Posts by Tom 260

Re: American Broadcasting Corporation?

To be (slightly) fair, I've seen and heard American sources compare large objects (typically the bigger asteroids, or ice shelves that have calved from Antarctica/Greenland) to various smaller US states, several of which I'd struggle to place on a map beyond generally north-eastern USA, let alone have an idea of their general size (though I believe there is one that's the size of Wales, give or take a few sheep).

Indeed, and GreenManGaming already lets you trade in a limited number of titles for credit (ones not bound to Steam or Origin among others), so... prior art?

Re: Maybe it's just me - but why is this important?

"Sending out 250K tweets with the same message could be effective."

Doubly so if there's a link to an attack or phishing site in those tweets. Twitter's insistence on re-short-linking URLs that are already short links puts paid to my Firefox addon that displays the original URL, are there any capable of displaying the end result of 'nested' short links?

Re: Can someone please enlighten me

Yep, from 1996 to 2010, all but one le Tour winner either tested positive for drugs or later had the title stripped from them, see the graphic at the bottom of this BBC article: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-21024288

Re: No, the battery supplier for the 787 is...

I think the weight saving is the key factor, given the concentration on building as much of the plane out of composites as possible.

As for the APU, it has to be capable of taking over the plane's electrical systems within a few seconds of engine shutdown/failure, so I would imagine there's a certain amount of low level power from the batteries for that eventuality - the batteries might also be getting charged in-flight to compensate for that and recharge the usage of the on-ground startup of the APU.

Re: Sad, but...

"Jessops - I enjoy photography as a bit of a hobby and last year I was after a lens for my Canon. Jessops wanted (online at this) £1,300 for a lens that Amazon wanted £600 for. Other online retailers were in the £700 bracket on average."

Jessops are about the only dinosaur in the photography world, as asides from Amazon and a few others trying to bite at the pie, most of the companies are small independent shops that offered mail order, and then moved into the internet at the right time (and the right price). Meanwhile Jessops thought they could still sell everything for maybe £30 off the list price, when everywhere else was >£100 discount - if they even got it in stock, I had a lens on order from them ages ago (in a high street branch), they never got any stock of it, nor did they even seem to know that it had been out for a month by the time I cancelled and ordered elsewhere.

Re: + Microsoft launched 16 months earlier too.

50% is exaggerating somewhat, going by reports from warranty firms it went no higher than 15-18% on the first generation of hardware, and is now around the 2-3% mark. Incidentally, the PS3 isn't immune, with its YLOD and lack of free 3yr warranty replacement that the 360 offers for the RROD, should your PS3 die after its first year you'll be forking out £145 for a refurb with a 3 month warranty, which these days isn't much cheaper than just getting a new console.

Also, though it's not much of a factor these days given the cheapness of internet ready standalone BluRay players, but the PS3 was the most affordable BluRay player for a number of years. Perhaps if both console makers released their estimated attach (unit sales of games per unit sales of consoles) rates we could see how genuinely successful both consoles have been.

Disclaimer: owner of both consoles here.

Re: I liked

Since they use both projectors and replicators to make the environments, I would assume they'd recycle anything left behind, I don't think Quark could bribe anyone enough to clean up Worf's sweat and blood after a fight session, never mind a holo of Vulcan Love Slave...

Perhaps they'll patent a manually operated dynamo (i.e. a knob to wind up your watch - square with rounded corners naturally) for it.

Re: One experience

GPS signals are comparatively weak, so it is conceivable that a badly shielded device could put out sufficient RF interference to cause calculation errors or loss of tracking.

Is it likely that is what happened, IMO probably not, more likely the aircraft lost sight of a satellite behind a terminal building, and it was resolved once line of sight was restored following taxiing. Several times I've been out walking and my Garmin has indicated only two satellites were at a decent height above me, the others skirting the horizon (ideally you need signals from 4 satellites when the device is turned on, then it can work off 3 once it's figured out where it is).

Re: For those user bashing

>pressing "start" to stop their computer!

That sort of reverse logic is obviously catching on, there was a car on a recent series of Top Gear (KTM X-Bow, I think?) where you have to press 'Stop' as part of the somewhat lengthy ignition sequence!

Well, the weak spot gag worked on the Bismarck, one torpedo to the port rudder (and a whole lot of other fortunate circumstances leading up to that), and it's going round in circles, an easy target when the KGV and Rodney caught up.

Re: My dog's very clever

Also explains why one of mine has a funny reaction to a Staffie that lives nearby - because of it's widely spaced shoulders/hips, it's quite a different shape to most dogs where the legs go down from the joint, not outwards and down.

Re: Download the game directly from Steam?

Considering it's a Steamworks game, eBaying the discs won't do you much good, as the serial code in the box is only good for the first Steam account it's used on.

Re: "....contact customer support for a replacement disc."

The only benefit I can see is avoiding problems with reselling/trading-in the game once you've finished it, which doesn't benefit the publisher, so maybe there is another issue they're not admitting... Unless they foresee any conflicts with the rights to resell that they have in the States?

Games bought as presents for Xmas are unlikely to be it too, as most wouldn't buy on release day for that.

Re: Wtf?

Mars rovers are not directly driven, they are given sets of instructions such as go towards this rock and inspect it, and the rover decides how to go about doing it.

Re: Full price launch titles

While Sony do indeed say that publishers set the prices, surely someone should notice that a game (NFS:Most Wanted) currently available to preorder at £59.99(!) is easily available at £36 to preorder from online retailers, and will certainly be no more than £39.99 in the majority of high street stores, and probably less at supermarkets on release. There's really no point in the exercise of making a game available digitally if they're not going to get any sales through unrealistic pricing.

Re: How about...

Oddly enough in my area they've already plonked the cabinets in along the conservation area (14/15th C cottages) last month, but not yet near the 60s/70s houses that make up the bulk of the village; the scheduled date for the exchange is this month, so there's still time, and I understand they are running up to two months behind schedule in some regions anyway.

Re: Another great waste of time/money?

Sounds like the one in Somerset, except after great expense they never even moved into the premises, preferring to keep local knowledge as a priority in the multiple existing control centers, rather than using one to cover the entire greater South West (Devon and Somerset, Dorset, Wiltshire, Avon, Gloucestershire and Cornwall Fire Brigades). Not even Devon & Somerset Fire Brigade are willing to move into the vacant premises as the upkeep costs would be far greater than their existing control center.

Re: Windows 8 Is Crap

Looks like the current chain of alternating bad/good releases will continue then, ME / XP / Vista / 7 / 8

Re: Automatic door locks?

Remote central locking works fine for cars, and though its a nice idea for a house, the practicality of wiring up existing window locks for power/motorisation would be a bit of stumbling block - and there's modern PVC doors that require the handle to be raised either while locking or before locking to get the locking pins into the door frame.

However, I do now have a mental image of the house lights flashing 3 times when you lock up...

Re: Points mean?

The buying in multiples applies to both systems though, you can only put a minimum of £5 on your PS3 wallet, just as the smallest amount of points you can get is either 400 (instore or online from Game/Gamestation at £3.50) or 500 (direct from Microsoft, £4.25 as I recall).

I do agree on the obfuscation created by points though, it does hide the true price, such as most 800 points items (£6.99) are cheaper than the PS3 equivalents (varies from £7.19 to £7.99). The reverse can also apply at other price levels, so its not a clear cut one is cheaper than the other. One thing I do notice is that compared to the US Playstation Network prices, you pay more in the UK than just VAT would account for.

>>"Sony shills will probably say that has something to do with Xbox owners having to spend more for an Xbox Live Gold membership to get them connected."

You can still buy content with a Xbox Live Free account, you miss out on the deal of the week and have to wait a week after release to download any free content, but pay-for DLC its the same rules as a gold account.

I'd like to see some more relevant figures though, just a percentage of users is a bit thin, what about average spend, or are the 6% extra PS3 users just buying 20 pence avatar icons? Is PS Plus counted (as you get access to free content with it) and Xbox Gold not counted as there's no freebies?

Re: I can run faster than an aeroplane...

Just a side note, but the most basic way of avoiding the 20 minute delay on a Mars lander is to put a person in it, no skirting the laws of physics needed there.

Re: Raptor is NOT the highest-tech aircraft

And for muddiness, it's at least the 4th aircraft to have taken that name (P-38, English Electric, prototype YF-22, production F-35)... but yes, it is called the Lightning II (as was the YF-22)

Re: Please, use a different colour!

It's more an annoyance that it wears off so easily, within a year several numbers can be unreadable (bar tilting to get the shadows), flat numbers under a clear coat would be fine and durable.

Re: WHY!?

I still don't see physical media being replaced any time soon, so many areas still have inadequate broadband speeds to cope with downloading 10-30GB for one game - Virgin aren't laying new cable, probably never will, and the fibre replacement of copper is slow and mostly limited to areas that already get >8Mbit connections.

I'm not sure whether Game can cope with the current market though, clearly their business model needs changing since they've been relying on credit rather than capital to get new stock in, but since they're dealing with internet savvy consumers now, they need to keep a closer eye on online pricing trends, rather than having a ton of recent releases on the shelves that you know half of it is easily £10 cheaper if you look online. The preowned market would seem to be viable on it's own, given the spread of CeX stores in the past few years, so I'm assuming that their losses have stemmed from new stock.

As an alternative, I use small icons and show the programme name (stacking multiple instances and hiding names only when there's no room), makes it much more obvious whether an application is open or not.

I've heard the same, that you only need the HD package to receive the new F1 channel, we shall see if that's still the case when it launches in March. You also only need one of the Sky Sports 1/2 packages if you don't have HD.

Lemon was the original fruit (juice) used to prevent scurvy, but limes were easier to obtain (I believe they mostly came from our Caribbean possessions), so we tended to use those instead, hence us brits being called limeys and not anyone else (as they sucked lemons!)

Merry Christmas! :)

As I recall it was more a complaint about the freshly diamond-cut road surface that was supposed to increase traction on the banking section (for the Indy cars that only use the outer oval), but was resulting in increased tyre abrasion on the F1 tyres. Given that the rules that season only allowed tyre changes for rain and punctures, and the Michelin tyres weren't up to lasting the race, the Michelin runners decided to quit on safety grounds.

Michelin did try a second tyre type, but this also suffered the same problems, and would not have been allowed by the stewards under the regulations in any event. Bridgestone didn't suffer any issues over the weekend, so presumably their tyre construction was more suited to the circuit.

In any event, roll on the new US circuit next year, which is designed from the outset as a F1 layout, just needs the fans to attend, or it'll become another Turkey.

neither

He was steering from his new sofa on the roof!