Archive for September 25th, 2008
Furutech is the premier purveyor of all things strange and overpriced. They’re trying to pass off what they claim is “the Most Sophisticated Power Cord and Connectors in the World” for an insane $1800. Their FI-50(R) IEC and FI-50M(R) Piezo Ceramic series connectors claim to give the cleanest possible power.
ANYONE who has even the most basic knowledge of electronics or electricity knows these people are full of shit. Do you think the power company is running “magic wire” from the nuke plants to the transformer yards to the power pole transformer and then to your house? No. Do you have “magic screws” on the circuit breakers that feed your outlets? No. Do you have magic screws on the outlets, or think the contracts are made of anything but builder-grade stamped brass? No. Why would anyone think that the last 6 feet of a $1800 cable would make one damn bit of difference compared to everything else upstream?
The best thing that could happen is to use several of these cables to make a noose and hang the dumb SOBs who try to fawn this garbage off. And maybe the so-called “stereophiles” who think they can hear a difference.
The 1963 Chrysler Turbine, a concept car Chrysler Corp made 55 of, loaned out to select customers for testing (and lots of breathless publicity), and then they unceremoniously destroyed all but a few of them. Supposedly, there is only a single vehicle owned by an individual car collector in Indiana. The rest are in museums (with the motors hobbled) and Chrysler has a working one at their Proving Grounds.
The Allpar page (lots of good info)
Turbine car fan site.
Mr. Jalopy’s page.
Video of one being destroyed (not for the weak of heart)
Make Magazine post that turned me on to this.
I saw this Pong Clock when it was first announced back in late November of 2005, and lusted after one. When it was finally released, I found the photos to have been rather deceptive, and it was much smaller than I expected, something on the order of a 6″ screen or so. It was also rather expensive, at $270.
Just a few weeks ago, a fellow by the name of [funnypolynomial] decided to build one of his own, using an old laptop (much cheaper now than in ‘05), and implemented it as a screen saver. I snagged an old laptop laying around and installed it. I haven’t gotten to picture framing it, but that’s next on the list.
The construction how-to, screen saver and binary are available through the link below.
Soyuz TMA-3 spacecraft and its booster rocket
As usual, the Boston Globe has a beautiful photo essay, this one on the Baikonur Cosmodrome. This facility has been in operation since 1955, longer than any other space facility on Earth.
Notice the Buran space shuttle mock-up in the lower right of the picture above. Saddening.