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Comment How it's going (Score 1) 218

I am a victim of this policy. Chevy Blazer EV 2025. Coming back to the desert from LA, Google Maps went crazy. It had me miles off the Interstate in an area with no roads. Never had that happen with Apple Maps. Fortunately, I knew the way home and was able to get home without incident. Next day the Maps app seemed back to normal, suggesting destinations I know nothing about.

Comment Write speeds (Score 3, Insightful) 38

Optical disks have relatively slow write speeds compared to other storage media. Current disk speeds are up to 15X the 4.5 MB/s write speed. At that speed it would take over 4 hours to write one Terabyte to the disk. Over a month to fill the disk. Practically, it would take much longer due to limitations in the OS. Capacity is only one dimension, so unless the system allows faster read and write speeds it is impractical for most data applications.

Comment firmware failure (Score 1) 124

I have avoided WD drives since they shipped drives with math errors in the firmware back in the late 90's. Still, a few have crept into my inventory and a few have been notable failures. I have drives that are storing data that are over 10 yers old. They are not powered on and I have been told that they will last a lot longer in this fashion. Now what did I do with that ATA adapter?

Comment Selective enforcement (Score 2) 165

My wife found a foreign language site that had stolen one of her poems and published it as their own. After researching who owned the site it turned out to be under Google's ownership. I sent a DMCA takedown to Google. Never heard back and now 8 years later it is still up. Looks like Google only pays attention to some notices.

Comment Re:Wow, what a terrible summary (Score 2) 188

Never miss an opportunity to take the audio through one more transform that distorts it. As long a everything was synchronous it was possible to send audio in sync. Now with the decoupling of the display rate from the propagation rate the poor stepchild that gets mangled is the audio as it is speed shifted and pitch shifted back to compensate. Tossing an occasional frame is much more problematic than just reprocessing the audio to match the new "frame rate".

Comment Manufacturers are sitting ducks (Score 1) 197

Remember that upgrade you were promised last year or the bug you have been working around for 3 months? Well the tech conference is the perfect time to get to person at a vendor who is in a position to resolve your issue. I always have a list of things to discuss with each vendor I visit. Some have even asked me to leave the booth as I am "scaring the other customers". :-) And the other key purpose is ideas. Hopefully, you will be exposed to the latest products and thinking in your area and that should give you some ideas to take back. Sure there is all the networking stuff and drinking with colleagues but a far as pitching attendance to your employer, those are the key points to cover that will add value for your attendance. Who knows? You might even learn something or at the very least hear what your competitors are saying.

Comment Paper punch tape (Score 1) 620

We were still feeding printer lights into the film printers with paper punch tape until the whole system was shut down. We had to have the machine shop make parts for the punch since you could no longer buy them. We did modify a few printers to take data from ethernet towards the end. The end being a couple of years ago. There are still some working film labs and they may still be using paper punch tape to set the printer lights.

Comment I use a mac mini (Score 1) 304

I've tried xmbc - which was better than plex but for the most part I use the internal DVD player or quicktime - I usually don't stream content but download and save it for playback - that way I can show my favorite pieces easily to guests. I use a remote bluetooth mouse and keyboard to control it. Mostly I can get away with the mouse and I have also tried several remotes that work with the ipod touch. This mini also feeds the whole house with music via iTunes - the key driver here being the ability of my wife to now access any music in the library via her iphone or the ipod touch remote - The scalar in DVD player is very good and allows me to feed the display at its native 1280 X 720 resolution. I use the optical output to feed the surround system with excellent results.
Cellphones

Verizon To Allow Skype Calling On Its Network 98

The Verizon press release begins: "At the 2010 Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Verizon Wireless and Skype today announced a strategic relationship that will bring Skype to Verizon Wireless smartphones in March." What used to be one of the most protective carriers anywhere has been opening up in major ways since the introduction of the Motorola Droid. Phandroid summarizes: "Starting next month, Verizon Smartphone users with data plans will enjoy free and unlimited Skype-to-Skype calls to anyone on the planet. And you’ll enjoy amazingly cheap Skype International calls as well. All this from Verizon Wireless’ 3G network." Some are wondering how the DoJ and law enforcement will react to a major upsurge in fully encrypted traffic.

Comment Re:iTunes + Airport Express - Passes the wife test (Score 1) 438

I can confirm that the remote application running on either my wife's iPhone or on an iPod touch passes the wife test. My wife loves to show off to her friends how she can now access her extensive music collection. All the systems I looked at had steep learning curves for operation. My wife picked up the remote app and within a few days was happily choosing her own music.

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