NanoraptorThe NeXTlevel was NeXT Software's first handheld device, eagerly awaited but canned just two weeks from release when Apple purchased NeXT and chose not to pursue gaming. All 250,000 release devices were pulled from channels and unceremoniously rolled into landfill out northwest of Dubbo.
Izzy 
@NanoRaptor whoa,,, road trip time!
Tyrone Slothrop@NanoRaptor This is what they took from us.
charlag@NanoRaptor okay this is misinfo, right?
alina cyborg mouse 
@NanoRaptor remember when WIRED published those weird NeXTlevel prototype pics showing the device with N, E, X and T buttons instead of the ABXY?
simonf 🦘@NanoRaptor What?!Underneath the Western Plains Zoo**?
Should be safe if the rhinos are guarding it.
(**Ok so the zoo is technically WSW of Dubbo)
(WooD][WorkeR) 😟@NanoRaptor thats a Nintendo DS
Prof. Rachel Thorn 🍉🇺🇦🏳️⚧️🏳️@NanoRaptor I don’t know how many minutes of my life have been wasted trying to figure out if one of NanoRaptor’s fancies is a real thing. Well, “wasted” is the wrong word, since the search is fun in its own way.
RolloTreadway@RachelThornSub @NanoRaptor I always presume they're genuine unless told otherwise.
Andreas Schödl@NanoRaptor I worked for a magazine publisher then. We had to pull the ads at the last minute, the printing line just taking up soeed.
😇
Erica Briony.@NanoRaptor 37 years later they're mining the site for the valuable heavy minerals contained in the devices
CTD@NanoRaptor I would buy that for a dollar
rdmI got to play with one of the demo units!
Not many people know about it, but tapping out NEXT in morse using A for dit and B for dah would pull up a virtual keyboard on the lower screen and a root xterm on the upper.
I spent a couple of hours digging around - a really elegant system.
Uli Kusterer (Not a kitteh)@NanoRaptor You even did the NeXT-style product background ! 😻
Caspar Fairhall@NanoRaptor “northwest of Dubbo” 😂
Roger BW 😷@NanoRaptor It originated as a way for salesmen to demonstrate the graphical power of the NeXTStation without needing the convoy of trucks to provide system, monitor, modular reactor, etc.
snowyfox
Ґрeйсі Джейн 🏳️⚧️ (Quuxum)@NanoRaptor Do you mind if I cry in "this should have been a thing"?
V_Mags_Fox 🏳️⚧️:3@Drquuxum @NanoRaptor A Steam Deck is pretty damn close tho.
Jen - mangledPixel@NanoRaptor Interestingly, many of Apple's handheld devices in the early 2000s (including the iPod) still contained references in the code to the NeXTlevel's unique 'LevelHead' programming language, suggesting that at some point Apple may have worked on bringing it back, or at least that they hadn't let all the work on the device go completely to waste.
I AM BANKSY ☕ / 🗑🔥@NanoRaptor
I bet they even had an emulator function that let them play Atari cartridges.
Like E.T.
In the dump.
Ellyse@NanoRaptor oh wow, did it run some version of nextstep OS?
monkeydom, Ar.T@NanoRaptor Great. Now I want a Nintendo DS / 3DS mod for that :P
Mark Struberg@NanoRaptor @leyrer lol, good rendering, though obviously fake. But I really like the speaker grills in the form of a Pac-Man!
I bet it plays "Never gonna give you up" as boot sound...
f_ 🇵🇸@NanoRaptor This just looks like a regular DS :p
I wonder if nintendo actually stole the idea from NeXT for their handheld...
I wonder if nintendo actually stole the idea from NeXT for their handheld...
PypeBros@NanoRaptor aw. Nearly 20 years of hobby development and I'm not even getting close ^^"
@NanoRaptor the ABXY buttons on the NeXTLevel should really read "N e X T", 45°-tilted, by the way ;)
Pete / Syllopsium@NanoRaptor I'd be fooled if it wasn't for the fact that it's not made of magnesium, and doesn't appear to have a SCSI port on the back :)
Clive 🏳️🌈🏴☠️@NanoRaptor landfill?! 🥺
Tacleja Lawson@NanoRaptor I used to want the rose gold one so bad
Kroc Camen@NanoRaptor The charger is integrated into the 15lb external subwoofer, for convenience
Jackie
Shredd Tone 
@NanoRaptor Interesting! When was the device due to release before Apple threw it all the way?
infinite love ⴳ
R.L. Dane 
🍵 
Still cooler than the Pippin. ;)
Also, of course, you could get it in any color you wanted, as long as it was black!
Thommy@NanoRaptor I'm going to show this to my 10 year old. He loves shit like this.
Lee Hauser@NanoRaptor I had a cousin who worked for NeXT. He brought one of these prototypes to Thanksgiving one year. I managed to steal it from him and almost made it to the car before he tackled me and wrestled it back. He broke one of my fingers and still isn’t speaking to me.
gunstick@NanoRaptor and still today, computers cannot correctly handle two displays.
But NeXT showed how it is done correctly.
Not to talk about close to sleep which does not drain your battery and making your laptop case burning hot.
But NeXT showed how it is done correctly.
Not to talk about close to sleep which does not drain your battery and making your laptop case burning hot.
Longspeak@NanoRaptor IDK the timing, but my 33 YO son looked at that and declared it to be just a DS.
jwz
Alice 4 running old SGI demos
DrYak@NanoRaptor ...and John Carmack worked on an a portable version of Doom on an early prototype of the NeXTlevel
Krutonium://@NanoRaptor We all know the speakers were actually microscopic, and existed only behind the tiny little set of offset speaker grille. The rest is for looks.
Ed Hurtley@NanoRaptor I have a buddy who worked there then. He told me that the technology for this was sold to a video game company.
I'm sad that Capcom didn't do anything with it.
Yaron Kaplan@shoko it's fake.
Chuck@NanoRaptor It is always remarkable to me the number of things you create that I would actually buy 😆
Curedleaves@NanoRaptor Tough luck. It might've had a chance with a game where you could solve everything by writing anything.
@ᴊᴀᴇ@ʙꜱᴅ.ᴄᴀꜰᴇ[ᴍᴏᴠᴇᴅ]™@NanoRaptor would love to have one of these. do you have one?
Taffer 🇨🇦
@NanoRaptor “It would have been priced at $1000US and boasted 55 minutes of battery life.”
Kevin Karhan 
@NanoRaptor I love your glorious "retro tech shitposts"…
- The sad part is that none of these are real...
Thorne Lawler@NanoRaptor Apex tech myth. ❤️❤️❤️
Nantucket Lit@NanoRaptor "What a story, Mark!"