Repeat slowly after me: Elop, Stephen Elop. Elon Musk is a different (way different!) person...

Unfortunately, that's not true. The output is AC and the input-referred current will reflect it, i.e. will be quite high when the output reaches its highest (340V). Since the input source has an equivalent internal resistance of 10Ohm and would droop too much, some bulk capacitance is needed to provide these 120Hz current surges.

I agree with you that the design revolves around the placement of power components (capacitors, inductor, power switches and some sort of heatsinking), then the control circuitry be crammed in the spaces between them.

Having read the actual spec, I realized that my question was stupid. Input voltage is 450V, therefore the inverter is just a full-bridge DC/DC converter

The challenge is actually perfectly doable, with the only difficult points being the size of the switching inductor and the input bulk (most likely tantalum) and output filtering (must be ceramic) capacitors. IOW, the winner will be the one with the best connections to component manufacturers.

Having read the actual Spec Document, the input voltage is 450V DC, with an equivalent series resistance of 10Ohm. Definitely not 12V DC.

what is the state of the art w.r.t. the 12VDC->110VAC/60Hz 1kW inverters?

I stand corrected. Thanks for the link.

One thing I never understood is why so many posters on /. believe that Comp-Sci is the only highly technical field that matters. H1B visa holders are many times technically-educated people who have nothing to do with programming (i.e. Chemistry, Materials Physics, EE etc).

The Sun does not revolve around IT, so why are we suggesting it does?

I have half-bricks on the bottom of my gas-fired oven. It bakes much more evenly and keeps the temperature very steady.

Yes, thermal mass is the ticket, not just-in-time heat control gimmicks.

Not only it's not obvious what "better" means when baking is involved, but he's showing his Microsoft roots here, stupid "improvements" that make the whole system break so much easier.

It's a known fact that most "modern" residential ovens, the ones with displays, lots of buttons to set baking programs etc, should never use the self-clean cycle. The thermal insulation is not good enough to protect the electronics (a.k.a. control board) and the oven fails, typically after a high-heat cycle (the self-clean reaches 700-800*F). This is equally true for GE and Whirlpool as well as for Viking and Ilve.

Adding more electronics to a hot environment is asking for more and expensive trouble.

Commercial appliances are better built though, are they Myhrvold's target? In any case, his post is just a petulant rant showing overkill application of technology, just because "he can". Zapping mosquitoes with laser beams sounds more realistic...

Meet Japan, the 51st state...

However, the general consensus is that Egypt borrowed the agriculture invention, and rather late at that (~5000BC), not the other way around.

The Egypt's ancient culture has been focused on the Nile *exclusively*, they did not care about the delta and sea-faring until they started meddling in Middle East affairs (1200BC or so). The first major sea port has been founded in Classic Antiquity only!

My apologies, I was thinking of the colon. EFL (English as a fourth language).

Thanks for the correction.

Farting is caused by the inability of our intestine to break complex sugars (lack of specialized enzymes), examples of which can be found in legumes. These sugars then reach the gut, where bacteria have no problems breaking them, releasing gasses in the process.

There are even pills you can take with your food (e.g. when eating beans) that provide the missing enzyme so that you won't fart. In US, Beano is probably the most popular one.

You won't fart just because you ate a chocolate bar. And b.t.w., these complex sugars are not sweet, therefore there is no connection between eating sweets and farting.

It must be a sad world in your neck of the woods or you're plain trolling. Gun ownership is much lower in Europe, you've been watching too many action movies "located" there.

I also don't see why you felt compelled to bring in the 2nd; the topic had nothing to do with it and nobody referred to it. Just take a deep breath and cool down.

Unfortunately, the major carriers keep scaling down the voice repeaters to increase the data bandwidth instead. The network I'm on (Sprint) is getting worse and worse for pure voice calls, with new dead zones appearing very frequently - all in a metropolitan area.

Soon the voice service will be so bad you'll be happy to permanently switch to VoIP.