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User: Neil+Boekend

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  1. Re:Nah. on Breakthrough Promises Smartphones that Use Half the Power · · Score: 4, Informative

    Nope, because it doesn't increase the range of the antenna. The same limits to transmitted power apply, no matter what technology you use to transmit it.
    Besides, in heavily populated area's the number of antennas has nothing to do with transmit power, but with maximum throughput.

  2. Re:Not another one... on Breakthrough Promises Smartphones that Use Half the Power · · Score: 1

    Okay, that's your choice. But what does that have to do with this article?

  3. Re:Spacecraft, aircraft, commercial vehicles... on NASA Teams To Build Gyroscopes 1,000X More Sensitive Than Current Systems · · Score: 2

    Did you miss the notice? Actually using nukes is out of style. Governments only threaten to use them.
    No these will be useful in conventional bombs/missiles. If you have 1 meter accuracy then the explosive force can be less, so the civilian casualties can be less so there are less embarrassing images to show on TV.

  4. Re:Let's go retro... on Ask Slashdot: What Stands In the Way of a Truly Solar-Powered Airliner? · · Score: 2

    You could place the solar panels on the containers. Just build them with the same attach points a container has and run a cable down. This cable is plugged into the ship.
    The problem is: a heavy storm is going to be more expensive. In heavy storms the upper containers are sometimes lost. In this case that would mean the solar panels are lost to.

  5. Re:The math doesn't work on Ask Slashdot: What Stands In the Way of a Truly Solar-Powered Airliner? · · Score: 1

    How are the bike and walk mpg's calculated? I don't drink petrol to have the energy for my biking or walking. Is it the volume of food the "motor" consumes extra? Is it the petrol used while producing said food?

    Is that a passenger train in the US (where I hear the trains are usually empty and heavily funded to stay upright, correct me if I am wrong) or a passenger train in Japan during peak hours (pushers helping to get more people in by means of compression)?

    Why is the small airplane better than the large one? Small airplanes are used on short routes which are less fuel efficient due to percentage wise more fuel used during take off and lower cruise altitude so more drag.

  6. Re:The math doesn't work on Ask Slashdot: What Stands In the Way of a Truly Solar-Powered Airliner? · · Score: 1

    Nope, it's lower in a bike. A Quest for distances of 30-200 miles. Beyond that: trains and a fold-up bike (or a rented bike). Planes are terrible mpgpp wise. Maybe cars with 1 driver no passengers are even worse (I haven't done the math, but that is what you seem to claim), but that's doesn't mean they are good.

    Time, however, may be an issue that forces the use of planes. That's a different discussion though.

  7. Re:pretty damm cool. on Glow-In-The-Dark Smart Highways Coming To the Netherlands In 2013 · · Score: 1

    The Dutch are always trying new stuff with roads, like asphalt with noise reduction and better water management (reduced aquaplaning) (Google translate) which is used on highways here or fast and easy to install asphalt (sadly that failed, but they are finding ways of improving it)(google translate)

  8. Re:So... on Glow-In-The-Dark Smart Highways Coming To the Netherlands In 2013 · · Score: 1

    In that case: nuke it from orbit.

  9. Re:Go outside on LG's 84-inch 3840 x 2160 Television Doesn't Come Cheap: $17,000 · · Score: 5, Funny

    Outside lacks Iron Man and other awesomeness. Until they fix that in 2.0 I am not using it.

  10. Re:drop in the bucket on Using Winemaking Waste For Making Fuel · · Score: 2

    I look forward to your explanation of how you plan to power your car with nuclear power. I really, really hope you're not going to claim we should put reactors in cars.

    That concept is old. Boy am I glad they never put it into production.

  11. Re:Not a practical solution to our energy problem on Using Winemaking Waste For Making Fuel · · Score: 1

    Simple solution: pass a bill to force the military to use only green fuels from 2022 onwards.
    Well, relatively simple.

  12. Re:what does RT do that the ipad doesn't? on A Look At Competitors to the Surface and iPad · · Score: 1

    The problem is that if the user can't choose another brand then most brands are not really pushed to improve much. Yes, the open market and it's market forces has a lot of explicit waste, but things will not be cheaper when there are abused monopolies. Android keeps IOS on it's toes, keeps it improving. The features of WP will in time force Android and IOS to become better.
    If the competition is removed then usually development stagnates and price stays the same.
    Proof: ISP's.

  13. Re:Low impact on EXT4 Data Corruption Bug Hits Linux Kernel · · Score: 2

    Windows 7 should not have automounted the partition once it detected it wasn't forward compatible with the partition formatting. Forced mounting and formatting would be possible user choices. The bug is in the detection (there may not be any) or the action after the detection.

  14. Re:Upper Limit on NASA Satellite Sees Black Hole Belching Out Hundred-Million-Degree X-rays · · Score: 2

    Since heat is movement, the upper limit to heat would be when the atoms are moving at C. How hot that is is a bit beyond my physics education to calculate, but matter isn't transparent at that temperature. Atoms do not exist. Neither do protons or neutrons. Everything is a quark-gluon plasma at 4 trillion degrees C. What it is at even hotter temperatures is unknown to me (and a quick Google/wikipedia).

  15. Re:idea on What To Do With Those First Generation Photo Frames? · · Score: 2

    Would it be possible to use this to display an X server and have it as a (horribly lagging) extra monitor?

  16. Re:Umm on Ask Slashdot: How Do SSDs Die? · · Score: 1

    The average temperature graph provided me with new information and I expect it would be actionable for datacenter builders (regulate temp of hdd's between 37 and 45 C).

  17. Re:How about a picture? on Amateur Planet Hunters Find First Planet In a Four-Star System · · Score: 1

    For reference to the 1000 AU orbit of the outer stars: Pluto has a max distance of about 50 AU, so the stars would probably not stand out more than Jupiter now on the night sky.

  18. Re:Six stars on Amateur Planet Hunters Find First Planet In a Four-Star System · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Easy, the planet could have a slow rotation. The planet orbits two stars (who orbit each other extremely closely). At an orbit further out two other stars orbit the entire system of 2 stars and a planet. The large orbit of the "outer stars" means everything can be in such a configuration:
    0 = star . = planet _ = space because nbsp's don't work

    00 _ _ _ _ 00 .

    This would give a night. Half a year later (from the planets POV)

    00 _ _ _ . 00
    and they have no night.

    My question is: how can such a system be stable? The planet would have vastly different gravitational forces when it's between the starts as opposed to when it's not between the stars. I suppose the outer stars could be in an extremely big orbit (twice the size of Pluto's) so the effect would be slow, but I expect a great risk of orbital instability and thus crashing into the star or being flung out of orbit into the vastness of space. Neither are fun.

  19. Re:A truly ridiculous idea. on A Supercomputer On the Moon To Direct Deep Space Traffic · · Score: 1

    Cooling is an issue. Space isn't as cold as in movies. It isn't warm either. It's just nothing. Almost no particles means there is nothing to transport the heat away. Since your computers do generate heat cooling is a big problem. Radiation works, but it's slow (unless the ship is very hot. Radiation goes faster if the object is hot, but that kills the computer).

    On poles of the moon you would be able to use the moon as a giant heat capacity and heat sink. The water detected in craters on the south pole would probably be used to transport the heat to a large area, in order to slow the heating of the local part of the moon. Assuming the insulating properties are known you'd be able to calculate what area you'd need to keep the cooling water cool enough.

  20. Re:Who's up first? on Air Force Lab Test Out "Aircraft Surfing" Technique To Save Fuel · · Score: 1

    Because humans can't hold the plane in the vortex reliably. Computers could probably be programmed to be able to, so it's getting interesting now.

  21. Re:Who's up first? on Air Force Lab Test Out "Aircraft Surfing" Technique To Save Fuel · · Score: 1

    Nope, the lead car has less resistance. The next car creates a high pressure zone in front of it. This high pressure zone fills the vacuum after the lead car. This vacuum was pulling the lead car back.

  22. Re:Birds Years MILLIONS Re:prior art on Air Force Lab Test Out "Aircraft Surfing" Technique To Save Fuel · · Score: 1

    They most probably did it for millions of years but that doesn't invalidate the thousands of years. Thousands of years is simply a bit incomplete.

  23. Re:What about the speed of information? on Mathematicians Extend Einstein's Special Relativity Beyond Speed of Light · · Score: 1

    A spacecraft has mass and it moves, so it does generate gravitational waves. But space is big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind- bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it's a long way down the road to the chemist's, but that's just peanuts to space.
    The result of this mind-bogging size is that most objects are quite far away. Spacecrafts are light (compared to planets) so they emit only a small wave. If the spaceship is also far away then this means the effective noise of it will be minuscule.
    Besides, the locations of all spaceships in our solar system are quite known. If you know the mass, location and speed then some geniuses can calculate the wave it should generate (I can't).

    Unless you are talking about alien spaceships. If such a spaceship would travel close enough to LISA then it could probably be detected. Maybe the aliens will be curious as to why we are positioning some weird ass satellites at the exact points of an equilateral triangle with arms of 5,000,000 km.

  24. Re:What about the speed of information? on Mathematicians Extend Einstein's Special Relativity Beyond Speed of Light · · Score: 1

    They measure it by using huge gravitational events. Some events cause gravitational ripples. The gravitational ripples of events such as the colliding of black holes are big enough to measure and quite fast (frequencies of 0.01 Hz).

    If I understand correctly even earth emits gravitational waves (due to it's orbit around the sun), and although the amplitude is minuscule compared to black holes the source is so much closer than the black holes (thank FSM for that).
    The frequency is what separates the black hole gravitational waves form the waves of the earth. Earth has 0.0000003171 Hz (one vibration per year), black holes orbiting and colliding have a frequency of 0.01 Hz to a couple of 100 Hz. That difference is what makes the black hole waves detectable.
    But yes, there is a lot of noise. That's wht LISA is meant for in space, where the most sources of noise (someone driving on a road, a researcher walking in the test facility and stuff like that. Everything that has mass and moves emits gravitational waves) are far away. The ones that are left are predictable (planets, the sun, nearby stars), can be used to check the speed of gravitational waves (since they coincide with a visible event) or are extremely rare.