Lucas' original dialog is in the novelization of "A New Hope". It's really, really bad -- according to the Annotated Screenplays book most of the good dialog was script doctored in after Alan Dean Foster ghostwrote the novelization, nothing to do with Lucas.
It depends on what you're dealing with. For TV, digital is better because a snowy analog signal loses too much information. But for radio, where you're dealing with only sound, an analog signal can be more robust.
It's a least common denominator thing -- analog radio is cheap and should remain that way. Digital radio is nice, but unnecessary.
Actually I think this switchover might work out well for broadcasters -- the cable and satellite providers compress the life out of their programming, whereas the broadcasters can be a little lazier about compression and thereby come up with better picture quality.
But I'll be really impressed when network sports start figuring out how to use the extra screen space -- I don't think American sportscasters really know how to use the wide screen to full effect.
WGBH, the PBS affiliate in Boston, actually does that. They run three stations, and the two in the Boston area (the third, in Springfield, is semi-independent) each have digital counterparts. WGBH-19 (2 on analog) has two programs, one in SD, one in HD, while, WGBX-43 (44 on analog) has four, all SD. WGBH is big enough that it can do that though... I don't think any of the commercial stations around here have anything like the ability to create enough content to fill up extra streams.
Set top boxes in the US, if you can find them (they aren't easy to find, though they were semi-common in stores just six months ago), are rather expensive, somewhat on the order of $300-$400 last time I saw one in a store. Forget digital radios -- if you don't count satellite, the only digital radios available in the US right now are car radios.
One thing I find myself wondering about -- what happens to all those pocket TVs when it all goes digital?
48KHz is about as good a sampling rate as you're going to get for most mastering projects, and for what it's worth is probably overkill unless you're recording to digital to begin with (analog just doesn't have the dynamic range), and usually it's going to be 44.1KHz because that's what CDs use. The 96KHz stuff is there, but that puts the dynamic range of the sample well into ultrasonic territory, which I'd suspect you'd more feel than hear. (I honestly believe a lot of audiophile chatter is placebo effect.) Maybe you can percieve the high harmonics in some way, but it might be akin to "seeing" x-rays -- not so much percieving the sound itself but its effects on your body.
As for surround sound, I can make a good case for surround for live music -- done properly it can do a good job of taking the acoustics of the venue into account, so there's that. And one could certainly do music designed specifically for surround, but that would probably be more experimental than anything else -- honestly, the nature of the music would be lost on someone not using surround. Stereo is pretty much all most people have, and affordable surround (i.e. home theatre in a box systems) are almost exclusively targeted at the movie-watching public.
What it generally comes down to is that while DVD-A and SACD have objective, quantifiable advantages on paper, they don't offer anything to the general music-buying public. I'll be a believer when the underground starts playing with surround in a big way -- I suspect that surround would make for some interesting dance music for example. Until then I don't think a killer app exists for the advanced audio discs. They solve a problem limited to a very small part of the record-buying public. No, I still think the technology is best applied to video applications, where surround audio can complement the visuals.
Much of the Space Shuttle program is run on core memory. That which isn't, until recently, was done on HP-48s velcroed to the control panel (I think the systems have since been upgraded with more modern and integrated hardware). Space engineers like to work old school because it's something they know they can trust.
Seems to me that's more something you do with video discs. The audio stuff uses a different encryption scheme, so I would tend to doubt you can do it that way -- your best shot would probably be the analog hole. The real issue is doing it digitally, and this is half a solution.
My question is, who really needs DVD-A and SACD in the first place? Only a super ear can hear the difference, and surround sound is pretty useless for basic music. It's far more useful for movies, concerts, and theatrical productions.
An open source version of Unix would be sort of moot, wouldn't it? I mean, OpenSolaris.org is a full System V Unix available under a more or less acceptable license, and if you really need the Unix pedigree there's four, count 'em four, source-available BSDs out there.
You know what I'm thinking... the PureDigital 20-minute film festival. It'd be interesting to see what a good videographer can do with one of those things, and they're a great choice for kids.
The PXL-2000 was an excellent toy for a kid interested in video production in the late 80s. With MiniDV being as cheap is it is now I don't think there's all that much market for something like it anymore, but I'd still love to see the PXL resurrected.
I never understood the point of SSTV porn. You can get much better quality stuff on the net (hell, I'm sure there's a couple of packet BBSes left with a decent quantity of the stuff), so why would you want to transmit over SSTV?
The rules are somewhat different for TV, and fairly complicated for Part 15 in general (the 100mW rule applies only on the AM broadcast band, for example). You might get away with a small local link that doesn't interfere with anyone else, but if you want to experiment with this stuff you're far better off getting an amateur radio license and doing your experimenting on the 70cm band -- that's where most of the ATV people in the US hang out (the allocation is different in Europe). The power limits are a lot less stringent at that level, and you can use an analog cable box to tune in the analog signals.
Your mileage may vary depending on location, but the only thing you could get away with in the US is doing it on an amateur frequency. The Friendly Candy Company might turn a blind eye on a pirate TV operation that doesn't extend past a city block, but it's technically illegal.
Depends on who's transmitting. 720/30p is the common progressive scan format, while interlaced is 1080/60i. You have the same choice with camcorders -- JVC is 720p, Sony is 1080i.
NTSC is easy. You can get a kit from Ramsey Electronics and plug a camcorder into it -- whole thing comes out under $300 if you use a Hi8 instead of a DV camcorder.
The 'Cat actually handles over a dozen different bar code formats. The big issue is whether there's any good reason to scan the bar code on your library card (Codabar, probably) or the tags on the back of your latest purchase from Borders (yes, it does scan those, but I don't know what format it is).
As I mentioned elsewhere, RatShack had a policy of only giving them out with new computer purchases. I'm not entirely sure what the deal was with that, but I think it had something to do with discouraging hackers (especially on the Mac platform).
Not true. There's a fairly simple decrypt transform that was widely publicized during the height of the 'Cat's "popularity" -- I think either Larry Wall or Dave Touretzky was responsible -- that would decrypt the output stream. The resulting output turned out to be a serial number (so your scanning habits could be tracked), an indicator for the type of barcode, and the bar code content itself.
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Which version? HP-UX? (Open)Solaris? MacOS X? SCOw Unixware? One of the BSDs?
If there's one thing that's constant about Unix it's interface diversity...
Lucas' original dialog is in the novelization of "A New Hope". It's really, really bad -- according to the Annotated Screenplays book most of the good dialog was script doctored in after Alan Dean Foster ghostwrote the novelization, nothing to do with Lucas.
Which is just the funniest damn thing for anyone who remembers RF modulators as being those spidery little boxes you velcroed to the back of the TV...
It depends on what you're dealing with. For TV, digital is better because a snowy analog signal loses too much information. But for radio, where you're dealing with only sound, an analog signal can be more robust.
It's a least common denominator thing -- analog radio is cheap and should remain that way. Digital radio is nice, but unnecessary.
Actually I think this switchover might work out well for broadcasters -- the cable and satellite providers compress the life out of their programming, whereas the broadcasters can be a little lazier about compression and thereby come up with better picture quality.
But I'll be really impressed when network sports start figuring out how to use the extra screen space -- I don't think American sportscasters really know how to use the wide screen to full effect.
WGBH, the PBS affiliate in Boston, actually does that. They run three stations, and the two in the Boston area (the third, in Springfield, is semi-independent) each have digital counterparts. WGBH-19 (2 on analog) has two programs, one in SD, one in HD, while, WGBX-43 (44 on analog) has four, all SD. WGBH is big enough that it can do that though... I don't think any of the commercial stations around here have anything like the ability to create enough content to fill up extra streams.
That's rather good to know.
Set top boxes in the US, if you can find them (they aren't easy to find, though they were semi-common in stores just six months ago), are rather expensive, somewhat on the order of $300-$400 last time I saw one in a store. Forget digital radios -- if you don't count satellite, the only digital radios available in the US right now are car radios.
One thing I find myself wondering about -- what happens to all those pocket TVs when it all goes digital?
What about violent sex? It's not my thing, but I mean as long as it's consensual...
Welllllll...
48KHz is about as good a sampling rate as you're going to get for most mastering projects, and for what it's worth is probably overkill unless you're recording to digital to begin with (analog just doesn't have the dynamic range), and usually it's going to be 44.1KHz because that's what CDs use. The 96KHz stuff is there, but that puts the dynamic range of the sample well into ultrasonic territory, which I'd suspect you'd more feel than hear. (I honestly believe a lot of audiophile chatter is placebo effect.) Maybe you can percieve the high harmonics in some way, but it might be akin to "seeing" x-rays -- not so much percieving the sound itself but its effects on your body.
As for surround sound, I can make a good case for surround for live music -- done properly it can do a good job of taking the acoustics of the venue into account, so there's that. And one could certainly do music designed specifically for surround, but that would probably be more experimental than anything else -- honestly, the nature of the music would be lost on someone not using surround. Stereo is pretty much all most people have, and affordable surround (i.e. home theatre in a box systems) are almost exclusively targeted at the movie-watching public.
What it generally comes down to is that while DVD-A and SACD have objective, quantifiable advantages on paper, they don't offer anything to the general music-buying public. I'll be a believer when the underground starts playing with surround in a big way -- I suspect that surround would make for some interesting dance music for example. Until then I don't think a killer app exists for the advanced audio discs. They solve a problem limited to a very small part of the record-buying public. No, I still think the technology is best applied to video applications, where surround audio can complement the visuals.
Much of the Space Shuttle program is run on core memory. That which isn't, until recently, was done on HP-48s velcroed to the control panel (I think the systems have since been upgraded with more modern and integrated hardware). Space engineers like to work old school because it's something they know they can trust.
Andawhatnow?
Seems to me that's more something you do with video discs. The audio stuff uses a different encryption scheme, so I would tend to doubt you can do it that way -- your best shot would probably be the analog hole. The real issue is doing it digitally, and this is half a solution.
My question is, who really needs DVD-A and SACD in the first place? Only a super ear can hear the difference, and surround sound is pretty useless for basic music. It's far more useful for movies, concerts, and theatrical productions.
An open source version of Unix would be sort of moot, wouldn't it? I mean, OpenSolaris.org is a full System V Unix available under a more or less acceptable license, and if you really need the Unix pedigree there's four, count 'em four, source-available BSDs out there.
You know what I'm thinking... the PureDigital 20-minute film festival. It'd be interesting to see what a good videographer can do with one of those things, and they're a great choice for kids.
The PXL-2000 was an excellent toy for a kid interested in video production in the late 80s. With MiniDV being as cheap is it is now I don't think there's all that much market for something like it anymore, but I'd still love to see the PXL resurrected.
Technically the Republicans supported Bob Dole having the line item veto, but you're more or less correct otherwise.
I never understood the point of SSTV porn. You can get much better quality stuff on the net (hell, I'm sure there's a couple of packet BBSes left with a decent quantity of the stuff), so why would you want to transmit over SSTV?
Ramsey Electronics sells a couple of ATV transmitters as well. They're interesting -- sort of like video bugs, though they don't come with a camera.
The rules are somewhat different for TV, and fairly complicated for Part 15 in general (the 100mW rule applies only on the AM broadcast band, for example). You might get away with a small local link that doesn't interfere with anyone else, but if you want to experiment with this stuff you're far better off getting an amateur radio license and doing your experimenting on the 70cm band -- that's where most of the ATV people in the US hang out (the allocation is different in Europe). The power limits are a lot less stringent at that level, and you can use an analog cable box to tune in the analog signals.
Your mileage may vary depending on location, but the only thing you could get away with in the US is doing it on an amateur frequency. The Friendly Candy Company might turn a blind eye on a pirate TV operation that doesn't extend past a city block, but it's technically illegal.
Depends on who's transmitting. 720/30p is the common progressive scan format, while interlaced is 1080/60i. You have the same choice with camcorders -- JVC is 720p, Sony is 1080i.
NTSC is easy. You can get a kit from Ramsey Electronics and plug a camcorder into it -- whole thing comes out under $300 if you use a Hi8 instead of a DV camcorder.
Hm... didn't answer the question, did I?
The 'Cat actually handles over a dozen different bar code formats. The big issue is whether there's any good reason to scan the bar code on your library card (Codabar, probably) or the tags on the back of your latest purchase from Borders (yes, it does scan those, but I don't know what format it is).
As I mentioned elsewhere, RatShack had a policy of only giving them out with new computer purchases. I'm not entirely sure what the deal was with that, but I think it had something to do with discouraging hackers (especially on the Mac platform).
Not true. There's a fairly simple decrypt transform that was widely publicized during the height of the 'Cat's "popularity" -- I think either Larry Wall or Dave Touretzky was responsible -- that would decrypt the output stream. The resulting output turned out to be a serial number (so your scanning habits could be tracked), an indicator for the type of barcode, and the bar code content itself.