Honda Ad

This is one of the coolest advertisements I've ever seen:

You can see the motion tracking and compositing is a little weak in places, but even so, it's still pretty amazing.

Also, here's a link to the breakdown: http://vimeo.com/69175471

Space scooter update

This is what it looks like now:

Blender sci-fi

While on the topic of blender, here's my latest creation:

It's still a work in progress, the texturing still needs a good bit of work, but I'm pretty happy with the exhaust flames, just a few more tweaks and they'll be pretty good. 

Usually smoke or fire takes a really long time to bake, and then renders pretty fast.

With the adaptive domain, I've been able to compute the smoke pretty fast too; it took less than a minute and a half to compute 200 frames at 128 divisions and high resolution set to 2.

Blender

Blender is amazing! Here's their 2013 demo reel which should serve well as inspiration:

Every year it just gets better!

Neat key holders

If you want to carry your keys neatly, there are two good options that I know of:

KeySmart

~ and/or ~

Switchy

Now I just can't make up my mind!

Maybe I should put frequently used keys on a Switchy, and keep the rest on a KeySmart...

Kickstarter has some really neat products.

Dell CS-24SC servers

Dell CS24-SC:

Recently I discovered these servers on ebay. So far as I have been able to find out, the Dell CS-24SC was made by Dell for some undisclosed customer in large quantities. When they decided to upgrade, they flooded the market with these servers, and the prices show it. You can buy one of these with 8 GB of memory for about $140 (including shipping!) For a model with 16 GB of memory, the price goes up to the astronomical number of... about $165!

Image from ebay

Here are the specifications:

CPU: 2X Intel L5420 quad core @ 2.5 GHZ
SATA trays: 4, but make sure the seller includes them.
USB ports: 4 USB 2.0, 2 front, 2 back
Ethernet: 2X GBE + one for management
Video: Internal Intel chipset, 1X VGA (back)
Memory: Up to 48 GB DDR2 EEC

Some notes:

This is an incredible value. If you are going to build a renderfarm or compute cluster, it doesn't get any better than this. If you find a better deal, I want to see it!
It has a PCI-E slot, so you can add a better graphics card. It's single slot, so the maximum you could fit would probably be something like a GTX 640 (Though that starts to approach the cost of the server!) If you want more GPU power in something like this, you would probably have to go to liquid cooling.
 If you like this model, but need more memory, the Dell SC24-TY (oops, typo, Dell CS24-TY.) looks like the same model, but I've seen some specifications that indicate it will hold up to 288 GB of memory. (18 DDR3 slots, 18X16 GB=288) Those get expensive pretty quickly though.
I noted 16 GB maximum memory for the -SC model above, but I forget, it could be 24 GB.

Before getting this, I read some of the reviews (which are surprisingly scarce), and it was claimed to be loud. This is not the case. The fans spin up loudly, but once booted, they throttle down, and stay nice and quiet. I've got a Dell laptop right here that is louder than the server. The server also runs very cool, so the cooling is doing its job. I ran a smoke simulation in Blender for an hour, all cores at 100%, and it only got mildly warm. This was in a room with an ambient temperature of probably about 85 F.
If you're curious about how fast this is, here's a nice comparison chart:  http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Xeon+L5420+%40+2.50GHz&id=1259&cpuCount=2 This shows that it's a little slower than a modern desktop, but remember that the entire thing costs somewhere around half of what just the CPU of a new computer might cost! At the cost, scaling out over multiple servers is a good option too.

I've run Linux mint, FreeNAS, and Ubuntu Studio on it. Boot time is rather slow, but I haven't timed it. When using onboard graphics the X server sometimes has to be started manually with startx. I haven't had any such problems with a graphics card.

All in all though, if you're looking for power without the price, it doesn't get any better than this!

More good advertising

This is good advertising, at least in concept. The video is somewhat sub-par.

I guess this reduces the possibility of a leaking liquid cooling system ruining your motherboard/CPU.

My first thought is that the coating will trap heat, but I guess some silicone based coatings have decent thermal transfer.

It also makes open air cases more attractive, though I like the ASUS Sabertooth armor too.

Now I'm just waiting to hear of this for laptop motherboards!

In the country...

You know you're in the country when you see signs like this:

(And cropped)

On the way back from our grandparent's farm we saw this, and I just had to get a photo! 

;D

Default Programs

When I install a new operating system, there is usually a set of default programs I want to install. Since I do this fairly frequently, (this may not be such a problem for many people!) it's nice when a distribution comes with most of the software I want so I don't have to go through a lot of installations. This is most noticeable on Windows, but many Linux distros come with a minimum of software too.

Enter Ninite!

What this website does is provide a single installation file to install multiple programs. You just select the programs you want, download the file, and install once!

Also, one of the really annoying aspects of some software installers is that they try to to install lots of junk software by default. (ASK toolbar for example) This website not only runs the installer automatically, it says no to the surplus extras!

It also detects whether the OS is 32 or 64 bit, and installs the right program version.

Want to update all the programs? Just run the file again! No matter when you made the installation file, all the programs will be up to date when they are installed.

Here are most of the Windows programs I like to install: (hyperlink)

Here's a file with most of the Linux programs I generally install (hyperlink)

If I remember I'll make a full list at some point.

Strandbeast

An impressive bit of mechanical engineering.

Don't mess with Marines

This is pretty old, but still good:

http://tigerhawk.blogspot.com/2011/05/messing-with-wrong-marines.html

Text reads:

Assailant suffers injuries from fall

Orville Smith, a store manager for Best Buy in Augusta, GA., told police he observed a male customer, later identified as Tyrone Jackson of Augusta, on surveillance cameras putting a laptop computer under his jacket. When confronted the man became irate, knocked down an employee, drew a knife and ran for the door. 

Outside on the sidewalk were four Marines collecting toys for the Toys for Tots program. Smith said the Marines stopped the man, but he stabbed one of the Marines, CPL. Phillip Duggan, in the back; the injury did not appear to be severe. after Police and an ambulance arrived at the scene Cpl. Duggan was transported for treatment.

"The subject was also transported to the local hospital with two broken arms, a broken ankle, a broken leg, several missing teeth, possible broken ribs, multiple contusions, assorted lacerations, a broken nose, and a broken jaw...injuries he sustained when he slipped and fell off the curb after stabbing the Marine." According to a police report.

From TigerHawkBlog.

Don't mess with marines!

EEC RAM

While reading through some operating system technical recommendations I came across this:

If the probability of an error is one in a hundred quadrillion, and if the memory system is running at 10 MHz (100 nanosecond), and if you have 125 Megabytes of RAM (1 billion bits), then you would expect on average to see one single-bit error every ten seconds and one double-bit error every thousand quadrillion seconds (somewhat more than the age of the universe). That is why ECC memory is worth using, and why it is designed to detect but not correct double-bit errors.

I'm not sure this is correct, but it is rather interesting. The rest of the page is here:
http://www.ohio.edu/people/piccard/mis300/eccram.htm
(Also note the date at the bottom!)