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User: jrumney

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Comments · 6,163

  1. Re:The Screen on Apple Unveils New iPad · · Score: 1

    Windows has let you change the DPI since at least Windows 95. On Windows 7, right click the desktop, select Screen Resolution, and click on Make text and other items larger or smaller

  2. Re:Photo of phones before and after iphone on Google, Motorola Ordered To Provide Android Info To Apple · · Score: 3, Insightful

    So on one side, a complete mish mash of phones on the market before the iPhone, all different colors, shapes and sizes. Oh, and among them, top center, is a phone which apparently was the inspiration for the iPhone (possibly the LG Prada, but at that resolution it's difficult to tell). And on the other side, you have a careful selection of phones that look somewhat similar to the iPhone, which were launched after it. If I go down to my local phone store, I still see phones with keyboards, phones in various colors other than black, and even non-smartphones, so your picture is obviously biased towards making a point.

  3. Re:24/192 forces better mastering on Why Distributing Music As 24-bit/192kHz Downloads Is Pointless · · Score: 1

    With the way music is mastered these days, I think its more likely that 24 bits would be seen as an opportunity for more dynamic range compression - a new front in the loudness war.

  4. Re:The bit depth does matter on Why Distributing Music As 24-bit/192kHz Downloads Is Pointless · · Score: 1

    In an age where DAC ICs are pretty cheap

    The cost of DAC ICs is completely irrelevant if said consumer device already has one. Most DACs used for 16 bit audio will support 24 bits already, it just takes a change in the I2S signal that is input to them. I'd say the reasons are the lack of source content, and the fact that some of the common audio codecs have inherent limitations, and even where the codec format is not limited, the implementations are.

  5. Re:The bit depth does matter on Why Distributing Music As 24-bit/192kHz Downloads Is Pointless · · Score: 1

    I can't hear any better than cd redbook (even then its better than my aging hearing) but I sure can see it on the test gear I use to design my own gear with.

    I take it that you are talking about frequencies well above the range of human hearing here.

    I too have some experience taking measurements from test equipment, and I can assure you that the waveforms you see from a decent 16bit DAC at 44.1kHz with a properly designed circuit are perfect sine waves from 0Hz all the way up to 20kHz.

  6. Re:The bit depth does matter on Why Distributing Music As 24-bit/192kHz Downloads Is Pointless · · Score: 2

    High bit-depth playback matters greatly for any system that controls volume at the mixer stage rather than the amp stage.

    Which is why sound cards that do mixing/volume control in the digital domain have an upscaling step before their final mixing stage. So the source material still doesn't need to have more bits.

  7. Re:Job over? on FTC Attorney Joins Microsoft · · Score: 2, Interesting

    What was his reason for leaving the FTC?

    Perhaps he wanted an employer who would agree with his distrust of Google.

  8. Re:Don't go there... on Ask Slashdot: Using Company Laptop For Personal Use · · Score: 1

    On the other hand, the time he spends in hotel rooms while on a business trip is HIS time, not theirs. They are not paying him for it, it belongs to him. He has loaned it to the company for work purposes. Don't abuse that by being arseholes about whether he can use his work laptop for personal use while on business trips.

  9. Re:goto is all you need for modern programming? on Stroustrup Reveals What's New In C++ 11 · · Score: 1

    Goto is no way sufficient for modern programming. You also need some way to manipulate whatever passes for the (effectively stack) constructs that allow nested parameters and locals. So push, pop and goto then. Anything more is syntactic sugar.

  10. Re:Commodore Amiga was utilizing the Internet worl on Why Didn't the Internet Take Off In 1983? · · Score: 1

    The A500 wasn't released until 1987. The 1985 Amiga was the A1000.

  11. Re: Judges ruling on Photographing Police: Deletion Is Not Forever · · Score: 1

    the prospective husband providing a sample for testing with his own hands

    Genius! Since complying with these criteria is a sin, religious bigots would soon be removed from the gene pool and we could move on to accepting marriage between two people who love each other regardless of gender.

  12. Re:$5? that's nothing on The Specter of Gasoline At $5 a Gallon · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Well, our 4% of the population has the largest GDP per capita than anyone else in the world.

    Ah, the old "we're the richest therefore we're entitled to waste the most" argument. And it's not even true.

  13. Re:Only root? on Torvalds Calls OpenSUSE Security 'Too Intrusive' · · Score: 1

    If you had a real printer you could just cat the postscript to whatever device it was connected to...

    You mean like:

    crw------- root root 6, 0 lp0

  14. Re:Winter/mud/etc. on Rearview Car Cameras Likely Mandated By 2014 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    What make the lawmakers think that people will use RV camera's instead. It's not very useful as most RV cameras only show what is directly behind you, not what is going to T-bone you as you jet out without looking.

    Most RV cameras are wide angle lenses, and being mounted at the very rear of the car, they are in a position where they have a much better view of what is about to T-bone you than the driver seat with its view obscured by the truck, wall, etc you are parked next to.

  15. Re:No difference or no discernible difference? on Master Engineer: Apple's "Mastered For iTunes" No Better Than AAC-Encoded Music · · Score: 1

    Every lossless decoder drops the phase information...

    Decoders don't drop anything, especially if they are lossless.

  16. Re:If Pakistan had it 13 years ago, why not Americ on US Wants Natural Gas As Major Auto Fuel Option · · Score: 1

    CNG / gasoline dual fuel vehicles became popular in New Zealand in the late 1970's, when government subsidies were available for conversions. These days LPG is more popular due to the longer range (and the fact that LPG can be transported in tankers, so is available everywhere, not just where the natural gas pipelines go).

  17. Re:Lame on Facebook Tests 'Safe' User Tag For Disasters · · Score: 2

    This is nothing more than a marketing drive to try to attract attention to themselves from the Japanese public who have so far ignored Facebook almost completely.

  18. Re:So, let them die. on Reasons Behind the Demise of Kodak · · Score: 1

    Kodak's strenght was film photography.

    Specifically, their strength was the film itself, and printing. Their cameras were always at the low end, which is why, even though they reacted quickly to digital and were one of the first companies to offer consumer digital cameras, they were ultimately unable to compete. Companies that focused on the hardware in the film age are still able to compete strongly in today's market.

  19. Re:Oh no! on Siri To Power Mercedes-Benz Car Systems · · Score: 2

    This could be a dangerous approach of Apple to cars... so they will soon patent stuff like, maybe, the car wheels.

    Don't worry, they won't patent all wheels. Just ones with rounded corners.

  20. Re:Pre-industrial? on Interrupted Sleep Might Be the Best Kind · · Score: 1

    The transition from dark to light and vice versa happens very quickly near the equator. Dusk and dawn last about 10 to 15 minutes.

  21. Re:US centric ? on The Best Streaming Media Player · · Score: 2

    I don't know of anyone else offering legal downloadable media in so many countries.

    All 6 of them? And the record and movie companies wonder why piracy is so rampant in the rest of the world.

  22. Re:OK, whatever. on With Push for OS X Focus, CUPS Printing May Suffer On Other Platforms · · Score: 1

    I guess your distro has patched the avahi support back in. The mainline has not supported avahi since CUPS 1.3.

  23. Re:Pre-industrial? on Interrupted Sleep Might Be the Best Kind · · Score: 1

    Near the equator it is never dark for 14 hours a day. The length of a day varies from about 11.5 hours to 12.5 hours.

  24. Re:Tenure on Academics Not Productive Enough? Sack 'em · · Score: 1

    ...extraordinary work that otherwise might have gotten them fired for not toeing the university line. (The easiest examples that comes to mind is global warming, creationism, etc.)

    You seem to be using the word "extraordinary" to mean abnormal. In regular usage, the word usually has a different meaning, which would suggest something positive comes out of this.

  25. Re:OK, whatever. on With Push for OS X Focus, CUPS Printing May Suffer On Other Platforms · · Score: 1

    So it works with Avahi, but is a pain to configure? Isn't that a problem with Avahi then? Why can't they include CUPs configs in Avahi as one of the main zeroconf uses if it is a usability concern?

    Because the "CUPS configs" are printer specific. CUPS used to configure both avahi and bonjour automatically for each printer, but since Apple took over the project, it was changed to only support bonjour.