FIRST let's try putting a candidate for up for office that has qualities clearly the opposite of those that should generate trust in voters. Pick someone that obviously isn't very intelligent, has a history of alcoholism, has had major financial support from a corporation with known corrupt management, and has been caught in numerous misleading statements and lies.
THEN find a large pool of voters exposed to oxytocin or a similar hormone. Since oxytocin is involved in production of breast milk, we could try giving cows extra hormones knowing some will pass through to the milk that humans consume. No one will pay much attention if we explain that it is for increased milk production.
The current drawn by the audio output stage is primarily dependent on the current flowing through the load. The load current depends on the load impedance, and the output voltage.
Measuring life while driving the Apple Earbuds seems entirely fair since that's what the iPod shipped with. Battery life would be slightly better driving a high-impedance load such as the typical input of a stereo system, and somewhat worse when driving un-amplified external speakers which may not only be lower impedance, but will be driven with more voltage (as you crank up the volume trying to get more power, as needed with a source comparitively far from the ears)
A higher volume control setting will NOT mean shorter battery life if it is with a high-impedance load, as the load current is then small enough to ignore.
Battery runtime, even in a new iPod, is influenced considerably by user behavior. As many owners of digital cameras have learned, using the backlight uses quite a bit of energy. Stepping between tracks manually and using higher bitrate files increases energy needs since those things reduce drive sleep.
I suspect that storage and operating temperature is a very important variable having considerable effect on how much battery runtime degrades with age. I've made a point of not leaving my 1G iPod in hot cars. I still get about 10 hours with the original battery. Most of my files are 128 and 160 kbps MP3s.
Perhaps in the Slashdot tradition someone will hack an Airport Express for an external antenna/amplifier connector and post links to a "how to" article.
Using an external antenna instead of more power has several advantages. Adding an appropriate external antenna helps both transmit and receive. Boosting power helps transmit only. Given equally well designed receivers and levels of interference, if it really takes 300 mw to send a signal over the path you're dealing with, it'll also take 300 mw on the other end to send a signal back to you. Having a large imbalance of power levels only generates more interference. The old phrase relating to illegally amplified C.B. radios, "all mouth and no ears", comes to mind. Imagine trying to carry on a conversation with someone up the block outdoors. What good does would it do to use a megaphone to speak to them if they didn't have one to reply with? All you'd do is annoy your neighbors.
When the location of users permits use of a directional antenna one can simultaneously boost the transmitted signal range, boost the receive signal range, reduce the level of received interfering signals from other directions, and reduce the level of transmitted signal causing interference in other directions.
Some might think that an amplifier with a receive preamp might boost receive performance to match more transmitter power. But receive preamplifiers may actually degrade performance of a good receiver since their internal noise level (which is what masks a weak signal) isn't any lower than that of a well designed receiver, and boosting nearby undesired strong signals makes the possibility of poor performance due to signal overload more likely. If an antenna is located some distance away from a receiver a preamp AT THE ANTENNA helps because it prevents the signal loss in the interconnecting cable from reducing the signal relative to the level of the input-circuit generated noise in the receiver.
I, too, would like to see better wireless range in Apple's products, but I believe it'd require power increases at both ends. Improved power management could help make increased power less taxing in a laptop. A laptop could probably be designed to automatically reduce transmit power as the incoming signal gets stronger, since that would be an indication of a lower loss path between the laptop and the access point.
"Close, but no importing.aiff" Perhaps you're using an old version? I've used 1.2.2 for reading and writing AIFF. The Audacity Manual also shows it as supported.
"Why do the remaining 20 million stay? There is nothing on AOL that can't be accessed from the internet at half the cost. "
Some of the services on AOL, such as their chat rooms, cannot normally be accessed by non-subscribers. (At least I haven't seen any software that allows doing it. The presence of spam-bots suggests it could be done). There are similar chat rooms on the net, but for some that is not enough since they won't include all of the same people. In some cases, particularly on old hardware, the platform specific AOL software behaves better than some of the JAVA-based alternatives for chat. The large number of people on AOL makes region-specific chatrooms viable. The location of others in chat may not matter for getting tech advice, but it certainly does if you're looking for a date.
Some do not particularly care for AOL, but aren't motivated enough to switch and face the hassles of changing email addresses. Perhaps we need something for email equivalent to number portability with cell phones.
I'd certainly never pay for AOL, but when a relative is willing to share an account it's okay as a backup ISP.
It seems like it ought to be possible to print an enlarged version of the test target spread across a number of pages making the resolution of an average consumer printer adequate. My question is, how big would the output have to be, to cleanly show everything on the target, with something like an Epson C82?
While this looks like a great geek gadget for the price I find it disturbing that both the review and the Griffin site totally neglect specifications. 1) Does it support an external antenna? 2) How free is it from spurious responses in the presence of strong signals? 3) How sensitive is it? 4) How is the adjacent and alternate channel selectivity? 5) What's the signal to noise ratio for strong and weak signals? 6) How's the A.M. rejection? 7) How's the stereo separation? 8) How's the distortion at various modulation levels? (including a bit above 100%, some stations overmodulate) 9) Can it receive S.C.A. subcarriers? 10) Is there software support to decode E.A.S. (Emergency Alert System) messages? 11) How's the frequency response? 12) Can it tune signals at other than the usual.2 Mhz spaced spots? (tv channel 6 sound is 87.775 Mhz, audible but not properly tuned on many digitally tuned radios)
Granted I don't expect a low-priced receiver to use a balanced mixer, but I'd at least like to see some clue that designers put some thought into performance.
How to send video back from a kite over 802.11 is a good start. I'd like to see similar projects for remote controlled planes. Sending the control signals up on the same wireless link is a logical extension.
I'd like to see other wireless related projects, like some of the things that have been covered by http://tv.seattlewireless.net/ - making antennas, community access points with cheap hardware and free software etc.
Details of simple hacks (hardware and software) would be great to fill in between the big articles. Show me how to add an external antenna to my Airport Express. Show me how power it from 12 Volts in the car without adding an inverter.
It's probably of too limited appeal, but I'd like to see a simple add-on I could use with old surplus 20" fixed-frequency workstation monitors to give them a shut-down sleep mode. It'd be something that looks at the video signal and kills power with a triac.
I'd like to see a project showing how to convert a power supply from an old PC into a general-purpose bench supply. (Perhaps some kind of diode/capacitor voltage multiplier on the coil for the 5 Volt circuit to make a higher current 12 Volt output. It might be easier to add a new winding though hmmmm...)
I'd enjoy seeing various PVR (personal video recorder) projects... how about one with an analog/HDTV tuner that works with Linux, and has a slick version for OS X too? (I expect both to be able to send audio out to an Airport Express)
Projects based on software that'll let us take analog audio and other sources and stream it out to an Airport Express would be fun in general.
How about something that'll let me send multiple streams from analog and HDTV off-air and broadcast them from a hilltop with 802.11b/g for multiple people to receive?
How about a homemade subwoofer with motion-sensing feedback from the cone to the amplifier driving it. That'd flatten frequency response while reducing distortion and box-effects.
How about modifications to consumer appliances to reduce their energy consumption when they're "off"?
How about a collection of Voice over IP telephony projects?
How about a framework for a P2P open-source owned-by-nobody global community-access TV network?
How about noise-cancelling electronics to add to old headphones so I can use my woodworking tools in comfort?
How about a collection of software tools and hardware hacks that can be adapted for mechanical control of all sorts of things? If someone makes a radio-controlled flying chainsaw, please make the link secure. Thank you!
"the Federal Circuit yesterday affirmed that the DMCA does not 'divest the public of the property rights that the Copyright Act has long granted to the public.'
If it is the DMCA that would make it illegal to crack the broadcast flag (which could be used to block digital recording of HDTV programming), shouldn't the reasoning and precidence of this case along with the "fair use" Betamax decision prevent the DMCA from applying ?
Perhaps we could start ranking the importance of these personal-freedom court cases by number and color for where they have impact.... Hmmm.
1. Shocking Pink - Bedroom (Are you in there Cowboy Neal??) 2. Red - Living Room 3. Orange - Garage 4. Yellow - Friend's Place 5. Green - Redmond
Switching to a new release of an OS is frequently painful and expensive. Microsoft may realize that when users are faced with this transition they are more likely than usual to be considering other options such as an OS jump to Linux or a complete platform jump to the Mac and OS X. A free or reduced cost upgrade for the installed base would soften the blow a bit, and potentially could further tie users to MS by getting them tangled even more deeply in proprietary MS technology.
I've run Black Night 1.07 under OS 9.1, but have not tested it in Classic. I believe it was last updated in 1997. I used it to telnet into a BBS with color ANSI graphics. It supports Zmodem and is extendable with Communications Toolbox plugins. I couldn't find a site for the author, but the software is still out there http://www.macosarchives.com/terminal.html
Aside from the number of channels used or carried, I believe there are other factors that should be taken into account to force rate REDUCTION.
1) Digital transmission allows carrying the content of many channels in the bandwidth of a single analog channel. These added channels cost less to carry and maintain since their addition does not tax the power output capacity of the distribution amplifiers. Also the demands for signal amplitude and freedom from cross-modulation (amplifier distortion causing noise and spill-over between channels) are lessened since the digital signal is less vulnerable than analog. Analog tv signals use vestigal-sideband amplitude modulation which is vulnerable to noise in the same way that A.M. radio brodcasts are. We've all seen the cost savings of digital transmission in long-distance telephone service. The same principles apply to some degree.
2) Cable companies actually get kickbacks from sales on shopping channels, and often give those more desirable channel placement than things we want. They should pay US for carrying these!
3) Cost of the systems are subsidized by locally inserted advertising in many cases. And while this competition for ad revenue is damaging to local radio and tv broadcasters, the cable company isn't faced with the high-cost of producing news programming, or the burden of complying with public inspection files.
4) The cost for basic service users should be lower now that digital technology has virtually eliminated piracy of premium services.
5) Although it should be fair use to watch and record cable programs on anything in a household (much like we're now free to have extension phones without added fees), digital transmission requires a decoder for each location, and we're stuck with added fees for this.
6) We're stuck with paying perhaps $1 a month per decoder box for electricity to power the decoder boxes which are party of the cable company infrastructure. These boxes use power even when we're not watching which is not only costly, but environmentally unfriendly.
7) In my area, there is an anti-competitive "cable access fee" of about $10/month tacked on for internet service of those that are not cable tv subscribers. This is unreasonable considering that the connection is simply a tap into an existing feed, NOT a dedicated cable all the way back to a central office (as it is with a phone company). To the extent that using the cable system for internet use covers a portion of the infrastructure costs, the cost for basic cable users should fall.
Cable rates are held artificially high because we're dealing with monopoly. With lack of competition relief must come through regulation.
Any analysis and suggested direction for Apple is likely to be fatally flawed if it only looks at music and iPod Sales. Apple's strategic decisions must take their entire business into account. The folks at Business Week act as if they've forgotten that Apple also sells Macs! In bringing Windows users iTMS, iTunes and the iPod, Apple is showcasing its abilities. The level of care in Apple designs is reflected in many subtle things that cannot be appreciated by reading specs. I'm certain that Apple appreciates the value of giving Windows users some direct postive experience with Apple products.
Aside from leading some users down a path bypassing an Apple-favorable experience, some or perhaps all of these competing music stores will likely provide poor Mac platform support, or none at all! That not only doesn't promote Mac sales, it discourages them. To overlook these factors and say that Apple should actually support these stores puts the Business Week analysis in the league of April Fools' Day material.
The flawed analysis reminds me of what's wrong with many of the products and services that compete with Apple. They generally meet key specifications, yet they feel like they were made by people who didn't look at the whole picture.
"You haven't seen squat until you've seen astronomers argue."
In 1994, in honor of astronomer Carl Sagan, Apple used "Sagan" as the internal development codename for the PowerMac 7100. They were sued when word of that became public. Apple won, but they still complied with demands for a different name. The project was renamed "Butthead Astronomer".
"Stores will want this because they can secretly track..."
The article talks about read/write RFID tags too. That's just too much like carrying around browser cookies!
I wonder how long it'll be before someone loads a tag with something that'll do a buffer overflow upstream? Tried the new iPod chewing gum yet? It looks just like a real iPod, but ring it up.... see, it's gum! Ten please....
While OS X seems relatively secure as far as net vulnerabilities go, there is still a very real risk of a user unknowingly installing something containing hostile code. It might even happen when installing a security utility. It's a bit spooky that Little Snitch, a utility for showing spyware phoning home, has had reports on macupdate.com saying that IT phones home. It gets spookier when one explores the developer's site and finds that they wrote a paper mentioning their kernel extension supporting keyloggers among other things.
I'd love to see an open-source GUI-supporting OS X version of tripwire. I believe it'd have to be installed before the hostile code to detect it. I have no idea what'd work after the fact. Perhaps a utility to scan hiding places for data could help. I'd like to check the alpha channel of all TIFF images (including icons) for a start. Perhaps it'd help to examine publicly offered keylogger/spyware utilities with a package manager and see what they're installing.
I believe that in order to change the frequency spectrum of the magnetron, it is the field INSIDE the magnetron, not the oven or waveguide (metal ducting into the oven chamber) that needs modification. The magnetrons I've seen all had the outside of the tube covered with alternating layers of ring magnets and thin aluminum heat-sink fins. There's no place to add anything, so you'd have to replace and redesign that structure completely. If attempting it, the really critical aspect is to have an effective radio-frequency seal around the end where the radiating stub goes into the waveguide. At that point there is normally a sort of fine wire mesh washer-gasket to reduce leakage (looks a bit like the braid in coax cable, but finer wires). Getting more radiation from that point is not only potentially dangerous, it would increase the interferrence we're hoping to reduce. Aside from narrowing the spectrum generated, we can additionally use better shielding/seals on ovens to help reduce interferrence. Designs that maintain a good seal over the life of the oven are important. A loose/damaged door or one separated from the box a bit by chunks of food can greatly increase signal leakage. Keep it clean!
I don't believe that magnets along the waveguide or oven box would change the frequency spectrum. If anything, it'd affect the distribution of "hotter" and "colder" spots within the oven.
I don't think one can effectively experiment with modifications without adequate equipment to actually see what's going on. One would need to see that the magnetron is cooled effectively, use some method of measuring power output (measuring temperature rise in known volume of water over time would work), and look at the frequency spectrum with a spectrum analyzer. A spectrum analyzer, power meter, or cheapie leakage detector can evaluate seal effectiveness. Bear in mind that modifications mostly likely are illegal as they almost certainly void the manufacturer's F.C.C. approval for the oven.
Some changes in the design of the power supply feeding a magnetron might help. With the magnetron operating in pulses, the duty-cycle (ratio of on/off time) and frequency of the pulses affects passing packets of data in between. As long as the throughput is high enough,, there is sufficient buffering and the system handles retransmission intelligently (recognizing the type of interferrence and adjusting timing accordingly), getting the data in spaced clumps of packets should still work.
802.11b interferrence isn't just from microwave ovens. Cordless phones, wireless survellance cameras and other devices use the band too. It doesn't help to have access points shipping mostly defaulting to the same channel. Also, if they're only serving up a net connection and not being used for local file-sharing traffic, there's no point in APs being set up for higher bandwidth when the bandwidth of the cable or DSL connection being served is far less.
Higher frequencies generally give shorter range. I think it'd really be better to use the 5.7 ghz 802.11g spectrum for streaming video around the house. It's not affected by your microwave oven, and would reduce noise around the neighborhood on 802.11b.
Slashdot Mirror
FIRST let's try putting a candidate for up for office that has qualities clearly the opposite of those that should generate trust in voters. Pick someone that obviously isn't very intelligent, has a history of alcoholism, has had major financial support from a corporation with known corrupt management, and has been caught in numerous misleading statements and lies.
THEN find a large pool of voters exposed to oxytocin or a similar hormone. Since oxytocin is involved in production of breast milk, we could try giving cows extra hormones knowing some will pass through to the milk that humans consume. No one will pay much attention if we explain that it is for increased milk production.
NEXT have an election.
oh wait.....
The current drawn by the audio output stage is primarily dependent on the current flowing through the load. The load current depends on the load impedance, and the output voltage.
Measuring life while driving the Apple Earbuds seems entirely fair since that's what the iPod shipped with. Battery life would be slightly better driving a high-impedance load such as the typical input of a stereo system, and somewhat worse when driving un-amplified external speakers which may not only be lower impedance, but will be driven with more voltage (as you crank up the volume trying to get more power, as needed with a source comparitively far from the ears)
A higher volume control setting will NOT mean shorter battery life if it is with a high-impedance load, as the load current is then small enough to ignore.
Battery runtime, even in a new iPod, is influenced considerably by user behavior. As many owners of digital cameras have learned, using the backlight uses quite a bit of energy. Stepping between tracks manually and using higher bitrate files increases energy needs since those things reduce drive sleep.
I suspect that storage and operating temperature is a very important variable having considerable effect on how much battery runtime degrades with age. I've made a point of not leaving my 1G iPod in hot cars. I still get about 10 hours with the original battery. Most of my files are 128 and 160 kbps MP3s.
Forget that WMD thing we never found across the planet, there's WMA right here and WMV around the corner.
Perhaps in the Slashdot tradition someone will hack an Airport Express for an external antenna/amplifier connector and post links to a "how to" article.
Using an external antenna instead of more power has several advantages. Adding an appropriate external antenna helps both transmit and receive. Boosting power helps transmit only. Given equally well designed receivers and levels of interference, if it really takes 300 mw to send a signal over the path you're dealing with, it'll also take 300 mw on the other end to send a signal back to you. Having a large imbalance of power levels only generates more interference. The old phrase relating to illegally amplified C.B. radios, "all mouth and no ears", comes to mind. Imagine trying to carry on a conversation with someone up the block outdoors. What good does would it do to use a megaphone to speak to them if they didn't have one to reply with? All you'd do is annoy your neighbors.
When the location of users permits use of a directional antenna one can simultaneously boost the transmitted signal range, boost the receive signal range, reduce the level of received interfering signals from other directions, and reduce the level of transmitted signal causing interference in other directions.
Some might think that an amplifier with a receive preamp might boost receive performance to match more transmitter power. But receive preamplifiers may actually degrade performance of a good receiver since their internal noise level (which is what masks a weak signal) isn't any lower than that of a well designed receiver, and boosting nearby undesired strong signals makes the possibility of poor performance due to signal overload more likely. If an antenna is located some distance away from a receiver a preamp AT THE ANTENNA helps because it prevents the signal loss in the interconnecting cable from reducing the signal relative to the level of the input-circuit generated noise in the receiver.
I, too, would like to see better wireless range in Apple's products, but I believe it'd require power increases at both ends. Improved power management could help make increased power less taxing in a laptop. A laptop could probably be designed to automatically reduce transmit power as the incoming signal gets stronger, since that would be an indication of a lower loss path between the laptop and the access point.
Mine DOES NOT say anything about paying sales tax. Perhaps different coupons are generated for different locations based in zip code?
"Close, but no importing .aiff"
Perhaps you're using an old version? I've used 1.2.2 for reading and writing AIFF. The Audacity Manual also shows it as supported.
"Why do the remaining 20 million stay? There is nothing on AOL that can't be accessed from the internet at half the cost. "
Some of the services on AOL, such as their chat rooms, cannot normally be accessed by non-subscribers. (At least I haven't seen any software that allows doing it. The presence of spam-bots suggests it could be done). There are similar chat rooms on the net, but for some that is not enough since they won't include all of the same people. In some cases, particularly on old hardware, the platform specific AOL software behaves better than some of the JAVA-based alternatives for chat. The large number of people on AOL makes region-specific chatrooms viable. The location of others in chat may not matter for getting tech advice, but it certainly does if you're looking for a date.
Some do not particularly care for AOL, but aren't motivated enough to switch and face the hassles of changing email addresses.
Perhaps we need something for email equivalent to number portability with cell phones.
I'd certainly never pay for AOL, but when a relative is willing to share an account it's okay as a backup ISP.
Perhaps these kids shouldn't be doing a bunch of coffee either?
A punishment of 15 years works out to only about 61.4 seconds for each of the 7.7 million people spammed.
- - - - - - -
Let's forget about WMD for a bit and tackle WMA, WMV and SPAM!
It seems like it ought to be possible to print an enlarged version of the test target spread across a number of pages making the resolution of an average consumer printer adequate.
My question is, how big would the output have to be, to cleanly show everything on the target, with something like an Epson C82?
While this looks like a great geek gadget for the price I find it disturbing that both the review and the Griffin site totally neglect specifications. .2 Mhz spaced spots? (tv channel 6 sound is 87.775 Mhz, audible but not properly tuned on many digitally tuned radios)
1) Does it support an external antenna?
2) How free is it from spurious responses in the presence of strong signals?
3) How sensitive is it?
4) How is the adjacent and alternate channel selectivity?
5) What's the signal to noise ratio for strong and weak signals?
6) How's the A.M. rejection?
7) How's the stereo separation?
8) How's the distortion at various modulation levels? (including a bit above 100%, some stations overmodulate)
9) Can it receive S.C.A. subcarriers?
10) Is there software support to decode E.A.S. (Emergency Alert System) messages?
11) How's the frequency response?
12) Can it tune signals at other than the usual
Granted I don't expect a low-priced receiver to use a balanced mixer, but I'd at least like to see some clue that designers put some thought into performance.
How to send video back from a kite over 802.11 is a good start. I'd like to see similar projects for remote controlled planes. Sending the control signals up on the same wireless link is a logical extension.
I'd like to see other wireless related projects, like some of the things that have been covered by http://tv.seattlewireless.net/ - making antennas, community access points with cheap hardware and free software etc.
Details of simple hacks (hardware and software) would be great to fill in between the big articles. Show me how to add an external antenna to my Airport Express. Show me how power it from 12 Volts in the car without adding an inverter.
It's probably of too limited appeal, but I'd like to see a simple add-on I could use with old surplus 20" fixed-frequency workstation monitors to give them a shut-down sleep mode. It'd be something that looks at the video signal and kills power with a triac.
I'd like to see a project showing how to convert a power supply from an old PC into a general-purpose bench supply. (Perhaps some kind of diode/capacitor voltage multiplier on the coil for the 5 Volt circuit to make a higher current 12 Volt output. It might be easier to add a new winding though hmmmm...)
I'd enjoy seeing various PVR (personal video recorder) projects... how about one with an analog/HDTV tuner that works with Linux, and has a slick version for OS X too? (I expect both to be able to send audio out to an Airport Express)
Projects based on software that'll let us take analog audio and other sources and stream it out to an Airport Express would be fun in general.
How about something that'll let me send multiple streams from analog and HDTV off-air and broadcast them from a hilltop with 802.11b/g for multiple people to receive?
How about a homemade subwoofer with motion-sensing feedback from the cone to the amplifier driving it. That'd flatten frequency response while reducing distortion and box-effects.
How about modifications to consumer appliances to reduce their energy consumption when they're "off"?
How about a collection of Voice over IP telephony projects?
How about a framework for a P2P open-source owned-by-nobody global community-access TV network?
How about noise-cancelling electronics to add to old headphones so I can use my woodworking tools in comfort?
How about a collection of software tools and hardware hacks that can be adapted for mechanical control of all sorts of things? If someone makes a radio-controlled flying chainsaw, please make the link secure. Thank you!
"the Federal Circuit yesterday affirmed that the DMCA does not 'divest the public of the property rights that the Copyright Act has long granted to the public.'
If it is the DMCA that would make it illegal to crack the broadcast flag (which could be used to block digital recording of HDTV programming), shouldn't the reasoning and precidence of this case along with the "fair use" Betamax decision prevent the DMCA from applying ?
Perhaps we could start ranking the importance of these personal-freedom court cases by number and color for where they have impact.... Hmmm.
1. Shocking Pink - Bedroom (Are you in there Cowboy Neal??)
2. Red - Living Room
3. Orange - Garage
4. Yellow - Friend's Place
5. Green - Redmond
Switching to a new release of an OS is frequently painful and expensive. Microsoft may realize that when users are faced with this transition they are more likely than usual to be considering other options such as an OS jump to Linux or a complete platform jump to the Mac and OS X. A free or reduced cost upgrade for the installed base would soften the blow a bit, and potentially could further tie users to MS by getting them tangled even more deeply in proprietary MS technology.
I've run Black Night 1.07 under OS 9.1, but have not tested it in Classic. I believe it was last updated in 1997. I used it to telnet into a BBS with color ANSI graphics. It supports Zmodem and is extendable with Communications Toolbox plugins. I couldn't find a site for the author, but the software is still out there http://www.macosarchives.com/terminal.html
Some of the discussion here is treating XM as if it were competition to Clear Channel. They've got their fingers in that too!
Aside from the number of channels used or carried, I believe there are other factors that should be taken into account to force rate REDUCTION.
1) Digital transmission allows carrying the content of many channels in the bandwidth of a single analog channel. These added channels cost less to carry and maintain since their addition does not tax the power output capacity of the distribution amplifiers. Also the demands for signal amplitude and freedom from cross-modulation (amplifier distortion causing noise and spill-over between channels) are lessened since the digital signal is less vulnerable than analog. Analog tv signals use vestigal-sideband amplitude modulation which is vulnerable to noise in the same way that A.M. radio brodcasts are. We've all seen the cost savings of digital transmission in long-distance telephone service. The same principles apply to some degree.
2) Cable companies actually get kickbacks from sales on shopping channels, and often give those more desirable channel placement than things we want. They should pay US for carrying these!
3) Cost of the systems are subsidized by locally inserted advertising in many cases. And while this competition for ad revenue is damaging to local radio and tv broadcasters, the cable company isn't faced with the high-cost of producing news programming, or the burden of complying with public inspection files.
4) The cost for basic service users should be lower now that digital technology has virtually eliminated piracy of premium services.
5) Although it should be fair use to watch and record cable programs on anything in a household (much like we're now free to have extension phones without added fees), digital transmission requires a decoder for each location, and we're stuck with added fees for this.
6) We're stuck with paying perhaps $1 a month per decoder box for electricity to power the decoder boxes which are party of the cable company infrastructure. These boxes use power even when we're not watching which is not only costly, but environmentally unfriendly.
7) In my area, there is an anti-competitive "cable access fee" of about $10/month tacked on for internet service of those that are not cable tv subscribers. This is unreasonable considering that the connection is simply a tap into an existing feed, NOT a dedicated cable all the way back to a central office (as it is with a phone company). To the extent that using the cable system for internet use covers a portion of the infrastructure costs, the cost for basic cable users should fall.
Cable rates are held artificially high because we're dealing with monopoly. With lack of competition relief must come through regulation.
And yesterday was the one year anniversary of the introduction of Viagra.
So where are the anniversary parties???
Any analysis and suggested direction for Apple is likely to be fatally flawed if it only looks at music and iPod Sales. Apple's strategic decisions must take their entire business into account. The folks at Business Week act as if they've forgotten that Apple also sells Macs! In bringing Windows users iTMS, iTunes and the iPod, Apple is showcasing its abilities. The level of care in Apple designs is reflected in many subtle things that cannot be appreciated by reading specs. I'm certain that Apple appreciates the value of giving Windows users some direct postive experience with Apple products.
Aside from leading some users down a path bypassing an Apple-favorable experience, some or perhaps all of these competing music stores will likely provide poor Mac platform support, or none at all! That not only doesn't promote Mac sales, it discourages them. To overlook these factors and say that Apple should actually support these stores puts the Business Week analysis in the league of April Fools' Day material.
The flawed analysis reminds me of what's wrong with many of the products and services that compete with Apple. They generally meet key specifications, yet they feel like they were made by people who didn't look at the whole picture.
"You haven't seen squat until you've seen astronomers argue."
In 1994, in honor of astronomer Carl Sagan, Apple used "Sagan" as the internal development codename for the PowerMac 7100. They were sued when word of that became public. Apple won, but they still complied with demands for a different name. The project was renamed "Butthead Astronomer".
The sample file also plays on VLC on the Mac. The sample probably isn't using DRM, so don't expect paid downloads to work.
"Stores will want this because they can secretly track..."
The article talks about read/write RFID tags too. That's just too much like carrying around browser cookies!
I wonder how long it'll be before someone loads a tag with something that'll do a buffer overflow upstream? Tried the new iPod chewing gum yet? It looks just like a real iPod, but ring it up.... see, it's gum! Ten please....
Investing in an iPod buys you a piece of Steve Job's reality distortion field!
While OS X seems relatively secure as far as net vulnerabilities go, there is still a very real risk of a user unknowingly installing something containing hostile code. It might even happen when installing a security utility. It's a bit spooky that Little Snitch, a utility for showing spyware phoning home, has had reports on macupdate.com saying that IT phones home. It gets spookier when one explores the developer's site and finds that they wrote a paper mentioning their kernel extension supporting keyloggers among other things. I'd love to see an open-source GUI-supporting OS X version of tripwire. I believe it'd have to be installed before the hostile code to detect it. I have no idea what'd work after the fact. Perhaps a utility to scan hiding places for data could help. I'd like to check the alpha channel of all TIFF images (including icons) for a start. Perhaps it'd help to examine publicly offered keylogger/spyware utilities with a package manager and see what they're installing.
I believe that in order to change the frequency spectrum of the magnetron, it is the field INSIDE the magnetron, not the oven or waveguide (metal ducting into the oven chamber) that needs modification. The magnetrons I've seen all had the outside of the tube covered with alternating layers of ring magnets and thin aluminum heat-sink fins. There's no place to add anything, so you'd have to replace and redesign that structure completely. If attempting it, the really critical aspect is to have an effective radio-frequency seal around the end where the radiating stub goes into the waveguide. At that point there is normally a sort of fine wire mesh washer-gasket to reduce leakage (looks a bit like the braid in coax cable, but finer wires). Getting more radiation from that point is not only potentially dangerous, it would increase the interferrence we're hoping to reduce.
Aside from narrowing the spectrum generated, we can additionally use better shielding/seals on ovens to help reduce interferrence. Designs that maintain a good seal over the life of the oven are important. A loose/damaged door or one separated from the box a bit by chunks of food can greatly increase signal leakage. Keep it clean!
I don't believe that magnets along the waveguide or oven box would change the frequency spectrum. If anything, it'd affect the distribution of "hotter" and "colder" spots within the oven.
I don't think one can effectively experiment with modifications without adequate equipment to actually see what's going on. One would need to see that the magnetron is cooled effectively, use some method of measuring power output (measuring temperature rise in known volume of water over time would work), and look at the frequency spectrum with a spectrum analyzer. A spectrum analyzer, power meter, or cheapie leakage detector can evaluate seal effectiveness. Bear in mind that modifications mostly likely are illegal as they almost certainly void the manufacturer's F.C.C. approval for the oven.
Some changes in the design of the power supply feeding a magnetron might help. With the magnetron operating in pulses, the duty-cycle (ratio of on/off time) and frequency of the pulses affects passing packets of data in between. As long as the throughput is high enough,, there is sufficient buffering and the system handles retransmission intelligently (recognizing the type of interferrence and adjusting timing accordingly), getting the data in spaced clumps of packets should still work.
802.11b interferrence isn't just from microwave ovens. Cordless phones, wireless survellance cameras and other devices use the band too. It doesn't help to have access points shipping mostly defaulting to the same channel. Also, if they're only serving up a net connection and not being used for local file-sharing traffic, there's no point in APs being set up for higher bandwidth when the bandwidth of the cable or DSL connection being served is far less.
Higher frequencies generally give shorter range. I think it'd really be better to use the 5.7 ghz 802.11g spectrum for streaming video around the house. It's not affected by your microwave oven, and would reduce noise around the neighborhood on 802.11b.