Saturday, October 1, 2011

IBM 120 Petabyte 'Drive'

This is file #2 of what I'll label as being the lost blog entries. A file created on August 31st 2011, published for the first time...right now, October 2nd 2011. I hope you enjoy it.


A project being undertaken by IBM being discussed on an online message board the other night got my attention - A 120 Petabyte Hard Disk Drive run by using 200,000 regular computer hard drives. I ran a search of the topic on an online search engine and there were news stories about it claiming it to be the biggest of its kind.

Frankly, I was underwhelmed. Compare me to the likes of Comic Book Guy from The Simpsons, but when you break it down, those 200,000 HDD's are packing on average just under 630GB (from memory of my earlier calculations), which for hard drives selling on the market today is talking the lower end of storage capacity. For about 5c per GB that 2 Terabyte HDD's retail for, this project is (not factoring in labor for installation and setup, nor electricity requirements) is the range of about $6 million dollars - A lot of money for everyday people but spare change to, I would imagine, the product that this storage system is making available.

In the news story, it is speculated that in the near future cloud computer infrastructure will incorporate storage systems like this project as an industry standard. I wonder when the 1TB 'thumb' drive will be available. I am still fascinated about the storage capacity of not only SD cards but MicroSD cards. I am amazed that movies that were once in massive film canisters and in VHS cassettes now fit on the size of a fingernail (no piracy).

The largest HDD I have now is 2TB (less formatted) as well as a portable 640GB HDD powered by USB alone. Master the possibilities!

Steve Jobs - Thanks for the memories


Hi everyone, this is obviously an older blog post...I typed it up on my netbook which I must have intended to use as my system of choice for blogging...but it never worked out. Here it is, the lost entry on the stepping down of Steve Jobs from his baby, Apple Inc.

Well the news broke last week, Co-Founder of Apple Computers, Steve Jobs has stood down from his position of head of Apple Inc. due to inability to fulfill the requirements of the position.

I have watched 'Pirates of Silicon Valley' as well as 'Triumph of the Nerds' and 'Nerds 2.01'. The first computer I ever recall using was an Apple of some sort, I first saw what the internet was on an Apple computer, I loved the colorful iMacs and I've seen the popularity of iPods, iPhones and iPads first hand. The Mac Mini's...boy if people knew the power and ease of a home entertainment system based on this system was!

Although I primarily use Microsoft Windows and dabble with a few different distributions of Linux (representin' holla) I do see the importance of and influential prowess of the brand that is Apple.
Time will tell if Apple the brand and continued success, growth and innovation can exist without the great leader of the past.

My thoughts are with Steve Jobs, his family, his friends and everyone that this man's presence has had an impact on.

Peace.

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

Christmas Decorations


Hey everyone,

The weekend just past I went shopping (more browsing than anything else). I was hoping for a little bit of retail therapy, but as usual I didn’t see anything that I wanted or needed, not even gifts for other people. Ah well.

One thing that I did look at was Christmas decorations. No your calendar isn’t wrong, it is in fact still September. I have a really soft spot for Christmas, as I have gotten older I appreciate the time off work and being around family more than anything else…although the presents I do get are nice too :)

Every year I go out of town to a bigger city to do Christmas shopping, and most years I can remember I’ve always looked at the new decorations. This year it seemed to be bigger is better, with massive plastic trees and ornaments to suit. My family has always had a small tinsel tree that fits on a wooden chest we have in one of the living rooms near the door. It’s easy to set up and when it’s not Christmas it takes up minimal space. These days I have my own place with a tree that is the same size.

I was thinking that the reason the Christmas stuff is already out on shop floors taking up room is because to buy one of the things most people would have to save up the money to afford the things, it’s crazy!
When I got home I was in the Christmas mood (not a good sign) and so I watched Mr Hankey’s Christmas Classics on DVD. Oh man I love that episode of South Park.

I wonder when supermarkets will replace their same old song catalogue with Christmas Carols, I remember when I worked in a Supermarket that around Christmas was almost torture with bad carols, and people that go crazy buying up a month’s worth of supplies because the supermarket will be closed for a whole one day on Christmas. I really despise over consumption but as I said I have a weak spot for Christmas. Now all there’s to do is to consider what to buy my family for Christmas and what I want so I can start to drop hints… 

Sunday, September 25, 2011

Gambling Reform in Australia

Hey everyone,

One of the "Government's" new policies is implementing pre-commitment technology into electronic poker (pokie) machines here in Australia. Personally I very rarely ever play the things, I know the odds of winning or even breaking even, I know how hard I work for my money...I'm just not willing to throw my earnings away in the things. I used to play more often when I was younger but I never gambled anything too significant. I think I gambled enough to get burnt and I never had the determination in me to try to win back what I lost. Some people do.

The new proposed legislation would require gamblers to set a figure (a dollar amount) that they are willing (and able?) to lose. The venues that have these pokie machines are upset because I suppose they'll potentially lose income, or perhaps they're upset because the gamblers are upset that they are being treated like children despite it being law that you can't play them unless you are of age (18).

When the Federal Election occurred last year neither of the primary parties said anything about this law, it become a hot topic because it was a condition of the Labor Government to bring it in, if they were to get the necessary vote from a independent member of Parliament - Labor didn't get into Government by winning enough votes, they had to garner support from other representatives. Basically, as I see it, corruption of power was put in place..."You want to form Government, I want my pokie reform pushed through - I scratch your back, you scratch mine"

Anyhow the two big 'football' codes here in Australia (National Rugby League and Australian Rules Football) are bagging out the new policy, all the teams in the competitions are afterall, clubs and those clubs have venues, lined with...you guessed it revenue making poker machines.

Naturally the Government has the hair on their neck bristled up and over educated academics that research gambling behavior are 'condemning' the sporting institutes speaking their mind on the topic.

The thing is that both sporting codes are using the finals season to really speak their mind to massive audiences watching on television at home.

A few months back, sport was being criticized for offering the odds on the games, and progressive odds at times like during half time saying it was giving the wrong message.

I think gambling addiction is as bad as any other addiction, it really sucks...it consumes time and money and alters what I'd consider a healthy mental state...it's an addiction after all. However Australia didn't vote for this, they had no idea someone would be pushing it and I think that's wrong. It's just another freedom that's being taken away. I also feel that demonstrates just how heavy the government acts to issues that they perceive to be problems. Really...they can't control problematic gamblers in any other way than manipulating the way in which they go about it? To me that's underhanded and a truly slimy way of dealing with things.

I'm not sure the best way to deal with people that have obvious gambling problems which negatively impact on other aspects of that persons life, but I know I am not convinced that the Government's approach is the best way of dealing with the matter.

Anyone out there have any alternative solutions that might work better?