12 pm
First mover disadvantage is very real. There is a documentary called General Magic about a company that built, essentially, an iPhone. In 1989. Fascinating to watch, but they were just ahead of their time.
@Katchi_
March 19, 2024 at 5:28 pm
Subject is good. Presentation is shite.
@ronescholz-nielsen3559
March 19, 2024 at 5:32 pm
Lovely story and great tribute!
@juanmiguel2636
March 19, 2024 at 5:43 pm
Dad! This piece of crap isn’t working and doesn’t make any noise!!
‘Did you try turning up the volume?’
@Gwalchgwyn
March 19, 2024 at 6:07 pm
Home Assistant shares more of its heritage with Butler in a Box than Alexa does, I think. Price aside, Butler in a Box was a marvelous bit of innovation. I am astounded by how much it achieved with the technology to hand. The achievement is almost as astonishing as the price. >.<
@stickboyfpv4742
March 19, 2024 at 6:33 pm
A.I. like 40 years ollld😅
@dmc994
March 19, 2024 at 6:34 pm
😉yyy
@488ci
March 19, 2024 at 6:36 pm
All you need is a car battery for backup and the butler in the box isn’t spying on you and all electronics were simple on off switches. I like it.
@pplwizard1
March 19, 2024 at 8:08 pm
He missed the part in the manual where there said there was a thing called a ram pack that would restore and store the entire memory in 5 seconds and would hold the memory intact for 7 years before you needed to replace the battery for an additional 7 years. Also he missed that the RS 232 which is easy to use actually wood store and restore all of the memory including all the voice recognition training. All in all though it was a good video I thought.
@muzikulike3089
March 19, 2024 at 6:39 pm
Great video. I grew up in the 80s & to see all the technological advancements from then to now I’m still amazed 😂
@user78405
March 19, 2024 at 7:20 pm
the tech been around since answering service begin adopting idea from butler program for their phone system for their customer answer services …it use first language recognition software …this been around in 80’s and heavily use by big companies in late 90’s to early 2000’s
@Yourmission9
March 19, 2024 at 7:40 pm
This is too cool, like a speak and spell that could control your home
@brandonakey6616
March 19, 2024 at 8:23 pm
The COSNTANT zooming in and out of your face is just nauseating.
@johnchase7667
March 19, 2024 at 8:28 pm
You think a playstation will only us 23watts of power when in use for 110 hours? The Playstation 5 has a almost 400watt power supply. Lets see how much 23 watts will cost a month if you have a typical 16 cent per kwh rate. 23 watts times 24 hours time 30 days is 16560 which is 16.56kwh per month at 16 cents each that would be $2.65 which is pretty high for what it does.
@Munenushi
March 19, 2024 at 8:34 pm
“The Clapper” did the same thing, you just clapped to turn appliances on and off or lights – but it became useless because it ran on sound and if you were literally clappin’ cheeks the lights would flash off and on and loud music would start and stop from the stereo or TV and the whole neighborhood would know you were ”Clappin’ with The Clapper™”….
@alejandrocuello3605
March 19, 2024 at 8:55 pm
A “voice-activated clapper” (a.k.a. “butler in a box”) is quite far from being any sort of flavor of “AI” LOL
@mastertx7139
March 20, 2024 at 6:53 am
so whats up with this anoying zooming in and out all the time when your talking…its feels off and makes me wanna stop watching the vid
@vasiovasio
March 20, 2024 at 7:13 am
Great Video! Really Great! Thank you! ☺️☺️☺️
@miquelmarti6537
March 20, 2024 at 9:12 am
Artificial Intelligence what’s just a simple box of relays? Exactly like some nowaday’s products. It’s just a catchy term.
@pplwizard1
March 20, 2024 at 2:49 pm
He would be wrong about that the artificial intelligence part of the system was in the voice recognition Colonel where it could actually learn make decisions upgrade and understand all variations of your voice once it was trained so even if you caught a cold or 20 ft from the microphone in one case there was a gentleman who was actually drowning and it saved his life that is where the AI part of this is actually working
@plasmar1
March 20, 2024 at 9:23 am
depending on how nice you are, you might see about if anyone can try to dump the roms or similar from your particular unit which might help in the reverse engineering; or least that’s what I assume
@pplwizard1
March 20, 2024 at 2:48 pm
Unfortunately it will not work inside the unit is a hockey puck about 3 by 3 by 1 in that has the microprocessor the voice that recognition algorithms and other key components all epoxied in and then mounted onto the board it has special booby traps in it that if you try to cut into the hockey puck it destroys the memory and wipes the programming
@jada1173
March 20, 2024 at 9:34 am
23 watts of power.. 😅
Not mutch compared to other gadgets today..
@inachu
March 20, 2024 at 9:46 am
Yeah Butler was supposed to be the way to go. I remember this.
@lesliedeana5142
March 20, 2024 at 9:49 am
Well, remember just how effective the first OCR devices were. It took an incredible amount of training to even read printed typeface.
@placek7125
March 20, 2024 at 10:03 am
3:40 giggity
@densetsu1974
March 20, 2024 at 10:19 am
I wish my Google assistant said as you wish. Tell me what it’s doing every time so annoying.
@Bargeral
March 20, 2024 at 10:35 am
23 watts idle isn’t bad in the age of 100 watt light bulbs. My dinning room fixture growing up probably used 400 or 500 when on.
@SeaScoutDan
March 20, 2024 at 10:49 am
My wife has voice commands working perfectly.
“Husband, please turn off the lights”
@TrevorHarvey-yi9zl
March 20, 2024 at 11:42 am
Also, the x-10 modules are prone to failure to work or false triggering due to noise on the power lines. People don’t realize how dirty the power is and the power companies don’t care.
@pplwizard1
March 20, 2024 at 2:45 pm
If you get deep into X10 technology you find out that there are filters that you can put on the line that blocks noise from the outside world and repeaters that amplify signals that reduce the probability of missed or falsely triggered events
@AronBezzina
March 20, 2024 at 12:19 pm
A the phone line is for…..?
@pplwizard1
March 20, 2024 at 2:45 pm
The phone line serves several functions one of course you can dial out and make phone calls for physically challenged people this is a spectacular feature however it also has the ability to receive phone calls for example you could be on your way home and turn on the air conditioner or set lighting or get the jacuzzi started
@Egodriver71
March 20, 2024 at 12:49 pm
Slightly deaf 80 year old man, so it’s a Biden in a box?
@scottnickell2282
March 20, 2024 at 1:39 pm
Cool step in technology.
@hypersonicmonkeybrains3418
March 20, 2024 at 1:53 pm
It has one superpower.. you can name the butler whatever you want.
@Admre
March 20, 2024 at 2:31 pm
I was expecting this to be an intricate April fools episode from a year ago
@ManoelNunesOSan
March 20, 2024 at 3:15 pm
Asterix?
@Hervoo
March 20, 2024 at 3:22 pm
Now this is an amazing thing! I’d love to imagine having full house filled with electronics that Butler in a Box can do!
@schpoingle
March 20, 2024 at 3:22 pm
This seems to work exactly as bad as ‘smart’ home systems do these days. they still suck and we still repeat commands like idiots. nice video mate
@maxcarter3413
March 20, 2024 at 3:27 pm
So, it was a pile of junk.
@Themusiic09
March 20, 2024 at 4:47 pm
Really great!!
@Ruffi0
March 20, 2024 at 8:18 pm
I still have a Ethernet adapter that works over the houses electrical system.
@John_1920
March 20, 2024 at 8:47 pm
08:14 I’m sorry, what was that about ice cream you said? I would like chocolate ice cream, if possible, I’d like the ones with chocolate chip. (all of that user manual just flew right over my head…)
@Partyfreaker
March 20, 2024 at 8:51 pm
I don’t see any future for this invention, who wants to use voice commands to turn off a light?
@fuzzywzhe
March 21, 2024 at 12:21 pm
The PIN is only 4 digits long and it appears to be numerals and letters, not case sensitive. That’s just (26+10)^4 combinations or 1,679,616 – it’s easy to crack with a brute force attack today. Does it lock you out permanently after so many failures? Making a guess once a second, maximum time is under a month. Shouldn’t be hard to wire it up to automate the process.
@sillicon8227
March 21, 2024 at 12:43 pm
8:45 that wasn’t badly written
@Stonehawk
March 21, 2024 at 12:50 pm
oh shit the video is almost all done and i only JUST realized that *this isn’t VSauce.*
@markhammer9975
March 21, 2024 at 12:55 pm
I’m so glad that you actually got it to work, I watched the whole video just to see it working.🎉
@the_kombinator
March 21, 2024 at 1:53 pm
This must have worked great in condos – imagine the interference on the riser. Forget it if anything else on that circuit is connected to another one of these controllers.
@pplwizard1
March 21, 2024 at 5:04 pm
Actually that wouldn’t be a problem they made an X10 blocker that would prevent it from going from one electric box to another box so you could have it in condos without interference
@lenargilmanov7893
March 21, 2024 at 2:04 pm
No way, it’s the dude from “This exists”!
@A-Milkdromeda-Laniakea-Hominid
March 21, 2024 at 2:47 pm
*Turns on TV but you still have to walk over and choose one of the 12 channels. Otherwise your cable box had an ON button on the remote
@pplwizard1
March 21, 2024 at 5:03 pm
The video did not cover all of its capabilities it had the ability to send and receive infrared commands not just a single command but groups of commands like turn on the stereo turn on the DVD player put in disc 5 and play song for or turn on the TV turn on the cable box and bring up HBO west
@A-Milkdromeda-Laniakea-Hominid
March 21, 2024 at 5:31 pm
@@pplwizard1 Hi Gus. Well it really sounds like you were pushing the envelope! Impressive that it could do so much with so little, using only the house’s electrical wiring and phone lines. And infrared. I’m reminded however of how many universal remotes just wouldn’t work with the myriad of TV brands and cable boxes, and how much of a monkey wrench that alone tosses in.
But I can sure understand your obvious pride in the product.
@spacemeter3001
March 21, 2024 at 2:54 pm
I mean this is extremely cool but HOW does it work!????
@bradleybrown8428
March 21, 2024 at 3:26 pm
This is honestly a beautiful video.
@isaacramonet
March 21, 2024 at 3:47 pm
I mean – we are speaking of what…Bell labs? SRI did more work than anyone else here…
@isaacramonet
March 21, 2024 at 3:48 pm
also 15,000 for an inventorship and living in the future… that’s cheap
@paulfitzgerald4933
March 21, 2024 at 4:03 pm
Let’s not forget “The Clapper” could have been plugged into each room’s lamp, or Tv etc, for $30 per location.
Don’t get me wrong, i LOVE this idea of Butler In a Box. But if there’s a mic in each room and you have to be IN each room…The clapper had that and just triggered the relay right then.
Clap On, Clap Off, it’s not $10,000
BUT, I’m in love with that device. Nothing should be taking our voice outside the house to operate things.
I’d love to have one of these. This is truly what the 80’s to 90’s was about, advancing technologically but within the confines of our own world. I love devices that do one thing, and not get muddled up in dozens. I still feel weird when our machines are recording all the time.
I will hunt to find one of these and get it working. It’s just too dang cool.
@Yes-nf4jc
March 21, 2024 at 4:32 pm
You don’t need wifi or bluetooth if all it is is a bunch of wires and detectors 😂
@pplwizard1
March 21, 2024 at 4:57 pm
It could transmit and receive X10 signal both through carrier current and over Cat 5 wiring something nothing else could do it could transmit and receive infrared, DTMF tones for telephone control and be controlled and ask a code so we could control and be controlled by computers
@brad4013
March 21, 2024 at 4:39 pm
Please, someone who knows about this thing, write the Wikipedia article. Thanks.
@pplwizard1
March 21, 2024 at 5:02 pm
This will explain
@bankruptsee
March 21, 2024 at 4:47 pm
I highly prefer this. Where your commands and usage are local and not tied to the internet or cloud.
@Yes-nf4jc
March 21, 2024 at 4:52 pm
Is this Vsauce2?
@Shaze1
March 21, 2024 at 4:55 pm
Interesting product (for its time), annoying video.
@thishandleisnotavailable
March 21, 2024 at 5:10 pm
The first minute through and im hooked
@russellzauner
March 21, 2024 at 6:14 pm
It looks like it’s wireless – powerline data tech is fun stuff.
Just imagine what your TV is telling via the power grid to the NSA guy reading it on the other end.
Unless you’re always running on batteries, all your devices are connected from some of the time (charging) to all the time (AC device).
@elijahmashter9587
March 21, 2024 at 6:21 pm
I was having the worst day ever until I heard your “user error” not turning up the volume is part of the troubleshooting steps for any audio device right next to “make sure its got power” of course
@Paul-Ota
March 21, 2024 at 6:37 pm
That looks cool. 80s Tech just looks so much cooler than the crap we have now.
@megaPlanet777
March 21, 2024 at 7:01 pm
bro has a HUGE forehead
@chronobot2001
March 21, 2024 at 7:09 pm
The real AI in the 80s was created by Infocom.
Play one of their games and tell me I’m wrong.
I liked starcross.
@bobinvirtuallife8794
March 21, 2024 at 7:16 pm
screw i.p.
@ShowaGalaxy
March 21, 2024 at 9:10 pm
the editing in this video is downright nauseating
@tmastersat
March 21, 2024 at 10:03 pm
Ai is just progeammibg
@saulloweryproductions
March 21, 2024 at 11:49 pm
🔥🔥🔥🔥 and now here comes the next evolution of butlers and personal assistants the “Rabbit R1”🤯
@n0red33m
March 22, 2024 at 12:31 am
Am I missing something? How could it take over right years to brute force a 4 digit pin?
@eck3506
March 22, 2024 at 1:00 am
Fantastic story about an incredible invention.
@PolishPerspective
March 22, 2024 at 2:55 am
SmartHome system can easily be way more than 15000 now.
@michaelangeloabarreto4588
March 22, 2024 at 6:33 am
$15000 is around what a smart apartment would be like now lol
@Reaper4367
March 22, 2024 at 7:46 am
very well presented.
@WorkoutOutlook-rx1ok
March 22, 2024 at 8:13 am
Great idea! How many of those are about in stock?
@kevinb7551
March 22, 2024 at 8:13 am
lmao I’m using this tech still at work… it can have 999 users 🎉
@kkfishrick6012
March 22, 2024 at 12:03 pm
This reminds me of the Miku guitar pedal. It’s basically a box that alters your electric guitar sound into Miku voice. It has a function that allows custom lyrics input, or rather a syllable sequence. It works via a phone app but the phone app does not use bluetooth to communicate with the pedal but you have to put the phone speaker close to the guitar’s pickup (basically a magnet that transfer string vibration to electric signal)the phone would beep in a unique sequence and after that the pedal saves that sequence of syllables.
@Petra44YT
March 22, 2024 at 1:54 pm
NO! Gas street lamps are good, they work, they give great light. And they don’t kill insects, because insects stay away. Unlike electric street lamps. … Greetings from Düsseldorf, where we still have a large network of gas street lamps. Our STUPID and COMPLETELY INCOMPETENT government has decided to have them replaced, but I’m still hoping that the GOVERNMENT will be replaced before they can start to ruin a perfectly good street light system!
@Custodianruu
March 22, 2024 at 2:19 pm
*Open Says Me. not Open Sesame
@WanderlustWonderscape
March 22, 2024 at 2:26 pm
In 1994 I had a house full of X-10 devices. There was software that I ran on an “old” 486 PC that would do the voice recognition and send X-10 commands using a string of interfaces. I could barely get it to work when I spoke directly into the microphone, so I quickly abandoned this idea and turned the computer into a webcam that would dial-in to the Internet and upload a single image every 30 minutes.
@YoutubeWatcher264
March 22, 2024 at 2:56 pm
I think I’ve seen a DIY project similar to this, a voice recognition switch in an electronics magazine back in late 90’s. That one is much simpler, can only take one word at a time.
@AllenKll
March 22, 2024 at 2:58 pm
As I grew up, I loved x10, it was cheap and awesome. I have my commodore 128 controlling my room. it would wake me up in the morning by turning on lights and the radio. x10 was so cheap, but if your house wasn’t wired well…… you’d have issues. I never got an X10 to work on a power strip.
@YoutubeWatcher264
March 22, 2024 at 3:09 pm
Until 2009 (maybe even later until Siri), voice recognition applications are pretty bad. I know because I was very fascinated with this technology, and I was here and then looking for a dictation/voice recognition application.
@seagie382
March 22, 2024 at 3:31 pm
8:39
it actually seems pretty simple, if you want to select the first letter next to a number, press a1 and the number, a2 for the second, a3, and so on…
@FutureLaugh
March 22, 2024 at 4:11 pm
all chat bots are considered ai?
@donerskine7935
March 22, 2024 at 4:25 pm
FYI, Wooster’s Jeeves was not a butler, he was a valet.
@jonnyreverb
March 22, 2024 at 4:26 pm
This is no harder to program than a VCR.
@user-hl7wr8oq6h
March 22, 2024 at 4:52 pm
The penalty of leadership, it’s actually Cadillacs Moto leaders are pleged by emulation and envy.
@jaklair
March 22, 2024 at 5:48 pm
The industrial design of the Butler
was way ahead of its time
It still looks great today
It looks like a modern game console
@kevinavillain4616
March 22, 2024 at 6:23 pm
I believe it was in 63 thereabouts for a Cub scout project I created a voice-activated train using some parts from the neighbor who worked in the space program and some vacuum tubes. It was a cheat because it operated on the number of words and the number of syllables to control the speed and direction
@vilislacis3337
March 22, 2024 at 7:02 pm
I was going to comment “you’ve never shown turning the light on!”, but then you did at the very end:)
@datferretguy
March 22, 2024 at 8:06 pm
I was introduced to Eliza at a young age, that was pretty primitive but amazed me
@chillmolder
March 23, 2024 at 1:16 am
so let’s see if any Wikipedia articles were created…
@fmslick7586
March 23, 2024 at 1:28 am
you really need to talk lass and show more of what you are talking about
@christonrlblackman
March 23, 2024 at 1:32 am
The end had me in tears 💧
@ryanmish4961
March 23, 2024 at 2:12 am
Oh man that ending was awesome
@MrProfizmus
March 23, 2024 at 2:26 am
I could not for the life of me figure out how such a device could have possibly worked that long ago. The realization that it doesn’t even need to know language, but “just” needs to compare samples with stored ones, was a humbling one. Actually ingenious. Rather ironic that compared to this device, the way people use modern voice assistants is really not that much more elaborate.
@jimbotron70
March 23, 2024 at 4:49 am
WOPR vibes here
@Toll99725
March 23, 2024 at 5:07 am
Imma be honest here: we should be able to call our Google, Alexa, Siri or whatever you have different names than just their names. would be super. also, the Blackbox thingy didnt even need a Server to function! why not nowadays?
@ParallaxVisuals
March 23, 2024 at 5:45 am
siiick ending!!!
@unknownworld8238
March 23, 2024 at 6:05 am
And what about the eccentrics? They were just temporarily recognized when they were at their highest sine value. And when others came with i.provements on the eccentric’s idea, the eccentric was forgotten and the new innovators didn’t care to pay a single mention to their work.
Be it the Butler In A Box inventor, or anyone else really.
Is … really that it? You make people aware of a new thing, you get to be heard, and then – you simply “disappear” from existence?
I belive there are even more that were forgotten because no one cared to mentioned them (between the people that know about them)
That doesn’t look right…
For a proper pay of respects, the eccentric’s work must be
appreciated (=”give it a try”) ,
recognized (=”what real life use does it have and how does it compare to the current level of progress in the evolution of, say technology jn this case?”)
awarded(=”what contribution did the inventor bring to the people?”)
credited,
and helped upon improving their own product, while giving credit to every individual’s contribution to the project.
Why is that hard to accept that X had the idea, Y improved it and Z was the impulse that made more interested in using and improving it?
Its a fucking win-win. All are paid, given credit, and get recognized.
I really cannot comprehend this level of selfishness in people’s actions.
@CosmicScaleFactor
March 23, 2024 at 6:16 am
Why did it need a home phone connection? That was never explained
@pplwizard1
March 23, 2024 at 8:37 am
Because back then there were a lot of landlines and you could pick up any phone in the house and control the unit you could call from outside the house and control the unit like call home and turn on the Jacuzzi or set the air conditioning and it could dial out for you and make phone calls
@LordPlageron
March 23, 2024 at 8:10 am
the instructions where written for specific with things written again differently to try to be clearly understood.
@LordPlageron
March 23, 2024 at 8:24 am
oh how i wish that it being first would have brought out better stuff. Companies never improve…..they copy then charge you more money for the same product just slightly altered.
@danboid
March 23, 2024 at 8:43 am
Very interesting video!
In 2024 we have Speech Note a fully open source speech to text translator that can be used to control your computer and works offline with zero training required by the user.
@MrMegaPussyPlayer
March 23, 2024 at 8:58 am
2:05 Ask LOOK MUM NO COMPUTER or any other retro channel that also deals with telephone. Or get a TSLS (telephone service line simulator or telephone line simulator)
@EasyMoney322
March 23, 2024 at 10:03 am
What 110 ps gaming hours?
PS4 consumes 86Watts at idle, and up to 144 in gaming. Its 6 times more power consumption.
You can also wire it up to UPS (they were a thing since 1950s), rather than to rely on these built-in batteries.
I bet if you had this much money to buy the device, you would had several UPS in your house.
RS232 (actually TIA-232) is the simplest (and the most popular) protocol, and you dont have to know anything about the computers to use it. What did you expect? RS-485? Thicknet? Thinnet? IRDA?
Also the keyboard layout is the same as on the most of cell phones.
Something isn’t mentioned on wiki? Go on and write or edit an article. You do know, that wiki is created and edited by volunteers, right?
@user-cl7cg8pe3u
March 23, 2024 at 10:37 am
Just like everything “AI” a scam
@user-zt8zi8we3r
March 23, 2024 at 11:28 am
It wasn`t AI and it wasn`t $15000, give me back my click.
@pplwizard1
March 23, 2024 at 3:07 pm
He got quite a few facts incorrect. But the one that he didn’t get wrong which unfortunately he really didn’t cover is the AI portion of this thing. It actually did have ai that’s why it’s in the Smithsonian. Well the other voice recognition systems that were attempting to operate could only manage to operate 1 to 2 in from the microphone where are the butler in a box the butler in a box could be from 1 in to over 30 ft away. It took an AI voice recognition kernel to be able to achieve that. Back then it was considered impossible the voice recognition system gave the ability that once it was trained you could catch a cold change your voice dramatically in fact one case there was a man that was drowning and screamed at it for help while he was drowning and it saved his life. I’m sorry the video didn’t cover that in more detail but the product really did have an AI Colonel not for the automation part not for the remote control but for how the voice recognition worked
@jekkleegrace
March 23, 2024 at 1:01 pm
Spent so much time listening to his own voice he only bothered setting up one command, light 😂
@parmesanzero7678
March 23, 2024 at 1:48 pm
Your videos are no better here than they are elsewhere. Goodbye.
@konsans
March 23, 2024 at 2:19 pm
Stop Yapping .
@DJVON
March 23, 2024 at 2:31 pm
you deserve 1 million subs NOW !
@paulhibbert
March 23, 2024 at 5:54 pm
This video alone deserves more than 80 thousand subs. Absolutely fantastic research, editing and delivery, loved watching this and assumed you had several million subs ❤️
@gianlucag6976
March 23, 2024 at 6:40 pm
22 minutes to say nothing
@tbuk8350
March 23, 2024 at 8:48 pm
This was an incredible video, you earned my subscription immediately. Keep up the amazing work!
@KyleFN
March 23, 2024 at 9:14 pm
Oh snap! I remember playing with those lamp/appliance modules. I think they were called X10 or something?”
I was a kid with no money but super into home automation. So, I would design hypothetical systems, and I remember using those X10 modules. Even back then, I was amazed at how fast the price skyrocketed as I added modules for the whole house on my “builds.”
Also, as a kid in the 80s/90s, I can tell you that voice recognition/dictation was always “just around the corner.” It was the elusive unicorn that would launch us into the next era of computing. Dragon Naturally Speaking was the best at what it did. I played with it when I was a computer salesman at OfficeMax while I was in college. It was… acceptable, not good though.
Also, I would never wish RS232 serial connections on my worst enemy. You kids just DO NOT KNOW the true pain.
@SpencerRyllSmith
March 23, 2024 at 11:09 pm
Is this Technology Connections long lost brother?
@thatpersonwithamlpiconwhos2861
March 23, 2024 at 11:34 pm
It would be cool if someone could take the guts out of a broken one with a little computer that links up to GPT-4 or something
@DFowleezy
March 24, 2024 at 12:33 am
At least this technology won’t steal your data.
@MJC22.03
March 24, 2024 at 1:46 am
It still works better than the YT’s caption/generator
@MJC22.03
March 24, 2024 at 2:10 am
That was a really good episode –
@YanestraAgain
March 24, 2024 at 2:25 am
I hear a Mimimi I can’t even clearly distinguish from the background noise.
@trainsplanesandotherthings5187
March 24, 2024 at 2:27 am
yeah I remember that on popular science
@SomeDudeInBaltimore
March 24, 2024 at 3:21 am
I kinda wish X.10 stayed with us as a widespread standard and I wish it was built into every high voltage appliance by default, even a toaster. It would be way better than dealing with flaky WiFi and Z-wave crap.
@cbcinfla
March 24, 2024 at 8:25 am
Your edits & short zooms make this video nearly unwatchable.
@SgtCrypto
March 24, 2024 at 8:53 am
Now I have to watch “Demon Seed” ☠️🤣
@pplwizard1
March 24, 2024 at 11:59 am
The scene that inspired it was the scene where the scientists walks into his house says it’s me open tells the music to come on lights not the whole rest of the movie it was that first part. Also part of my inspiration which isn’t listed here anywhere is also a thing from The Addams Family and that’s how the butler worked sat in one spot but it seems to be all over the house.
@nuldorvamoysenor2091
March 24, 2024 at 10:17 am
But can it play Doom?
@TomTom-gx1sm
March 24, 2024 at 10:54 am
Klingon, haha
@Videoneer
March 24, 2024 at 12:28 pm
This (and its protocol) remind me of PLC programming. I bet many PLC programmers took to this in the 80s and found it easy to deploy?
Also it’s videos like this that really make me love the internet. I see Gus, some coworkers and others loosely related to his business responding positively and helping. I love it
@Videoneer
March 24, 2024 at 12:42 pm
Honestly I’d want this more than a Siri or Alexa. I’d rather spend the time programming this knowing that my data won’t be bought or sold to companies. I love this as an off-grid option and I’d absolutely buy this today if they were still manufactured.
@CJT3X
March 24, 2024 at 1:02 pm
My uncle had one, but I don’t believe I ever knew about it while it was operable.
@Ellipsi5Streams
March 24, 2024 at 2:00 pm
Someone tell Technology Connections about this
@pplwizard1
March 24, 2024 at 4:58 pm
What would you like to know?
@ultralaggerREV1
March 24, 2024 at 4:14 pm
LETS REBUILD THE BUTLER IN A BOX WITH OPENAI!
@9vdc500ma
March 24, 2024 at 5:25 pm
Open seas a me
@jonathandrake4673
March 24, 2024 at 5:55 pm
Nicely done video! I met Gus at the Consumer Electronics Show in Chicago in the early 80s. It was Sunday afternoon and I bought a Butler that had been used on display (around $300). I already had X-10 modules purchased from the BSR corporation at CES a couple of years earlier as well as Radio Shack versions.
Training the box took patience. The name I ended up giving my B.I.A.B. was Hemorrhoid, representative my feelings toward it when I wanted the kitchen light turned on and it turned off everything in the house instead. I built a battery backup with larger batteries. I had about 15 controlled devices. The speakerphone function worked but not well. I would sometimes use it only for the voice dialer and pick up a different phone after my call was answered. Voice mouse macro commands could be pre-programmed to execute a series of RS-232 port commands. The ability to dim or brighten lights was a nice feature.
It was very polite as well. A command sequence would have this kind of structure:
Hemorrhoid
Yes master
Front light
What is your command?
On
Right away.
The front porch light would turn on.
I enjoyed using it and frequently had people visit to see how it worked.
I ended up selling it in the late 80s to a person who wanted to help a handicapped woman. He had limited success with it.
Final note: probably because of this early experience, I choose to NOT use any of the voice command devices available now.
@drrenard1277
March 24, 2024 at 7:10 pm
I remember X-10. Heck I live in a house that has outlets with X-10 functionality but no controller in the house. Don’t know if they even work
@rfs54
March 24, 2024 at 7:37 pm
Some Things Did Not Make It & Some did, those that did directly evolved into todays gadgets but even those that failed played a part in the modern tech of today & years from Now someone will probably try to figure out how we ever used todays tech as what they will have will be even better than now, but without the old you wouldn’t have the new
@Mr.Cyberdude
March 24, 2024 at 7:44 pm
The difference between millennials and old school common sense and try try try before giving up is explained right here in the next 15 seconds. Great job on explaining the time warped tech, the problem now is that most devices do not start when powered back up.
@adambevill
March 24, 2024 at 8:18 pm
dont forget in the 80s you did not have multiple single apllicances, not most people anyway. 1 vcr, 1 tv, etc.
@pplwizard1
March 24, 2024 at 8:27 pm
One thing you need to keep in mind is that computing power (speed), RAM and ROM and all that 40 years ago was very slow and very very expensive. As a point of reference the average Smartwatch today has 125,000 times more memory than the butler in a box did, and no I’m not exaggerating! Also the average computer speed today is 3,800 times faster than the processing in the butler in a box 40 years ago. Yet despite those limitations it still did real time voice recognition and full human sounding digital speech which back then was unheard of.
@itwasntworking1916
March 24, 2024 at 9:05 pm
Just get a damn human butler
@zerazara
March 25, 2024 at 5:40 am
What are you talking about RS232 port? RS232 is still alive and kicking and will probably live longer than USB-C. RS232 and 9-pin serial line plugs are like Ethernet. A timeless industrial standard that is simply very very hard to get rid of. The world does not run on consumer electronics.
@Shivansh-qw5jl
March 25, 2024 at 6:37 am
No demo no utilisation.
Just Nixon fantasy.
@campkohler9131
March 25, 2024 at 7:15 am
“Alexa, talk to the Butler in a Box and get it working.”
@campkohler9131
March 25, 2024 at 7:28 am
Great script!
@TheRealNightShot
March 25, 2024 at 7:57 am
Basically SCP-079 was real
@SuperNovaRider
March 25, 2024 at 8:19 am
Good video. Sadly the title is so misleading/clickbait, that you end up disappointed in the end.
This is no AI and it was never sold as an artifical intelligence.
Shot in the foot.
@LIVE781REDRUM
March 25, 2024 at 8:39 am
Upload the manuscript to chat gpt 5
@aduibar4595
March 25, 2024 at 8:41 am
Because old generation was brighter.
@LIVE781REDRUM
March 25, 2024 at 8:51 am
Real talk here. Who’s the Host? Who is the owner of the channel? I just wanna say Keep doing this format. Taking something old from pop Sci with this host and you have a goldmine.
High quality like this and you could see 10 million subscribers in 2 years. Trust me. I’m a digital marketer and I build channels
@LIVE781REDRUM
March 25, 2024 at 8:54 am
THIS VIDEO FORMAT IS THE SECRET SAUCE TO YOUR CHANNEL MORE MORE MORE
@aduibar4595
March 25, 2024 at 8:54 am
You could have just trained the box with another tape or computer. There’s an add-on cassette player with a serial.
@TrasherBiner
March 25, 2024 at 8:54 am
weren’t you one of the little Michael V-sauce minions? Even your gestures are Michael’s 😂😂😂😂
@LIVE781REDRUM
March 25, 2024 at 8:56 am
SUPERB VIDEO
@dragonrider2104
March 25, 2024 at 9:03 am
So a barely functioning voice activated appliance on/off switcher passes as an AI?
@supersingular
March 25, 2024 at 10:12 am
What an amazing video. The most eccentric company I’ve seen today is Timeplast.
@sadboidex6106
March 25, 2024 at 2:17 pm
i was today years old when i learned open sesame had nothing to do with seeds
@AnimeSliceOfPie
March 25, 2024 at 2:54 pm
I was more impressed by butler in a box than my alexa…
@jassenjj
March 25, 2024 at 4:05 pm
This product is/was … “preposterous” and it’s amazing how much attention you paid to it. A true tribute with that dramatic speech at the end…
But that “user error” with not noticing the volume *slider* made me feel old and I am 41. Gen Z, explore the world! A simple solar storm could disable all of your smart touch-sensitive toys.
And what is this CRT TV set from a parallel universe at 1:06 with a vertical raster? 😀
@leonidas14775
March 25, 2024 at 4:31 pm
When I was a teenager, i bought a radio remote controlled light switch to turn the lights on and off without getting up. It was pretty dope 😛
@NicksStuff
March 25, 2024 at 4:58 pm
I love the design, it has a very B&O vibe
@wakomikro
March 25, 2024 at 5:27 pm
The Butler is a sweet name though
@trevorsloan2047
March 25, 2024 at 6:12 pm
They had ai and chat bots in the sixties. Most of the new ais are older models retweaked or not at all
@AwesomeThe
March 25, 2024 at 6:12 pm
Its quite clear that he put the brains of his victims into the buttler boxes, some still scream for help.
@trevorsloan2047
March 25, 2024 at 6:19 pm
Because they were alot smarter than this generation, we still use this shit today, little different format, not much progress really, old recycled stuff
@apryed
March 25, 2024 at 7:55 pm
Damm… on VSauce2 and here? Where else are you on?
@bobjo1006
March 25, 2024 at 9:29 pm
that ending gave me goosebumps
@YourComputerExpert
March 25, 2024 at 9:30 pm
At the last part of the video: this is why patents exist and are good. Also, voice assistants today still suck. They talk way too much whenever you ask them to do something and are still dumb on basic knowledge.
@RubensRainelli
March 25, 2024 at 10:00 pm
Please, please and PLEASE… take a bit of your time to publish the info on Wikipedia and wikimedia for the love of tech history.
Amazing video!
@nickmiroli
March 25, 2024 at 10:55 pm
Those instructions were pretty clear. Each alpha selection chooses the corresponding letter on the number. Alpha 1 – A D G – Alpha 2 – B E H – Alpha 3 – C F I – And so on.
@spacefury65
March 25, 2024 at 11:03 pm
I love gadgets, especially from when I was younger in the 80s. I would get one of these things just to have. Funny how long it could take to program for a lamp to be turned on or off when a Clapper can do it out of the box in seconds…
@pplwizard1
March 26, 2024 at 2:14 am
Remember the butler in a box could do 32 things by voice commands not including dimming and brightening lights. The Clapper could not do any of that it could only do one thing if you got this just to turn on one thing it would be a waste of money.
@DiamondDepthYT
March 27, 2024 at 8:54 pm
@@pplwizard1 hi Gus
@patino851
March 26, 2024 at 3:53 am
😮After reading the manual and becoming a rocket scientist, you’ll be able to turn on your light bulb
@domi-no1826
March 26, 2024 at 2:04 pm
i was hoping it would be a lost AI from U.E.S.C 🙁
@TheKringgle
March 26, 2024 at 10:10 pm
I shouldnt know this much about the $15,000 A.I. From 1983. The butler in a box.
@MrZorbatron
March 26, 2024 at 10:26 pm
How would a 9V battery keep the memory for longer than AA batteries? The typical 9V has a capacity of around 110-190mAh. 6 AA batteries in series would deliver the same 9 volts, but with an energy capacity of around 900-1300mAh for basic alkalines.
@TheCreativeContentHub
March 26, 2024 at 10:51 pm
remember that disney movie about a smart house…..turns out it was the same lady from sons of anarchy
@hellhound-si5oz
March 27, 2024 at 12:24 am
To be very honest, I wouldn’t be surprised if that lamp module is just a homepower x10 poem automation system. You are so probably will need. A transceiver module from the X10 system as well to operate. Cause that converts the r f to the household wiring
@greyship1341
March 27, 2024 at 4:07 am
Lamp… ON
Toilet… Flush
Engines… Max Power
Portal… Activate
@Instant_Nerf
March 27, 2024 at 7:32 am
2004? Nope
@Husleek
March 27, 2024 at 9:50 am
Literally 1984
@I.____.....__...__
March 27, 2024 at 11:34 am
The most salient point of this video is that Kevin was able to get this working over 40 years later.
I have a home-automation device that stopped working less than a year later because the company folded and the smartphone-app that’s required to use it “NEEDS” to connect to their defunct servers to work instead of just using the home LAN. Even the remote-control won’t work since it disconnected from the device and “NEEDS” the website to reconnect.
I have another home-automation system that worked until a few months ago, but now, all the smart-plugs and controllers are no longer joined to the hub and I can’t get them to work. (And the app won’t work locally and “REQUIRES” connecting to their servers to even start up.) The company said it’s no longer supported so now the entire system is e-waste. 😒 – Newer is not always better. In fact, it seems like “upgrades” usually make things WORSE now. 🤦
It’s frustrating that there are both a first-mover advantage and first-mover disadvantage. WTH are you supposed to do? How can you know if you should proceed or wait? These days, they call the FMD the MySpace effect, but I’m sure it’ll be renamed to something else since it never stops happening.
And it’s not just for products or companies, it happens to people as well. There have been many people who were “ahead of their time” and only appreciated after it was too late. And that’s just the ones who were able to get recognized at all, ever, imagine all the people who were ahead of their time and didn’t get recorded and were lost to history. 😕
@speakerbasstester1639
March 27, 2024 at 12:09 pm
Can I have the link to the cellphone landline adapter?
@marcogiuranna116
March 27, 2024 at 12:33 pm
Amazingly interesting video, thank you!
@KimberHall
March 27, 2024 at 2:49 pm
Love the subject, hate the presenter…
@rskillet5325
March 27, 2024 at 3:59 pm
Mind blown
@TeodorD
March 27, 2024 at 5:22 pm
i skipped through 3 quarters of the video … or i would recommend turn the fast forward to 1.75. could have been a 5-10 minutes video 🙂
@cezartorescu
March 27, 2024 at 8:19 pm
Total waste of time and a ton of bullshit.
@reverentevzheniy
March 27, 2024 at 8:45 pm
On practice it means that this Buttler can’t track your actions, and will do everything with top honesty and transparency.
And it is unhackable? I want one.
@JamesHawkeYouTube
March 27, 2024 at 8:48 pm
Pop science is baloney. It’s the unpopular shit that’s true.
@glennjones6574
March 27, 2024 at 11:26 pm
actually the implementation is quite ingenious..only held back by the then current state of peripheral technology.
@benjaminkline4855
March 28, 2024 at 1:49 am
I think anyone willing to learn the kernal book for commodore could easily handle 134 pages
@tomcarlson3913
March 28, 2024 at 3:59 am
So for the ~$1000 you got a really fancy device that could control only 2 things with sound, but was expandable at ~$36 per device….During the same time frame you could get a clapper for what $19.95? that could control 2 devices with sound but wasn’t expandable (unless you bought more and placed them in other rooms)…..It’s not hard to see which sold better.
@jonathanschenck8154
March 28, 2024 at 6:56 am
Current chat bots are too limiting via their guidelines.
@jonathanschenck8154
March 28, 2024 at 6:59 am
International rights is our friend, while strict guidelines are almost hal9000 in terms of driving you mad.
@somedinguswholikestea
March 30, 2024 at 7:09 am
what guidelines
@cieplydran1
March 28, 2024 at 11:44 am
wtf is wrong with your voice
@ThomazDias1
March 28, 2024 at 1:10 pm
22 minutes of video.
And he did the “thing” at the very last minute.
The history of the product was awesome, but i’m very confuse about how this work in reality.
@colinstu
March 28, 2024 at 4:26 pm
1:51 PS4… really? Could’ve said “ream of paper”, more accurate and is something that most folks have in their home or have handled one before.
@wemartin1211
March 28, 2024 at 6:29 pm
Great video. Made me think of the Humane AI pin that just came out. It’s an interesting idea that wont catch on now but in some other form will be popular in the future.
@Use-Your_Brain
March 28, 2024 at 8:23 pm
Open says me
@Tom-ru9ds
March 29, 2024 at 1:01 am
So, you bring up the murder trial … ??? any links to that information since there is nothing but teaser in the video … ???
@univon4892
March 29, 2024 at 2:11 am
The internet was invented in the late sixties
@manicmods
March 29, 2024 at 2:19 pm
Loved this!
@SFah1mS
March 29, 2024 at 4:07 pm
Wow!
@alessandroaiezza4339
March 29, 2024 at 6:56 pm
Did anyone else legit tear up at the end when he turned on that lamp?
@waltertarr2014
March 29, 2024 at 7:06 pm
This would be a great review. If it wasn’t done by such a young generation person. This is how you got your other devices.
@DragPlix
March 29, 2024 at 7:34 pm
Wow!
@AnonymousSquirrel123
March 30, 2024 at 2:43 am
*I **_loved_** the X10 protocol! My entire house was X10’ed until I moved in 1989, where I lost my X10 box in the move… Great loss!*
*23 watts in the 1980s was utterly incredible! My first “PC” (before the IBM “PC” coined the term) was a 1977 SWTPC 6800, and it drew almost 200 wats! The “Butler” was way ahead of it’s time in every dimension!*
@vossenvossen
March 30, 2024 at 11:41 am
‘Wet van de remmende voorsprong ‘ was actually about the opposite effect. Dutch to english it translate something like:
Law of the decreasing advantage
Being the first to have a great invention ahead in time, will let you not improve because of it. People tempt to proudly hold on to it, even though better/cheaper inventions are already on the market. I think the example was about England was the first to introduce gas-lantarns as street lighting, but where the last to adapt to electric lights.. so being ahead of your time may cause you to hold on to a more complex or cost inefficient solution for too long. The trick is flexibility. Being able to go with the flow and quickly adapt to the changes/improvements of the industry you’d chosen.
Never the less: GO BUTLER
must have been hell programming it.
I found a windows in my bookshelf version 3.1 on floppy disk(s). I say disk(s) because windows was on one of the 14 disks total. On the other disks was the extra voice command/dictation (dragonsoft?)software to operate windows 3.2 completely by voice.
I liked your video about the Butler. Rock on
@Wary_Of_Extremes
March 30, 2024 at 5:08 pm
I like the ‘Newton’ robot that would play with kids, phone the fire department, etc. etc…from the 80’s
@foxale08
March 30, 2024 at 7:03 pm
If you could afford one my guess is you could also afford a generator
@pplwizard1
March 30, 2024 at 10:38 pm
I don’t think you saw the other comments but he missed that one part in the manual there is a device called a ramp pack that would store and restore the entire memory in 5 seconds lasted for 7 years before you needed to replace the battery for another 7 years.
@filipgrasberg9333
March 30, 2024 at 7:24 pm
Damm! This video is GOLD!
@toksik_protogen
March 30, 2024 at 7:56 pm
8:54 *turning my head to look at my TV*
@magnaman1963
March 30, 2024 at 8:08 pm
the problem with most voice recognition is that they all have to be “taught” what YOUR voice sounds like for each word
@pplwizard1
March 30, 2024 at 10:37 pm
Well you may consider it a problem if you consider that something is running your home and your security system you don’t want anyone else walking in and turning it on that’s why it can be controlled only by the person who trained it and if you had four users you could still only have one of them that could disarm the alarm system for example
@magnaman1963
March 30, 2024 at 10:49 pm
@@pplwizard1 Each person has a specific way they talk, the enunciation, the cadence, the accent, etc…. IBM back in the 1990s had OS/2 warp with part of that operating system being voice type navigation and dictation… the owner of the computer using it spends hours if not days training the software to recognize their voice using many factors distinct to them… each person using the software had to do the same thing. If stranger X came in and tried to use the software it would do NOTHING for them because it didn’t recognize them because of their “voice pattern”. The same type of system could be used securely for security systems and home automation.
@pplwizard1
March 31, 2024 at 12:57 am
@@magnaman1963 that’s exactly what we did in 1983 but it didn’t take hours to train it once it knew who you were and knew the difference between you and someone else and you could even catch a cold or even be drowning which in one case actually happened and it would still understand you.
@magnaman1963
March 31, 2024 at 2:51 am
@@pplwizard1 It’s been so long since I used OS/2 warp I couldn’t remember the year it came out lol… It sucks getting old
@0x0fffff
March 30, 2024 at 10:16 pm
Upload the manual to the internet
@pplwizard1
March 30, 2024 at 10:32 pm
The manuel was originally written in Amy Pro it has since been converted to Microsoft Word but all the pictures and diagrams are missing so if someone knows how to convert an Amy pro to SAM file with pictures and diagrams I’d be glad to post it on my website.
@0x0fffff
March 31, 2024 at 2:24 pm
@@pplwizard1 Ami Pro was later renamed to IBM Lotus Word Pro, and it can export .doc files
@0x0fffff
March 30, 2024 at 10:24 pm
134 pages? That’s small, just one of the 8 manual included on an Apple II Plus is 837 pages.
@christianrissotto.gordohom3478
March 31, 2024 at 1:10 am
I dont know what exactly you did but just the effort to make that thing work is astronomical….
subscribed.
@TbM
March 31, 2024 at 4:58 am
21:42 waited very long and got disappointed but: HE WILL USE IT!
@aeixo2533
March 31, 2024 at 8:29 am
Very nice video Mr Vsauce man.
@Sir_Edward_Cheung
March 31, 2024 at 10:56 am
I almost bought one when I came out. Still have my extensive X10 system and always wondered about that system.
@darren92redrum67
March 31, 2024 at 4:50 pm
‘first mover disadvantage’
blackberry phones
@thedungeondelver
March 31, 2024 at 6:40 pm
I would sooner own this than a google, amazon, or apple anything. As far as I’m aware, Gus wasn’t compromised by the NSA, FBI, CIA or Chinese, and wouldn’t sell my personal information to other companies to make a buck.
Amazon, Google, and Apple, on the other hand are, and will.
@max_e_maxxy_
March 31, 2024 at 9:34 pm
Amazing video, I wrote this response with help of my Google assistant speak to type, which I’ve been told only old people use.
@rdt8
March 31, 2024 at 9:51 pm
I read through a good number of the comments before watching the video and all I can think about now is that poor guy who has wasted 8 years of his life trying to reverse engineer an algorithm to get a PIN when he simply could have emailed or messaged Gus directly for the PIN. I hope that guy sees the comments here and learns that he can simply contact Gus.
@rdt8
March 31, 2024 at 9:52 pm
I wonder if this is the system that they used in Xanadu: Home of the Future 🤔
@pplwizard1
March 31, 2024 at 10:43 pm
Yes it was…
@jonwallace6204
March 31, 2024 at 10:14 pm
Ah yes the old “recognize speech” or “wreck a nice beach” problem.
@BBC600
April 1, 2024 at 1:14 am
I would have liked to see it interface with the cellphone. I liked the history lesson but feel this could have demoed it more.
@pplwizard1
April 1, 2024 at 11:56 am
This will explain everything about it
@FrankSuno
April 1, 2024 at 2:50 am
Why cant i get awesome videos like this in my recommend? Not only do you have my low attention span ass paying FULL attention in 1 minute, you also have a sub with notifications on!
@4KSYDNEY
April 1, 2024 at 5:40 am
Butler in a box is more advanced than the so-called smart devices of today, because you can call your butler whatever you want, instead of only Google, or Alexa, I wish I could call my Google something other than Google.
@ChrisEdwardsRestoration
April 1, 2024 at 12:48 pm
damn kids…
@CamdenBloke
April 1, 2024 at 1:20 pm
I used to use x10 in my bedroom in the 90s. I even used it as late as about 2010 do I have an alarm clock that turned on my room lights.
The modules aren’t actually that expensive.
Of course I didn’t have the butler in a box system, I had things where they were switches and alarm clocks and such that could be rigged up to send different signals to turn things on and off remotely, but that ended up being kind of annoying except for the few times that I stepped out the door realized I didn’t turn my light off, and pointed the remote control at my bedroom light and turned it off from outside.
@csabirares411
April 1, 2024 at 2:26 pm
How the Heck don’t you have a land mine?!
@Diamonddrake
April 1, 2024 at 4:49 pm
“This isn’t a tech video, it’s a ghost story” **shivers**
@sunny-vega
April 1, 2024 at 6:12 pm
Little did they know that people will have home offices and not putting the PC next to theri TVs :’D
@nicholashamblin3600
April 1, 2024 at 8:50 pm
Gosh I haven’t seen one of these things in decades and even then only in magazines this is one of the coolest videos I’ve seen in awhile thank you so much for producing this.
On a similar note another”ghost story” you might enjoy detailing
Is that of Temple OS.
Thank you.
@tarzanaman666
April 2, 2024 at 12:03 am
U gotta do boxee box lol
@Official_Joshua
April 2, 2024 at 7:28 am
Just skip to the end of the video to see it work 😂😂😂
@lexinexi-hj7zo
April 2, 2024 at 1:44 pm
So cool I sold cell phone in the 200’s and the moyorola v90 that metal flip phone where the ant would break if you gave it a dirty look. And the new antenna was shaped like an L and soldered in place so you couldnt screw a new one on. Any ways it did have speech recognition it would say select “Mum” from the phone book then record you saying “call mum” three times so it would match up the sound to the recordings. The phone was a customer service nightmare at 219$ and constant broken antennas and people not realizing it didnt have Voice recognition but rather a recording it would compare to when you pressed the talk button.. Im surprised that was 20 year old tech before 2003ish. SO NO VOICE RECOGNITION AI!!!
@Nal_WT
April 2, 2024 at 3:44 pm
could someone tell me what the music is at 10:39?
@johneygd
April 2, 2024 at 4:28 pm
It was ahead for it’s time whether it needed some fine tuning or not.
@GraveUypo
April 2, 2024 at 5:14 pm
8:53
my pc is literally 20 centimeters to the side of my screen, which is a 48″ oled TV. i felt attacked.
@GraveUypo
April 2, 2024 at 5:24 pm
oh so much drama over 20w. 110 playstation hours, 20 times alexa. still 60 cents.
@Tom_Oliver_89
April 2, 2024 at 6:05 pm
what is the name of the song at the start or the video i like it
@wesallen3926
April 2, 2024 at 6:15 pm
Come on Popular Science, You totally forgot about the Knight Industries Two Thousand or KITT for short…. xD
@stinghouseproductions8502
April 2, 2024 at 6:55 pm
With that price mark-up I’m surprised this wasn’t made by Apple.
@Gandeloft
April 2, 2024 at 7:27 pm
8:50 – People were less stupid before.
@dcisme5594
April 2, 2024 at 7:50 pm
my alexa disconnects from my stuff all the time, this literally seems more reliable
@MichaelMammon
April 2, 2024 at 10:27 pm
Please. Asterisk is pronounced “ASTER RISK” not “ASTER RICK”. It isn’t a cartoon character or something…
@CaseyDplays
April 2, 2024 at 10:34 pm
This looks like a great system for home automation that’s NOT connected to the internet. It would certainly take a while to set up, but put in a house with a back up generator that comes on a few minutes after the power goes out and give it a UPS to plug into (assuming that wouldn’t break it’s communication with other devices) then it would be amazing. It’s sad to see inventions like this forgotten as they really did get us where we are today in technology.
@pplwizard1
April 3, 2024 at 5:24 am
Hi, I’m glad you appreciate what it could do. He did miss several facts about the product if you look in the other comments you will see there was a device called a rampak that plugged into the back of the unit and would store and restore the entire memory in 5 seconds and would last for 7 years before you had to change the battery in it. It was about the size of a pack of cigarettes he just didn’t read that far in the manual
@Robert08010
April 3, 2024 at 3:17 am
In 1983, an actual butler would have been cheaper!
@After_Burnett
April 3, 2024 at 4:43 am
I would have loved one of these with all the modules if I were a rich dude in the ’80s. Even now, Id like something like this without the internet connectivity. Just walk in say “lights” and there ya have it. Awesome device if you ask me 😍
@holystars3
April 3, 2024 at 8:58 am
9:15 i was born two days ago lol
@bingusneverchanges
April 3, 2024 at 10:11 am
How did it work though??? If darpa couldn’t even do voice recognition???
@pplwizard1
April 3, 2024 at 1:07 pm
I actually invented a form of voice recognition that no one else had even tried to use. That’s why we’re in the smithsonian. If you see all the samples he shows from earlier people they were all having to speak 2 inches from a microphone yet we could stand 20 to 30 ft away. You can’t even look up the patents under my name at the US patent office to get more detail however below is a link that will give you a full explanation of everything that it did including a demonstration.
@howisthishandletaken
April 3, 2024 at 12:15 pm
chatgpt’s got nothing on this
@stringercorrales6627
April 3, 2024 at 2:12 pm
I don’t like home automation and smartphone assistants just because using my home and smartphone is so easy for me. It would feel like going through an overbearing parent for everything. They’d just get in my way.
@user-yj3uf8nx5r
April 3, 2024 at 4:40 pm
Those 120v X – plugs were an ingenious concept but constantly failed from interference. They communicate by piggybacking a signal thru the 120v electricity. I set one system up using this in 1999 cost a little than $300 for the entire house and in the end threw it all in the trash a year latter after getting warnings from the police I had too many false alarms.
@HansOvervoorde
April 4, 2024 at 6:44 am
Now please let the rabbit go.
@kosterix123
April 4, 2024 at 8:15 am
12:50 olease explain to me how markov chains can help with voice recognition.
@imcrow6674
April 4, 2024 at 9:18 am
the power draw honestly isnt too bad, my pc alone uses like ~500 watts, not even counting my monitors or anything. i could think of 30 different things i have around that use more power
not to mention its an 80s device, they arent gonna be as power efficient as something made 40 years in the future
@WillowFox
April 4, 2024 at 11:50 am
“I DON’T EVEN HAVE A LAND LINE!!11” Yeah, its… fuckin 40 years in the future… Yet some of us still actually DO have one… Not the butler’s problem.
“IT USES SOME ARCHAIC ENTRY CODE HOW DO!!??” It’s basically an earlier version of T9, it’s… not hard.
“IT WAS SOOOO EXPENSIVE!” Yeah, that’s how tech is when it comes out… how much did the first computers cost, who had them, and what could they and could they NOT do….?
“IT CAN LEARN ANY MADE UP LANGUAGE BASED ON WHAT YOU TELL IT”
Okay, good, so it works better than “Hey siri, what time is it? …Siri replies in german because she sorta heard Vas and not What….”
It’s not a “flawed technology”, it’s a fore runner.
You clearly didn’t even bother reading the manual or looking at the damn thing for more then a second after plugging it in if you didn’t see the slider switches on the unit for volume and mic sensitivity…
Cleaning slider switches is a normal thing… the board being cracked is a bit weird and obviously from mishandling. What I would have been worried about are the electrolytic capacitors throughout the board, and would have replaced those while taking the board out for servicing just to get them out of the way and not to worry about them for another 40 years or so.
I don’t get how people get all pissy when they see a device that was clearly NOT for the “common person” it’s a BUTLER in a BOX… who had BUTLERS to begin with? … Someone who could drop 7 grand on a device for basic home automation to impress their yuppie friends, that’s who.
They said in the future devices like this would become common…. were they wrong? no.
“ZOMG I HAVE TO READ A HUUUGE MANUAL??? Y THO!?” Oh dear, you actually had to read a manual and not just plug in a device dumbed down to work instantly? The device wasn’t made by some super giant like apple or google… it was very crude, and you actually had to program things up… Luckily they had a way to do this through a phone and you didn’t NEED to have a PC… Just running a PC like an NEC or a DIGITAL terminal or even a TRS-80 back then… have you ever read the BASIC books? your PC actually came with BINDER(S) on how to use it, and commands….
So this was SUPER easy in comparison…
Too used to everything just doing what you want right out of the box?
“FRUSTRATED” when things actually require a little work on your part?
How do you not understand that, it wasn’t easy to do things “waaay back then” ?
But yet people complain “now adays” that everything is Soooooo harrrrrrd zomg you can’t even.
Seriously.
It’s tech that’s over 40 years old and you expected to just plug it in and be like “HEY JEEVES TURN ON MY LAMP AND TELL ME NEWS.”?
I literally followed along with the reading of the instructions on how to enter the code and was like, okay… yeah… got it… and you were like AND SO ON INDEED! and complained about it…
Fuck do we need back to the future power laces now, because people ZOMG WHY DO I HAVE TO ACTUALLY TIE THE SHOES THATS SO HARD I FEEL LIKE A CAVEMAN!
Or do you wear crocs or velcro laced sneakers?
Seriously, I am starting to see why we need self driving cars, because everything is just so harrrd omg, you mean i can’t just sit there on my smart phone while i get driven around like a baby in my car???? I actually have to use the mirrors, windows and touch a steering wheel and pay attention???? WHY?
…
I found it more frustrating to watch someone bitch and whine about the tech than try to understand it’s most basic operations like WHY ISNT IT WORKINNNNG!?!?!?! …Oh volume is down… Like how fucking dare it be a physical control 40 years ago.
You literally didn’t even flip it over and look at the back of it? you just plugged it in and said HEY JEEVES! and it didn’t respond so you got “frustrated” and had to run to daddy with it like a 3 year old who couldn’t get his toy to work because he don’t understand the most basic things about anything.
That’s what’s got me here.
It’s like you picked up the manual and was like EWWWW TL;DR *plugs in* “DO THE THING!” AAAAAAGH! IT MUST BE THE BROKEN!
Just, fuckin stop it.
And claiming we haven’t heard of it… after showing it covered extensively in full page columns in the MOST popular tech mags… is silly.
YES we heard of it, and we likely all thought the same thing reading it, “This is way too expensive and doesn’t do quite enough, but if I had shit tons of money (which despite what people now adays think we had back then, we didn’t.) It would be something neat and novel to have until they refine the tech and we get cooler things.
Which…. we… later did.
Imagine kids in the future, “reviewing” stuff like Siri, “Imagine asking for the news, and having to REPEAT yourself… or asking what time it is and not getting a responce…. ENTER SIRI…. SO difficult to program you actually had to get it to LEARN your voice…” you’d be like, “stop crying kid, it wasn’t that bad, seriously.”
That’s like this.
Same thing with manual transmission, Imagine actually having to shift your car???? Horse and buggy stuff…
No, we just… did it, and still do it….
“Imagine waaaay back then, having to actually come in the house and touch a light switch… eewwww and you had to do this in EVERY room you wanted light.”
Like, wtf bro.
@deepee8010
April 4, 2024 at 12:06 pm
Seeing it finally work at the end of the video brought tears to my eyes, like we just found proof of a fictional entity actually existing and still alive. Well done.
@syproful
April 4, 2024 at 12:38 pm
This was epic. This was wildly fascinating as someone who does residential building automation as a profession.
@saturnarts
April 4, 2024 at 1:05 pm
Very cool. All of it. But could we get the murder trial story?
@g984
April 4, 2024 at 1:31 pm
stop zooming in and out every 5 seconds, I’ve got sea sickness from this video
@SysOpQueen
April 4, 2024 at 4:18 pm
‘how did it work without wi-fi, bluetooth or the internet?’ why would it need any of those things to work?
@aaronmurgatroyd5810
April 4, 2024 at 7:31 pm
Lack of EEPROM chips really destroyed this device… lol
@pplwizard1
April 4, 2024 at 9:36 pm
Actually it had them
@aaronmurgatroyd5810
April 5, 2024 at 12:08 am
@@pplwizard1 they didn’t use them for non volatile storage then?
@pplwizard1
April 5, 2024 at 12:26 am
@@aaronmurgatroyd5810 the voice recognition system had to run in ram in real time… There was also a storage device he didn’t mention that held memory for 7 years and stored and restored the memory in 5 seconds.
@lastnamefirstname8655
April 4, 2024 at 7:46 pm
impressive technology.
@CrassSpektakel
April 4, 2024 at 8:52 pm
The concept behind the Butler Voice recognition is also know as “The Chinese Room” where you communicate with a Chinese without really understanding each other.
@TommyCrosby
April 4, 2024 at 10:52 pm
4:50 X10!
Gus didn’t invented that one, go check LGR’s X10 IBM PC DOS home assistant and alarm clock videos. That was an awesome early home control network.
@NakedSageAstrology
April 4, 2024 at 11:55 pm
I still have ours installed to this day! Though we have had power outages over the years, so the only training data on it is my occasional lamp command. Its amazing too because I use the same system to send ethernet to each room.
@JurgendeMooij
April 4, 2024 at 11:56 pm
19:49 Loved hearing a Dutch phrase randomly inserted there XD “Wet van de remmende voorsprong” literally means “Law of the handicap of a head start”
@schoktra
April 5, 2024 at 5:52 am
Thin wire lights encircling all 4 walls of the room? sounds like that writer predicted wither electroluminescent phosphor wire, or led strip lighting in a novel series which started in 1911!
@greendryerlint
April 5, 2024 at 6:08 am
My grandfather was a techie before being a tech nerd was recognized as a good thing. (or at all) He didn’t have the “Butler in a Box”, but he had a lot of the lights in his home hooked up to the X-10 home automation system and several consoles, a timer, and a RF remote with which he could control them. The system overall worked fairly well, but was pretty primitive in a lot of ways. When the furnace blower came on, randomly lights would sometimes turn on or off. If the power flickered, same result. Other RFI events would cause unpredictable behavior. He recognized the limitations and never used the appliance modules for anything much. (because who wants to come home to smouldering ruins because the coffee pot turned itself on randomly with this flaky system) Re. power consumption, yeah, old TTL logic tends to draw a lot of power, but still only about as much as a bright LED bulb for this thing. Interesting device and video.
@michaelsparks1571
April 5, 2024 at 11:14 am
The fact that “the volume was low” was the “broken” part of the speakers is such an insanely humbling experience. Even working IT for almost 12 years, I didn’t think that a device this old would have a problem with a solution that simple.
@orangehatmusic225
April 5, 2024 at 12:02 pm
You literally have no idea where the modern LLM ai came from. it has no inventor. all the same companies that would sue each other over keyboard layouts are now using the same ai tech. wake up.
@liquidignition
April 5, 2024 at 1:36 pm
This guy is hot after a while. Yum
@Sylvqin
April 5, 2024 at 3:30 pm
Really cool!
@Solitas777
April 5, 2024 at 4:54 pm
The U.S. is looking after its own industries just like other nations do theirs. Other countries aren’t used to that because we have been letting their tariff our industries and subsidizing theirs and not doing anything about it for half a century. Now, both parties in the USA is putting American citizens first. Good.
@Mark1and2
April 5, 2024 at 6:00 pm
Today these types of devices are Internet connected Only which I hate.
I would use something like an updated version of this
@CarlosOsuna1970
April 6, 2024 at 12:55 am
Aaron Paul definitely went tech bit-chers 😭
@themax2go
April 6, 2024 at 1:53 am
“see you in the future” – nope, in the presence, the future is already here, it’s the era of “the future is now”
@Erlandsson1964
April 6, 2024 at 4:30 am
Way too long video with no real action or testing. Booring.
@RyanJardina
April 6, 2024 at 10:03 am
That A.I. is still alive and we are living it! But still better than the other side.
@WinrichNaujoks
April 6, 2024 at 10:06 am
Why do you sound throughout the whole video like the Butler is this ridiculous, over priced pile of crap? It’s from 1983 and it actually works and is really quite sophisticated for the time. Goodness knows who often I have to scream at Alexa to get her to switch my lamp on!
@Archarios1
April 6, 2024 at 10:17 am
I watch the video and I’m inspired, I read the comments and I am saddened. I see life, progress of ‘man’ and I am…
@matthewmiller6068
April 6, 2024 at 11:00 am
The most wild thing is even in 2024 somehow the voice recognition has become worse than it was around 2010-ish. Sure you no longer have to train them…but more often than not it guesses totally wrong, which can lead to some REALLY awkward situations if you use it to send a message to someone and instead sends a random set of inappropriate words. Or you ask it to call papa johns pizza and instead it suddenly says calling john smith at work.
I liked around early 2000s phones and computer dictation software you had to train for a couple hours but usually gor the right answer 9 times out of 10
@yakobhat
April 6, 2024 at 12:06 pm
I hate click bait
@paappraiser
April 6, 2024 at 12:26 pm
Pin codes – My old boss back in the 80’s use to do these codes for inventory control in a electronics shop I worked at. It was something super simple so no one could forge the inventory docs but he could figure it out in a few seconds. It was something like remove all the letters take the first and last digits add them together, take second and second to last digits add them together, take the third and third to last etc. combine the results, assign the number to the corresponding place of the letter in the alphabet. It was not anything super complex, but it worked .. This is probably some variation of that. If you had another serial number and pin it someone could probably solve it. Oh and he was a massive X10 freak, his whole house was automated.
@serjoka77
April 6, 2024 at 3:13 pm
This is a very entertaining video and mindblowing story. The end says it all, great job.
@alienJIZ1990
April 6, 2024 at 7:49 pm
If it’s only 4 alphanumeric characters with repeats allowed, that’s only about 1.6 million possible combinations. I’m curious what device security is stopping that guy from just brute forcing it (timeouts?), cuz that’s easily done with modern hardware. Down the rabbit hole I go…
@jkohutiak
April 6, 2024 at 10:44 pm
Insane amount of effort went into this, you sir, are a monster
@VillagerGOAT
April 7, 2024 at 2:05 am
vesoyasve
@summerlaverdure
April 7, 2024 at 3:37 am
I want to like and learn from this video but damn it’s too edited and you just go on tangents too much just show the device and show it working the best it can, you talked way too much
@80srenaissance67
April 7, 2024 at 4:33 am
The end was brilliant 👏
@jurgenmaier116
April 7, 2024 at 6:05 am
For me the best content about a piece of tec I have seen so far! The end gave me goosebumps! Good job!
@boardsort
April 7, 2024 at 8:11 am
Most of my home is controlled via X10. As a former Radio Shack employee in the 1990’s I had access to lots of Powerhouse attachments, or X10. It was the primary method of remote power control and Radio Shack was a prominent supplier of said devices. They still work and are very reliable. I have a computer dedicated to controlling them, which while that sounds wasteful, that computer also hosts a number of other home services including a Plex (video) server and my weather station. By the way, that weather station also interacts with the X10.
@VirtualR
April 7, 2024 at 8:24 am
In fairness, for the rich of the time, I feel this would have caught on if it was coupled with an installation and maintenance service attached, for extra cost of course. I mean, 25k or so in today’s money for a full install isn’t that far fetched of an investment for many middle+ class people. 40 watts standby mode is not that much either, especially for 1983. You can’t compare it to a modern USB system. A modern gaming PC uses about 750w when running games and back 10 years ago 1000w was common. The fact the guy is still around, publicly contactable and easily found for you to ask questions, but you didn’t get any of his input, makes the video production look fairly lazy.
@RiotShieldMan
April 7, 2024 at 11:53 am
Mr. Belvedere LMAO excellent choice
@kronosbystander
April 7, 2024 at 1:24 pm
Very much would like to rename my assistant, there’s only a couple of preprogrammed options available.
@technotastic897
April 7, 2024 at 1:51 pm
3:37 that just gort me so offguard…no wonder the film is called “Demon seed”.
@12chachachannel
April 7, 2024 at 4:51 pm
Bro don’t shoot videos
@PedroSantos-fw6gk
April 7, 2024 at 5:24 pm
Vsauce 3!
@PedroSantos-fw6gk
April 7, 2024 at 5:24 pm
Yes, that is Vsauce three factorial.
@Thejr666
April 7, 2024 at 5:35 pm
Its open says me
@Thejr666
April 7, 2024 at 5:49 pm
No one else amazed that back in the 80s it had enough memory to lnow 4 different users on 64 different devices? That had to be hundreds of megabytes back than. Thats crazy cause early 2000s 128mb flash drives were crazy expensive
@TheTuubster
April 7, 2024 at 6:40 pm
21:20 Fun fact: The predecessor of the USB is the ATARI 8-Bit SIO device port, which connected devices even in a row and provided power (for the cassette drive for example). The engineers for the SIO then worked on the USB.
@chip.chippa6416
April 7, 2024 at 6:52 pm
Im in another universe. Wtf is going on.
@johnwang9914
April 7, 2024 at 7:05 pm
They still make X10 home automation modules so you can still use them to operate your lamps, however that’s not why I’m posting. I just wanted to say that there was another Popular Science or perhaps Popular Mechanics article that was earlier about the writer using an Imsai 8080 kit built home computer to automate his home. He wrote the code himself including the voice recognition, he used the intercom system which was a common feature in homes back then for the microphones and speakers. Our house still has the intercom system though we don’t use it and people often mistake the external intercom box at the front door with the doorbell cam when I speak through the doorbell cam. Anyways, the author used the activation word “Breslin”. He ended the article by saying he was out barbequeing on the back porch and asked Breslin to give him a ten minute countdown and it locked him out of his house which inconvenienced him greatly.
Also during the early 1980’s, I programmed my Apple II+ to play tic tac toe by voice. It was a sample machine language program listed in one of the computer magazines at the time. It was frustrating to get the machine to make the right move but it did work. Keep in mind that the Apple II+ only produced and heard sounds in clicks, the frequencies of which being the tones so it would hear your voice commands as a series of clicks at varying frequencies all of which you would time in a tight machine language loop with each instruction set with operands being 3 to 4 milliseconds so it was how many instruction sets you went through while waiting for the next click which told you what the tone the microphone heard was. Other computers of the time such as the Comodore 64 had specialized chips for sound and also for graphics whereas the Apple II+ relied on the programmers cleverness for which Don Lancaster wrote books on how to do many miraculous seemingly impossible things with.
To be honest, with your video title mentioning AI, I thought you were going to talk about the early heuristic AI program called Eliza, the best version of which at that time was the version on the Radio Shack TRS 80 model 1. The various versions of Eliza on the Apple II were downright primitive in comparison.
@TheAsyou
April 8, 2024 at 1:07 am
The “Buttler In a Box” doesn’t gather your data and spy on you. 🙂
@madstork91
April 8, 2024 at 1:12 am
Wait until you find out that the iPhone wasn’t the first smart phone, or that the definition of a processor was changed so one company could claim they were the first, or… you know… about 1000 other “ghost” things that we are being lied to about today intentionally.
@kcflick6132
April 8, 2024 at 1:42 am
I wonder how many super rich people actually did this lol
@jensalik
April 8, 2024 at 3:25 am
I really don’t know what is so “complicated” about the instructions. Seem pretty clear to me but then, I used to program automatic recording on VCRs in the 80s and 90s… 😀
@steveirvinejr1672
April 8, 2024 at 4:15 am
Handed cap😅
@SentaDuck
April 8, 2024 at 10:26 am
Can we just appreciate that the aesthetics still hold up today.
@megan_alnico
April 8, 2024 at 2:27 pm
Around 2002 to 2003 (maybe?) I worked with a company called Vocollect and their Talkman system. It worked very much like this but it was a headset. People used it in warehouses so they could use both hands for moving stuff around. Instead of training it to respond to things like “lamp on” you trained it to recognize “next”, “pick 3” or “repeat”.
It worked really well for a very small subset of commands.
@megan_alnico
April 8, 2024 at 2:27 pm
There is no way you cannot brute force a four character pin…
Give me an Arduino and like five minutes…
@pplwizard1
April 8, 2024 at 10:55 pm
If you watch soul gem Studios you will see from their work there was no way to brute force it because you couldn’t get to the microprocessor where the information was stored. And there was no way to use a keyboard to input the information it would take forever
@megan_alnico
April 9, 2024 at 9:32 am
@@pplwizard1 In the video they show a membrane keyboard where you type in your pin. Go find yourself a broken donor and peel the top of that membrane off. Solder wires to every keypad. Now you can have an Arduino press every button until it works.
I know you’re a smart man, and have totally achieved more fame in your life than I ever will but you can’t tell me you’ve built a membrane keypad that can’t be hacked if you’re willing to be destructive.
But you know what? Honestly, that shouldn’t be necessary. You stated many times that you have the algorithm. Why not post it on GuHub or something? You’re not making money from these anymore. Why did you even have a pin in the first place? It basically made all your hard work e-waste.
@JoyDavidson
April 8, 2024 at 8:52 pm
This video made my booty tingle. Is that bad? Asking for a friend.
@sidboyplays7614
April 9, 2024 at 3:07 am
The people did what they could with the technology available at the time.
To get our AI assistants to work now, we need special types of lightbulbs and other things to work. I have to pair the devices to special aps on my phone. It’s not much different than the Butler in a box, since the commands are still limited. Voice recognition is getting better, but it doesn’t always understand what I am saying or I have to repeat myself 3 or 4 time to turn the light off or on. It’s good at giving me the weather though… I don’t think of it as smart, I think of it as knowing my location (x) and finding the weather for (x) and then saying it in an almost human like voice.
One thing people don’t realize about AI is that it is all programming.
@tizwah
April 9, 2024 at 6:26 am
Can you make a video about the sonicworx audio software that came out in 1993 and used artificial neural networks to modify sound? That video reminded me of this…
@svenmify
April 9, 2024 at 7:04 am
Do people actually use Siri / Alexa? I’ve got Siri on my phone but never bother with it, can’t understand why anyone would get a standalone version. Sure, if you have a disability I get that it could be convenient, but other than that?
@jcccomputerrepair
April 9, 2024 at 11:18 am
People use personal assistants all the time, daily. If they didn’t, we wouldn’t have them lol
@svenmify
April 10, 2024 at 4:06 am
@@jcccomputerrepair I guess my question is more like, why? Typing generally is faster than speaking, and getting up to turn on the lights never bothered me.
I get it while driving tho
@johnr598
April 9, 2024 at 7:56 am
Interesting video but too much shouting and choppy exposition.
@internetcancer1672
April 9, 2024 at 11:18 am
Such a long video to waste your time, these YouTubers don’t respect your attention. 21:42
You’re welcome!
@pastuh
April 9, 2024 at 11:38 am
Teleportation From 1653
@5000lamas
April 9, 2024 at 12:08 pm
I don’t know if I should be impressed or depressed
@paulstubbs7678
April 9, 2024 at 1:33 pm
Nice, seemed to work fine at the end, although you failed to explain what all that phone carry on earlier was all about – you never connected your phone. Actually you had me wondering if you needed to use a phone to talk to it. Aactually using a phone etc would solve a common complaint with Alexa & google, in that they are always listening to you (and hilariously randomly thinking you were commanding them). With a phone etc, it only listens when you pick up the phone to talk, otherwise it’s not listening.
I’ve thought of hacking my Alexa to be like the original star trek communication station where you walk up, press a button then say ‘computer….. ‘, Having a bit of Star Trek kit on my wall, straight out of the show, that actually works would be real neat.
@levigerlach7626
April 9, 2024 at 6:07 pm
here form vsauce
@abdulcedeleche16
April 9, 2024 at 7:05 pm
so its not an AI
@pplwizard1
April 10, 2024 at 5:16 am
Actually it was… The AI portion of the product was where the voice recognition took place. That is not covered in the this video.
@abdulcedeleche16
April 10, 2024 at 11:26 am
@@pplwizard1 Ahh, i see. The video is lacking quite a bunch of info, innit?
@pplwizard1
April 10, 2024 at 11:36 am
@barry-allenthe-flash8396
April 10, 2024 at 1:22 am
How did I only just now have Youtube recommend this channel to me? I never even _thought_ to see if Popular Science had a Youtube channel before, but then BAM! It recommends me your excellent Captain Power video and I checked this one out too; instantly subscribing! I don’t get it; I *love* content like this. Creators like CRD: The Cathode Ray Dude, and Ken from Computer Clan are so good at wrapping up tales of tech with great history lessons and stories about the people behind these efforts, and this is right in that same wheelhouse. Bad algorithm, bad; you should’ve pointed me towards Popular Science earlier! 😄
Fantastic work; I may not have ever heard of this before, but I’m certainly glad to have been schooled on the Butler in a Box now! Thank you.
@debruce
April 10, 2024 at 9:41 am
Time was set to 7:11, I see what you have done here.
@pistolk1
April 10, 2024 at 1:25 pm
all the examples of things you would use with the biab all run off a time system and not an on/of system, the only system you got somewhat right was garage door and there is useally a switch by the door where you would hang your car keys to open the garage…
@calorion
April 10, 2024 at 2:20 pm
It’s…named…Sidney.
*Sidney.*
@alexmiranda6107
April 10, 2024 at 3:57 pm
I figured it was going to use the x10 protocol, but i was unsure if it existed then, and when i saw it did, i was happy. The x10 home automation system is really cool, i wish more people knew about it
@real100talk5
April 10, 2024 at 4:02 pm
Wow it is funny seeing a young dude look at this tech like it is alien or something and think that only wifi radio signals exist.
@distantdreams2008
April 10, 2024 at 5:52 pm
21:50 woooow – a whole 20 minutes of wasted life time – just for the presentation of at least a 4 second clip of the device actually working. the worst bait this video has ever had in terms of its title
@DarkstarthenightwingSUBSCRIBE
April 10, 2024 at 6:45 pm
what is Vsuace2’s Kevin doing here?
@thatoneannoyingfriend
April 11, 2024 at 1:07 am
this video is honestly amazing i would expect this quality of content from a yt channel with over 4 mil subs but you only have 88k unheard of in my book you just earned a new sub keep it up
@SaebriSelect
April 11, 2024 at 1:19 am
The fact you actually got it working meant a lot more to me than expected 😂 . That’s how a majority of products are, especially on cheap apps, they seem awesome but are way too much a pain in actual practice
@robertlawrence1041
April 11, 2024 at 3:00 am
Very well done, I sub now.
@mycosys
April 11, 2024 at 4:52 am
I find it actively funny that you bought a cellular telephone adapter for X-10 just because it uses RJ-12
@jacobbaranowski
April 11, 2024 at 7:49 am
The claper 👏 would have been easier to turn on lights.
@pplwizard1
April 11, 2024 at 3:25 pm
Perhaps, but it couldn’t turn on your TV select your favorite CD with your favorite song or close your garage door operate your sprinklers control your air conditioner and allow you to phone home and turn on your Jacuzzi or set your air temperature all of which the butler could do
@cttcjim5353
April 11, 2024 at 12:17 pm
halfway through the vid… i am reminded of the IBM Aptiva Home Director system they were selling in the 90s. wild tech.
@AlonsoVPR
April 11, 2024 at 2:19 pm
This is amazing!! I’m gonna share this with the homeassistant team :3
@bjornerlendur4606
April 11, 2024 at 3:29 pm
Wow, an actual piece of electronic that runs on ternary system
@bjornerlendur4606
April 11, 2024 at 3:40 pm
Back in the day we had a power outage lasting more than 3 hours about once a month. They’d often shut down the power for maintenance for several hours as well.
@BigFunnyGiant
April 11, 2024 at 4:32 pm
My grandparents had X10 in their home like in the 80’s. I had a bunch of modules myself years later. It was great for it’s time. I loved having remote control lamps. LOL
@Ken1171Designs
April 11, 2024 at 4:44 pm
Fascinating story. Thanks for sharing! ^___^
@aztekno2012
April 11, 2024 at 8:09 pm
Who or what did the voice for the “Butler in a Box”? Or was it synthetic like the Speak and Spell?
@pplwizard1
April 11, 2024 at 11:21 pm
All the personalities of the butler in the Box were fully digitized human speech we were like Ursula from The Little Mermaid where we would get British people French people all kinds of personalities even Betty Boop and essentially steal their voice. It should be noted that way back then that was unheard of. Everything sounded like a speak and spell today people take it for granted but back then it was not considered possible especially with the amount of memory available. With all of that said the original voice that says hello when you plug it in in the original voice is mine.
@clomok
April 11, 2024 at 10:00 pm
it’s been over a month with over a quarter million views and NOBODY has created that Wikipedia page yet? Come on internet, do your thang!
@river446
April 11, 2024 at 11:27 pm
21:17 Ohh, that’s what an RS232 cable looks like! My old computer (ThinkPad 2440P) had ports for those. I never ended up using them, and never really knew what they were for. I did use the built-in CD/DVD tray to rip CDs and burn DVDs, though. That was nice.
@petitjabanes
April 12, 2024 at 2:49 am
Way to drag this ooooonnnnn 😮💨
@rodentrider2
April 12, 2024 at 6:46 am
21:13 name of this streetlamp plus origin footage name?
@staberas
April 12, 2024 at 8:40 am
Im at 15:00 im calling it, its the capacitors on it edit: ok it was “user error” lol
@fus132
April 12, 2024 at 9:32 am
Finally, a spyware-free smart home device!
@totallymage6507
April 12, 2024 at 9:42 am
So Apple’s rise as BlackBerry demised. yup they waited for BlackBerry to solve the network congestion as the first iPhone will devour a whole cell towers capacity if released early to compete. so iPhone fanboys, y’all can stop patronizing a crook company with the praise their late on something coz they just wanted to be better on it.. Like yeah they wait until its fully refined, reverse engineer the hell out of it and scream they spent billions for research just to justify the price tag all un truth they just photo copied someone else hard work🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
@patipataszon4570
April 12, 2024 at 2:39 pm
It’s remind me Tars from Interstellar
@jonathanwatson268
April 12, 2024 at 7:20 pm
It kinda hit me hard when you said that we aren’t even impressed with good voice command tech anymore. I’m only 32 and I can clearly remember making fun of useless voice command tech on phones when I was in highschool. We figured it’d never work well since everyone speaks so uniquely.
@Scar32
April 12, 2024 at 7:56 pm
4 characters is easy to just brute force, well on a computer with no rate limit
@JayFolipurba
April 12, 2024 at 8:49 pm
And yet here are the techbros blindly following the richest eccentric in the world into a dusty grave, being driven automatically by their butler in a boxes.
We should honestly let Mr X as well as other brands like apple rest with the likes of Gus, in hopes that we end up with products that actually work, once the ones we use now are finally accepted to be failures.
@MrGeocidal
April 12, 2024 at 9:08 pm
I’m kind of glad that you could set the wakeword to anything you wanted. Unlike the Alexa which only gives you 4 choices or the Google speaker that only gives you 2 choices.
@JD99-zj3gq
April 12, 2024 at 10:16 pm
Typical American talking: fast, loud, obnoxious.
@sir_john_hammond
April 13, 2024 at 12:28 am
Gus states that the PIN is an algorithm based on your serial. Given that we have an example PIN in the video, it’s entirely possible that if the author of this vid were to look at his serial, it would contain those letters and numbers (nothing was said of encoding). This “algorithm” may be nothing more than “first character, third character, fifth character, seventh character”. If they cracked that, from there, all PINs could be derived. Or, of course, @pplwizard1 could tell us.
@MHLivestreams
April 13, 2024 at 2:07 am
My man really is the O.G. of electronics.
@kevinfishburne
April 13, 2024 at 3:00 am
If you like art then support artistic humans.
@DavidLopez-vn4be
April 13, 2024 at 3:26 am
this was a great video
@willemblom6042
April 13, 2024 at 5:26 am
Thanb you for a very informative and well thought through video. I rarely watch a full length video but this one was quite interesting.
@PutTheKettleOnGromit
April 13, 2024 at 7:25 am
Thank you, thank you, thank you for bringing back popular science or at least bringing it to my attention. I was a reader of the magazine when I was a kid. Looking forward to great videos to come.
@KlaroNebulous
April 13, 2024 at 8:51 am
Thanks for covering this!
@ytuseraccount
April 13, 2024 at 9:03 am
you should lend the guy reversing his yours so he can analyze what happens when a correct key is entered and perform a side channel attack on his own
@kotXbit
April 13, 2024 at 9:22 am
I would value the vacuum fluorescent display more than the box itself.
@jess4679
April 13, 2024 at 10:48 am
Incredible piece of tech, love to see it
@denniscarlson9646
April 13, 2024 at 12:58 pm
I bought the first version and it worked exactly as indicated, including the RS232.
@AnglophobiaIsevil7
April 13, 2024 at 1:17 pm
There is still no Wikipedia page for it wow
I would have toughtone of yall would have made one 😅
@burbank3
April 13, 2024 at 1:28 pm
KEVIN NOOOO!!!!
my own run in with user error, only once in my entire life, ended in just as much embarrassment. i didn’t press the power button to the on position on my new router 😂😂😂 i had to call customer service.
@gabemccullough
April 13, 2024 at 1:33 pm
Feeling mislead… this is home automation, not A.I. never would this be considered AI. unfortunate clickbait, bitter aftertaste
@pat_riot_2024
April 13, 2024 at 4:17 pm
this guys voice cracks is just funny
@AlicanPehlivan8
April 13, 2024 at 6:32 pm
i love this comment section, it’s like a time machine
@TheDOSGamer
April 13, 2024 at 8:28 pm
We have one PIN and Serial Number combination here. If we can identify a second one we could probably reverse engineer the algorithm to get a PIN from a Serial Number.
@Survivalguy
April 13, 2024 at 9:59 pm
I know exactly what 23w draws because I use huge solar generators that have digital read outs of what’s coming in from the solar panels and what’s being used. 23w is 10 times as much as my cellphone booster antenna. Having this set up makes me understand why my dad was always bitching about the lights left on, the time when everyone used 100w bulbs. That didn’t seem like much, but it is.
@Survivalguy
April 13, 2024 at 10:05 pm
I wonder how many people named it Proteus IV. lol. I paused this right when he mentioned this bizarre movie and rented it. Absolutely nuts. Made on the year I was Born, Demon Seed! LOL!
@sunshinemodels1
April 13, 2024 at 10:10 pm
I’m still waiting for “Bimbo in a box”
@KurtSchefter
April 13, 2024 at 10:41 pm
Wow! I loved that video! Thanx
@DeLorean4
April 13, 2024 at 11:08 pm
PopSci… you can tone it down with the snap zooms and exaggerated facial expressions.
@umageddon
April 14, 2024 at 12:16 am
23 watts isnt THAT bad
@MizanHIT
April 14, 2024 at 12:57 am
bla3
@djpaulhannon
April 14, 2024 at 2:53 am
Thought this was going to a demo of the unit, not a history lesson 🙁
@csachevauxsansabri2612
April 14, 2024 at 4:50 am
That was an amazing pice of kit. Yes in the past evreting had an extensive user manual and you would have to call an so called insaler to install things for you. It’s only one of the traceable examples of the so called technology improvements that cost human jobs and led to the downfall we can whiners today sleeping on the street. Technology is good, is it?
I miss the days where we all had opportunity’s to earm a living easely.
Wher you chose where you want to go knowing on the door for a job and actualy got it becaus they needed you.
We tend to think that there is no reason that there are so many homeless in the streat and that they are just lazy. I assure you that is not the cause.Yes not been in a working life maks you unable to emediatly adapt to work but if you talk about the reason why thinks are the way they are, most people don’t know. Whel now you do
@versebuchanan512
April 14, 2024 at 9:16 am
Plug it into one of it’s own modules, take the batteries out, and you can program it kill itself!
@MickeyMousePark
April 14, 2024 at 11:01 am
Radio Shack sold X-10 controllers in the 1980s to connect to your serial port on your C-64 or TRS-80 to build a home controller..
@BlixGuy
April 14, 2024 at 11:17 am
Home Assistant’s crazy old grandpa
@TheBroDotTV
April 14, 2024 at 11:50 am
Haha amazing.
@BobDiaz123
April 14, 2024 at 12:28 pm
When I was young, my parents had voice control for our TV. They’d say, “Bob, change the channel to …” and I’d have to get up and do i.
@letsrock72
April 14, 2024 at 1:12 pm
This is a great device but it is not AI, the title is misleading.
@pplwizard1
April 14, 2024 at 1:59 pm
Actually it is AI it’s just not covered in the video the AI portion resides where the voice recognition kernel took place because voice recognition at the time wasn’t even close to doing what we needed we invented our own which is why we’re in the Smithsonian and why it is patented. It had the ability to learn your voice and then once it knew your voice and knew the words it didn’t matter if you caught a cold or two inches from the microphone or 30 ft away yelling at it it would still understand it had the ability to think and learn automatically on its own and adapt. So definitely an AI system just not covered in this video. And unfortunately I didn’t find out this video was even done till about a month after it was already out on YouTube my son-in-law is the one that let me know that it was there. He got quite a few facts incorrectly for example there was a device that restored the memory in 5 seconds and maintained it for 7 years and the price actually sold more at higher levels than it did it lower levels.
@letsrock72
April 14, 2024 at 3:26 pm
@@pplwizard1 Thank you for your reply, I appreciate the time that you took to clear this up.
@zengara11
April 14, 2024 at 1:34 pm
“The more rational people wait to see improvements…..”……sad times, rich people pretending they are poor, is kinda scary for the progress of things. Specially when everyone who is rich wants to be “DiFfErEnT”
@franzpattison
April 14, 2024 at 2:11 pm
LGR reviewed a computer program that uses the same technology to do the same thing but not voice powered
@michaelsane6136
April 14, 2024 at 4:13 pm
I had the full complement of X10 devices, including video cameras, in the early 2000s. I bought it all from a brick-and-mortar Radio Shack store (oh god, how I miss Radio Shack). It actually all worked really well.
@KippinCollars
April 14, 2024 at 4:35 pm
Why buy this when The Clapper was so cheap and released in 1984?
@brians1793
April 14, 2024 at 4:58 pm
At least the butler in a box isn’t spying on people almost constantly whether people even realize it or not. There is/was a Nissan controversy where they could get away with spying on people getting it on in their cars legally as far as people not carefully reading ‘agreements’. They know damn well what they’re doing with how verbose they can be, and that people aren’t necessarily stupid, just too trusting. A lot of people are far too trusting of the government and corporations in general, like with the jab and the wavers people had to sign, big red flag. It’s safe and effective yet they had people sign a paper absolving them of all responsibility if anything goes wrong, they obviously knew they were lying or at least weren’t confident.
@gbalcombe
April 14, 2024 at 5:28 pm
Such a great video bud. Thank you for the learning experience! 🤜🏾🤛🏾
@samorgan5361
April 14, 2024 at 6:30 pm
This was an excellent video. I am not often compelled to write a comment, but in this case I was so pleased with what I just watched that I felt I had to. I believe you made an important and insightful observation regarding the importance of the trailblazer. I learned about not only an AI of paramount importance, but an important factor of technological development – a prospect that applies to many more fields as well.
@needserotonin167
April 14, 2024 at 7:42 pm
0:09 Siri came out in 2011, not 2004. The first iPhone didn’t even come out till 2009.
@iainsear7830
April 14, 2024 at 9:18 pm
In 40+ years Ive never had a power outage in the UK for more than a few minutes so perhaps this isnt an issue unless you live in the sticks? Seems a good idea, not badly implemented to be fair. Interesting video. Thanks.
@michaelrstudley
April 15, 2024 at 9:48 am
I’m so happy you are doing so much content again. Thank you
@gypsytarot333
April 15, 2024 at 12:54 pm
Boomer dad shows Millenial how to turn up volume on speaker ❤
@samithasheshan8215
April 15, 2024 at 1:20 pm
Sir you earned yourself a subscriber
@giannaras2010
April 15, 2024 at 1:27 pm
15000$ for something like siri or alexa is too much and it’s not even close to siri or alexa, no thank you.
@pplwizard1
April 15, 2024 at 9:19 pm
, I think you’re being a little cynical back then there was no such thing as Alexa or Siri they weren’t even possible and 15,000 is a statement keep in mind this automated an entire home and Alexa or Siri would need modules to do that today as well however what you also need to know is I did get the price wrong but not the way he thinks when I tried selling it for $995 and I would buy it back then an electric typewriter was $1,200. No one thought I could possibly do what we said for the price the higher we raise the price the more they sold when we got the 3995 we couldn’t keep them on the shelf. This ran Xanadu epcot’s home of the future and many other dream homes across the country as well in the parade of homes.
@joeguy5989
April 15, 2024 at 1:52 pm
I should probably watch the rest of the video first, but you could purchase an analog phone and an Ata box in order to test this equipment.
@joeguy5989
April 15, 2024 at 1:56 pm
Yup, OK you did that 😉
@rhomboidman
April 15, 2024 at 1:54 pm
Beats Siri.
@notkivic7060
April 15, 2024 at 2:11 pm
that’s a neat little device.
@joeguy5989
April 15, 2024 at 2:11 pm
To protect your new system from power outage just get a UPS and backup generator.
@pplwizard1
April 15, 2024 at 9:17 pm
Actually it didn’t need it he got some of the facts wrong if you look under top comments you’ll see but there was a device cuz he didn’t read the manual all the way called a ramp pack that would store and restore the entire memory in 5 seconds would last for 7 years before you had to change the battery.
@peanut7098
April 15, 2024 at 3:21 pm
“A.I. from 1983”
me about to attach it to an Exidy Sorcerer:
@larryphillipsjr.1607
April 15, 2024 at 7:14 pm
At least he got it to work in the end 🤔😉😂😃
@Nekomonger
April 15, 2024 at 7:18 pm
bruh 22min of baiting for lamp on. xD
@robyn051
April 15, 2024 at 8:53 pm
Wait is this the vsauce 2 guy???
@cyberyogicowindler2448
April 16, 2024 at 1:13 am
Another sci-fi movie about home automation AI was “Electric Dreams” (1984). I wonder why “Butler in a Box” could not backup its RAM to a cassette recorder (like C64 datasette); even 1980th synths and good calculators had that feature. The power consumption is not that odd. I own a VHS recorder Philips VR-6880 (with internal small TFT) that eats 29W standby! These things were like leaving a C64 always on. A less complex (but still madly moonpriced) vintage smarthome device was the NuTone LBC55 (kind of door chime with digital clock, alarms etc.).
@pplwizard1
April 16, 2024 at 4:58 am
Actually it did have a backup system that allows you to store and restore the entire memory in 5 seconds and would last for 7 years before you change the battery. He missed that part in the manual.
@rinzler9775
April 16, 2024 at 1:30 am
The X10 protocol still stands the test of time.
@pseudonymousgarbage8
April 16, 2024 at 1:58 am
The thing is, this device isn’t useless today. No telemetry or snooping from bad actors because there’s no backdoors.
@Z4KIUS
April 16, 2024 at 6:17 am
Nokia and Sony Ericson I believe used similar tech to power their voice dial, it worked pretty nicely!
@vycos-zen
April 16, 2024 at 11:17 am
considering its time of invention, and the context. it is a remarkable solution
@vajona2495
April 16, 2024 at 11:20 am
AI doesn’t exist stfu about it
@chaetys4818
April 17, 2024 at 5:02 pm
tripping
@vajona2495
April 17, 2024 at 11:15 pm
@@chaetys4818 The truth isn’t “tripping”; rather it is our current reality whether you can accept it or not.
Computers don’t make decisions. They simply follow code a programmer wrote given data received.
@danilaplee
April 16, 2024 at 1:19 pm
amazing thank you for this inspiring video!
@GooseMugs
April 16, 2024 at 1:19 pm
Imagine having patented some of that tech.
@pplwizard1
April 16, 2024 at 5:58 pm
I did!
@michaelzborowskyii4668
April 16, 2024 at 2:14 pm
very interesting video
@chicagotimesskateboarding_2149
April 16, 2024 at 3:13 pm
Lol so it’s a big arduino 😂
@AjarnSpencer
April 16, 2024 at 5:28 pm
Thanks for freaking me out for the first time on youtube in years. This freaks me out because it is part of a larger study topic I am immersed in, and this information really fills i9n a few missing pieces.
@RedMartyr
April 16, 2024 at 8:17 pm
now we have the rabbit r1
@mrhassell
April 16, 2024 at 8:39 pm
Shall we play a game.
@pplwizard1
April 16, 2024 at 10:02 pm
Shall we play a nice game of chess?
@ianwilkins3009
April 17, 2024 at 5:43 am
Great video. and a great invention. That would have taken a lot of innovative and very original thinking.
Not to mentions the incredible wherewithal to actually produce a working unit and then a run of sellable items with documentation.
Thats quite an achievement. Great work Gus @pplwizard1.
@ahyonvlogs
April 17, 2024 at 6:45 am
i was stressed just watching this docu 🤣🤣🤣
@DivinityIsPurity
April 17, 2024 at 10:18 am
This entire video could have been condensed to two minutes. Too much drama
@drewynucci9037
April 17, 2024 at 11:19 am
Electronics teardown? This sounds like an amazing raspi reimagining and update
@59_atlas70
April 17, 2024 at 2:32 pm
Forbidden chocolate cake 😅
@cyberhard
April 17, 2024 at 9:11 pm
“you can call it whatever you want”
Sounds more advanced that siri, alexa and google. 🤣
@scherzox
April 17, 2024 at 9:32 pm
Dude I still wear that Express shirt regularly. It’s 10+ years old at least
@SuperOverlord666
April 18, 2024 at 1:53 am
So I have set up and run a 113 year old smart house.. it’s a beast.. and this is entertaining how it all started… my setup is only around $1800 me only half implemented. But is almost automatic I couldn’t imagine what this would be like..
@blackironseamus1017
April 18, 2024 at 2:40 am
Oh yeah the SCP foundation got that one I think
@19dines77
April 18, 2024 at 7:32 am
In the Fallout universe, it will work perfectly if it has at Atom reactor inside the box.
@kkshinykk7859
April 18, 2024 at 12:48 pm
its like a horse to a car but instead a butler in a box to alexa its old and slower but works the same
@batman8ish
April 18, 2024 at 5:21 pm
what a way to end the video !
@WazzzaaaBroadcasting
April 18, 2024 at 8:20 pm
So this is the prototype of a Powerline Adapter
@illudiumq36spacemodulator39
April 18, 2024 at 11:08 pm
actually the original evolved and is now named Colossus Matrix Skynet
@Seafoxmccloud
April 19, 2024 at 5:46 am
open it ? want to look inside 😀
@Pikez98
April 19, 2024 at 6:40 am
This was my first video of this channel and i have to say, congrat’s on making an amazing video.
It’s vomprehensive, well structured and even managed to use the right music at the right moments, which is somehow still a rarity.
Well then, i’m gonna sub now and hope to see more video’s about obscure old tech nobody remembers! 😀
@TheSpurious
April 19, 2024 at 8:44 am
Stop doing that weird voice thing.
@ThomasConover
April 19, 2024 at 10:37 am
I think using AI for that box is stretching it pretty far bro. ❤👍 great retro video I love it
@sir.niklas2090
April 19, 2024 at 1:46 pm
Why it faded?
Same reasons why RayTracing faded when developed in the 80s, same as Google Glass. The public doesn’t know they want it yet, to early for its time.
@dubtokermusic950
April 19, 2024 at 5:10 pm
its not “open sesame” that make no sense! its “open Says me” a chinese whisper type thing! I figured that out with my 2 brain cells x
@linux2420
April 19, 2024 at 5:24 pm
I wanna get a broken one of these and put a pi in there to use as a homemade homr assistant
@dubtokermusic950
April 19, 2024 at 5:33 pm
the butler seems pretty simple to me, but i’m an 80’s boy x
@dubtokermusic950
April 19, 2024 at 5:34 pm
kids these days have zero patience lol
@dubtokermusic950
April 19, 2024 at 5:38 pm
i’d rather have this than Alexa the data stealer x
@dubtokermusic950
April 19, 2024 at 5:39 pm
siri and alexa are spy tech so….
@MoCheez
April 19, 2024 at 6:18 pm
Best video I’ve seen in years. I watched the wole video, captivated, hoping for the end to be like that, and it litteraly gave me goosebumps!
@BSAscouts-dj1ht
April 19, 2024 at 8:01 pm
This guy sounds like he would do a great Hickup how to train your dragon impression
@bryanspencr
April 19, 2024 at 10:15 pm
This reminds me of the Tomy Verbot (still have mine in “working” order).
@mkill572
April 20, 2024 at 1:03 am
That was sweet
@deaddegenerategeneration7441
April 20, 2024 at 3:30 am
Is this THEE popular science
@keyvanmehrbakhsh4069
April 20, 2024 at 7:58 am
nice mentioning .
@Hyp3rSon1X
April 20, 2024 at 8:20 am
I mean they could have kept improving it and releasing better versions… Just because they release one hard to use not so good product doesn’t give them the right or entitlement to be recognized and remembered in history.
Imagine Apple only ever releasing the first iPhone, then the competitors being the only ones to keep on going. It would be their fault for not continuing themselves.
@alicethegrinsecatz6011
April 20, 2024 at 8:40 am
User error happens even to the people who should know it better. I studied 5 semester computer science but I failed to connect the router to the internet because I plugged the cable for the connection to the internet in to the ethernet port instead of into the DSL port because both are using cat 6. I failed because I didn’t read the instructions. xD
@chinossynthesizer705
April 20, 2024 at 11:10 am
Dx7 1983
@RonKan69
April 20, 2024 at 4:16 pm
This video feels like when you need to add more words to an essay
@MaskedPresence
April 20, 2024 at 5:01 pm
I see what you mean honestly, back then. The butler in a box was the coolest thing ever, but just like giving a child a toy on his birthday, it will soon fail to inpress him
@ysxki
April 20, 2024 at 5:11 pm
What an odd inspiration to build this thing huh
@Ponnybit
April 20, 2024 at 6:07 pm
Beyonce as a butler is wild…… but that BEE deserves that after exploring those kids in her clothing factories (L)
@user-of5fd2ks8d
April 20, 2024 at 9:05 pm
👉🏼 Your childish ZOOM IN shows your level of lame. LOL
You should do kitty cat videos. Wow
@Feuxdufox
April 20, 2024 at 9:33 pm
I Didn[‘t have this, but i have used X10 Modules from Lamp,Applicance, (Lamps are dimable modules, also works with dc motors, any electronics that are AC) Still use to this day, with my Home Commander
@DoctorNemmo
April 21, 2024 at 10:42 am
To be fair, neither Siri ir Alexa either know or learn stuff.
@John-zn4lp
April 21, 2024 at 3:26 pm
Back in the day, I loved using Radio Shack X10 products. Even had a Sony computer that had it integrated it into the software and came with an interface and modules to control all my lights. I think it was called an Aptiva.
@John-zn4lp
April 21, 2024 at 3:40 pm
I wonder if Gus had a patent on the idea for The Butler? Could Gus have sued Apple, Amazon, and Google?
@pplwizard1
April 21, 2024 at 3:49 pm
Yes, including our own voice recognition patent (you can search the patent office to find it. Search Gus Searcy). The pattern was filed in 1980 and it was good for about 20 years which goes to the year 2000 period then it expired And it’s right after it expired that all the voice recognition stuff exploded
@Nurof3n_
April 21, 2024 at 6:01 pm
the user error part killed me =)))))
@BensonTrent
April 21, 2024 at 9:26 pm
This was such a charming video! That last bit, “Lamp, ON” was just magic.
@ROO624
April 22, 2024 at 2:57 am
ChatGPT knows about it. 🙂
@DarkArachnid666
April 22, 2024 at 4:04 am
Then: The future is NOW! Feast your eyes on the Butler In A Box!
Now: Uuuuuh… Feast your eyes on a homeless man in a box?
@Taintlessdisc
April 22, 2024 at 10:07 am
Alexas grampa😂
@youtubeuser6067
April 22, 2024 at 10:24 am
This was a very nice introduction to many not familiar with the butler device. The presentation style and topic were both interesting. However, perhaps for story building or for theatrical reasons you appear to have dropped the ball on the technology as mentioned by some commenters and, more importantly, by the actual inventor chiming in. It was a technical topic, but you either need to “level up” your knowledge here or ask people with the necessary expertise to review your presentation before posting it. Also, read the whole manual, please. It reflects poorly on you and your channel if you do not. Nonetheless, I enjoyed your presentation very much and will subscribe to your channel. 😊👍
@WS-gw5ms
April 22, 2024 at 12:14 pm
That’s actually pretty cheap for what it is. Nobody would do every outlet.
@JayWilkins-zh7fx
April 22, 2024 at 2:09 pm
Yout wrong about the price when accounting for inflation. The numbers are cherry picked when the offiials do calculations for sapposed inflation. In reality what they need to do is find the min wage for a year then calculate how many hours need to be worked in order to purchase goods/neccesities. When you do that the min wage would need to be around 117hr in order for us to be able to buy the same ammount as someone working min wage job in 1990. Basically the average american has to work 10x as many hours to afford the same as someone who worked 1 hour could in 1990. I know that sounds unbelievable but think aout it in 1996 2 packs of cigs were 1.50 now its 15 to 20 dollars a big mac meal was like 2dollars now its 20 after tax. Like alot of people would think those prices were frm the 1950s or sum but really these are prices our parents paid when they were in college. Just do the math man look at things from 1940 onward and youll see whts so obvious. Maybe you wounder why they lie and fudge the data well its obvious that the american people would be marching on the capitol to hang the crooks who cause americans today to yave to work 400hours a week in order to get paid enough to have the same buying power as someone working 40gours a week in 1990. Like thats insane and even when they try to fudge the data to look as good as possible theyre still saying we have lost half its value since bidens presidency. The value of the dollar doesent really matter at all what matters is how many hours the average worker needs to work in order to afford goods and neccesities and today we have to work 10x as long as someone 25 years ago which is not just sad its wrong and can directly been seen in the data as the fault of the federal government for bailing banks out in 2008 and the banks fault for being frauds and purposfully destroying the housing market because they were greedy and were blackmailing the government into bailing them out and our president and goverment didnt do a damn thing about it. From 1940 to 2008 avg 2b 2b home in california went frm 300 to 700 a month. In 2010 it was 1200 by today its over 3000. So in the course of 25 years weve more than tripled in pries but before that it took almost 70 years for prices to double thats insane
@scorchedearth1451
April 22, 2024 at 2:28 pm
15.000$ for a thing that turns on/off a lamp?
D E A L !
@prinzbach
April 22, 2024 at 4:27 pm
Holy sh*t… What did I just cliqued on!!
@baladar1353
April 22, 2024 at 7:09 pm
This video is about affecting and overexaggerating. Youtube now is like what TV commercials were in the late ’90s. Except commercials now are interrupted with even cheaper commercials than before. But more often. I hope I’ll still live when this ugly trend of forcing everyone to buy the shittiest craps ends up with a huge crash collapse.
@atlasanomalous202
April 22, 2024 at 7:14 pm
I can tell from your reactions that you didn’t have a lot of experience with 80s and 90s tech. Because this gadget seems amazing, and those flaws would have been expected. The only people who had these for everything in their house were movie stars and stock brokers. There was also multi player VR in the 90s.
@timmturner
April 23, 2024 at 3:20 am
Seems simple enough, need to enter C you hit A3 then 1…at least this is what I got from the instructions you read.
@benji2d
April 23, 2024 at 3:58 am
wicked ending!!!
@dwightperkins175
April 23, 2024 at 4:38 am
Thank you so much for the great presentation. Truth be told, those of us born in the Dawn of information age read all of those manuals in order to have innovation. I feel those experiences were both instructive and liberating. We could feel proud to have conquered those nearly impossible user manuals and had bragging rights. Ever assemble a swing set? A waterbed? An entertainment system? Those instructions always introduced new “inventive” fasteners that failed and Glue was vastly improved to account for just the failures. One had to lay out all the bolts, screws, of various sizes…all structures, all according to the diagrams, on the carped and then read-read- and re-read the instructions before ever turning the first screw. Wow! I am an Engineer now, but I almost failed at my first major project back in 1996, of assembling my daughters massive Swing set. I had it almost assembled when I realized I mis-identified one of the major structures for a slightly shorter version and wound up having to tear it almost completely down in order to correct my mistake. Live and learn. “A picture is worth a Million words…unless you discover that its labels and instruction and are only in Japanese”(DDP).
@Robotique69
April 23, 2024 at 4:46 am
Magnificent! A splendid video telling us all, in a funny, inspiring way about our tech future. I only wish the big crowd would pay attention of ALL the content in this vid.
@forzahorison6870
April 23, 2024 at 5:05 am
Imagine how many tech are missing bcs we failed to preserve it, simply not existing in Wikipedia is like never existed. thank’s Gus!
@redbeacon4871
April 23, 2024 at 6:19 am
The ending was cool
@jeroenklugt
April 23, 2024 at 7:00 am
lol wet van de remmende voorsprong (dutch language) translate to the law of breaking advantage nice
@raphaelturcotte9638
April 23, 2024 at 10:43 am
Glad i stumbled onto this channel, great videos👌👌👌
@NormReitzel
April 23, 2024 at 5:37 pm
So, do you think a Mac Wheel is more Intuitive?
@LearnSpanishDaily
April 23, 2024 at 7:13 pm
Bro took it to his dad to turn the volume up.
@andreaschatzopoulos
April 24, 2024 at 3:46 am
The design of the box is stunningly stylish, you have to give them that.
@wilssavino8833
April 24, 2024 at 12:27 pm
Go to the last 30 seconds of the video. It’s what you want to see. Your welcome.
@BigelowInventions
April 24, 2024 at 2:02 pm
Great, now I want one!
@JensRapp
April 24, 2024 at 4:04 pm
just in short: this was really impressive.
@MrAmity009
April 24, 2024 at 4:15 pm
You talked 20 minutes, and showed nothing ?! Wasted time
@pplwizard1
April 24, 2024 at 5:50 pm
Watch the last 30 seconds
@alexgravitos
April 24, 2024 at 7:47 pm
This reminds me I should probably get myself a few Google Home compatible power sockets for my home lighting.
@christurnblom4825
April 25, 2024 at 12:02 am
I think you’re still trying to equate this to how a similar device would be used today.
There was no plug & play back then. You should have seen what I had to go through to get a color graphics adapter working on an Amstrad PC or many other IBM compatible PC’s back then.
I had what I considered a very rich friend down the street from me during this era, they had horse stables, 2 music rooms art room formal dining room and regular dining room, great room…. that kind of thing. Always had the coolest toys I would never have. This device was even way out of their league of usability.
For a wealthy person to want this to make their life simpler, it would have been the level of wealth where their assistant gets it all ready to go. They’re gonna have a back-up power system standard for stuff like this …and their equally expensive home security system. ….or a tech junkie who’s willing to pay what you could get a nice sports car for might get this just because it’s futuristic.
Think something more like a Microsoft executive or an Arabian prince, for almost anyone else, (other than the well-off tech junkie who likes tinkering) it was impractical back then.
@clevonapparicio3830
April 25, 2024 at 7:50 am
😢❤ thats actually better than what we have now
@anthonywolf5127
April 25, 2024 at 8:35 am
That’s how anyone with a flip phone texts
@pseudolisa
April 26, 2024 at 4:31 am
Why don’t you have a cassette player ?
Get it together, dude.
@mjouwbuis
April 26, 2024 at 6:42 am
23W in standby is not more than many settopboxes.
@mjouwbuis
April 26, 2024 at 6:49 am
Even if not ‘proper’ voice recognition technology, this is really pushing the boundaries of what was possible in 1983 or even a few years later. I suspect the software engineer was the real magician in this story, as from the prototype board it doesn;t look like it has a whole lot of memory or processing power.
@darukineo
April 26, 2024 at 10:50 am
Not even gpt knows the existence of butler in a Box, a real lost ai
@thomascharnock
April 26, 2024 at 11:51 am
Fantastic video on something I’d never heard of before.
@t1mman
April 26, 2024 at 12:37 pm
How people navigate in all of this? Well, Car Manuals used to have the instructions to adjust your carburetor, so I guess people did read the f*cking manual band then!!
@il-president
April 26, 2024 at 1:32 pm
1:15, hey hey hey, I’m the president!!!, jk…. Please don’t take this seriously, I’m just a someone who has a channel called il-president
@citricdolphin336
April 26, 2024 at 9:56 pm
I’ll be honest, it really threw me when he didn’t end with “And as always, thanks for watching.”
@FarmerKen355
April 27, 2024 at 5:36 am
Good job, good story, I am 76 and I remember this product, never owned one. In 1988 there was a new product that came out, it was amazing. it cost me $25,000 to get one of the first 25. I owned it for a week, and thought about it. I called and asked if he had a waiting list, he said yea, I said ok give number 26 mine and send me my $5000 deposit back. He did.
You see I make things and I know this, first one is never the best one. For me it is usually number three or four starts to be pretty damn good.
Many of my friends bought into the product that I passed up on.
Three years later one of my friends walked up to me and put his arm around me and said…”Ken you are the smartest SOB that I know/” I asked why and he said because you knew when to get out. He went on to say that he wound up spending $250.000 on his before it was sorted out.
New product, great idea. Wait for version 3, you will be much happier.
I still make stuff and every time I laugh… it is always version 3 before the kinks are sorted out. … and sometimes even then…. well ya know.
In closing I want to congratulate the host here digging your way through the swamp to present this product. Good Job.. and a hard job too. Thanks for doing this.
@northhankspin
April 27, 2024 at 9:17 am
good job on the video BUT man it up a bit. your acting to boyish and in my face. please correct this issue
@Jamesalec63
April 27, 2024 at 10:50 am
This device appears in a movie directed and starring Woody Alen. At least it looked like this device.
And this machine also has a connection to Star Wars the Death Star one of the consoles’ delays kind of looks slightly similar. And it might have turned up in the original Ghostbusters movies as one of those devices used by the Ghostbusters.
@pearl3042
April 27, 2024 at 12:27 pm
underrated channel with fantastic research and great storytelling. keep it coming
@alexandrorodrigez
April 27, 2024 at 2:15 pm
Sad but true
@trackah123
April 27, 2024 at 2:39 pm
It’s cool but it kinda reminds me of “Back To The Future 3” , you are stuck in the year 1885 and you need to repair your time-machine you just gotta work with the parts and technology that exists at that time.
@eksit101
April 27, 2024 at 3:32 pm
They’ve been forcing the agenda for many decades. Like google glasses/ apple VR… They keep pushing it, no one wants it.
@tomapc
April 27, 2024 at 6:08 pm
@16:30 WTH??? That seems very wrong
@MehmetKoseDev
April 27, 2024 at 7:11 pm
the ending of this video is another level. respect
@Jonathan-pv3dn
April 27, 2024 at 7:17 pm
Perhaps the naming of the butler between users is a security feature. Different recordings. The land line is tied into the house electric wiring. Signals are sent over ground? Also in a power outage a land line still has a little, it might’ve Volts. Hope that is helpful. I enjoyed the video.
@pplwizard1
April 28, 2024 at 1:19 am
The purpose of the landline is the butler could be controlled from any phone in the house or you could call in from outside the house turn on your air conditioner or lighting also the butler in the Box could make phone calls for you like call Mom or call the pizza shop
@sbeasley4263
April 27, 2024 at 9:32 pm
yep sounds just like X10
@pplwizard1
April 28, 2024 at 2:33 pm
Actually, X-10, infrared, DTMF TONES, ASCII CODE, Dry contact closure and even secured X-10 over Cat 5 wiring
@sbeasley4263
April 28, 2024 at 6:24 pm
@@pplwizard1 Yep X10 was my go to in the 90’s even Radio shack had relays that would work with the X10 stuff, automated my house then my business. Alarms too. Unfortunately It was still not 100% reliable and ended up switching the Businees to DMX for all my lighting and NVR POE CAMS. I got boxes of the DMX devices I don’t use anymore Can’t bring myself to toss them out.
@gavinpeters9531
April 28, 2024 at 3:06 am
The instructions are actually simple, clear and straightforward if you follow them. It’s your pre-conceived notions of how it worked on mobile phone pads that fooled you.
@Blue_eye_devil
April 28, 2024 at 3:11 pm
Modern young men look so lame.
@RamseySchaefer
April 28, 2024 at 4:17 pm
Do I look lame too? 😂
@poorman-trending
April 28, 2024 at 6:58 pm
I miss when the user manual told you EVERYTHING you need to know about a device. Now we just get the dumbed down ADHD version.
@code-chimp
April 28, 2024 at 9:57 pm
I actually had three.
@coolspot18
April 28, 2024 at 10:28 pm
Funny how X10 sold the appliance module for like 30 years with no changes.
@netoeli
April 28, 2024 at 10:36 pm
what is the purpose of showing the dollar amount in todays value? Are we expecting anyone from 2024 to go back to 1983 and purchase one of this? Like people back in 1983 are going to ask you what year you’re from and increase the price for the value of today’s dollar? If we are looking at this from the perspective of when it came out., wouldn’t a better analogy would be to show average salary or minimum wage and state the hrs required to purchase the device at that time or something like that, lately since inflation has being rampant a lot of channels started adding the price including inflation specifically channels talking about *old tech. Like im looking at a video about tech, not economics and a reminder of how f*** our way of life is.
@darkmetaOFFICIAL
April 29, 2024 at 3:18 am
Who else has a whole home computer system right next to their family television set? 😂
@darkmetaOFFICIAL
April 29, 2024 at 3:25 am
there were automata that had voice recognition a century before this
@laurenceglazier
April 29, 2024 at 6:42 am
Excellent – Thank you!
@adamjw2301
April 29, 2024 at 8:18 am
Should have called him Codsworth 😅
@ther0ss
April 29, 2024 at 8:22 am
He said front bottom
@Frontdesk99
April 29, 2024 at 6:48 pm
3:02 Please tell me you DO know where the name HAL9000 actually came from.
@concreteheat7629
April 29, 2024 at 7:21 pm
The price is nothing. You want to be flashy you gotta drop that cash. At least it didn’t listen to your conversation and store it on a server in a dark room somewhere ready to be used for something nefarious.
@Kor-zf9mw
April 29, 2024 at 7:56 pm
Jessy Pinkman with brown hair
@dropdead_
April 29, 2024 at 9:07 pm
All of the technological jargon in this video is totally wrong, please do research or hire someone before you try to educate people about something you don’t really know anything about
@ShepTheCreator
April 29, 2024 at 9:18 pm
yo is this vsauce 2s channel?
@MatthewDannevik
April 29, 2024 at 10:13 pm
it was 1496 or $4,201 in todays money, clickbait title
@brilliant-handle
April 29, 2024 at 10:25 pm
Would love to see Technology Connections cover this product! 22 mins isn’t enough to give this thing justice
@xthriteenx
April 29, 2024 at 10:58 pm
Wishing luck for that one guy to get into his box!
@dbptwg
April 30, 2024 at 8:38 am
kids these days would never survive with old tech. You had to work for everything
@firstdayversion1015
April 30, 2024 at 9:52 am
Mate you sound dissapointed, this was only a little more than 10 Years after we landed on the moon , if we actually landed on the moon and if we did not it is a whole;e lot more impressive, you sound like your UNDERexagerating its worth, I say its a great piece of technology and if the fool that was using it took a bit longer and wasn’t making a video for clicks it was likely good quality technology I mean who can tell me their siri and iPhone will work after almost 40 years , I DONT THINK SO. SO IT WAS DEFINATELY GOOD QUALITY.
@lovewenwin
April 30, 2024 at 9:58 am
16 different people
@ShlomoRaz69
April 30, 2024 at 12:29 pm
21:43 why is this moment so surreal
@toncatboy
April 30, 2024 at 4:26 pm
I just got the aluminum one! Made my mouth feel like I just left the dentist. Technology is over the roof! I never brushed my teeth so long at once, and Im looking forward to brushing again. I felt like a kid with a new toy for my teeth!
@danielakerlof4862
April 30, 2024 at 5:15 pm
That kind of interface was fairly common, how to do inputs 😉
@markokramar3504
April 30, 2024 at 6:44 pm
i really dont like how youre talking about it so negatively at the beginning. always remember that someone put their time and hard work into making sóething that didnt exist before.
@bestgameralive1
April 30, 2024 at 7:02 pm
with the bot next to you i can rearrange the video cuts in order of when taken
@ray-sattler
April 30, 2024 at 7:38 pm
I would love a modern version, that is not connected to the internet, that’s the main reason i don’t own an Alexa or anything like that. (Having an Android phone probably isn’t much better)
@jimbotron70
May 2, 2024 at 12:25 pm
Home automation projects based on Arduino-Pi exist.
@shawndemper7286
April 30, 2024 at 9:01 pm
Hey everyone
@TalismancerM
April 30, 2024 at 10:36 pm
This was all much more possible at the time than people now seem to think. Turtle logo had a voice interface that allowed you to control turtles on the screen. Just pick up any computing magazine (eg Compute!) from the period and you’ll get the gist. Computer/electronics projects were everywhere. None of my wireless home control devices used anyone else’s “protocols”, you just made it up on the fly.
@gamingworld-bw4du
May 1, 2024 at 7:57 am
what tl hj
@sinistar3198
May 1, 2024 at 9:50 am
Not AI. It’s an exhaustively programmed horizontally scaling thing from the 80s like you’d expect. Video builds up to some unimportant remarks on obsolescence and trail blazing. Enjoy the 22 mins you got back.
@GnomeEU
May 1, 2024 at 12:22 pm
Was talking to your phone or computer really a brilliant idea?
Or just what everyone expected and someone tried to make work.
We all expect working android robots already, we’re not a footnote in Wikipedia either.
@HerecomestheCalavera
May 1, 2024 at 2:43 pm
9:17 Ah the day Butler in a box was announced. That’s a day I’ll never forget.
@AadZwaan
May 1, 2024 at 2:49 pm
this was by far one of the best, clear, amusing old tech reviews i have been fortunate enough to come across, what makes it even better is the fact that the Wizard himself is both still alive and just casually walked into the comment section. golden.
@rkoharchik
May 1, 2024 at 4:16 pm
The appliance module looks like something Radioshack and IBM Aptiva worked on called home director kit
@doodoo2065
May 1, 2024 at 6:34 pm
This has potential for a fanmade deltarune secret box
@PARKERSG
May 1, 2024 at 7:01 pm
too much talking
@woreno
May 1, 2024 at 7:24 pm
I enjoyed a lot seeing this of device functioning!
@TeamLurxOfficial
May 1, 2024 at 9:58 pm
vsauce dong , vsauce dipdi
@DianoiaNoesis
May 1, 2024 at 11:14 pm
or like Siri, I just don’t even use her.
@vangildermichael1767
May 2, 2024 at 2:39 am
And what people don’t even realize (and even after I say it, people will dismiss me and forget about it before they go to the bathroom next). Is that even the “google assistant” is just barely better than the “butler in a box”. We laugh and poke fun at the “butler in a box”, now. But at that time, that was BIG stuff. The same thing will happen to “google assistant”. We consider it to be “pretty decent” and “acceptable”, right now. BUT, in a few year, we will say. “Remember that “assistant” thing?”. And we all used to “like” it. hahahaha. Because the “voice recognition” and “understanding”. Our assistant will be like the one on the Enterprise on TNG. I don’t remember it ever responding with the “wrong answer”. Or “I didn’t understand the question ask” when Picard talked to it.
@hmst5420
May 2, 2024 at 4:29 am
Great video!
@patrickclausen6922
May 2, 2024 at 7:48 am
Wait wtf?!
How did I not know about this channel?!?
The amount of joy I felt when I saw it’s vsauce2 Kevin!
@memodump
May 2, 2024 at 10:11 am
Great vid, but a 100+ page manual for complex device in 80s wasn’t something unheard of, and you were _supposed_ to read it before operating the device.
@Lukas-qy2on
May 2, 2024 at 10:49 am
I find the way you describe tech sometimes to be weird lol (disclaimer: love your content, it’s a facinating video topic, it just stood out to me and was a bit funny lol)
0:46 “How did it work without wifi, bluetooth, or the internet?” You bring this up again later but why would it need any of that? yes there are appliances but i think most people thought, “cables, because cables” it’s kind of irrelevant lol, but also funny because every amazon device nowadays wants to be an IoT device and connect to your wifi, and it’s ridiculous, and sometimes a literal security risk for companies.
12:55 “it was then another 20 years … for siri to translate your voice into code”, I wouldn’t say it turns your voice into code,, it would just run functions based on key words and parameters in a sentence. i don’t know if i’d call it code, i mean in a way it does translate audio into functions so maybe technically it could be called an interpreted language? but it doesn’t turn the sentence into code and then run it, it doesn’t spawn a new process, it’s a single program that inteprets and then runs functions with some control flow, voice being the way you interact with it. you wouldn’t say your phone turns your touch gestures into code, it just moves you around in the logic of the OS or app. It’s a fun thing to think about but a weird sentence imo haha.
@Lukas-qy2on
May 2, 2024 at 10:50 am
I also love how it’s a safer bet to be a science fiction writer and invent stuff that to actually try to invent stuff, what a sad ending lol
@NuGanjaTron
May 2, 2024 at 1:04 pm
“Does everything but windows”. How prophetic.
@dewolfeFSP
May 2, 2024 at 1:12 pm
The instructions to enter the pin only seem complicated now. Those who grew up during this age of electronics were well aware of this type of technology and were comfortable manuals like this.
@dewolfeFSP
May 2, 2024 at 1:23 pm
It was one of these devices that, after a power surge, initiated the launch of the first nuke in Fallout.
@Reiv311
May 2, 2024 at 6:11 pm
The topic is amazing but the host is so annoying – impossible to watch
@Delahunt1080
May 2, 2024 at 6:41 pm
Awsome Video. Thank you for sharing this
@zredyoshiz
May 2, 2024 at 11:36 pm
What if instead of butler it was butthoel
@amurtigress_mobile365
May 3, 2024 at 6:48 am
I am not sure I understand why you call this an AI in the video title. This is SPEECH RECOGNITION and I remember this from my C64 times in the 80s. To me this is AT BEST mimicing what AI does nowadays. As cool as your video is, overall, I am feeling somewhat *clickbaited*.
@dougcollison1213
May 3, 2024 at 11:57 am
I remembe this. i also remember putting a bunch of research into x10 protocolfor some reason.
@oPHILOSORAPTORo
May 3, 2024 at 1:49 pm
Wait, this isn’t Vsauce!
@SachinDewthuru
May 3, 2024 at 4:53 pm
I assume it works by matching the recorded audio sample wave to the microphone received sound wave? There is no other way this could possible.
@pplwizard1
May 4, 2024 at 12:06 am
That would be incorrect…. If you want a more elaborate answer reply and I’ll get into it.
@SachinDewthuru
May 4, 2024 at 1:05 am
@@pplwizard1 Yes please! I’d love to know how they achieved this.
@pplwizard1
May 4, 2024 at 11:42 am
Well this is going to be a bit of a long answer. First off need to understand that back then and if you look at the video and look at the pictures he showed regarding people doing voice recognition they were all talking within 2 inches of a microphone. Back then if you went from 2 in from a microphone to 4 in for the microphone it wasn’t just doubling the distance it was an algorithmic leap as a result it would change the pattern of the voice and it would not be recognized. In order for our product to do what we needed it to do we had to create our own voice recognition which did not exist it’s even patented you can look up the patent office under my name. Once it knew who you were by saying a list of words that have nothing to do with what you were going to be controlling it learned with the sound of your voice and who you were therefore you could change your voice even catch a cold just like you recognize someone when they have a cold you still know it’s them . Also our product had to be able to work in noise in a room and at distance and if you see the demonstrations it does do that like Alexa does today. Back then it was impossible. Until we made it possible we were even tested by the US Air Force where they trained a pilot in a quiet room put him in an F-16 and a 9g Mach 2 turn and it still worked. Now the reason it did this is because it was an AI system that’s why the box says Ai and his information it wasn’t the operation of the home it was the voice recognition it could understand it could learn it could update it could interpolate it could extrapolate and decide and they even had a voting system within itself that would vote on words it was very very sophisticated all running in real time at a time when this was not considered a doable thing . I hope this helps. @@SachinDewthuru
@SachinDewthuru
May 4, 2024 at 4:20 pm
@@pplwizard1 I read the patent paper. This is some next level work when comparing you had to run this in real time without much of processing power back then like today. Processing audio signals, Developing reference patterns, Segmenting commands, and comparing patterns for recognition in 90’s must’ve impossible due to lack of processor power, and it probably laid the groundwork for today voice recognizing models.
It’s very genius to train a voice model that can adapt to user’s voice. I’ll definitely take some deeper look into the paper in my free time to see how you all achieved this without a good processing power and how it runs in real time.
Thank you for your detailed breakdown.
@pplwizard1
May 4, 2024 at 7:23 pm
Actually this voice recognition was developed in 1979 patented in 1980 it went in as something called a submarine patent and didn’t emerge until the 90s but the actual date initial date of patenting Was 1980 it was rejected by the patent office 22 times because no one understood what we were trying to do. Also it was patented not copyrighted it was the very first time that anyone had taken software and put it on a chip making it firmware . Also if you go to the comments sections and click on top comments I think the very first one I compare what it had to do then with what’s available and where we’re at memory and speed-wise today. You might find that interesting @@SachinDewthuru
@everybot-it
May 4, 2024 at 8:08 pm
0 Asterix and Obelix? And an unnecessarily negative review for something that ‘kinda’ worked – all these years ago. I’m impressed (with the machine, not the video).
@dorkultra
May 4, 2024 at 10:53 pm
This was clearly made for 2 types of people: those that were obsessed with technology and those that were super rich and hired someone to program it for them
@israelgrayzman3623
May 5, 2024 at 12:40 am
It’s not an AI machine, it’s a voice recognition device. In the early 1980s, such tools had to be trained using sentences containing all syllables and sounds over time to recognize the speaker’s intonation as well. Because of this, as you mentioned, there is no meaning to the speaker’s language. Today, tools such as Siri, Google and Alexa are already more developed, so they can recognize speech even without training, but sometimes they have errors that happen mainly from background noise. After voice recognition, it is possible to run all sorts of applications, etc., including artificial intelligence engines.
@Dr_Mario2007
May 5, 2024 at 1:27 am
I am amazed that Butler handled AI okay given computer technology wasn’t really all about performance but usability back then.
Nowadays, you could stuff Raspberry Pi 5 into a broken Butler to essentially repair it back to working condition or to recreate such AI computer as there’s 3D printers nowadays, and it would do things much faster than the original hardware. Honestly it’s mind-blowing with how they got away with so little computing performance within the original computer hardware.
Also, given the fact that Butler is architecturally simpler with technology used from back then, it’s also possible to add WiFi and Bluetooth connectivity to it with a separate wireless microcontroller.
@johanbtheman
May 5, 2024 at 10:57 am
Too much rambling, you said everything and nothing…
@ipponyc
May 5, 2024 at 1:43 pm
UI remembers some huge similarities to the Commodore 64.
@pplwizard1
May 5, 2024 at 11:49 pm
This was before the Commador 64… It was developed on the Commador PET (32K)
@sumper_man
May 5, 2024 at 8:21 pm
Gus was the name of the robot butler in fallout
@Bertie_Ahern
May 6, 2024 at 11:08 am
Unfortunately technology doesn’t always progress, and in computers this is often moreso the case than not. Most things from the early 80s were significantly more advanced than anything we’ve had until just recently (possibly still more advanced). Most modern computers are so bloated they’re far slower and less capable than they could be.
@tiboregedi99
May 6, 2024 at 5:25 pm
I really enjoyed your video. Thanks for sharing this piece of history. I searched a lot, but couldn’t find one of this treasure. I’m teaching in an electrical engineering school, and I love to show to my students retro, this kind of old things/tools. I really hope once i will find a working unit of this, and I’ll be able to show it on my classes, and turning on TV, or lights in the classroom. 🙂
@rrrichiexl
May 8, 2024 at 6:38 am
I was around in 1983 and I didn’t know this existed back then, but it would have blown my mind. As a technician I have to guess how it works and it’s amazing actually, and with what was available at the time it a real product that works… Thank you for the video, but your attitude seems to be a bit derogative, when this product is actually awesome! and great engineering! 3 hour backup on a couple of AA batteries is amazing!
@Mike-oy9vj
May 8, 2024 at 7:27 am
That’s just like the first voice to text my dad was big on as new software would come out and getting frustrated and throwing in the trash with the next lasting longer then the last.
Tandy can do anything it you set it up to do so.
That set up so unique to your set up.
@DoodiePunk
May 8, 2024 at 8:01 am
@21:41 the moment we’ve watched the whole video for. 😏
@maasicas
May 8, 2024 at 2:10 pm
Please google what AI is. AI doesnt exist. Let alone in 80s
@jlcelorio
May 8, 2024 at 3:27 pm
I remember seeing the “Butler in a Box” at a computer convention when I was 10 years old. The presenter at the booth had a lapel mic with a loud speaker and the device would get the commands right about 50% of the time. When the device got it wrong, the presenter would say something like “No” or “Stop” and the device would respond back something like “I am sorry, Master” that would always get a big laugh reaction from the crowd. The booth was always packed with back to back demos going on. My dad got me into the convention and then went to to work. I stayed at the booth and saw the demo over and over for a few hours. Seeing the “Butler in a Box” in person was just unbelievable. The fact that you could talk to a computer reminded me a lot of the 80’s show “Whiz Kids” who had a computer (Ralf) that could talk… I thought that was just impossible, yet here we are. Many (many) years later, with the arrival of the new home assistants (Google Assistant, Siri, Alexa, etc.) people kept talking about how revolutionary this was… I kept thinking “Well, isn’t this what I saw at that computer show like 20 years ago?”. I was never able to find any reference to that tech/device anywhere. At some point I though, “I was just a little kid, maybe that was not real, maybe I just imagined the whole thing, maybe that machine did not actually exist”. Today that changes. The “Butler in a Box” did exist, it did actually allow you to control lamps with your voice… back in the 80s. This is amazing, it brings back such good memories! Thank you for posting this video.
@pplwizard1
May 9, 2024 at 12:51 am
Hello, I loved your comment. So I got some news for you. I was the guy you saw demonstrating in the booth all those many years ago. And yes it was very real.
@woodstoney
May 9, 2024 at 9:07 am
Dude, Look up X-10. It used household wiring to transmit control signals to various modules that one had plugged in around the house. Nothing magical and no Bluetooth or internet required. They weren’t around then! Yet, you buy this device and expect it to work as it might have over 4 decades ago. Dream the dream…Use your phone instead.
@ZYZZinVR
May 9, 2024 at 9:26 pm
even the vaccuum tube display reminded me of a “fancy” early 2000s display clock
@biologicalhazard552
May 10, 2024 at 3:55 am
7:06 no, he has not spent 8 years. It is literally written in the description of the picture that you share, “For as little time as I’ve had with the Butler”. What else did you make up?
@Ekistic-oh4uj
May 10, 2024 at 10:27 am
I imagine $10,000 would have been totally not overpriced for being Da Man with a fully automated house. I mean, that’s stuff for Sonny Crocket, Brantley Foster, Axel Foley,..
@torbjornericson2482
May 10, 2024 at 4:51 pm
I ordered the leaflet back in the day and was amazed, but I didn’t order one. I don’t remember if I got any pricing information.
@partiid
May 10, 2024 at 7:45 pm
Man, you are the new vSauce, really. I hope you get viral. Great story telling
@Arthur_macneed
May 10, 2024 at 9:41 pm
vsauce 3
@CompComp
May 11, 2024 at 2:47 am
You should loan this to CelGen Studios to see if it can help them in reverse engineering their Butler.
Im sure having an example with a known pin will make it much easier to find where it’s stored in the devices memory.
@TheSteveTheDragon
May 11, 2024 at 3:01 am
15:32 – They call this user error. I am User.
Hello User, I am error!
@land3021
May 11, 2024 at 4:28 am
2:28 Damn, Alibaba goes way back, never knew that before! 3:05 Oh that’s where that name comes from… 3:54 Sounds so crazy it’s probably true. 4:15 This is crazy! 5:11 Oh so that’s how the AI worked pre-WiFi and pre-internet… 6:08 lmfao crazy frog before crazy frog 7:17 8 years… sounds about right for codes like that 8:34 Yeah Gus was approaching it with a programmer mentality huh? 11:32 Wowser… That’s really expensive and inaccessible. 12:11 Bizarre how it stayed futuristic for so long… 14:38 Woah 15:24 a physical volume slider… that’s pretty niche nowadays. 16:33 YIKES 16:48 Fewth! 17:44 Oh Jesus… 18:15 Yikes! 3 hours… 19:58 Ah I see. A shame… 20:34 FR 21:31 Yeah we truly do
@3dmilk433
May 11, 2024 at 7:18 am
There is no “A.I” inside.
@PCBoardRepair
May 11, 2024 at 12:01 pm
Housesitter was I unit I have to do this
@nebcat808
May 11, 2024 at 1:42 pm
He was definitely going for a specific target market: Rich People
@tslim250
May 11, 2024 at 7:01 pm
ah yes, x-10. I love x-10!!
@MyTestAccount-md6tb
June 6, 2024 at 5:56 am
I do this now with HOMESITE for FREE! 😉
Well, I bought the USB dongle and Z-WAVE stuff…
@Galaxxi
June 7, 2024 at 4:15 am
the vsauce guy …….. one of them, anyway
absolutely fascinating stuff. perhaps now this Will get a wikipedia article
@BITCOIlN
June 8, 2024 at 2:06 am
Typical yooutuber 22 minutes talking about nothing, this video could’ve been shortened to 5 minutes.
@mischiefen333
June 8, 2024 at 12:40 pm
Is this the father of POE?
@ll1881ll
June 8, 2024 at 6:56 pm
Don’t forget the movie Demon Seed
@jaikishorsharan5971
June 9, 2024 at 4:46 am
At least with this box, you don’t have any privacy issue.
@EmiSuperTrans71
June 9, 2024 at 7:23 am
In fairness to the butler home automation is still awful today. Buy device download yet another app. Hassio and an Amazon or Google assistant kinda of works but they’re still not great.
@brooknet
June 9, 2024 at 12:16 pm
What’s so bad about entering text on a telephone keypad? [Alpha 2] 3 [Alpha 1] 2 [Alpha 3] 7 [Alpha 3] 9! Butler In A Box was ahead of its time, but the technology wasn’t up to the job. Remote electronic control of household items was a popular topic in the 80s. I designed a box that connected to a telephone, used DTMF signalling to switch items on and off. Its only drawbacks were that you needed to wire everything up to a separate signalling channel, it wasn’t very smart (make a mistake and the wrong appliance switches on or off), there was no feedback as to the device status, and I was scared of mains voltage – so it never happened. No way was I going to connect a load of relays and 567 tone decoders to the mains.
@foxdavani4091
June 9, 2024 at 1:11 pm
As a kid, i remember our house was automated. I wonder if it was done by this thing. I dont know. I was very little. I just remember, everything from lamps to coffee maker was all turning on on its own. Mom never touched things and told me not to touch switches either. It was cool. I was a little kid who’d walk into my house at night and lights would turn on. It was never dark there. Id wake up and smell coffee but nobody was int he kitchen.
@LarkaEarthsong
June 9, 2024 at 5:48 pm
Why do I cry at the end of each one of Kevin’s videos?
@jaysonl
June 10, 2024 at 1:55 pm
Wow. 21 minutes 40 seconds into a 22 minute video for the payoff.
@cavemanjesus6993
June 10, 2024 at 5:09 pm
Front bottom lol
@TheAndyCraven
June 10, 2024 at 11:04 pm
lol “Front-bottom”
@TalibannedProduction
June 11, 2024 at 9:12 am
This is really cool and way ahead of its time.
@emilyapricot1313
June 11, 2024 at 9:42 am
Nice message. I also appreciate the microphone light operational on the Butler at the end of the video.
@DonoVideoProductions
June 11, 2024 at 1:57 pm
13 years later, Wildfire would up the ante.
@jermz79
June 11, 2024 at 3:25 pm
The Alibaba thing tho… ??
@ImTimT.
June 11, 2024 at 8:14 pm
I miss geeking out over Popular Science
@9hundred67
June 11, 2024 at 10:57 pm
pretty cool. I remember X10
@TheKeithterry
June 12, 2024 at 4:06 pm
All electronics were expensive back then.
Also, we were still programming voice “dumb” tags like this device just ten years ago on some devices.
@RahhmiPoofs
June 13, 2024 at 3:28 am
Dude in video freaking out because perfectly simple instructions on how to press the 2 key 3 times to get the letter C like that’s not how you typed in a 10 digit keypad back in the day.
These f’n young people I swear. Props to @pplwizard1 for showing up to be awesome.
@sirtunacan
June 13, 2024 at 8:20 am
15:15 HAHAHA! Guy that deals with tech every day hoes to dad for help only for dad to find the volume button!😂😂😂
@Blurns
June 13, 2024 at 6:39 pm
I’m guessing the amount of power it consumed was enough that you might as well just leave the light on and forget the butler box entirely.
@aperinich
June 14, 2024 at 11:12 am
Like your style
@playtilithertz
June 14, 2024 at 2:19 pm
WHY?
@Cheburashka_420
June 15, 2024 at 12:26 pm
Wait…… Are you the Vsauce guy?
@numbrocker
June 16, 2024 at 7:37 pm
I was waiting for you to demonstrate how it works
@pplwizard1
June 17, 2024 at 1:30 am
You didn’t stay till the end he demonstrates it the very last thing however you can find a full demonstration of it on YouTube
@numbrocker
June 17, 2024 at 4:27 am
@@pplwizard1 hey thanks . Which video should I look out for?
@scottpetersen2028
June 16, 2024 at 10:28 pm
In the early-mid 80’s I worked on a Dragon voice recognition system for a paraplegic friend, and it was a complete 286 computer all by itself in a normal PC occupying a 16 bit slot, I don’t remember if it spoke, but it had pages of 16 command words that it compared to voice samples to run computer programs, it didn’t understand anything without many training sessions, and it was only for one user.
@comatose3788
June 17, 2024 at 6:47 pm
Starting to really think the only thing GenZ likes is when you stroke their egos. Maybe you can go back to 30s and find something else to bag on.
@synergy021
June 17, 2024 at 11:59 pm
Well I had a voice in a box in the early 80’s. It was called a speak ‘n spell. 😉 Happy times.
@Moechtegernpilot1
June 18, 2024 at 5:54 am
Domestobot
@MisterMotel
June 18, 2024 at 6:54 am
17:54 That is truly depressing haha, I already get annoyed when I have to restart or retrain an item in my Google Home.
@TJ-rf1xl
June 19, 2024 at 1:04 am
This device is absolutely extraordinary given the limitations of technology at the time it was conceived! It really should be acknowledged as the precursor of modern home automation…someone please update the Wikis!
@pplwizard1
June 19, 2024 at 12:17 pm
Yes, contact me
@shawnio
June 20, 2024 at 4:44 am
I got goosebumps when you turned the lamp on dude, I dont know why
@user-xc3rs3qm2o
June 20, 2024 at 11:07 am
Are you CoffeeZilla’s younger brother???
@Zhixalom
June 20, 2024 at 3:55 pm
Kevin, could you please tell your two mini-minions, who are using the zoom in/out “buttons” inside your video editing software as a seesaw, to take it down a couple of notches. I suppose that this can be rather subconsciously effective when used discreetly. The problem is that once you have consciously noticed it, it cannot be consciously un-noticed…
– And buddy, it is driving me up the walls, into the corners right next to the spiders, making us synchronously gnaw at our fingernails… Ehm, do spiders even have fingernails? – huh, I guess I’ll have to ask them next time. 🥸😅 – Anyway, besides all that subconsciously manipulative stuff, I do find your content thoroughly enjoyable. 👍❤
– “Simon Phoenix… Illuminate!”
@pauldy
June 21, 2024 at 1:03 pm
Too funny, I didn’t hear you mention these were all x10 and you could pick the modules up at radio shack which at the time were everywhere. Most of the people I knew dabbling in home automation at the time already had some type of computer and were using them control their devices so I can see how this had a hard time getting footing. I used x10 for home automation right up till we started getting the cheap esp devices with wifi around 2016.
@thomasholland9568
June 21, 2024 at 1:29 pm
The host did a good job, but i have to laugh at the host’s apparent amazement at the touchpad entry, use of X-10 (which i still use in some applications). His youth is really showing (not a bad thing). But as an old guy that no kidding was building neural networks in the 1980s, this bit of tech history is very entertaining and hopefully gets the point across that every generation has many geniuses and visionaries are by definition ahead of their time.
@glennshoemake4200
June 21, 2024 at 3:23 pm
You could automatically turn on and off lights a lot easier in the mid 80’s, it was called “The Clapper”.
@nashvilleunderground9198
June 21, 2024 at 5:22 pm
#terrancehoward
@AzumiRM
June 22, 2024 at 2:57 pm
Was he taking price recommendations from apple? Ridiculous price, even for what it was and the era it was made in.
@pplwizard1
June 24, 2024 at 7:45 am
Well he was right I got the price wrong but not for the reason you’re thinking I got it wrong the opposite direction keep in mind back then an electric typewriter was $1,100 and when I started selling it for $9.95 people wouldn’t buy it because it didn’t think it could really do what we said the higher we raise the price the more we sold
@FiggsNeughton
June 23, 2024 at 1:56 am
Imagine not having a fully functioning Butler in a Box in your home. Couldn’t be me.
@BioluminescenceOfTheSpirit
June 24, 2024 at 3:17 am
If the power went out, would you be able to reprogram it all over?
@pplwizard1
June 24, 2024 at 7:43 am
Yes it could be reprogrammed but if you read the other comments you will find that he missed the fact there was a device called a ramp pack that would store and restore the entire memory in 7 seconds and would last for 7 years before you had to replace the battery in it.
@Toylympics
June 24, 2024 at 8:29 am
So interesting. Thank you.
@kombinat0r
June 24, 2024 at 5:51 pm
That ending was absolutely epic
@Rockstarenergyf1team
June 25, 2024 at 2:25 am
What if you named your butler in a box manuela a sweet mexican girl will be your butler???
@pplwizard1
June 26, 2024 at 10:35 am
Yes
@Rockstarenergyf1team
June 26, 2024 at 10:41 am
@@pplwizard1and she speaks spanglish and she comes from albuquerque or las cruces???
@daijoubu4529
June 25, 2024 at 2:33 pm
23W thats about how much phantom power a microwaves draw lol no biggie…
@SO_DIGITAL
June 26, 2024 at 2:46 pm
So Apple users would have bought it then.
@MamatraNy
June 27, 2024 at 1:48 am
People who came from Vsauce
👇
@MamatraNy
June 27, 2024 at 1:49 am
🫳🏻
🎤
@tomaims
June 27, 2024 at 11:29 am
When you think about it. IT is amazing. No MIT geniuses. Impressive!
@shpongled587
June 27, 2024 at 2:48 pm
I believe starting in “B” would be safer, for the butthole lovers.
@ryanmcdonald8240
June 27, 2024 at 5:07 pm
this guy needs to take some xanax
@Oliver-cv6pv
June 27, 2024 at 11:58 pm
This have nothing to do with AI like we have today, it’s completely different.
@sunwavee5748
June 28, 2024 at 6:38 am
This is actually still fucking impressive for the time god damn
@Joe-Przybranowski
June 29, 2024 at 6:09 am
This is why I am never an early adopter.
@escapecampus
June 30, 2024 at 3:15 am
Uh… This is an… AMAZING video. Just TOO MUCH research.
@markhodgson2348
July 1, 2024 at 1:25 am
This is perfectly suited for a communist home
@bellemorelock4924
July 1, 2024 at 3:39 am
16:14 This 23W isn’t anything by pre-2000 standards. When “Energy Star” was pushed out in the late 90s, the Astroturf-roots community (of profit-minded corpos) decried it, for instructing every maker of electronics to use the commonly available options to save power in some standard ways. My c.1998 Cambridge Acoustics PC speakers originally had a weighty (transformer based) power block that used about 10W, by itself. Now I have a 36W switched power supply (large cap, for acoustics) plugged into it, that uses under 1W. I don’t think switched power supplies were around before 1996, everything used a “wall wart” or had a heavy transformer built-in.
If you wanted to run this Antique Alexa, you could determine the power rail voltage(s) and replace whatever it had with a modern supply. This would eliminate 50-90% of the wasted electricity.
The primary change across everything, was switching from transformer-based power supplies, to “switching” power supplies around 1998. A friend has a Bose A/V 5.1 Surround system (basic bookshelf little speakers) from 2004, that consumes 25-35W continuously when off. I tried creating an external switching system to cut its supply since he only uses it a few hours a week, but it takes 2 minutes to do some internal indexing and loading whenever the power is lost. This BOSE system is the newest (last) consumer item I know of to have this sort of waste. By 2010, 65W-90W (laptop) power supplies were under $10. An easy point of reference to remember, is that each Watt of vampire power drain for something sitting idle, costs around $1 per year. So in 10 years since I swapped the power supply for my PC speakers, the $10 (or so) power supply has saved me around $100, which is twice what the speakers cost new (on sale).
By 2010, there was only one thing in the modern home still stealing from you. THE CABLE BOX. In an extension of their business model, the cable boxes used in the transition to digital cable were lightweight computers that stole electricity. Most were ON 24/7 and took 20-45W continuously to power, with DVRs being the higher wattage. Supposedly this is better now, as they always say “those are the old boxes we are phasing out” but then they went full digital and required a box at every TV in the home.. I don’t know. A lot was said about LEDs saving power, but you don’t leave lights on all the time.. Well, back in the 1980s and 1990s people did have more money, and rent was cheaper, and my porch light in 2000 did not even have a switch. It just stayed on, always. I eventually put a Philips florescent on it saving 80%, but mostly because the bulb died every month randomly. Society was really really slow in America, to legislate little tweaks that cut the waste of electricity.
These vampire losses are really expensive. If you have an older refrigerator, from 1980, it may use 1500 kWh per year (or more if its failing). A 2000 model used 800-1100. A new model uses 500-800. This means a dying old fridge may cost you 1000kWh per year, or $150. A window AC might waste $50-200 cooling, if its not running well, versus a high efficiency model. The savings on electricity will buy the new unit in a couple years.
@JoimFormula
July 1, 2024 at 8:49 am
Cassette tape player with USB interface now we can buy online.. I’ve bought one….. I’ve transferred, converted its contents to become audio files (MP3).
@RAlter
July 1, 2024 at 2:35 pm
Keep in mind we were a lot smarter back then.
@truthteller50
July 2, 2024 at 3:27 pm
X10 modules were pretty useful and pervasive in certain areas. Nice video but you hinted on lots of things about ththe device and the man, but covered very little. You only used the device a single time and showed a couple other clips of people using it. That was it. Bummer.
@Dzeroed
July 3, 2024 at 12:37 am
Ah well, I don’t have 16 friends. Guess the 15k would be a waste 😔
Sigh. Why is it, that every time I want to spend money I have never actually possessed in my life, there’s always some damn reason that comes up to give me a reason not to spend it 🤷
@SlowPCGaming1
July 3, 2024 at 1:05 am
Voice command software and the machines of that era all required a lengthy training period. As I recall, Alexa has a voice training mode as well. And even though Alexa or other voice command software now rely on servers over the Internet to complete a task, they still mess up. That thing did it all as a self-contained machine. I think you’re allowing your current world view of how things should work cloud your expectations of how things in the past should work.
@Whickedlee
July 3, 2024 at 4:14 am
Tenny is Bulldog Drummond’s butler. Cadbury is the manservant of Richard Ritch. aka Dickie Dollars
@jada1173
July 3, 2024 at 12:02 pm
23 watts in standby, not so terrible. 😄
I suspect the price per kw must be wery high where you live.
@nyplace1
July 3, 2024 at 1:55 pm
For a second there i thought you will not actually turn on a lamp with a voice command…. that would be such a lat down ; ) But you did.. amazing stuff love these type of vids keep them coming
@robinhood379
July 3, 2024 at 4:08 pm
I’m blown away! All the hassle was worth it, just to see that lamp turn *ON* in the end. Seeing that in 1987 would’ve been like stumbling upon one of *”Stranger Things'”* big reveals in your own hometown, in real life; the excitement, the wonder, the mystery, the IMPLICATIONS!! I’m inspired JUST by that lamp, alone.
It makes me wonder… What’s our government hiding?
@PortierBlog
July 6, 2024 at 4:05 pm
Świetnie zrealizowane, bezbłędny straszno smutno futurystyczny klimat. Dziękuję i pozdrawiam.
@neilstrongarm377
July 9, 2024 at 12:03 am
I came to watch the AI, but as I fast-forwarded through, all I saw was 22 minutes of some dude’s face. Pass
@PigeonHoledByYT
July 9, 2024 at 11:41 pm
I’ve still never been impressed by voice assistants. In the time it takes me to say “hey doofus” and then wait for it to light up indicating it’s ready for my command, because I’ve yet to meet one that simply hears my command and acts, then I say my command, the indicator blinks and finally the light turns on; in all that time I can just get up and do it myself. Maybe I’m just using the wrong assistant but Alexa is nothing but a glorified music player in my house, and not a particularly good one.
@klanglabor1997
July 10, 2024 at 1:57 am
Volume Slider down 😂 Microphone slider down 😂 User error 😇 Great video 👌🏻
@snajper4141
July 10, 2024 at 11:58 am
I wanted to see device but this guy is talking alooot… Yeah. Poor video.
@moot6794
July 11, 2024 at 4:24 pm
Thanks, really enjoyed the video.
@KeinNiemand
July 12, 2024 at 4:38 pm
Why didn’t they just put a hard drive in it?
@user-mx6oh1if9n
July 12, 2024 at 8:11 pm
Even you understood the Economic situation thru wre putting people through
@user-mx6oh1if9n
July 12, 2024 at 8:13 pm
Like I was saying even you understand the economic situation they are putting people through