* Posts by MJI

6857 publicly visible posts • joined 5 Mar 2009

Would you believe it? The Museum of Failure contains quite a few pieces of technology

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Re: Kodak failures: Disc, PhotoCD, and APS.

APS was a bad decision, I am so glad the film format APS died.

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Re: VHS

V2000 was slightly better than VHS and slightly worse than Beta. Trick play was its advantage.

Comes down to recording speed, which comes down to head diameter.

Beta - 74.5

V2000 - 65

VHS - 62

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Re: Philips Digital Cassette Tape etc

DCC was a dead end DAT was better

Elcassette was an attempt at a high end cassette format, failed due to compact cassette.

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Re: Betamax

Since I have used it from 84 to date I have had some experience.

Sanyo VCRs were slightly better than VHS, except top end

Sony cheap VCRs were slightly better than VHS

Sony top end decks were better enough to be obvious over the opposition

I had 3rd generation Beta copies better than someone else 2nd Vhs copies.

That is my copied off edit master better than their edit master.

Slightly larger VCR with 3hours 15minute recording vs slightly smaller with 30 minute.

That is THE Beta portable vs a JVC I think compact portable.

Actually there were not that many portable VCRs in the UK, only 3 were sales successes.

Mechanical Sony no

Most VHS, few bought as expensive heavy and not very good.

The other Beta one, why would you?

The big sellers were

a JVC Vhs-C deck, Panasonic NV180, Sony SL-F1UB

The same 3 companies also made the best cameras, JVC made the best tube camera, Panasonic just about the only CCD camera, Sony was basic but good colour handling.

The main reason that it came down to so few decks was simple.

Why buy an inferior recorder to the market leaders?

The F1 was so ahead of the other portables it was the most common recorder to be found at the end of a camera cable, the two other Beta portables were in comparison bad. JVC was small and compact, the NV180 was best non Beta, possibly the best non SL-F1.

Then came all in ones and the market disappeared for portables overnight. Pity really as you could mix and match. Many JVC cameras were plugged into Sony portables.

But for me 3 video cameras in 30 years is not bad, Beta seperates, DV, HDV, not sure what to do after HDV, but it still works!

MJI Silver badge

Re: Betamax - Betamax quality was actually that much better.

I ran Beta until I got a PVR.

Used an old Ondigital box with a HiFI Sanyo deck.

My old Sony super deck was superb

Will the MOAB (Mother Of all AdBlockers) finally kill advertising?

MJI Silver badge

Re: Trust

Actually people do not like being advertised to. Not the advert itself but the act of being advertised to.

Only adverts I do not mind internet wise are related to website adverts, which are served locally.

OK hobby forum website ads at the top of the screen, advertising new products I would like, or a service I would like. As an example why would I NOT like an advert for a new model railway loco on a model railway forum? New producer brings loco X out with no fanfare, no prior warning, lets see it!

Conversly why would my wife want an advert for something I bought last week from Ebay when she is on farcebook? She moans about it. Not my fault!

Now to real world, lets say magazines. I really find the amount of silly overpriced watch adverts in car magazines very annoying, I want to read about cars, not about overpriced portable clocks. The mix of advert and editorial is enough to stop me buying a magazine.

Now look at model magazines, pages upon pages of adverts, but guess what all readers read at least some of them. Because they are 100% relevant to the magazine, things we want to buy, things we play with.

Now what this says to me is I hate being advertised to, trying to sell me some sh1t I do not want. Yet adverts for relevant stuff if static (like in print) will get read.

As above I blame admongers not the manufacturers.

Why Firefox? Because not everybody is a web designer, silly

MJI Silver badge

Stop hiding things

FF with CTR here.

Rounded tabs annoy me.

No file edit menu annoys me.

No window bar annoys me.

A blank screen with address bar and no search field annoys me.

Chrome annoys me

'Nobody's got to use the internet,' argues idiot congressman in row over ISP privacy rules

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Big Brother

Nobody has to

not whack the idiot in the face with a cricket bat

NASA agent faces heat for 'degrading' moon rock sting during which grandmother wet herself

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Totally ridiculous.

Heavy handedness and cruelity towards 70+ old lady.

Having to raise money by any means for medical treatment.

Really nasty entrapment against the elderly lady. (Pretending to be broker).

As to Neil Armstrong, I would guess he had a few slithers and gave them to people as presents but denied it to avoid upsetting the goons who go around upsetting old ladies.

Leaked NSA point-and-pwn hack tools menace Win2k to Windows 8

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Looks like of all things

A patched XP up machine may be safe.

Patches back to 2008/2010

No SMB2

However not sure if SMB1 was patched.

My XP boot did update last week.

DTMF replay phreaked out the Dallas tornado alarm, say researchers

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When I saw the word Tornado

I was hoping it was about this

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-york-north-yorkshire-39581712

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/cars/news/tornado-steam-train-hits-100mph-secret-test-run-east-coast-main/

Apple’s premium TV plans – the hobby doomed to stay that way

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Re: TV Subscriptions

Easy to rationalise

1. BBC - Top Gear

6. Amazon Prime - The Grand Tour

All motoring shows worth watching counted for.

Microsoft's new hardware: eight x86 cores, 40 GPU cores

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Re: Project Scorpio?

Worse spelling than I thought!

Missing key strokes mainly and a shift 4 rather than 5

MJI Silver badge

Re: Project Scorpio?

PS4 runs on a variant of BSD not Linux

Standard PC graphics ;ibraries are also not best for graphics quality.

DX12 best, doubt it.

Getting closer to the "Metal" is always best for performance.

I reckon SCORIO will be about 10$ to 20% more powerful hardware wise, but never bet against Sony ICE team and Guerilla*

* yes they did have a PS3 multiplayer which looked better than the first this generation COD

Sorry for any bad spelling as I can't quite see my monitor clearly due to presbyopia and y moniror glasses are at work

MJI Silver badge

Re: Steam

But many great games missing.

This week I have played 3 games

Horizon Zero Dawn, console only

Destiny, console only

Uncharted 4. consoel only

Yes I took down a robot dinosaur* with a compound bow and arrows

Yes I ran around slaughtering aliens.

Yes I robbed an auction (hard play through)

And yes I own Borderlands 1, 2, Presequel

* Most are mammal equivalents, only the Thunderjaw is a robot dinosaur.

MJI Silver badge

Re: This "or" That ?

But it would not cover PS and XBOX

Then you do need 2 subscriptions

Quite possible that console 2 would be off line.

MJI Silver badge

"If you were plowing a field, which would you rather use?... Two strong oxen or 1024 chickens?"

A tractor

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Re: Microsoft cheque in the post?

Raw power helps.

Better draw distances, better animations, more NPCs, more detailed characters.

It can allow more engrossing stories, more games which provide that wow feeling.

After spending the last month hunting robotic animals, being able to stop and sightsee really adds to the experience.

MJI Silver badge

Re: I'll buy it

But better than emulating a PS1 is that I can download and play a lot of them on the 3.

Oh and you can play Crash Bandicoot on a PS4 as well, complete with commentry from Nathan Drake himself.

MJI Silver badge

Re: Multiprocessing

One good thing about the PS3 was the fast connection between CPU and GPU, it enabled the fast but low throughput GPU to use a few CPU SPUs to do calculations.

Hard to code for, but when done properly by the likes of Naughty Dog or Guerilla the results were astounding.

The 360 was a lot easier to code for but ultimately a bit less powerful.

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Re: I'll buy it

Well stuff that

I am only missing the PS1.

Got 2, 3 and 4

And prefer Vita games to telephone games

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Re: RX 480

The SCORPIO fixes the XBONE technical weaknesses.

MJI Silver badge

Re: Multiprocessing

1 main CPU core

6 SPU cores

7 cores basically, but most of them got used as surrogate GPUs.

And console CPUs are a little bit different to telephone CPUs.

last gen though was fascinating.

MJI Silver badge
Pint

Interesting

Same ram as PS4 (GDDR5) but more, slightly more compute cores than PS4PRO, running slightly quicker, slightly better CPU than PS4PRO. A number of small improvements which will all add up.

Appears to be similar improvement over PS4PRO as PS4 is over XBONE.

If it is not too much money it would be worth getting if you have a suitable TV, and you like the games.

Now the crunch, where are all the games for it? Is it worth the extra money over a PS4PRO? Will people upgrade from XBONE or S? Will PS4PRO owners double up? Would a TV owner going from HD to UHD get one?

And one more thing, Sony have 2 studios who can wring the last drop put of any console, would a SCORPIO game look better than Horizon : Zero Dawn on PS4PRO.

Now if I was in the market for a new console (my PS4 stays put) I would go S before SCORPIO, due to price as it would be an exclusive only box. If I had a new UHD TV I would go PS4PRO for the games over SCORPIO.

I hope it does well as we need a strong market to keep everyone honest.

Anyway good luck MS with the SCORPIO, it will keep the market active, but you have rather a large lack of Thunderjaws.

Murdoch will get EU green light for full Sky takeover – reports

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Re: I do try

Well due to forced adverts Fox DVDs are unpurchasable so Fox = torrent

In fact it was Sky poaching stuff off Free to Air that lead me first to the world of torrents

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I do try

To not give a single penny to the crook and his companies.

But it is difficult.

BOFH: Defenestration, a solution to Solutions To Problems We Don't Have

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I think we see

An apprentice PFY here.

The beast is back: Reborn ekranoplan heads for the Arctic

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Re: Did anyone hear the name "Caspian Sea Monster" and think.

Nope.

Instead I got excited about the well know 10 engined KM

Put down your coffee and admire the sheer amount of data Windows 10 Creators Update will slurp from your PC

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Re: How does this compare to Windows 7?

Mine is off, but search is broken.

I typed in action centre, nothing found.

I don't type Yank

Alabama man gets electrocuted after sleeping with iPhone

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Not happen here

BS1363 FTW

As to dog tags, for fashion?

Wasn't it a dodgy fashion years ago?

Yee-hacked! Fired Texan sysadmin goes rogue, trashes boot business

MJI Silver badge

Company were also stupid

They sack a sysadmin without protecting their system.

Sack someone and you make an enemy. As soon as you are considering it make sure that you can protect your system.

Bring them into the meeting, chat about why and how sorry you are to let them go. Offer a nice (but honest) reference. Keep them there.

While this is happening change all passwords, temporarly block all remote access, make sure your backups are OK.

If there is no new sysadmin ready to drop in, oh dear!

Remember there are people who think BOFH is a documentry.

Boeing and Airbus fly new planes for first time

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787

Nice to see first flight using RR Trent engines.

Something world beating and British

Boeing or Airbus, both use a lot from the UK.

Your internet history on sale to highest bidder: US Congress votes to shred ISP privacy rules

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Re: WTF?

Is there a copy anywhere safe?

Do not want to go to a conspirasy theory site

The evolution of ransomware: How a nuisance turned into a business menace

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Time to come down heavy

National security risk.

We have the technology GCHQ

We have the reply SAS

Just do it, trace them back and terminate them.

Alabama joins anti-web-smut crusade with mandatory opt-out filters

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What a backwards place.

Not sure what to say, but so incredibly backwards.

I am surprised this moron has even heard of computers.

Dishwasher has directory traversal bug

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My internet enabled dishwasher

Is currently looking at new wood flooring.

I have to do two rooms and she is looking for the colour she wants.

UK Home Sec: Give us a snoop-around for WhatApp encryption. Don't worry, we won't go into the cloud

MJI Silver badge

Re: Halcyon visions of yesteryear

But Elms was a really nasty piece of work, but looking at recent events I would say that nutters recruited by extremist nutters is a really important thing to watch.

Lee Rigby killers and Elms are both of this type.

MJI Silver badge

Why was Elm not in prison?

A complete nutter and used to go around slicing people for fun.

Elms should have been on a watch list as a total nutter found by radical nutters a few years ago.

Plenty out there about his past, a really nasty piece of work.

Why do GUIs jump around like a demented terrier while starting up? Am I on my own?

MJI Silver badge

Re: FYI to everyone...

I found that Google was faulty, one of the biggest faults is that + is no longer used so searching for X Y Z will find many results for Y Z but none for X Y Z, so did +X Y Z, errors.

DuckDuckGo however returned a few X Y Z sites.

MJI Silver badge

Re: Adobe Reader... + Memories of Ashton Tate

Should have gone to Nantucket then, or CA even

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Re: Yep...

Does it on computers as well

MJI Silver badge

Bad GUIs

I hate moving stuff, especially when stuff is moved for no reason.

But my favourite and the one which needed a restore was great.

I wiped an accounting system.

Why?

Because it used non standard GUI.

I accidently went into the wipe system option so clicked no. But the program yes no boxes were all swapped over, so I clicked yes, brilliant design there Pegasus, I did have a go at you for that. A right shonky piece of software.

I so wanted to bypass their importer by directly inserting transactions but I was told not worth the risk, use their ANAL and TRAN files.

I still think directly inserting is safer than letting a programmer test on a system.

BTW Our system used a DBF compatable client server system.

UK.gov confirms it won't be buying V-22 Ospreys for new aircraft carriers

MJI Silver badge

Re: ->The V22 has a less than stellar safety record, bring back the Fairey Rotodyne

Or another one, didn't we used to have a very effective V/STOL jet fighter?

MJI Silver badge
Pint

Beat me to it

US Senate votes to let broadband ISPs sell your browser histories

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Gobsmacked

Totally unbelievable.

I need to tell a US friend who didn't vote against Trump (not sure if abstained or Trumped) he will be for sale and it is his own fault.

Good news, everyone! Two pints a day keep heart problems at bay

MJI Silver badge

If I get stressed at work I go next door

Sort of.

Next building to ours is an old building, black timbers, white paint. A sign on a post. Quiet and relaxing.

Serve Stowford Press.

Yes I work very near a pub!

MJI Silver badge

Re: Joyous news!

Fruit is for fermenting, apples, grapes, pears.

Vegetables are for keeping the meat company in a roast.

Roast potatoes hmmmm

Leeks hmmmmmmmmm

Sprouts hmmmm - really!

And some nice roast beef and Yorkshires, or chicken with stuffing.

But I detest peas!

I am now hungry!

If you were cuffed during Trump's inauguration, cops are trying to crack your smartphone

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Police state?

Lot of effort being invested here.

Seems worrying.

Amazon dodges $1.5bn US tax bill: It's OK to run sales through Europe out of IRS reach – court

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All in Europe

So sell in Europe and Tax in Europe, nothing to do with US taxes.

I cannot see anything wrong with that.

Microsoft cloud TITSUP: Skype, Outlook, Xbox, OneDrive, Hotmail down

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Re: Why does?

Still says hotmail in the address, so still hotmail to me.