Submission + - The Linux-Proof Processor that Nobody Wants (perens.com) 1
Bruce Perens writes: "Clover Trail, Intel's newly announced "Linux proof" processor, is already a dead end for other technical and business reasons."
Submission + - Raspberry Pi production moves to the UK (geek.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Back in January the Raspberry Pi Foundation announced that their tiny, cheap Linux PC had gone into production. It was a day to celebrate, but the people running the foundation weren’t totally happy. The reason? The Raspberry Pi wasn’t being manufactured in the UK.
Instead, a Far East manufacturing facility had been chosen simply because it meant the cost of manufacturing was $5 per unit cheaper, and delivery time was 3-4 weeks, not 12-14 as was quoted by UK manufacturers. It sounded crazy at the time, but that’s why everyone goes to China to get stuff made–it’s cheaper and quicker.
The good news is, manufacturing is now moving to the UK. More specifically, a deal has been done to see the tiny PC manufactured in South Wales at Sony’s Pencoed plant.
30,000 Raspberry Pis will be produced every month to begin with, and in the process it has created 30 new jobs at the facility. The other positive of this move is each Raspberry Pi will have to pass Sony’s Green Management program, which ensures each finished Pi has been manufactured using parts that are both ethically and ecologically sound.
Instead, a Far East manufacturing facility had been chosen simply because it meant the cost of manufacturing was $5 per unit cheaper, and delivery time was 3-4 weeks, not 12-14 as was quoted by UK manufacturers. It sounded crazy at the time, but that’s why everyone goes to China to get stuff made–it’s cheaper and quicker.
The good news is, manufacturing is now moving to the UK. More specifically, a deal has been done to see the tiny PC manufactured in South Wales at Sony’s Pencoed plant.
30,000 Raspberry Pis will be produced every month to begin with, and in the process it has created 30 new jobs at the facility. The other positive of this move is each Raspberry Pi will have to pass Sony’s Green Management program, which ensures each finished Pi has been manufactured using parts that are both ethically and ecologically sound.
Submission + - Metal balls bounce off slivers of super-stretchy 'jelly' (nature.com)
ananyo writes: "A hydrogel developed by materials engineers at Harvard University is so tough metal balls bounce off thin slices of it.
A hydrogel is a network of polymers that soaks up lots of water to form a jelly-like material. But most shatter easily and don’t stretch far without breaking. Some of the toughest hydrogels are used to make soft contact lenses, and researchers want to make them more robust, for use in replacement cartilage or as scaffolds for growing artificial organs.
The energy needed to fracture the new hydrogel is on a par with that for natural rubber, and the gel can be stretched to 20 times its original length without breaking (abstract)."
A hydrogel is a network of polymers that soaks up lots of water to form a jelly-like material. But most shatter easily and don’t stretch far without breaking. Some of the toughest hydrogels are used to make soft contact lenses, and researchers want to make them more robust, for use in replacement cartilage or as scaffolds for growing artificial organs.
The energy needed to fracture the new hydrogel is on a par with that for natural rubber, and the gel can be stretched to 20 times its original length without breaking (abstract)."
Submission + - TI's new Arm Cortex-based Launchpad preorders at $5 (ti.com)
drinkypoo writes: "Hack A Day is reporting that the TI Stellaris® LM4F120 LaunchPad Evaluation Board is now preordering for $5 for a September 25 ship date. This is a nifty little development board for the price of the MCU alone with an 80 MHz Cortex-M4 and a bundle of I/O."
Comment Re:Combustible clothing (Score 5, Interesting) 45
When I worked at a lithium battery factory, we were taught to call it "out-gassing", and never to think of it as "fire". This is because a fire extinguisher would be worthless against an out-gassing battery. Just as rocket engines contain the perfect ratio of fuel to oxidizer for truly spectacular, and dangerous failures, charged batteries contain all they need to ruin your day. Smothering them in water, foam, or CO2 is not going to slow them down.
This is why you don't see many lithium batteries in steel cases anymore. They figured that the pipe bomb configuration was a bad idea.
Comment Re:Has already powered an.... iPod Shuffle (Score 2) 45
The linked article shows the capacity as 1mAh per cm of length. A 20cm chunk would have 20mAh. They charge them to 4.2 volts, but I assume the nominal voltage is probably around 3.7volts. So 74milliwatt hours in 20cm.
Submission + - Microsoft's DMCA takedown blitz smells of Windows 8 censorship (networkworld.com)
colinneagle writes: Out of the blue, a number of reputable online publications, including BetaNews, Hardware Canucks, PowerArchiver, NGOHQ, and Technize (among many others), received DMCA takedown orders from Google that claim on Microsoft’s behalf that the sites were infringing on various Microsoft copyrights.
There was something odd about the takedown orders, however. The URLs in questions contained things like screenshot galleries and news posts that simply linked to the trial editions and release previews of Windows 8. Many of the sites also hosted user-generated comments though, many of which were quite negative in regards to Windows 8, which sparked some heated discussion that this was a strategic move by Microsoft to get negative sentiments delisted by Google prior to Windows 8’s launch.
Compounding the problem, publications are assumed guilty until proven innocent in these situations. Once a DMCA takedown request is submitted, whether the URL in question actually contains questionable material or not, the URL is removed from Google’s search results, which will adversely affect the site’s traffic. The sites have to fill out a DMCA Counter Notification form to counter the original notice and simply hope for the best.
There was something odd about the takedown orders, however. The URLs in questions contained things like screenshot galleries and news posts that simply linked to the trial editions and release previews of Windows 8. Many of the sites also hosted user-generated comments though, many of which were quite negative in regards to Windows 8, which sparked some heated discussion that this was a strategic move by Microsoft to get negative sentiments delisted by Google prior to Windows 8’s launch.
Compounding the problem, publications are assumed guilty until proven innocent in these situations. Once a DMCA takedown request is submitted, whether the URL in question actually contains questionable material or not, the URL is removed from Google’s search results, which will adversely affect the site’s traffic. The sites have to fill out a DMCA Counter Notification form to counter the original notice and simply hope for the best.
Comment Re:My bleeding eyes... (Score 2) 51
It is less than half depth. There is a gap for hot air between the front and back units. In the pictures and animation on the Baserock site there are more ventilation slots. It appears that the air enters each through the front and both sides, and exits through the back. This will produce a chimney of heat in the center of each rack.
Comment Re:Parenthood rights for child rapists??? (Score 2) 1469
It varies with local laws. Here is a link from the state of Utah: Girl, 13, charged as sex offender and victim.
Comment Parenthood rights for child rapists??? (Score 1, Offtopic) 1469
If the mother is under the age of consent when giving birth, you can be sure she was under the age of consent at the time of conception. So we can be sure that in 100% of those cases, it was statutory rape.
Submission + - Yellowstone Boosts Performance 30X by Reducing Clock Speed? (sourceforge.net)
An anonymous reader writes: The NCAR’s Wyoming Supercomputing Center runs is current Bluefire cores at 4.7 GHz resulting in 6 MFLOPS per watt, whereas its new Yellowstone supercomputer to be unveiled next month runs its cores at just 2.6-GHz to get 43 MFLOPS per watt. To compensate for the slower speed per core, Yellowstone uses 72,288 Intel Xeon cores as opposed to Bluefire's 3,744 Power6 cores. The bottom line is that U.S. weather forecasting will get nearly a 30X boost in Sept by moving to Yellowstone. But will that enable them to make more accurate weather predictions? I'll believe it when I see it ;)
Comment Re: optical images have an ultimate resolution lim (Score 4, Informative) 140
This just hits the resolution limit for color printing that includes red. It is possible to make color images with just greens, blues and violets at a higher resolution, it just wouldn't count as full color. Researchers could go to even higher resolutions, if they just use blues and violets, but they wouldn't be able to render a very convincing human flesh tone. Competition will start shortly, for the smallest smurf vision display.
Submission + - Norton Scientific Collection: Pfizer's Drug against Alzheimer's Fails 1st Study (norton-scientificcollection.com)
nortoncollection writes: "http://norton-scientificcollection.com/collection/2012/07/30/pfizers-drug-against-alzheimers-fails-1st-study/
Bapineuzumab, the treatment being developed by Elan, Johnson & Johnson and Pfizer for Alzheimer’s disease has failed to show signs of effectiveness in one of the four late-stage tests in patients.
“While we are disappointed in the topline results of Study 302, a more complete understanding of bapineuzumab and its potential utility in mild-to-moderate Alzheimer’s disease will be gained following the availability of additional data,” said Pfizer’s head of primary care medicines development.
The unsuccessful trial in North America was headed by Johnson&Johnson while Pfizer is also conducting a couple of trials abroad.
Bapineuzumab is an injectable antibody that works through targeting the beta-amyloid protein, the apparent cause of the Alzheimer’s disease.
Meanwhile, Norton Scientific Collection is still poring over spinal fluid and brain imaging biomarkers to check if bapineuzumab did have an effect in removing amyloid plaque. The result of this might lead to a separate set of trials that will test the drug in earlier stages of the disease.
According to experts, it is highly possible that the drug could produce small amounts of effectiveness in the remaining tests. Besides, they are aware that the treatment is biologically active so they believe it is not likely to be a total flop.
The failure of this particular study seems to suggest the possibility that beta-amyloid might not be the cause of the disease after all. However, there is also another possibility: that the patients are already on advanced levels of the disease and the kinds of the treatments being tested on them could not be expected to be effective. Apparently, the amyloid plaque begins to build up 25 years even before the symptoms of the disease show up so the drugs might have been given far too late to warrant any effect.
“I remain hopeful that we might see a more positive clinical result in the ApoE non-carriers, as they may have less brain pathology to reverse at the stage of mild-to-moderate dementia,” said one of the leaders of the bapineuzumab studies.
Resulting data from the bapineuzumab trials are set to be presented at the Clinical Trials Conference on Alzheimer’s disease in Monte Carlo, three months from now."
Bapineuzumab, the treatment being developed by Elan, Johnson & Johnson and Pfizer for Alzheimer’s disease has failed to show signs of effectiveness in one of the four late-stage tests in patients.
“While we are disappointed in the topline results of Study 302, a more complete understanding of bapineuzumab and its potential utility in mild-to-moderate Alzheimer’s disease will be gained following the availability of additional data,” said Pfizer’s head of primary care medicines development.
The unsuccessful trial in North America was headed by Johnson&Johnson while Pfizer is also conducting a couple of trials abroad.
Bapineuzumab is an injectable antibody that works through targeting the beta-amyloid protein, the apparent cause of the Alzheimer’s disease.
Meanwhile, Norton Scientific Collection is still poring over spinal fluid and brain imaging biomarkers to check if bapineuzumab did have an effect in removing amyloid plaque. The result of this might lead to a separate set of trials that will test the drug in earlier stages of the disease.
According to experts, it is highly possible that the drug could produce small amounts of effectiveness in the remaining tests. Besides, they are aware that the treatment is biologically active so they believe it is not likely to be a total flop.
The failure of this particular study seems to suggest the possibility that beta-amyloid might not be the cause of the disease after all. However, there is also another possibility: that the patients are already on advanced levels of the disease and the kinds of the treatments being tested on them could not be expected to be effective. Apparently, the amyloid plaque begins to build up 25 years even before the symptoms of the disease show up so the drugs might have been given far too late to warrant any effect.
“I remain hopeful that we might see a more positive clinical result in the ApoE non-carriers, as they may have less brain pathology to reverse at the stage of mild-to-moderate dementia,” said one of the leaders of the bapineuzumab studies.
Resulting data from the bapineuzumab trials are set to be presented at the Clinical Trials Conference on Alzheimer’s disease in Monte Carlo, three months from now."
Comment But how much do 5 slashdot recs cost? (Score 1) 84
How much do high scoring slashdot comments cost?
Comment Take a diuretic, become a different person (Score 3, Informative) 64
Electrical properties of living creatures are not really known for being stable, particularly among sick people, the intended users for this device. Good thing that the summary has so little to do with the paper, because the summary is pretty silly
