Posts by Dave 126

Sound-mufflers chuck acoustic sleep blanket at the noise-plagued

Re: Not noise cancellation. Not at all.

>And why the heck does everyone think Bose invented this either?

Because Bose marketed it heavily at consumers, often in the same glossy newspaper supplements as they have long advertised their other wares.

There is lots of aviation technology that only later is affordable for Joe Punter. Additional examples include e-ink (several kg of flight manuals cost fuel) and eyeball tracking.

In any case, it doesn't bother people where a technology originated from... they only need to know who they can buy it from. Oh, and they don't want to buy a 'how', they want to buy a 'what'.

Ex-soldier slapped with sex offender order after flouting private browsing mode ban

Re: Infantilization is now an officially recognized disability?

The trick is to swap the exercise book in which you drew the naughty pictures for an otherwise similar

-looking exercise book.

Maybe this is why they say public school is good training for prison - or indeed, public life.

>it appears no different from being prosecuted for having an encrypted file for which you cannot offer the decryption key to the police when requested.

It's not an encrypted file, it's just a log of some atmospheric noise I recorded.

Shit, the 'Forgotten your password? Click here to send reset email' button gets a lot of use from me.

Turns out my 1024 bit keys are themselves just ascii art of kittens.

Microsoft flips Google the bird after Windows kernel bug blurt

>"One, you are irresponsible; two, you are wrong"

"I didn't steal your horse, and it turned out to be a shit horse anyway."

??

New MacBook Pro beckons fanbois to become strip pokers

Re: "Oh look!! It has a display. And a keyboard."

> the USB format started in 1994. Since then (over 20 years), the speeds have increased 4 times. 3 of those times, the form factor for the connector to the PC did not change AND the new versions were all backwards compatible.Can't say that for Apple... Your argument is weak and your fanboi is showing.

FireWire (IEEE 1394) wasn't just an Apple effort, it was a group effort for high resolution scanners, digital video and external soundcards. On Sony kit it was called iLink. USB 1.0 wasn't up to those applications (it was more for joysticks, mice, keyboards etc), and even USB 2.0 which arrived much later, wasn't as suitable for streaming data as FireWire.

Similarly, Thunderbolt is an Intel effort (though Apple contributed the name, because Intel's original name, LightPeak, wasn't suitable after they ditched the fibre optic for copper). Again, it does stuff USB can't do - such as place PCIe devices outside the computer. PC vendors have been slow to adopt it, but we're beginning to see applications such as external GPUs for laptops.

Re: Apricot?

>This is approaching being a tablet with keyboard, the I/O is so poor.

Eh? It has 4 USB Type C ports, each one of which can do power, USB, FireWire, Thunderbolt 3, DisplayPort and HDMI.

The I/O is broad, fast and versatile.

True, there will be a bit of a faff for a while you're still using USB-A memory sticks and the like, but there's a good selection of 3rd party hubs and dongles thanks to the USB-C-only Macbook last year.

Re: "Oh look!! It has a display. And a keyboard."

>No USB sockets. Was a joke. Now a fact.

No USB [Type A] sockets.

Re: Strip or screen...

> ...tiny strips for DJing, how cool. Couldn't help but think 'just put your hands on the bloody screen man'.

It was just to demonstrate that the touchstrip had ten-point multitouch, and had low latency. If the DJ wanted more room for virtual knobs and sliders, he could use a variety of kit, including an iPad - which, like the original iPhone, has low latency and wireless MIDI baked into its OS (so the iPad can easily control the software on the Macbook).

In essence, the touchstrip is a thin iPad screen. Indeed, Adobe have had an iPad app for Photoshop tool palettes (controlling the host application on OSX) for a few years now.

It's curious that in two days we've had two different answers to 'How can I change the size of my Photoshop brush on the fly?' - MS's Knob, and Apple's Touchstrip.

Cuda

What are the advantages of CUDA over OpenCL? I know a few of you here use it.

It seems that CUDA ties you to one vendor, but application developers such as Da Vinci made the switch without too much fuss when the AMD only Mac Pro came out

Microsoft goes back to the drawing board – literally, with 28" tablet and hockey puck knob

Re: "Promised" 3D in Powerpoint?

I'm now thinking of the 3D holographic shark in Back to the Future 2 - the shark that scares Marty outside the cinema to advertise 'Jaws 19'.

As a Powerpoint demonstration.

Until then, we have this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6RxHvQ0eHXA (Chang: Just a guy who knows PowerPoint)

Re: I'm confused.

>Why does a desktop computer, designed to be placed with its back against a wall or tilted so that its back goes down to the desk, have both front _and_ back mounted cameras?

It could be handy for snapping handdrawn sketches ( or small objects you want to sell on eBay or Etsy) at a 'good enough' resolution. If so, then Microsoft should supply it with an 'L' shaped power connector, so that the cable doesn't stray into the shot.

>Isn't the Professional Edition supposed to be the one people create on?

We used to have professional (Pro) titles such as 'product designer', 'carpenter', 'steel fabricator' and the like, but these days the term 'maker' (read: Creator) is widely used for amateurs, hobbyists and small-scale manufacture.

Generally, for hobbiest CAD, CAM, CNC and interfacing with old bits of kit, Windows is the OS to use, despite its idiosyncrasies and frustrations.

Re: The silver hockey puck works on and off the screen.

>Why do almost no screens (and none on laptop) support portrait, though many graphics drivers do?

The screen (and GPU + drivers) on my laptop support Portrait orientation just fine. The issue is that I find the keyboard difficult to use when my laptop is sat on its side. :)

Re: I want!

You have two main issues:

1 - Protecting the screen area from scratches (bits of metal, dust from diamond tools etc). This could be done with a sacrificial plastic sheet, as many people use on their phone screens.

2 - Dust ingress into the base unit. You should be able to knock yourself up a slim enclosure with dust filtering, though you might have to actively drive air through the filters in order to provide sufficient cooling. Still, some 9 mm plywood, some vacuum-cleaner filters and a couple of fans won't break the bank.

The hinge areas can be protected with - at minimum - a plastic bag and some duck tape.

Re: Perfect for the wannabe creator market

>this specs seem to fall short of anything really useful for professional use , especially the weird screen resolution.

What the hell are you talking about? Damned near every non-Surface Windows laptop is 16:9, which isn't great for many purposes. Macs are 16:10 (the same as my ageing Dell) which is handy - even for editing full-res 1080 video you have some spare vertical pixels for a timeline.

Professional applications - CAD, Photoshop - tend to allow the user some freedom in how toolbars and palettes are arranged in the workspace. If you were a professional, you would know that.

Let's praise Surface, not bury it

Re: It is in fact interesting that the last three years or so have seen something that.....

It's only Microsoft (4:3) and Apple (16:10) making laptops with displays other than 16:9 , as I've been observing in these forums for quite a while now.

If anyone knows of any exceptions, please let me know!

Re: They fluffed it ages ago

Whilst it would have been nice if MS had made an ARM version of Windows that could run any Windows application (without performance penalties), it isn't possible. Mark this one down to 'technical hurdle', instead of 'strategic fumble'.

I've arrived on Mars. Argggh, my back!

Re: Spin is the answer

>A spin that provides somewhat less than 1g, say 1/3 g + lead-lined helmets and shoulder pads!

Just a thought: A very wide brimmed hat, worn in a vertical wind tunnel (think of the opposite of those wind tunnels that sky-divers use for practice!

Did Apple leak a photo of its new Macbook Pro in an OS update? Our survey says: Yes

OSX lets you toggle between Function Keys and controls for volume and Wi-Fi etc on their existing keyboards.. By default, it's set to the latter.

For controlling volume (or Photoshop brush size, for example) a well implemented touch-strip may be a better than traditional keys.

And for our next trick, says Google while literally wheeling out a humongous tablet ...

Re: Let me "Google" that diagram

>Google's business is personalized and interactive advertisements - nothing more.

Er, no. If you are a business, you can pay Google for email and office suite* - no ads. So your statement is demonstrably incorrect.

Given this article made explicit mention of a $250 / year subscription fee for this device, it would appear that the grasp of your opinion is greater than the reach of your knowledge:

*Unlike Google's consumer offerings, which may show ads, we do not collect, scan or use your G Suite data for advertising purposes and do not display ads in G Suite, Education or Government core services - https://gsuite.google.com/intl/en_uk/faq/security/

BlackBerry DTEK60: An elegant flagship for grown-ups

Re: Nice as it may be to have oodles of camera info

>What is the phone call quality, good, bad, or indifferent? That is the one thing that always gets forgotten in reviews of phones

The article said this would be addressed in the full review. This article was marked as a 'hands on review', which by tech blog convention means a quick first look and feel.

However, one would expect the call quality to be on par with every other Snapdragon 8xx-based phone out there - i.e it works.

Finally, that tech fad's over: Smartwatch sales tank more than 50%

Re: Things that a smart watch is good for

>You are up there with car salesmen who wear giant divers watches, because who knows, they might have to adjust the time wearing thick neoprene gloves in 80feet of icy North Sea water...

The selection of conventional watches of a sensible size (the traditional 36 - 39 mm) is surprisingly limited these days. 43 mm seem to be the norm, which is just a bit daft.

Re: How about a watch that...

>To be honest, I do have a bit of a problem with the idea that people are to friggin' lazy to reach for their phone to read texts and pick up a call.

I'm too lazy to reach into my pocket for my phone if all I want to do is read the time. That is why I wear a watch (currently a £5 Casio, though I have a windup for when I scrub up). It is simply quicker and more convenient.

Every time I pull my phone out of my pocket there is a small (but real) chance I will drop it, and other the lifetime of a phone those chances add up. There is also a chance there will be water, mud, oil or some other grime on my hands, substances I would rather keep on the outside of my clothing and off my phone.

Re: Batteries

>The watch form factor is just too small to do anything much other than well be a watch.

A small display can communicate the time just fine - as traditional watches do by hands or segmented LCD display. However, there are other data or states that can also be communicated just fine on a small display, such as a message notification. Even if only using watch hands, lots of useful info can be read - speed, altitude, direction, time. Even a single RGB LED can communicate useful info (type of incoming message, battery level etc, as seen on Blackberry and some Android phones already).

Casio and Citizen both makes watches with this sort of functionality, both with 1 year + battery life.

Personally, I'll wait til SoC and battery tech allow a smartwatch to be smaller, and the cost of selective laser sintering of titanium becomes cheap enough to let me design (or rather, copy a 1969 Omega Chronostop) my own watch case. It will communicate to me by vibration and through its hands ( the hands will 'dance' at 6 o'clock for a text message, for example).

Re: Garmin

>I would have thought that doing anything based on wrist flicking may be prone to error, as in introducing a very badly timed variant of butt dialling :).

It's only to turn on the display :)

Even some conventional LCD watches have used a similar mechanism to temporarily turn on the back light (thinking of a late-nineties Casio G-Shock).

Swedes ban camera spy-drones for anything but crime fighting

Re: But cams on the ground are bafflingly just fine

It's baffling to the Reg's sub-headline writer, though he often gives the impression that he's neglected to take his dried-frog pills.

Is Google using YouTube to put one over on Samsung?

Fair Use through Parody was the first thought that came to me upon reading this article.

Smoking hole found on Mars where Schiaparelli lander, er, 'landed'

Re: Beagle 2

The good Prof did know that his wasn't the only Mars mission to fail. The Soviets took a few stabs at it before the US succeeded with Viking.

Re: 4 Kelvin Moles?

Grampa: "The metric system is the tool of the devil! My car gets forty rods to the hogshead and that's the way I likes it!"

Lessons from the Mini: Before revamping or rebooting anything, please read this

I know of a local billionaire who, despite a garage of exotica, drives a MINI on a daily basis - for the country lanes between his house and high tech factory, it's evidently the tool for the job in his opinion.

The police were called by a concerned citizen a few years back, boy racers in the car park of the factory pulling doughnuts, apparently. Plod arrived to find some gents in their late sixties and lots of tyre smoke. "Ah hello officer... ah yes, I see... well, my name is Sir David, this is my car park, and this is my Lamborghini... No, no problem at all officer, we'll be done in a couple of hours. Have a good day now"

Re: I am astonished

I liked my Renault 5. It was like a go cart, and lots of fun. It wasn't even a silly Ali-G turbo version with a dump valve, either.

Re: Are you saying the mini revamp was a success?

I don't like the MINI Coopers - mainly because they are usually driven very slowly given their sporty badge. I can only assume it has been bought by the spouse of the slow driver for when they need to borrow it.

However, the early BMW MINI wasn't bad, and one fella I know drives a red one every day. His other car? A 1963 Mini Cooper that he has lovingly stripped down to every component, painted, and rebuilt. Again, red, with British Racing Green inside the engine bay. Indeed, he's had it for decades, but told me that it was only with the rise of the internet that he was able to source some certain refurbished parts.

Nintendo's new console-tab

Re: Looks ok

Plus one for mentioning the social aspect. Too many games for XBox and Playstation only do multiplayer over LAN or internet, overlooking the idea that people might want to play with the people they are actually in the same room with. Even the new version of Halo, which traditionally offered split-screen multiplayer, has abandoned it.

Early reports suggest games for this new Nintendo console will buck this trend.

Re: I really only...

Backwards compatibility is 'nice to have', but not a deal breaker - people with a collection of older games will generally still have the correct hardware to play them on, and if the hardware fails then a replacement can be had for next to nothing from eBay or (eventually) a charity shop.

I've got two GameCubes I've bought for a tenner - both working. I only want a few choice games - but even second hand they still command good money.

Here's how much HP's 3-in-1 PC replacement will cost you

Re: So what happens...

>So what happens when you can't get a network connection... ?

Same as for any other application or task that requires a network connection, such as sending an email, booking travel tickets or consulting a supplier's online price list.

DeepMind boffins are trying to help robots escape The Matrix and learn for themselves in the real world

Re: Where are these projects that scare the Zuck out of Bill Gates & Elon Musk???

>Make me a robot that can manage to 'take the stairs', any stairs, all by itself, dependably without falling over.....

That's feasible, though its more of a mechanical engineering problem. Unless you're talking about a bipedal robot, in which case yeah, the devil is in the control system details.

Microsoft keeps schtum as more battery woes hit Surface sufferers

Re: Spro4 not too bad

Most are only 16:9, tho. Macbooks are 19:10, Surfaces 4:3. Exceptions are rocking horse shit.

Prove me wrong - citing a current machine! :) - and I'll be genuinely grateful!

Re: Just a thought...

That sounds plausible, and worth a try. Thanks! I've had a few issue on Windows machines that can be fixed (if only temporarily) by uninstalling a device on Device Manager and then restarting.

It used to occur on optical drives when a damaged disc would stop Windows from using DMA mode. Uninstall, restart, drivers reinstalled on start up - job done.

I still get it on the SD card reader on my Dell, though thankfully I don't have to restart.

This speech recognition code is 'just as good' as a pro transcriber

Re: To be fair to the woman calling local police getting the US ...

Back in the nineties there was a PC gaming magazine called PC Zone. As far as I can remember, the only game they awarded a score of 0% to was called GloboCop: World Police.

Genuinely, I don't know what to make of my inability to find any mention of it online. It might have been a game that enjoyed only very limited release (and PC Zone only reviewed it to take the piss).

!!!! [Just seen on Wikipedia that] Charlie Brooker wrote for PC Zone from 1995. That explains a lot. Shit, that probably explains why I'm on the Reg. Heck. I blame the Dennises (plural of Dennis, not of Denise, sadly) who gave me the first issue. Nathan Barley was a work of prophesy.

Bit of fun:

http://www.kissthisguy.com/

A collection of missheard song lyrics. The site's name, for you philistines, comes from Jimi Hendrix's Purple Haze - 'Scuse me whilst I kiss the sky'.

>"Cortana evidently can benefit from further improvement. Last month, security firm Sophos advised against relying on Cortana for making emergency calls, based on an account of a UK woman who used the software to dial the local police in order to report an accident and was directed to authorities in the US."

What the hell is up with the Register shoe-horning in some tangentially (at best) related final paragraph into its articles?

Cortana transcribed the UK woman's speech perfectly. She said 'Barnstaple', and it transcribed that perfectly. The issue is that it supplied a telephone number for a police force in some USA town called Barnstaple, and not the town in North Devon*. There was an issue with Cortana in this case, but it wasn't in the area of speech recognition.

In any case, in an emergency you call 999 or 112 (works in Europe** and UK) - not the local plod's number. The emergency (999) switchboard are able to roughly triangulate your location if you are not able to describe it.

* If you are passing Barnstaple on the Atlantic Highway, a fifteen minute detour to East West Bakery on Butcher's Row (next to the town's covered market) will get you the finest pasties in the South West. They've won numerous awards, and as a bonus they'll annoy your Cornish mates!

**Please don't take my word for it. Check before you travel. I don't want you to blame me if you crash your car in Moldovia and 112 doesn't work.

LG’s V20 may be the phone of the year. So why the fsck can’t you buy it?

Re: "a 32-bit DAC, part of a burgeoning partnership with Bang & Olufsen"

>Useless compared to a decent DAC.

Care to give an example of a 'decent DAC'? As far as I can find, the ESS Sabre Quad 9018 - as used in the LG V20 - is highly rated, and regularly used in external DAC/amp combos costing thousands.

The point is, sound quality on a phone will depend on more than the DAC chip - the power supply, shielding and amplifier all play a part.

- http://www.musicservertips.com/product-reviews/dac-buyers-guide/

- http://www.computeraudiophile.com/f6-dac-digital-analog-conversion/ess-sabre-9018-vs-wolfson-wm8741-8976/

Re: "a 32-bit DAC, part of a burgeoning partnership with Bang & Olufsen"

>Now I have a Dragonfly DAC which works great... ...Anyway, 32-bit DAC from LG and B&O. Something to think about for my next phone for sure.

Dragonfly use either the ESS Sabre 9010 DAC or the 9016, depending on the model. The LG V10 and V20, as well as the B&O add-on module for the LG G5 also use ESS Sabre DACs. The DACs themselves are 32bit, but Dragonfly say they limit them to 24bit so a not to require the user to install extra drivers.

Again, these are the same DACs as used in expensive stand-alone kit. They have a reputation for sounding superb when playing back 16bit audio. Why they are capable of greater depth I don't know, but it seems the engineers who created them know their stuff.

The lesson is to just buy the phone outright. In addition to getting a refund immediately from the retailer should it fail, it also means you take out a rolling monthly SIM-only tariff with your network operator. Doing so gives you leverage against them, i.e: "Knock a couple of my monthly bill or I'm switching to Vodaphone... they offered me much the same as you but for just £12"

Re: I have a LG g4 Stylus here ...

So, to recap... Korean software isn't the best, fix easily available from the Play Store. I'm shocked.

Re: Phone features? What phone features?

>A lot of stuff gets missed in these smaller reviews, actual Optical Image Stabilisation performance,

OIS isn't super useful, because often your human subjects will still be moving - their faces will exhibit motion blur even if OIS is compensating for your hand movements. For that reason you should be shooting at 1/30 second or faster, at which speeds most people can hold the camera steadily enough. This is only achieved at acceptable 'ISO' (grainy noise in the image) by having better sensors, bigger sensors and brighter lenses.

If you want longer exposures of static subjects, you'll usually be better off placing your phone on a solid object.

Of course there are niche cases where this does not apply, but they remain just that: niche.

Re: "a 32-bit DAC, part of a burgeoning partnership with Bang & Olufsen"

>... and scientifically proven to be completely useless,

No, but the ESS Sabre DAC that they use has been scientifically shown to be the dogs bollocks. True, 24 bit audio for playback for mastered music is useless, but the ability to play it back is a convenience to the owner since it saves them having to transcode any 24but FLAC files they might already have. Anyway, the 32bit capability comes with the DAC, so why should LG hobble it?

Regardless of how they achieved it, the previous LG V10 is said to have very good sound quality indeed, and all subjective hearings of the V20 suggest it just as good - with the promise of being able to drive an even wider range of headphones (obviously that's the amp part. If you want 'science', then wait for Anandtech to run it past their laboratory kit.

If a company wants to sell a phone on its sound quality, then it has to somehow communicate the extra money that has been spent on the audio pathway. Customers who are then interested can seek out independent reviews and tests, such as Compared with the quite superb sounding LV V10, the newer V20 DAC and amplifier’s paper specifications are a very close match. The V10’s ES9018 and 9602 amplifier combination offer an ever so slightly better dynamic range and lower distortion characteristics than the V20’s ES9218. However, the ES9218’s new Quad DAC design lends itself to a superior signal-to-noise ratio of 130dB versus 122dB.

- http://www.androidauthority.com/lg-v20-audio-capabilities-714807/

- http://www.esstech.com/index.php/en/news/newsroom/ess-technology-brings-advanced-audiophile-features-mobile-devices-first-time/

NFL is No Fondleslab League: Top coach says he'd rather use pen and paper than Surface tab

Re: Oh dear

Just to clarify:

Another news outlet used more direct quotes from this coach when reporting this story, in which he said it wasn't the Microsoft Surface per se that didn't suit his work flow, but all tablets.

That's not too shocking; designers such as Marc Newson and Jony Ive are known for known for preferring pen and paper for parts of their work flow.

There was also an episode of Have I Got News For You, when Jeremy Clarkson threw a pen at Ian Hislop. We do not know if Clarkson would have preferred to have thrown a 2lb computer at Mr Hislop instead.

Apple's car is driving nowhere

Re: Frankly...

> Anyone who needs blind spot assistance or auto-backup needs to have their license taken away until they can learn to adjust their mirrors properly themselves.

And how the hell do you [the authorities] distinguish between the people who check their blind spot 99.9% and those who are perfect and check 100.000% of the time?

As always, the issue is the implementation. Volvo are in the camp that believes that semi-autonomous carts are dangerous, because in the case of events that confuse the car it will be up to a human to suddenly take over, a human that is either attentive and bored, or else distracted.

Bits of Google's dead Project Ara modular mobe live on in Linux 4.9

Re: What other phones are modular and would need Greybus?

More info here:

http://www.modularphonesforum.com/news/greybus-protocol-an-application-layer-for-unipro-491/

It's still all Greek to me, but less Martian than the Github link in the article! :)