Techradar's ultimate Christmas day: our best gifts revealed

TechRadar's greatest Christmas day: our best gifts revealed
Merry Christmas, from TechRadar

Nostalgia, eh? It's that thing that creeps up at you over the festive period. It makes you fondly think back to the days of Christmas past when gifts weren't just iTunes cards and apps, PS4 games and e-readers.

Here the TechRadar team looks back at the tech gifts received at Christmas that they remember the fondest. The ones that made us geeky about gadgets and forget the family squabbling.

Oh, and don't forget to add your tech-mas memories in the comments below so we can all wallow in nostalgia together.

And on that note, let us transport you to the year 1987...

Commodore Amiga 500

Patrick Goss, editor in chief (UK)

@patrickgoss

I remember being so excited when I got a Commodore Amiga 500 one Christmas that I wanted to rush off and plug it in right away, which given that my other pressies were the games was probably a mistake.

I will always have a place in my heart for the Amiga - from Sensible World of Soccer to Cannon Fodder, from Kick Off 2 to Football Manager and from Lemmings to Speedball 2, this was one of the all time great gaming machines. I'll still fight to the death with anyone who suggests the Atari ST was better...

Amiga 500

Sony PlayStation One

Nick Broughall, editor TechRadar Australia

@bruff

I remember getting a joint PS One with my brother in the mid nineties. We had two controllers so we could play together like we had with every console before it, but that wasn't enough to stop the arguments. Because the game we both wanted to play was Final Fantasy VII, and the single Playstation just wasn't enough. Nor was the single analogue TV.

Still, we somehow managed to survive, and I still have that copy of FFVII. Although sadly I think my brother has the Playstation to play it on, so I guess we're right back to where we started from...

PlayStation One

The Argos Catalogue

Desire Athow, editor, TechRadar Pro

@desireathow

Unfortunately, I never got a tech-based gift for Christmas. The closest thing to it was a (paper) Argos catalogue from the late '80s that one relative sent to me from the UK. Flicking through it, I discovered Amstrad, Commodore, Atari, Amiga and so many other tech brands, most of which have now disappeared. It kickstarted my passion (addiction??) for technology, something that lasts till this day and that big, fat bible-like directory of stuff is probably why I am the editor of TechRadar Pro today.

Argos Catalogue

Acorn A5000

Dan Grabham, editor, T3.com

@dangrabham

My favourite Christmas tech memory was when my parents bought me an Acorn A5000 computer (which was a next-gen Archimedes with the ahead-of-its-time RISC OS). I'd wanted one for ages and they really pushed the boat out as they were quite expensive, (although they used it as well). I was about 11 or something at the time. My friends used to come around after school and we'd play games like Stunt Racer 2000. And eat Jaffa Cakes.

Acorn A500

Quartz Robot Watch

Marc Chacksfield, deputy editor

@mchax

While my first proper tech memory was inheriting my uncle's Atari 2600, the best tech present I ever received was a small, plastic watch... that turned into a frickin' robot. It was around 1985 and I was really into Transformers, so a watch (which after hours of looking on the web, I think was the Quartz Robot Watch) that 'transformed' blew my tiny mind.

To be honest, the watch probably broke every health and safety regulation going - I remember its legs and arms falling off a lot - but I didn't care. My watch could tell the time AND become a robot - nothing since has excited me as much. Well, not until I saw Sonic blast through Green Hill Zone catching all those rings a few years later.

Marc Chacksfield

Marc Chacksfield is the Editor In Chief, Shortlist.com at DC Thomson. He started out life as a movie writer for numerous (now defunct) magazines and soon found himself online - editing a gaggle of gadget sites, including TechRadar, Digital Camera World and Tom's Guide UK. At Shortlist you'll find him mostly writing about movies and tech, so no change there then.