"The book will be outdated in (insert your favorite timetable here)" should all be moderated as obvious. I mean, really, there are people out there trying to make sex itself outdated sometime in the future, but I live in the here and now. What this or any well-written book does is it gives us an understanding of the issues and a foundation for future learning. Read it and forget it is no more a stragegy than not reading it at all.
If it is a good read that makes the complicated less intimidating, I would consider it an excellent foundation for those who aren't up on the issues but want to get started.
Yeah, it's called Super Audio Compact Disk (SACD) and players have been out for about 14 months. It's Sony's answer to DVD-A which uses conventional Pulse Code Modulation (PCM) which is another way of saying the way everybody else, from the 70's till now, have been doing it.
Special (expensive) players and no software (SACD or DVD-A disks) are the major complaints; sound quality isn't.
However, the jury is still out amongst the golden-eared as to whether it's better than DVD-A at 24bit/192KHz. Certainly they sound quite similar.
The smart guys have been quietly releasing 24/96 disks with very good sound quality for a while now. These are DVD disks that can play back in any DVD player; they use the standard 2 channel (and in some cases multichannel) DVD sound format. No special hardware (except it must be DVD) and at consumer level pricing. Think of it as a movie disk with no picture encoded. However, for the most part, the "audiophile" formats haven't really caught on with consumers.
Thus the push for a higher consumer standard; the idea is to avoid having more than one format for all retail music.
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We (or at least you) are talking about suing someone who makes breakers. I gave you an example of an approved, UL listed condition where a breaker will not prevent possible fire, and it's not the breaker's fault.
However, we can use your air conditioner example if you like. A UL listed properly functioning air conditioner will not draw more than the maximum power available from the circuit; in fact it will draw a little less (typically about 1600 W, for a safety factor).
Maximum power V x A = W
115 x 15 = 1725
If you have a 300W TV powered up and plugged into the same line, you are overloading the circuit (1600 + 300 = 1900) and the breaker will trip. If you have the air conditioner alone on that circuit, nolo problemo.
The fact is you cannot buy a UL-listed appliance that will not work safely alone on a circuit it was designed for. But you can easily plug enough stuff into a line to cause a breaker trip or a fire.
And if you do, it's all your fault. No insurance company in the world need go further.
"... In general, Microsoft says it offers an "unmatched technology portfolio" while Linux is "a follower, not an innovator."... "
In General, MS is neither a follower nor an innovator. MS's technology portfolio consists of bagmen with cash to lure innovators; whereupon the technology is closed an implemented or buried forever.
VERY complicated. No "consumer" device in history comes close to the level of complexity this "appliance" has.
So, everybody agrees we need a way to simplify the complex. Thus directories, icons, desktops, aliases, pretty colors, menus, etc....
The trouble is, any simple solution soon comes up against the wall of new, ingenious, or plain popular ideas/features/killer app/eye candy/etc.
So, you make a few new icons (for example). They are undecipherable, because all the "obvious" images are allready used. Pretty soon icons are useless, cuz nobody can figure out what the rows of tiny pictures mean.
Directories; same thing. Installers create new files and create new places for them; one day you open a file/folder/directory and "what the hell is this". Lost again.
Ah, the GUI concept of the desktop, drawers, files, folders, documents. Sounds simple and for a while it was (once you got around the concept, which took a while). But nobody ever had 30 thousand files to run their home, pay their bills and write grandma 6 times a year. Lost again.
There is nothing inherently wrong with most of the ways invented so far to organise a digital storage/workstation like most people find sitting in the home today. But everybody is different; they think differently; see differently and organise differently. An OS should reflect that with a number of ways to interact and organise the whole mess. Linux has got part of it totally right: the GUI you choose to use could be one of many. Trouble is, all the Linux GUI's kinda do the exact same thing. They want to be everything, super-customizable interfaces, but are built around an old, familiar model.
The only reason it is this way is because somehow Intel/Microsoft/Adobe have convinced the world that "market share" is everything. To deliberatly create a GUI that only a few people might like is essentially the modern definition of folly. The entire Tech Industry rewards godzilla and crushes the little guy.
Why can Volkswagen, SAAB and Honda thrive in one market, while Apple (whose market share is bigger than any of them) is pretty much outside looking in? What about BeOS? This is All Wrong, folks.
Now, maybe it's too late for some players in this industry; but Linux could pull this off if it wanted to.
We really need a group of simple (and I mean really simple) interfaces. User A chooses one and User B chooses another; the OS's job is to keep track of these choices and do the required thing when a command is executed.
Customization equals complexity (too many ways to do the same thing). Give me rules (like your parents were supposed to do) when I'm learning and later I can decide for myself.
The old command line or tree structure is always there for those who won't put up with rules. What should probably happen (it kind of does now) is people move up to more complex interfaces over time.
Nobody wants to move "up" from Windows because this "simple" interface is allreay the world's most complex. What if "Isn't Linux complicated?" became "Wow, this is easier than Win95!" ?
"... Sooo, while I'm not going to rush out and buy one, I'd still say it may find a market with audiophiles...."
No it won't.
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"... When that air conditioner turns on there is a moment when the motor in the unit draws a LOT of current. Perhaps more than the breaker can handle... "
This is the definition of "using something outside of it's limits".
Breakers are slow, electrons are fast. They are not intended as a fix for improper loads, momentary or continuous. They are a compromise for safety to keep from burning up all our homes & businesses. In order to make electricity useable at all, they are designed to ignore many conditions which could be a fault or just a normal operation.
How does the breaker tell the difference between an electric heater with copper wiring and a 5 watt bulb in a home with oxidized aluminum wiring? Well, when the aluminum wiring acts like a heater (resistance rises) at some point the breaker will go "too many watts" and shut it down. But the aluminum has been acting as a heater for quite some time by this point. The breaker may allow you to reset the circut after things cool down (reistance falls) and do it all over again. And suprise, suprise, the breaker is designed to act this way.
It's the user's responsibility to insure everthing is working/designed/approved. Aluminum wiring was banned due to fire hazards, but nobody blamed the breakers, because they were working as intended.
"... When a DAC sees a strong high-to-low swing it shapes it (jeez... can't remember the name now... Q filter? Delta filter?) into a sine wave... "
Turn the filters off, and the digital data can easily represent a square wave. The filters are there to "create" sine waves out of fast moving signals, because that is what audio mostly works with. The result of the filtering is that a sqare wave is incorrectly reproduced, but sound data is more closely reproduced. It's a "fix" to compensate for stepped bits describing a smooth tone of infinite steps.
A (pure) sine wave is mathematically described as a series of square waves. The actual length and amplitude of these square waves determines the frequency. The sampling frequency a DAC uses would determine what shape the sine wave had, but it would still be discreet steps.
High frequency and low frequency, it doesn't matter. Low frequency sounds have the advantage that by the time all the harmonics are accounted for (to the noise floor) the circut in question has processed it withing it's linear frequency range, so distortion is less likely.
DAC's use all kinds of methods (filtering and shaping) to compensate for their inability to accurately describe a fast moving signal.
Digital data has the advantage of perfectly describing a square wave; it is sine waves it has problems with. Problems electonics have with square waves (digital or analog) are responisble for the difficulty audio gear has in reproducing a digitally described "perfect" square wave. It's related to how fast and how linear transistors, etc can work.
To describe a square wave you only need 1 bit sampling (all on or all off). To describe a sine wave of the same amplitude, a 1 bit processor would output a perfect square wave.
You are sort of correct, but you have it backwards.
"... I don't mind, timidity is better anyway, and the sampling rate from 44.1kHz to 48kHz helps the playback of some files (software that doesn't downsample, not that I can tell the difference between 44.1 and 48kHz, 44.1kHz more than satisfies the requirement of the human ear. To appreciate 48kHz, you would have to be able to distinguish sounds approaching 24 kHz, while 44.1 had you covered up to 22.05, more than enough for common ears.. And the industry move from 16-bit samples to 24-bit samples for sound seem equally pointless... I don't think *anyone* can distinguish 65,535 levels of amplitude for sound, much less 16.7 million...."
For the record, changing the sample rate from 44.1 to 48 and back again is A Bad Idea. You will alter the file unless you use a multiple/fraction (ie 44.1 should be upsampled to 88.2 or downsampled to 22.05 to maintain data integrity).
We can all "hear" 24KHz and far beyond. When you localize sounds (ie a bag is popped behind your head, but you know which direction it came from) your brain is processing frequencies which are many multiples of 24K.
The trend to record at higher sampling rates is based (in part) on the filtering necessary at 16 bit. All information at and above 22.05 KHz is abruptly cut off. Because filtering introduces audible "artifacts" at multiple/fraction and interference frequencies, there will be distortion created at many frequencies, these distortion components are well below the cutoff frequency (and therefore in the audible portion).
Redbook CD is a primitive digital standard based primarily on the hardware envisioned in the late 1970's and the need to get "an album's worth" of music on a single CD.
You should also know that 16 bit quantization is only used on loudest sounds (100% signal). When a sound is reduced in volume, fewer bits are used to describe it. Moving to 24 bit means (in layman's terms) that a quieter sound may be described by 6 or 8 bit data rather than 1 or 2. This is clearly audible.
To encode a 10Khz note (sine wave, which means like a smooth ocean wave) that moves from volume 0% to volume 100% immediatly, 16/44.1 can only describe the change in 2 discreet steps. Imagine a 2 step stair when what we want is a pond ripple. You need many times the sampling frequency to describe this wave accuratly with digital storage. At 100Kz you could describe it with 10 stair steps, for example. This is still not a smooth continuous wave, but it's closer. Analog, which has other problems, can describe it perfectly.
Finally, remember that Analog is not a "dirty word"; it is how we all hear everything. We are trying to use digital storage and processing to describe analog data.
This is akin to translating a novel from French to English; we will always be wrong about some subtle things but we still try as hard as we can to come closest. Each translation step (like resampling 44.1 to 48K) is a subtle change in dialect which may drastically change the final interpretation. We want to minimize the translation steps for the most accurate reproduction and storage.
"... Most (pro audio, not games) software out now is in 24 bit/96khz land...."
The SW may be HiBit, but a CD must still be downsampled to 16/44.1 for disk burning.
Without regard to your sound card (or even no soundcard installed), you can work on HiBit files in the digital domain all you want,and even share those files as data with others. To print to Redbook Standard (CD Audio) playback, it must be downsampled.
People who want to encode live music/DAT/etc at HiBit will have pro audio cards or outboard processors that make any SoundBlaster seem a bargain.
Different users, different world. The SW issue is moot.
Since you are building you should consider a "hot water heat" system. Basically this involves laying a special plastic pipe in the concrete and using a low pressure boiler to curculate warm water through the concrete.
It's scaleable from small to industrial and has many advantages over conventional hot air systems.
Water is more efficent than air for heating/cooling.
Concrete acts as a thermal mass and temps are very stable, even if power is lost.
This system heats the objects in a room rather than heating the air and relying on that warm air to heat objects in the room. Typically users set heat settings to the mid 60's because cooler air is refreshing yet everything is warm to the touch.
Possible to nearly eliminate dust/mould/etc problems with moving air systems.
A little more that hot air, but affordably so.
I know people who use it for summer cooling and winter heat in:
Standalone 2 car garage;
Farm shop of about 1200 sq feet
Entire homes, one I know of has an indoor pool and is over 6000 sq ft.
I have worked in the garage at -40 and it was super comfortable. Every tool is warm to the touch, and there are no flames (electric; any fuel possible including redundant), hot or cold spots, etc.
You will like living in a house like this. There are systems that can be installed in upper floors, although it may not be necessary if you avoid carpet.
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"... If a breaker fails to trip, then your insurance company will have a case against the manufacturer of the breaker...."
Obviously either this guy doesn't have much experience with insurance companies or his agent is somehow godlike.
If a fire is caused because you have a greater load than the circut is coded to handle, it don't matter about the breaker. You break code, you lose with insurance. It's not one reason vs. another; it's your fault cuz of this one thing so the rest is moot, we don't have to pay.
Remember, this is an industry that believes keeping your settlement in their own bank account for even 1 extra day (spread this over all pending claims and you have REAL money) is worthwhile and encouraged.
There really are too many options for this regarding heating/cooling: a lot depends on the systems people in your local climate use.
A lot of posters here assume because you live in Canada it won't get hot; but 40 C / 105 F is considered average summer maximum where I live, and it's way north of 49.
Since we are considering basement, try routing a cold water line to the room. Find a suitable radiator and hook up a 12V automotive electric fan. You can have the fan thermally switch off and on, and your temp sensor can be anywhere on/in/around your servers/racks and will switch at pretty much any temp you choose. This will work winter/summer.
An el-cheapo radiator needn't be much more than a coil of copper tubing although there are many options; an old steam-heat radiator converted to low pressure; a copper pipe/aluminum sheet sandwich affair, whatever.
I strongly suggest you maintain a cooler room in summer and winter. No need to heat it much (if at all) in winter, though. Try to maintain a nice 15 C / 60 F air temp in the room.
It may seem silly to "waste" that heat in winter, but you should really consider excess heat from this particular source a hazard to your pocketbook; the cooler they run the longer they last and CPU's are terribly expensive and inefficent heaters.
That's 14 consecutive days. Should have made that clear.
Very hot summers are normal in Canada.
Where I live (western Canada) normal annual temps are -40 C to +40 C (-40 to +105 F). My hometown had 107 F and 109 F last year. Over 90% of Canadians live south of me.
"... Get a little Window AC for summertime - not that you're going to get 100 F summer days in Canada, but just in case you need it..."
Near, at, and over 100 F every summer. I work north of 58 N lat and last summer 14 days over 90F.
As an arrogant monopoly, Bell was guilty of many things. But consider:
They invented the transistor (Bell Labs).
Comanies like Intel and National Semiconductor were started up or staffed by Bell educated engineers.
The whole concept of the Internet would be impossible without the large, arrogant telephone compaines of the past.
First of all, diesel-electric submarines are able to run silent. Nuclear subs create detectable noise. That is why DE subs are still being developed by nuclear-capeable nations such as the UK.
WWII era diesel subs had to surface often (24 hours at most) but modern ones can stay down for more than 30 days. Nuclear subs have the advantage of staying down for extreme periods (many months), which is why they are also still deployed. To be truly effective, you need both.
"... Sure boats have been usefull in the past.. but really I dont feel that they can keep up with the pace with stealth bombers capable of coming in, wiping out an area and getting out undetected...."
Naval force is invaluable in modern warfare; there are numerous examples but an obvious one is the current action in Afganistan, a landlocked nation. Without the current cooperation from previously hostile nations, naval air power could have still done the job.
Stealth aircraft are neither undetectable nor invulnerable to intercept by missiles. Serbian forces were able to shoot down 2 stealth fighters in action against the former Yugoslavia. Conventional radar has extreme difficulty detecting them but there are currently 2 different methods to track them; both systems are well known to US and Soviet military and have been tested by both nations (and no doubt others).
If a SW developer wants to change the rules, fine. But consider your "customers* " and what you owe them for your current prosperity.
Change the model all you want, but if you stop supporting/updating/selling a given SW product, release the old, functionally limited (by the developer's own definition, unless all the improvements are just window dressing) product as a free d/l.
Even Apple will let you d/l OS7.6 for free. No, it's not supported, but it is a perfectly decent OS. Users of old, probably free computers (read "the poor") can get into the game for nearly nothing. Apple reaps goodwill and potential customers.
It has got to be a big red flag if a developer won't release old, unsupported SW for fear that nobody will buy the new stuff. What's the good of your latest and greatest?
SW is different than a car or a TV. Users must invest time and greymatter to learn it's ins-and-outs; you compel them to invest time and money in your wares. It is economical to keep using your stuff; the money is just half the investment.
*customer- the guy who PAID you for a product, uses that product and is predisposed to support your future products with his MONEY. Alienate him at your peril.
"... Granted, I could create a system partition for my old copy of Win98SE, load the program there, and keep going...."
Why you didn't set up a dual-boot for a new OS install is the big question. It's fairly easy under the XP install menu. Believe it or not, my XP box (AMD TBird 950) has a dual-boot with Win95 (USB/FAT 32).
No offense intended, but the upgrades should have been figured into the cost of your new OS; to say that paying more for upgrades was implied by a new OS is an understatement. Remember the definition of stupidity (we're all guilty at some time or another)---
"Stupidity is doing the same thing repeatedly and expecting a different result."
I get virtually no spam (not one in the last 12 months, 3 ISP accounts and 2 web-based accounts).
Some things I do which may have something to do with my nospam:
(I use Mac/Windows/Linux)
When you first install many OSs (MacOS, Windows, Internet Explorer, etc.) you are asked certain questions like your full name and email address. This is used globally in some conditions when your actual eMail app is not used. They can send all the spam they want to nobody@bullshit.net, but I never get it.
Here is how you document your billing. Charge $60/hour plus telephone charges; you are entitled to markup telephone charges by any reasonable amount (try 150%).
Answer the phone, be polite, and mention to the caller that you will connect them. Do a 3-way call which uses your phone companies service and is billable to you.
Result:
No monitoring of the line/call is necessary; (recording without permission is illegal, mostly) the phone company will provide very well documented, court-accessible documentation for your billing. You will be able to charge interest on any unpaid invoice pretty much from day 1; and the remedies for collection are much simpler (any civil court).
This would require reasonable notice to Radio Shack, but I'm sure it would hold up, and your damages would be accepted without bullshit arguements about what exactly is owed.
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"The book will be outdated in (insert your favorite timetable here)" should all be moderated as obvious. I mean, really, there are people out there trying to make sex itself outdated sometime in the future, but I live in the here and now. What this or any well-written book does is it gives us an understanding of the issues and a foundation for future learning. Read it and forget it is no more a stragegy than not reading it at all.
If it is a good read that makes the complicated less intimidating, I would consider it an excellent foundation for those who aren't up on the issues but want to get started.
Yeah, it's called Super Audio Compact Disk (SACD) and players have been out for about 14 months. It's Sony's answer to DVD-A which uses conventional Pulse Code Modulation (PCM) which is another way of saying the way everybody else, from the 70's till now, have been doing it.
Special (expensive) players and no software (SACD or DVD-A disks) are the major complaints; sound quality isn't.
However, the jury is still out amongst the golden-eared as to whether it's better than DVD-A at 24bit/192KHz. Certainly they sound quite similar.
The smart guys have been quietly releasing 24/96 disks with very good sound quality for a while now. These are DVD disks that can play back in any DVD player; they use the standard 2 channel (and in some cases multichannel) DVD sound format. No special hardware (except it must be DVD) and at consumer level pricing. Think of it as a movie disk with no picture encoded. However, for the most part, the "audiophile" formats haven't really caught on with consumers.
Thus the push for a higher consumer standard; the idea is to avoid having more than one format for all retail music.
We (or at least you) are talking about suing someone who makes breakers. I gave you an example of an approved, UL listed condition where a breaker will not prevent possible fire, and it's not the breaker's fault.
However, we can use your air conditioner example if you like. A UL listed properly functioning air conditioner will not draw more than the maximum power available from the circuit; in fact it will draw a little less (typically about 1600 W, for a safety factor).
Maximum power V x A = W
115 x 15 = 1725
If you have a 300W TV powered up and plugged into the same line, you are overloading the circuit (1600 + 300 = 1900) and the breaker will trip. If you have the air conditioner alone on that circuit, nolo problemo.
The fact is you cannot buy a UL-listed appliance that will not work safely alone on a circuit it was designed for. But you can easily plug enough stuff into a line to cause a breaker trip or a fire.
And if you do, it's all your fault. No insurance company in the world need go further.
" ... In general, Microsoft says it offers an "unmatched technology portfolio" while Linux is "a follower, not an innovator." ... "
In General, MS is neither a follower nor an innovator. MS's technology portfolio consists of bagmen with cash to lure innovators; whereupon the technology is closed an implemented or buried forever.
VERY complicated. No "consumer" device in history comes close to the level of complexity this "appliance" has. ...
So, everybody agrees we need a way to simplify the complex. Thus directories, icons, desktops, aliases, pretty colors, menus, etc.
The trouble is, any simple solution soon comes up against the wall of new, ingenious, or plain popular ideas/features/killer app/eye candy/etc.
So, you make a few new icons (for example). They are undecipherable, because all the "obvious" images are allready used. Pretty soon icons are useless, cuz nobody can figure out what the rows of tiny pictures mean.
Directories; same thing. Installers create new files and create new places for them; one day you open a file/folder/directory and "what the hell is this". Lost again.
Ah, the GUI concept of the desktop, drawers, files, folders, documents. Sounds simple and for a while it was (once you got around the concept, which took a while). But nobody ever had 30 thousand files to run their home, pay their bills and write grandma 6 times a year. Lost again.
There is nothing inherently wrong with most of the ways invented so far to organise a digital storage/workstation like most people find sitting in the home today. But everybody is different; they think differently; see differently and organise differently. An OS should reflect that with a number of ways to interact and organise the whole mess. Linux has got part of it totally right: the GUI you choose to use could be one of many. Trouble is, all the Linux GUI's kinda do the exact same thing. They want to be everything, super-customizable interfaces, but are built around an old, familiar model.
The only reason it is this way is because somehow Intel/Microsoft/Adobe have convinced the world that "market share" is everything. To deliberatly create a GUI that only a few people might like is essentially the modern definition of folly. The entire Tech Industry rewards godzilla and crushes the little guy.
Why can Volkswagen, SAAB and Honda thrive in one market, while Apple (whose market share is bigger than any of them) is pretty much outside looking in? What about BeOS? This is All Wrong, folks.
Now, maybe it's too late for some players in this industry; but Linux could pull this off if it wanted to.
We really need a group of simple (and I mean really simple) interfaces. User A chooses one and User B chooses another; the OS's job is to keep track of these choices and do the required thing when a command is executed.
Customization equals complexity (too many ways to do the same thing). Give me rules (like your parents were supposed to do) when I'm learning and later I can decide for myself.
The old command line or tree structure is always there for those who won't put up with rules. What should probably happen (it kind of does now) is people move up to more complex interfaces over time.
Nobody wants to move "up" from Windows because this "simple" interface is allreay the world's most complex. What if "Isn't Linux complicated?" became "Wow, this is easier than Win95!" ?
" ... Sooo, while I'm not going to rush out and buy one, I'd still say it may find a market with audiophiles. ..."
No it won't.
" ... When that air conditioner turns on there is a moment when the motor in the unit draws a LOT of current. Perhaps more than the breaker can handle ... "
This is the definition of "using something outside of it's limits".
Breakers are slow, electrons are fast. They are not intended as a fix for improper loads, momentary or continuous. They are a compromise for safety to keep from burning up all our homes & businesses. In order to make electricity useable at all, they are designed to ignore many conditions which could be a fault or just a normal operation.
How does the breaker tell the difference between an electric heater with copper wiring and a 5 watt bulb in a home with oxidized aluminum wiring? Well, when the aluminum wiring acts like a heater (resistance rises) at some point the breaker will go "too many watts" and shut it down. But the aluminum has been acting as a heater for quite some time by this point. The breaker may allow you to reset the circut after things cool down (reistance falls) and do it all over again. And suprise, suprise, the breaker is designed to act this way.
It's the user's responsibility to insure everthing is working/designed/approved. Aluminum wiring was banned due to fire hazards, but nobody blamed the breakers, because they were working as intended.
" ... When a DAC sees a strong high-to-low swing it shapes it (jeez... can't remember the name now... Q filter? Delta filter?) into a sine wave ... "
Turn the filters off, and the digital data can easily represent a square wave. The filters are there to "create" sine waves out of fast moving signals, because that is what audio mostly works with. The result of the filtering is that a sqare wave is incorrectly reproduced, but sound data is more closely reproduced. It's a "fix" to compensate for stepped bits describing a smooth tone of infinite steps.
A (pure) sine wave is mathematically described as a series of square waves. The actual length and amplitude of these square waves determines the frequency. The sampling frequency a DAC uses would determine what shape the sine wave had, but it would still be discreet steps.
High frequency and low frequency, it doesn't matter. Low frequency sounds have the advantage that by the time all the harmonics are accounted for (to the noise floor) the circut in question has processed it withing it's linear frequency range, so distortion is less likely.
DAC's use all kinds of methods (filtering and shaping) to compensate for their inability to accurately describe a fast moving signal.
Digital data has the advantage of perfectly describing a square wave; it is sine waves it has problems with. Problems electonics have with square waves (digital or analog) are responisble for the difficulty audio gear has in reproducing a digitally described "perfect" square wave. It's related to how fast and how linear transistors, etc can work.
To describe a square wave you only need 1 bit sampling (all on or all off). To describe a sine wave of the same amplitude, a 1 bit processor would output a perfect square wave.
You are sort of correct, but you have it backwards.
" ... I don't mind, timidity is better anyway, and the sampling rate from 44.1kHz to 48kHz helps the playback of some files (software that doesn't downsample, not that I can tell the difference between 44.1 and 48kHz, 44.1kHz more than satisfies the requirement of the human ear. To appreciate 48kHz, you would have to be able to distinguish sounds approaching 24 kHz, while 44.1 had you covered up to 22.05, more than enough for common ears.. And the industry move from 16-bit samples to 24-bit samples for sound seem equally pointless... I don't think *anyone* can distinguish 65,535 levels of amplitude for sound, much less 16.7 million. ..."
For the record, changing the sample rate from 44.1 to 48 and back again is A Bad Idea. You will alter the file unless you use a multiple/fraction (ie 44.1 should be upsampled to 88.2 or downsampled to 22.05 to maintain data integrity).
We can all "hear" 24KHz and far beyond. When you localize sounds (ie a bag is popped behind your head, but you know which direction it came from) your brain is processing frequencies which are many multiples of 24K.
The trend to record at higher sampling rates is based (in part) on the filtering necessary at 16 bit. All information at and above 22.05 KHz is abruptly cut off. Because filtering introduces audible "artifacts" at multiple/fraction and interference frequencies, there will be distortion created at many frequencies, these distortion components are well below the cutoff frequency (and therefore in the audible portion).
Redbook CD is a primitive digital standard based primarily on the hardware envisioned in the late 1970's and the need to get "an album's worth" of music on a single CD.
You should also know that 16 bit quantization is only used on loudest sounds (100% signal). When a sound is reduced in volume, fewer bits are used to describe it. Moving to 24 bit means (in layman's terms) that a quieter sound may be described by 6 or 8 bit data rather than 1 or 2. This is clearly audible.
To encode a 10Khz note (sine wave, which means like a smooth ocean wave) that moves from volume 0% to volume 100% immediatly, 16/44.1 can only describe the change in 2 discreet steps. Imagine a 2 step stair when what we want is a pond ripple. You need many times the sampling frequency to describe this wave accuratly with digital storage. At 100Kz you could describe it with 10 stair steps, for example. This is still not a smooth continuous wave, but it's closer. Analog, which has other problems, can describe it perfectly.
Finally, remember that Analog is not a "dirty word"; it is how we all hear everything. We are trying to use digital storage and processing to describe analog data.
This is akin to translating a novel from French to English; we will always be wrong about some subtle things but we still try as hard as we can to come closest. Each translation step (like resampling 44.1 to 48K) is a subtle change in dialect which may drastically change the final interpretation. We want to minimize the translation steps for the most accurate reproduction and storage.
" ... Most (pro audio, not games) software out now is in 24 bit/96khz land. ..."
The SW may be HiBit, but a CD must still be downsampled to 16/44.1 for disk burning.
Without regard to your sound card (or even no soundcard installed), you can work on HiBit files in the digital domain all you want,and even share those files as data with others. To print to Redbook Standard (CD Audio) playback, it must be downsampled.
People who want to encode live music/DAT/etc at HiBit will have pro audio cards or outboard processors that make any SoundBlaster seem a bargain.
Different users, different world. The SW issue is moot.
Since you are building you should consider a "hot water heat" system. Basically this involves laying a special plastic pipe in the concrete and using a low pressure boiler to curculate warm water through the concrete.
It's scaleable from small to industrial and has many advantages over conventional hot air systems.
Water is more efficent than air for heating/cooling.
Concrete acts as a thermal mass and temps are very stable, even if power is lost.
This system heats the objects in a room rather than heating the air and relying on that warm air to heat objects in the room. Typically users set heat settings to the mid 60's because cooler air is refreshing yet everything is warm to the touch.
Possible to nearly eliminate dust/mould/etc problems with moving air systems.
A little more that hot air, but affordably so.
I know people who use it for summer cooling and winter heat in:
Standalone 2 car garage;
Farm shop of about 1200 sq feet
Entire homes, one I know of has an indoor pool and is over 6000 sq ft.
I have worked in the garage at -40 and it was super comfortable. Every tool is warm to the touch, and there are no flames (electric; any fuel possible including redundant), hot or cold spots, etc.
You will like living in a house like this. There are systems that can be installed in upper floors, although it may not be necessary if you avoid carpet.
" ... If a breaker fails to trip, then your insurance company will have a case against the manufacturer of the breaker. ..."
Obviously either this guy doesn't have much experience with insurance companies or his agent is somehow godlike.
If a fire is caused because you have a greater load than the circut is coded to handle, it don't matter about the breaker. You break code, you lose with insurance. It's not one reason vs. another; it's your fault cuz of this one thing so the rest is moot, we don't have to pay.
Remember, this is an industry that believes keeping your settlement in their own bank account for even 1 extra day (spread this over all pending claims and you have REAL money) is worthwhile and encouraged.
There really are too many options for this regarding heating/cooling: a lot depends on the systems people in your local climate use.
A lot of posters here assume because you live in Canada it won't get hot; but 40 C / 105 F is considered average summer maximum where I live, and it's way north of 49.
Since we are considering basement, try routing a cold water line to the room. Find a suitable radiator and hook up a 12V automotive electric fan. You can have the fan thermally switch off and on, and your temp sensor can be anywhere on/in/around your servers/racks and will switch at pretty much any temp you choose. This will work winter/summer.
An el-cheapo radiator needn't be much more than a coil of copper tubing although there are many options; an old steam-heat radiator converted to low pressure; a copper pipe/aluminum sheet sandwich affair, whatever.
I strongly suggest you maintain a cooler room in summer and winter. No need to heat it much (if at all) in winter, though. Try to maintain a nice 15 C / 60 F air temp in the room.
It may seem silly to "waste" that heat in winter, but you should really consider excess heat from this particular source a hazard to your pocketbook; the cooler they run the longer they last and CPU's are terribly expensive and inefficent heaters.
He's in Canada. Yes it costs money, but think 1/2 to 1/6 of US rates. I pay C 0.06/Kwh which would translate to less than $US 0.04.
That's 14 consecutive days. Should have made that clear.
Very hot summers are normal in Canada.
Where I live (western Canada) normal annual temps are -40 C to +40 C (-40 to +105 F). My hometown had 107 F and 109 F last year. Over 90% of Canadians live south of me.
"... Get a little Window AC for summertime - not that you're going to get 100 F summer days in Canada, but just in case you need it ..."
Near, at, and over 100 F every summer. I work north of 58 N lat and last summer 14 days over 90F.
As an arrogant monopoly, Bell was guilty of many things. But consider:
They invented the transistor (Bell Labs).
Comanies like Intel and National Semiconductor were started up or staffed by Bell educated engineers.
The whole concept of the Internet would be impossible without the large, arrogant telephone compaines of the past.
Absolutely. I thought I said the same thing, but you said it a bit better.
First of all, diesel-electric submarines are able to run silent. Nuclear subs create detectable noise. That is why DE subs are still being developed by nuclear-capeable nations such as the UK.
WWII era diesel subs had to surface often (24 hours at most) but modern ones can stay down for more than 30 days. Nuclear subs have the advantage of staying down for extreme periods (many months), which is why they are also still deployed. To be truly effective, you need both.
"... Sure boats have been usefull in the past.. but really I dont feel that they can keep up with the pace with stealth bombers capable of coming in, wiping out an area and getting out undetected. ..."
Naval force is invaluable in modern warfare; there are numerous examples but an obvious one is the current action in Afganistan, a landlocked nation. Without the current cooperation from previously hostile nations, naval air power could have still done the job.
Stealth aircraft are neither undetectable nor invulnerable to intercept by missiles. Serbian forces were able to shoot down 2 stealth fighters in action against the former Yugoslavia. Conventional radar has extreme difficulty detecting them but there are currently 2 different methods to track them; both systems are well known to US and Soviet military and have been tested by both nations (and no doubt others).
If a SW developer wants to change the rules, fine. But consider your "customers* " and what you owe them for your current prosperity.
Change the model all you want, but if you stop supporting/updating/selling a given SW product, release the old, functionally limited (by the developer's own definition, unless all the improvements are just window dressing) product as a free d/l.
Even Apple will let you d/l OS7.6 for free. No, it's not supported, but it is a perfectly decent OS. Users of old, probably free computers (read "the poor") can get into the game for nearly nothing. Apple reaps goodwill and potential customers.
It has got to be a big red flag if a developer won't release old, unsupported SW for fear that nobody will buy the new stuff. What's the good of your latest and greatest?
SW is different than a car or a TV. Users must invest time and greymatter to learn it's ins-and-outs; you compel them to invest time and money in your wares. It is economical to keep using your stuff; the money is just half the investment.
*customer- the guy who PAID you for a product, uses that product and is predisposed to support your future products with his MONEY. Alienate him at your peril.
"... Granted, I could create a system partition for my old copy of Win98SE, load the program there, and keep going. ..."
Why you didn't set up a dual-boot for a new OS install is the big question. It's fairly easy under the XP install menu. Believe it or not, my XP box (AMD TBird 950) has a dual-boot with Win95 (USB/FAT 32).
No offense intended, but the upgrades should have been figured into the cost of your new OS; to say that paying more for upgrades was implied by a new OS is an understatement. Remember the definition of stupidity (we're all guilty at some time or another)---
"Stupidity is doing the same thing repeatedly and expecting a different result."
I get virtually no spam (not one in the last 12 months, 3 ISP accounts and 2 web-based accounts).
Some things I do which may have something to do with my nospam:
(I use Mac/Windows/Linux)
When you first install many OSs (MacOS, Windows, Internet Explorer, etc.) you are asked certain questions like your full name and email address. This is used globally in some conditions when your actual eMail app is not used. They can send all the spam they want to nobody@bullshit.net, but I never get it.
Here is how you document your billing. Charge $60/hour plus telephone charges; you are entitled to markup telephone charges by any reasonable amount (try 150%).
Answer the phone, be polite, and mention to the caller that you will connect them. Do a 3-way call which uses your phone companies service and is billable to you.
Result:
No monitoring of the line/call is necessary; (recording without permission is illegal, mostly) the phone company will provide very well documented, court-accessible documentation for your billing. You will be able to charge interest on any unpaid invoice pretty much from day 1; and the remedies for collection are much simpler (any civil court).
This would require reasonable notice to Radio Shack, but I'm sure it would hold up, and your damages would be accepted without bullshit arguements about what exactly is owed.