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OCAU News |
Friday Afternoon
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Friday, 23-September-2011 13:12:57 (GMT +10) - by Agg
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A few people pointed out these NASA sounds. Here's a collection of NASA sounds from historic spaceflights and current missions. You can hear the roar of a space shuttle launch or Neil Armstrong's "One small step for (a) man, one giant leap for mankind" every time you get a phone call. Or, you can hear the memorable words "Houston, we've had a problem," every time you make an error on your computer. We have included both MP3 and M4R (iPhone) sound files to download.
Speaking of which, Rezin pointed out this awesome video from the International Space Station flying over the Earth. A time-lapse taken from the front of the International Space Station as it orbits our planet at night. This movie begins over the Pacific Ocean and continues over North and South America before entering daylight near Antarctica.
On the SSD front, TechSpot explore Patriot Pyro 120GB RAID0 Performance, while ITShootout compared 7 SSDs. LegitReviews noticed that Crucial M4 SSD Firmware 0009 improves performance and Tweaktown checked out Intel's Smart Response SSD caching technology. Intel Smart Response Technology should become a part of most near future Intel chipsets and we expect to see the technology for several years to come.
The ANZUS treaty has been expanded to include information warfare. As their long-standing ANZUS treaty reaches its sixtieth birthday, Australia and America have decided to extend their co-operation into the virtual space. According to Reuters, the decision was made in discussions between the two countries this week. The extension of the treaty would mean that a cyber-attack on either country would be considered an attack on both.
MojoMan spotted a possible new trans-tasman high-speed internet link. Chinese telcos are reportedly planning to enter the transtasman cable market and build a submarine internet pipe between Auckland and Sydney. Australasian telecommunications news service, Communications Day, says Axin Ltd is teaming up with Huawei Marine to build the US$100 million internet cable.
From BlueRaven: This is the first I've heard of heatpipe technology filtering down into consumer-level audio gear. It may have been done before, but only on high-end Pro gear. Pics and info here, discussion here.
Anandtech report on another round of patent attacks, this time involving PCI-Express. One of our contacts recently made us aware of a new round of lawsuits, which could apparently apply to every major company in the world of personal computers. Also related, ArsTechnica report that patent trolls have cost half a trillion dollars.
HWSecrets explain why UEFI is important. This article delves into the new UEFI architecture and why it is much more important to the computer world than you think. Computer hardware has evolved a great deal in the past few decades. Graphics cards and sound cards are providing life-like graphics and theater quality sound, terabyte size spindle hard drives are being paired with blazing fast SSD drives for limitless storage for the common user, while huge quantities of RAM and CPUs are providing six- (soon eight-) cores for incredible multi-tasking capabilities.
JD spotted laser tractor beams. The Fudan University team won’t be capturing rebel tranports with their beam any time soon–it only works (theoretically) at the nano-level–but it does achieve an interesting turnabout of physical force. We know photons exert an outward momentum; this is what allows solar sails to harness sunlight to generate small amounts of thrust. But carefully tuned to meet two conditions, a system can be created to turn “push” into “pull.”
Further in physics news, some scientists are claiming to have accelerated a particle past the speed of light, which would pretty much turn our understanding of the universe on its head. The claim was met with skepticism, with one outside physicist calling it the equivalent of saying you have a flying carpet. In fact, the researchers themselves are not ready to proclaim a discovery and are asking other physicists to independently try to verify their findings.
ArsTechnica also report on an FPS where a camera replaces your gun. A work in progress at Brisbane-based studio Defiant Development, the game is a collaboration of sorts; Defiant is working with both a journalist and a filmmaker to create a game that puts you in the role of a journalist embedded in a warzone. Ars spoke with Defiant's Morgan Jaffit to learn more about this political game disguised as an FPS. Discussion here.
Meanwhile guns are a major feature of this new game, Gunpoint. The challenge is to treat guns with respect, and play up their lethal power. "The reason guns add so much drama to a scene in a book or a movie is the threat. We all know that if it goes off, someone is probably going to die," Francis explained. In Gunpoint a guard will shoot you dead in a moment unless you have it at gunpoint as well. Guns actually introduce tension into the game, which is a rare thing in modern action titles.
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