Search results

I know on average I won't get close to what the items were purchased for. However, they have a certain "book value" which is the average of what collectors will give you for them. I'm looking to get perhaps around half that since those book values are almost always inflated. Problem is once you...

Here's the problem-we have a basement full of crap from my Dad's hobbies. Since it's worth something and neither of us are rich we can't just throw it away. However, going by typical eBay prices most of it would sell for so little after counting eBay/Paypal fees that we wouldn't do much better...

Yeah, they're all long tubes. They're all 32W 4-foot T8s except the Chroma 50, which are 40W 4-foot long T12s. We have mostly linear fixtures here with the exception of three chandeliers and about ten various table/outdoor lamps (only around a dozen standard screw-base bulbs total in the entire...

I read in the paper today that people with a BMI of 25 to 30 tend to live longer than those who are either obese or normal weight, all other things being equal. I have no idea why, but that's what the article said. Exercise and diet in the end are more important than weight, at least within...

The white balance on my camera was set to sunlight for all the shots. That's also why the daylight shot looks somewhat blue. I was trying to show the different light sources closer to how my eye sees them, rather than attempting to have neutral color balance. Here is another version of the same...

I read that link. While I certainly agree with many of the points made (the need for higher power factors in particular), the fact is thanks to capitalism, we will always be stuck with cheap, sometimes dangerous, usually less than optimal, goods in the absence of regulation. Just look at the...

Seems they're working on and off. Five minutes ago they didn't work, now they are.

Same here. The only thing that made school tolerable for me was proximity to large numbers of the opposite sex. This was more true in high school than college. In college for the most part there weren't really any who I found attractive. I won't say it's understanding on the part of my parents...

I wondered about that myself. So long as I'm not high on drugs, not drunk most of the time, don't bring over females for sex, and do a reasonable amount of chores, I'm welcome to stay at home for as long as I want. One of my cousins was home until his mid or late 40s, and only left because his...

Here's their whole line of dimmables. No bulb-shaped dimmables available in 5000K but they do have a couple of spirals. This is about the closest thread we've had where something like this might fit. What would really be nice are some reasonably-priced (i.e. <$5 each) small-base dimmable CFLs...

The prices went up on Amazon. As for shipping, first-class international to Canada would be less then $10 (I just checked on usps.com), so it would be more cost-effective for someone in the US to buy them from Costco, and ship them to you. If I were a member of Costco I'd gladly do that but I'm not.

Congratulations! Looks like you'll be doing a lot of :drinka:. Might not see you around here much for maybe another 20 years (especially if you decide to have a few more). ;-)

They're actually pretty robust. The main thing to worry about is reverse-charging. This occurs if a device is using several cells in series, and one of the cells has less capacity or less charge than the others. Voltage will first drop to 0, and then reverse as the other cells continue to supply...

Honestly, looking at that intersection I'm really surprised there isn't a traffic light. What might work would be a light with a sensor which only stops traffic on the main road whenever there's cross traffic, and then only when the timing cycle tells it to. They probably already know that, but...

I actually have a few of those dating from the late 1970s, IIRC. They still hold a charge believe it or not. NiCd may contain toxic heavy metals, but it can't be beat for robustness.

Regarding power, merging, etc.: We can go back and forth all day with this stuff. At the end of the day the real problem isn't power, lack of power, courtesy, lack of courtesy, etc. It's the human being behind the wheel. The sooner that is completely removed from the equation, the sooner we...

Bringing this thread back to a bit of randomness (can't stay on any one topic too long or it isn't something random anymore ;) )-I wonder if I'm capable of actually feeling cold any more. I just came back from a 45 minute ride wearing just a sweater and windbreaker. It was 40°F. Normally I'd...

Granted, but how do the cars with 200 mph top speeds I mentioned fit in here? Do you ever need that, or to get to 100 mph in 4 seconds? And from everything I've read about roads and driving, plus seen in real life, I would think 10 second 0-60 times are more than adequate. Or put another way...

That's fairly well known, actually, and something which has been going on since the days of NiCad. IMHO, things like this shouldn't even be allowed. They're misleading to the consumer. It really wouldn't surprise if it's done on purpose to keep consumers using disposable batteries. Now if...

Well, not quite universally, but almost. I've pretty much failed to see the whole appeal of the car culture myself. Those idealistic car commercials with people driving on an empty road about as lame as it gets. The reality is closer to perpetual traffic jams, nauseating fumes, road rage, and...

Are you going by your standards or your students? What's unacceptable to you might be perfectly acceptable to most of your students. I know on my CLP-510 color photos look just fine to me. And that's a fairly old printer by today's standards. I can't believe there's nothing in color lasers which...

Nichia reaches 169 lm/W! A few of their numbers are very interesting. The first sample was 161 lm/W and 9.89 lm at 20 mA. This implies a forward voltage of 3.071V and an input power of 61.4 mW. They mentioned the output of the blue chip used in this LED was 42.2 mW, hence a WPE (wall-plug...

Knowing how everything else with chip manufacturing works, I basically just feel that at a given price point the available capacity will probably go up by a factor of four each year on account of increasing density, at least until we start to bump up against real physical limits as is now...

Nothing is really resolution independent, even CRTs. A CRT with high dot pitch won't look that great either when scaled. The only reason CRTs could be scaled reasonably well is because their dot pitch was usually somewhat smaller than an equivalent-sized LCD. The solution remains making the dot...

I use those words because in many cases I've been there, done that, and for me personally it just wasn't possible. I tried living in a small town for those three semesters. The boredom and ensuing depression because of the sameness was more than I could handle. I was actually suicidal by the...

Higher resolution with a software solution really makes the most sense here. Part of the reason older people can't read small text on a screen is the pixelization. Lowering the screen resolution to make the test larger won't fix that. Rather, it makes it worse. In fact, with higher resolution...

First off, relocation is out of the question. I know myself well enough to know I couldn't stand living anywhere but a large city. I went to a college in NJ. After 3 semesters I stopped sleeping there and started commuting because I just couldn't take the boredom of being in a small town any...

Oh, I forgot to mention that one of my failed projects caused my friend who I was doing it with to lose about $20K. So besides not making either of us a dime, it cost him a pretty penny, and me about six months of my life. Think how guilty I'm feeling about that even though neither of us was at...

You're both right and wrong. Sure, most homeless have many social problems which I don't. There are a few who don't and just reached an unfortunate stage where they're unable to earn enough to support themselves for whatever reason. That would really be my problem. I have CTS so full-time work...

Not scared. I just wouldn't gain enough from it to make it worth the risk, probably still rather take a boat if it came down to it. Remember that I don't drive so that means I have no way of getting to a lot of airports. Besides, not much you can do in the way of world travel on my income. The...

Very astute, Dave. That's exactly what I was getting at, an ROI calculation. And it doesn't just apply to scientists. You can lump in musicians, actors, authors, etc. Even though I don't listen to music, very rarely read fiction, and rarely go to the cinema, I still feel all these groups need...

I actually rather like the idea. Once we get rid of copyrights the RIAA and MPAA will disappear. Hopefully all the money will go directly to the artists. I don't mind artists profiting directly off their work. What really annoys me are the bunch of parasites (executives, agents, lawyers) who...

Nice, at least on paper. Maybe this time around Samsung will actually deliver something close to schedule.

So long as we have a society of mostly morons, things like that will unfortunately be in demand. I guess that's really the heart of the problem. It doesn't take effort or brains to do something which appeals to the masses since they are both fickle and mostly illogical. It's a matter of...

I wish my 19" could do 2048x1536. The screen door effect of seeing the individual pixels annoys me. I'd probably still notice them even at 2048x1536, but that's as high as most video cards go. Where are the superresolution displays? What I would really like would be about 4000x3000 in a 21"...

I actually notice the extra tire drag while cycling over recently paved asphalt roads. It takes a few weeks for the asphalt to cure enough so that the tire drag becomes "normal". I do notice even less tire drag on the few local roads which are made of concrete. As a cyclist the main downside to...

Except that capitalism rarely works that way. A lot of success in our society has more to do with knowing the right people, or being in the right place at the right time. I know plenty of people who have busted their butts and are still poor. I personally had to take jobs at $5 an hour at times...

Article about the system. The things you mentioned drive up the cost of roads also. It's an across the board problem with public works projects which needs to be fixed. Mass transit has an additional factor going against it-a strong vested interest by many with influence to make sure it...

And that's pretty much how we arrived where we are. GM et al would buy up trolley (nowadays termed light rail) lines, not maintain them, cut service, etc. Eventually they would shut the line down due to the "poor ridership" which occurred on account of their neglect. They would replace it with...

Thank you, Tim. The numbers for the big dig in Boston are even more obscene. $14.6 billion for 7.5 miles of underground roads. Literally a money pit. All that money spent and the travel times you mentioned are worse than a typical express subway train. Regarding modern subway costs, here's...

This isn't a light rail system. And light rail systems often don't make money because it seems politicians purposely put them in places where they're doomed to failure just to say "we tried and it won't work so let's just keep everyone in their cars." BTW, no form of transportation makes money...

The total output of the locomotives was 25,000 HP, (about double normal) and they were running a much shorter trainset (3 cars instead of 8 or 10). Both things were necessary to reach the speed record. In regular service the locomotives develop 12,000 but only about 8,000 HP of that is needed to...

$20 million and up but that's not much more building a road (and maintenence is less). Speaking of roads, I remember the cost for Boston's big dig was obscene. And the DOT spent something like half a billion on a highway interchange in Texas IIRC. around $20 million 512 per set but two sets...

It may be old news to me as it happened in April but I'm still blown away by the videos. I thought it was kind of funny that they had to use a jet for the aerial shots. Remember that this is not a maglev. It's regular steel wheels on steel rails just like any subway. Same track guage in fact...

I wonder if there's one person who does the voices for all the female reporters. It certainly seems like it. And yes, the "reporter voice" is exceedingly annoying.

Yep, that's exactly how I feel. When I'm in a car with someone driving 75 mph on a long trip I feel bored just watching them drive. I couldn't imagine trying to hold that speed for the whole trip if I were the one driving. And it annoys the engineer in me that the law should require that I do...

Now see why I have no desire to drive? I probably wouldn't be as lucky as you, given that this is your first ticket in 7 years. If I had gotten a license, in all likelihood it would probably have been revoked by now, along with a good amount of jail time, and a nice pile of speeding tickets. I...

Funny but I was thinking the same thing.

The NYC subway opted for radar-based speedometers because they're more accurate and reliable than wheel-driven ones, so, yes, they can be very accurate.

Britney Spears is nouveau riche white trash. Always has been, always will be. Six months of her income and I'd be set for life. What a shame. I don't care to go any place so remote that I need a car to get there, so I'm not limiting my options at all. Besides, you can go a lot more places than...