Posts by Timmyg

Intel: Our new mobile chip SoCs it to its predecessor

Underestimating Intel

A lot of people are still underestimating Intel. This announcement is just evidence of a big team of engineers developing the platform, they have spent the last couple of Atom generations integrating existing Intel tech, hyper threading, power saving tech from Sandy/Ivy bridge, memory controller....

They have been doing this at a rate of major new generation every 12 months, far quicker than the competition, and whether you believe the benchmarks showing Intel more efficient that ARM or not is irrelevant, the fact it is up for debate any any one can build a phone based on the design and it be some where usable means Atom is somewhere close, 2 years ago it was not in the same ballpark.

Now Intel are close they are going to start pulling the trump cards, in the next 14 months we are going to see two more major releases including big upgrades to performance and efficiency such as out of order processing, 64bit, higher core counts, along with 2! full node process shrinks. In most processor family's that's 3-5 years worth of Moore's law Intel can bring to bear in 14 months.

This is a one off windfall Intel are going to get by making Atom a first class product line. If I were ARM I would be very worried about the performance of the next couple of Atom designs and how you compete with a product exceeding Moors Law, they don't want to be squeezed into the value end of the market, it didn't do much for AMD.

LOHAN fizzles forlornly in REHAB

O2

Firstly bear in mind im guessing

I reckon the problem is a lack of O2 not for the rocket motor but for the igniter,

I haven't looked hard enough but from what I've read the copper head is essentially a fuse that you blow with or without something wrapped round it. now in an ordinary atmosphere it will glow red hot then burn providing the threshold energy to your rocket motor.

however 20mbar is quite good a vacuum with only 2% of the normal oxygen, so you copper head gets red hot then melts breaks the circuit, the lack of combustion reduces the peak energy generated to about 1100C the melting point of copper.

Trouble is the motor compound as it is designed to be used in relatively large volumes and be safe is designed not to ignite with any old heat source it needs to have sufficient energy to make it very unlikely to susceptible to static discharges and alike. Unfortunately the common methods of improving copper heads like taping magnesium ribbon to is or using thermite wont help you as 1100C isn't hot enough to to ignite either (~1600 C is required for thermite) and magnesium still needs oxygen.

Personally i find the idea that you will some how retain the atmosphere inside the vacuum unlikely producing a truly air tight seal like that is difficult.

More likely is finding some sort of igniter that will combust without O2 im guessing something more pro or using a fuse made of a higher temperature metal such as a tungsten light bulb filament as this will reach the temperatures you need.

Tim