It’s a digital world and yet it seems that we cling onto old technologies that were great in their day but simply should not still be around.

The telex or telegram still exists; you can still send a same-day telegram from New York to London for $25 and 88 cents per word. Email, instant messaging, texting have got to be better and quicker.

Typewriters are collectors pieces but the New York Police Department spent £1 million on new typewriters last year. My favourite author, Cormac McCarthy recently sold one for $250,000 and has promptly bought another.

Fax machines are still being used to spam people and for antiquated procedures that require a signature; scanners are cheaper and easier.

Turntables for playing LPs are still around and although the youth of today don’t understand, they are antiquated but something of a pleasure; listening to the scratchy genuine sound of a record is still cool as opposed to the “airbrushed”, over produced digital sound that has no feel to it.

With the advent of digital photography there is still room for the twice bankrupt Polaroid to exist, and some photographers still believe in the dark room – to be honest the only way forward is digital.

Disk drives are becoming obsolete, streaming and downloading mean that we don’t need them. Perhaps the odd memory stick is useful. When was the last time you used your disk drive?

At Hardware.com, we embrace the new; including servers, virtualisation software, 10 Gigabit Ethernet, switches, routers and optical transceivers that make the world’s networks and the Internet a digital world.

You can even email us on info@hardware.com.

Mark Cadbury, Marketing Director, Hardware.com