Transistors are so small these days that the primary limiting factor among these is interconnect length.
Some friends of mine are doing an interesting senior project where they use signal reflectance to determine state of memory. Since virtually no current is used to read the state of the device, this memory could be very very fast to read...
As evidenced by the success of the JAILBAIT distro, I believe that 16MB ROM and 32MB RAM is "the right amount" of space for a PDA / embedded Linux system. With advancements in kernel technologies such as CramFS, expect to see things such as Netscape 4.7, an mp3 player, and full version of XFree in 16 megabytes. Expect it in JAILBAIT 6....
For instance, my favorite would be Orange Marmalade. Some people would argue strawberry would be the best choice, but only one man would dare give you the raspberry....
>nVidia should be releasing drivers in the next >few months for their line of 3D cards, although >the impression I've gotten is that they won't be >using DRI (apparently they or SGI didn't feel >that DRI was the most appropriate means of doing >accelerated 3d for nVidia's cards).
When writing CGI, I write time-critical or process-intensive tasks in C and shell out in Perl using backticks. This gives me the speed and 'cleanliness of code' that I need while allowing me access to all of Perl's wonderful hash-and-smash text munging to handle the output.
I used to use Accelerated X because it actually was superior to XFree... at least before version 5 came out. I switched when I discovered that it created a nonlinear framebuffer in my I128 card and I couldn't use my new television card. No DGA support either.
Xaccel version 4.2 was really fast and crashed much less than XFree in its time. But I'm pissed that I spent $100 on an upgrade that wasn't worth s%@*. It crashed and ate ram like a pig. These days, I can run XFree for a week without having to restart it - which is a real tribute to those hard-working good guys over there at XFree86.org.
Anyhow, kudos to XFree and rotten eggs to XAccel. That's what I say. Have a nice day.
Lithium has one of the greatest voltage half-reactions in the redox table (CRC 1995) that I have. The reduction reaction Li+ +e- -> Li renders about -3.0401 E/V. And since the other half-reaction is the standard hydrogen electrode, we end up with a battery generating 3 volts per cell for lithium, which is a real boon.
The only greater reduction potentials are from 3N2 + 2H+ + 2e -> 2HN3 , Pr3+ + e -> Pr2+, Ca+ +e -> Ca, and finally Sr+ +e -> Sr which tops off at -4.10 E/V.
On the other hand, if we look at our Iron FerrATE (by the way, CmdrTaco, it's FERRATE (O4) and not FERRITE (O3) !!!) Iron Ferrate is Fe04, and according to my handy dandy table:
Fe04 2- + 8 H+ + 3e- -> Fe3+ + 4 H20 at +2.20 E/V
Here we're charging the battery and losing a lot of water. I'm not sure how Li Ion batteries charge becuase it's been to long since electrochem, but it's clear that lithium ion is a much better technology in terms of energy density:
1. Voltage is probably much better 2. Fe -based batteries will weigh about 10 times more 3. Fe - based batteries will have to deal with lots of water, which takes VOLUME becuase it doesn't reduce volume when dissolved back into solution...
So, in all, I bet you the energy density of a Li Ion battery is about 15 times what a ferrate battery probably is.
But I could be wrong - it's been many years since I've played a lot with electrochem.
However, when we look at cycles, nothing beats charge-discharge of those iron-nickel batteries... so there you go...
But I think a ferrate battery might make an interesting replacement for lead-acid batteries in cars in WARM climates, considering that all you'd need to add is some water once in a while, and that's pretty innocuous compared with sulfuric. Yipes.
But our predecessors were smart cookies. There's a reason why we have lead-acid... cheap, dependable, doesn't freeze at 32 degrees, etc...
Personally I like the idea of a giant iron-based UPS!!! that'd be fun... ; ) But there you go...
Assume for a moment that a fellow named Jim has just had one of his fingers cut off. Instead of getting a finger reattached that was made of cow cells, why not take Jim's bone, cartilage and tendon cells and graft them onto a polymer scaffold and implant this inside of Jim himself? That way we don't have _any_ chance for rejection.
Plus, Jim could be a great hit at parties for the next 20 weeks.
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Transistors are so small these days that the primary limiting factor among these is interconnect length.
Some friends of mine are doing an interesting senior project where they use signal reflectance to determine state of memory. Since virtually no current is used to read the state of the device, this memory could be very very fast to read...
"Scratch once, lose eighty times the data!"
"My router is having a brainfart!"
As evidenced by the success of the JAILBAIT distro, I believe that 16MB ROM and 32MB RAM is "the right amount" of space for a PDA / embedded Linux system. With advancements in kernel technologies such as CramFS, expect to see things such as Netscape 4.7, an mp3 player, and full version of XFree in 16 megabytes. Expect it in JAILBAIT 6....
Right On!
De best thin' about downgradin' all Internet pages t'Ebonics be dat it kin be done by slight modificashuns t'de Jive webfilter. Ah be baaad...
For instance, my favorite would be Orange Marmalade. Some people would argue strawberry would be the best choice, but only one man would dare give you the raspberry....
>few months for their line of 3D cards, although
>the impression I've gotten is that they won't be
>using DRI (apparently they or SGI didn't feel
>that DRI was the most appropriate means of doing
>accelerated 3d for nVidia's cards).
The funny thing about this is if you go to Xi Graphics' web site (they make a commercial product called 3D Accelerated-X), they seem to bitch about how uncooporative nVidia is with their 3D technology...
...teenagers will be taking FLIR cameras instead.
When writing CGI, I write time-critical or process-intensive tasks in C and shell out in Perl using backticks. This gives me the speed and 'cleanliness of code' that I need while allowing me access to all of Perl's wonderful hash-and-smash text munging to handle the output.
I used to use Accelerated X because it actually was superior to XFree... at least before version 5 came out. I switched when I discovered that it created a nonlinear framebuffer in my I128 card and I couldn't use my new television card. No DGA support either.
Xaccel version 4.2 was really fast and crashed much less than XFree in its time. But I'm pissed that I spent $100 on an upgrade that wasn't worth s%@*. It crashed and ate ram like a pig. These days, I can run XFree for a week without having to restart it - which is a real tribute to those hard-working good guys over there at XFree86.org.
Anyhow, kudos to XFree and rotten eggs to XAccel. That's what I say. Have a nice day.
What annoys me is how big-time journalists never seem to compare the number of coal-mine fatalities to that of nuclear causes.
Accidents in coal mines are far, far, far more common than nuclear accidens. More fatalities, too.
Take a look at some statistics for coal mine fatalities and you'll see what I mean.
And then there's the oil rig problems...
Lithium has one of the greatest voltage half-reactions in the redox table (CRC 1995) that I have. The reduction reaction Li+ +e- -> Li renders about -3.0401 E/V. And since the other half-reaction is the standard hydrogen electrode, we end up with a battery generating 3 volts per cell for lithium, which is a real boon.
The only greater reduction potentials are from 3N2 + 2H+ + 2e -> 2HN3 , Pr3+ + e -> Pr2+, Ca+ +e -> Ca, and finally Sr+ +e -> Sr which tops off at -4.10 E/V.
On the other hand, if we look at our Iron FerrATE (by the way, CmdrTaco, it's FERRATE (O4) and not FERRITE (O3) !!!) Iron Ferrate is Fe04, and according to my handy dandy table:
Fe04 2- + 8 H+ + 3e- -> Fe3+ + 4 H20 at +2.20 E/V
Here we're charging the battery and losing a lot of water. I'm not sure how Li Ion batteries charge becuase it's been to long since electrochem, but it's clear that lithium ion is a much better technology in terms of energy density:
1. Voltage is probably much better
2. Fe -based batteries will weigh about 10 times more
3. Fe - based batteries will have to deal with lots of water, which takes VOLUME becuase it doesn't reduce volume when dissolved back into solution...
So, in all, I bet you the energy density of a Li Ion battery is about 15 times what a ferrate battery probably is.
But I could be wrong - it's been many years since I've played a lot with electrochem.
However, when we look at cycles, nothing beats charge-discharge of those iron-nickel batteries... so there you go...
But I think a ferrate battery might make an interesting replacement for lead-acid batteries in cars in WARM climates, considering that all you'd need to add is some water once in a while, and that's pretty innocuous compared with sulfuric. Yipes.
But our predecessors were smart cookies. There's a reason why we have lead-acid... cheap, dependable, doesn't freeze at 32 degrees, etc...
Personally I like the idea of a giant iron-based UPS!!! that'd be fun... ; )
But there you go...
Assume for a moment that a fellow named Jim has just had one of his fingers cut off. Instead of getting a finger reattached that was made of cow cells, why not take Jim's bone, cartilage and tendon cells and graft them onto a polymer scaffold and implant this inside of Jim himself? That way we don't have _any_ chance for rejection.
Plus, Jim could be a great hit at parties for the next 20 weeks.