Rip almost any new CD. Find out how many music peaks are within 99% of clipping in any song.
I ripped one of my kid's CD's. Every track hit 100% within 5 seconds of the start of the track. Compare that with a Telarc recording from the 1980's. No compression is simply a relative term refrenced to the CD, not the live performance. It's almost all highly compressed these days to sound loud on the radio. Can you find a track anymore where more than 10 seconds are below -20db of peak?
I guess that is why Pink Floyd is popular again. They put out stuff with real dynamic range. It's amazing how much I'm seeing the cover art for Dark Side of the Moon lately.
It seems to me like the RIAA is stabbing blindly in the dark.
I don't think they will be happy until computers come with a read only hard drive. After all most stuff is simply tucked on a hard drive to be played by Winamp.
I know I rip all my CD's to the hard drive and put the originals away for safekeeping. Then I burn mixes for the car. Oops.. Does that mean I'm a pirate? I now have two copies on recordable media.
If you're playing with the GPS / WiFi sniffer / $random_electronic_car_toy your attention is off the road, which is dangerous...
Don't knock GPS. When lost a GPS is better than a folded map and trying to read the street names on the signs in the trees instead of watching the road. A GPS with voice turn by turn directions beats trying to read the street sign while missing the light turning red.
I drive in unfamiliar areas all the time. Putting in an address before leaving home and having the GPS navigate is a winner.
Much as I'd love a clean burning fire in my fireplace - drawing 8-9kW to do it is nuts.
As much as you would like to believe otherwise, this is electric heat. Start with water. Make parts. Recombine parts. Get water back. Water at high temp is called steam. Release steam into room. It's electric heat that releases water vapor into the room. The same end result of a kettle of water on a hot electric stove. The amount of heat released is the same as released by resistive electric heat. Some of the heat is used to change the state of water from liquid to vapor. Electrolisis and burning is a net zero change. Look up rules of thermodynamics on the conservation of energy. They still apply. There is no hidden extra heat output from the burning of hydrogen. A heat pump is more effecient as some of the energy used simply relocates heat from one place to another. Therefore BTU's used + BTU's relocated = total BTU's put into the heated spece.
I am going to SUE the University of Texas for ruining my only chance at true love, and future damages from the children I will not have.
If they inform you, then no problem. Just use your hotmail account instead. Having a box for work and another for entertainment/personal is the way it should be.
My business box is heavely guarded with SpamAssassin and Roaring Penguin. I don't lose business mail while throwing out the garbage. My other account is sorted by whitelist. I may lose some corospondance when taking out the trash, but not any from regular family and friends.
Now I guess we'll all just have to wait until we're hacked to find out if we bought the right one.
Finish reading the article.. Does you device allow you to enter your own passkey? Does your device allow you to reject connection attempts? If your device has no user interface, then it probably is vunerable.
They are building armor for pay content and trying to make it transparant to the end user. Files backup, restore and work as long as the restore is not on someone else's machine.
The next generation of downloadable movies, news, pictures, etc. may have restrictions such as you can view online, but not swipe a copy, you can buy a copy, but it'll only work on your machine. You can send a classified document you created to a co-worker and they can read it, but not forward it, or cut and paste it, or save it. The file would be encrypted. The encryption would be tied to the hardware of the creater and reciepient. 3rd parties would not have the keys to decrypt for viewing, forwarding, etc.
This is for e-mail, documents, and pay content.
Old hardware will not be compatible with the new encryption.
but can't you just program the kernel to tell the media player program "yeah, sure the DRM is fine. carry on!"
Um.. sure unless the key for your copy is in the hardware. It's like the access card on a Dish TV box, a cable box, or the firmware in a DVD player. The media is encrypted and sent. The key is tied up in firmware. Just flipping a bit to tell it to play won't work unless you also have a working decryption program with working keys for the file. On download on demand media, the file will be encrypted using your key hash. Then the file can be played on your machine using your key. It won't play elsewhere because the key for decryption is missing. There is no bit that says it's ok to play. There is the problem with the wrong key can't decrypt the file for playing. That's how DRM works.
Oddly enough, even though you're a troll, your post brings up an interesting question: The Darwin kernel is Free Software. According to the headline, the kernel is the part that implements the DRM. Given this, shouldn't it be trivial to get the source code, remove the DRM bits, add some code to lie to programs requesting authorization (i.e., fake the DRM), and go merrily on your way?
Umm sure unless you want to play some DRM content. It's like buying a DVD player with no DRM. All your DRM (encrypted) DVD's no longer play. I guess if you want to be limited to playing just your friends home cam DVD's you'll be fine.
I hate those bastards! I knew they were going to try and sneak this crap past us! They were plo...oh wait, did you say Apple?
No, it's there so you can play your subscription content. Think i-Tunes. The copy you paid for will play on your machine, but will not on your kids friends machine. It enables the ablilty to play encrypted content that you paid for. It has nothing to stop you from playing your CD full of MP3's.
So here I had a legitimate paid licensed Windows XP Professional computer which will not pass the windows licensing scheme. I'll have to dig out a SP1 cd sometime and reinstall with the actual key so it will pass.
Even worse are 3rd party apps that get toasted in the shuffle. My HP (Bought brand new) had it's cd burner software act up. No problem. Uninstall and re-install to repair. Uninstall went fine. Re-install became a big problem. No install CD. The program is part of the recovery HD image. The only way to re-install is to wipe the hard drive of all your settings and applications and start over from scratch.
Needless to say, my CD burner is working again. Just don't ask about the version of the CD software..or it's reciept. I would have used the original for re-instalation if it didn't come with the penalty of wiping the drive to re-install it.
I thought that the record companies were supposed to be the shining beacons of morality!
You're kidding, right? Have you listened to any of the lyrics the middle school kids are sharing via burnt CD's. My kid wanted me to copy a CD so he could give a copy to a friend. The burnt copies don't have the M rating printed on the cover for the parents to notice. Do you have any idea how many songs on the Slipknot Iowa album have the F word? You may hear only 2 or 3 songs from an Album on the radio, but the CD has an M rating. They say it's not for those under 18, but it's what the middle school kids trade copies of at school.
I know that it's an absurd over-reaction, but if no-one is willing to accept the bribe, then there will be no bribe.
Wow, talk about a double standard. Is this one of the same companies that helped make it possible to shut down internet radio stations by making the music too expensive to play?
Wow, first they complain and bribe because their stuff doesn't get played enough, then they shut down radio stations that would be happy to play it for free.
It sounds like they want the competition shut down (indi station might play the competition's songs) and their stations bought and paid for to play their stuff excluding the competition.
When looking up and seeing all these power transmission lines criss-crossing my city, I could not help but wonder what would happen if there was a high negative DC voltage on those, causing the air around them to be charged like what happens in a thunderstorm. Add a little breeze, and I figured the airborne dirt would be charged and electrostatically attracted to ground.
The DC line is not 800KV to ground. The line is Bi-Polar. One conductor is +400KV the other -400KV. What I find interesting is after years of operation, the line has noticable color diffrences between the conductors. It's been a few years since I've been out and looked at the line, but one conductor is light colored while the other one is a dark color. I wondered if the reaction changed the resistance or strength of the line much. Could the life of the line be extended if the polarity of the line were reversed every few years, and would it make much difference? I don't know which conductor is light and which is dark. It would be interesting to find out.
Now, that high power solid-state switches ( hence, power converters ) are becoming do-able, is there any way we can start putting high-voltage DC on our power grids?
It is do-able for a price. A typical AC substation has transformers consisting of iron, copper, oil and a few other materials. Construction of the d-c leg of the Pacific Intertie began in 1966 and lasted until 1970, with the Celilo Converter Station facility itself costing $54 million. The Sylmar converter at the South end of the line cost more due to the farady cage built over it.
If a small electrostatic generator drops the crap out of the air in a room, would a bigger one clear stagnant air over an entire city... such as the Los Angeles basin?
It may help some on particles, but much of the smog is oxides and hydrocarbons which are gasses. The end of the BPA DC line terminates at the Ditmer converter station near LA. There hasn't been enough of a change in air quality near the line to notice. The line is about 800KV.
From a google search..
Celilo-Sylmar, 800-kV d-c Transmission Line
This line runs about 845 miles from the Celilo Converter Station, the northern d-c terminal of the NW-SW Intertie on the Columbia River near The Dalles, Oregon, via Nevada to the Sylmar Station. This bipolar overhead transmission line, with an operating voltage of 800 kV (±400 kV) and a power rating of 1,440 megawatts (MW), was constructed and placed in service in 1970.
It would allow people to hook up better electronics to their vehicle, plus it would make the car more energy efficient. The example I heard was that instead of a belt driven AC unit, it would be electical.
The article I had read at the time stated that the standard would be implemented in 2005. Does anyone know about this?
The only car I know of with an electric sealed compressor instead of a belt driven compressor is the 2005 Prius. It runs off the 400 volt hybrid battery, not the low voltage side of things. They didn't bother to stop at 48 volts.
In the new Prius, the AC is no longer belt driven. This eliminates the shaft seal, a common wear and slow leak source. The new AC is electric using a sealed compressor much like a home AC unit.
The peltier chips used in the device are more energy-efficient, last between 20 and 30 years,
I have a solid state ice chest. I don't believe the expected life rating when applied to a solution where condensation is present. It does not apply when they are used in high humidity. Corrosion from condensation kills these in a very short time. The module in my fridge died long ago from condensation caused corrosion. I would not want these in any application that runs below the dew point. Since my AC in my car is designed to run below the dew point to defog windows, there is no way I want a cooling solution that dies when it gets wet. Speaking of more energy-effecient; More effecient than what? Older modules, compressor driven? I have not seen any peltier chips ready to replace the compressor driven freezers and window AC compressors. They simply don't remove enough heat.
An advantage a working fluid AC has over a solid state solution is the hot side can be far removed from the cold side. The radiator for most car AC units is in front of the engine in cool air. A solid state AC would have the hot side behind the engine next to the passanger compartment. Just where were they planning on putting their waste heat? A typical car AC unit is over 20,000 BTU's. How many BTU is their system?
"I've never heared of a sound card on a mainframe."
It's called a AM pocket radio and a very special stack of punch cards, you insensitive clod!
Wow does that bring back ancient memories. I remember that being done at the Columbia Basin College in the 1960s. They demonstrated their new computer by playing "The Flight of the Bumble Bee". They used a transistor radio for the sound card.
Disclaimer, I wasn't a student then. My father was. I went to the open house. The other hit at the show was using the high speed hydraulic press to crack wallnuts.
Snicker. Mainframes don't even have the concept> of what video cards are, much less sound cards.
I agree. Not all hardware supports all ports. However if the mainframe has an RS-232 port, I can make some assumptions about it such as voltage swings (not 0-5 V but +12 and -12) some handshaking such as DTR CTS DSR, and some expected supported baud rates such as 300, 600, 1200, 2400, 4800.
I can make these assumptions even though I've never seen your port on your mainfraim, but I can expect it to print text log files to an ASCII dot matrix printer with a serial port after the comm paramaters are properly matched.
I also expect at the hardware level to be able to talk to a VT100 dumb terminal. The port on the mainfraim can be configured to talk to a dumb terminal on a serial port.
Try connecting a all in one printer to the centronics port on the mainframe. Now try printing that log file.....
Now you enter the realm of communications problems between Windows and Mainframe programmers. The Mainfraim programmer can't find any information in the owners manual of the commands to send the printer to either print, scan, or read the flash card from the digital camera. The Windows programmer is simply instructed to give the output to the OS to use the driver. The lack of open information is the problem. No Windows, hardware won't work.
What do we all need to know to get along in each other's worlds?"
What is needed is open specs on anything that enters or leaves the machine whether it be a file, protocol, or hardware handshake.
The biggest area's of contention are printers that won't work, this sound card, video card, input device, etc won't work because of no published standard of how to talk to it. We need the end of closed drivers, files and secret drivers.
Open standard items work great on all platforms. Take for example Ethernet and TCP/IP. The cable is standard as well as the low level signals. Plug in a cable, follow the spec for the address and it works.
Anything that uses TCP/IP on Ethernet also just works.
Plugging in my printer into a Centronics port takes care of the low level hardware connection, but there are big problems after that. The printer box should not require anyting beyond a Centronics, USB, or other standard connection. The idea of Requires Windows 2000 or Windows XP is for the birds. Saying it is Postscript is 100% OK. I can connect that to anything with the proper hardware port (Centronics, USB, Ethernet, Firewire, etc.) that supports Postscript.
I don't think that's what he meant. He is interested in a RF picture of the room to pinpoint the location of RF souces, no just check the color of the light in the room.
I think something along the lines of an X\Y scanning radar (passive only) that would raster graph the signal strengths in it's pattern is more what he is looking for. A room full of laptops and routers would look like candles on the ocean.
I can tell no ham radio operators have replied. A loop antenna is built as a small portion of a wavelength of the signal. For example a 12 inch loop is used for low VHF such as Marine or Aircraft bands. A 24 inch loop is used for HF amature bands. This would include the 20 Meter, 40 Meter and other HF bands. (2-30 MHZ)
At 2.4 Ghz a pratical loop antenna would have very small dimensions and have a bi-polar pattern. A much more pratical antenna would have high gain in a single direction. This could be used to pinpoint the direction of the signal using a moderate size antenna such as a small 1 foot dish or 18 inch long yagi. Getting a null and hunting a source using an antenna the size of an asprin makes no sense. Loop antennas are not noted for their high gain and sensitivity. They are used for finding the direction of a strong signal is a relatively small package. With Wi-Fi, you are looking for a low power signal. It makes much more sense to use a moderate size high gain directional antenna to pinpoint the direction of the source.
Why start with an antenna with very low gain and try to find the diretion the signal is the weakest? (the null)
I've used loop antennas for DF work. Much of the time is spent trying to get close enough with a regular whip antenna (stronger signal) to get enough signal to DF with the loop. A loop in the house may find the guy at the table with a laptop stashed in his gym bag at the board meeting, but it won't find the leach in the parking lot until you get very close.
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as a regular CD with artwork and no compression!
You are kidding. Right?
Rip almost any new CD. Find out how many music peaks are within 99% of clipping in any song.
I ripped one of my kid's CD's. Every track hit 100% within 5 seconds of the start of the track. Compare that with a Telarc recording from the 1980's. No compression is simply a relative term refrenced to the CD, not the live performance. It's almost all highly compressed these days to sound loud on the radio. Can you find a track anymore where more than 10 seconds are below -20db of peak?
I guess that is why Pink Floyd is popular again. They put out stuff with real dynamic range.
It's amazing how much I'm seeing the cover art for Dark Side of the Moon lately.
It seems to me like the RIAA is stabbing blindly in the dark.
I don't think they will be happy until computers come with a read only hard drive. After all most stuff is simply tucked on a hard drive to be played by Winamp.
I know I rip all my CD's to the hard drive and put the originals away for safekeeping. Then I burn mixes for the car. Oops.. Does that mean I'm a pirate? I now have two copies on recordable media.
If you're playing with the GPS / WiFi sniffer / $random_electronic_car_toy your attention is off the road, which is dangerous...
Don't knock GPS. When lost a GPS is better than a folded map and trying to read the street names on the signs in the trees instead of watching the road. A GPS with voice turn by turn directions beats trying to read the street sign while missing the light turning red.
I drive in unfamiliar areas all the time. Putting in an address before leaving home and having the GPS navigate is a winner.
Much as I'd love a clean burning fire in my fireplace - drawing 8-9kW to do it is nuts.
As much as you would like to believe otherwise, this is electric heat. Start with water. Make parts. Recombine parts. Get water back. Water at high temp is called steam. Release steam into room. It's electric heat that releases water vapor into the room. The same end result of a kettle of water on a hot electric stove. The amount of heat released is the same as released by resistive electric heat. Some of the heat is used to change the state of water from liquid to vapor. Electrolisis and burning is a net zero change. Look up rules of thermodynamics on the conservation of energy. They still apply. There is no hidden extra heat output from the burning of hydrogen. A heat pump is more effecient as some of the energy used simply relocates heat from one place to another. Therefore BTU's used + BTU's relocated = total BTU's put into the heated spece.
I am going to SUE the University of Texas for ruining my only chance at true love, and future damages from the children I will not have.
If they inform you, then no problem. Just use your hotmail account instead. Having a box for work and another for entertainment/personal is the way it should be.
My business box is heavely guarded with SpamAssassin and Roaring Penguin. I don't lose business mail while throwing out the garbage. My other account is sorted by whitelist. I may lose some corospondance when taking out the trash, but not any from regular family and friends.
Try a trace route on the URL. There is lots of ways to find it. Subscribe to their mail list and read the headers in the spam...
Then add it to your router hosts file.
Now I guess we'll all just have to wait until we're hacked to find out if we bought the right one.
Finish reading the article.. Does you device allow you to enter your own passkey? Does your device allow you to reject connection attempts? If your device has no user interface, then it probably is vunerable.
They are building armor for pay content and trying to make it transparant to the end user. Files backup, restore and work as long as the restore is not on someone else's machine.
The next generation of downloadable movies, news, pictures, etc. may have restrictions such as you can view online, but not swipe a copy, you can buy a copy, but it'll only work on your machine. You can send a classified document you created to a co-worker and they can read it, but not forward it, or cut and paste it, or save it. The file would be encrypted. The encryption would be tied to the hardware of the creater and reciepient. 3rd parties would not have the keys to decrypt for viewing, forwarding, etc.
This is for e-mail, documents, and pay content.
Old hardware will not be compatible with the new encryption.
but can't you just program the kernel to tell the media player program "yeah, sure the DRM is fine. carry on!"
Um.. sure unless the key for your copy is in the hardware. It's like the access card on a Dish TV box, a cable box, or the firmware in a DVD player. The media is encrypted and sent. The key is tied up in firmware. Just flipping a bit to tell it to play won't work unless you also have a working decryption program with working keys for the file. On download on demand media, the file will be encrypted using your key hash. Then the file can be played on your machine using your key. It won't play elsewhere because the key for decryption is missing. There is no bit that says it's ok to play. There is the problem with the wrong key can't decrypt the file for playing. That's how DRM works.
Oddly enough, even though you're a troll, your post brings up an interesting question: The Darwin kernel is Free Software. According to the headline, the kernel is the part that implements the DRM. Given this, shouldn't it be trivial to get the source code, remove the DRM bits, add some code to lie to programs requesting authorization (i.e., fake the DRM), and go merrily on your way?
Umm sure unless you want to play some DRM content. It's like buying a DVD player with no DRM. All your DRM (encrypted) DVD's no longer play. I guess if you want to be limited to playing just your friends home cam DVD's you'll be fine.
The DRM is for playing purchased media.
I hate those bastards! I knew they were going to try and sneak this crap past us! They were plo...oh wait, did you say Apple?
No, it's there so you can play your subscription content. Think i-Tunes. The copy you paid for will play on your machine, but will not on your kids friends machine. It enables the ablilty to play encrypted content that you paid for. It has nothing to stop you from playing your CD full of MP3's.
So here I had a legitimate paid licensed Windows XP Professional computer which will not pass the windows licensing scheme. I'll have to dig out a SP1 cd sometime and reinstall with the actual key so it will pass.
Even worse are 3rd party apps that get toasted in the shuffle. My HP (Bought brand new) had it's cd burner software act up. No problem. Uninstall and re-install to repair. Uninstall went fine. Re-install became a big problem. No install CD. The program is part of the recovery HD image. The only way to re-install is to wipe the hard drive of all your settings and applications and start over from scratch.
Needless to say, my CD burner is working again. Just don't ask about the version of the CD software..or it's reciept. I would have used the original for re-instalation if it didn't come with the penalty of wiping the drive to re-install it.
Does that make me a criminal?
I thought that the record companies were supposed to be the shining beacons of morality!
You're kidding, right? Have you listened to any of the lyrics the middle school kids are sharing via burnt CD's. My kid wanted me to copy a CD so he could give a copy to a friend. The burnt copies don't have the M rating printed on the cover for the parents to notice. Do you have any idea how many songs on the Slipknot Iowa album have the F word? You may hear only 2 or 3 songs from an Album on the radio, but the CD has an M rating. They say it's not for those under 18, but it's what the middle school kids trade copies of at school.
Why do they provide this trash?
I know that it's an absurd over-reaction, but if no-one is willing to accept the bribe, then there will be no bribe.
Wow, talk about a double standard. Is this one of the same companies that helped make it possible to shut down internet radio stations by making the music too expensive to play?
Wow, first they complain and bribe because their stuff doesn't get played enough, then they shut down radio stations that would be happy to play it for free.
It sounds like they want the competition shut down (indi station might play the competition's songs) and their stations bought and paid for to play their stuff excluding the competition.
When looking up and seeing all these power transmission lines criss-crossing my city, I could not help but wonder what would happen if there was a high negative DC voltage on those, causing the air around them to be charged like what happens in a thunderstorm. Add a little breeze, and I figured the airborne dirt would be charged and electrostatically attracted to ground.
The DC line is not 800KV to ground. The line is Bi-Polar. One conductor is +400KV the other -400KV. What I find interesting is after years of operation, the line has noticable color diffrences between the conductors. It's been a few years since I've been out and looked at the line, but one conductor is light colored while the other one is a dark color. I wondered if the reaction changed the resistance or strength of the line much. Could the life of the line be extended if the polarity of the line were reversed every few years, and would it make much difference? I don't know which conductor is light and which is dark. It would be interesting to find out.
Now, that high power solid-state switches ( hence, power converters ) are becoming do-able, is there any way we can start putting high-voltage DC on our power grids?
It is do-able for a price. A typical AC substation has transformers consisting of iron, copper, oil and a few other materials. Construction of the d-c leg of the Pacific Intertie began in 1966 and lasted until 1970, with the Celilo Converter Station facility itself costing $54 million. The Sylmar converter at the South end of the line cost more due to the farady cage built over it.
If a small electrostatic generator drops the crap out of the air in a room, would a bigger one clear stagnant air over an entire city... such as the Los Angeles basin?
It may help some on particles, but much of the smog is oxides and hydrocarbons which are gasses. The end of the BPA DC line terminates at the Ditmer converter station near LA. There hasn't been enough of a change in air quality near the line to notice. The line is about 800KV.
From a google search..
Celilo-Sylmar, 800-kV d-c Transmission Line
This line runs about 845 miles from the Celilo Converter Station, the northern d-c terminal of the NW-SW Intertie on the Columbia River near The Dalles, Oregon, via Nevada to the Sylmar Station. This bipolar overhead transmission line, with an operating voltage of 800 kV (±400 kV) and a power rating of 1,440 megawatts (MW), was constructed and placed in service in 1970.
Unless the refrigerant is flowing around the electric motor, which I doubt,
Hint,, Look at the compressor in the back of your refrigerator. Look for a motor and shaft..
Yes, it is a sealed compressor with the motor completely sealed inside the can. There is no shaft seal.
It would allow people to hook up better electronics to their vehicle, plus it would make the car more energy efficient. The example I heard was that instead of a belt driven AC unit, it would be electical.
The article I had read at the time stated that the standard would be implemented in 2005. Does anyone know about this?
The only car I know of with an electric sealed compressor instead of a belt driven compressor is the 2005 Prius. It runs off the 400 volt hybrid battery, not the low voltage side of things. They didn't bother to stop at 48 volts.
In the new Prius, the AC is no longer belt driven. This eliminates the shaft seal, a common wear and slow leak source. The new AC is electric using a sealed compressor much like a home AC unit.
The peltier chips used in the device are more energy-efficient, last between 20 and 30 years,
I have a solid state ice chest. I don't believe the expected life rating when applied to a solution where condensation is present. It does not apply when they are used in high humidity. Corrosion from condensation kills these in a very short time. The module in my fridge died long ago from condensation caused corrosion. I would not want these in any application that runs below the dew point. Since my AC in my car is designed to run below the dew point to defog windows, there is no way I want a cooling solution that dies when it gets wet. Speaking of more energy-effecient; More effecient than what? Older modules, compressor driven? I have not seen any peltier chips ready to replace the compressor driven freezers and window AC compressors. They simply don't remove enough heat.
An advantage a working fluid AC has over a solid state solution is the hot side can be far removed from the cold side. The radiator for most car AC units is in front of the engine in cool air. A solid state AC would have the hot side behind the engine next to the passanger compartment. Just where were they planning on putting their waste heat? A typical car AC unit is over 20,000 BTU's. How many BTU is their system?
It sounds like the same reason I no longer fix VCR's.
They used to sell for over $500 and people would pay to have a video head replaced and aligned. A new VCR is typicaly less than the replacement part.
"I've never heared of a sound card on a mainframe."
It's called a AM pocket radio and a very special stack of punch cards, you insensitive clod!
Wow does that bring back ancient memories. I remember that being done at the Columbia Basin College in the 1960s. They demonstrated their new computer by playing "The Flight of the Bumble Bee". They used a transistor radio for the sound card.
Disclaimer, I wasn't a student then. My father was. I went to the open house. The other hit at the show was using the high speed hydraulic press to crack wallnuts.
Snicker. Mainframes don't even have the concept> of what video cards are, much less sound cards.
I agree. Not all hardware supports all ports. However if the mainframe has an RS-232 port, I can make some assumptions about it such as voltage swings (not 0-5 V but +12 and -12) some handshaking such as DTR CTS DSR, and some expected supported baud rates such as 300, 600, 1200, 2400, 4800.
I can make these assumptions even though I've never seen your port on your mainfraim, but I can expect it to print text log files to an ASCII dot matrix printer with a serial port after the comm paramaters are properly matched.
I also expect at the hardware level to be able to talk to a VT100 dumb terminal. The port on the mainfraim can be configured to talk to a dumb terminal on a serial port.
Try connecting a all in one printer to the centronics port on the mainframe. Now try printing that log file.....
Now you enter the realm of communications problems between Windows and Mainframe programmers. The Mainfraim programmer can't find any information in the owners manual of the commands to send the printer to either print, scan, or read the flash card from the digital camera. The Windows programmer is simply instructed to give the output to the OS to use the driver. The lack of open information is the problem. No Windows, hardware won't work.
What do we all need to know to get along in each other's worlds?"
What is needed is open specs on anything that enters or leaves the machine whether it be a file, protocol, or hardware handshake.
The biggest area's of contention are printers that won't work, this sound card, video card, input device, etc won't work because of no published standard of how to talk to it. We need the end of closed drivers, files and secret drivers.
Open standard items work great on all platforms. Take for example Ethernet and TCP/IP. The cable is standard as well as the low level signals. Plug in a cable, follow the spec for the address and it works.
Anything that uses TCP/IP on Ethernet also just works.
Plugging in my printer into a Centronics port takes care of the low level hardware connection, but there are big problems after that. The printer box should not require anyting beyond a Centronics, USB, or other standard connection. The idea of Requires Windows 2000 or Windows XP is for the birds. Saying it is Postscript is 100% OK. I can connect that to anything with the proper hardware port (Centronics, USB, Ethernet, Firewire, etc.) that supports Postscript.
You mean a spectrum analyzer?
I don't think that's what he meant. He is interested in a RF picture of the room to pinpoint the location of RF souces, no just check the color of the light in the room.
I think something along the lines of an X\Y scanning radar (passive only) that would raster graph the signal strengths in it's pattern is more what he is looking for. A room full of laptops and routers would look like candles on the ocean.
I can tell no ham radio operators have replied. A loop antenna is built as a small portion of a wavelength of the signal. For example a 12 inch loop is used for low VHF such as Marine or Aircraft bands. A 24 inch loop is used for HF amature bands. This would include the 20 Meter, 40 Meter and other HF bands. (2-30 MHZ)
At 2.4 Ghz a pratical loop antenna would have very small dimensions and have a bi-polar pattern. A much more pratical antenna would have high gain in a single direction. This could be used to pinpoint the direction of the signal using a moderate size antenna such as a small 1 foot dish or 18 inch long yagi. Getting a null and hunting a source using an antenna the size of an asprin makes no sense. Loop antennas are not noted for their high gain and sensitivity. They are used for finding the direction of a strong signal is a relatively small package. With Wi-Fi, you are looking for a low power signal. It makes much more sense to use a moderate size high gain directional antenna to pinpoint the direction of the source.
Why start with an antenna with very low gain and try to find the diretion the signal is the weakest? (the null)
I've used loop antennas for DF work. Much of the time is spent trying to get close enough with a regular whip antenna (stronger signal) to get enough signal to DF with the loop. A loop in the house may find the guy at the table with a laptop stashed in his gym bag at the board meeting, but it won't find the leach in the parking lot until you get very close.