Posts by Randolf McKinley
29 posts • joined Wednesday 17th October 2007 14:06 GMT
Yep, I agree
Yep, I agree entirely, and for that reason I'm doing another flip from Android to iOS with my next upgrade. I've found myself doing that for the last three upgrades - first Android, then iOS when I got fed up with that not quite working, then Android again when the Apple hegemony became too much for me, and now back to iOS again! At least the Apple stuff just seems to work properly on their hardware.
It's a bit like Linux and Windows - I used Linux exclusively on he desktop for years (at least 10) but I finally got fed up with stuff not quite working properly on my hardware (mostly high-end laptops), and have given up with that for now too. Like it or lump it, if you but a laptop with Windows installed it just works these days (mind you, that hasn't always been the case!). Still use Linux on a lot of stuff, from servers to embedded systems, but not the desktop.
I wonder if the Spectrum has caused any real interference problems either with contemporary or modern electronic equipment, despite the failure? If not, what does that say about the limits? Or modern electronics?
Abject fail icon to reflect the abject fail ...
I use LiPos extensively for model aircraft electric motors. Even at a few degrees above zero their performance is very noticeably degraded, and they're useless below zero (although I'm taking one or more 10s of amps from them, so YMMY but I suspect not). These days I keep my LiPos in a "cool" box with a hot water bottle to keep them toasty.
Feet and pounds and meters ...
No wonder they screw things up! A 21 foot tether 20m from the surface? You'd have thought rocket scientists would at least keep to consistent measurement units, wouldn't you?
Posted in Eight... Rugged Cameras
Viewfinders!
I need a viewfinder! My middle-aged varifocal-equipped eyes can't cope with screens, particularly outdoors in bright sunlight. Been trying for some time to get a new compact with a viewfinder, can't find one anywhere.
@Beau
Err, yeah, fail on my part!
@MondoMan
Naa, the resistance of the wire depends on the width. The resistivity is independent of the width. They're not the same thing.
Flash? It's a no-brainer anyway ...
Spinning metal is on the way out permanently anyway, as inexorably as punch tape and the floppy drive did before it. The price and capacity and lifetime differences are shrinking all the time, and it's inevitable that flash will eventually dominate, and I'd not be surprised if that was within the next few years, 10 at the most.
Struck *with* a ship?
FFS!!!
Reclining seats
We flew Cathay Pacific UK to Oz this year and their seats reclined in a slidey-forward manner so the seat back rear face didn't move at all (the bottom of the front of the seat back moved forward). Excellent idea, it meant that the seat in front didn't move backwards at the expense of a bit less leg-room when you recline your own seat.
Posted in iPhone baby clothes shop mauled by Apple
Just stomping on bad taste ...
Gotta admire Apple for stomping on bad taste when it sees it!
Re: Dear Pat,
It's the capacitors. The routers all run too hot, the caps just end up dying. The two I've had I've ended up replacing all the electrolytics after a couple of years when they started going flaky (Dropping ADSL connections and even dropping Etherent-side connections), and they were right as rain after that.
Ha ha ha ha ha ...
Frankly I think that anyone stupid enough to sign up for a card voluntarily deserves to lose the money - think of it as a tax on the stupid for being stupid.
OxBlood
So OxBlood reckons that anyone who spells their name in numbers ought to have their computer confiscated? Is that OxBlood of 0xB100D, or 725005?
Posted in US Navy develops toss-proof robot crane
@Fr. Ted Crilly
Yeah, but it's not heave compensation. That just has to keep a load in one place in space, which is an entirely simpler problem to keeping a load in one place relative to a moving point (the other deck). Firstly you have to sense the deck and secondly you have to accelerate the load around to make it stay in the same place, particularly laterally, which isn't easy on the end of a cable. Also you probably need to adjust the plane of the bottom of the container to match the receiving deck, which is probably what the gubbins on the crane head and the extra lateral cables are for.
So, simple heave comp it ain't.
Posted in ID cards poster girl laments her £30
Something Labour did right ...
ID Cards - a tax on the stupid.
Kitchen timers
They're not pocket calculators, they're off-the-shelf kitchen timers. Also there's a dispenser of Post-It page markers on the LH windowsill, one stuck just above the joystick. I do like the aftermarket velcro fittings though - Pimp My Shuttle.
Posted in Windows 7 - the Reg reader verdict
Virtual Desktops
I've been using goScreen (www.goscreen.info) for ages now with Vista having been used to virtual desktops on Linux for years. It works pretty much as well as the Gnome version (for all the things I do with it, YMMV) and can be configured to use keystrokes to switch screens too like Gnome. The only thing it doesn't do that I used on Linux is alter windows' system menus to add "Put this window on Woxkspace X", but there are keyboard based workarounds for that.
A National ID Card ...
... would have prevented this. Because there's no way anyone in the National ID Card Registration Office would do anything similar and abuse their position of power to create false National ID Cards, is there. Absolutely not, it's unthinkable.
Complete rubbish
The technology is all used in electric model helicopters, but has one important drawback - it can't autorotate. Lose one motor, the whole thing crashes and burns. The "Powerful 3-phase motors and 3-phase speed controllers" are in everyday use in model aircraft and helicopters. I have, umm, 9 model aircraft using them sitting right now in my garage. A motor the size of the ones in the "UAV" costs about £40, the speed controller a similar amount and the LiPo battery (they had one per motor) about £50, all bought from my local hobby shop. I even have a video camera I can attach to any of my models, and in our club there is at least one remote telemetry video camera.
The only different thing is the control board that coordinates the motor thrust to give speed and directional control. Big deal. You can but something that'll do that as a toy (with 4 upward-facing props) for less than £100 on the high street. It ain't rocket science.
It's not even a UAV in the commonly accepted meaning of the term, it's remotely controlled. Most UAVs have some autonomous flight capability - if you take your fingers off the transmitter this one will crash and burn. All it is is an RC aircraft that is in fact inferior to an electric helicopter (because it can't auto rotate).
For goodness sake, it's complete rubbish - these days there are even plenty of model aircraft hobbyists who have mounted cameras on gimbals on their aircraft, wear goggles with head-tracking software that controls the gimbals, and they fly their models out of direct sight using the cockpit view (Of questionable legality in the UK, mind).
€5000? Rubbish. £1000 absolute max.
Bloody students just wanted their university to pay for their model plane.
Oooh, look, I've had a rant!
How's my Driving?
Text "arrêt" to 0773243...
@The solution
"... really no excuse why they haven't built a centrifuge into the ISS"
Well, except for the complexity, the space requirements, the expense, the fuel requirements to overcome the effects of friction in the bearings and counter-torque while accelerating it to and from speed, the somewhat more pressing needs of carrying out the station's primary mission, the cost of lifting it and installing it on the ISS, etc ...
@yeah right
Or it could be down to increased sophistication and sensitivity in detecting any leakage and more importantly in pulling useful signal from the noise with better and more powerful signal processing.
re: AC and "It's your taxes and mine."
In the 63 years since WW2 ended, despite them being in the country since before I was born, I can still run round the streets, (and I do, a lot,) , surf the net for filth, (and I do, a lot,) , criticise the government, (and I do, a lot,) Vista, and practically everyone else, and not once have I been sat on by an elephant or eaten by a tiger.
It is therefore with some regret that I have to conclude that all these elephant and tiger trainer type people are pretty successful on the whole at protecting my wife and kids.
Thank goodness, eh?
Paris, because she's just as stupid.
New device detected: Aurbus A380
Reminds me of this:
http://www.heise.de/ct/schlagseite/03/01/gross.jpg
The text on the screen reads something like "New device detected: Airbus A380. Begin auto configuration?"
Posted in Dutch fire up petrol-pumping robot
75000 Euros?
You could pay a human pump attendant for about 3 years with that. What's more, a pump attendant could deal with at least 3 or 4 pumps at once. SO with the money you save you could pay for the attendant for about 12 years. How long is the ShitStop thing going to last?
Coppers weren't that bent
At least one of the coppers was a woman.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/north_east/7113574.stm
"Pc [Fiona] Duncan added: "We went into the bar to make sure we could keep an eye on him."
"Later that night, Pc Duncan took Mr Kennedy to Grampian Police headquarters for questioning.
It doesn't say what sex here colleague was, or how closely she kept an eye on him. I wonder if it was on his truncheon?
@A.J. Stiles
So what you're saying is that US toilets are shit flushers because they have a shit flushing function, and UK toilets are not shit flushers because they have a proper shit flushing function?
