Waiting for process "ExchangeFetch" to terminate... *Explosion.

Yeah, I'll still pass.

It doesn't actually look that bad. I did a lot of Pentium 1(pre MMX) stuff many years ago, and I could remember and properly use a fair percentage of it. That is only perhaps twice as long. I would imagine a compiler designer would be comfortable with the majority of that, and then some (pipeline optimizations, etc).

But I do agree with you, RISC or near RISC is perhaps better. Especially now memory is cheaper. Cache memory never seems to get cheaper though, not the real fast Level 1 stuff anyway...

Apparently TechyImmigrant below may not be human....

Error: 25367. Watchdog timer failed. This phone will now self destruct.

You're the legit owner and now your head has assploded. Welcome to the weird world of embedded systems, where the not every combination of failure can always be accounted for. I get the sentiment you have, but I'd never buy such a device.

To be honest, I haven't quantified either figure, so it may then be a well worthwhile investment. Though having an engineering leaning, while I understand the value, I often wonder if we couldn't extract useful work as a byproduct of the mining process. Riecoin and primecoin may do this, but I question the practical uses of their results...

My point? Simply that a lot of the things we do "because we want to" have other purposes that might be useful in an objective sense beyond fulfilling "because we want to." Parachuting and diamond mining are bad examples of things we " tend to do things because we want to, not because it makes sense [poster]." I am fairly confident the poster would see the sense in them.

Hardened carbon does have industrial uses. Jumping out of aeroplanes has military applications. Not sure what applications bitcoin mining has apart from an expensive to run currency. Maybe worthwhile for just that, I don't know.

So? I see no ethical problem time shifting content that has already been paid for. If you use the internet for that, so what?

The ethical issue arises if the content had not been paid for at all.

I feel we should update that joke to include Vista somehow.

Sacrilege! The car analogy is always appropriate! Burn the AC Heretic! All we need do is make the analogy more out of this world; if someone 3d printed a copy of your car (license plates included), should you be liable for their crimes with the copy of the vehicle?

No, his dissertation had obviously been overturned, and using MacWrite, he was able to right it. :D

It isn't about efficiently. It is about not blowing up large systems because the kid made a mistake on the embedded system.

[sarcasm]Oh, wow! Just because I only mentioned Thorium cycle reactors means we certainly can't consider any other designs! My mistake then![/sarcasm]

I mentioned the most interesting (as far as I can see) upcoming fission technology. In reality the rise of passive safety designs (i.e. unlike fukushima, if power fails, the reactor simply shuts down completely) amoung other ideas to do with safety can make things a lot safer.

I wouldn't let an 18 year old near any important embedded system. I would be suspicious of any 23 year old with 5 years experience. Developing embedded systems rests on some fairly specific thought processes and you can be clever as you like, but unless you have the training to think in the right way, you will certainly screw up. Not only that, I don't know that many 18 year old who can do math at the required level.

It isn't about the ability to code, so much as the ability to be thorough and exhaustive about understand the process or application and considering all possibilities. Some of the stuff I do, I would not really fully understand without my degree. Some of the maths is way beyond high school level.

It isn't impossible, but as I say, I would be very suspicious.

This may work, but it would take some setting up...