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X-Rays Of A TiBook's Interior
A reader writes: "A fine application of expensive medical equipment: producing neat desktop pictures by taking an x-ray of the guts of a PowerBook G4. Guy Mullins has the details." The actual photos are on a separate site.
Well, this is really cool, though I'm not sure I actually learned anything from the pictures. Except that it would be fun to have the use of a really good medical x-ray machine, along with a few household objects. But I already knew that. And you did, too, didn't you?
InstaPundit! Ahead of the Curve Since 30 Minutes Ago
Out of curiosity, are laptop batteries always made up of a large number of linked, smaller, cylindrical batteries?
My sig is too lon
Don't xrays wipe drives? I think I can see the hard drive in the xray - in the middle at the bottom - the CD drive is on the left, and the batteries are on the right I reckon.
Anyone know what effects XRays have on magnetic media? I always used to post floppies with a 'magnetic media, do not xray' sticker on em?
Fantastic images tho.
September 1,2001-Apple Computers(APLE) have come out with a new piece of software called iXRAY, which will, X-ray your computer for bugs. We got ahold of Steve Jobs, here is what he has to say: "While creating our latest program, iMovie we where flabergasted by the error messages that said 'bug #93827239' So we have come out with iXRAY witch will find the bug for you in your computer!" UPDATE:"It seems hours after the release there have been numerous bugs in the program which actually X-RAY your brain and get all your memmorys, it seems that a program called GATOR has put a small add-on (virus?) into the iXRAY please use caution when using iXRAY
I don't know about you.... but I have to place a big lead sheet over my body when I get an xray. This guy might need to rebuild his desktop file or something ;).
"Things are more moderner than before- bigger, and yet smaller- it's computers-- San Dimas High School football RULES!"
I feel bad for whoever's TiBook this is... he didn't get the AirPort card! that means he has to actually leave the internet behind when he goes to the can!
(I just got my TiBook, and the airport range is less than spectacular anyway... sigh.)
CAUTION!!!!! XRaying Windows machines WILL cause your X-Raying machine to crash!
By suggesting the use of an X-Ray machine to examine the interior of this computer, you are describing a method by which one can determine the layout of the circuit board (which is protected by copyright).
Since the case is secured by a means to prevent access (screws) except as authorized by the copyright holder, you have, in effect, transported a method to bypass said method of "encryption." As such, you have potentially violated rights under the DMCA.
Please remove the description of the x-ray methodology and all links from your site. Failure to do so may make you potentially liable for copyright violation and subject to civil penalties.
DMCA - the Peter Principle of Legislation
The little guy just ain't getting it, is he?
TiGutz in Blue
;p
TiGutz plain
The 3m and 9m files will half to wait for later
Sexy stuff.
Computational Madness in a round package.
What are the 4 circles on the bottom right?
Kinda cool, see the firewire and usb ports, and the dual speakers. Even the 802.11b antenna. The battery doesnt look very hi-tech. lol
Could the X-raying of electronics be a violation of DMCA? Seems like there might be a lot of copyrighted work in there, right down to the patterning of PCBs. And an X-Ray machine certainly could be used to circumvent a factory sealed case... Should have gone to L-school
Yes, see that shadow spot in the top left? Yes, it looks serious. Looks like a mycrosoftius tumor. Probably malignant. We'll have have to remove several ASICs, the hard drive, and a few capacitors. You may even have to subscribe to Office XP. It doesn't look good. Please tell your family and have your credit card limit increased.
"Welcome to APPLE COMPUTER customer service, how may I help you on this beutiful day? My name is Mike" "Ahhh, yes I seemed to accidently X-Ray my brand new Powerbook G4 to get slashdotted but all my files seemed to get erased! What should I do?" *customer service guy faints* "Hello?" "......" "HELLO?!"
I just know that one day some sick bastard will bring his ti-book to an x-ray technician who'll be started to find a gerbil shoved up his PCMCIA slot.
That thing runs off 8 AA batteries!
No. X-Rays are just light. If it caused a problem, you wouldn't be able to take your computer on a plane. Nothing in a computer is affected by x-rays.
I once had to obtain a new battery for P75 laptop and that battery could not be had from anywhere. However, the cells were in Batteries Plus' catalog and they were able to rebuild the battery for me.
I used to work as a technician for a firm that rented environmental instrumentation and we recelled batteries all of the time. It is a common practice for more than just laptops.
How'd they get that in somebody's mouth to take the picture?
alright well if you want to call me the moron, at least get it right yourself. Technically "Light" is infrared, ultraviolet, or visble. My point is that x-rays are no more harmful than visble light. If we could "see" x-rays we would call it light as well. Fundementally radio waves, x-rays, and visable light are all the same thing anyway. Which is the only thing you got right.
And contrary to windoze, it is very normal to work more than a month without any crash.
You obviously never owned a Powerbook 5300 or any other Mac running OS 7.5 :(
I love Macs, too, but anyone who would call classic MacOS "stable" is full of shit.
Most parts of a computer are "immune" to xrays. Meaning that the computer doesn't get damaged by them.
However, CMOS EEPROM cells that are designed using buried gate transistors (which is the most common type of EEPROM these days) can be damaged by xrays. If an xray passes through the buried gate to the channel, it'll ionize a bit of the silicon dioxide insulator between the buried gate and the channel. This makes the charge leak out of the buried gate somewhat faster. The more xrays that pass through that area, the more ionization and the faster the charge leaks out. This ionization is irreversable, and causes permanent damage.
Whether the damage actually causes the bit in question to revert to a 1 depends on the strength of the xray source and how long (total across all the sessions) your computer has been bathed. An airline xray machine is unlikely to erase a bit if your machine passes through once. But if you travel a lot, then its almost certain that you'll suffer at least a one-bit error.
In short: don't let the airport security goons xray your laptops, palm pilots, digital cameras, or anything else that has CMOS EEPROM memory.
Every airport security checkpoint in the US has alternate procedures for electronics (generally involving a swab and a "portable" gas chromatograph to search for nitrogen compounds). The goons will argue with you, but it's worth the annoyance.
I've done this in Las Vegas, Los Angeles, San Fransisco, San Jose, Seattle, Denver, Sioux City, Minneapolis, and New Orleans. Those airports pretty much run the gamut of size from little podunk warts to huge transport hubs.
The FAA's assertion that airport x-ray machines dont damage electronics is a bald-faced lie.
-- Nolite audere delere orbiculum rigidum meum.
Oh, so that's where the AirPort card slot is in these.
For the humor impaired--yes, I do know where the AirPort card goes. I do believe that the TiBook Engineering team's meeting with Steve Jobs went something like this, however:
Jobs: Wow! That's thin, and sexy! We're going to sell a billion of these! Raises and stock options for everyone! By the way, how do you put the AirPort card in?
TiBook Team: Um, AirPort card?
Jobs: AirPort--and it's Absolutely Vital that the home user be able to install this card by themselves, without fucking anything up--as simple to install as RAM. You've got that in there, right? Otherwise, you're going to be shitting Titanium bricks really soon...
Titanium Team [palming screwdriver]: Oh, right! AirPort! Hahaha, we were just fooling. Of course we have that built in! Too bad we didn't bring a screwdriver to this meeting, we'll show you how to put an AirPort card in at the next meeting! You don't really need two PCMCIA slots, right?
--
$tar -xvf
... is excellent if you don't run any applications or measure your uptime in nanoseconds. I've used six through ten.... the systems I've had the MOST problems with were 8.1 on an 8600 and 9.0.4 on an iMac. The most annoying- which doesn't count due to the fact that I'm payed by the hour to hassle with it- is a G3/Media 100 with 8.6.
:P ]
I had one of those HP Lovecraft moments a few months ago- I began to seriously question my sanity when I realized that the only Mac at work that hadn't been rebooted in over a month was..... my workstation. The one that was used every day, all day- a G4/733 with OS 9.1. The only time it's blown up in the last month was when I attempted to connect a bad firewire drive to it.
For UNIX, that's a fart in a hurricaine. For Windows, it's next to impossible (my boss runs Win2k and reboots at least twice before lunch, the sysadmin for the building cycles his every week or two).... and for the Macintosh OS, I'd thought it propability zero.
Wish I could get that level of uptime on my damned 9500 [G3/333, 196 RAM, Lucent USB, no-name Ethernet, Adaptec SCSI, Infinity and ATI video cards, Sonnet IDE card w/ an IBM and Fujitsu drive.... every piece of gear in the beast is made by a different manufacturer. Wouldn't stay up for more than ten minutes until I put OS X on it.
...I was stopped at JFK airport because they couldn't figure out what I was carrying. They could only see two almost empty boxes except for a very dark area on the X-Ray machine, and some wires coming out of it. They probably thought "someone set up us the bomb" (TM), but it actually was a pair of Labtec computer speakers. Very fine speakers, I use them since 95 without problems. But It really got me confused to explain to them what I was carrying. (english is not my native language). I also had a HD with me, but at my pocket not my backpack, so it didn 't go through the monitor, only the metal detector. Not any problem with it also, I still use it.
The properties of EM radation change drastically over the spectrum. For example, visible light is easily blocked by little solid matter, even a 1mm sheet of aluminum is enough to block all but the most intense lights. On the onther hand, radio waves will go right through. That's why you can pick up TV signals in a room, even if little outside light is getting in. Don't assume that the properties of one frequency range of EM radation necessairly apply to another.
The TiXray.orig file is in DICOM format, and I imported it into GraphicConverter. If anyone's interested, this is what GraphicConverter put in the comments:
Image Type: ORIGINAL\PRIMARYStudy Date: 20010424Acquisition Date: 20010424Image Date: 20010424Study Time: 154340Acquisition Time: 154532Image Time: 154531Accession Number: TiModality: CRManufacturer: Lumisys Institution Name: Institution Address: Referring Physician's Name: Referring Physician's Telephone Numbers: Station Name: OPACS_SENDERStudy Description: Name of Physician(s) Reading Study: Operator's Name: Administrator Admitting Diagnoses Description: Manufacturer's Model Name: Lumisys LS135 Patient's Name: PowerBook^TitaniumPatient ID: Apple Patient's Birth Date: 20010101Patient's Sex: O Other Patient IDs: Ethnic Group: Additional Patient History: Body Part Examined: Device Serial Number: clt35403.datCassette Orientation: PORTRAITCassette Size: 35CMX43CM Relative X-ray Exposure: 1713View Position: Study ID: c0a865080gq5m8Series Number: 1 Image Number: 1 Photometric Interpretation: MONOCHROME2 Pixel Spacing: 0.172\0.172 Study Priority ID: MED Requesting Physician:
$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
Figuring out why, and going back to figure out what other comments we might have missed, is one of our priorities for this coming week.
To the trolls who started this meme, if you are interested in getting these problems fixed rather than just raising a fuss, the next time you find something like this, please submit a SourceForge bug. Thanks. Meanwhile, extended discussion of Slashdot's bugs on a story that's not about testing the Slash code is offtopic and should be moderated as such.
ImageJ is a Java app that will handle the file without a problem and being in Java it is x-platform. Oh, and the source code is available on the download page.
Jumpstart the tartan drive.
On the other hand OS X is pretty stable. Not as stable as my FreeBSD machine (which is modestly more stable then my Linux box, but that may be hardware related), but pretty good. It did refuse to unsusspend once last month, and it does panic when you umount -f. I also tend to reboot it a little more frequently for upgrades.
When I was in college, the probability was closer to 1 in every 1000 scans. These days, the airport xray machines are much stronger than back then. I can't cite a new probability, because I don't know the new radiation strength, but it must be lower than 1 in 1000.
.2um technology (that tells us that the transistor channel will be .2um x .4um in EEPROM memory cells), then your bulk EEPROM is probably using a .5um or 1um process. That means that not only does your bulk memory have far more EEPROM transistors, but that each one is 6.25 to 16 times as large. For this reason, we can ignore the probability of getting a one bit error in your CPU when discussing the likely places for errors to occur. But a rigorous discussion would require that we pay attention to all EEPROM cells in a computer.
The critical question is, "Will you notice the damage?" We're talking about a one bit error, here.
Take your average PC. You've got pretty much three firmware chips in there: one for the system BIOS, one for the hard drive firmware, and one for the video controller. No matter which firmware suffers the error, there's first a question of whether or not the error is in a memory cell that ever gets accessed, and second whether or not the error changes the value in a way that makes a difference. If we're talking about one of those lame bootup graphics that a lot of manufacturers like these days, you'll probably never notice a one bit error. And if we're talking about code that drives a piece of hardware that you don't have installed (or dont use) you won't notice that error either. But if you get an error in your POST code, you're dead. System BIOSes these days are pretty fluffy. Lots of extraneous stuff in there. Video firmware is also pretty fluffy, but not nearly as bad as system BIOS. And drive firmware is quite tight. Almost any error you get in there will be in some code that gets executed.
But on the other hand, the Intel opcode set is full of lots of unused bits. There are a whole lot of examples where flipping a bit from 0 to 1 doesn't change the opcode or operands. And recall that we're talking about errors that can only change a 0 to a 1; there is no way that xray damage could change a 1 to a 0. If the bit that gets damaged is already a 1 (~50% chance of that) then your dead memory cell is still functioning exactly the way you want... until it comes time to do a firmware upgrade.
So that brings us to the last two issues: given that damage occurs, and given that its noticeable, then how long will it take for you to notice it, and will you ascribe the damage correctly to the airport xray machine? Many users are perfectly happy to ascribe crashes and corruptions to Windows. And while Windows certainly accounts for more than its fair share of errors, on a machine that crashes once every 40 hours, are you going to notice and correctly assign a failure that makes it crash every 39h30m?
Lastly, we're not talking about a bit suddenly changing from 0 to 1. Normally a buried gate transistor will hold its charge for around 150 years (each transistor will be different). No insulator is perfect. You zap it with a single photon, and maybe you've chopped a year off that. Of course, a xray machine isn't going to output a single photon. It's going to bathe your machine in a tremendous number of photons. So maybe one airport xray machine will drop you from 150 years to 130 years (I'm pulling that 20 year figure out of my butt, pretty much, but it's within an order of magnitude of being right). Do it again, and we're down to 110 years (it'll always reduce the life by the same number: a single xray photon opens a single ionizied path in the silicon dioxide, and that single ionized path will saturate at a small fixed current). So after 8 hits in the airport xray machine, you've probably got a number of one bit errors. And then the discussion above about whether or not you'll notice the error and whether or not you ascribe it correctly comes into play.
PS: these days, most microcontrollers, PICs, CPUs, MMUs, and other assorted large chips also have EEPROM cells on board. But in any particular computer, the technology used to design the EEPROM cells in functional chips is usually 5 to 7 years ahead of the technology used to create EEPROM cells in memory chips. That means that if your CPU is using a
-- Nolite audere delere orbiculum rigidum meum.