Recent Comments:
LCD TV Prices to Dive Even Lower in 2008 {Switched.com}
Jan 2nd 2008 7:02PM It's silly to waste time commenting on whether or not there's anything on TV to watch; it's entertainment - jokes, news, stories - different strokes for different folks, so can the editorializing and stick to the subject: price vs. picture quality of a consumer product. For my money, DLP was it. I bought a JVC 52 inch HD-ILA and later a JVC 70 inch. There's no fan noise, nor is there any downside that I have seen over a three year period other than that it takes a while (15 seconds) for the bulb to fully warm up. Big deal. The 70 inch unit cost me something over $2,400 from Tiger Direct on clearance, about a year ago. (Mitsubishi 65" units are less than $2,000 now.) It's in a big (20 foot) wide room, and has a great lateral acceptance angle - you can see a bright picture from 'way off axis, whether seated or standing. It's 1080p, with lots of connectivity including VGA and the ability to read various camera memory cards from a front slot. I'd buy again, so I think there needs to be some discussion on this alternative to LCD and Plasma.
The Night The Lights Went On In Phoenix {News Bloggers}
Mar 25th 2007 12:57PM Typo: not mach 200 at 80% light speed; just reread (should have proofed better) my post. 80% light speed is mach 700,000; I didn't notice that the conversion calculator I used divided by 3600 (seconds/hour). Makes a slightly stronger case, but I should know better than to just cut and paste without using a slide rule to check my work . . .
The Night The Lights Went On In Phoenix {News Bloggers}
Mar 25th 2007 12:48PM I think one of the problems from which this whole area of inquiry suffers is a mixing of different issues into one foggy cloud of unrelated thought. The issues, as I see it, separate into at least the following:
1. the presence of extraterrestrial life.
2. the presence of intelligent extraterrestrial life.
3. the presence of advanced, space-traveling extraterrestrial life.
4. the probability that such life would find, and travel the vast distance to, earth.
5. the probability that a life form that advanced would be at risk from, or worry about, any weapons that we would direct at them (do the math).
On balance: it is possible that there exist 1, 2, and 3. 1 and 2 are, in fact, probable, and 1. is almost certain. 4. is very unlikely, although remotely possible, if (since the universe is well over 10 billion years old, and earth hasn't been around nearly that long) you take into account that flight on earth is about a century old and we've gone from Kitty Hawk to the moon in that time as extraterrestrials and past Pluto as robotic probes.
Where will we be in 3007? That's only 1,000 years. Other life forms would probably only need to be 1,000 years more advanced than we are to be capable of long-distance, long-term space flight. That, to put it mildly, is a piece of evolutionary cake.
Despite the above, the probability of that long-distance, long-term flight ending up here, in our atmosphere, hovering above the fruited plain, is mighty small. But still very, very, remotely possible.
And the likelihood that an intelligent, space-traveling machine, with the sensor and avoidance technology required to dodge space-borne detritus at speed, would not be able to get out of the way of a missile (mach 5 or less) aimed at it, given that the thing might have to be capable of speeds on the order of sub-light (mach 200 or so at around 80% light speed), with the in-atmosphere gymnastic maneuverability that all their "spotters" claim for them, seems intrinsically silly, so I suspect that the only logical rationale for night sightings is that they would stir up the natives less - not because they're worried. Hard to imagine in that case that they'd keep the outside lights on.
Just a few thoughts.
51GB triple-layer HD DVDs in the pipeline? {Engadget HD}
Jan 9th 2007 8:25AM I've been through the miserable recent experience of trying to make current generation HP DVD-DL (two layer, not three)disks write reliably - or even be recognized as a valid medium - on 4 different DL recorders without success. I'm not holding my breath regarding the commercial adoptability of these far more difficult to engineer blue laser devices; my experience in the optical disk world since the '80s has been: announce, announce, announce, underdeliver late, require belt and suspenders to provide any degree of data safety, and don't even think about smooth cross-compatibility as a given. The only real exception, and marginally so, was the CD.
I can remember brand new Sony single speed CD-R's fresh out of the package that a new and expensive SCSI HP dual-speed writer couldn't even recognize. This particular lunatic fringe of the industry is overpopulated with marketspeak and suicidal engineers trying vainly to make it work. I know - I had a company in the business for 11 years. Just last night I checked a disk that Roxio said had been burned successfully; no data on it. Optical disk is a "check your backups and worry a lot" technology that is always being eclipsed by magnetics.
Do the math - terabyte magnetics for $400 retail. Now calculate the cost of the same on optical - drives plus media. Get the picture? There's no crossover point! Take the Sony 200 DVD disk changer: add 200 media at $1 each and add it to the $500 for the changer, then add the software. $700+ for 1.7 terabytes of slow, mechanically complex and noisy video or data server that requires a computer to manage and a fork lift to move.
For data, it's worse, because you never get 100% fill on an optical disk; there's always unused space at the end, so the "overhang" reduces the effective capacity. Speed? No comparison - 10 seconds to load, several more to spin up and start, vs. 10 millisecond access on magnetics. Space - I can fit 30 external HDs in the space of a Sony 200 disk changer - power consumption, reliability, speed, convenience, you name it; optical is a poor solution precisely because the vendors never deliver what they spec out, or deliver it so late it's irrelevant.
51 GB tri-layer disks in the pipeline? You better live at the wellhead if you want to see real product in your lifetime.
