I agree. It's really cool. I wonder if this was written with AI assistance. Seems like the perfect kind of fun project that a dev team would really be able to crank out pretty quickly whereas five years ago, there might not have been time or budget for something like this.
I can't remember either but they nailed it. When the sax comes in and the voice overlay hit's you with "Your extended forecast"; I'm right back in the kitchen before school eating cereal with the kitchen TV on the weather channel.
Edit: another comment mentioned it was generated with Suno
This appears to be a fairly low effort simulation of a WeatherStar 4000, but it's been done much better by someone else here: https://weatherstar.netbymatt.com/
Also for those of us like me who grew up with a cable provider that still ran the old WeatherStar III, there's this one: https://weatherstar3000.netbymatt.com/
This may be an age or geography thing, but Weather.com/Retro looks a lot more like the weather channels I remember than either of your two links.
I don't think they were trying to recreate the thing you were expecting, but it seems a little harsh to call it low effort. It's neat! A fun little nod to their history.
> This may be an age or geography thing, but Weather.com/Retro looks a lot more like the weather channels I remember than either of your two links.
That'll be a memory thing then, because unsurprisingly there are some serious Weather Channel nerds out there and the history of the local programming as well as the STARs that powered it is quite well documented.
The only thing that looked anything like this was the WS4000. WeatherStar III and Jr. didn't have graphics at all while WeatherStar XL had a much more modern graphic design.
As others have stated, no, this isn't a simulation of WeatherStar. It does, however, look exactly like the weather channel did when I was a kid. (New Jersey and Maryland, in the 80s and 90s)
Because, IIRC (it has been a while since I’ve looked at the code) it grabs weather from the US National Weather Service… which is also a primary source of data for the original WeatherStar.
It’s useful for this purpose because all of the data is in the same format as the original down to the different forecast types and phrasing used
This reminds me of a sports channel I recall from the late 80s on cable TV. Sportsnet? Sportswire? I can't find anything about it online but I remember the music well.
It's nearly perfect. My only complaint is I wish it would keep playing on repeat, and rotate through more smooth jazz. Then I could have this on a screen in my living room, fall asleep on my couch in a snuggie, and wake up to its garish light and jazz at 3am just like old times
Great job. Thanks. Why the intermittant timed stop? Is it just to break it up since its a short clip?
Like others have said, there are several projects recreating the old weather channel vibe, each with its own spin. And if you don't need current weather info, there are some good yt vids that play old clips with the music in the background.
The Weather Channel did (does?) a segment called "Local on the 8s," where it would play a brief local weather update like this one on time slots ending in 8, which this site replicates.
This is really cool. But showing Fahrenheit, despite everything else is perfectly localized, for my home town Hamburg in Germany, is somewhat useless. Guys from the US, we use Celcius here! :-P
This hit the nostalgia hard. To complete this would be an IPTV feed to stream it through my TV. It would be nice to be able to wake up and put this on while eating breakfast.
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Good job Weather Channel dev. I just wish it would loop forever. Make a loop checkbox at the start screen.
Also the music slaps.
Edit: another comment mentioned it was generated with Suno
Also for those of us like me who grew up with a cable provider that still ran the old WeatherStar III, there's this one: https://weatherstar3000.netbymatt.com/
I don't think they were trying to recreate the thing you were expecting, but it seems a little harsh to call it low effort. It's neat! A fun little nod to their history.
> This may be an age or geography thing, but Weather.com/Retro looks a lot more like the weather channels I remember than either of your two links.
That'll be a memory thing then, because unsurprisingly there are some serious Weather Channel nerds out there and the history of the local programming as well as the STARs that powered it is quite well documented.
The only thing that looked anything like this was the WS4000. WeatherStar III and Jr. didn't have graphics at all while WeatherStar XL had a much more modern graphic design.
If you want to nerd out on this stuff, here's a good link to start with: https://www.twcarchive.com/wiki/Weather_Star
It’s useful for this purpose because all of the data is in the same format as the original down to the different forecast types and phrasing used
Either way, thanks to the wonders of open source here's a fork that works for other parts of the world: https://mwood77.github.io/ws4kp-international/
Thanks!
Probably still a rpi.
https://channelsurfer.tv/?ch=50
What kind of sensitive thing is there that the page must be region-restricted?
Title: Neon Office Glide Performer: 555indigo comment: made with suno; created=2026-03-31T19:07:49.773Z; id=f122d9dc-493a-4249-b7d7-3b4fd2995726 lyrics-eng: [Instrumental]