Great wristwatches of the 1980s

On Retronaut, David Orman has gathered up a magnificent collection of digital watches from the 1980s, which was truly the last spasm of the heroic age of digital horology.

1980s: Watches

I write books. My latest is a YA science fiction novel called Homeland (it's the sequel to Little Brother). More books: Rapture of the Nerds (a novel, with Charlie Stross); With a Little Help (short stories); and The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (novella and nonfic). I speak all over the place and I tweet and tumble, too.

MORE: Gadgets • happy mutants • horology • Old school

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janusnode

I had some watches like these and loved them. However, I am not sure if it is correct to say that these come from “truly the last spasm of the heroic age of digital horology”- there is some great digital horology coming down the pike now. Check out:
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/597507018/pebble-e-paper-watch-for-iphone-and-android
noahd

No transforming robot watch? http://www.pcmag.com/slideshow/story/265834/12-ultra-nerdy-watches-of-yore/2
- Ramone
  
  YES! I had this watch as a kid. I wish they’d do a grown-up version now…
Fogbert

I had a Casio C-801 calculator watch for a time back then (might even still have it someplace). It was awesome, but the buttons were too small.
dolo54

This will forever be one of my favorite websites: http://pocketcalculatorshow.com/ – just wait til you get to the boombox sections, oh and the walkmen…
http://www.facebook.com/stephen.andrews.5030 Stephen Andrews

As a kid (and still today when I think about it) I loooonged for Roy Scheider’s watch from Blue Thunder. Now, thanks to the internet, I know it was a Casio AA85. The 1 minute timer with the ‘petals’ disappearing as he raced his car looked absolutely amazing back then.
- Halloween_Jack
  
  Came here to say exactly that thing. I’m hoping that I can get an app for the Pebble (whenever that comes out) that duplicates the effect.
  - http://www.facebook.com/patrick.phelan.77 Patrick Phelan
    
    Not exactly that watch, but:
    http://fantod.x10.bz/2011/twingraphii.html
    Sooner or later, I’ll get around to sizing that for a phone.
http://twitter.com/dethbird dethbird

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Frank Diekman

Heroically UGLY, that is!

ZING!
smeno smeno

Just send me on a 2 hour unsuccessfull search for the watches of my childhood.
I couldn’t even find a photo of the Casio Watch for the Olympics in Barcelona 1992. This watch was so unique. It had different timers for different sports that timed the breaks also. And it had a counter for the points.
Glory Timer.
Chentzilla

“Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the Western Spiral arm of the galaxy, lies a small, unregarded yellow sun. Orbiting this at a distance of roughly ninety-million miles is an utterly insignificant blue-green planet whose ape-descended lifeforms are so amazingly primitive that they still think digital watches are a pretty neat idea”.