Electric air planes with lithium-air batteries would weigh the same at landing as they do at takeoff whereas a 747 loses around a quarter of it's weight en-route.
It is even worse then that. Li-Air batteries absorb oxygen as they release electricity. They get heavier the lower the electric charge. The only possible advantage is that they are lightest when they require the most power - take-off.
Most USB2 hosts include a current limited load switch. When an overcurrent is detected, it turns off the switch and signals the host. This allows the host to display a warning to the user. Just using a PTC resettable fuse does not allow for any user feedback. Also, those PTC fuses are not very accurate and take some time to blow. The load switches are less impacted by changes in the ambient temperature and are much faster to react to an overcurrent event.
Tested them all. The only USB to serial devices that worked flawlessly are FTDI based adapters and some from Tripp-Lite (USA-19HS). The advantage of FTDI devices is they work without additional drivers on Linux and MacOS. And unlike the Tripp-Lite adapters, they work with MacOS hosted virtual machines. For some reason the Tripp-Lite driver can not switch between host and client operating systems when hosted by MacOS.
The FTDI devices are by far the easiest devices to get working and support. Send support an email and they'll provide you with a PID block for your device. They will also sign the Windows driver after being modified to work with this PID. So no annual USB fees or Windows development costs. The little extra you spend to use a FTDI IC is so much less then the other costs associated with low volume products. And who else sells ICs that can also act as a SPI, I2C, or JTAG bridge? And is natively supported by openocd...
Guess if you are only doing USB->serial then the alternatives are fine. But try to do something fancy or support legacy code on a PC and the FTDI chips have no real competition.
For someone who is not an expert it is quite simple. Trust the experts. More specifically, trust the general consensus of the scientific community.
All of the figures, plots, and graphs are not enough to truly understand the problem. Data can be formatted to backup almost any claim. You have to dive deep into the topic to understand enough to come to your own conclusion. So unless you plan on getting a PhD, trust those who already have. And do not trust individuals - they can be purchased. Rely on conclusions that have been presented, discussed, and argued by the scientific community thereby resulting in the acceptance of said conclusion.
And one last point. Ignore articles posted in places such as Slashdot. Rely on articles posted in reputable scientific journals. All of the newsfeeds that repost these things filter out anything they do not want you to see. Bogus papers will be posted but the numerous rebuttals showing that the paper is bogus will not. In essence - you are lied too. So go to the original source where crap is called out for what it is.
About sockets - HBM is integrated into the IC package thereby negating the need for additional IC pins. The claim of poor latency is also a non-issue. The various different caches sitting between the ALU and memory are there to hide memory latency and bandwidth limitations. Even if HBM has higher latency, which I doubt, the CPU cache would largely hide this fact.
All questionable devices should go on a separate network segment that is isolated via a strict firewall. If I can not compile and install OpenWRT on my device, it does not go onto my main network.
Ironically, I've caught myself doing that more than a few times with the "gamer" keyboard.
That is because most "gamer" keyboards are use the Cherry-Red switches. The red switches are designed to be as fast as possible with no change in feedback when the switch is being depressed. This is exactly what you do not want when typing. But when gaming, it allows a talented individual to toggle the switch at a rate much higher then any other style of key.
Cherry-Brown switches are similar to the old Model-M keyboards - just quieter. Not for gaming - but typing is excellent. There are also Cherry-Black and Cherry-Blue switches. One of these is identical to the Model-M, annoying sound and all.
When milling wood or modelling board (plastic composite with the approximate density of wood), CNC machines do not require much power. Potential damage is greatly limited over industrial machines that can mill steel. Home builds are practical and people have been doing it since before 3D printers were popular. A typical use-case for a low powered machine is to mill moulds. These would be used for plastic moulding but you could go another step and cast metals as well. Quality wise, there is really no comparison to most 3D printers. Try browsing the Guerrilla guide to CNC machining, mold making, and resin casting to see what can be done. It is very impressive.
My guess is they just grabbed some farm equipment engine off the shelf to get a prototype together and didn't pay much attention to noise at this early stage, noise is an easy problem to deal at a later stage.
They probably used a lightweight two stroke engine like those used in snowmobiles. They are highly optimized and hard to improve upon with regards to power to weight ratio. Someone previously mentioned a small turbine - that could be interesting. Alternatively, a rotary engine is both more reliable and less weight - if you don't mind the extra fuel required. But regardless of the power source, making it quiet would not be as trivial as you suggest.
But your assessment is accurate. I doubt Boston Dynamics was attempting to do anything other then demonstrate it working in the field. "It's too loud" is something the end user would complain about but those who are assigning contracts are surely intelligent enough to look past that. In fact, if that is the only complaint then the project is a huge success.
Unfortunately the amount of bandwidth available for wireless is limited.
Hence the smaller towers - which are really just boxes installed along power poles designed to service a much smaller area. This greatly reduces the subscriber / tower ratio.
You forgot wireless. If anything will kill the cable companies it is the wireless providers. It is already feasible in some locations to use wireless for internet. As technology improves - and as more mini- or micro-towers are put up to facilitate demand - there will be far more people tempted to adopt a wireless-only connection. With the adoption of newer, lighter portable electronics there is even an advantage to using a wireless ISP - the cable companies will not be able to compete. Of course, this only appliers to cable companies that do not also have wireless divisions.
Of course it would be cooler if only small badges of devices had the same cert, or if you even would go through the hassle to make individual ones.
Going through this hassle is exactly what is typically done. It is not uncommon for the initial - or post reset - boot of a router to take significantly longer then subsequent boots. This is when the router generates the public / private key combination. I suppose that the manufacturers are bypassing this to simplify support. Alternatively, they are truly incompetent and simply flashing the devices with a firmware that already contains the certificate. But each device should have a different serial number which should invalidate a copied certificate. So they must be going out of their way to facilitate a common certificate. Possibly they disabled verification against the serial number?
Regardless of why or how they are doing it, a common certificate indicates a common private key. With that private key you can decode the shared AES (or DES) key and subsequently decode all network traffic. The key will be stored in FLASH memory and can be accessed via JTAG connection.
And this helps how? Neither the device or host have knowledge of the cable that connects between them. Only by embedding this information into the cable can the two devices negotiate power settings that conform to the physical connection. The only alternative is to force active cables - such as Apple's lightning connector or Intel's thunderbolt connector. While this is not a horrible idea, it will not lead to low-cost cables.
or VW could offer an alternative. A new firmware and X dollars refunded to compensate for lost milage / reduced resale value. If they offered enough then people would accept the deal and problem solved. It will cost VW a significant amount of money but would save them in the long run.
Many VW owners would likely see it as a net-gain. Especially those who, after getting the new firmware and compensation check, revert back to the more efficient firmware.
AFV - autonomous fuel vehicle. Why send all the fuel with the astronauts? Send multiple smaller fuel tanks ahead of time and have them go into orbit around Mars. This should greatly reduce the risk of such a mission. Hell, do not send astronauts until you have first verified that 150% of the fuel required has already been successfully put into Mars orbit. Then when humans do go to Mars (if it ever happens), first have then sit in orbit using a robotic workforce to construct whatever planet based infrastructure they require. Only when everything is done should humans step foot on Mars.
Will depend on the OS. The MacBook Pros have had this for some time and MacOS will use the dedicated GPU in certain situations. Depends on many factors - what the application requires, is the computer plugged in, how much battery life is available... Apple has more control of software and hardware so implementing this sort of solution is easier for them. I've heard some complaints but not too many. Do not know how Windows manages this. And Linux? Without capable hardware in the hands of developers one can not expect much progress. And considering the perpetual state of video drivers on Linux.....
But as far as the hardware goes, the integrated GPU is going to be available even if when the external GPU is present. It is likely Dell uses the same motherboard for both laptops - they just neglect to install the external GPU in certain models. This is how manufacturers typically approach this problem.
No need to infer a base case for TB. Unlike most other protocols, the specified speed is the actual throughput and not the speed of the physical layer. So when they claim a bandwidth of 20Gb/s you actually get 20Gb/s - same as if you were using an internal port.
Backwards compatibility is worth more then extra battery life. The A series CPUs are excellent and I am certain they cost Apple less then the Intel chips but adopting them for current products would cause too much grief. Intel is still improving their CPUs and not forcing Apple to switch architectures.
For new platforms, the A series CPUs are an obvious choice. I could see a version of MacOSX being ported to the latest large iPads. In time, the software ecosystem would develop to support the ARM CPUs and eventually, an ARM laptop could be viable. But this would take some time and would require Intel to drop the ball. I do not personally see it happening anytime soon.
No, but the technology used to make a "swarm" work is required if you want drones to operate alongside regular aircraft - ex, Search and Rescue. Remember the fires in California where the water bombers had to turn away because drones were taking photos of the fires? It was not due to a lack of airspace - it was due to the inability to guarantee that the drones would not impact the water bomber. "Swarm" technology could provide that guarantee.
LaTex is horrible for programming in. Painful does not even begin to describe the experience. But LuaLaTeX is different - it allows you to script using Lua thereby making what used to be horrible, feasible. Very useful for automatically generating tables based on external data.
Gas stations of the future will not exist unless they are selling gas. The demand for electric charging will not be great enough because the majority of people will charge at home. Competition from restaurants and other service providers will also be present since providing electricity does not require the infrastructure and safety certification required for selling gasoline - at least not if you are charging slow. Some fuel stations supporting fast charges will likely exist but they will not be common and will likely charge a premium for a charge due to the increased cost of the charging infrastructure. The desire to save money will cause people to adapt their driving / charging habits so that fast charges are not required.
Slashdot Mirror
Electric air planes with lithium-air batteries would weigh the same at landing as they do at takeoff whereas a 747 loses around a quarter of it's weight en-route.
It is even worse then that. Li-Air batteries absorb oxygen as they release electricity. They get heavier the lower the electric charge. The only possible advantage is that they are lightest when they require the most power - take-off.
Most USB2 hosts include a current limited load switch. When an overcurrent is detected, it turns off the switch and signals the host. This allows the host to display a warning to the user. Just using a PTC resettable fuse does not allow for any user feedback. Also, those PTC fuses are not very accurate and take some time to blow. The load switches are less impacted by changes in the ambient temperature and are much faster to react to an overcurrent event.
Tested them all. The only USB to serial devices that worked flawlessly are FTDI based adapters and some from Tripp-Lite (USA-19HS). The advantage of FTDI devices is they work without additional drivers on Linux and MacOS. And unlike the Tripp-Lite adapters, they work with MacOS hosted virtual machines. For some reason the Tripp-Lite driver can not switch between host and client operating systems when hosted by MacOS.
The FTDI devices are by far the easiest devices to get working and support. Send support an email and they'll provide you with a PID block for your device. They will also sign the Windows driver after being modified to work with this PID. So no annual USB fees or Windows development costs. The little extra you spend to use a FTDI IC is so much less then the other costs associated with low volume products. And who else sells ICs that can also act as a SPI, I2C, or JTAG bridge? And is natively supported by openocd...
Guess if you are only doing USB->serial then the alternatives are fine. But try to do something fancy or support legacy code on a PC and the FTDI chips have no real competition.
For someone who is not an expert it is quite simple. Trust the experts. More specifically, trust the general consensus of the scientific community.
All of the figures, plots, and graphs are not enough to truly understand the problem. Data can be formatted to backup almost any claim. You have to dive deep into the topic to understand enough to come to your own conclusion. So unless you plan on getting a PhD, trust those who already have. And do not trust individuals - they can be purchased. Rely on conclusions that have been presented, discussed, and argued by the scientific community thereby resulting in the acceptance of said conclusion.
And one last point. Ignore articles posted in places such as Slashdot. Rely on articles posted in reputable scientific journals. All of the newsfeeds that repost these things filter out anything they do not want you to see. Bogus papers will be posted but the numerous rebuttals showing that the paper is bogus will not. In essence - you are lied too. So go to the original source where crap is called out for what it is.
About sockets - HBM is integrated into the IC package thereby negating the need for additional IC pins. The claim of poor latency is also a non-issue. The various different caches sitting between the ALU and memory are there to hide memory latency and bandwidth limitations. Even if HBM has higher latency, which I doubt, the CPU cache would largely hide this fact.
All questionable devices should go on a separate network segment that is isolated via a strict firewall. If I can not compile and install OpenWRT on my device, it does not go onto my main network.
Ironically, I've caught myself doing that more than a few times with the "gamer" keyboard.
That is because most "gamer" keyboards are use the Cherry-Red switches. The red switches are designed to be as fast as possible with no change in feedback when the switch is being depressed. This is exactly what you do not want when typing. But when gaming, it allows a talented individual to toggle the switch at a rate much higher then any other style of key.
Cherry-Brown switches are similar to the old Model-M keyboards - just quieter. Not for gaming - but typing is excellent. There are also Cherry-Black and Cherry-Blue switches. One of these is identical to the Model-M, annoying sound and all.
That is a little too extreme. Just require a breathalyser lock on the ignition. She is likely not drunk the majority of the time.
When milling wood or modelling board (plastic composite with the approximate density of wood), CNC machines do not require much power. Potential damage is greatly limited over industrial machines that can mill steel. Home builds are practical and people have been doing it since before 3D printers were popular. A typical use-case for a low powered machine is to mill moulds. These would be used for plastic moulding but you could go another step and cast metals as well. Quality wise, there is really no comparison to most 3D printers. Try browsing the Guerrilla guide to CNC machining, mold making, and resin casting to see what can be done. It is very impressive.
My guess is they just grabbed some farm equipment engine off the shelf to get a prototype together and didn't pay much attention to noise at this early stage, noise is an easy problem to deal at a later stage.
They probably used a lightweight two stroke engine like those used in snowmobiles. They are highly optimized and hard to improve upon with regards to power to weight ratio. Someone previously mentioned a small turbine - that could be interesting. Alternatively, a rotary engine is both more reliable and less weight - if you don't mind the extra fuel required. But regardless of the power source, making it quiet would not be as trivial as you suggest.
But your assessment is accurate. I doubt Boston Dynamics was attempting to do anything other then demonstrate it working in the field. "It's too loud" is something the end user would complain about but those who are assigning contracts are surely intelligent enough to look past that. In fact, if that is the only complaint then the project is a huge success.
Unfortunately the amount of bandwidth available for wireless is limited.
Hence the smaller towers - which are really just boxes installed along power poles designed to service a much smaller area. This greatly reduces the subscriber / tower ratio.
You forgot wireless. If anything will kill the cable companies it is the wireless providers. It is already feasible in some locations to use wireless for internet. As technology improves - and as more mini- or micro-towers are put up to facilitate demand - there will be far more people tempted to adopt a wireless-only connection. With the adoption of newer, lighter portable electronics there is even an advantage to using a wireless ISP - the cable companies will not be able to compete. Of course, this only appliers to cable companies that do not also have wireless divisions.
Of course it would be cooler if only small badges of devices had the same cert, or if you even would go through the hassle to make individual ones.
Going through this hassle is exactly what is typically done. It is not uncommon for the initial - or post reset - boot of a router to take significantly longer then subsequent boots. This is when the router generates the public / private key combination. I suppose that the manufacturers are bypassing this to simplify support. Alternatively, they are truly incompetent and simply flashing the devices with a firmware that already contains the certificate. But each device should have a different serial number which should invalidate a copied certificate. So they must be going out of their way to facilitate a common certificate. Possibly they disabled verification against the serial number?
Regardless of why or how they are doing it, a common certificate indicates a common private key. With that private key you can decode the shared AES (or DES) key and subsequently decode all network traffic. The key will be stored in FLASH memory and can be accessed via JTAG connection.
And this helps how? Neither the device or host have knowledge of the cable that connects between them. Only by embedding this information into the cable can the two devices negotiate power settings that conform to the physical connection. The only alternative is to force active cables - such as Apple's lightning connector or Intel's thunderbolt connector. While this is not a horrible idea, it will not lead to low-cost cables.
or VW could offer an alternative. A new firmware and X dollars refunded to compensate for lost milage / reduced resale value. If they offered enough then people would accept the deal and problem solved. It will cost VW a significant amount of money but would save them in the long run.
Many VW owners would likely see it as a net-gain. Especially those who, after getting the new firmware and compensation check, revert back to the more efficient firmware.
AFV - autonomous fuel vehicle. Why send all the fuel with the astronauts? Send multiple smaller fuel tanks ahead of time and have them go into orbit around Mars. This should greatly reduce the risk of such a mission. Hell, do not send astronauts until you have first verified that 150% of the fuel required has already been successfully put into Mars orbit. Then when humans do go to Mars (if it ever happens), first have then sit in orbit using a robotic workforce to construct whatever planet based infrastructure they require. Only when everything is done should humans step foot on Mars.
Yes... Going 16:9 is fine on a 27" screen but 16:10 is much better for laptops.
Will depend on the OS. The MacBook Pros have had this for some time and MacOS will use the dedicated GPU in certain situations. Depends on many factors - what the application requires, is the computer plugged in, how much battery life is available... Apple has more control of software and hardware so implementing this sort of solution is easier for them. I've heard some complaints but not too many. Do not know how Windows manages this. And Linux? Without capable hardware in the hands of developers one can not expect much progress. And considering the perpetual state of video drivers on Linux.....
But as far as the hardware goes, the integrated GPU is going to be available even if when the external GPU is present. It is likely Dell uses the same motherboard for both laptops - they just neglect to install the external GPU in certain models. This is how manufacturers typically approach this problem.
No need to infer a base case for TB. Unlike most other protocols, the specified speed is the actual throughput and not the speed of the physical layer. So when they claim a bandwidth of 20Gb/s you actually get 20Gb/s - same as if you were using an internal port.
Backwards compatibility is worth more then extra battery life. The A series CPUs are excellent and I am certain they cost Apple less then the Intel chips but adopting them for current products would cause too much grief. Intel is still improving their CPUs and not forcing Apple to switch architectures.
For new platforms, the A series CPUs are an obvious choice. I could see a version of MacOSX being ported to the latest large iPads. In time, the software ecosystem would develop to support the ARM CPUs and eventually, an ARM laptop could be viable. But this would take some time and would require Intel to drop the ball. I do not personally see it happening anytime soon.
More like 5cents per kWh - or $50 per MWh? If so then the quoted $23 figure is quite reasonable.
No, but the technology used to make a "swarm" work is required if you want drones to operate alongside regular aircraft - ex, Search and Rescue. Remember the fires in California where the water bombers had to turn away because drones were taking photos of the fires? It was not due to a lack of airspace - it was due to the inability to guarantee that the drones would not impact the water bomber. "Swarm" technology could provide that guarantee.
LaTex is horrible for programming in. Painful does not even begin to describe the experience. But LuaLaTeX is different - it allows you to script using Lua thereby making what used to be horrible, feasible. Very useful for automatically generating tables based on external data.
Gas stations of the future will not exist unless they are selling gas. The demand for electric charging will not be great enough because the majority of people will charge at home. Competition from restaurants and other service providers will also be present since providing electricity does not require the infrastructure and safety certification required for selling gasoline - at least not if you are charging slow. Some fuel stations supporting fast charges will likely exist but they will not be common and will likely charge a premium for a charge due to the increased cost of the charging infrastructure. The desire to save money will cause people to adapt their driving / charging habits so that fast charges are not required.
copyright != license. The term "pro-copyleft" is with respect to the license - copyright is not involved.