Don't let the door hit you on the way out /wave
It's been stated several, several times that mechanics were going to be changed. one of the changes they are making is a way to expand gear in number and appearance. In order for them to do that, they had to create new structures for everything. The existing structures were not designed for materia socketting, which is why you can't socket materia into nm drops because they existed before materia.

Instead of drastically reducing the amount of gear available, they got crafty and left the old gear in prefixed with "Dated" so that the gear still exists in game until they can add more new gear to the system.

The game in its currently state doesn't serve hardcore play very well at the moment...if you go all out all the time, you will run out of stuff to do. Pace yourself and make some friends and the game is much more enjoyable.

I'll be paying because I am enjoying myself. Things are changing, we've known this for quite some time now. Roll with it or don't.