[AT] computer problems

[Larry D. Goss]

USB or Firewire, but not both at the same time.  It's a Western Digital.
I figure any time the price on storage drops below $1 per Gigabyte, it
has to be a bargain.  I can remember when it was in the neighborhood of
$1 per byte!

I haven't done any through-put experiments myself, but from what I see
posted on the Internet, the through-put of Firewire (at 400 Mbs) is
better than USB 2.0 (at 480 Mbs because Firewire is a peer-to-peer
connection and doesn't have the management overhead to support it that
is inherent in USB.  So much overhead is going back and forth on USB
that it's amazing any data gets transferred at all.  I downloaded the
entire USB standard about a month ago (nearly 900 pages) and read it in
preparation for giving a talk to our local computer group on the
differences.  The bottom line on USB is that if you can connect the
hardware together using readily available cables, the entire system is
supposed to work.  The standard actually says that.  It also says that
the ports are to be tested by the software and that a warning message
must appear on the computer monitor when a high speed device (USB 2.0)
is connected to a regular one (USB 1.0) that is higher in the pyramidal
communication structure.  That is also a part of the USB standard.  But
it is a lip-service warning only.  You can bypass it and continue to
operate your system.  I do that on a regular basis.  I have a laptop
that has a USB 1.0 controller in it.  As soon as I hook any USB 2.0
device to it, I get the warning on the screen.  Since I regularly hook
an external DVD read/write unit, my external hard drive, a printer, and
a couple of scanners to that system, I sometimes have to bypass as many
as five warnings when I plug them all in.

The latest in USB is an amorphous device that will act as the host when
no other is present but acts like a slave unit on all other occasions.
Some of the new stand-alone printers are in that category so that you
can upload images from a digital camera and print them without having to
go through your computer.  It's the USB's answer to the competition from
Firewire.

Larry

-----Original Message-----
From: at-bounces at lists.antique-tractor.com
[mailto:at-bounces at lists.antique-tractor.com] On Behalf Of Mark Greer
Sent: Saturday, January 15, 2005 11:01 PM
To: Antique tractor email discussion group
Subject: Re: [AT] computer problems

How does that external drive connect? USB or some other?
Mark

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Larry D. Goss" <rlgoss at evansville.net>
To: "'Antique tractor email discussion group'"
<at at lists.antique-tractor.com>
Sent: Saturday, January 15, 2005 10:33 PM
Subject: RE: [AT] computer problems


> I figured a thumb drive wouldn't do what I needed, George.  They're
> limited to around 4 Gigabytes.  So last Father's Day, I went out and
> bought a 160 Gigabyte external drive that I can move from computer to
> computer to store images on.  The price was $130.  I'm doing a heck of
a
> lot of digital imaging, and some of the files are getting a bit hairy.
> It's not unheard of for me to generate an image in the 800 Megabyte
> range -- too big to fit on a CD disk. I have a wall map that I'll take
> the time to scan one of these days. Using my HP 4670 scanner and the
> software that comes with it, I can merge a whole bunch of smaller
scans
> together to make one image out of dozens of individual files.  I'm
> scanning an 1863 World Atlas (folio style) using six scans per map.
The
> software merges them together seamlessly and automatically.  In case
> you're wondering why I want such a big map, the wall map shows every
> county in the US -- location, boundaries, railroads, canals, county
> seats.  I need that for reference when I'm working on genealogy.  The
> World Atlas gets down to every township in the whole country as they
> existed at the time of publication -- complete with the name and
> location of the town center.  That's also invaluable information.
>
> I go to tractor shows, stand in one spot, and snap a bunch of pictures
> of what I can see.  Then I have the computer merge them all into a
> panoramic image that I can pan around on and view the scenes close-up.
I
> wish I would have known I could do this when I saw the Dain on display
> up in Iowa a few years back.  With that capability, I could have stood
> next to it and taken a series of shots with nobody else between me and
> the tractor, and then stitched them together on the computer.
>
> Look for the external hard drives to be on sale at your local
> electronics store during the middle week of June again this year.  I
run
> mine through a UPS at all times, but I also "hot plug" it from system
to
> system at will.  Since I don't have an operating system on it, I'm not
> bothered by the specter of boot up problems.
>
> Larry


_______________________________________________
AT mailing list
http://www.antique-tractor.com/mailman/listinfo/at