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User: ArtistFrmrlyKnwnAsAC

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  1. Re:MS did contribute to shit drivers on Microsoft Concedes Vista Launch Problems · · Score: 3, Insightful

    So WDM is "ill conceived" just because it's *different*? You didn't really provide any other evidence, except to imply that MS just launched Vista one January with zero notice. Wake up, everyone who was making money selling hardware for Windows XP knew about Vista and WDM YEARS in advance. The implication that MS should institute OS-wide hacks like NDISWrapper instead of being allowed to change their ABI with years of advanced notice makes no sense at all, esp. since your evidence-free bitchings make me assume you're a linux user--someone who should know what frequent ABI changes are all about.

    Where do you even think NDIS came from? Do you think it was the first driver API ever created? I guarantee some DOS network card programmers feel the same way about NDIS that you do about Vista. Yes, the fact that NDISWrapper works at all is a testament to good ABI specification and stability, but WDMWrapper will be just as good five years from now when you're trying to get your next gen of incompatible network cards working on you linux/bsd boxes*. You're welcome ;)

    * threw that in for humor, Vista, etc. still supports NDIS 6.x+

  2. Re:There can be no TouchSmart w/o Windows on How HP Could Turn a Novelty Into a Revolution · · Score: 1

    I guess the insight I provided that you don't understand is that HP is neck-deep in Windows APIs for TouchSmart, and that shell replacement is a longstanding tradition in the Windows OEM market. These two things are critical to understanding the logical problems with TFA.

    Nobody said that HP isn't doing anything with Linux or that no OSS touch/tablet APIs exist--you just pulled that out of thin air. Also, do you realize all of the netbooks you mention run Windows, too?

  3. There can be no TouchSmart w/o Windows on How HP Could Turn a Novelty Into a Revolution · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I'm not trolling at all when I say this anonymous blogger has absolutely no idea what's involved with software development. Anyone familiar with the underlying technologies (.NET, WPF, and the Tablet API) knows that the TouchSmart UI code makes up 1% of the GIGANTIC software stack required to make it possible. Running away from windows? I'd say they're doing exactly the opposite.

    This brings me to my second point: this person also has no sense of history--Windows OEMs have been doing shell replacement since DOS. Remember Geoworks? I'll bet the Compaq half of HP remembers Tabworks. They used it as their Windows shell from 3.1 all the way through their first year of Windows 95 (I supported in 1995 as a Compaq employee). TouchSmart is way more capable than any previous shell replacement, but what this blogger doesn't understand is that he has endless Windows APIs to thank for that.

  4. Get a test audit on Software Quality In a Non-Software Company? · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I write software for clinical researchers. From the summary description, sounds like the company has software that is part of their clinical quality system which is not being tested/validated. If the description is correct and the software is actually part of the clinical therapy they're selling, they should have an external auditing agency take a look at it before the FDA does.

    The first time one of their products is audited by the FDA, the warning letter they receive will communicate to management exactly what is lacking in their compliance with FDA cGMP. Unfortunately, everyone from regulatory compliance down to the lowliest coder who had something to do with the products in question will share in the group spanking (been there).

    I'd be shocked if they didn't already have a relationship with an auditing company--unless they're the tiniest of startups. If they do, the submitter should look through their last audit summary and see if anything has gone unaddressed, and if the scope of the audit matches the submitter's idea of the actual quality system for the product(s) in question.

  5. Re:It's not the power efficiency... on Notebook Storage SSDs and HDs Compared · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I wrote another comment recently about building my own flash drive with a couple of 16gb CF chips and an adapter from Addonics. I left out *why* I did this. I'm very rough with my tablet PC, and a spill earlier this year killed the mechanical drive. That was the 3rd drive to die for various reasons relating to rough use over the previous four years in this particular tablet. Six months of very rough use later, I've had absolutely no problems with the flash chips. The notebook is as fast with my homemade drive as the old 7200rpm that died, but now it runs cooler and completely silent, and gets about 25 more minutes of battery life at full load. The performance is a nice side-effect (compilers and IDEs like a fast drive), but my original intent was to have something that could survive my daily bike commute in a padded saddle bag over 20mi of bumpy roads + random dropping/banging around. Couldn't be happier so far.

  6. Re:Try Transcend, but watch for voltage on Most CF Cards Fail DMA Transfers · · Score: 1

    I wonder how often voltage (5V vs. 3.3V) is a factor in UDMA problems...

    A lot less often than you think, probably ;) TFA is about UDMA failing altogether, not a failure in differentiating between 4 and 5. My tablet only supports UDMA4 to begin with, so I didn't experience the issue you described with the Transcend card. I'd be extremely interested to know if you see any speed difference whatsoever between 4 and 5 though, as the physical specs of the card seem to max out at the speeds allowed by UMDA4.

    Also, I found the connector of the Addonics card to be so extremely tight-fitting that I don't need secure it except for plugging it in, so people's mileage is likely to vary on this. Addonics has instructions on their site for snuggly fitting the adapter into your IDE bay, should the connector prove too loose. No super glue required, but it involves cutting a 2" x 3" chunk of foam and placing it into the space that is ordinarily filled by a traditional 2.5" mechanical drive.

    Good luck with that other adapter though.

  7. Re:Lexar and Sandisk should be good on Most CF Cards Fail DMA Transfers · · Score: 3, Informative

    I can't vouch for cameras, but I created a CF-based hard drive to boot my Windows XP tablet PC using one of these. It has two CF slots, and my tablet's IDE controller supports UDMA. In Windows, you can check what UDMA/PIO mode your disks are in by clicking the Advanced Settings tab on the IDE adapter's property page in Device Manager.

    The first device I tried was the cheapest UDMA CF card I could get my hands on (233x 16gb Ritek), and after a few disk driver errors, it dropped out of UDMA mode and the laptop went from ~40 seconds to ~4 minutes to boot. When in PIO mode, it would run in fits and starts whenever more than one app was accessing the drive. Now I have two 16gb Transcend 300x UDMA4 cards hooked up to it and it's easily 2-3x faster than my old mechanical disk.

    Something interesting to note is that I can't get anything approaching the speed of the Addonics IDE-CF apapter out of any USB CF adapter I could find. They generally run fast, just not as fast.

  8. Re:A big "duh" to the auto industry on The SUV Is Dethroned · · Score: 1

    As the parent wrote in another part of this thread, 46 is the baseline for the old Prius (I also have a 2002 model). The '04+ design can get significantly higher mileage--I pushed 54mpg in a rental a couple of years ago without even trying (had the AC most of the time).

    The whole diesel vs. hybrid thing is just dumb. Toyota started designing the Prius systems 12 years ago, when neither oil costs nor mileage were issues for their fleet. They worked almost exclusively to create the lowest emission vehicle in the world. All-electric was out of the question due to cost, and diesel was out of the question because of the lack of low-sulfur fuel and catalytic technology.

    Do your homework: until ULSD became standard in Europe and the states, diesel was fricken horrible for air quality. Now that ULSD is available and VW and Mercedes have shown that near-gasoline emission quality is attainable, NOW let the diesels and diesel hybrids come forth. Continuing to whine about how the Prius isn't as good as your 20 year old diesel simply ignores every non-mileage consideration regarding the difference between any new car and (almost) any 20 year old car. Safety and emissions being chief among them. I'm sorry your favorite euro car companies dropped the ball in the 90s, but diesel is back, so they have another chance.

  9. Re:A big "duh" to the auto industry on The SUV Is Dethroned · · Score: 1

    I also have a 2002 Prius. I love the car, but neither of us has traction control. Traction control was introduced with the '04 redesign, and was part of the reason the '04 model received car of the year from Motor Trend, while the pre-04 design was described as having "questionable handling" by Consumer Reports. The characteristics you ascribed to traction control are familiar to most people who have front-wheel drive.

  10. Re:The videos are a joke on 3 Rugged Notebooks Take a Beating · · Score: 1

    Yeah, that's pretty weak. I have an HP TC1100 tablet PC that survived a 6ft fall onto a concrete floor. Then it survived the exact same drop again (don't ask) a month later, but the hard drive died and the case corner cracked. Popped in a new drive (flash this time--it's still risking that fall periodically ;) and restored the OS and it's been cranking away every since.