Posts by C Phillips

Bye bye MP3: You sucked the life out of music. But vinyl is just as warped

60 years old and grew up on vinyl. In my opinion, the only thing wrong with vinyl is it must be kept clean and stored well. Phono cartridges have improved too since the sixties. Unfortunately to get the best sound out of vinyl one can spend well over 10, ooo dollars for turntables and thousands for cartridges. I still have my late 60's turntable and with a reasonable cartridge and a declick/noise reduction program I can get beautiful recordings from my LP's. Yes, I record them. Why do I want to spend my time cleaning the same record over and over again just to listen to it. I love CD and sorry to see it dying. Eventually, it will probably return just like vinyl. Each format, records, cd, digital began to die just as it began to really improve. Vinyl began to die just as MFSL began producing their beautiful 1/2 speed recordings. Casette tape began to die just as it began to provide better tape materials and DBX/Dolby C noise reductions. CD began to die just as it advanced to XRCD (by Phillips), etc. The problem with most audio quality in physical media is the cheap production of the materials. Manufacturers began producing 8 track (for instance) with hard plastic pinch rollers instead of good rubber and plastic coated foam pads instead of felt backed spring metal. Mass production was the real culpret of the demise of each format. Records being produced pre-warped from the factory with off center spindle holes and recycled vinyl plastic sounding like someone eating potato chips next to your ear. MP3 is great if used for it's proper purpose...conserving the most space on a portable player but not for audiophile playing on a expensive system.

Not all data encryption is created equal

Too Much Fear

It is good to use the best security you can possibly use, but knowledge is even better. For instance, the linux you talk about is more secure than windows, even without firewalls and anti-virus. I have been using linux now for 10 years. Second, learn how to work your router. Don't just use hidden network names, or mac addressing. Learn to work every security feature out of it you can. For instance, most people don't use IP addressing tied to the Mac addresses for each computer or device. If you only allow IP's for each device and tie that to each mac address of those devices it adds another layer of security by only allowing an IP address for those mac devices listed and will kick anyone else off the network. Linux, even an old version is very secure so I wouldn't worry about WRT. The idea is to make it as difficult for someone to hack your systems as possible. Each layer of security you add will do this so even hardened hackers will want to turn away. There are too many easier fish to fry. If you really want to be secure on your devices learn how to use linux, or even better yet, a more unix type system like Free BSD for all the things you need to do that require security. Learning to use linux or BSD will make other things easier and less time consuming in the long run (not having to run continuous virus/adware scans and checks). If your system is then compromised you can restore your user desk in just a few minutes instead of reinstalling or fixing a virus infiltrated windows computer. Hope things go well for you.

Master Beats: Why doesn't audio quality matter these days?

There will always be a following of high quality and expensive equipment, and if you follow the Hi-Fi magazines you can see there it is possible to spend in the hundreds of thousands of dollars for it. The makers of most equipment are just catering to the crowd and going where the money is. Most people really don't care about quality over quantity (the most songs they can pack into a playback device) because they really don't have the ears to tell good quality from bad. Those who consider 128 kps Mp3 playback to be CD quality really can't tell the difference when played against the original CD. Sometimes it is just a choice of trying to get the best quality for what you can afford that makes us buy what we do. Sometimes, unfortunately, it is simply because others (who probably can't really tell quality) have made a certain type of headphone popular by giving good ratings rather than bad. My best set of earbuds were some skullcandy that were on clearance for $4.00 and I couldn't tell you what model they are. But for the most part, most of us can't afford to be buying 10 different brands to find the best so we lean on the opinions of others for good or bad.

How to spot a terrible tech boss within SECONDS

Good Management

This is a good article for anyone looking for a job, not just IT. I am convinced there are no good jobs out there anymore. Seems to me most companies are looking for the employee that doesn't exists which forces people to become something they really are not in the interview to begin with, that is, someone who they are not in real life. It is an act on both parties, the hiring manager who pretends to hide his weaknesses and the prospective hired who tries to act like the person they think the company wants. Companies have gotten away from being real people so to keep a job one must get on the stage and dance if asked to. Skill are important but all of business revolves around people and contact with them. Companies have just stopped being 'good people' and it is all about business. Companies no longer care, if they ever did, about people. As long as companies try to dissect their people with and toss them to the lions attitude they will never be a good companies. The mom and pop business knows the truth to this. They build their client base from people they come to know and like and who likes them. Perhaps they aren't as interested in the bottom line as much as big companies, but they are real people and often truly happy.

NASA halts 'naut flogging Apollo 13 notebook

Shame On Nasa

NASA didn't care at the time whether or not he had the notebook and most likely even gave it to him. Like Hollywood did to their movie props, they threw much of their stuff away, gave it away, or just threw it in a corner, or even destroyed it. Leonard Nemoy said Fox destroyed every set from the Star Trek movies and had to start over from scratch with each new one. How stupid was that? Seems like NASA had the same mentality. My understanding is they didn't even take care of their photographs properly until the 1980's which is probably their most valuable asset keeping the memories of the space missions alive. Now that there is money to be made and they are not getting it elsewhere, they are getting greedy. Take the whole moonrock issue. NASA pushing and shoving laws to reclaim moonrocks from people they gave them to over the years making it illegal to own or sell one. If anything, they sound like a bunch of whinning kids wanting their toys back. They need to grow up and realize this isn't helping their cause but rather, making the people of the US and the world want to stop supporting it more.

Judge OKs warrantless tracking of suspect's cellphone

Ummm...what's the difference with judges handing out search warrants without any discrimination anyway? After all, how often do you hear of a search warrant being refused? All it does is prolong the inevitable lack of privacy we are now experiencing.

Apollo 17 Moon landing: Shock revelations

Lunar Conspiracy?

Whether this pic is a conspiracy or not I don't know. What surprised me when I went to the Nasa site to see it first hand was the hole where the Upper Lem engine bell sat appears to be round. I have seen a lunar module lower housing first hand from below with the upper engine bell missing and I can tell you, the hole is square,( and it is square in all of the engineering diagrams I have seen), and larger than the hole in the picture appears to be. Also parts of the picture appear to have the upper Lem portion there and the hole appears to be the size of the hole where the upper Lem joins the CM. This would not be possible since the astronaults flew that part back from the lunar surface. Is it an optical illusion? Could be. The pics are still so bad who can really tell. I never believed the lunar conspiracy theories but I know the lower Lem portion has a square hole, not round, where the upper Lem engine bell sat down inside the lower portion, and should appear larger.