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Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

Parallel Paraplegic posted:

Yeah checks are nice because you, personally, get a distinct record that you made out a check to the person, and you and an authoritative third party (the bank) gets a record they cashed it for the amount you said it was worth. You can't really do that reliably with cash even if you get a receipt, and most not-companies don't take credit cards. It's a pretty good choice when you're just dealing with some other person.
Here in Europe we just use bank transfers. I've only once in my lifetime seen a check and I received it from my septuagenarian landlady.

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Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

Dick Trauma posted:

EDIT: I looked up the name on the door and found Grover Brothers and Wood Company, founded in Detroit in 1915. If you can believe it the company still exists and still makes PTT, but now they're called TransLogic.
I've seen one of those in a large pharmacy too.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

Might as well continue the glass talk with obsolete window tech:

Crown glass is the kind of glass you'll find on old churches and the kind of glass that spawned the "glass is a liquid" myth. It's made by picking up a blob of glass onto the end of a glass blower's pipe, cutting the end of the bulb off and spinning the remaining glass into a circular plate that is then cut into square or rectangular panes. Obviously the size of the panes you can get using this method is very limited, which is why old buildings had windows consisting of many small panes. The glass is thicker in the middle of the plate and the glass was usually put into the frame thick end down when making windows. Some poor soul mistook this and the uneven shape of the glass as evidence for flow.

Today crown glass only used for the conservation of historical buildings, which is why this dude is spinning a large plate of hot glass:


Significantly newer buildings might have much larger panes that are slightly uneven since they were made using the Fourcault process. This was a major invention in it's time because it allowed for much larger panes than previously. It was made by dipping a rod flat into molten glass and then pulling it out at a rate that allowed the glass to solidify as it rose, pulling a continuous sheet of glass out of the vat. Since it was guided by rollers and cooled by air, the sheets were always a bit uneven.



Nowadays we get amazingly large and even panes of glass by pouring molten glass onto a bed of liquid tin. Also known as the float glass process:

Jasper Tin Neck has a new favorite as of 00:46 on Nov 2, 2012

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

Count Chocula posted:

Instead of using clothes dryers most people hang clothes on 'hills hoists', spinning clothes hangers Aussies are very proud of inventing.

Most countries dry clothes outside. The US doesn't because many home owners associations have rules against it on the grounds that it makes neighbourhoods look poor.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

MagnumLode posted:

I used to work in construction and I found a few of those razor blade caches. I always wondered why there was a ton of blades piled up inside the wall.

Interesting. Now I know.

Somehow dumping razorblades inside walls seems like a really strange idea, but I guess the houses weren't expected to last for centuries so they figured they couldn't fill up. It just seems to me that you could achieve the same convenience with a tin bank. You'd have to empty it every once in a while though.

Speaking of garbage, fortunately high-rise incinerators got banned the 60s in favour of garbage collection. Incinerators used to make the air in many cities legitimately dangerous to breathe. They were probably a great way to dispose of dead bodies too.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

Axeman Jim posted:

The tilt technology was sold to Fiat, who realised that if they just developed the tilt technology on its own without literally reinventing the wheel they could make it work, and suddenly perfectly functional tilting trains were running all over continental Europe. And in 2002, in one of the biggest ever embarrassments for the British rail industry, Fiat sold tilting “Pendolino” trains back to Britain, which now run, 20 years later, on the same timetables that the APT was supposed to follow.

The Pendolino family of multiple unit trains isn't entirely without problems either, though. The Finnish Railways Sm3 is based on the Pendolino ETR460 but has a wider bogey due to the Finnish rail gauge which is 1524 mm (imperial Russian gauge) instead of 1435 mm (standard gauge).

It's not really a bad train by itself, it's more about the way it's being operated. The Sm3 was acquired in the early 1990s mostly to serve the Helsinki–Turku line, which is one of the oldest in the country and runs through some of the most densely populated parts of the country (which aren't particularly densely populated, but I digress) and consequently is single-tracked for most of it's length, has a very winding geometry and lots of tunnels. The Finnish National Railways, VR, wanted a train that was light, had a tilting mechanism to alleviate the poor horizontal geometry of the coast line and had a pressurized cabin to prevent ear locking from pressure shocks.



The ETR460 was chosen as the base of the new train over the ASEA X2000, mainly because it already existed. Unfortunately VR never really managed to capitalize on the tilting mechanism. This occurred because while tilting trains does reduce passenger discomfort due to horizontal acceleration changes, it does nothing to reduce horizontal forces exerted on the track. Since the track beds on the coast line were often laid on slopes or soft clay back in 1896-1903, the top speeds on the tracks ware often limited by the structural integrity of the tracks. Remedying these issues often necessitated also redoing the horizontal geometry, which usually made it suitable for the rest of the intercity fleet too.

VR also tried to couple together Sm3 trains coming from separate destinations to reduce the bottle neck effect of the tracks leading to Helsinki. It seems like every railway in the world tries this at least once and concludes that it's as stupid as trying to balance multiple eggs on your fingertips to impress your date. In theory it works because the length of a train is almost negligible compared to its braking distance, so coupling two trains together reduces the required block length to almost a half and almost doubles track capacity. In practice, while decoupling two trains on-the-road is usually easy, coupling them together is often more difficult. The other train might simply be late or the coupler could be jammed with ice. Too often two Sm3s that were supposed to arrive to Helsinki as one train came as two, with the latter one being desperately crammed into whichever time slot happened to be available. This gave the Sm3 partially undeserved notoriety as a hopelessly unreliable train.

They fit this thread because despite being currently successfully operated they're effectively obsolete, as their 220 km/h top speed is only a marginal improvement over the 200 km/h capable, wheelchair accessible, mechanically far less complex and more flexible Sr2-locomotive driven Intercity fleet.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

KozmoNaut posted:

Surprisingly, the IC4 doesn't really have that many additional features over the IC3. Mostly it's just stuff like a power outlet for every seat, a slightly different seating layout and a dedicated bistro area instead of the current trolleys. On the other hand, the Danish State Railways did insist on a custom configuration instead of going with an off-the-shelf configuration, so there was at least some second-system effect going on. After all, they did spec four 20L diesel V8 engines for each trainset (3000hp total). I don't know much about trains, but it sounds pretty excessive considering the IC3 does just fine with 1600hp total.

One of the flaws of the IC3 that the IC4 does adress is the lack of platform-level entry. Every station needs to have a wheelchair lift and you have to call in advance if anyone in a wheelchair or using a mobility scooter needs to enter or exit an IC3. The IC4 has one platform-level entry per trainset. So I guess that's one good thing about it :)

I've been meaning to post about the IC4 for a couple of days, so here goes my take on things:

Danish governments in the 70s decided the highways and cars were the way of the future, so there was a systemic lack of investment in railways. That's one of the reasons why Denmark has never really bothered to electrify their railways:

Only the main line and the branches to Germany and Sweden were electrified, which became a problem once Danish governments did a 180° and decided that high-speed trains were the way of the future. Electrifying the railways would have required massive investments, but that would have allowed Denmark to buy off-the-shelf rolling stock. This would have delayed the plan to introduce high-speed rail travel in Denmark. The state-owned railway operator DSB didn't believe the government would go for such a massive investment, so it got the go-ahead to order a high-speed diesel multiple unit instead. High-speed DMUs are rather unusual, so it had to be a custom job. The tender went to AnsaldoBreda, an Italian manufacturer with close ties to Silvio Berlusconi.


Wouldn't you buy stuff from this man's buddies too?

AnsaldoBreda isn't exactly known for excellent workmanship and the IC4 seems to have been a bit over their heads. None of the trainsets have been delivered on time, the computer systems controlling the brakes are apparently both buggy and extremely opaque, and the wiring is shoddy. To top it all off, one of the missing train sets was found in Libya, with the inscription "for 40 years of achievement", coincidentally a bit after the 40th aniversary of Muammar Gaddaffi's coup. (Link in Danish, chosen for the pictures of the swanky interior.) Bizzarrely, instead of cancelling the whole order and suing the pants off AnsaldoBreda, DSB took over the unfinished train sets, intending to finish them themselves.


Strange rolling stock choices are not really the only strange thing about Danish railways though. Having taken a few courses in railway engineering in Denmark and worked in Finland, I'm constantly mystified why Danish railways make life so difficult for maintenance. In Finland, there is an extremely limited selection of switches and crossing that are allowed on public railways. This means that switches and crossings can only be placed on straight sections, but it also means that unless one of the very few curved switches or a diamond crossing breaks, you can pull a replacement straight out of the warehouse. Danish and Swedish railways are much more permissive about the use of custom parts, which I can't really understand.

The overhead line poles are also another baffling choice. Here is the Finnish version, which is similar to Swedish and German ones:


Here is the Danish version


Although the Danish drawing is a bit more schematic, notice that while the Finnish overhead line pole is slightly wedge-shaped, the Danish one is just a square beam. If you need to mount heavy equipment on a Finnish pole you can do that with a clamp and it will stay put. On the Danish pole, you have to have mounting plates welded on first, which usually means switching the whole drat pole. To top it off, the Danish poles are made of weathering steel, which is more expensive than galvanized steel. Poles at stations are made out of galvanized steel though, to prevent rust stains on passengers who lean against the poles.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

Hogge Wild posted:

Electronic gadgets are not more environment friendly than books.

Unless they outlast books by a wide margin. Which is doubtful, for the time being.

In time, we might get there though, much like we pulp wood and dry it into paper to print on rather than just carving stuff into wood.

I mean take the Drawing board.



Drawing boards were in use well into the 90s at my job because Computer aided design software used to be painfully slow to work with. Then CAD software took over as computers became faster and much less expensive. Today the company I work at has one drawing board for comparing different revisions of old drawings.

Jasper Tin Neck has a new favorite as of 20:52 on Mar 20, 2014

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

Plotterboy posted:

I wouldn't call drawing boards obsolete. There are a few disciplines that still use them. A lot of the smaller groups producing shop drawings work on the board here.

Also when CAD software took over the average design time for a project increased by about three weeks. This is because you could now revise multiple times without having to start from scratch. This meant designers and engineers started working a bit more loosely.

Architects also seem to use them, at least the older generation. The landscape architecture professors at my school also have a huge boner for paper and pen (Seriously, screw doing A1-sized posters with a pen. In three copies. That's just busywork.)

I will dispute your point about working looser though. At least in my trade (railway construction) there seems to be an effect akin to Jevon's paradox with respect to planning. A few decades ago, plans were rather minimal and most stuff was left to be figured out on-site. Nowadays plans are much more detailed, which saves a lot of head-scratching of the construction sites. As a bonus, the drainage on newer stretches actually works.

Drawings have also become much more legible since you can do separate drawings for different disciplines, rather than trying to cram all information into the same blueprint.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

Jerry Cotton posted:

One selling point that was pretty valid at least ten years or more ago was that "regular" vacuum cleaners pushed most of the poo poo they sucked up straight out of their asses into the air whereas central vacuums would suck it... somewhere else so you don't have to breath it.

My brother installed one in his house. He has two cats and a dog, so he has to vacuum a lot and likes the fact that the central vacuum is quieter than a regular one. His pets are still terrified of it though.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

DrBouvenstein posted:

The biggest problem I had with was trying to use a modern laptop to connect to them.

No serial ports on anything made in the last 7 or so years
Six at most. I have a Lenovo X201, released in 2010, that came with both a serial port and a dial-up modem. I wouldn't be surprised if newer business laptops still carry those.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

Instant Sunrise posted:

Why DID computer cases go from beige to black in the mid-late 2000's?

Computers used to be primarily business equipment and hence had inoffensive color schemes similar to lab equipment.

I remember seeing magazine ads, peppered with buzzwords such as "Multimedia" and "CD-ROM", for black, consumer-oriented desktop computers in the mid-90s. I just think the idea of a computer as an electronic entertainment device on par with TVs and stereos simply took that long to really catch on.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

Manky posted:

90% of people, whatever the hell was their browser's default

ninja edit: or the most recent thing a toolbar or extension set it to

Not true. Many people specifically type haitch-tee-tee-pee colon double-slash double-u double-u double-u dot Google dot com into the address bar so that they can "Google" haitch-tee-tee-pee colon double-slash double-u double-u double-u dot some website dot top level domain. Usually while you're waiting for them to show you something on the Internet.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

Computer viking posted:

I kind of expect the showroom plus mail order model to make a comeback. Say you want a new laptop but would like to poke a bit at the keyboard or try the hinges before you buy. Would you rather go to some mediocre electronics store with a large selection of borderline-outdated trash from HP and Packard-Bell, or to an Amazon showroom that had one of everything you actually considered (but you'd have to wait for it to be delivered)?

I'd love to have this for clothing. I'm a short and thin guy in a land or rotund giants, so finding my size is nigh impossible. On the other hand, buying clothes online, without a visit to the fitting room first, is a complete gamble.

Also, why the gently caress does every country still have their own shoe size standard when the ISO 9407:1991, "Shoe sizes—Mondopoint system of sizing and marking" standard exists?

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

XKCD strip or not, it's weird that in this age of global trade only ski boots and military shoes are sized by the same system in the UK, US, France, Germany, China and Japan.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."


The military shoe part admittedly only applies to NATO.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

KozmoNaut posted:

Samsung tried that, and it was a complete failure.



I remember looking into this at one point, but back then it didn't have a phone antenna. I guess Samsung must have released a second model that actually works as a phone.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

Krispy Kareem posted:

As for the next obsolete tech, anything you control with your voice. We don't even like talking on our phones. Why the gently caress would we want to talk to them.
Because you're not supposed to take your hands off the steering wheel to fiddle with your playlist or search for a nearby drive-in.

I ride the bus, so I never use voice commands either, but I can see the point.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

El Estrago Bonito posted:

That and the historically poo poo support of sound drivers.
Is this really a problem nowadays? I often find that peripherals work as soon as you plug them in in Ubuntu, while windows 7 has to take five to find and install a god drat mouse driver.

Granted, I couldn't get one USB DAC model to work at all and my ancient printer/scanner is a battle to install on any OS.

On a completely different note, beer crates seems to have gone extinct in my country, because cheap beer is now exclusively packaged in cans. If you need a lot, you buy a cardboard case containing 24 cans.

Glass beer bottles seem to have gone the way of the vinyl record, only hobbyists buy them and the contents are somewhat more eccentric than the average fare.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

Jerry Cotton posted:

Life hack: European shopping carts meant to be unlocked with a one euro coin will happily accept a five cent coin. (I mean you don't save anything since you always get your own coin back but handy if you don't have a euro :shrug:)

Shopping carts and most coin-operated toilet locks also accept a Hilti R-23 washer in place of a one-euro coin. I always carry one on my keychain because I'll rather pay ¢8 than €1 to take a leak at a bus or train station.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

Shifty Pony posted:

Gas heat, hot water. clothes driers, and cooktops are all as good as or better than their electric/oil equivalent and are much, much cheaper to operate. Here gas is $3.50/MBTU. The same amount of energy would be $15.50 worth of heating oil or $23.40 worth of electricity.

Norway, Denmark, Sweden and Finland are prolific users of Combined Heat and Power. Most of us simply get piping hot water delivered to a heat exchanger instead of having a burner of some kind in a closet. Hence there isn't much of a consumer market for gas.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

BalloonFish posted:

The house I spent most of my childhood in had an AGA exactly like the one in the picture
---
Basically, I'm they're great if you're Swedish
Thing is, in Sweden the manufacture of AGA stoves ended in 1957. The UK is the only country where they're still around.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

Humphreys posted:

I think one of my first N-series Nokias had MiniSD. I want to say it was an N80.



http://www.gsmarena.com/nokia_n80-1347.php

Fake edit: Yes it was, I do miss that phone.

I don't. The drat thing didn't have a GPS receiver, so I had to buy a separate Bluetooth brick to use a painfully slow navigation app.

The phone got stolen from me, but I still have the GPS brick in a drawer somewhere in this room.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

WeX Majors posted:

Man that picture is confusing. I get that it's an external hard drive that in reality only has a flash drive guts plugged in, but what's everything else inside the case? Just random bits to make the whole thing weigh more?

Yup. Looks like two nuts and a couple of stud anchors all hot-glued in.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

Shugojin posted:

I have some incredibly nebulous interference-type problem with the onboard and even a pci-e sound card I plugged into this computer where there's a buzzing heard through my nice headphones that increases with CPU load so technically I have an internal separate sound card. A cheap USB sound card fixed the issue and I haven't really wanted that single pci-e x1 slot so uhhh I haven't bothered to take the internal one out because :effort:
I had the exact same problem with a PCI sound card back in the day. My solution was to make a hillbilly EMI shield around the card out of tin foil, duct tape and cardboard.

It worked much better than it ought to have.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

Elsa posted:

Displayport is so superior, holy poo poo.

move to DisplayPort, everyone.

My friend, who designs AV-systems for a living, is still angry that DVI was the last standard to feature screw-fastened connectors. The clip on a DP connector simply isn't strong enough to prevent you from accidentally unseating the connector if you bump or tug it.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

Konstantin posted:

How did that work with things like college papers? Did students in the 60s and 70s learn how to type, or did they just handwrite everything?

From working at the library at my Alma Mater, I've understood that until the 1940s or so, you would write a thesis manuscript by hand, then submit it to a copy typist, who would hammer out your scribbles in legible type. Then you'd glue in any figures you needed.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

razorrozar posted:

does this still work if you have a non-stock keyboard?

In SwiftKey, it just changes your layout to one of your other languages, so no.

Physical keyboards were indeed awesome, if only because they didn't cover half the screen when you typed. I miss my Desire Z. :(

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

twistedmentat posted:

Why are these needed? Is this some MLG gotta squeeze every bit of power out of computer so i can come out of top of LoL matches? Or is it another buttcoin thing?

Or just a cool engineering project?
Computer benchmarks are much like drag racing. The compressor thing is like fitting a stock car with ridiculously big superchargers.

Liquid nitrogen setups on the other hand are the computer nerd equivalent of those purpose-built dragster that will either explode once you step on it or run a quarter mile so fast your ears will bleed.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

AntherUslessPoster posted:

But if you love programming, would you not find a way to implement a good written code somehow, just because you love what you do and do it with full commitment and dedication?
I dunno, maybe it's just me.

Sometimes doing things the neat way is just too drat expensive. In my line of work, we recently faced the choice of demolishing and rebuilding half a bridge or relocating a bunch of fiber optic cables that serve an office district.

Rebuilding half a bridge was cheaper.

Edit: where'd the quote go? Oh well, never mind.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

3D Megadoodoo posted:

I heard someone in the [redacted] industry like two years ago say they still used plotters for big sizes for some reason, but I can't remember the loving reason.

e: Actually I guess it's just because they literally don't make printers that big.

Modern plotters are just big-rear end inkjet printers though. No pen whizzing around.

The paper comes on a big roll, so while width is still limited, you can do much longer prints these days.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

Computer viking posted:

Huh, thanks. Not sure where I got that from.

Also kind of interesting - we were early electricity adopters, sure, but why did it then displace gas so completely here? Was it just cheap & plentiful?

Probably because the gas was coal gas from coal that had to be hauled all the way from Svalbard or imported and then gassified. Not only was it a pain, it was also dangerous.

Arsenic Lupin posted:

Gas-oven suicides were common when the gas in your home was coal gas, which contained carbon monoxide among other things. Nowadays it's "natural" gas.

Natural gas didn't really become a thing until the 1970s, when practically everyone in Norway already had electricity.

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

Went down to the local thrift store, which had plenty to offer for friends of old tech. Could I interest you in:

An over-the-shoulder video camera?


A Beovision MX 3500 CRT?


Or perhaps you'd prefer a portable TV?


Or a microfiche reader, small tv or a betamax player?


Or maybe a combination tape deck and turntable?


How about a PowerMac 6800/66 with some kind of drawing digitizer on top?


Or a pile of extremely early-noughts keyboards? They have D-pads!

Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

Creature posted:

Assuming that this place is like the other flea markets I’ve been to here in :finland:, that isn’t really possible. Individuals rent a spot in the store and fill it with whatever crap they want. The store just sells it on their behalf. That’s why you see weird poo poo like piles of old keyboards still in boxes, or a collection of old power cables and computer magazines from 2003. Sometimes there’s some good stuff, but most of the time it’s just trash which someone’s convinced themselves is worth a few €.

This was a thrift store run by the municipal waste management agency as a waste reduction/employment assistance scheme. Like a public Goodwill.

The large amount of AV gear suggest to me some AV company cleared out the old gear from their back room. I don't remember the prices, but big items are usually surprisingly cheap to ensure turnover.

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Jasper Tin Neck
Nov 14, 2008


"Scientifically proven, rich and creamy."

LimaBiker posted:

Not sure if pen plotters are at all in use anymore. At a company where i worked in 2017ish they had big 'plotters' to print hardware store layouts on a0 or a1 sheets of paper. Those were essentially just very large inkjet printers specifically for line drawings, fed by rolls of paper.

Yeah, pen plotters are dead, everyone plots with inkjets now. Pen plotters live on as vinyl cutters.

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