Perhaps I should have said "the earphones the iPod comes with." Some of my friends do have nice earphones, and tell me how good the bass is. I don't claim to be an expert on the subject, as I don't have an iPod, and most of my listening is done through my Envy24-based soundcard. I just find it hard to believe that this weak bass condition exists.
I laughed at that sentence. I was reading audioXpress this morning too, so I've had enough audiophile crap for one day. "The smaller size and lack of screen of the iPod Shuffle dampen vibrations from local electrical fields, enabling full, rich bass. The soundstage was elevated and the individual instruments were amazingly crisp."
Your camera already works, so why fix something that's not broken? I couldn't imagine tinkering with the code or hardware of a late-model digital camera -- it'd be way too complex. Most of the functions are probably implemented in hardware, too, so modifying any sort of firmware is unlikely to get you anywhere. The level of integration is sure to be extremely high.
The only cameras that have been looked at and disassembled are the Dakota Digital/CVS "one-time-use" cameras. It's because they're cheap, and hold the promise of extended reuse. They don't have very many features, and probably can't have any more added to them. The attraction is the challenge of breaking a "closed" system, and getting something for (close to) nothing.
The original blue Dakota was based on a custom Sunplus chip. So far there's been one modified firmware release that fixes bugs and extends the picture limit. This model has been discontinued, however. More info here, here, and here.
The newer models have been looked at in depth as well, and they're based on SMaL chipsets. So far methods of reading and writing have been uncovered, and a method of downloading pictures via hacked drivers is documented. The eventual goal is a GPL driver and sofware, and possibly firmware upgrades. Current progress here, and background info here and here.
I saw this project some time ago. It's pretty neat. There's a PIC that manages everything -- it basically takes data from the CF card, feeds it to a MP3-to-PCM chip, which feeds PCM in turn to a DAC, which outputs analog audio.
Sure it's not groundbreaking, but the important thing is that you can make your own MP3 player with off-the-shelf components. These chips are widely available, and they're amazingly small. If they were any smaller there would be no reasonable way to solder them without resorting to industrial processes, or custom silicon. This project represents the most cutting-edge DIY that's still Do-able.
Is there some sort of auto free-carrier slot detection?
That'd necessitate a receiver on the transmitter board. I doubt anyone would bother with such a mechanism, as you'd probably manually scan the airwaves to find an open frequency.
The FM band is pretty full here in US metro areas, if not all the way full. The FCC will come looking for you if you cause enough interference, but if nobody notices and complains, well...
Going to the store page reveals that a 0.3W transmitter costs a wild $140. Yes, there's an LCD and menus, but no self-respecting budget-minded geek would lay down that much money to broadcast music over a short distance.
There's plenty of circuit designs at ePanorama that are relatively simple and powerful. DIY; save your money and your honor.
If people aren't willing to correct mistakes they see in Wikipedia articles, will they bother to go through and rate people's contributions? That involves going through a version-change diff, or else (the ugly approach) integrating the diff into the regular page view.
Of course then you'll have the terrible/.-like modding up of articles that are blatantly untrue but look authoritative. Ratings have no place in an encyclopedia. Wikipedia already has {{disputed}} and {{delete}} flags for those purposes, and democratically elected Admins who hold the higher powers. The system works as it is.
I rather prefer the way Clarke set the Monolith on a moon. That lent some parallelism to the scene. Kubrick's setup has its merits though, as it works well on the screen.
It was rather interesting reading through my childhood-planet-book (Peterson's guide?) and learning that Iapetus/Japetus has the curious distinction of having a completely white side with a black dot right in the middle.
In the major X-Wing/TIE Fighter threads, nobody seems to remember X-Wing Alliance! Why is that?
X-Wing Alliance is still a modern-looking, beautifully done game, with fancy lighting, high-polygon models, etc. But that's not all -- it has a Storyline.
And the clincher? You get to do the Death Star 2 assault. If that's not convincing, I don't know what is.
(You're right in that it's a hard game. I still haven't beaten it, but I don't game much anyway. Gotta put that on my list of things to do...)
Yeah, that's one of the few SNES games I had.
I thought the landspeeder level was actually pretty cool: you had psuedo-3d graphics where you could turn around, pretty big for a console.
I never got past the sandcrawler level though, it was too hard.
As for the wackiness, that's how games were back then. When your game has to fit into 1MB, all you can do is wacky side-scrolling stuff. It's like Mega-Man with SW characters, weapons, settings, and enemies.
Definitely.
Calculators in the classroom can be useful, but too often they can be used to cheat. For example, the TI-89 will do symbolic integration for you. A lot of people took advantage of that in my high school Calc class, and when the (no-calculator) test came around, well...
I've been using a simple scientific, and it gets me through college physics just fine.
Slashdot Mirror
See this. It appears that DDR performance is not affected by CAS. I do remember the PC133 days, though, and CAS did make a difference back then.
Also, running RAM at lower than its rated speed doesn't necessarily ensure stable operation at a lower CAS latency.
Perhaps I should have said "the earphones the iPod comes with." Some of my friends do have nice earphones, and tell me how good the bass is. I don't claim to be an expert on the subject, as I don't have an iPod, and most of my listening is done through my Envy24-based soundcard. I just find it hard to believe that this weak bass condition exists.
I laughed at that sentence. I was reading audioXpress this morning too, so I've had enough audiophile crap for one day. "The smaller size and lack of screen of the iPod Shuffle dampen vibrations from local electrical fields, enabling full, rich bass. The soundstage was elevated and the individual instruments were amazingly crisp."
I don't think the electronics are at fault. You just can't expect good bass from earphones.
Your camera already works, so why fix something that's not broken? I couldn't imagine tinkering with the code or hardware of a late-model digital camera -- it'd be way too complex. Most of the functions are probably implemented in hardware, too, so modifying any sort of firmware is unlikely to get you anywhere. The level of integration is sure to be extremely high.
The only cameras that have been looked at and disassembled are the Dakota Digital/CVS "one-time-use" cameras. It's because they're cheap, and hold the promise of extended reuse. They don't have very many features, and probably can't have any more added to them. The attraction is the challenge of breaking a "closed" system, and getting something for (close to) nothing.
The original blue Dakota was based on a custom Sunplus chip. So far there's been one modified firmware release that fixes bugs and extends the picture limit. This model has been discontinued, however. More info here, here, and here.
The newer models have been looked at in depth as well, and they're based on SMaL chipsets. So far methods of reading and writing have been uncovered, and a method of downloading pictures via hacked drivers is documented. The eventual goal is a GPL driver and sofware, and possibly firmware upgrades. Current progress here, and background info here and here.
I saw this project some time ago. It's pretty neat. There's a PIC that manages everything -- it basically takes data from the CF card, feeds it to a MP3-to-PCM chip, which feeds PCM in turn to a DAC, which outputs analog audio.
Sure it's not groundbreaking, but the important thing is that you can make your own MP3 player with off-the-shelf components. These chips are widely available, and they're amazingly small. If they were any smaller there would be no reasonable way to solder them without resorting to industrial processes, or custom silicon. This project represents the most cutting-edge DIY that's still Do-able.
Is there some sort of auto free-carrier slot detection?
...
That'd necessitate a receiver on the transmitter board. I doubt anyone would bother with such a mechanism, as you'd probably manually scan the airwaves to find an open frequency.
The FM band is pretty full here in US metro areas, if not all the way full. The FCC will come looking for you if you cause enough interference, but if nobody notices and complains, well
Going to the store page reveals that a 0.3W transmitter costs a wild $140. Yes, there's an LCD and menus, but no self-respecting budget-minded geek would lay down that much money to broadcast music over a short distance.
There's plenty of circuit designs at ePanorama that are relatively simple and powerful. DIY; save your money and your honor.
If people aren't willing to correct mistakes they see in Wikipedia articles, will they bother to go through and rate people's contributions? That involves going through a version-change diff, or else (the ugly approach) integrating the diff into the regular page view.
/.-like modding up of articles that are blatantly untrue but look authoritative. Ratings have no place in an encyclopedia. Wikipedia already has {{disputed}} and {{delete}} flags for those purposes, and democratically elected Admins who hold the higher powers. The system works as it is.
Of course then you'll have the terrible
I rather prefer the way Clarke set the Monolith on a moon. That lent some parallelism to the scene. Kubrick's setup has its merits though, as it works well on the screen.
It was rather interesting reading through my childhood-planet-book (Peterson's guide?) and learning that Iapetus/Japetus has the curious distinction of having a completely white side with a black dot right in the middle.
"When you put them together, out jumps a security flaw." What is this, magic?
In the major X-Wing/TIE Fighter threads, nobody seems to remember X-Wing Alliance! Why is that? X-Wing Alliance is still a modern-looking, beautifully done game, with fancy lighting, high-polygon models, etc. But that's not all -- it has a Storyline. And the clincher? You get to do the Death Star 2 assault. If that's not convincing, I don't know what is.
(You're right in that it's a hard game. I still haven't beaten it, but I don't game much anyway. Gotta put that on my list of things to do...)
Yeah, that's one of the few SNES games I had. I thought the landspeeder level was actually pretty cool: you had psuedo-3d graphics where you could turn around, pretty big for a console. I never got past the sandcrawler level though, it was too hard. As for the wackiness, that's how games were back then. When your game has to fit into 1MB, all you can do is wacky side-scrolling stuff. It's like Mega-Man with SW characters, weapons, settings, and enemies.
I just can't imagine playing a space sim with a mouse. Though my friend did beat X-Wing with a touchpad...
Secret Order of the Emperor -- that was so great.
Definitely. Calculators in the classroom can be useful, but too often they can be used to cheat. For example, the TI-89 will do symbolic integration for you. A lot of people took advantage of that in my high school Calc class, and when the (no-calculator) test came around, well... I've been using a simple scientific, and it gets me through college physics just fine.