* Posts by JeffyPooh

1244 publicly visible posts • joined 8 Aug 2007

PS3 fans buy more digital content than Xbox buffs do

JeffyPooh
Pint

Re: Xbox is a bit comical

PS3 Media / Blu-ray Disc RC - There are two versions. CECH-ZR1U (the more common one that everyone buys) and CECH-ZRC1U (the better one, more buttons and IR for TV and sound system). Same price (YMMV). Got the latter just last night for $15.

I bought a 2nd PS3 when it was on sale to use as a Blu-ray and up scaling DVD player. Damn good disc player. Best up scaling DVD player around.

Nexus 7 and Surface: A bonanza for landfill miners

JeffyPooh
Pint

Work?

Some commenters appear to be assuming that gadgets (e.g. tablets) are supposed fulfill a work purpose. FWIW, I assume that gadgets are purely for amusement and entertainment. To each his own.

War On Standby: Do the figures actually stack up?

JeffyPooh
FAIL

Ahem... Isn't 3:00am the default start time for many activities?

MS-Windows check for update - doesn't it default to starting at 3:00am?

PVR downloads the Guide info starting at 3:00am.

Like most, our dishwasher has a 2,4,6 Hour delayed start. We aim for 3:00am +/- when we press it.

Downloading podcasts - 3:00am.

Water softener recharge cycle - programmed to run at 3:00am.

Dimming the lights on smart(arse) TV

JeffyPooh
Pint

@Panasonic PVR

OMG. That's a fail.

My Bell PVR (made by EchoStar) can record two channels while playing two previously recorded shows out to two different TVs. I bought it outright many years ago, and Bell sent me a brand new updated version when they switched the HD channels to h.264 video encoding.

JeffyPooh
Pint

True story

Buudy and his wife reportedly had the following exchange.

W: The TV is not working. We want to watch a movie.

B: Ah, are you using the complicated remote control?

W: Yes.

B: Are you sitting in the brown chair next to the table?

W: Yes.

B: Open the drawer, put the complicated controller back inside, close the drawer, and never touch it again.

W: (mumble mumble)

B: Pick up the colorful simple controller and press the large cartoon-like button marked 'Watch Movie'.

W: Okay, it's working now.

Apple patent may foretell an end to iPhone autocorrect Tourette's

JeffyPooh
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Even within its present algorithm, iOS autocorrect is daft

iOS autocorrect doesn't even keep track of cursor relocations. If one moves the cursor back to manually correct something (typically an autocorrect gone wrong), whatever letters you type IN THE MIDDLE OF AN EXISTING WORD (!) are examined without regard to the context (!) and then autocorrected to the point where several words are deleted or overwritten in the process. What amazes me is that the SW Machine that is Apple fails to notice this sort of glaring bug.

Android - many of my coworkers have Android phones. They seem to have many more horrible SW bugs than does iOS. The high points are good (great even), but it seems to be an ecosystem that lets more serious bugs loose. It's great to have alternatives to meet all needs. I'd love to have an Android phone, but I'm not wanting another monthly bill. Perhaps I'll grab a pure Android tablet (as opposed to PlayBook) when they're on sale. Cheers.

Free tool inspects all your personal 'ware automatically

JeffyPooh
Pint

"...from more than 3,000 vendors..."

"3,000 vendors." Wow. So it covers nearly 5% of the marketplace then?

As far as the "Penguin" (Unbuntu) goes, one can click on 'Update All' daily and there will still be dozens and dozens of updates the very next day. If one is Obsessive-Compulsive about updates, and suffers with a slower Internet connection, it leads directly to insanity.

US East, West Coasts face fast-rising sea levels

JeffyPooh
Pint

What about continental drift?

The Atlantic basin is growing in volume by about 1 cubic km per century (ROM WAG) due to continental drift. Should help. A bit.

How about we flood the Afar Depression in Ethiopia? With their permission of course. Lovely waterfront properties, free fish. The Dead Sea could use some water as well. Other places as well. E.g. Death Valley. It seems there's quite a few areas where we could create in-land seas to offload some excess water.

Why I love Microsoft’s vapourware tablet

JeffyPooh
Pint

We need a new name for large tablets with keyboards...

We need a new name for large tablets with keyboards; to distinguish them from smaller form factor tablets without keyboards.

How about the name "laptop"?

Any objections?

Apple's iPhone 5 connector said to be a control freak

JeffyPooh
Pint

Re: @JeffyPooh

"...Poundland..."

That's the point! I *do* now buy my "OEM" cables in bulk from DX; so it's only a minor inconvenience. No longer a huge financial drain. But if they're going to cut-off the DX and Poundlands of the world with a stupid chip inside the new cables and allow only $15 to $20 genuine Apple cables, then they damn well better make sure that they last three or four years for everyone. And not have a systematic design flaw.

It's not a big deal at $3 each. It is a show stopper at $15 to $20.

It's inexcusable that Apple would allow such a poor design loose. If they've fixed it, I've not seen any sign of any improvement through multiple generations.

JeffyPooh

Re: How about Apple spend some time fixing the damn power cables?

iPhone 3GS times two.

iPod gen 3

iPod gen 4

iPhone 4S

Yes, looks like we skipped the 4. Right you are. The rest were all basically identical. The genuine cables fell apart with light use.

Obviously YMMV. But 'Apple Cable Failure Deniers' are perfectly unhelpful. Pointless replies.

JeffyPooh

Re: How about Apple spend some time fixing the damn power cables?

Drop by an Apple Store?

Yeah. Thanks for that. Not everyone lives in a town with an Apple Store.

JeffyPooh
FAIL

How about Apple spend some time fixing the damn power cables?

The iGadget power cables always fall apart - the cable jacket separates from the docking connection even with careful use. The original cables supplied with the iPods and iPhones all failed within a few months. The expensive genuine replacement cables failed in exactly the same way. Now we buy "OEM" ? cables in bulk from an overseas supplier (DX) - at least they're cheap enough that we've mitigated the financial impact of this Apple design FAIL.

I've never seen such a poor and unreliable design. Shame on Apple.

If Apple is now planning to lock out the aftermarket suppliers of $3 power cables, and not fix the design, this one stupid thing will have me looking at other options.

Amount of meat we eat will barely affect future climate change

JeffyPooh
Pint

Re: Gareth is still right though

AC "...vast tracts of land..."

Exactly right. The rural areas in my jurisdiction are depopulating. The metro is growing fast.

It's going to be quite pleasant for the retired folks that want to get outta town for some peace and quiet.

Hmmm... I predict that they'll eventually have self-contained residences, linked by cheap satcom, powered by who-knows-what (wind, solar?), extracting water from the air, that they'll helicopter into isolated, remote and beautiful locations with spectacular views (e.g. Namibian coast). Once a month, in exchange for your pension check, they'll chopper in groceries.

JeffyPooh
Pint

Re: Only partial picture

Ideally, meat is a garnish. A 6-oz steak should be a very rare treat. Never, ever order a double burger.

Limit yourself to just three or four strips of bacon per serving, not more than four or five times a week (plus the weekends of course). Oh, sorry, is this one not like the others?

JeffyPooh
Pint

Re: references, references, references ...

Then click twice.

It's perfectly reasonable to provide outside references via previous columns on the same subject. It provides the arguable benefit of additional context at the cost of you having to follow one more link if you wish to reach the original external source.

The limited space of a column (as compares to a 47-page paper) essentially forces this sort of approach. It's not practical to incorporate all the previous context into each new column. If you're actually interested enough to try to read the original source, then you can take a few seconds to review the context of the previous column(s) where those links may eventually be provided. Or use Google.

Disclaimer: this doesn't imply I agree with everything he writes (the Clarkson comparison is apt), but the role of a skeptic is absolutely critical in all important debates. Those that denigrate the "climate skeptics" have themselves become unthinking, unscientific, essentially-religious, dangerous zealots. Even if they're actually right.

JeffyPooh
Pint

Re: Only one number that really matters

The following might be considered counterintuitive, so I'll type slowly.

High child mortality leads to overpopulation. Read it again.

Most humans instinctively want to reproduce themselves. They want high odds of success in this mission. 50/50 isn't good enough. 95% is probably about right. 100% is not required.

If the child mortality is low and you want two kids, then you have two kids. This will almost certainly lead to several grandchildren and one would eventually die happy.

If the child mortality is high and you want two kids, then you might need eight babies to provide 95% odds of having two survive. But under these circumstances the average could be four that survive. In other words, to guaranty two the average would overshoot and result in overpopulation.

As soon as the child mortality problem is fixed, population growth tapers off.

I'm convinced that this is the root cause. It may then be layered over with cultural and religious reinforcements. But if you fix child mortality then the human overpopulation problem will fix itself in a generation or two.

Ex-Soviet space gunboats to be FOUND ON MOON

JeffyPooh
Pint

Mad as a box of frogs...

Logistics/Reliability Engineering - ever heard of it? Without careful engineering analysis of the old kit (and rework of the time-expired subsystems), these would be suicide missions.

Earthquakes will release captured carbon: Stanford study

JeffyPooh
Pint

Just shove it in deeper...

I assume that if the CO2 is injected into a place that is sufficiently hot, it'll break down into its constituent elements. That'll be carbon and oxygen. Job's a good'en.

Microsoft takes on tablets with keyboard-equipped Surface

JeffyPooh
Pint

Of course it needs a keyboard...

...Otherwise how could one press Ctl+Alt+Del?

Lightsquared cremation postponed

JeffyPooh
Pint

New Business Plan

A subscription service to provide high bandwidth, high precision, high resolutiion GPS corrections to the GPS crowd. With this huge bird covering North America, blasting high power corrections to the unwashed masses.

Step 1 - bankruptcy to shake off the creditors a la EuroTunnel

Can't watch Flash vids in Firefox? It's not just you

JeffyPooh
Pint

So...

...just like Apple's iOS then?

LOL.

Asteroid zips past Earth

JeffyPooh
Pint

Re: How big a hole would it have made if it had hit the Earth?

Wow. It'd take out a medium size US state. Or make a tsunami when it hit the ocean (75% odds),

It'll certainly make the evening news...

JeffyPooh
Pint

How big a hole would it have made if it had hit the Earth?

I'll go look it up.

Ever notice that most of these things arrived in-between Tuesday and Friday? I recommend lunch out on Tuesdays, as well as Fridays. One never knows...

Source code smoking gun links Stuxnet AND Flame

JeffyPooh
Pint

Headline: "Source code..." and Kaspersky Lab

Headline indicates that Kaspersky Lab has access to the source code. ???

Kaspersky also seem to know quite a bit about exactly what happened and when, right down to what the malware authors had for lunch and the brand of vodka they used to wash it down.

Hmmmm... ;-)

16GB BlackBerry PlayBook flushed away by RIM

JeffyPooh
Pint

Re: What a load of...

"...had to be tethered to a BlackBerry smartphone to use email..."

The quoted statement (above) is still perfectly wrong.

I'm not saying your points are not correct. Of course the native email client is an improvement. Of course RIM are idiots for taking more than a month to write it. Of course it should have been there from Day 1.

But I was "using email" since Day 1. And furthermore I've never tethered to a BB phone.

The quoted statement is wrong twice. And that's a FAIL.

JeffyPooh
Pint

Answers...

1) No. There are workarounds for Voice or Text chat via any of multiple services.

2) It has a native Video Chat app. Only works PB to PB* (similar to how Apple's Facetime is also an Apple-only service). It works very good. Only one to one, not conference calling. Uses wifi of course (just in case some loon claims that it "requires tethering").

* The usual solution is to scoop up multiple PlayBooks and distribute them for Xmas.

JeffyPooh
FAIL

What a load of...

"...the fact the tablet had to be tethered to a BlackBerry smartphone to use email..."

Gezus H... What a load of incomplete-to-the-point-of-being-perfectly-incorrect b... s... that is.

Any sensible email provider provides a web interface. These days, tying yourself to your ISP by using their email service ties you to their Internet access service - not smart. All major non-ISP email providers provide a web interface: perhaps you've heard of Gmail, Hotmail, etc.

Once you save the optimal shortcut then the webmail interface even allows access to attach files from almost anywhere in the PlayBook storage (something not even permitted by other OS choices). This so-called issue was a non-issue for many, thus proving that the statement as written is incorrect. We could "use email" just fine - even from Day 1.

And of course they eventually (these are the correct words...) provided a native email client app.

The initial omission affected some, but the statement implies a false impossibility.

Even today, I have never tethered to a BlackBerry phone since I don't have a BlackBerry phone. The webmail and the new email client app both work just fine through wifi (of course).

Please get your facts correct, and use the words that convey the correct facts.

Flame gets suicide command

JeffyPooh
Pint

So in other words...

So, the Flame authors write a far better Uninstall routine than does Symantec for their horrid NIS.

Worse than that, the Flame authors can write software that goes about its secretive business without hardly anyone even noticing, as compares to Symantec software that constantly gets in the way and generally makes a complete nuisance of itself.

Flame authors: +2

Symantec: -1,000,000 for being so useless

Climate scientists see 'tipping point' ahead

JeffyPooh
Pint

Obviously false...

"...43 per cent of the earth's land having been converted to agricultural and urban use..."

Obviously false. I doubt it's even half that.

10m years ago there was less CO2 - but the Earth was warmer

JeffyPooh
Pint

Dinosaurs invented nuclear-powered space heaters

Lots of heaters.

1,000 Foxconn iPad workers trash dorms in riot against guards

JeffyPooh
Pint

Wasn't me...

The Workers have confirmed that the rioters were independant third-party rioters contracted to provide Professional Rioting Services by the contracted-out Rioter Hiring Services riot-management services contractor. The Workers are in a third-party contractual relationship with the Rioter Hiring Services contractor via a numbered company in Bermuda. The Workers wish to make clear that they were not involved in any way in the actual rioting. However it must be acknowledged that some of the independent rioters may moonlight part time at the factory. But this does not imply that the Workers were rioting.

The Workers trust that this clears up the question about just who was rioting.

Is the Store Once Catalyst/B6200 8-node cluster a single system?

JeffyPooh
Pint

A whole new approach...

The content is used on the address lines, and every possible address points to either a zero or a one. Thus, the entire Interweb in just two bits.

Unfortunately the address decoder is non-trivial...

'Super-powerful' Flame worm actually boring bloatware

JeffyPooh
Pint

AV vendors exaggerate...

AB vendors exaggerate both the threat and their own supposed skill levels. Whatever they say should be right-shifted twice (times ¼) if you wish to approximate the truth.

Sony PlayStation 4 will not be download only

JeffyPooh
Pint

Once upon a time...

There was a brief window of time when well-rated, Internet-enabled, wifi-equipped BluRay players were $200 or very close. At the same time, the 160GB PS3 was available on sale for $250. At the same time I wanted a good BluRay player, so that's when we bought our 2nd PS3 - primarily for the media playing. The PS3 is also one of the best up-converting DVD players of all time.

All this requires the optical drive.

BBC uses lifted Iraq war photo to depict Syrian slaughter

JeffyPooh
FAIL

The unspoken false assumption

So there are never any mistakes or careless acts so long as the news organization avoids 'citizen journalism'? <- false assumption

Sorry, similar errors or acts of laziness have happened at other outlets. Even when citizen journalists were not involved. There's not much excuse for this failure by BBC, but if you're trying to make a larger point then you'd need to perform a statistical study.

Foxconn receives Apple smart TV order - report

JeffyPooh
Pint

Apple TV

There will be a big round button centered under the screen. To do anything, you'll have to get up, wander over to the TV and press it. Then you'll smudge-up the screen using the GUI.

Passwords are for AES-holes

JeffyPooh
Pint

Keyboards are the weakest link

Do you trust your keyboard? You keep typing all your passwords into it.

More generally, I am pretty certain that Gödel's Incompleteness Theorem can be mapped to Computer Security thereby proving that perfect computer security relying only on computers is an impossibility. The reason that I'm not perfectly certain is that darn Gödel again.

TiVo spits out monster 6-way Pace box for US eyes only

JeffyPooh
Pint

Confused...

"...TiVo service at $15 a month, or you can buy the Stream box for a one-off fee of $500."

Okay. Is it $15 a month FOR THE BOX RENTAL, or is it free TiVo "service" (sic) for life with the purchase of the $500 box. Either is perfectly acceptable, except calling what TiVo offers a "service" (at most some TV guide data and the always-helpful ;-) keep-alive signal).

To be clear, it sounds like a good product (note, product as opposed to "service").

Boffins cram binary data into living cells' DNA

JeffyPooh
Pint

Aliens, or any possible creators

Maybe human foibles are caused by our DNA carrying watermark-tech messages such as "Borgs rule - Humans drool; We nailed your ancestors circa 150,000BC", or perhaps "God wuz here I told you I was real".

SAP hopes to embiggen its cloud with Ariba slurp

JeffyPooh
Pint

Fake Barcodes might help - LOL

Maybe they could slap a fake barcode on the box Ariba comes in, and get it out the door much cheaper?

US space programme in shock metric conversion

JeffyPooh
Pint

"We are directly under the Sun... ...now."

"Altitude 5.3 kilometres, velocity 225 metres per second, and downrange distance of six-tenths of a kilometre."

Those numbers seem overly-precise considering that they would have been outside the allowed significant figures allowance by the time he spoke the first word.

"Altitude 5. ah 5. ah 5.5 .6 .7 .8 .9 6.1 6.3 6.5 .7 .9 7!..."

Official: Apple, IBM are world's most valuable brands

JeffyPooh
Pint

'Toyoto' brand valued more than 'Mercedes Benz' ???

The brand name of the world's leading maker of boring and tedius transportation appliances (sitting in warm porridge)is more valuable than Mercedes Benz 3-pointed star? Fail. Complete and utter fail.

A few years ago, a (better) analysis pegged the 3-pointed star as the world's most valuable branding exerecise. One must allow the rise of Apple et al.

Mobile fee dodgers will get away with enough cash to bail out Greece

JeffyPooh
Pint

Duh...

If only the device in question (the mobe handset) had some sort of data network connection back to the operators' headquarters... if only...

Then they could use a 'One-Time Pad' type of cypher to provide perfectly unbreakable encryption that's not owned by anyone.

Assuming that encryption is actually the root problem (it isn't).

Virgin straps on phone masts for the flying upper classes

JeffyPooh
Pint

Round trip delay of 500ms

I think it's worse these days. Just the round trip time-of-flight for geostationary satellites is over half a second. Add in some voice digitization, encoding, compression, awaiting your time slot, etc. probably brings it up within sight of a full second. Iridium is low Earth orbit and is thus faster, but with Morse code like data rates of 2400 bits per second (pre OpenPort) it's tedious.

Will someone puhleeze launch a fleet of MEO birds to make worldwide broadband Comms into a 'solved' problem (similar to what GPS did for navigation) - puhleeze? This is so overdue.

JeffyPooh
Pint

"...which means a dish..."

Pendantic On

If they're using Inmarsat SBB (as they should), then that's L-band. It doesn't use a "dish" antenna for this application. Inmarsat might use a mechanical end-fire helical antenna, or a quad array of same. There are other antenna options, but a physically pratical parabolic reflector ("dish") isn't typically used for aircraft - too big.

On the other hand, if they're using one of the k- or ka-band systems, then, yes, dish. But those systems have their pros and cons compared to Inmarsat.

There's also Iridium Openport Aero, but probably not as useful as the others.

Pedantic Off.

UK milk wastage = 20,000 cars = actually completely unimportant

JeffyPooh
Pint

Cars reduce nitrogen oxide (NOx)

Modern petrol-powered cars produce essentially zero point zero zero zero... NOx emissions. The NOx emissions from modern cars might well be less than amibient. Thus, cars are saving the planet.

Solar quiet spell like the one now looming cooled climate in the past

JeffyPooh
Pint

Predicting the next Maunder Minimum

A little secret: They don't really know. Predicting the amplitude of future solar cycles (i.e. the "looming" next Maunder Minimum) is not presently a mature science. It's still just pure guesswork.

They. Don't. Know.

I'm not dissing the scientists involved in this work, but certain fields just simply are not yet fully matured. This is an example.

Maybe their speculation will prove correct, or maybe the future will allow them to gather unexpected data and further mature their models.

Fanbois froth as Apple claims 'iPhone5.com' rights

JeffyPooh
Pint

"their"

I send replies to our faithful, hardworking, dedicated webmaster informing him...

"Re: Your email.

You spelled 'their' correctly."

Same thing with 'there', 'your', 'you're', etc.