Historically there have only been enough top-notch HDD design engineers to make about one and a half design teams. The rest are decent enough engineers but they're not "gurus". So every hard-drive manufacturer tries to steal and keep the good guys with one degree of success or another.
The sudden increases and decreases in drive quality seen in every manufacturer over the last couple of decades is a direct result of these guys getting poached.
And then there's the whole assembly line QC problem which I won't go into here.
The short version of this is that Seagate has the best assembly lines right now (good article on it in Business 2.0 recently) and the best team.
The other good guys are scattered around the other mfg which is why other drives are mediocre at best. (I don't think Maxtor has anybody good right now at all which is why they are crap at the moment.)
But Seagate has a good retention plan for their guys going forward so I'd stick with Seagate for at least the next few years after which other mfg will either be out of business or have caught up to what Seagate's doing right now whereupon who knows...?
I had a similar situation awhile back. I moved to a new town on the other side of the country and tried to stay independent and fell flat on my face.
So then I went to work for a couple of consulting firms in fairly rapid succession (useful for cranking your salary up while you're biding your time) with a sharp eye on the size of their customer base and the duration of the non-compete agreements. Once I felt I had a large enough number of potential customers that were no longer restricted by the non-compete's I went back to doing my own thing.
YMMV, IANAL, TIS, HTH, ETC
they had only one product and one customer, and that customer was slow on the payments. So they stopped work until they got paid...instead of developing different/more products and/or looking for different/more customers? Sounds like a colossal lack of business sense!
So how long did they last?:)
...maintain humidity level and keep it fron drying out ...oil/salt compositions will vary which affect the hulls of kernels ...especially corn which has been left exposed to air ...more porous hull is likely to dry out faster or be weakened by contact with hydrogenated oils
This looks like a screed from the Department of Redundancy Department!
(/Me RTFA again) Oh yeah, here we go (straight from the text above, boys and girls!): "The short answer is that unpopped kernels have leaky hulls (seed coats) that prevent the buildup of sufficient pressure to cause the pop."
In other news stomping on the kernels, subjecting them to an acid wash and grinding them with a mortar and pestle were also found to affect the poppability.
However, just to keep ranting, let me add that this is not news at all. I remember asking this question when I was a little kid (yes, that was several decades ago) and getting the same answer.
...it appears a diploma isn't always a must-have after all...
That's true at other levels as well. I discovered awhile back that if you're appealing enough to the admissions office you can get into a Masters program without having even an Associates.:)
I can tell you from personal experience that some (most?) foreign high schools are accepted by US institutions. Here's how it works: 1 - come to the US with a foreign high school diploma. 2 - try to join/attend some institution which requires a US high school diploma. 3 - when they refuse to accept your foreign diploma call the state board of education and ask them which colleges/universities handle this situation. 4 - stop by the admissions office of the nearest place on that list and explain the problem. 5 - they will give you a "certificate of equivalency". 6 - Et voila'! Just as good...
Of course in her case it would be wise to check in with these various institutions ahead of time to be sure that her specific school system is, in fact, accepted as an equivalent but I myself had no problems doing that and I've met various people over the years in similar situations who did the same.
Good luck!
But seriously.
I used to have a good half-dozen certifications active at any given time ("real" ones, not just the generic A+ crap). But after awhile I began to notice that people were much more impressed by what I'd done in the real world and I slowly started letting them lapse. The last one expired about four years ago and to be quite honest I don't think a single customer has noticed or cared. And it sure saves me a lot of time and hassle!
But then again I suppose it depends on your background. If you're fresh out of college then they would be a Very Good Thing to have for at least some number of years.
...I can't trust you regarding your apparent conclusion that it's OK to use car batteries for UPS applications... I never said it was OK to do that.
My original post was refuting the statement that they would get killed in just a few cycles.
It's actually very difficult to use anything but the OEM battery packs on an off-the-shelf UPS because the UPS manufacturers try to cut costs wherever they can.
A good general purpose charger will have an op-amp circuit that is set up to reduce power as the battery reaches a full charge. The output of the circuit is also regulated so as not to fry the circuit itself if too large a load is placed on it.
In the case of an OEM UPS, the output from the charging circuit is very rarely regulated. If you put a larger than expected load on it you will fry it. Additionally, a UPS usually uses a simple temperature sensor instead of a proper comparator because the characteristics of the cells and UPS housing are known factors. Even if you tried to extend the sensor out to the car battery it would still be wildly inaccurate and run the risk damaging the UPS or the battery or both.
A reversed cell in a battery never reaches anything near full voltage. It adds to the internal resistance of the battery (the opposite of what would happen if the cell shorted out). It happens much faster than sulfation.
Then it's not a reversed cell.:)
Next time you think that's what has happened, isolate the cell and test it. You'll find that the polarity is still correct, it just isn't holding much of a charge any more.
If you're really curious you can take it apart and find out why. Having done that myself more than a time or two I can tell you that you'll find either broken/shorted plates, sulfation (see my notes above about accumulation at the bottom of the cell; this causes fairly rapid loss of functionality along the lines of what you're describing) or, last but not least, the pH is wrong in which case it is either a sealed battery whose seal has breached or it is an unsealed battery which has not been maintained.
Trust me, I've dealt with these fuckers for years - I have first-hand experience with every possible mode of failure up to and including exploding.
Car batteries aren't normal lead-acid batteries. Car batteries actually are "normal" lead acid batteries. So are deep-cycle batteries. The only differences that are ever present in any type of lead acid battery is 1 - the physical structure of the plates (grid vs foil), 2 - the venting system (sealed or not) and 3 - the acid (water vs gel).
There are other minor variations. E.g. car batteries have extra ribs of plastic which help to support the plates so that they don't crack loose when you hit a pot-hole. So-called deep-cycle batteries have extra heavy-duty bus bars between the plates to handle the power and help act as a heat-sink.
you risk reversing a cell any time you discharge below 80% Cells don't risk reversal until they *completely* discharge. Even a damaged cell that discharges earlier than the others will retain its polarity as long as the other cells have any energy left in them. There's no way a lead acid cell will reverse if it still has at least 20% charge (maybe you meant to say that above?) Even then it is highly unlikely to reverse until well below that.
Not to mention that unless the cell is physically damaged so badly that it can't be charged at all, the reversal will be undone as soon as it is charged with the correct polarity.
To get to your point about reduction in voltage, if a cell were truly reversed and somehow stayed that way even through a charge cycle (not sure that's even possible unless you purposely disconnected it and charged it separately with a reverse bias) you would actually see a 4v reduction as it would not only be failing to contribute it's own 2v but that reversed 2v would effectively cancel out 2v worth provided by one of the other cells.
In the case you're describing I would assume that the battery was charged (or discharged) at a higher rate than it was designed for and the plates warped from the heat causing the cell(s) to short out.
I'd bet that the reduced capacity of your batteries just became easily noticable after a few years. This is actually due to sulfation. Even a sealed battery will have impurities present in both the lead and the acid compound. An unsealed battery is especially vulnerable. Sulfation occurs when the sulfuric acid reacts with the impurities and leaves deposits on the plates. Eventually enough of the surface area is covered that the cell ceases to be functional. This is also why a car battery (or any battery designed for a physically abusive environment) will have a fairly large gap between the bottom of the plates and the bottom of the reservoir. The sulfation in a car battery tends to get knocked loose and settle to the bottom where it shorts the plates out when it accumulates to a sufficient depth.
Anything else I can help clear up about lead acid batteries?:)
And PLEASE don't use car batteries! You'd kill them dead in just a few full cycles! Only use deep cycle batteries.
I lived in a third world country for some years with nothing more than a bank of old car batteries and a 12v generator. We abused the crap out of them and yes, they would die after a few years, but no sooner than would be expected. Normal lead-acid batteries are actually surprisingly resilient...
they had a policy of two-weeks per year notice That's pretty cool! And if business keeps up I'll be hiring again soon, I just might have to implement that.:)
As a follow-up to the on-call, get it all in writing in case it becomes a legal matter! Also make them sign some kind of waiver etc. Finally, since it is on-call, in addition to whatever you decide to charge them you might also consider a retainer. Finally, since they seem to like you so much and it doesn't sound like you really hate them you could think about doing a longer term support contract (charging enough to make it worth your while of course!:).
Disregard the parent. The IT industry is as incestuous as any other and burned bridges *will* come back to haunt you.
As for the notice, I've given as much as six months (for bosses I liked:). I've never, ever quit with less than two weeks though, even working with what turned out to be complete idiots/assholes.
As for the subsidized on-call, that just depends on how much free time you'll have and if you feel like doing it or not. (Also depends on what exactly "subsidized" means?!?)
...the whole thing a 70's trailer home "complete with wood paneling" appearance.
Agreed! Some of the joints are pretty sloppy too. I am by no means a professional wood-worker but there's no damn way I'd brag about any of that. Not to mention the varnish looks like some kind of outdoor spar varnish, like he's really going to care about the wood if it gets wet!:)
Kudos for him even trying it though! It's really not bad as a rough draft. Maybe he'll have another go at it with lessons learned.
Those would all be good and valid points if they actually related to the problem posted.
From the article: it's getting really crowded for the other customers that just come in for some coffee and have nowhere to sit
I'm sure the shop would love to do things exactly the way you describe if they only had room to!
(Nice post though, even if was completely off-topic - you should be in sales!:)
Slashdot Mirror
Historically there have only been enough top-notch HDD design engineers to make about one and a half design teams. The rest are decent enough engineers but they're not "gurus". So every hard-drive manufacturer tries to steal and keep the good guys with one degree of success or another.
The sudden increases and decreases in drive quality seen in every manufacturer over the last couple of decades is a direct result of these guys getting poached.
And then there's the whole assembly line QC problem which I won't go into here.
The short version of this is that Seagate has the best assembly lines right now (good article on it in Business 2.0 recently) and the best team.
The other good guys are scattered around the other mfg which is why other drives are mediocre at best. (I don't think Maxtor has anybody good right now at all which is why they are crap at the moment.)
But Seagate has a good retention plan for their guys going forward so I'd stick with Seagate for at least the next few years after which other mfg will either be out of business or have caught up to what Seagate's doing right now whereupon who knows...?
I had a similar situation awhile back. I moved to a new town on the other side of the country and tried to stay independent and fell flat on my face.
So then I went to work for a couple of consulting firms in fairly rapid succession (useful for cranking your salary up while you're biding your time) with a sharp eye on the size of their customer base and the duration of the non-compete agreements. Once I felt I had a large enough number of potential customers that were no longer restricted by the non-compete's I went back to doing my own thing.
YMMV, IANAL, TIS, HTH, ETC
The parent is not a mirror, it just a link to somebody's cute version of Google...
Actually, 128 is not reserved for that purpose.
Google for "CIDR"
I have heard a rumor (unconfirmed) that "overrated" and "underrated" moderations don't get meta-moderated.
they had only one product and one customer, and that customer was slow on the payments. So they stopped work until they got paid ...instead of developing different/more products and/or looking for different/more customers? Sounds like a colossal lack of business sense! :)
So how long did they last?
This looks like a screed from the Department of Redundancy Department!
(/Me RTFA again)
Oh yeah, here we go (straight from the text above, boys and girls!):
"The short answer is that unpopped kernels have leaky hulls (seed coats) that prevent the buildup of sufficient pressure to cause the pop."
In other news stomping on the kernels, subjecting them to an acid wash and grinding them with a mortar and pestle were also found to affect the poppability.
However, just to keep ranting, let me add that this is not news at all. I remember asking this question when I was a little kid (yes, that was several decades ago) and getting the same answer.
While OO supports .doc, exporting to the Microsoft .doc format isn't there
No, but RTF is. (And I doubt a K12 student is going to need anything that RTF can't provide...)
Can I use dig to find all the addresses for a domain?
Only if the DNS server allows you to. Most don't.
...it appears a diploma isn't always a must-have after all...
:)
That's true at other levels as well. I discovered awhile back that if you're appealing enough to the admissions office you can get into a Masters program without having even an Associates.
...a dual opteron with 8 gig of ram.
:)
Damn you!
And here I'd just convinced myself I didn't *really* need to upgrade my main test system yet!
Argh...
I can tell you from personal experience that some (most?) foreign high schools are accepted by US institutions. Here's how it works:
1 - come to the US with a foreign high school diploma.
2 - try to join/attend some institution which requires a US high school diploma.
3 - when they refuse to accept your foreign diploma call the state board of education and ask them which colleges/universities handle this situation.
4 - stop by the admissions office of the nearest place on that list and explain the problem.
5 - they will give you a "certificate of equivalency".
6 - Et voila'! Just as good...
Of course in her case it would be wise to check in with these various institutions ahead of time to be sure that her specific school system is, in fact, accepted as an equivalent but I myself had no problems doing that and I've met various people over the years in similar situations who did the same.
Good luck!
Can't believe nobody's suggested just doing kernel compiles in a loop...?
...doesn't mean we can speculate...
:)
I guess that's why there's hardly any posts!
...or tic-tacs for that matter. :)
But seriously.
I used to have a good half-dozen certifications active at any given time ("real" ones, not just the generic A+ crap). But after awhile I began to notice that people were much more impressed by what I'd done in the real world and I slowly started letting them lapse. The last one expired about four years ago and to be quite honest I don't think a single customer has noticed or cared. And it sure saves me a lot of time and hassle!
But then again I suppose it depends on your background. If you're fresh out of college then they would be a Very Good Thing to have for at least some number of years.
...I can't trust you regarding your apparent conclusion that it's OK to use car batteries for UPS applications...
I never said it was OK to do that.
My original post was refuting the statement that they would get killed in just a few cycles.
It's actually very difficult to use anything but the OEM battery packs on an off-the-shelf UPS because the UPS manufacturers try to cut costs wherever they can.
A good general purpose charger will have an op-amp circuit that is set up to reduce power as the battery reaches a full charge. The output of the circuit is also regulated so as not to fry the circuit itself if too large a load is placed on it.
In the case of an OEM UPS, the output from the charging circuit is very rarely regulated. If you put a larger than expected load on it you will fry it. Additionally, a UPS usually uses a simple temperature sensor instead of a proper comparator because the characteristics of the cells and UPS housing are known factors. Even if you tried to extend the sensor out to the car battery it would still be wildly inaccurate and run the risk damaging the UPS or the battery or both.
A reversed cell in a battery never reaches anything near full voltage. It adds to the internal resistance of the battery (the opposite of what would happen if the cell shorted out). It happens much faster than sulfation.
:)
Then it's not a reversed cell.
Next time you think that's what has happened, isolate the cell and test it. You'll find that the polarity is still correct, it just isn't holding much of a charge any more.
If you're really curious you can take it apart and find out why. Having done that myself more than a time or two I can tell you that you'll find either broken/shorted plates, sulfation (see my notes above about accumulation at the bottom of the cell; this causes fairly rapid loss of functionality along the lines of what you're describing) or, last but not least, the pH is wrong in which case it is either a sealed battery whose seal has breached or it is an unsealed battery which has not been maintained.
Trust me, I've dealt with these fuckers for years - I have first-hand experience with every possible mode of failure up to and including exploding.
Car batteries aren't normal lead-acid batteries.
:)
Car batteries actually are "normal" lead acid batteries. So are deep-cycle batteries. The only differences that are ever present in any type of lead acid battery is 1 - the physical structure of the plates (grid vs foil), 2 - the venting system (sealed or not) and 3 - the acid (water vs gel).
There are other minor variations. E.g. car batteries have extra ribs of plastic which help to support the plates so that they don't crack loose when you hit a pot-hole. So-called deep-cycle batteries have extra heavy-duty bus bars between the plates to handle the power and help act as a heat-sink.
you risk reversing a cell any time you discharge below 80%
Cells don't risk reversal until they *completely* discharge. Even a damaged cell that discharges earlier than the others will retain its polarity as long as the other cells have any energy left in them. There's no way a lead acid cell will reverse if it still has at least 20% charge (maybe you meant to say that above?) Even then it is highly unlikely to reverse until well below that.
Not to mention that unless the cell is physically damaged so badly that it can't be charged at all, the reversal will be undone as soon as it is charged with the correct polarity.
To get to your point about reduction in voltage, if a cell were truly reversed and somehow stayed that way even through a charge cycle (not sure that's even possible unless you purposely disconnected it and charged it separately with a reverse bias) you would actually see a 4v reduction as it would not only be failing to contribute it's own 2v but that reversed 2v would effectively cancel out 2v worth provided by one of the other cells.
In the case you're describing I would assume that the battery was charged (or discharged) at a higher rate than it was designed for and the plates warped from the heat causing the cell(s) to short out.
I'd bet that the reduced capacity of your batteries just became easily noticable after a few years.
This is actually due to sulfation. Even a sealed battery will have impurities present in both the lead and the acid compound. An unsealed battery is especially vulnerable. Sulfation occurs when the sulfuric acid reacts with the impurities and leaves deposits on the plates. Eventually enough of the surface area is covered that the cell ceases to be functional. This is also why a car battery (or any battery designed for a physically abusive environment) will have a fairly large gap between the bottom of the plates and the bottom of the reservoir. The sulfation in a car battery tends to get knocked loose and settle to the bottom where it shorts the plates out when it accumulates to a sufficient depth.
Anything else I can help clear up about lead acid batteries?
And PLEASE don't use car batteries! You'd kill them dead in just a few full cycles! Only use deep cycle batteries.
I lived in a third world country for some years with nothing more than a bank of old car batteries and a 12v generator. We abused the crap out of them and yes, they would die after a few years, but no sooner than would be expected. Normal lead-acid batteries are actually surprisingly resilient...
they had a policy of two-weeks per year notice :)
That's pretty cool! And if business keeps up I'll be hiring again soon, I just might have to implement that.
As a follow-up to the on-call, get it all in writing in case it becomes a legal matter! Also make them sign some kind of waiver etc. Finally, since it is on-call, in addition to whatever you decide to charge them you might also consider a retainer. Finally, since they seem to like you so much and it doesn't sound like you really hate them you could think about doing a longer term support contract (charging enough to make it worth your while of course! :).
Disregard the parent. The IT industry is as incestuous as any other and burned bridges *will* come back to haunt you. :). I've never, ever quit with less than two weeks though, even working with what turned out to be complete idiots/assholes.
As for the notice, I've given as much as six months (for bosses I liked
As for the subsidized on-call, that just depends on how much free time you'll have and if you feel like doing it or not. (Also depends on what exactly "subsidized" means?!?)
...the whole thing a 70's trailer home "complete with wood paneling" appearance.
:)
Agreed! Some of the joints are pretty sloppy too. I am by no means a professional wood-worker but there's no damn way I'd brag about any of that. Not to mention the varnish looks like some kind of outdoor spar varnish, like he's really going to care about the wood if it gets wet!
Kudos for him even trying it though! It's really not bad as a rough draft. Maybe he'll have another go at it with lessons learned.
[snip]those curly clouds intrigue me to no end....the curves of nature amaze me...
One word: phi
Those would all be good and valid points if they actually related to the problem posted.
:)
From the article: it's getting really crowded for the other customers that just come in for some coffee and have nowhere to sit
I'm sure the shop would love to do things exactly the way you describe if they only had room to!
(Nice post though, even if was completely off-topic - you should be in sales!