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User: timthorn

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Comments · 44

  1. Re:Already some huge sunk costs on Microsoft and GE Partner On Healthcare · · Score: 1

    Nothing - Centricity isn't part of the JV.

  2. Re:Why not an MBED? on ARM-Based Arduino Competitor At SparkFun · · Score: 1

    You can develop for mbed with GCC - it takes regular binaries, and the mbed website walks through how to use alternate toolchains. However, the project was developed in order to reduce the barrier to entry of developing embedded software. It's extremely easy for a novice to get started.

  3. Re:Now with Shoulder & Elbow Joint Technology! on OLPC Set To Dump x86 For Arm Chips In XO 2 · · Score: 1

    It's no longer an acronym, but it is still all caps.

  4. Re:No, not the Avionics... on Failed Avionics a Possible Cause of BA038 Crash · · Score: 5, Insightful

    No, this happened at the worst possible point. Over the middle of the ocean the aircraft will have been at perhaps 38000 feet and in a flight configuration, giving time to attempt various restart procedures, declare an emergency and glide to an airfield - a transatlantic flight is rarely out of gliding distance to a landing strip, and a flight from China likewise.

  5. Re:Buck Rogers on Making 3D Models from Video Clips · · Score: 1

    Since 2001 at least. Boujou from 2d3 Ltd.

  6. Re:I suppose... on AT&T Wireless Network Is Open Too · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Not Tracphone. As I found out to my cost.

  7. Re:The problem with digital.... on Switch to Digital Television Picking up Steam · · Score: 1

    Multipath is beneficial to DVB-T, because of the COFDM transmission scheme. As long as the time difference is less than the guard interval (which it almost always is) the signal is boosted.

  8. Re:Why are Phones in US Locked Anyways? on Can Apple + AT&T Shut Down iPhone Unlockers? · · Score: 1

    That's true - but there's a legal obligation on the telco to unlock phones on request, though they may charge an admin fee (with Orange it's £20). The iPhone must be unlocked on demand in the UK (and I believe the rest of Europe).

  9. Re:DAB? DRM? on High Definition Radio and New Content Alternatives · · Score: 2, Informative

    National DAB in the UK is single frequency - the radio never retunes.

  10. Re:Welcome to the World of Tomorrow on London 2006, Meet London 1984 · · Score: 1

    My apologies - of course you were...

  11. Re:Welcome to the World of Tomorrow on London 2006, Meet London 1984 · · Score: 1

    The Master System was actually 6502 based - though you could add a Z80 co-processor in the Tube.

  12. Re:Bluetooth on Wireless USB hubs · · Score: 1

    No, they mean 480mbps over wireless. It's ultrawideband (UWB) technology - the data signal is spread out over a vast chunk of radio spectrum, but at low power levels. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultra_wideband The dream is to be able to connect your DVD player with your TV wirelessly, and at that kind of proximity it's very plausible.

  13. Re:North America different yet again on TV On Mobiles: Not Yet There? · · Score: 1
    DVB-H, DVB-T...GSM, CDMA...110V/60Hz, 220V/50Hz...why does there always seem to be a slight yet significant difference in what should otherwise be a universal te3chnology when it comes to the North American and the rest of the world?
    Just to be clear, DVB-H and DVB-T are not US vs RoW standards but extensions of the DVB standard for particular applications (-H handheld, -T terrestrial, -S satellite etc). The US digital terrestrial TV system is ATSC and is very different to DVB-T. There was a short time when DVB was considered for the US as representations were made that the COFDM modulation of DVB was superior to 8-VSB used by ATSC, but they decided to stick with the home-grown solution. Note that DVB is perfectly capable of transmitting HD - this wasn't about picture quality.
  14. Re:North America different yet again on TV On Mobiles: Not Yet There? · · Score: 1

    In the UK at least, GSM was predated by TACS, the European version of AMPS. Cellnet (as was) and Vodafone also had a huge investment in the existing technology - yet still moved to GSM over a fairly short period and made a pile of cash out of doing so.

  15. Re:Buy NVIDIA and ATI stock on Bulky System Requirements for Windows Vista · · Score: 1

    My TFT monitor (Samsung 730MW) supports HDCP. Just a shame my graphics card is a 16MB 2D thingy...

  16. Re:tracking devices on Can a Customer Loyalty Database Change a Society? · · Score: 1

    The only information Tesco get on income is from the amount you spend in store, unless you take out a financial product from them. And, the law in England permits you to see records about you in virtually all databases, and to have corrections made where the data is incorrect. They cannot store data that is unrelated to the purpose of the db - such as if you have a criminal record in this case.

  17. Re:What I want... on BBC Opens TV Listings For Remix · · Score: 1

    That was exactly what the TV-Anytime format was invented for; CRIDs (URLs for TV programmes) will be transmitted along with trailers to allow you to programme your PVR. The format understands repeats of the same programme to assist the PVR scheduler. This is the first time that TV-Anytime has made it into the public, as far as I know, but I hope not the last.

  18. Re:This is new? on Hybrid Fixed and Mobile Telephony · · Score: 2, Informative

    BT sold a DECT/GSM combo phone from Ericsson a while ago that automatically diverted calls between the numbers. This is novel in that the speech path will dynamically reroute from cellular network to landline as the phone moves in and out of coverage of the home base station. That is an impressive bit of engineering.

  19. Re:What percentage does the switchover apply to? on FCC Speeds Up Digital TV Signal Deadlines · · Score: 1

    Only for HD channels. SD channels don't go anywhere near 1080i.

  20. Re:What percentage does the switchover apply to? on FCC Speeds Up Digital TV Signal Deadlines · · Score: 1

    Who said anything about HD? For an adaptor box for an old TV, you wouldn't bother with HD.

  21. Common sense! on Writing Down Passwords? · · Score: 2, Insightful

    In your own home, who else is going to find a piece of paper with your password on? For a router that you configure and forget, writing down the password sounds reasonably sensible to me.

  22. Re:April Fools? Right? on Apple Switching To Intel Chips In 2006 · · Score: 1

    Xscale CPUs are designed to be super low power(and therefore low performance) Low power doesn't mean low performance. There's a lot of energy that gets wasted in desktop CPUs that doesn't need to be.

  23. Re:Beat up Martin on History of the Apple Newton · · Score: 1

    You could get Graffiti for Newton.

  24. Re:OK, I'm impressed. on Google Maps, Local Expand To UK · · Score: 4, Informative
    The colour is for the road status - in the UK we have motorways (eg M1, M25), other trunk roads (A class and B class, eg A41 or B4096), and other roads. Motorways are usually blue, A roads usually red or green, and B roads usually orange. Motorways are almost all 70mph, A roads vary from 40 to 70, and B roads from 30 to 60.

    The road numbering started out as loosely based on which direction from London the road heads. The M1 goes north from London, as does the A1. The A11 is a bit further around, the A110 further still. I'm sure there's a website somewhere that explains the numbering better.

  25. Re:Voom went down because they had no customers on Voom No More · · Score: 1
    Not going for funny at all. I've not seen CSI but I know the kind of image "enhancements" often seen on TV drama are a figment of the writers' imaginations. My original post wasn't referring to those though - it was talking about upconversion.

    Reading my post again perhaps I gave the impression that upconverting could be done to the same standard as native HD which is wrong, but nonetheless a much better job can be done than simple linear interpolation.

    Check out the work of Zisserman and Hartley at Oxford and Irani and Peleg of Weizmann Institute of Science. That's the science I've been reading, I don't think the IEEE consider it fiction.