Everything that puts my friends to sleep.
We’ve got three events upcoming!
On the 17th:
Firefox 3 will be released. Everyone go out and get it on launch day, we are trying to set a world record for most downloads in a single day.
The Spore Creature Creator will be released, more on this Tuesday.
On the 18th:
Nvidia releases their next line of GPUs! It seems only a few months back the 9000 series hit the shelves, now the GTX 200 line is already at our doorstep. AMD will be releasing their 4000 series early next week in retaliation.
In case anyone is in need of a flash-based zombie fighting fix, check out a classic and its sequel!
The Last Stand
Fight the zombies off before they break through your barricade, recruit others to help in the fight, and find more potent weapons along the way!
The Last Stand 2
More of the same, continues the storyline after the first game, even more fun!
Now go! Productivity be damned!
Part two of my Eve Online segment, here are two trailers detailing their recent Empyrean Age Expansion (free, awesome).
And finally, you MUST take a look at their expansion site. This has to be the coolest use of flash I’ve seen in awhile. Let the site load and watch as a space battle automatically ensures across the top half of the page: HERE
Eve Online is an MMO by the Icelandic company CCP. I’ve played the game since 2004 and have always been greatly impressed by their cinematic trailers, usually produced alongside one of their massive free expansion packs. This is the first of several I wanted to post, starting with a fairly recent cinematic released by CCP for their Trinity Expansion. Some of you have no doubt seen this before, but it is worth watching again, if just for the music.
Download the high definition version: HERE
Hydrogen is Awesome. I saw a TV commercial and drank some water, now I’m a big fan!
Hydrogen Bomb
Hydrogen Burning Sun
Hydrogen Powered Car
The military is funding the development of binoculars that will activate an automated threat detection and tracking system by measuring brain wave response in soldiers. Theoretically, soldiers in dangerous situations would cue the HUD (Heads Up Display) to scan the entire area for potential enemy threats, highlighting them for the soldier’s attention.
Here is an artist’s wild interpretation of what one of these HUDs might look like if the soldier happened to find himself floating in space…
Link to the original news article: Here
I couldn’t just let the music sit in the XP music video!
For anyone who wants a copy *cough* Charlie *cough* you can download it here. Of course, being who I am I have to offer several different versions! Because these are music files, you’ll need to right click and press “Save As” or “Save Link As” to get them to download to your computer. Otherwise it’ll just play in the browser.
This one is the original: ORIGINAL
Here is the extended version: EXTENDED
Here is the extended version modified to work better with iTunes*: EXTENDED FOR ITUNES
*(sometimes iTunes will cut off the other extended version because it thinks the song is over before it really is, this version should continue all of the way no matter what at the expense of a small bit of audio quality)
A few days back I wrote an abridged history of the CPU, spotlighting Intel and AMD in their never ending battle for supremacy. Today, one of my favorite technical/review sites (AnandTech) snagged an early revision of the Nehalem architecture (Intel’s next big chip) and ran a few benchmarks. AMD must feel crushed, because Intel pulled out ALL the stops.
Nehalem chips wont be available to consumers until then end of 2008 and beginning of 2009. They offer as many as 8 cores, each ‘HyperThreaded” (a technology used in Intel’s older Pentium 4 chips) to create twice as many logical (processing capable, virtual) cores. The biggest, baddest consumer Core 2 available today comes with a maximum of 4 cores. Testing one of the 4 Core 2.66GHz Nehalem CPUs against one of Intel’s 4 Core 2.66GHz Penryns (updated Core 2 ‘Conroe’), the Nehalem still put the hurt on Penryn on a clock for clock basis. In other words, even at the same “GHz” the Nehalem is much faster.
Nehalem at Computex 2008 in Taipei, China.
To quote Anand himself, “First keep in mind that these performance numbers are early, and they were run on a partly crippled, very early platform. With that preface, the fact that Nehalem is still able to post these 20 – 50% performance gains says only one thing about Intel’s tick-tock cadence: they did it.”
I’ve discovered a musical genius on the internet! Here is someone who decided to make a symphony using ONLY sound effects from Windows 98 and Windows XP. Rock on, Geek Brother/Sister.
Solar power has seen a resurgence in research, and being my favorite power generation method, I’ve been following it closely. A basic (photovoltaic) solar power array is made up of several silicon solar panels that convert photons directly into electricity. The quality of a solar cell is usually based upon its efficiency, which measures how much absorbed sunlight is converted into electricity. Traditional solar cells have an efficiency of 12% to 18% and are fairly expensive. A residential solar installation might cost about 6 dollars per watt. The advantage is, after the installation is complete, every drop of energy from the system is free, possibly eliminating power bills forever. In some states, power companies pay customers for excess energy fed back into the grid. One caveat, during the night power must come either from batteries used to store excess energy during the day, or from the local power grid. In order to make solar a more viable alternative form of energy, efficiencies need to go up and cost needs to go down.
Thankfully, there have been a plethora of recent developments in solar technology:
Solar cells shaped like Popcorn balls and made of pigment zinc oxide grains show a 6.2% efficiency, continued progress could render traditional solar cells obsolete. Link
Extremely cheap nanowires may soon match traditional solar cell efficiencies, combining power with much more affordable production costs. Link
Printable solar panels dramatically reduce costs using the technology in your inkjet printer. They also allow solar cells to be produced outside a clean room environment and on virtually any surface. Link
Extensive solar arrays (280 megawatts) are going up in Arizona by 2011. Link
And, my very favorite concept, the space-based solar array. Various groups, including the Pentagon, have considered solving the world’s energy needs using a truly massive solar array orbiting the Earth. Power could be continually beamed down from the array in the form of microwaves or lasers. Advantages would include 24/7 solar input (no night), access to power in remote regions of the world, complete energy independence, and zero pollution/carbon emissions. Also, provided I get my hands on the controls, a giant ion/beam/laser cannon. And we all know how awesome that would be, right?
MY REIGN OF (solar) POWER BEGINS!