I'm a long time e-reader starting with the the PC, then the Palm Pilot, the Sony E-reader, Amazon Kindle and various phones. I like paper books for reading where a reader could get damaged, Kindle paper whites for reading novels and tablets for reading larger sized books with color illustrations. Generally if the size of the paper book is the size of a magazine or larger, It is better to have the larger book as I find the size reduction to a tablet a limitation. Also a lot of older books have not been put into E-reader format, and some have just been clumsily converted as to make them useless. So all of them have areas where they excel.
Since Amazon has their kindle app on all major devices, it is not hurting the category. B&N has a similar strategy. Apple has its own too. None of these are "hurting" the Ebook/ereader category they should support some kind of DRM where a package like Calibre could convert to each format with the DRM so that the book could be read on any major app.
It is truly amazing that this level of resolution is available to earth bound telescopes. Granted that the location of this telescope is in a very remote desert, but at least it is accessible without a rocket when something needs to be swapped out. What I would be interested in though is to see a comparison of the images that the upgraded scope can provide for exposures longer than 24hours. Perhaps Hubble still has an edge here due to the imperfections of being able to cancel out all atmospheric turbulence over such a long period of time.
Another related item ist that would be interesting is to apply some Big Data and HPC computing techniques on each microsecond of image data received by the sensor. It seems to me that sometimes the turbulence would be more random then normal making it harder to cancel out in the allotted fraction of a second. However those moments, if all individually recorded, could be evaluated such that the full frame, or subsection of the frame, could be subtracted from the final image. But perhaps they are doing that already, since the few astrophysicists that I've met tend to exploit even the most subtle of nuances that these photons can possibly reveal.
It could be dependent on the gear that playback occurs on and the quality of the listener's ears. In watching Stan Lee's new show about "superhumans" it becomes clear that some people have, by training or genetics, better reflexes then the bulk of humanity. On my home gear I can't tell the difference above 160Kbs, but I'm more then willing to believe that some people can, either because they have much better gear to listen to, and/or they have superior hearing.
If 65nm, 45nm or 10mm consumed the same amount of power or were equally susceptible to random errors, then from a consumer standpoint I would agree with you. But that is not the case. The smaller process allows for an equal amount of computing power to be done with less electrical power. For instance lets say
the 65nm processor uses 50watts, and the 45nm process uses 45watts. That may not seem like much but lets assume that you now apply that to 1 million pcs that use the proc 24x7 for three years. This results in:
Lbs CO2 134,405,700
Tons CO2 67,202
Equivalent in Cars 3,875
Equivalent gallons of gas 6,870,139
Acres of Trees needed to offset 6,109.63
Mature Trees needed to offset 2,986,793
Trees planted to offset 716,830
If you just want to look at what a person would save for running 1 new proc for the same 3 year period
it results in:
Equivalent gallons of gas 6.87
Mature Trees needed to offset 2.99
So even if you just purchase 1 chip, it will save you about $18 over the 3 years and will be more eco-friendly.
In addition lower power chips tend to be higher in reliability, so the average consumer is less likely to have to pay for a repair over the same 3 year period of time which also has a tangible value.
So all in all you should care about the new processes.
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I'm a long time e-reader starting with the the PC, then the Palm Pilot, the Sony E-reader, Amazon Kindle and various phones. I like paper books for reading where a reader could get damaged, Kindle paper whites for reading novels and tablets for reading larger sized books with color illustrations. Generally if the size of the paper book is the size of a magazine or larger, It is better to have the larger book as I find the size reduction to a tablet a limitation. Also a lot of older books have not been put into E-reader format, and some have just been clumsily converted as to make them useless. So all of them have areas where they excel. Since Amazon has their kindle app on all major devices, it is not hurting the category. B&N has a similar strategy. Apple has its own too. None of these are "hurting" the Ebook/ereader category they should support some kind of DRM where a package like Calibre could convert to each format with the DRM so that the book could be read on any major app.
It is truly amazing that this level of resolution is available to earth bound telescopes. Granted that the location of this telescope is in a very remote desert, but at least it is accessible without a rocket when something needs to be swapped out. What I would be interested in though is to see a comparison of the images that the upgraded scope can provide for exposures longer than 24hours. Perhaps Hubble still has an edge here due to the imperfections of being able to cancel out all atmospheric turbulence over such a long period of time. Another related item ist that would be interesting is to apply some Big Data and HPC computing techniques on each microsecond of image data received by the sensor. It seems to me that sometimes the turbulence would be more random then normal making it harder to cancel out in the allotted fraction of a second. However those moments, if all individually recorded, could be evaluated such that the full frame, or subsection of the frame, could be subtracted from the final image. But perhaps they are doing that already, since the few astrophysicists that I've met tend to exploit even the most subtle of nuances that these photons can possibly reveal.
It could be dependent on the gear that playback occurs on and the quality of the listener's ears. In watching Stan Lee's new show about "superhumans" it becomes clear that some people have, by training or genetics, better reflexes then the bulk of humanity. On my home gear I can't tell the difference above 160Kbs, but I'm more then willing to believe that some people can, either because they have much better gear to listen to, and/or they have superior hearing.
If 65nm, 45nm or 10mm consumed the same amount of power or were equally susceptible to random errors, then from a consumer standpoint I would agree with you. But that is not the case. The smaller process allows for an equal amount of computing power to be done with less electrical power. For instance lets say the 65nm processor uses 50watts, and the 45nm process uses 45watts. That may not seem like much but lets assume that you now apply that to 1 million pcs that use the proc 24x7 for three years. This results in: Lbs CO2 134,405,700 Tons CO2 67,202 Equivalent in Cars 3,875 Equivalent gallons of gas 6,870,139 Acres of Trees needed to offset 6,109.63 Mature Trees needed to offset 2,986,793 Trees planted to offset 716,830 If you just want to look at what a person would save for running 1 new proc for the same 3 year period it results in: Equivalent gallons of gas 6.87 Mature Trees needed to offset 2.99 So even if you just purchase 1 chip, it will save you about $18 over the 3 years and will be more eco-friendly. In addition lower power chips tend to be higher in reliability, so the average consumer is less likely to have to pay for a repair over the same 3 year period of time which also has a tangible value. So all in all you should care about the new processes.