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I took a late-model Pentium 4 out of use at work just before Christmas. It was meant to be retired years ago, but I installed Windows 7 64-bit just to test it on one of the very first CPUs that technically speaking supported it. It ran ok with upgraded RAM and a small SSD, so it just ... stayed. I stashed it under a bench instead of trashing it, though - it's a fun little artifact that's just exactly on the edge between "a very slow modern machine" and a historical artifact. It's 64-bit but single-core, has both PCIe and PCI, SATA and IDE, USB and PS/2, and I believe it's one of the last chipsets that would run Win98 without complaint.
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Feb 4, 2020 17:54
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ryonguy posted:Normal and cool software behavior. So glad I'm using chrome:  So, anyone mentioned the Curta before? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curta It is a hand-cranked calculator. There's an awesome website that has tons of pictures from a disassembly and I don't know much about mechanics but it looks really neat.
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Feb 4, 2020 23:19
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I've lusted after a Curta ever since I saw Adam Savage's video about his.
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Feb 4, 2020 23:28
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My new phone has a dedicated button that turns on Google Assistant, but I disabled the Assistant, so now it's a button that makes my phone work slightly, almost imperceptibly faster every time I hit it.
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Feb 5, 2020 03:31
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Cojawfee posted:I've lusted after a Curta ever since I saw Adam Savage's video about his. they are p. expensive 
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Feb 5, 2020 03:37
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LifeSunDeath posted:they are p. expensive When I finally graduate from college and get rid of my credit card debt, I plan on buying one.
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Feb 5, 2020 22:53
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I recently learned about the AKAT-1 from 1959, "the world's first differential equations analyzer based on transistors" according to Wikipedia. No idea if that's truly the case but just look at it:  It's freaking glorious.
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Feb 6, 2020 01:47
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Trabant posted:I recently learned about the AKAT-1 from 1959, "the world's first differential equations analyzer based on transistors" according to Wikipedia. Can you give a really stripped down explanation to a person who maxed out at college algebra an explanation of how this advanced science? This is not a joke question, more I'm interested in the tools along that progressed our technology, and this seems like a really unsung one.
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Feb 6, 2020 01:51
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It's an analog computer. Some operational amplifier circuits - which are made of transistors, basically - can be made to behave like integrators or differentiators, i.e. feed it the x-values into the integrator (definite integral) and you will get the numerical integrand out for the time that you had it running. So you could build a computer that has multiple configurable modules like that and use it to test/analyze differential equations numerically, based entirely on analog circuit behavior. It's pretty neat. *** Stripped down, basic explanation ***
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Feb 6, 2020 01:55
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I assume "maxed out at college algebra" means no calculus, so it might help to start with what integrals are and some of their practical application.
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Feb 6, 2020 02:24
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An integral is the area under a curve.
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Feb 6, 2020 02:28
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LifeSunDeath posted:Can you give a really stripped down explanation to a person who maxed out at college algebra an explanation of how this advanced science? This is not a joke question, more I'm interested in the tools along that progressed our technology, and this seems like a really unsung one. I'm hardly a computer historian, but I don't know if it did much to advance (computing) science in the long run. Analog computing was cool and immensely useful, but became obsolete the moment cheap integrated (digital) circuits became available. I just don't see a lot of this thing's -- or any analog computer's -- DNA surviving in other systems. Design-wise though, 
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Feb 6, 2020 04:13
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Cojawfee posted:An integral is the area under a curve. Ok got it. I'm now abler enstin. thans. I shouldn't have asked the question I asked but appreciate your responses LifeSunDeath has a new favorite as of 04:21 on Feb 6, 2020 |
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Feb 6, 2020 04:18
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Trabant posted:I recently learned about the AKAT-1 from 1959, "the world's first differential equations analyzer based on transistors" according to Wikipedia. I know everything is cyclical and I should just be patient but goddamn I want buttons so bad. I'm sick of tapping and stroking glass surfaces I want some drat knobs and buttons and toggles and such. I hope they come back in the 2020's.
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Feb 6, 2020 06:11
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Teriyaki Hairpiece posted:I know everything is cyclical and I should just be patient but goddamn I want buttons so bad. I'm sick of tapping and stroking glass surfaces I want some drat knobs and buttons and toggles and such. I hope they come back in the 2020's. I think this is behind much of the analog synth revival of the last years. People are just bored of clicking and tapping digital interfaces, fiddling with knobs and buttons is just so much more satisfying and fun. fake edit: fiddling with our knobs is all that synth fans seem to know how to do dohohohoho  
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Feb 6, 2020 06:39
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LifeSunDeath posted:Can you give a really stripped down explanation to a person who maxed out at college algebra an explanation of how this advanced science? This is not a joke question, more I'm interested in the tools along that progressed our technology, and this seems like a really unsung one. LifeSunDeath posted:Ok got it. I'm now abler enstin. thans. So, I don't know anything about that device, but I know stuff about math and circuits (tutored electrical engineering for a couple years). In calculus classes, at the start, you study two operations: integration ("finding an integral") and differentiation ("taking a derivative"—not finding a difference, which would be subtraction, because names are stupid). These are roughly analogous to multiplication and division. (The integral of something rectangular would just be its base times its height, for instance.) What you do for your first few terms of studying calculus is, in this analogy, basically like studying order of operations in learning arithmetic. Like: I know how to find the integral of blah-di-blah-A, and I think I remember what to do about blah-di-blah-B, but this homework problem is about (blah-di-blah-A) times (blah-di-blah-B), gently caress, where's the formula sheet again ... And so on. Like division and multiplication, differentiation and integration are inverses: the derivative of the integral of X is just X. (With a catch, sometimes, that doesn't matter here.) This is not differential equations. I will get to that after a diversion into circuits. In circuits, we talk a lot about current and voltage. Current is the flow of electric charge, like the flow of water. Voltage is a difference in potential energy, like the difference between water at the top of a waterfall and water at the bottom of one. (People always use a water pressure analogy for voltage and I don't know anything about water pressure. It's elevation, but for electricity instead of gravity.) You may have heard of capacitors. (You might not have! That's fine. Only nerds have heard of them. You aren't a nerd are you, mr. posting on a webforum in tyool 2020?) Here are some capacitors I stole off Wikipedia:  Capacitors are one of three (or four) fundamental passive circuit components. Like, you lay out the basic electromagnetism equations from physics, see how they related to each other, and you end up with Capacitors, Inductors (loving spellcheck doesn't know inductors?), and Resistors. They have the properties of Resistance, Capacitance, and Inductance, which are abbreviated R, C, and L (names are stupid). Here's where stuff starts to get cool. You can generate and measure current and voltage, yeah? If you want to do some math with sparks, you can add voltages to voltages or currents to currents. If you want to multiply, grab a resistor: The voltage across a resistor is equal to its resistance times the current going through it (which means the current is equal to the voltage divided by the resistance). But a capacitor's voltage is equal to the integral of its current divided by its capacitance. (So the current is equal to C * the derivative of its voltage.) Inductors are the same way, but you swap the locations of voltage and current in the equations: Inductor voltage is L * the derivative of inductor current, etc. This means: You don't need to know calculus. You just need to generate some signal, some pattern in either current or voltage, pump it through a circuit, and it (by the laws of physics alone!) spits out the integral or derivative or whatever. If you want the second derivative, fine, hook up another circuit, feed the output into that. But that's not differential equations. Differential equations are when you take the "multiplication" and "division" of integration and differentiation and you make College Algebra. (They're called just 'differential' equations because derivatives are easier to work with than integrals or mixing the two, so if you end up with something that involves integrals you just take derivatives until they're all gone.) Some of them can't be solved analytically (with pencil and paper). A lot of the time, you just don't try, and you're studying methods of figuring out approximations. Like, okay, if I start by finding out what this equals at x = 5, that'll give me some idea what it is at x = 6, which I can use for x = 7, but I can only tell how far off the mark I am by instead going 5.0, 5.1, 5.2 all the way to 7.0, and even that's an approximation. Differential equations are a pain in the rear end. The reason why the AKAT-1 is cool is three things: 1. It's an analog computer, meaning it solves things using that laws-of-physics method, rather than by writing down numbers and symbols and performing basic operations on them the way you or I might (and which digital computers do much faster than you or I). I've always found analog computing really cool, I'm sure in part because I grew up with digital computing. It's just, well, obsolete. 2. It's apparently the first differential equation analyzer built using transistors. Transistors are different, and complicated, because while any of those capacitors in the picture up there is fundamentally a capacitor, there's no such thing as a fundamental transistor or a property of 'transistance'. "Transistor" refers to a group of families of active components. They have three or four (or five?) points to connect wires to, not just two like resistors/capacitors/inductors do, and so instead of one equation (how terminal A relates to terminal B), you get these sets of equations describing them: there's three(?) equations for voltage between the pins of a three-terminal transistor (six pairwise combinations of three pins, cut in half because the voltage between B and A is just the negative of the voltage between A and B, and so on). Transistors are wild and I do not understand them because I dropped out of college. 3. It looks like something out of the original Star Trek because that's just how high-end scientific equipment looked back then. This is long, but I don't like seeing people get discouraged from asking questions. All told, it's probably a healthy thing to get triggered by.  P.S. Names are stupid: Inductance is L because i is used for current because c is the speed of light (because celeritas is Latin for speedy). I always assume inductors are french. L'inductance. You might point to all the big C stuff for capacitors, but capacitance, the actual property that shows up in equations, is F, for Michael Faraday. You want to find the capacitor in the equation, look for the number next to an F. P.P.S. Resistance is named after Georg Ohm, but an O looks like a zero so we write Ω instead. Names are stupid. P.P.P.S. Inductance is actually H, named after Joseph Henry. Henry is a fine name. It's fine. Everything is fine.
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Feb 6, 2020 07:18
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Hey I’m Ms. nerd posting on a forum in tyool 2020, don’t misgender me
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Feb 6, 2020 07:26
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I don't hate Core 2 Duos, I just hate that they're no longer usable for watching YouTube videos, at least the ones I was trying to use in the last few years  The US Navy mechanical fire control computer training video has been linked in this thread or the other one before, but I thought given the talk about differential equation analysis that I'd link to the mechanical integrator part of the fire control computer in case anyone hasn't seen the video already and is interested: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s1i-dnAH9Y4&t=1881s
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Feb 6, 2020 09:08
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Vavrek posted:. Ah, the noble Ohmega.
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Feb 6, 2020 10:42
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My favourite unit is Å and SI should adopt it. STARGÅNGSTRÖMTE
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Feb 6, 2020 11:02
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Arivia posted:Hey I’m Ms. nerd posting on a forum in tyool 2020, don’t misgender me Is Mx. nerd posting on a forum in tyool 2020 appropriate or otherwise acceptable? I've seen Mx. used but I can't tell at a glance if it's sincere, ironic, irony poisoned mockery of intersectionality, irony poisoned intersectionality, double-ironic sincere intersectionality, a confused civil engineer or railway technician looking for the intersection ... You know, X is an intersection of two lines. I want to end this post with some kind of dumb 'makes you think'-type smiley but I can't find one I like. 
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Feb 6, 2020 11:33
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barbecue at the folks posted:fake edit: fiddling with our knobs is all that synth fans seem to know how to do dohohohoho Before synths, we had to manhandle massive organs instead.
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Feb 6, 2020 13:20
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Vavrek posted:
I still miss when conductance (the inverse of resistance) had the best unit ever: mhos. Yes, it's literally ohm backwards and the symbol was an upside down Omega. Now it's Siemens and it's dumb. e: and the symbol for conductance as a term is G because names are stupid. We also use i for partial currents when solving loops, so the square root of -1 becomes j. Explosionface has a new favorite as of 14:03 on Feb 6, 2020 |
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Feb 6, 2020 13:57
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Vavrek posted:Cool stuff Thanks! I'm really fascinated by the line of history from simple tools to complex and precise tools, but once it gets into computer technology it's like understanding the route of upgrading is hidden behind a paywall of pure math.
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Feb 6, 2020 14:12
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Vavrek posted:My apologies if I caused any offense. I was directing that message most specifically at LifeSunDeath, who had identified with the name "abler enstin"; abler seemed masculine to me, though I'm sure it could have adequate nonbinary use, and I acted and wrote thoughtlessly with my comment. Mx. is sincere but it’s not gender neutral, it’s specifically for non-binary folks. I would have gone Mr/Ms/Mx nerd in your case. e: it was a great cool post otherwise!
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Feb 6, 2020 14:25
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Arivia posted:Mx. is sincere but it’s not gender neutral, it’s specifically for non-binary folks. I would have gone Mr/Ms/Mx nerd in your case. I'm not sure about that. OED's earliest use of it (1977) explicitly suggests it as a gender-neutral honorific, and that's how it's currently used by the government agencies and businesses that have adopted it. Mx doesn't appear to be any more exclusively nonbinary than the singular they.
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Feb 6, 2020 14:59
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packetmantis posted:Ah, the noble Ohmega. lol when I was a kid I thought that's what it was I like how the omega is a visual representation of electric resistance, that seems like a rare quality for a science/engineering symbol
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Feb 6, 2020 15:26
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Peanut Butler posted:I like how the omega is a visual representation of electric resistance, that seems like a rare quality for a science/engineering symbol Could you... elaborate? I've been working with resistors for about 20 years now, but I've never thought "drat, that Ohm symbol really looks like electric resistance, like in a visual sense".
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Feb 6, 2020 15:30
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Pham Nuwen posted:Could you... elaborate? I've been working with resistors for about 20 years now, but I've never thought "drat, that Ohm symbol really looks like electric resistance, like in a visual sense". it's a broken line with a longer path around it- a closed circuit, but not an easy one to cross
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Feb 6, 2020 15:51
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Electricity and math combined is just great when you get to AC stuff. You know how complex numbers are a + bi? Well, you can't use that because I is current because C is the speed of light. So you use j. But the j also goes in front. So it becomes a + jb. Then when you're figuring out phase angles, you use phi, except for when you use theta, and then sometimes you use both theta and phi because each one represents a phase angle for a different component, but then later on they become the same and you add them together.
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Feb 6, 2020 17:34
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Teriyaki Hairpiece posted:I know everything is cyclical and I should just be patient but goddamn I want buttons so bad. I'm sick of tapping and stroking glass surfaces I want some drat knobs and buttons and toggles and such. I hope they come back in the 2020's. barbecue at the folks posted:I think this is behind much of the analog synth revival of the last years. People are just bored of clicking and tapping digital interfaces, fiddling with knobs and buttons is just so much more satisfying and fun. If you don't already know about it, I have a feeling you two might enjoy this youtube channel. (Sadly, it looks like it hasn't updated in a while.)
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Feb 6, 2020 17:35
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Cojawfee posted:Electricity and math combined is just great when you get to AC stuff. You know how complex numbers are a + bi? Well, you can't use that because I is current because C is the speed of light. So you use j. But the j also goes in front. So it becomes a + jb. Then when you're figuring out phase angles, you use phi, except for when you use theta, and then sometimes you use both theta and phi because each one represents a phase angle for a different component, but then later on they become the same and you add them together. now do the application of Euler's formula to complex quantities 
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Feb 6, 2020 17:54
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Toast Museum posted:I'm not sure about that. OED's earliest use of it (1977) explicitly suggests it as a gender-neutral honorific, and that's how it's currently used by the government agencies and businesses that have adopted it. Mx doesn't appear to be any more exclusively nonbinary than the singular they. Huh, I'll have to look into that. Thanks!
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Feb 6, 2020 18:01
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Cojawfee posted:Electricity and math combined is just great when you get to AC stuff. You know how complex numbers are a + bi? Well, you can't use that because I is current because C is the speed of light. So you use j. But the j also goes in front. So it becomes a + jb. Then when you're figuring out phase angles, you use phi, except for when you use theta, and then sometimes you use both theta and phi because each one represents a phase angle for a different component, but then later on they become the same and you add them together. And then you specialize in the wrong subfield and nobody talks about current I because the current density j is much more useful. And you still stick with j for the imaginary number.
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Feb 6, 2020 21:28
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lol out this poo poo at the queued up section: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u4_ic5tKdQ0&t=321s
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Feb 6, 2020 22:39
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Trabant posted:lol out this poo poo at the queued up section: pretty cyberpunk to find that cling-on in there. Also remember how Riven had a goddamn million CDs, lol.
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Feb 6, 2020 22:48
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Trabant posted:
This is extremely Fallout I want to tag Science and dump all my points into it, and use that skill on this device to trigger a nuclear explosion and end the game
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Feb 7, 2020 01:03
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SneezeOfTheDecade posted:If you don't already know about it, I have a feeling you two might enjoy this youtube channel. (Sadly, it looks like it hasn't updated in a while.) So many knobs! It's beautiful!
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Feb 7, 2020 05:16
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Trabant posted:
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Feb 7, 2020 09:11
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Explosionface posted:I still miss when conductance (the inverse of resistance) had the best unit ever: mhos. Yes, it's literally ohm backwards and the symbol was an upside down Omega. Now it's Siemens and it's dumb. LifeSunDeath posted:Thanks! I'm really fascinated by the line of history from simple tools to complex and precise tools, but once it gets into computer technology it's like understanding the route of upgrading is hidden behind a paywall of pure math. Computers are, uh. Computers are weird and different surprisingly non-mathy? Like, computers are built out of really complicated, continuously varying* analog electronics hardware which is all set up to produce these incredibly simple but reliable devices. One of the ways they're simple is that you don't think about a range of voltages, you just call one voltage HIGH another one LOW, and you make sure HIGH and LOW are far enough apart that the analog electronics respond very differently to each. Then you stop thinking about anything analog and just talk about HIGH and LOW and maybe call them TRUE and FALSE or 0 and 1, and you hook those devices together into a complex machine that's designed to respond in perfectly predictable ways to certain sequences of bits. There's just ... no calculus involved, you know? There's barely algebra. (There's boolean algebra, which is like algebra if you got rid of all the numbers except for two of them and also ignored fractions and square roots.) I remember arithmetic coming up because I had to design a digital circuit that could add and subtract. (It was an intro class. Multiplication would've been too complicated.) That and adding up how long it took for a signal to get through a device, because all those analog devices this stuff is built out of take time to respond. Computer Engineering / Computer Science is its own weird cool thing that arguably (technically?) could be called a branch of some really abstract high-level mathematics, but the only people who would are mathematicians. *don't @me quantum physicists you know what I mean and that I know it's not really
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Feb 7, 2020 10:48
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