Obsolete means they have no value any longer, in a sense of casino or corporate financial obligations. They can't be used for gaming and won't be in the future.

Out of Play means they aren't used, but haven't gone through redemption. They are not Obsolete. They might even come back to the tables, as we have seen in numerous cases.

AC chips never become obsolete.

I've seen Wisconsin chips become obsolete, without a formal redemption like Nevada. They just go out of play and one day (maybe a year later), the cage stops honoring the old ones.

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Just to make matters worse, your computer or TV might be obsolete, but it's still working and you can use it. The word "obsolete" is used and abused which makes it confused.

I can tack on the definition from Websters which includes "no longer in use" "no longer current" and "out of date" In which case, everything not in use on the tables in casinos, is obsolete, even if it might come back out of the cage tomorrow.

If we use the dictionary definition, the argument of Obsolete vs Out of use, falls flat, because No Longer In Use is Obsolete!

With that I suggest that for the sake of the hobby, we have different definitions than the rest of the universe.

By the way, your TV is probably Obsolete because it doesn't have features needed for the new broadcast standards of the future. You can still watch t and it still works fine, but it's "obsolete".