The reason is simple: it is by far the cheapest way that the USA will be able roll out broadband Internet on a truly large scale, thanks to the fact putting up WiMax antenna arrays is vastly cheaper than hardwiring every residence and business for T-1/T-3, xDSL and cable broadband access.
Remember, unlike Europe, Japan and South Korea, much of the USA doesn't have enough population density per square mile to justify the exorbitant costs of installing and/or upgrading landlines to get xDSL and cable broadband access; this is the so-called Last Mile Problem. WiMax avoids these issues, especially given the potential for using current cellphone tower arrays for WiMax transmissions, which means the vast majority of the USA population could be within line-of-sight reach of a WiMax antenna setup.
Once they decode these papyrus rolls, it will be very interesting to see who will publish them. G** help us all in terms of copyrights, especially if we are able to "re-discover" a large number of the plays by ancient Greek playwrights!
But the thing of major interest is the discovery that there may be more than just Theogeny and Works and Days by Hesiod. What does Hesiod's other writings say?
In the U.S. a large percentage of metropolitian areas have suburbs that extend hundreds of miles from the nearest city that fill up these wastelands. In other words, you have to wire millions of homes outwards from the city for hundreds of miles.
Is it small wonder why there is so much interest in the USA for 802.16/802.20 WiMax wireless networking technology? Remember, because a single WiMax antenna tower array can handle thousands of users pretty much up to line of sight, this means even spread-out suburbs can get high-speed Internet access without the exorbitant expense of having to install and/or rebuild landline connections to handle DSL or cable broadband.
I live in NYC, and I can get broadband for about $30/month, and it's relatively fast (1.5 M/bit each way, roughly, for pretty much any of the options), available everywhere, and has very low latency.
Of course, it does help that because New York City is the business center of the USA, you better have the best-quality Internet connections, no questions asked. Besides, NYC was one of the first cities to get large-scale fiber-optic connections, so the telecommunications infrastructure is modern enough to set up T-1/T-3, DSL and cable modem broadband rather easily.
I think when LED technologies mature, that's where it will have the most importance.
Imagine the same color temperature as xenon high-intensity discharge headlamps but with far less hardware and power requirements, not to mention far longer usable life! It could mean lighter automobiles because there will be less need for a high-capacity automotive electrical system and also we eliminate the weight of the xenon HID headlamp electrical hardware in the first place.
Here's the big issue: the USA has so much old legacy communications infrastructure that the cost of upgrading it to support broadband Internet is exorbitantly expensive, especially in the older large metropolitan areas in the USA. And of course, because of the large rural population, most of them are out of the reach of DSL or cable broadband. It's essentially the so-called Last Mile Problem, something that's less of an issue in densely-populated Europe, Japan, and South Korea, where there are enough people per square kilometer to justify the exorbitant cost of setting up land-line broadband connections for everyone locally.
So how do we get around this problem? The answer is wide-scale wireless Internet access using 802.16/802.20 WiMax technologies, which will start rolling out in the USA in 2006. Unlike 802.11x WiFi technologies, WiMax can handle thousands of users per antenna array at essentially light of sight range at 2-4 Mbps data transfer speeds. It's vastly cheaper to put up an array of WiMax antennas than to hardware every business or residence to support DSL or cable broadband; this will also allow many rural communities to get broadband for the first time. I think WiMax will roll out by using the same antenna arrays used by cellphones, so already we'll have pretty substantial national coverage anyway.
...That he expected Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith to be rated PG-13 in the first place?
This is a no surprise announcement, given the supposedly very intense action sequences in the movie.
Re:Quirky service but worth it
on
Voom No More
·
· Score: 1
I hope the satellite companies get their act together with HD soon or I might have to jump ship to cable.
With DirecTV announcing the launch of more satellites so they can provide local broadcasts in the larger metropolitan areas in HD along with more HD programming from cable channel providers (probably by the end of 2007), you know where to go. =)
But what motherboard chipset will Dell use?
on
Dell Might do AMD
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
I think Dell will use nVidia's nForce series of chipsets if they do decide to build machines using AMD CPU's. Also, Dell will probably limit themselves to the Athlon 64 CPU's for their desktop machines (they likely won't support Sempron CPU's initially because currently Sempron doesn't support x86-64 instructions).
Most will migrate eventually to DirecTV.
on
Voom No More
·
· Score: 4, Informative
The reason is simple: DirecTV has already publicly announced that they will launch more satellites to provide more 720p/1080i high-definition channels from both cable channel provider and local broadcast sources.
In short, by the end of 2007 your DirecTV receiver dish will get most (if not all) your local channels broadcasting in high-definition along with high-definition signals from the cable channel providers (ESPN/ESPN2 HD, Discovery HD Theater, HDNet, HBO and Showtime in HD, etc.).
I think the biggest reason why the revival of Battlestar Galactica has worked so well is the fact one of the co-creators of the revival is Ronald D. Moore, the same person who did some of the very best episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.
This is why I can't wait for the first ten Second Season episodes that will be shown later this Summer.:-)
However, you do want larger hard drives given the following:
1. Digital still cameras are rapidly increasing in pixel count, even for lower-end models. With five megapixel digital still cameras becoming quite common, the file size for each individual shot has increased quite a bit compared to the 2-3.2 megapixel cameras of just a few years ago. And it will accelerate when 6-8 megapixel digital still cameras come down in price rapidly and high-end non-SLR digital still cameras start to reach the 10 megapixel range.
2. People are now editing videos downloaded from their MiniDV/MicroDV digital camcorders. And those files are very large, especially if you want to assemble a single home video to burn onto a VideoCD or DVD format from multiple original MiniDV/MicroDV tapes.
Dramatically reduced size of battery packs for hybrid drivetrains, like the original article says.
Why do I have this feeling that Honda and/or Toyota are already working on hybrid drivetrains using this new battery? Imagine a Honda Accord Hybrid with these new batteries--they could reduce the battery pack size enough that you regain the ability to fold down the rear seat to increase trunk space just like a "normal" Accord sedan. My guess right now is that Honda is already testing this new battery design for the hybrid version of the 8th-generation Honda Civic due this Fall.
You can download Windows Media Player 10 (if you're a Windows XP user) using broadband so fast nowadays that the download and installation is only a minor inconvenience. Besides, many, many websites (notably those from Premiere Radio Networks) are switching to Windows Media format for their media streaming, mostly because the Windows Media format works quite well in both broadband and dial-up streaming.
I'm not surprised they found these results. After all, fluids of all types tends to behave really differently if you drastically change it from 980 millibars, the standard sea level air pressure. It has all kinds of applications from studying how explosives work to designing high-pressure hydraulic systems for airplanes.
While the achievement of the Spitzer IR space telescope is impressive, a project now in development called the Terrestrial Planet Finder will sport many times the resolution of Spitzer and could become the first telescope to see an Earth-sized planet orbiting around another star.
Essentially four telescopes with 3.5-meter mirrors operating in space in a synchronized fashion, TPF is designed to look for Earth-sized planets orbiting other stars circa 50-100 light years from Earth. If TPF finds a Earth-like planet that has an atmosphere rich in water vapor and oxygen, then we know chances are pretty good that life in some form exists there.
Yes, I've actually seen those on the Finding Nemo DVD and you can tell just from the video that shot at Pixar HQ that the people that work there are sure having a lot of fun.:)
I can just see Robert Iger--who will succeed Michael Eisner this Fall--try to go way out of his way to keep Pixar working with Disney, because Iger know what a big moneymaker Pixar is to the Walt Disney Company.
They may not have the size of Lowes or AMC, but the Syufy's have already made major commitments to have high-quality theatre complexes--most of the new ones built in the last seven years now sport full THX certification on every screen, which certainly means at least I'll have decent sound quality during the movie!:-)
The Syufy's should in a bold move announce that some of the screens at their complexes will be converted to digital projection, and may announce that some of their future complexes will go all-digital, too. That type of move signals that digital projection is going mainstream, especially in the western USA where Century Theatre complexes are all the rage.
I think one of the biggest problems with digital projection is the fact there is no standard for the digital storage media for theater-quality digital projectors.
Interestingly enough, the development of HD-DVD and Blu-Ray optical disc technology could solve that problem. Imagine scaling up a Blu-Ray disc to something about 300 mm (12") wide (about the same size as a Laserdisc); the result could be storage capacity approaching the one terabyte range, which (using standard MPEG-2 compression) could store probably at least two-hour movie at beyond 1080p resolution, including multiple subtitling tracks and multiple audio soundtracks! Even if the disc has to be held in a plastic caddy the whole package would weigh under two kilograms (4.4 pounds), which means far cheaper shipment costs compared to 35 pounds per 20-minute reel of 35 mm film!
...They need a major national movie theater chain to start committing to the technology.
If a company as big a Century Theatres were to announce they were willing to convert some of their complexes they own to include digital projectors and/or open new digital-projector only complexes, that would finally convince people that digital projection is worth the investment.
Having seen digital projection, the amazingly vibrant colors, consistent sharpness and lack of scratches on-screen makes for a breathtaking viewing experience. Small wonder why sales of rear-projection TV's using DLP, LCD and HD-ILA elements are rising rapidly. =)
While I do agree that IE 6.01 SP1 is still vulnerable (especially if you haven't bothered to patch the program regularly), I'm sure that when IE 7.0 arrives these issues will be addressed, especially now given Microsoft's new emphasis on Internet security (note that in the last few security update cycles MS has addressed the big IE security issues discovered by companies such as Secunia).
But I still stick up for Maxthon because its AD Hunter feature blocks up a lot of the banner ads and pop-up ads that can slow the system down (especially Flash banner ads--I detest those!) and frequently load adware/spyware unknowingly to the user. Ever since I switched to Maxthon from plain IE 6.01 SP1 whenever I run SpyBot S&D 1.3.1 I notice dramatically less tracking cookies installed and very rarely the loading of spyware from Alexa and Gator.
However, you do have to download a program to get Firefox to do mouse gestures. The current version of Maxthon has them built-in; I'm a little surprised that Firefox didn't include them as standard.
While I do agree that you could use third-party tools to tweak Firefox to stamp out most banner ads, many of these tools does take some experience in setting them up properly.:(
What's nice about AD Hunter in Maxthon is that all the ad-filtering and pop-up filtering settings are in one menu location, and you can update the blocked site lists to provide updated banner ad/pop-up window ad blocking, too. It's one of the reasons why I hope Microsoft actually considers licensing the Maxthon code so it could be incorporated into Internet Explorer 7.0.
...That they may license the technology from either the Avant browser or the Maxthon "shell" for IE that will become part of Internet Explorer 7.0.
This could be especially bad news for Firefox if IE 7.0 incorporates MySoft Technology's Maxthon code. I've been running Maxthon for over a month (I started with Version 1.12.00 and recently updated to 1.2.00) and believe me, once you're used to Maxthon it's hard to go back to the "stripped down" Firefox. Not only does Maxthon have tabbed browsing, but also true mouse gestures and the very powerful AD Hunter function, which can block out many online ads that slow down the computer and/or install spyware/adware without your knowledge in addition to blocking out most pop-up ad windows.
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The reason is simple: it is by far the cheapest way that the USA will be able roll out broadband Internet on a truly large scale, thanks to the fact putting up WiMax antenna arrays is vastly cheaper than hardwiring every residence and business for T-1/T-3, xDSL and cable broadband access.
Remember, unlike Europe, Japan and South Korea, much of the USA doesn't have enough population density per square mile to justify the exorbitant costs of installing and/or upgrading landlines to get xDSL and cable broadband access; this is the so-called Last Mile Problem. WiMax avoids these issues, especially given the potential for using current cellphone tower arrays for WiMax transmissions, which means the vast majority of the USA population could be within line-of-sight reach of a WiMax antenna setup.
Once they decode these papyrus rolls, it will be very interesting to see who will publish them. G** help us all in terms of copyrights, especially if we are able to "re-discover" a large number of the plays by ancient Greek playwrights!
But the thing of major interest is the discovery that there may be more than just Theogeny and Works and Days by Hesiod. What does Hesiod's other writings say?
In the U.S. a large percentage of metropolitian areas have suburbs that extend hundreds of miles from the nearest city that fill up these wastelands. In other words, you have to wire millions of homes outwards from the city for hundreds of miles.
Is it small wonder why there is so much interest in the USA for 802.16/802.20 WiMax wireless networking technology? Remember, because a single WiMax antenna tower array can handle thousands of users pretty much up to line of sight, this means even spread-out suburbs can get high-speed Internet access without the exorbitant expense of having to install and/or rebuild landline connections to handle DSL or cable broadband.
I live in NYC, and I can get broadband for about $30/month, and it's relatively fast (1.5 M/bit each way, roughly, for pretty much any of the options), available everywhere, and has very low latency.
Of course, it does help that because New York City is the business center of the USA, you better have the best-quality Internet connections, no questions asked. Besides, NYC was one of the first cities to get large-scale fiber-optic connections, so the telecommunications infrastructure is modern enough to set up T-1/T-3, DSL and cable modem broadband rather easily.
I think when LED technologies mature, that's where it will have the most importance.
Imagine the same color temperature as xenon high-intensity discharge headlamps but with far less hardware and power requirements, not to mention far longer usable life! It could mean lighter automobiles because there will be less need for a high-capacity automotive electrical system and also we eliminate the weight of the xenon HID headlamp electrical hardware in the first place.
It's that simple.
Here's the big issue: the USA has so much old legacy communications infrastructure that the cost of upgrading it to support broadband Internet is exorbitantly expensive, especially in the older large metropolitan areas in the USA. And of course, because of the large rural population, most of them are out of the reach of DSL or cable broadband. It's essentially the so-called Last Mile Problem, something that's less of an issue in densely-populated Europe, Japan, and South Korea, where there are enough people per square kilometer to justify the exorbitant cost of setting up land-line broadband connections for everyone locally.
So how do we get around this problem? The answer is wide-scale wireless Internet access using 802.16/802.20 WiMax technologies, which will start rolling out in the USA in 2006. Unlike 802.11x WiFi technologies, WiMax can handle thousands of users per antenna array at essentially light of sight range at 2-4 Mbps data transfer speeds. It's vastly cheaper to put up an array of WiMax antennas than to hardware every business or residence to support DSL or cable broadband; this will also allow many rural communities to get broadband for the first time. I think WiMax will roll out by using the same antenna arrays used by cellphones, so already we'll have pretty substantial national coverage anyway.
...That he expected Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith to be rated PG-13 in the first place?
This is a no surprise announcement, given the supposedly very intense action sequences in the movie.
I hope the satellite companies get their act together with HD soon or I might have to jump ship to cable.
With DirecTV announcing the launch of more satellites so they can provide local broadcasts in the larger metropolitan areas in HD along with more HD programming from cable channel providers (probably by the end of 2007), you know where to go. =)
I think Dell will use nVidia's nForce series of chipsets if they do decide to build machines using AMD CPU's. Also, Dell will probably limit themselves to the Athlon 64 CPU's for their desktop machines (they likely won't support Sempron CPU's initially because currently Sempron doesn't support x86-64 instructions).
The reason is simple: DirecTV has already publicly announced that they will launch more satellites to provide more 720p/1080i high-definition channels from both cable channel provider and local broadcast sources.
In short, by the end of 2007 your DirecTV receiver dish will get most (if not all) your local channels broadcasting in high-definition along with high-definition signals from the cable channel providers (ESPN/ESPN2 HD, Discovery HD Theater, HDNet, HBO and Showtime in HD, etc.).
I think the biggest reason why the revival of Battlestar Galactica has worked so well is the fact one of the co-creators of the revival is Ronald D. Moore, the same person who did some of the very best episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.
:-)
This is why I can't wait for the first ten Second Season episodes that will be shown later this Summer.
1. They consume 3-4 times the power of LCD's for the same display area.
2. They generate a lot of heat.
3. They tend to take up way too much desk space.
4. Getting the display geometry right takes a lot of finicky adjustments, many of which are beyond the understanding of many computer users.
If you get a top-quality LCD from the likes of Samsung, it's hard to go back to a CRT monitor.
However, you do want larger hard drives given the following:
1. Digital still cameras are rapidly increasing in pixel count, even for lower-end models. With five megapixel digital still cameras becoming quite common, the file size for each individual shot has increased quite a bit compared to the 2-3.2 megapixel cameras of just a few years ago. And it will accelerate when 6-8 megapixel digital still cameras come down in price rapidly and high-end non-SLR digital still cameras start to reach the 10 megapixel range.
2. People are now editing videos downloaded from their MiniDV/MicroDV digital camcorders. And those files are very large, especially if you want to assemble a single home video to burn onto a VideoCD or DVD format from multiple original MiniDV/MicroDV tapes.
Dramatically reduced size of battery packs for hybrid drivetrains, like the original article says.
Why do I have this feeling that Honda and/or Toyota are already working on hybrid drivetrains using this new battery? Imagine a Honda Accord Hybrid with these new batteries--they could reduce the battery pack size enough that you regain the ability to fold down the rear seat to increase trunk space just like a "normal" Accord sedan. My guess right now is that Honda is already testing this new battery design for the hybrid version of the 8th-generation Honda Civic due this Fall.
...the effect will be zero anyways.
You can download Windows Media Player 10 (if you're a Windows XP user) using broadband so fast nowadays that the download and installation is only a minor inconvenience. Besides, many, many websites (notably those from Premiere Radio Networks) are switching to Windows Media format for their media streaming, mostly because the Windows Media format works quite well in both broadband and dial-up streaming.
I'm not surprised they found these results. After all, fluids of all types tends to behave really differently if you drastically change it from 980 millibars, the standard sea level air pressure. It has all kinds of applications from studying how explosives work to designing high-pressure hydraulic systems for airplanes.
While the achievement of the Spitzer IR space telescope is impressive, a project now in development called the Terrestrial Planet Finder will sport many times the resolution of Spitzer and could become the first telescope to see an Earth-sized planet orbiting around another star.
Essentially four telescopes with 3.5-meter mirrors operating in space in a synchronized fashion, TPF is designed to look for Earth-sized planets orbiting other stars circa 50-100 light years from Earth. If TPF finds a Earth-like planet that has an atmosphere rich in water vapor and oxygen, then we know chances are pretty good that life in some form exists there.
Yes, I've actually seen those on the Finding Nemo DVD and you can tell just from the video that shot at Pixar HQ that the people that work there are sure having a lot of fun. :)
I can just see Robert Iger--who will succeed Michael Eisner this Fall--try to go way out of his way to keep Pixar working with Disney, because Iger know what a big moneymaker Pixar is to the Walt Disney Company.
Century's not big enough.
:-)
They may not have the size of Lowes or AMC, but the Syufy's have already made major commitments to have high-quality theatre complexes--most of the new ones built in the last seven years now sport full THX certification on every screen, which certainly means at least I'll have decent sound quality during the movie!
The Syufy's should in a bold move announce that some of the screens at their complexes will be converted to digital projection, and may announce that some of their future complexes will go all-digital, too. That type of move signals that digital projection is going mainstream, especially in the western USA where Century Theatre complexes are all the rage.
I think one of the biggest problems with digital projection is the fact there is no standard for the digital storage media for theater-quality digital projectors.
Interestingly enough, the development of HD-DVD and Blu-Ray optical disc technology could solve that problem. Imagine scaling up a Blu-Ray disc to something about 300 mm (12") wide (about the same size as a Laserdisc); the result could be storage capacity approaching the one terabyte range, which (using standard MPEG-2 compression) could store probably at least two-hour movie at beyond 1080p resolution, including multiple subtitling tracks and multiple audio soundtracks! Even if the disc has to be held in a plastic caddy the whole package would weigh under two kilograms (4.4 pounds), which means far cheaper shipment costs compared to 35 pounds per 20-minute reel of 35 mm film!
...They need a major national movie theater chain to start committing to the technology.
If a company as big a Century Theatres were to announce they were willing to convert some of their complexes they own to include digital projectors and/or open new digital-projector only complexes, that would finally convince people that digital projection is worth the investment.
Having seen digital projection, the amazingly vibrant colors, consistent sharpness and lack of scratches on-screen makes for a breathtaking viewing experience. Small wonder why sales of rear-projection TV's using DLP, LCD and HD-ILA elements are rising rapidly. =)
While I do agree that IE 6.01 SP1 is still vulnerable (especially if you haven't bothered to patch the program regularly), I'm sure that when IE 7.0 arrives these issues will be addressed, especially now given Microsoft's new emphasis on Internet security (note that in the last few security update cycles MS has addressed the big IE security issues discovered by companies such as Secunia).
But I still stick up for Maxthon because its AD Hunter feature blocks up a lot of the banner ads and pop-up ads that can slow the system down (especially Flash banner ads--I detest those!) and frequently load adware/spyware unknowingly to the user. Ever since I switched to Maxthon from plain IE 6.01 SP1 whenever I run SpyBot S&D 1.3.1 I notice dramatically less tracking cookies installed and very rarely the loading of spyware from Alexa and Gator.
However, you do have to download a program to get Firefox to do mouse gestures. The current version of Maxthon has them built-in; I'm a little surprised that Firefox didn't include them as standard.
While I do agree that you could use third-party tools to tweak Firefox to stamp out most banner ads, many of these tools does take some experience in setting them up properly. :(
What's nice about AD Hunter in Maxthon is that all the ad-filtering and pop-up filtering settings are in one menu location, and you can update the blocked site lists to provide updated banner ad/pop-up window ad blocking, too. It's one of the reasons why I hope Microsoft actually considers licensing the Maxthon code so it could be incorporated into Internet Explorer 7.0.
...That they may license the technology from either the Avant browser or the Maxthon "shell" for IE that will become part of Internet Explorer 7.0.
This could be especially bad news for Firefox if IE 7.0 incorporates MySoft Technology's Maxthon code. I've been running Maxthon for over a month (I started with Version 1.12.00 and recently updated to 1.2.00) and believe me, once you're used to Maxthon it's hard to go back to the "stripped down" Firefox. Not only does Maxthon have tabbed browsing, but also true mouse gestures and the very powerful AD Hunter function, which can block out many online ads that slow down the computer and/or install spyware/adware without your knowledge in addition to blocking out most pop-up ad windows.