Posts by Adrian Coward

Rocket 'Grasshopper' leaps higher than tall building in single bound

Cost of fuel

I had the same thought at first but 100kg of fuel is hell of a lot cheaper than 100kg of rocket engines. Or 100kg of avionics.

BT to China: let me in!

Re: Wild optimism

"...unlike every other..."

Someone is going to be first - it might be BT, it might not, but hit a wall often enough and eventually it will fall.

"...lardy-bottomed monopolist BT..."

Ignoring the fact that even in the UK they aren't a monopoly, on the Global scale they are "just another player" in the world market.

"...they saw everybody piling into BPO and infrastructure support, so they had to do that too as BT Global Services, and that all ended in tears..."

Largely due to the bottom falling out of the world economy, a lot of other players got burned too.

Office 365 reaches for the sky with 80,000 seat FAA win

Re: Expensive

I'm sure that a significant chunk of that $91M is supporting the legacy system until all users are migrated and providing helpdesk and training functions. What we don't know is how much the FAA was currently paying per user - I'd be surprised if it was under $150/month.

Japan launches, orbits radar spy satellite

Erm, actually....

"Did Japan license the design from the US or Russia, or perhaps ESA? Because those are the only ones I know of that have serviced the ISS."

Japan developed the HII-A used in this launch into the HII-B that has successfully launched 2 HTV service vehicles to the Space Station. The HTV is actually more capable than either Progress or ATV since it allows full-sized racks to be delivered to the station.

Threesome ends in arrest as wife struck by pair of TVs

Will nobody think about....

...the poor innocent TV's?

The Register Guide on how to stay anonymous (part 2)

Alternatively....

....don't worry about it and "Just say No" when they try to sell you something.

Phishing email used in serious RSA attack surfaces

"...Flash is executed by Excel..."

Why, why, why does Excel need to execute Flash?

BT earmarks 66 more exchanges for fibre-to-the-cabinet upgrade

@Commend

"I cant change my broadband to another provider who will give me better connection because BT is not willing to upgrade my exchange"

More likely that no other provider wants to pay to move in - BT Wholesale would be happy to take the rent.

Virgin IT dept shocked by donkey-shagging Taliban

It's not what you do....

...it's what you are SEEN to do. If they had been caught watching it, then they probably would've just got a warning. Emailing to to *hundreds* of other people though was asking to be made an example of.

Fukushima explained in crap cartoon

See what they did there?

Shame to have to explain a joke.... the cartoon has a scatological theme, hence "crap" is a reference to the content (cartoon about crap) rather than the quality (cartoon that is crap).

Google plugs new-age telephony into US carrier phones

Sprint or Spring?

Suppose it doesn't make a difference - it'll be a long time before it's available in Blighty.

Japanese earthquake sparks nuclear emergency

Not stupid

Not a stupid question at all: there are several designs of reactors that have passive cooling and/or fail-safe designs.

For example in a CANDU reactor a loss of power will result in control rods automatically dropping into the reactor, stopping the reaction. A liquid salt reactor (not yet commercially available) has a 'thermal plug' at the bottom of the reactor. If power is lost, the plug will 'melt' and the reactants will flow into storage chambers below the reactor.

US carrier tailors 3G jacket for iPod touch?

@Stu

"...Does it work only with Jailbroken phones, comes with some custom software to provide a phone/sms facility, if at all?..."

As the article said, 'with a little help from Skype'.

Nokia No.2 is so sorry for N97 debacle

About time

I was looking to replace a lost (and much missed) N95. Considered the N97 but ended up going with the HTC Hero in the end. The Hero has its issues, but it is light-years ahead of the latest Nokia offerings.

Microsoft apes Google with chillerless* data center

Water Cooled

Why not build your data centre near (or over) a large body of water? All the cool H2O you could possibly want with nothing more elaborate than a pump required.

iPhones get sun, leg power

@magnetik

"Surely it could be done with magnets?"

The Law of Conservation of Energy tells me that even if you use magnets, you would still have to pedal harder.

BT chief: People don't need fibre to the home

BT is a Plc

There are a lot of "He's a Luddite!" type comments, but most of them seem to miss the point. Mr Livingston is paid to make money for BT's shareholders. If he can't make the business case for the *massive* investment that would be Fibre-to-the-Home then he can't make it - largely because, unlike Virgin, he can't tie the customer into paying BT for the use of that fibre.

That's where his 'monopoly' comment was aimed - squarely at VirginMedia.

BT OpenZone: Is it or isn't it?

It is *supposed* to be Opt In

Any router that upgrades should have Openzone disabled. It will be enabled if they choose to opt in, or if they factory-reset their router.

At least that is how it's supposed to work.

BT reprograms biz customers as hotspots

Haven't read all the comments....

But if it hasn't been mentioned yet, the service will be OPT IN for customers whose routers are upgraded and OPT OUT for new customers.

Apple rethinks battery bondage

Replaceable Battery Chemicals

One word: lithium. (Hence the flame icon.)

Humyo cloud disappears from afternoon sky

Online storage...

Anyone who uses a service provided (a) over the Internet; and (b) by a third party as their primary storage *deserves* to lose their data.

NASA working on boomless supersonic jets

Not quite.

"...and meant that the London-New York route was the only one it could routinely serve..."

Actually there was daily service by Air France between Paris and New York, and a weekly (sometimes twice weekly) scheduled service between London and Barbados for many years.

US Army working on 'exploding marmalade' missile tech

@Brett Brennan

The problem with hybrid motors like the one SpaceDev provided for Space Ship One is that while their ISP compares favourably with conventional solids (250s v 270s for the Shuttle SRB), they don't really scale well for thrust. If you want to increase the thrust of a solid, you just make it longer (most solids burn along their entire length from inside out), while with liquid (or gel) propellants you increase the flow rate by using bigger pumps.

A hybrid requires you to increase the flow of oxidizer (which requires larger pumps) *and* increase the area of fuel (make it longer) - not to mention the difficulty of ensuring proper combustion along the entire length of the rocket.

Could the Airbus A380 be the new Air Force One?

@Torben Mogensen

Actually, it's not a runway limitation it's mainly a gate/taxiway limitation - the A380 is certified to operate on any runway that a 747 can. Since AF1 rarely (never?) taxis up to the gate, this is less of a problem than you make it out to be.

Columbia disaster 'not survivable', NASA concludes

@Dodgy Geezer

If you re-read the report (especially Fig 2.1-27) you will see that the G-forces were likely not so severe as to prevent closing the visors for 20 seconds or so. It only takes 4 or 5 seconds to close and lock the visors.

Supersonic bizjets could have windowless flight decks

@Boris the Cockroach

>... ALL commecial aircraft are fitted with a wind powered electrical generator...

No, not all. For example the 747 (100-400) doesn't have one, neither does the 737 - and these are two of the most numerous aircraft of all time.

BT claims UK broadband boost breakthrough

Re: The real reasons

And who is going to *PAY* for replacing the hundreds of thousands of miles of wiring? Are you offering to foot the bill?

Two Shuttles hit by fuel tank problems

@Anonymous John

"No. The ISS and Hubble are in different orbits. THe Shuttle can't travel from one to another."

Further to that, a back of the envelope calculation made in another forum gave the result that getting between the orbits of ISS and Hubble would take nearly as much propellant (~80%) as it takes to get into orbit in the first place!

US TKOs Antigua in bizarre WTO arbitration decision

Re: How much for an Antiguian passport

It can be yours for the low, low sum of $100,000 USD - at least that's how much you used to have to invest to be granted 'economic citizenship'.

Beavis and Butthead in London jihad

Why is this here?

I understand the occasional funny/weird/"glad it's him and not me" deviations from what is, after all, a technology/IT site, but what is this story doing here? Slow day at Vulture Central?

Royal Society calls for UK space agency

Familar words....

'We've got enough problems this side of the valley/mountain/river/ocean thank you very much, deal with those first...'

If Google kills penguins, is it doing evil?

Lies, Dammed Lies and El Reg articles

"You don't need any numbers, however, to know that data centers use up energy..."

So, if you don't need any numbers, why write an article based entirely around numbers that are 'dodgy' at best?

BT readies 'on the night' 21CN mass migration trial

RE: Copper? *cough*

Broadband speeds are (almost) entirely dependant on the local access network, so I suspect your 512K would not improve. Though, having said that, ADSL2 does make more efficient use of the spectrum - it may lead to a speed boost.

Why do you sometimes lose bowel function when scared?

What I've been told...

....is that an empty bowel is less likely to lead to infection than a full one in the case of injury.