NVidia's kernel interfaces, and ATi drivers.
on
UT2003 Demo Ready
·
· Score: 2
While it would be nice to have an open-source driver, having ones based on the same codebase as their Windows drivers is pretty close - NV's Linux drivers are *EXCELLENT*
As to the kernel interface portion itself - The drivers are released as two parts. One is the X driver module (closed-source), the other is the kernel glue (open-source) - NV has been VERY good about upgrading their kernel glue to track kernel changes, and in cases where they don't immediately release a new version, they have often put up unofficial user-submitted patches that allow people to use the driver before they release the next official version (Which happens often)
ATis work great? Last I heard the oh-so-almighty open-source drivers were missing texture compression, a key (and standard) feature on ALL modern cards less than 2-3 years old. This makes the ATi drivers essentially useless for any modern 3D game. If you want TC support with an ATi, not only do you have to deal with a "dreaded" closed-source driver, you have to PAY XiG for it.
Wasn't there a study recently posted on/. that showed that Linux installations actually outnumbered OSX? (By only a little, something like 3.9 percent for Linux vs. 3.7 for OSX.)
And I have a feeling Linux users are more likely to be gamers than Mac users.
And from your description, your software is just like gpsdrive, which schleps maps from other sources like MapBlast, Terraserver, etc.
Raster maps don't allow zooming unless you download multiple resolutions, and once you've done this, the maps take a LOT more space than a vector map.
Note: The TIGER datasets are not a good example of a vector map size-wise, as they're in an ASCII format for ease of processing - A lot of the numeric fields could have their ASCII representations replaced with binary to save a LOT of space. Also, rather than having each "road segment" include the name of the road, the segments can be chained together to make a road definition that is a series of latitude/longitude points in a chain. Somewhere I've got a Perl script that does this and outputs it in a format used by a neato Garmin Mapsource map generator program. (Long since disappeared from the 'net...:( )
There's apparently a Gnomad project that aims to support vector maps under Linux, but it's vaporware at the moment. Not even an alpha or CVS release.
The data is there, it's just a matter of writing the software...
Maybe because the people currently staffing NJ gas stations are barely capable of pumping gas?
Maybe because they can barely understand "Fill it up regular" and 50% of them *cannot* understand "Don't top it off."
Yes, I don't know how many times I have asked, "Don't top it off" and was either ignored or not understand. I've even yelled, "Stop!!!" when they did top it off. Did they stop? Nope.
Gas stations also used to be a place where you could ask for directions. Since they have to hire 4 minimum-wage guys that can barely understand English rather than 1 cash register operator who can at least understand some, the current crop of gas station attendants couldn't tell you how to find a street EVEN IF IT IS THE STREET THE STATION IS ON! I saw an article about just such an incident a few weeks ago - Someone was heading to an appointment, asked the attendants for directions, and they had no clue. The guy called his destination from a payphone, guess what their instructions were?
The phone transmits a minimum amount of power when it is in standby mode. The time you have to worry about it is when it's next to your head, if at all.
You don't get power for free... If a phone has 6 days of standby battery life and 4-5 hours of talk time, it's clearly NOT transmitting much when in standby.
Verizon's unlimited plans are $99/month I believe, and peak at 144 kbits/sec. Note that this is a shared channel - You're more likely to be about the equivalent of a 56k modem on average.
It does have the advantage that you can take it with you though. But for home access it's Not There Yet by ANY means.
In the article about Dartmouth they note that Dartmouth's network is intentionally left wide open, in the true spirit of academia.
Harvard could likely be intentionally wide open, or they could be like Cornell's Red Rover service. You can associate, you can get an IP, but good luck getting your packets routed beyond the gateway unless your MAC is registered.
A lot of corporations frown upon 802.11 due to its security isses.
Small corporations, not as much (due to ignorance). Large corps, majorly different story, even thought they could potentially benefit from it more.
That said, the article doesn't just talk about Dartmouth's coverage, it talks about how much 802.11 has been integrated into Dartmouth lifestyle.
I went to Cornell, by no means a backwards school. But laptops were few and far between and Red Rover (Cornell's network) sucks coverage-wise. It's also far more closed than Dartmouth's network.
The writer mentions that it took a day or two of being present at Dartmouth before he saw someone using a cell phone - That shows just how much impact cell phones are having on life at Dartmouth. At Cornell, if you go for more than an hour or two without seeing someone yakking on a cell phone, it's impressive. It's especially true for the younger incoming classes (those who were sophomores when I was a senior, for example) - My upstairs neighbors were all sophomores, and to picture them NOT being attached to their cell phones is unimaginable.
Roaming (and automatic handoffs) are one of the features that sets Cisco/Symbol/high-end Orinoco APs apart from many cheaper ones (Note: Such features are quickly drifting downwards to lower-priced units, I believe some Linksys APs now support roaming too).
Hopping from cell to cell (AP to AP) is the key to cellular phone systems having such high capacity. Need more capacity? Can't afford more spectrum? Drop your power level down and pack the cells more closely together.
If Dartmouth has 460 APs, that means that they are running at relatively low power levels, i.e. their network is quite segmented to distribute the load.
Still, some APs (like those in cafeterias) could be a little overloaded.
Solutions, wireless, etc etc.
on
Portable Hubs?
·
· Score: 4, Informative
For one:
Price is a useless excuse for not going wireless. If you search, you can get WLAN cards for $30 on sale these days. And as many pointed out, if you plunked down $1000-2000 for a laptop, you can afford a WLAN card even if it's $100.
That said, for another year or two, strangers are less likely to have WLAN cards. (But this is changing VERY quickly... It's getting to the point that having a laptop without getting a WLAN card is just plain silly.)
So your two solutions are: PS/2-powered hub. Good if you have a decent mobo, but some laptops don't quite meet the PS/2 power supply spec... And there's no way to tell w/o risking damage to the mobo. Also, it'll drain your battery.
Homebrew battery-powered hub. IMO this is the way to go. There were a few links to a 9V powered one. Note that trying to find the smallest hub might not give you the one with the lowest power consumption. Also, 9V batteries have VERY low capacity compared to AA/AAA batteries. 4 AA rechargeables will cost you about as much (or less than) a 9V rechargeable and last much longer. I think most 9V rechargeables are 15 mAh rated, "cheap" Walmart AAs will be 1200-1300 mAh. Sears has the best deal on NiMhs I've seen - 1500 mAh units, $10 for 4. I have tons of DieHards now.:) Getting back the 9V vs. AA, a 9v 150 mAh battery is approxibately equivalent to a 4.5v 300 mAh battery. 4 AAs gives you 4.2v at 1200-1500 mAh or more, which is 4x or more the capacity at the same price.
4.2V will be a bit iffy with a 5V hub, but it'll be easier to charge than having more than 4 batteries. Plus the more rechargeables you have in series, the more likely you are to have problems with cell imbalances. With a step-up regulator (not expensive if you're comfortable with homebrewing some elctronics - Maxim sells some great switching regulator ICs at http://www.maxim-ic.com/), you can power 9V hubs from 4 AAs.
Don't discharge the battery pack below an average of 1 volt/cell (4.0 volts total) - Any lower and you risk a cell reversal, which will kill the cell for sure and possibly damage other cells in the pack. (Not as much of an issue if each battery is individually removable - it matters more for packs of cells.)
While this is somewhat different than what you describe...
Most cars have a "heater door" in the intake airbox that is temperature-controlled. If the intake air temperature is below a certain point, the door opens up, recycling warmer air that has been heated by the engine rather than using cold intake air.
This allows the car to warm up MUCH more quickly. (At the expense of performanc - Cold air is denser than warm air, which means more air mass can be fit into the cylinders.)
As to oil flow - The engine is filled with oil, what more can you ask for as long as it's circulating while the engine is running? Oil filters and other parts of the oil system have check valves to prevent the engine parts from draining out their oil when the car is turned off. The system you propose is just a crutch for people who can't properly maintain their car. (i.e. change the oil filter, which contains the primary check valve, often enough)
Of course, the fact that this is an HEV system makes most of your comments relatively irrelevant.
Security through obscurity.
on
"Squishy" DRM?
·
· Score: 2
No. Crack it but don't tell anyone until it's major egg on the faces of all involved.:)
3...2...1... Cracked!
on
"Squishy" DRM?
·
· Score: 5, Funny
And shortly afterwards, statistics show that the #1 and #2 producers of illicit MP3s in the United States based on the fingerprints of MP3s found on the net are...
1) Hilary Rosen 2) Jack Valenti
With William Gates coming in close with the #3 spot
Only those OSes which scored badly the first time around were retested.
That said, the last test was for 2.2 - It would be useful to test 2.4 just for comparison. It sounded like 2.2 had a few *MINOR* flaws (Mainly a reduced number of bits of randomness, probably easily changed by changing the type of a variable or two) that despite being flaws, were insignificant. Something like a.03% probability of a successful attack. Satisfactory but not 0.
Has 2.4 achieved a 0? (Or at least.0000001%?)
Or what if the kernel developers accidentally screwed something up and 2.4 is worse than 2.2? (HIGHLY unlikely but still possible...)
GSM's underlying modulation scheme is TDMA, which means that it is no better in areas such as range/call handoff/noise immunity than TDMA. CDMA is generally considered to be a superior modulation scheme, which is why next-gen GSM will be CDMA.
And don't forget that with the exception of AT&T (whom I've heard VERY mixed opinions of), all of the GSM/TDMA providers have miniscule coverage areas.
The only two carriers that are really an option if you actually care about coverage quality and dropped calls are AT&T and Verizon, they're the only truly nationwide providers.
The post here is honestly the FIRST time I've heard anything negative about VZW from someone who actually uses their service, and it's a blatantly false claime - Verizon doesn't require Passport *at all* to check online billing. I know this because I just checked my bill and didn't see a single mention of Passport.
1) Inferior coverage. Sprint's non-roaming coverage is probably around 20-30% if you look at their map. Hell, they can't even cover all of New Jersey, the most densely populated state in the USA! Verizon is well over 50% of the country, probably closer to 75%+
2) Inferior customer service. I've heard numerous complaints about "claire" - And now they want to charge you for customer service calls!
3) No MO-SMS - You have to log into some sort of website to send an SMS.
4) Distinction between data minutes and voice minutes. You *HAVE* to get Wireless Web unless you want to pay 39 cents/minute for data calls whether they're microbrowser or simply using your phone as a modem. With Verizon, you only need Mobile Web if you need microbrowser capability. If you have an integrated PDA/phone such as the Kyo 6035 or use your phone as a modem for a laptop or other PDA, Mobile Office is free and simply uses your voice minutes for data calls.
Yes, their online portal is a different story. They switched MyVZW from Infospace to MSN.
Not like I care.
My advice: Get a Kyocera Smartphone. No more need for the crappy $5/month Mobile Web WAP service, you now have a full-blown client side web browser, an excellent combo web/WAP browser (Blazer) is available for $20, and you get to use the hundreds of PQA apps that have been written for the Palm VII.
I work at a company that does a lot of RF electronics work.
We needed a piece of test equipment for one of our lab setups. While we were turning it on and setting it up, we smelled an odd smell.
We immediately shut down the lab setup, assuming that it was the cause. (Early research/development effort, we fried a LOT of the stuff we were working on in the process.)
Turns out that the super-expensive HP network analyzer we had came complete with the "brand new electronics" smell. After an hour or two the smell was gone.
But with Netflix, who cares? Yes, there's a bit of a delay if I REALLY REALLY want to see a particular movie. But in general, I'm fed with a constant stream of movies, usually faster than I get around to watching them, at what probably averages to $3 a movie or less. (Depending on how quickly I get around to watching em')
Because of the fact that one of the most common criticisms of the media industry is that of insanely overinflated prices.
(Note: The MPAA is honestly nowhere near as guilty as the RIAA in this regard... At least not for video rentals. Don't get me started on the combination of jacking up theater admission prices AND subjecting us to advertising before the movie at the same time. A common bash of the RIAA is that the soundtrack for H.Pot is only $1 less than the full movie itself with all special features.)
In this case, they are charging an insanely overinflated price for these downloads.
They're charging $3.99 for one day, whereas most video rental stores give the full higher-quality DVD for $5 or less.
So for $1 more (Probably the same price or even less if I go to a smaller, non-Blockbuster/Hollywood Vid shop) I get 5x the playing time and DVD quality. If I'm a Netflix subscriber I'm even better off.
If you're having idle problems, then almost surely your computer is being fed bad data (i.e. a sensor is bad or something is wrong that's causing wacked data to be reported by the sensors). Many mechanics are clueless at diagnosing such problems. If he's simply resetting your computer to fix the problem, go get a new mechanic.
Probably either one of the sensors in your throttle body is going bad, or the idle air control motor. Could also be cracked/leaky vacuum lines, when they start going all SORTS of weird shit starts happening - How old is your car, what make/model?
Lexmark inkjets and Epson inkjets
on
Printer Makers' Ploys
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
It's probably improved a bit, but a few years ago Lexmark had *NO* Linux support.
I don't know about speed, but quality-wise when printing photos, Epson is one of the best AND has *excellent* Linux support. (Not from the vendor, but Epsons always seem to get the coolest new driver improvements under Linux.)
Slashdot Mirror
While it would be nice to have an open-source driver, having ones based on the same codebase as their Windows drivers is pretty close - NV's Linux drivers are *EXCELLENT*
As to the kernel interface portion itself - The drivers are released as two parts. One is the X driver module (closed-source), the other is the kernel glue (open-source) - NV has been VERY good about upgrading their kernel glue to track kernel changes, and in cases where they don't immediately release a new version, they have often put up unofficial user-submitted patches that allow people to use the driver before they release the next official version (Which happens often)
ATis work great? Last I heard the oh-so-almighty open-source drivers were missing texture compression, a key (and standard) feature on ALL modern cards less than 2-3 years old. This makes the ATi drivers essentially useless for any modern 3D game. If you want TC support with an ATi, not only do you have to deal with a "dreaded" closed-source driver, you have to PAY XiG for it.
Wasn't there a study recently posted on /. that showed that Linux installations actually outnumbered OSX? (By only a little, something like 3.9 percent for Linux vs. 3.7 for OSX.)
And I have a feeling Linux users are more likely to be gamers than Mac users.
And from your description, your software is just like gpsdrive, which schleps maps from other sources like MapBlast, Terraserver, etc.
:( )
Raster maps don't allow zooming unless you download multiple resolutions, and once you've done this, the maps take a LOT more space than a vector map.
Note: The TIGER datasets are not a good example of a vector map size-wise, as they're in an ASCII format for ease of processing - A lot of the numeric fields could have their ASCII representations replaced with binary to save a LOT of space. Also, rather than having each "road segment" include the name of the road, the segments can be chained together to make a road definition that is a series of latitude/longitude points in a chain. Somewhere I've got a Perl script that does this and outputs it in a format used by a neato Garmin Mapsource map generator program. (Long since disappeared from the 'net...
There's apparently a Gnomad project that aims to support vector maps under Linux, but it's vaporware at the moment. Not even an alpha or CVS release.
The data is there, it's just a matter of writing the software...
You've gotta do it yourself.
Why do we want to pump our own gas?
Maybe because the people currently staffing NJ gas stations are barely capable of pumping gas?
Maybe because they can barely understand "Fill it up regular" and 50% of them *cannot* understand "Don't top it off."
Yes, I don't know how many times I have asked, "Don't top it off" and was either ignored or not understand. I've even yelled, "Stop!!!" when they did top it off. Did they stop? Nope.
Gas stations also used to be a place where you could ask for directions. Since they have to hire 4 minimum-wage guys that can barely understand English rather than 1 cash register operator who can at least understand some, the current crop of gas station attendants couldn't tell you how to find a street EVEN IF IT IS THE STREET THE STATION IS ON! I saw an article about just such an incident a few weeks ago - Someone was heading to an appointment, asked the attendants for directions, and they had no clue. The guy called his destination from a payphone, guess what their instructions were?
"Look behind you..."
The phone transmits a minimum amount of power when it is in standby mode. The time you have to worry about it is when it's next to your head, if at all.
You don't get power for free... If a phone has 6 days of standby battery life and 4-5 hours of talk time, it's clearly NOT transmitting much when in standby.
Verizon's unlimited plans are $99/month I believe, and peak at 144 kbits/sec. Note that this is a shared channel - You're more likely to be about the equivalent of a 56k modem on average.
It does have the advantage that you can take it with you though. But for home access it's Not There Yet by ANY means.
In the article about Dartmouth they note that Dartmouth's network is intentionally left wide open, in the true spirit of academia.
Harvard could likely be intentionally wide open, or they could be like Cornell's Red Rover service. You can associate, you can get an IP, but good luck getting your packets routed beyond the gateway unless your MAC is registered.
A lot of corporations frown upon 802.11 due to its security isses.
Small corporations, not as much (due to ignorance). Large corps, majorly different story, even thought they could potentially benefit from it more.
That said, the article doesn't just talk about Dartmouth's coverage, it talks about how much 802.11 has been integrated into Dartmouth lifestyle.
I went to Cornell, by no means a backwards school. But laptops were few and far between and Red Rover (Cornell's network) sucks coverage-wise. It's also far more closed than Dartmouth's network.
The writer mentions that it took a day or two of being present at Dartmouth before he saw someone using a cell phone - That shows just how much impact cell phones are having on life at Dartmouth. At Cornell, if you go for more than an hour or two without seeing someone yakking on a cell phone, it's impressive. It's especially true for the younger incoming classes (those who were sophomores when I was a senior, for example) - My upstairs neighbors were all sophomores, and to picture them NOT being attached to their cell phones is unimaginable.
Roaming (and automatic handoffs) are one of the features that sets Cisco/Symbol/high-end Orinoco APs apart from many cheaper ones (Note: Such features are quickly drifting downwards to lower-priced units, I believe some Linksys APs now support roaming too).
Hopping from cell to cell (AP to AP) is the key to cellular phone systems having such high capacity. Need more capacity? Can't afford more spectrum? Drop your power level down and pack the cells more closely together.
If Dartmouth has 460 APs, that means that they are running at relatively low power levels, i.e. their network is quite segmented to distribute the load.
Still, some APs (like those in cafeterias) could be a little overloaded.
For one:
:) Getting back the 9V vs. AA, a 9v 150 mAh battery is approxibately equivalent to a 4.5v 300 mAh battery. 4 AAs gives you 4.2v at 1200-1500 mAh or more, which is 4x or more the capacity at the same price.
Price is a useless excuse for not going wireless. If you search, you can get WLAN cards for $30 on sale these days. And as many pointed out, if you plunked down $1000-2000 for a laptop, you can afford a WLAN card even if it's $100.
That said, for another year or two, strangers are less likely to have WLAN cards. (But this is changing VERY quickly... It's getting to the point that having a laptop without getting a WLAN card is just plain silly.)
So your two solutions are:
PS/2-powered hub. Good if you have a decent mobo, but some laptops don't quite meet the PS/2 power supply spec... And there's no way to tell w/o risking damage to the mobo. Also, it'll drain your battery.
Homebrew battery-powered hub. IMO this is the way to go. There were a few links to a 9V powered one. Note that trying to find the smallest hub might not give you the one with the lowest power consumption. Also, 9V batteries have VERY low capacity compared to AA/AAA batteries. 4 AA rechargeables will cost you about as much (or less than) a 9V rechargeable and last much longer. I think most 9V rechargeables are 15 mAh rated, "cheap" Walmart AAs will be 1200-1300 mAh. Sears has the best deal on NiMhs I've seen - 1500 mAh units, $10 for 4. I have tons of DieHards now.
4.2V will be a bit iffy with a 5V hub, but it'll be easier to charge than having more than 4 batteries. Plus the more rechargeables you have in series, the more likely you are to have problems with cell imbalances. With a step-up regulator (not expensive if you're comfortable with homebrewing some elctronics - Maxim sells some great switching regulator ICs at http://www.maxim-ic.com/), you can power 9V hubs from 4 AAs.
Don't discharge the battery pack below an average of 1 volt/cell (4.0 volts total) - Any lower and you risk a cell reversal, which will kill the cell for sure and possibly damage other cells in the pack. (Not as much of an issue if each battery is individually removable - it matters more for packs of cells.)
While this is somewhat different than what you describe...
Most cars have a "heater door" in the intake airbox that is temperature-controlled. If the intake air temperature is below a certain point, the door opens up, recycling warmer air that has been heated by the engine rather than using cold intake air.
This allows the car to warm up MUCH more quickly. (At the expense of performanc - Cold air is denser than warm air, which means more air mass can be fit into the cylinders.)
As to oil flow - The engine is filled with oil, what more can you ask for as long as it's circulating while the engine is running? Oil filters and other parts of the oil system have check valves to prevent the engine parts from draining out their oil when the car is turned off. The system you propose is just a crutch for people who can't properly maintain their car. (i.e. change the oil filter, which contains the primary check valve, often enough)
Of course, the fact that this is an HEV system makes most of your comments relatively irrelevant.
No. Crack it but don't tell anyone until it's major egg on the faces of all involved. :)
And shortly afterwards, statistics show that the #1 and #2 producers of illicit MP3s in the United States based on the fingerprints of MP3s found on the net are...
1) Hilary Rosen
2) Jack Valenti
With William Gates coming in close with the #3 spot
Only those OSes which scored badly the first time around were retested.
.03% probability of a successful attack. Satisfactory but not 0.
.0000001%?)
That said, the last test was for 2.2 - It would be useful to test 2.4 just for comparison. It sounded like 2.2 had a few *MINOR* flaws (Mainly a reduced number of bits of randomness, probably easily changed by changing the type of a variable or two) that despite being flaws, were insignificant. Something like a
Has 2.4 achieved a 0? (Or at least
Or what if the kernel developers accidentally screwed something up and 2.4 is worse than 2.2? (HIGHLY unlikely but still possible...)
Verizon, like Sprint, uses CDMA.
GSM's underlying modulation scheme is TDMA, which means that it is no better in areas such as range/call handoff/noise immunity than TDMA. CDMA is generally considered to be a superior modulation scheme, which is why next-gen GSM will be CDMA.
And don't forget that with the exception of AT&T (whom I've heard VERY mixed opinions of), all of the GSM/TDMA providers have miniscule coverage areas.
The only two carriers that are really an option if you actually care about coverage quality and dropped calls are AT&T and Verizon, they're the only truly nationwide providers.
The post here is honestly the FIRST time I've heard anything negative about VZW from someone who actually uses their service, and it's a blatantly false claime - Verizon doesn't require Passport *at all* to check online billing. I know this because I just checked my bill and didn't see a single mention of Passport.
1) Inferior coverage. Sprint's non-roaming coverage is probably around 20-30% if you look at their map. Hell, they can't even cover all of New Jersey, the most densely populated state in the USA! Verizon is well over 50% of the country, probably closer to 75%+
2) Inferior customer service. I've heard numerous complaints about "claire" - And now they want to charge you for customer service calls!
3) No MO-SMS - You have to log into some sort of website to send an SMS.
4) Distinction between data minutes and voice minutes. You *HAVE* to get Wireless Web unless you want to pay 39 cents/minute for data calls whether they're microbrowser or simply using your phone as a modem. With Verizon, you only need Mobile Web if you need microbrowser capability. If you have an integrated PDA/phone such as the Kyo 6035 or use your phone as a modem for a laptop or other PDA, Mobile Office is free and simply uses your voice minutes for data calls.
Went to http://bill.verizonwireless.com/
Input my username/password
I now see my bill.
Nothing about MSN.
Yes, their online portal is a different story. They switched MyVZW from Infospace to MSN.
Not like I care.
My advice: Get a Kyocera Smartphone. No more need for the crappy $5/month Mobile Web WAP service, you now have a full-blown client side web browser, an excellent combo web/WAP browser (Blazer) is available for $20, and you get to use the hundreds of PQA apps that have been written for the Palm VII.
I work at a company that does a lot of RF electronics work.
We needed a piece of test equipment for one of our lab setups. While we were turning it on and setting it up, we smelled an odd smell.
We immediately shut down the lab setup, assuming that it was the cause. (Early research/development effort, we fried a LOT of the stuff we were working on in the process.)
Turns out that the super-expensive HP network analyzer we had came complete with the "brand new electronics" smell. After an hour or two the smell was gone.
I'm also a lazy bum.
But with Netflix, who cares? Yes, there's a bit of a delay if I REALLY REALLY want to see a particular movie. But in general, I'm fed with a constant stream of movies, usually faster than I get around to watching them, at what probably averages to $3 a movie or less. (Depending on how quickly I get around to watching em')
No need to go to the video store.
If you're only keeping the movies for a day or two it comes out to $3/movie - Probably closer to $2 or less.
I have Netflix and I love it.
The cost of this isn't worth the convenience, especially with Netflix out there.
Because of the fact that one of the most common criticisms of the media industry is that of insanely overinflated prices.
(Note: The MPAA is honestly nowhere near as guilty as the RIAA in this regard... At least not for video rentals. Don't get me started on the combination of jacking up theater admission prices AND subjecting us to advertising before the movie at the same time. A common bash of the RIAA is that the soundtrack for H.Pot is only $1 less than the full movie itself with all special features.)
In this case, they are charging an insanely overinflated price for these downloads.
They're charging $3.99 for one day, whereas most video rental stores give the full higher-quality DVD for $5 or less.
So for $1 more (Probably the same price or even less if I go to a smaller, non-Blockbuster/Hollywood Vid shop) I get 5x the playing time and DVD quality. If I'm a Netflix subscriber I'm even better off.
Because of the following:
Which would you rather have:
Full-blown DVD, 5 days for $3-5, or:
Download - 1 day for $4?
I'd pick the DVD.
They'll have to drop the price a LOT to compete with brick-and-mortar rental store.
a) Deskjet/Laserjet are HP-specific brands for their inkjet and laser printers.
..."?
b) Um, did you read the subject of my comment? "Lexmark inkjets
If you're having idle problems, then almost surely your computer is being fed bad data (i.e. a sensor is bad or something is wrong that's causing wacked data to be reported by the sensors). Many mechanics are clueless at diagnosing such problems. If he's simply resetting your computer to fix the problem, go get a new mechanic.
Probably either one of the sensors in your throttle body is going bad, or the idle air control motor. Could also be cracked/leaky vacuum lines, when they start going all SORTS of weird shit starts happening - How old is your car, what make/model?
It's probably improved a bit, but a few years ago Lexmark had *NO* Linux support.
I don't know about speed, but quality-wise when printing photos, Epson is one of the best AND has *excellent* Linux support. (Not from the vendor, but Epsons always seem to get the coolest new driver improvements under Linux.)