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User: Telecommando

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  1. I dunno... on Segway Getting Real-Life Tests · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I mean, the Segway is neat and all that, but outside of the "Wow, cool!" factor, is there any part of it's design that really screams, "Look! I'm so much better/cheaper/more efficient than a conventional (2 wheels, front and back) motorized scooter?"

    If there is, I don't see it. It's neat, sure. But at root it's just an electric scooter. It could easily be replaced by an 3-wheeled, electric cart, motorized skateboard, electric bike or powered roller skates; all of which would be a lot cheaper to produce.

    I would think it would be better to change the laws to allow all small motorized vehicles, 2, 3 & 4 wheels, on the sidewalks and bike paths.

    I haven't seen the laws that were passed, but doesn't it seem odd to pass a law just to help a single product achieve market share? Surely it's vague enough that other small scooters would be allowed rather than just the Segway. If laws are changed just so one guy can make money, I want one changed for me, too. ;-)

    It seems like the only thing that the Segway does that other scooters don't (outside of the self balancing bit), is put money in Kamen's pocket.

    Maybe I'm just in a bad mood, it's been a long day.

  2. Re:How much bandwidth? on VoIP at $15 a Pop · · Score: 1

    64 Kbps is true for a uncompressed DS0 or G.711, but there's no reason you have to use that rate. G.723 is only 6.4 Kbps (or 5.333 Kbps) and G.729 is only 8 Kbps. And there's Lucent's proprietary 7.3 Kbps codec, which no one but them uses.

    I've experimented with all of them and they're quite acceptable. They're no good for music of course, but that's not what they were designed for. For voice they work quite well. If you have a digital cell phone, you've probably used one of these codecs and not even noticed it.

    The most popular codec is G.729 which is used in cell phones as well as VoIP. Cisco uses a modified version called G.729A in some of their router products which include VoIP capability.

    Of course, this is just the bandwidth of the codec, the overhead of the transmission method will add to that. Typically over ethernet (802.3) an 8Kbps (G.729) codec sending 20ms packets will use about 31K, which is a bit much for most dial-up connections.

    Up the packet size to 60ms (more data, fewer packets, less overhead) and it drops to about 16K. A G.723 codec (6.4K) with 60ms packets takes even less, about 14K.

    60ms packet size is about as big as you can get away with before the delay gets to be annoying. Some users find even 60ms to be unacceptable but since you're only sending 16 2/3 packets a second, the lower bandwidth often makes it attractive, especially if it's FREE!

  3. Re:fobbit fxo and pots lines on VoIP at $15 a Pop · · Score: 3, Informative

    Software based FXO? To be an FXO you'll need hardware ring detection and some way to protect the VB from being damaged by the ringing voltages. Unless you're not really trying to be an FXO, just looking for a way to seize the line.

    It can be done with off the shelf hardware. Just off the top of my head I'd say for starters you'll need something like a pair of Tellabs 6131 2W-4W cards with 6008B FXO - E&M subboards wired back to back along with the appropriate power supplies. This allows both the phone line and the VB to think they're connected to a phone.

    Then you'll have to figure out some kind of answer supervision to connect the two lines when when it rings from either end. Probably not too hard, simple logic would do it or a PIC microcontroller. Dial the number, rings once and connects you to the other circuit, dial again to get your called party.

    Oh, and since you won't have an actual phone attatched to the circuit you'll need a way to figure out when the call is ended so you can disconnect. FXO circuits usually detect when the call is completed by the lack of loop current when you hang up the phone, which you won't have in this application. This is where it gets tricky. Some phone systems will reverse the battery to disconnect the call but what does the VB do?

    As I said, this is just off the top of my head. Haven't put a FXO or FXS card in service for years, Used to install them on microwave and T1s all the time to bypass toll charges across LATAs. Now we just feed the phone switches directly into the fiber we lease between sites and bypass the telcos all together.

  4. Re:On NASA's tracking program? on NASA's HETE Coming Down · · Score: 2, Informative

    try http://liftoff.msfc.nasa.gov/RealTime/JTrack/3D/JT rack3D.html and select SAC-B/HTET/PEGASUS under satelites.

  5. Re:Never happen - frequencies on Sun Joins RFID Program · · Score: 2, Informative

    Well, if they are trying to get the 70cm amatuer band, they most likely won't get it.

    Isn't that what the amateurs said about the 1.25 meter (220 MHz) band before part of it was taken away?

  6. Re:protection? on Sun Joins RFID Program · · Score: 1

    I've forgotten where I found this but I thought it amusing at the time:

    Colorado Springs, Colorado, Jun 27, 2001 -- If you're thinking
    about going to the mall in that snappy aluminum-lined underwear in the back of your dresser drawer, think again.
    Beginning Sunday, it will be illegal in Colorado to wear aluminum underwear.OK, there's a caveat. You can wear aluminum
    briefs and lingerie as long as it's for personal amusement - but not if it is to help steal by foiling stores' anti-shoplifting devices.
    The new law is no laughing matter ... really."This is serious business," said Sen. Stephanie Takis, one of the bill's sponsors.
    "We have laws against using crowbars as theft devices, but if you were lining your underwear with aluminum foil, that
    was not a crime."And by golly, said Takis, it should be.She cited several Denver-area malls that have caught
    shoplifters with aluminum-lined shopping bags and even the so-called "iron pants" and could do nothing to stop it.
    Steve Miller, an attorney who helped draft the bill:"I don't know if it was the highlight of my career, but I got the
    assignment."Miller said the bill went through several evolutions - "or devolutions depending on your viewpoint" -
    before it received Gov. Bill Owens' approval.Essentially, it makes it a misdemeanor to make, wear or know others
    are wearing aluminum underwear if they intend to use it to fool stores' theft-protection devices.Those devices
    electronically sense when merchandise leaving the store hasn't been handled by a cashier, and foil can interfere with that detection.
    Miller said the new law also gives store employees civil and criminal immunity if they stop shoppers who crackle
    when they walk.

  7. Re:Breast Pocket? on Electronic Abacus · · Score: 1

    I still think mine impresses them more. Of course it could be that it's an Otis King Cylindrical.

  8. Re:This article is all fine and dandy but... on Electronic Abacus · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    I find they're more impressed when I put mine in my front trouser pocket. ;-)

  9. Re:Apparently this one is still working: on Listening to Leonids · · Score: 1

    Sorry, that should be 1 bit per MINUTE.

  10. Apparently this one is still working: on Listening to Leonids · · Score: 1

    See this link.

    and here's a a link with a map.

    The ELF system transmits at about 1 bit per second, shifting the center carrier of 76 Hz only 4 HZ up or down to indicate a zero or a one bit. It takes about 5 minutes to send one character.
    And you thought YOU had a slow connection.

  11. Re:A good motivator on Excite Could Go Dark On Friday · · Score: 1

    What if back in the first half of the 20th century the government decided to let Ma Bell and the electric utilities deny service to whoever they deemed unprofitable to have as customers?

    Um, actually that's just what they did at the beginning of the 20th century. Rural areas weren't being served as it was considered too expensive to run the lines all the way out to nowhere for just a few customers. My grandfather didn't have electric or phone service on his farm until the government stepped in and started the REC's (Rural Electric Cooperatives) backed with government money through no-intrest loans and cost sharing. The urban customers didn't subsidize running of the lines to the rural customers, the government did.

    It still took them until nearly the end of WW2 to get my grandfather hooked up to the electric grid. Until that time it was oil, gasoline and carbide lamps to see by, windmills to pump water (when the wind was blowing, hand pumps when it wasn't) and a wind powered charger to charge the lead-acid batteries in the cellar to run the radio.

    Rural internet is at about the same point today that rural electric was 100 years ago. Few people have it and those that do have poor service. Maybe what we need is something similar to the REC's, maybe RIC's (Rural Internet Cooperatives) backed by the government.

  12. Re:ATT customers will be in good shape on Excite Could Go Dark On Friday · · Score: 1

    I got the same email as the AC posted above the same day I got a snail mail from AT&T stating the exact same thing.

    Which is strange since I'm not supposed to be a customer of AT&T@home anymore. Several months ago Mediacom took over all AT&T operations in my area. Since that time I've heard nothing from Mediacom but I continue to get messages from AT&T@home. I tried to access one of the FAQ pages on an email they sent me a few months ago but got a message saying that only AT&T customers were permitted to view that page.

    So WTF?

  13. Re:Great fodder for an arcade cabinet! on Sega Drops Dreamcast Price To $50 · · Score: 2, Funny

    Identify the windings on the deflection yoke coils and reverse them, left for right, up for down. Small reed relays mounted near the yoke will probably suffice. You may need capacitors across the contacts to absorb the surge from the collapsing field of the coils if you switch them at a time other than at a zero-crossing of the drive signal. Don't know how you'd decide when to automatically switch them, joystick enable voltage maybe?

  14. Re:Uh. Something isnt right here (offtopic) on ATI Drivers Geared For Quake 3? · · Score: 1

    (I wonder if anything is connected to the right most LED digit on more recent machines, or if it's hardwired to zero?)

    Judging from my Williams Twilight Zone, they're hardwired. The lowest point value you can get on it is 10 points anyway. Besides, it's not an LED display, it's an EL dot matrix array that they do animated graphics on. I believe the last machine that Williams made before they got out of the pinball business had a video display.

  15. Quirky-ness not always appreciated on Quirky Engineers Gone the Way of the Dinosaur? · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Here where I work, we had an electrical design engineer who everyone referred to as "ZZ", due to his ZZTop style beard and long hair that hung down below his waist. Strange fellow, liked to talk about UFO abductions, Harleys and why fat women were better in bed. Helluva engineer, though. He'd look at a diagram for a minute or two, then whip out a pencil and start marking it up. Deleting unnecessary parts, changing values, adding parts... When he was done it was usually simpler, cheaper and more solidly designed. He was respected among all in the engineering department. Whenever someone would come up with a new circuit change they were always told, "run it past ZZ first." His own designs were often unique and innovative. It might take you a while to figure out what he was doing but when you did you just kinda sat back and said, "Wow!"

    When we had a management shakeup a few years ago, where it was decided to shuffle all the managers around to different departments, his new manager took an immediate dislike to him. He called ZZ a "goddamn filthy hippie freak" in a staff meeting and ordered him to either show up clean shaven the next day or be fired. Of course, ZZ declined. Actually, ZZ was quite fastidious in his appearance. His beard and hair probably took an hour to comb out and braid everyday.

    The manager didn't fire him, but did do his best to make his life a living hell. Finally after about a year, ZZ got fed up with it and left.

    We didn't see or hear anything from ZZ for a couple of years after that. One day we had a big project that wasn't going well and our manager hired a consulting company to come in and help straighten things out. He asked for their best man. As you've probably guessed, the engineer who showed up was none other than ZZ himself. He had taken a year off to motorcycle across Asia before joining the consulting company. He was making 3 times what he was before. Our manager had to grit his teeth and refer to ZZ as "Mister ZZ" (ZZ insisted) until the project was completed.

  16. Re:I sell a similar product on Building Cheap 100 Inch TVs · · Score: 1

    FYI: Amway now calls themselves Quixtar.
    New name, same old pyramid scheme.

  17. Re:Yeah, except for... on First Steganographic Image Found In The Wild · · Score: 1

    You left out shortwave radio. A few hundred watts + a few meters of wire = world wide coverage when conditions permit, which is oftener than you might think. Some bands propagate very well for thousands of miles.

  18. Re:Why waste it?! on TeleZapper - A Way to Avoid Telemarketers? · · Score: 4, Funny

    A friend of mine loves to mess with them as well. For years he'd listen to their pitch, then start breathing heavily, "Hehhh, Henh" and ask "What kind of underwear are you wearing? Is it soiled? Can you send me a pair?" They'd usually hang up right away. Once one of them called the police and reported him for making an obscene call. He explained to the cops that the telemarketer had called HIM and told them what he had done. I guess the cops were still laughing as they drove away.

    Now his favorite routine is to try to "convert" them.

    "Have you taken our Lord Jesus Christ as your personal savior? Have you welcomed him into your heart? For LO! He is coming. Coming to cast all vile sinners into the firey pits of..." And that's about as far as he's ever gotten before they hang up. Pity, he's got about a 10 minute routine worked up. Funniest thing about it is when he receives one of these calls on his cell phone in a restaraunt. You should see all the other diners shut up and listen in, then nervously go back to their conversations.

  19. Re:My $.02 on Wanted - 45 Mile Wireless Broadband? · · Score: 1

    As an EE currently studying Hardware Communications, I'd say Fiber...with latencies in the picosecond range, It'd probably be your best bet...the only question is what kind of terrain do you have between here and there...Microwave might have too much latency.

    Do us all a favor and tell us what school you are attending so we can advise our friends and relatives to avoid it. There is no appreciable difference in latency between fiber and microwave, take it from someone who's worked with both for more years that you've been alive.

    Go run your statement past one of your profs if you dare. Just don't do it while he's drinking coffee or you'll probably get a {snort} caffiene shower.

  20. Re:Microwave is the Way on Wanted - 45 Mile Wireless Broadband? · · Score: 1

    Western Mux was exactly what I was going to suggest. Where I work we had a problem getting data service down into a valley and across the Mississippi to a new plant. We couldn't get right-of-way for fiber and the local telco couldn't provide the capacity.

    Ended up putting a couple of hops of Western Multiplex Lynx radios. (Spread spectrum, no license required) One 20 mile hop from one of our buildings to a grain elevator on the river, another hop (about 2 miles) across the river to the plant. 4 radios total. We get 4 T1's, both ways. We pay the grain elevator $100 a month lease and the radios use less power than a 100W light bulb. They're easy to setup, easy to maintain and can be remotely monitored. (We don't bother anymore, they just keep running.) I forget the exact cost but it was so low we were able to buy a couple of spares that we've never needed in 2 years. We're now thinking of putting the spares in service at another building and saving the line charges we're paying for a T1 for the phone system there.

    At the grain elevator we installed the radios and a UPS in a sealed metal cabinet to keep the dust out and hardly ever have to touch it. Once a year we check the UPS and usually change the batteries just to be safe. They can put these in cabinets that mount on a pole or outside on a roof. Mount the antennas and radios, run power into them... Volia! You've got a repeater link to the next site.

    4 T1's are about 6M. Maybe that's not as much as you were looking for, but they make bigger capacity units as well. (I see they now have an unlicensed 8 T1 now.)

    We bought ours through Ibex Systems. (www.ibexsystems.com) Ask for Bill Barr, although anyone there can probably help you. Sometimes they even have used and demo equipment.

    Disclaimer: I don't work for Ibex Systems, I recommend them because they've always helped us out and steered us straight.

  21. Re:The Impact On The American Economy on Red Hat puts out Legislation Alert on the SSSCA · · Score: 1

    Therefore, it is in violation of the fourth ammendment.

    And your point is?

    Seriously, laws passed in the so-called "war on drugs" allow seizure of assets without due process and the judges in this country uphold them time and time again. Don't think they won't uphold this law as well. We don't have a "justice" system in the US, we have a "legal" system. A justice system implies that at some point justice is done, a legal system only implies that the laws are enforced.

  22. Refunds? on ZeroKnowledge to Discontinue Anonymity Service · · Score: 0, Redundant

    Do the paying customers get their money back?

  23. Re:Mostly funny, but kinda serious too... on Yahoo Serious Fights Yahoo! trademark · · Score: 1

    This should only apply if you infringe on their trademark in the specific area that it applies.

    It should, but it doesn't necesarily happen that way. Fed-Ex sued a coffee shop that called itself Federal Expresso. They tried changing their name to something like Ex-Federal Expresso and Fed-Ex still wasn't satisfied. I heard they eventually had to change their name to something else but I an't confirm it.

  24. Re:Why bother... on Yahoo Serious Fights Yahoo! trademark · · Score: 1

    Actually there is an inn and restaraunt run by the original McDonald family in Scotland. When the McDonalds chain was suing everyone in sight that was using the name McDonald, the owner of the inn basicly told them, "Bring it on, we go back 300 years. Who has the prior claim now?" McDonalds (the chain) has yet to do dick to him.

  25. Re:apology on Yahoo Serious Fights Yahoo! trademark · · Score: 2, Funny

    Thank you.

    And in reciprocation, we Americans would like to apologize for Carrot Top.

    Well, actually not so much apologize as fire him from a cannon into a low earth orbit without a space suit.