"Normally, writes to disk can't be confirmed faster than one per full revolution of the platters. Thus, a 7200 RPM disk can not perform more than 7200 transactions a minute."
Being more concerned with write limits on RAM than a power loss shows you don't understand this problem at all.
You will never exhaust the write limit on this type of memory, there is no write limit for the RAM and you only write to flash on power failures that you aren't concerned about. Meanwhile, those batteries suck compared to capacitors and are getting replaced by caps even for conventional backed up RAM. Finally, requiring "some form of iLo/DRAC type monitoring" is an admission of the inferiority of that approach, this design needs none. It just works and you don't need any elaborate software intervention to help with it.
The first advantage is reduced complexity of software. The second is that the local capacitors recharge relatively fast compared to a UPS. With a UPS, full performance can't be achieved until the batteries are recharged. That can take quite a while and result in longer effective downtime.
"Just use three really great sensors then we can have digital color that rivals film."
Digital surpassed film long, log ago.
"Three sensors and a prism" is not a new idea nor has it escaped camera manufacturers. What do you think "3CCD" means on video cameras? Given that, don't you think the lack of that technology in stills might be for a reason?
Foveon NEVER had superior color rendition. All it offers is lack of color moire at the expense of many other flaws that are, in the balance, vastly more important. Color moire is not the most problematic issue in digital photography.
"This is very true, although the Foveon was superior in resolution and lack of color moire only - it terms of higher ISO support it has not been as good as the top performers of the day."
The Foveon has always been inferior in resolution overall photosite-for-photosite, superior only is a small subset of color combinations, and it has been, in fact, a dismal technology in terms of high ISO. It is not simply "not been as good as the top performers", it is notably worse than Bayer sensors categorically. Foveon is horrible in low light.
"Now that Sigma has carried Foveon forward into a newer age of sensors they are having better luck selling a high-resolution very sharp small compact that has as much detail as a Nikon D800 and no color moire..."
Foveon fanboy alert. Anyone who would rate this as informative has never studied this topic nor understands what the D800 is.
I despise Luminous Landscape, but if they can recognize technical flaws then they are readily apparent.
The most interesting criticisms of their DP2 review are color problems. The key thing about digital photography is that you are employing a system, and Foveon draws from a small subset of lenses, a small selection of inferior bodies, and poor software support which is a critical handicap.
"Another interesting alternative sensor is Fuji with the X-Trans sensor - randomized RGB filters to eliminate color moire."
Randomizing the Bayer pattern doesn't eliminate color moire.
It is possible that the extra photons not being passed through traditional filters will actually degrade performance. In the past there have been complementary Bayer filter arrays for the same purpose, improved light sensitivity. These cameras delivered inferior color performance.
It is important to have good light sensitivity AND good dynamic range. Dynamic range is not just what your sensor can provide but what you can consistently use. Sometimes filtering light improves the utilization of dynamic range and makes the system better even if it hurts light sensitivity.
Not when you can handle all frequencies that you will encounter. There are cameras on the market without anti-aliasing filters. When you stop down enough your aperture limits resolution to potentially less than the aliasing limit anyway.
"From what I can tell, this will not get rid of the need for the anti-aliasing."
Which was not the goal, nor is it a goal of a Foveon sensor. Aliasing exists whenever there is frequency content greater than a sensor can handle.
"Foveon has 3 photodiodes per pixel, and theoretically should have the most accurate colors and sharpness by avoiding moire and interpolation issues with bayer filters."
Foveon does not promise more accurate colors. Sharpness is a function of a number of things, not just photosite layout. Foveon is a loser in the market because it doesn't perform.
The trend toward larger phone displays is because they aren't significantly more burdensome. We don't need a new device to overcome a problem that doesn't exist, we need devices that are more useful. That explains the trend toward larger screens. Watches, on the other hand, haven't been useful in a long time.
But the math doesn't say anything. 440 ppi is much finer than the eye can resolve. How it is subdivided says nothing about useful resolving power. Only morons would argue what is better based on subelements that, taken alone, mean nothing.
"You can see the additional details. You can't see the individual pixels, but text rendering will be MUCH crisper and I believe color reproduction gets better."
"...maybe they just upscale things, but it would look awful."
No reason to believe a 1080p 5" display with upscaled 720p data would "look awful" compared to a 720p 5" display driven directly. It may not be better but it's unlikely to look worse. Hard to imagine it would be noticeable at 440 ppi.
"It" doesn't scale to 8 cores. It's a 4 core processor where each "core" has both a low power and high performance core that it selects between. Only 4 cores are operational at any given time.
Of course, that doesn't matter to the tech-savvy membership of/. 8 is greater than 4, that's what counts.
Block level SSD can cache filesystem metadata that the "OS' own cache optimization routines" cannot.
It helps to actually understand what you are criticizing in such a juvenile manner. Catch up.
All caching is stupid caching until its behavior appears smart. Block caches are as capable of that as any.
Memory caches are useless because they are hung on the side, can't be independently accessed, and basically stupid-cache everything. Right, systems-architect?
"Face it, we're all a bit of a control freak when it comes to anything PC."
No, just many pretend to be. Those that do don't even know how storage works.
"It also leaves the option open to allow tweaking as to the algorithm or ruleset used to determine where data is stored."
Which will be done exactly never.
The Apple solution is limited to internal storage only as well as to their best attempt to keep it closed to their own hardware. It has the advantage of expanding capacity where block-oriented solutions do not plus the division of work is in a superior location. You cannot dual-boot the Apple solution. It is better only in applications that Apple envisions, precisely the opposite of what you suggest.
Disk storage contains filesystem metadata. Sooner or later writes *have* to go to disk regardless of how much RAM you have. Flash can accelerate that. RAM and flash are not interchangeable and 8GB can be enough for some applications.
"Once your RAM file cache is more than the files you load, file access is essential zero seek and 2GB+ reads and writes. Don't forget here we're talking about RAM. The disk is NEVER touched once its cached, there's no possibility for a disk that isn't being accessed to speed up a read from the RAM cache, and no benefit from speeding up a deferred write that's done in the background."
You don't know how writes in a filesystem work. It isn't just the data that gets written and not every write can be deferred.
If your "disk light never blinks" you aren't using your computer.
Slashdot Mirror
This is untrue. Examiners do consider content it is in their domain to do so. There's just no assurance that they get it right.
Saying that the burden is on the filer to research prior art is like saying it's the fox's job to guard the henhouse.
"Problem is if apple didnt patent it someone else would have filed a patent years later and sued apple
Yes."
No.
Very few use patents offensively. Apple is among the few worst offenders. Furthermore, patenting this "years later" would clearly be invalid.
Apple IS the patent problem, not the victim of it.
You have a dizzying intellect.
"Normally, writes to disk can't be confirmed faster than one per full revolution of the platters. Thus, a 7200 RPM disk can not perform more than 7200 transactions a minute."
This is untrue.
Being more concerned with write limits on RAM than a power loss shows you don't understand this problem at all.
You will never exhaust the write limit on this type of memory, there is no write limit for the RAM and you only write to flash on power failures that you aren't concerned about. Meanwhile, those batteries suck compared to capacitors and are getting replaced by caps even for conventional backed up RAM. Finally, requiring "some form of iLo/DRAC type monitoring" is an admission of the inferiority of that approach, this design needs none. It just works and you don't need any elaborate software intervention to help with it.
The first advantage is reduced complexity of software. The second is that the local capacitors recharge relatively fast compared to a UPS. With a UPS, full performance can't be achieved until the batteries are recharged. That can take quite a while and result in longer effective downtime.
3CCD will disappear from the video segment as well. I would say RED is "non-consumer digital video" and I don't see 3CCD there.
"Just use three really great sensors then we can have digital color that rivals film."
Digital surpassed film long, log ago.
"Three sensors and a prism" is not a new idea nor has it escaped camera manufacturers. What do you think "3CCD" means on video cameras? Given that, don't you think the lack of that technology in stills might be for a reason?
"Their superior colour rendition ..."
Foveon NEVER had superior color rendition. All it offers is lack of color moire at the expense of many other flaws that are, in the balance, vastly more important. Color moire is not the most problematic issue in digital photography.
"This is very true, although the Foveon was superior in resolution and lack of color moire only - it terms of higher ISO support it has not been as good as the top performers of the day."
The Foveon has always been inferior in resolution overall photosite-for-photosite, superior only is a small subset of color combinations, and it has been, in fact, a dismal technology in terms of high ISO. It is not simply "not been as good as the top performers", it is notably worse than Bayer sensors categorically. Foveon is horrible in low light.
"Now that Sigma has carried Foveon forward into a newer age of sensors they are having better luck selling a high-resolution very sharp small compact that has as much detail as a Nikon D800 and no color moire..."
Foveon fanboy alert. Anyone who would rate this as informative has never studied this topic nor understands what the D800 is.
Here's an interesting read here: http://www.luminous-landscape.com/reviews/cameras/sigma_dp2m_review.shtml
I despise Luminous Landscape, but if they can recognize technical flaws then they are readily apparent.
The most interesting criticisms of their DP2 review are color problems. The key thing about digital photography is that you are employing a system, and Foveon draws from a small subset of lenses, a small selection of inferior bodies, and poor software support which is a critical handicap.
"Another interesting alternative sensor is Fuji with the X-Trans sensor - randomized RGB filters to eliminate color moire."
Randomizing the Bayer pattern doesn't eliminate color moire.
Or it may not be an advantage at all.
It is possible that the extra photons not being passed through traditional filters will actually degrade performance. In the past there have been complementary Bayer filter arrays for the same purpose, improved light sensitivity. These cameras delivered inferior color performance.
It is important to have good light sensitivity AND good dynamic range. Dynamic range is not just what your sensor can provide but what you can consistently use. Sometimes filtering light improves the utilization of dynamic range and makes the system better even if it hurts light sensitivity.
Not when you can handle all frequencies that you will encounter. There are cameras on the market without anti-aliasing filters. When you stop down enough your aperture limits resolution to potentially less than the aliasing limit anyway.
"From what I can tell, this will not get rid of the need for the anti-aliasing."
Which was not the goal, nor is it a goal of a Foveon sensor. Aliasing exists whenever there is frequency content greater than a sensor can handle.
"Foveon has 3 photodiodes per pixel, and theoretically should have the most accurate colors and sharpness by avoiding moire and interpolation issues with bayer filters."
Foveon does not promise more accurate colors. Sharpness is a function of a number of things, not just photosite layout. Foveon is a loser in the market because it doesn't perform.
"Because with the trend of phones being 5"+..."
The trend toward larger phone displays is because they aren't significantly more burdensome. We don't need a new device to overcome a problem that doesn't exist, we need devices that are more useful. That explains the trend toward larger screens. Watches, on the other hand, haven't been useful in a long time.
...costs less than one engineering hour..."
Yes, everyone who is implanting backdoors in docking stations is paying an engineer's salary to do so. ;)
"it is a variation on the Raspberry Pi..."
Here's a guy who knows his history...
"So the parent here did do the math correctly."
But the math doesn't say anything. 440 ppi is much finer than the eye can resolve. How it is subdivided says nothing about useful resolving power. Only morons would argue what is better based on subelements that, taken alone, mean nothing.
"You can see the additional details. You can't see the individual pixels, but text rendering will be MUCH crisper and I believe color reproduction gets better."
You believe a lot of things for no good reason.
Those have existed for years.
"...maybe they just upscale things, but it would look awful."
No reason to believe a 1080p 5" display with upscaled 720p data would "look awful" compared to a 720p 5" display driven directly. It may not be better but it's unlikely to look worse. Hard to imagine it would be noticeable at 440 ppi.
"It" doesn't scale to 8 cores. It's a 4 core processor where each "core" has both a low power and high performance core that it selects between. Only 4 cores are operational at any given time.
Of course, that doesn't matter to the tech-savvy membership of /. 8 is greater than 4, that's what counts.
"I haven't *ever* heard or read someone in the community say anything remotely similar."
They think it, they're just not articulate enough to say it. Not that you'd hear what you didn't want to anyway.
Block level SSD can cache filesystem metadata that the "OS' own cache optimization routines" cannot.
It helps to actually understand what you are criticizing in such a juvenile manner. Catch up.
All caching is stupid caching until its behavior appears smart. Block caches are as capable of that as any.
Memory caches are useless because they are hung on the side, can't be independently accessed, and basically stupid-cache everything. Right, systems-architect?
"Face it, we're all a bit of a control freak when it comes to anything PC."
No, just many pretend to be. Those that do don't even know how storage works.
"It also leaves the option open to allow tweaking as to the algorithm or ruleset used to determine where data is stored."
Which will be done exactly never.
The Apple solution is limited to internal storage only as well as to their best attempt to keep it closed to their own hardware. It has the advantage of expanding capacity where block-oriented solutions do not plus the division of work is in a superior location. You cannot dual-boot the Apple solution. It is better only in applications that Apple envisions, precisely the opposite of what you suggest.
Disk storage contains filesystem metadata. Sooner or later writes *have* to go to disk regardless of how much RAM you have. Flash can accelerate that. RAM and flash are not interchangeable and 8GB can be enough for some applications.
"Once your RAM file cache is more than the files you load, file access is essential zero seek and 2GB+ reads and writes. Don't forget here we're talking about RAM. The disk is NEVER touched once its cached, there's no possibility for a disk that isn't being accessed to speed up a read from the RAM cache, and no benefit from speeding up a deferred write that's done in the background."
You don't know how writes in a filesystem work. It isn't just the data that gets written and not every write can be deferred.
If your "disk light never blinks" you aren't using your computer.