Posts by roger thomas

Blu-ray 0, SDHC card 1, THX Chief Scientist predicts

So let me get this right

Within the next year or 2 we can expect SDHC devices to

a) Increase in size from a max of 8GBytes to 128GBytes

b) Increase their write speed from a max of x150 to x1000+ so that

50Gbytes can be copied in say 5mins.

c) Become so cheap that you can store your library of HD movies on

a large number of such cards.

I can't wait to see this happen, it will be so nice to get away from 8GBytes devices costing £35-£50 with I/O speeds greater than the best harddisks available.

On the other hand I may just drop a DVD drive into my PC (around £85) and get on with my life.

Keyboard PC design recalls Amiga era

It maybe worth you reading up on the Amiga spec's

The Amiga was not an 8 bit computer. It used a 68000 processor that was 16/24/32 bits. As in 16 bit memory width, 24 bit address lines and a 32 bit CPU core.

All in all it was somewhat more advanced than most of the other machines available at the time.

A third of online shops undermine consumer rights

Companies like SCAN hide behind the way the law is written

Distance selling rules are written to protect consumers and not businesses so venders such as SCAN claim that they are focussed on selling to businesses. One of the ways that they 'prove' this claim is by showing everything as ex VAT. You are only allowed to do this when selling to a business - its against the LAW to publish ex VAT pricing when marketing to Consumers.

SCAN is not alone, Even the Dixons group gets it wrong with charging a return's fee per item, but they at least understand part of the Distance Selling rules as can be seen here for their T&Cs on their microwarehouse site (General section 2)

http://www.microwarehouse.co.uk/help/terms/

Roger

Bunker-nobbling US megabomb test delayed

30 or 40 feet of concrete

>> I reckon the Iranians can add 30 or 40 feet of concrete to their

>> bunker by June. Even more by the time they _actually_ manage

>> to test this thing. Pointless waste of money. Either use a nuke,

>> or don't bother.

This does not help as much as you may first think, as long as the resulting shock wave from the blast can be placed underground (rather than lost to the atmosphere it will keep traving underground until it comes across voids (think rooms etc) where the shock will do rather a lot of damage.

30 or 40 feet of extra concrete may even do a nice job of keeping the shoke wave underground.

Roger

Microsoft backpedals on Blu-ray for Xbox 360 comments

How about the PC upgrade market

The one area that no one seems to talk about is the availablity of drives for PCs - at the moment you can purchase Blu-Ray reader Combo drives from venders for as little as £88 (inc VAT). The cheapest dual (Blu-Ray and HD DVD) is £136 and I've not seen a dedicated HD DVD drive but I'm sure other someone must have one.