I don’t like CFCs because they contain mercury and don’t provide much light. They have to be recycled as hazardous waste and if you break one you’ve got a hazmat cleanup.
Yeah, there are usually growing pains with all new technology. I was an early adopter of the SSD several years back and firmware updates were almost a weekly thing. Some of the bugs fixed were pretty major where you could lose all data in certain circumstances while others were relatively minor annoyances. I never had any major issues but heard some horror stories from others on online forums. Sometimes the bugs only showed if you had a certain hardware configuration or power was cut to the device at a critical time.
The technology is definitely more mature and is becoming more mainstream as the cost drops. Hopefully most of the bugs will also be worked out by now. Most firmware updates now seem to be for performance increases, additional features, and better support for newer operating systems, not critical bugs.
As for batteries, as someone indicated the lead-acid wet cell is old tech. I know that more advanced batteries are in some hybrids but I wonder if things such as lithium and nickel metal hydrid will ever serve as starting batteries. Probably not as it isn’t needed and they cost more.
I will believe it when I see one a decade old that has no problems, but right now we're still in the early days of this tech.
EARLY??? They’ve been in production since the 90’s. Although back then the capacity was limited.
SSD’s have PROVEN to be MUCH MORE RELIABLE. Companies like IBM, Microsoft, Oracle, HP, GE, Boeing (and MANY MANY MORE) have been switching their critical system disks over to SSD’s for the past 5-10 years. The upfront money is much more…but when the system MUST stay running or loose tens of thousands of dollars an hour…the cost is easily justified. If the SSD’s were NOT a lot more reliable…then those companies wouldn’t have bothered with switching them out.
Agreed. My two main computers use SSDs exclusively so obviously I have put my money where my mouth is. My two main computers are also laptops which I do use in a portable manner. This is important as the SSDs generate less heat, use less power, and are essentially indestructible when it comes to mechanical shock. I have looked at the G forces they are rated for and basically you will be smashing the computer and SSD to bits beyond this level of shock. We are talking about dropping it off the Empire State Building sort of force!
I was installing a nice Samsung 840 Pro 512GB series SSD for a woman I had talked into getting one. I opened the package and didn’t realize the tray was inside the box upside down so the drive fell on the floor as I was sliding it out. I told her this wasn’t a concern as it was an SSD but would have likely been the end of a traditional hard drive.
As for the earlier SSDs, we have essentially been using them since the advent of USB flash drives. Yes, the older ones were very slow and I found some, especially the cheaper ones, to be very unreliable. What I find interesting is that as the geometry of the memory shrinks, the overall lifespan of the memory decreases. This has been compensated for by increasing drive sizes and better wear leveling but I find this interesting.
I feel the electric cars have a possibility to become the norm if standardized battery swapping and charging becomes a reality. They could have batteries available to swap at gas stations and everyone would have to use a standard setup, much like all gas grills take the same propane/LP tank and you can just get it swapped or refilled. You leave your old battery which is charged overnight and get a fresh one for a fee. The deal here is that certain lobbyist groups seem to have an influence that isn’t around with computer components. I can even see how stations could lock people in by pre-selling a certain number of battery exchanges ahead of time for a reduced price vs. the cost of paying for each swap as it is done.
I feel the electric cars have a possibility to become the norm if standardized battery swapping and charging becomes a reality.
Article I just read on Yahoo.
Tesla is building a Battery plant in the US to reduce costs of their cars. They said the main cost is due to the high cost of the Lithium batteries. So by building the batteries here they expect to cut the cost of their vehicles by 30%.
Battery swapping won’t work as long as batteries are so expensive. A Tesla battery is about $30,000, so even after a new plant is built it’ll still be too expensive to have a bunch sitting on the shelf at the local 7-11.
The key to the electric car being viable may be with fuel cell technology instead of “the right battery”. Energy companies will love that. They will still be “in charge”. The electric motor is so much superior in most military applications over the ICE, the military is poised to make a big commitment in this area, with our money of course !
You and I will still have to pay $30k for a fuel cell compact that buys hydrogen at a pump that will rival the price of gas. Good grief !
If I’m not mistaken,some types of aircraft use a different starting battery besides the lead acid type,I’m really starting to see some impressive life out of NiMh batteries in some apps.
@ Oblivion,can you give a few specifics on the Linux? these Wally World versions of Windows are really starting to bug me,the new E-mail I got with my last Windows machine really didnt do the job for me,so I installed a free Firefox e-mail and I’m really pleased with it-Kevin
@kmccune: Info on Mint can be found here: linuxmint.com/index.php Get the 64-bit installation if your hardware will handle it–most recent machines will.
Basically you download, burn the image to disk (download imgburn if you don’t know how to burn an .iso to disk), and you can boot off the DVD and try it or install it after booting. (running from DVD will be slow vs. when it’s installed) The installation is easy, but I would recommend putting it on a 2nd hard drive and disconnecting your Windows drive when you install it to avoid inadvertently wiping out your existing data if you are a beginner, just to be safe.
I would then Google “things to do after installing Linux Mint” – this will guide you through setting up extras and making it more secure.
Linux is fun to play with and the best thing is most of the distributions are totally free. (as in both beer and speech) No ads, no registering with anyone, no hidden catches, no reporting back to the mothership on sites you’re visiting, etc. Tons of good free software too. It also puts the performance of MS Windows to shame in most cases. On an SSD, once I select the boot drive, it literally boots in 3 seconds as well.
Thank you oblivion-Kevin
What do you mean by Wal-Mart versions of Windows? As far as I know, there is no version of Windows just for the Wal-Mart computers. Although I try to avoid them, I see them all too often and haven’t seen any special versions. Now, I used to see the Home Basic editions and didn’t care for that version or the typical computer this came on. They were usually just cheap and barely have enough resources to boot up if you are willing to wait 10 minutes!
Another thing I hate is all the crap they load with Windows on most store bought computers. This goes for everywhere, not just Wal-Mart. I am talking about the pre-loaded Norton, plugins for Facebook, free coupons, other adware, etc. This stuff just gets in the way and slows the computer down. Some computers including HP offer a minimal restore where you don’t have to have all this installed right off from the start. I always do this to my HPs as soon as I turn them on.
There used to be a computer company called Packard Bell for those who remember. I think they still make them elsewhere but are no longer in the US market. They were the eMachines of their time. They were consumer grade cheap junk and built to fail in short order… I seem to recall seeing some of these with a modified version of windows or an add-on shell that took over the user interface. I have installed something similar over the shell of Windows 8 to make it look more like the old Windows 7. Win 8 is solid and stable but that interface is dreadful on a standard desktop or laptop PC.
hese Wally World versions of Windows are really starting to bug me,the new E-mail I got with my last Windows machine really didnt do the job for me,so I installed a free Firefox e-mail and I'm really pleased with it-Kevin
Wallmart does NOT sell a special version of the Windows operating system.
For a generic Email…use yahoo or gmail. Windows Outlook works just fine. Not sure why you had a problem with it, unless you didn’t install it correctly.
The E-machines are just plain cheap. They may be inexpensive…but they are NOT good computers…Usually 1-2 steps behind in technology…and they use the cheapest parts possible. There still some local companies that assemble systems for you…they are as inexpensive as the E-machines…however most of the time they are built very very well.
ons of good free software too. It also puts the performance of MS Windows to shame in most cases. On an SSD, once I select the boot drive, it literally boots in 3 seconds as well.
Linux is a very light operating system. We use Linux for all our servers. Good as a server…but Linux is decades behind windows for ease of use. Engineers fine it easy to use…but your average user has a very hard time with it. Big learning curve. Someone who’s never worked on a computer before can be productive in Windows in hours…It takes DAYS for someone using Linux.
The other thing Linux really lacks is software development - especially when developing web applications. Microsoft Visual Studio is so far ahead of Linux and Java. Our company stopped doing Java development for web applications a couple of years ago. It took almost twice as long to develop the same app in Java/Linux then with Windows and Visual Studio.
@MikeInNH–Some 20 years ago, I taught an operating systems class where we did some projects in UNIX on a mainframe computer. Linux was spawned by UNIX. UNIX had an editor called “vi”. It took a week of intensive work by the students, but once they got the hang of it, most did really well. When computers were slower and had less capacity, Linux was valuable because it was fast and took less space. With the faster computers today, people time is more expensive than computer time. I remember working on a CDC 6600 back in 1970 where CPU time was billed at $1265 an hour. I suppose that would be over $10,000 an hour in today’s money.
Linux was spawned by UNIX.
Yea…It was written by a 19yo.
Linux was valuable because it could run on x86 processors. Unix at the time was running on mini computers (PDP-11’s, Vax Systems)…or Mainframe computers. Most people couldn’t afford even a small mini computer.
The vi Editor wasn’t the first Screen editor. But it was good. And simulated and copied over the years.
@MikeInNH: How recently have you used Linux? Maybe your grandmother would find Windows easier to use. (though with Windows 8 I doubt it) I personally find the 5 extra steps to do anything in Windows with confusing little popups and diagnostics that utterly miss the point most of the time quite insipid. I guess the other part of your point is dependent on what you mean by “productive” in Windows. If you’re going to play media, work on spreadsheets or other documents, connect to the Internet, etc., I really fail to see what you mean. Maybe a few years ago things were a bit rough, but now everything “just works” as well as in any recent version of Windows.
Since a web browser is supposed to conform to standards agreed upon by an international standards committee, I don’t know what you mean by web development being harder. (actually it’s only MS that deviates from these standards, as they like to make up their own) Maybe some of the tools you used on Windows were more friendly, like VS, but that’s about it. And there are a LOT more web servers running Apache on the web than MS products, though MS has closed the gap a little in the last 5 years or so.
If you haven’t played with Linux in a few years, I urge you to give it another chance.
@CW-thats what I meant these things are so preloaded with junk,bound to slow them down,there is some super marketing ware on my Home systems that will knock what you want right off the screen and give you scores of bogus sites and suggestions,that crap I can live without,maybe I’ll just get an I pad and the heck with the PC,I dont usually do much with the computer any way,other folks have told the walmart versions of software have an extreme amount of marketing junk included.Reminds of that Retro style commercial a few years back where this nice looking young woman comes out and says something bravely about keeping the internet free,I wasnt aware that it was free to start with,I’ve always had to pay to use it(computers,modems,software,providers,etc) I just want basic ,fast service-I dont want to repeat satellite Tv(where I pay a healthy fee every month to watch commercials that used to be free on broadcast TV-Kevin
My newest all in one,didnt have outlook express and I couldnt get the email system to work with the microsoft stuff,like I say Mozillia works great-I do not like to have do all this registering to use a lot of those products,the old Outlook Express on my old XP machine works fabulous.but the windows 8 version gave me nothing but grief,I guarentee one thing if I could get XP again on any new machine,I would take it,it worked great for me(charms indeed),computers should serve me,not vice versa-Kevin
You guys are talking commputer geek over my head. I’m going to watch a movie on my IPad.
Yes, eMachines are simply cheap. No, they are also not very good at all. They are cheap disposable throwaways. If they can save a cent to make them cheaper without concerns for quality, speed, etc., they will do it. They are the computer world counterpart of the Yugo automobile. The only reason people buy one is because they are cheap. I don’t know what is worse… The computer or the customers who bring them to be repaired.
I don’t see Wal-Mart versions of software on the computers I see. All consumer grade computers seem to be loaded with a bunch of junk you don’t want. It is just that the Wal-Mart computers are so miserably slow and underpowered that all the extra junk really takes its toll. It is sad when a 5+ year old computer outperforms a new system but this is the way things are going on the low end.