Posts by Neil 44
34 posts • joined Wednesday 17th June 2009 09:38 GMT
Re: Where will video conferencing be by the time HS2 is actually working
The Chiltern (nee Great Central) line isn't too low:
"Unlike other railway lines in Britain, the line was built to an expanded continental loading gauge which meant it could accommodate larger sized continental trains, in anticipation of traffic to a future Channel Tunnel. There is, however, a popular myth that the GCR was built to the standard continental Berne loading gauge - impossible, since the Berne gauge convention was not held until 1912." (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Central_Main_Line)
Where will video conferencing be by the time HS2 is actually working
By 202x (might even be 203x!) where will video conferencing be?
Why would you NEED to travel across the country just for a meeting?
When I'm travelling around I've normally got a car-full of kit, so the train wouldn't be an option even if HS2 actually stopped in the county that I live in....
Then there's the route... Why doesn't it connect with our major hub airport at Heathrow?
A much simpler and cheaper solution would be to put a couple of carriages on each train (maybe double decker for the commuter stock) and extend the platforms accordingly...
BBC been there before
Isn't this like the BBC 3G survey from 2011?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-14582499
Shame they're not still gathering data to fill in the gaps...
AND it covers more than just Hull!
Not new - done in Oxford
A similar trial is taking place in Oxford.
See http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2138775/The-eye-borg-First-successful-implant-bionic-eye-restore-sight-blind.html
Debugger time?
Don't they have a debugger that they can run the virus under until it has unencrypted itself - then they should be able to see what it is looking for (and satisfy its search so they can see what it does when it finds what it is looking for!)
Mine's the one with the assembler card in the pocket...
Sole provider
An awful lot (majority?) of the telephone exchanges round the country outside of the cities ONLY have BT-provided wholesale broadband - so it doesn't matter if you use BT, Sky, Virgin or any of the host of other ISP's: you're still using BT broadband as that's all there is....
Some of the ISP's (O2 springs to mind) simply say that if you live in one of these "market 1" exchanges, then you simply cannot have their service.
Whilst there's no competition in the exchange, a) broadband is more expensive and b) there's no incentive for BT to upgrade the kit in the exchange to provide better/faster equipment!
Comparing "download" speed on its own is also a little arbitrary: whilst a 7Mb/s DOWNLOAD speed might be adequate (or even quite good), being hamstrung to .5Mb/s UPLOAD speed is likely to be limiting to a business (and actually many domestic users too with the growing prevalence of "cloud based" applications!)
Personally, I'd do away with the ability to have an analogue phone line if I could have more bandwidth for broadband to the house itself - and simply use a VOIP phone when I need it (I've seen places in the US that use this arrangement).
Can be funny though
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jPW8xmI4w6U
still makes me chuckle.
Using you phone in the shopping mall can be risky too...
(total immersion of your phone probably isn't good for it either... wonder how the insurance claim was worded :) )
Re: TRS80's
No, it was "tamper protection", not "copy protection". It meant you couldn't dissemble the executable from the disk image, change it and re-assemble it (easily!).
However, if there were Copywrite statements in the program, they were the first bit that got "patched" over as they were spare space - the longer the message the better :)
was it piracy as we owned the program (usually!) and were just making it do what we wanted...?
Re: TRS80's
http://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/comphist/objects/trs80.htm
Interesting that the Smithsonian's keyboard unit doesn't have the numeric keyboard which means it must be a "level 1" from what I remember...
Another memory was the "tamper protection" that quite a few people used: load the code into memory in one place then use the "block move" instruction to move it somewhere else to execute - made it somewhat harder to disassemble (and modify!)... Meant all the long jumps went to the wrong place if the code hadn't been moved correctly...
TRS80's
In the very early 80's my wife's PhD theses was written in Scripsit on a TRS80 model 1 (with expansion box).
The expensive bits were the floppy disks! 84kB (I seem to remember) a time - which subsequently got updated to double density through a US-sourced "doubler" board that had a different controller on it....
Relocating the RAM (on bigger, 64kb chips that weren't available when the machine was on the market) to the keyboard greatly improved reliability as like others of the era, your whole document was in memory!
Scripsit got hacked to make it do all sorts of things that more modern printers could support - like addressing individual pins which we used to print Greek letters!
After the thesis, it got used to produce - both analysing the data and writing up - what has become quite a seminal paper in its field that's still findable on the Web as a scanned image of the (new printer ribbon!) dot matrix printout produced by the TRS. Someone even wanted a copy of the (compiled Basic) program I used for the analysis which made me rather chuffed..
One of the things that set the TRS80 apart was the fact it had a decent Cherry keyboard - that taught me to touch-type although the keyboard unit needed a wrist rest as it was thick...
Happy memories - I think its still in the loft!
Posted in Lytro light field camera
Shutter delay?
One thing you didn't comment on was the shutter delay...
I would assume as there is no focusing to do, it is lightening fast which could be an advantage for some applications
Posted in Punters want BBC iPlayer in TVs, not 3D
Re: My perfect telly!
I'd like the satellite tuner (not just Freesat - so I can watch RTL1 for formula 1!) AND the DTV tuners to be used without reconfiguration of the tuner.
ALL channels' online players - not just iPlayer and capable of downloading programs to attached disk for repeated playback.
Online movie rental is quite nice too but I don't know how often I'll actually use it. Too many a month and I'll blow my broadband cap...
Better integration with home cinema / BlueRay boxes as the speakers on thin, flat screens are understandably dreadful.
Posted in Dijit
NetTVs
An app shouldn't need an (expensive) Griffin box to talk to network-connected TV (Samsung et al)
No doubt it'll be subtly different from the "standard" method of NFC payments and will only work with fruity terminals (that won't work with Droid phones, of course...)
How much will iPounds cost (or is it Pounds of Apples?) - probably more than a pound (£1.30?)?
Review programs on TV
I can just picture one of the technology review programs on the TV demonstrating "Siri : change to channel 27" at which point the TV hehttp://www.reghardware.com/Design/graphics/icons/comment/trollface_32.pngars its own output and changes to channel 27 :)
Posted in FilmOn
F1?
Does it carry any of the (non-UK) channels that will be showing ALL the F1 races?
That would be a HUGE attraction!
(Wonder if they'll do a version for "Smart" IPTVs - that would also be good...)
Posted in HD JuiceBox HDMI over Powerline kit
Could and RCD block it?
As there are current measuring sensors in RCDs (to detect inbalance in live and return), which have some of the characteristics of a choke, could they block the PLC signal?
If so it'll have problems in "modern" wired houses that have different sets of socket mains on different RCDs.
I don't know if this is what they mean by "can't get past a fuse box" but it could be....
If it isn't, you're likely to have interference from the people 3 doors down who are on the same mains phase - even if they've just got another PLC networking product....
Toothbush style?
Electric toothbrushes have been doing contactless charging for years - bathrooms are damp places that corrode contacts and all other exposed bits of metal, so being able to seal the toothbrush was a no-brainer.
Wonder how long before the fruity lot try to claim the iCharge was their idea?
Lost veteran ship
Having been at the National Maritime Museum at the weekend I heard about HMS Implacable.
Another ship that fought at Trafalgar (albeit on the French side from where she was captured at the battle of of Cape Ortegal), wasn't finally sunk (deliberately) by the Navy until 1949 because there wasn't the money to preserve her!
CPU monogamy
"Windows 8 also ends Microsoft’s decades-old history of x86 monogamy by going with ARM"
"Windows NT 3.1 was released for Intel x86 PC compatible, DEC Alpha, and ARC-compliant MIPS platforms. Windows NT 3.51 added support for the PowerPC processor in 1995, specifically PReP-compliant systems such as the IBM Power Series desktops/laptops and Motorola PowerStack series..." (Windows NT Wikipedia page)
Windows NT 4.0 ran on DEC Alpha as well as Intel.
Various people also ported NT to Sparc and Clipper though these weren't released.
Posted in Inside the BBC's R&D Labs
Shame they didn't do more on DAB
Then we wouldn't have been stuck with something that doesn't even do the equivalent of their own RDS service!
Posted in CableJive DockBoss Plus
iThing to bluetooth?
The smart way to have done this would have been to adapt the fruit connector to bluetooth and just have a uUsb power plug to power the phone/slab/....
That way you could use BT to get your sound and control the media player on the Droid - rather like the Parrot mki9200 that I have in my car does!
Housing Associations / Councils fitting PV
Quite a number of Housing Associations / Councils are fitting them to their rental properties.
The HA/Council take the FiT, which helps their funding after the kit has been paid for, but the tenants (who are often in the "fuel poor" classification) get free electricity.
The problem the HA/Council have is how they are seen to be fair between those houses that have suitable roofs and those who don't....
Posted in Renault Wind Gordini roadster
Underpowered with the engine at the wrong end
If they'd done it properly, they'd have put the engine at the back and turned the drivetrain round (like was done in the MGF) to separate power from steering.
However the lack of power for an all metal lump makes it a tepid hatch at best. Only 100bhp from a 1.2? A 700cc Smart Roadster manages >101bhp (before remapping to get it towards 120!) and can do 0-60 in sub 8 seconds (post remap) despite its terrible gearchange!
Not sure about 17" wheels with low profile tyres either: on British, potholed roads the tyres don't absorb the bumps and you end up buckling the alloys!
@AC Delivery at work
Technically, they shouldn't send stuff to work if your credit card is registered at home - they should only dispatch stuff to the card's registered address so as to prevent me ordering stuff on your card and having it shipped somewhere of my choosing!
Display quality
... is probably a bit grainy...
Luckily...
an etch-a-sketch has two knobs on it to distinguish an iPad from it....
http://www.prezzybox.com/data/media/12695.jpg
Is the 80% that are being iQuoted the same as the 80% of statistics that are made up?
Highlights?
Will the BBC's view of F1 highlights correspond to mine - from the 5 red lights going out until the chequered flag? I doubt it.
Like the many, I won't be shelling out for MurdockTV Sports....
Now... If the Olympics were made exclusive to Sky, would the money the BBC save pay for proper F1 coverage - and maybe even a bit of live test cricket?
Allowed to charge more for iPad?
Presumably of the $20/month 30% goes to Apple, so they only get $14...
A list of Mac malware
If you query the Sophos site, you can see about 80 specific mac malware that they've done a (brief) write-up on, and they don't write up everything explicitly - particularly when there are multiple, similar variants of the same thing:
http://www.sophos.com/security/analyses/viruses-and-spyware/search-results/?search=mac%2F&action=search&page=0&advanced=
Them, of course, there are the various vulnerabilities of "common platform" applications as others have pointed out...
Posted in Group Test: smartphone satnav apps
CoPilot
I am using CoPilot on Android (Froyo) and whilst it works pretty well it does have some issues:
- They don't seem to be using the keyboard driver correctly so you can't input numbers by the push and hold mechanism that is the standard way of doing it - you have to go into the alternate number keyboard (really useful for entering postcodes!)
- When you have entered a postcode and go back to it from history it doesn't seem to go back to the full postcode location correctly
- There's no ability to paste into the address field (maybe down to non-standard keyboard handling again?)
- You can't move what is a comparatively large application onto the SDCard to free up phone memory
- ALK are saying they have no map updates coming for Europe on their support channels - its soon going to go out of date. They claim this is down to their provider - I suspect they just didn't get the right agreement with their map provider...
It might be best of breed, but its a long way from perfect
Posted in Ten Essential... iPad Apps
Knives
Kitchen knives as demonstrated on Jonathan Ross a couple of weeks ago....
Posted in That Digital Britain report in full
DAB is no replacement for FM+RDS
There's one glaring omission from the standard: no equivalent of RDS.
That means no Traffic Announcements from the local station when in cars, no automatic (and almost instantaneous) switching to an alternate transmitter when you are driving.
Thus it just doesn't work for receivers in cars!
Its not simply a matter of the UK not implementing it, it simply isn't in the standard...
DAB being on Band III whereas FM is on Band II is going to be an issue. Band III being higher frequency has poorer coverage than Band II (it bends round objects less well) - thus the broadcasters will need more transmitters to achieve the same level of coverage (for the old 405 line TV transmissions you typically had a simple X aerial for the BBC on Band I and a multi-element part for ITV on Band III)
That's beside the fact that only the UK and Denmark are still using DAB to any extent (according to El Reg http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/01/28/germany_switches_dab_off/ ). I can't see mainstream, global suppliers either of cars or radios wanting to spend much on development for what is globally a small market.
So why are we bothering?
Keep It Simple, Stupid - as the saying goes.
