Timothy
Parker Consulting Incorporated
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Questions and Answers, Part 14
Q: I have a client involved in
very fine detail drawing on a multiprocessor PC.
He complains the usual 21-inch monitors are not good enough for his work
and he wants not only a larger monitor but also a higher resolution one.
Are there any options for him? A: If money is not an object, the
highest resolution screen currently available is the IBM T220.
It is a flat-panel 22.2-inch monitor with more than 12 million pixels
available (roughly 10 times the best 21-inch monitor we normally associate with
PCs). It was originally designed
for the medical world but is widely used for 3D modelling, video processing, and
other fields that need super-high resolutions.
It’s $35,000 (give or take a bit).
If that’s too steep, a new generation of 21-inch monitors from Sony,
Viewsonic and others are pushing resolutions well over 1920x1440, the typical
highest resolution consumer video cards can support.
Naturally, he’ll need a heck of a video card to run the T220, so check
out the offerings from IBM, Matrox, and others. Q: I regularly spill things on my
keyboard, mousepad, and into the computer case (I’m a slob, and proud of it!).
Is there any way to clean this stuff up? A: You could buy a hardened
computer that resists spills completely, but that’s going to require spending
a few bucks. Alternatively, you can
check out some of the sites that specialize in cleaning things (such as
howtocleananything.com) for information on cleaning various fabrics, plastics,
and electronics. Either that, or
step back from the computer when the urge to drink or eat arises! Q: We’ve all heard of Moore’s
law, but I keep hearing it has run out with today’s processors. Is this true? A: Moore’s law essentially
states that the number of transistors on a chip would double every 18 months.
So far, the law has held almost perfectly.
As more transistors are packed on to a chip, processors get faster and
more powerful. However, there have
been many problems with reaching the upper limits of the technique that etches
lines on silicon, hence the predications of the failure of Moore’s law very
soon. Naturally, science won’t
allow either the progress in chip design to slow down and there are many
developments that will change the way we currently produce chips, and allow
Moore’s law to continue to hold. Two
of the most interesting techniques are a new way of using ultraviolet light to
etch very small lines on wafers, and the develop of a very small transistor. The UV light development was sponsored by Intel, AMD, and
others and has been proven to work. It
will likely be in the manufacturing plants very soon. The small transistor is from Intel, and is the world’s
smallest so far using only three atom widths.
This will allow switching at 1.5 trillion operations per second according
to Intel. For those who don’t
keep up with these numbers, that’s about 10 times faster than current
transistors. According to current
research and white papers from Intel, Moore’s law will hold at least until
2014. Beyond that, I’m sure there
will be even more developments. Q: Silly question, perhaps, but
driving me nuts. I have used
Matshita CD-RW drives in several systems I built, and recommend Adaptec’s Easy
CD Creator for those systems. With
the latest upgrades to this software, no one can write the CDs.
They all report that the CD-RW is not recognized.
What gives? A: An upgrade to Easy CD Creator
is necessary to work with Matshita CD-RW drives.
The update allows the Adaptec (now Roxio) product to work with the
Matshita. You can download the
updates from the Roxio Web site. Q: How many monitors can I hang
off a PC? Is three the limit? A: I assume you are talking about
active monitors and not just slaves off a single monitor (there is no limit for
the number of slaves, as long as the signal is strong enough to pass through
splitters). For active monitors using Windows 98 through Windows XP, three is
the usual limit. There are tricks
around this limit, but it depends on drivers to make it work.
I can’t figure why anyone would want more than three monitors on their
desk for a single PC anyway, but check out the video cards available from Matrox
and others for information. Q: IS DVD-ROM and DVD-RAM the
same thing? A: No. The two formats are incompatible. DVD-ROM is the same as the DVD movies you buy in a store and play on your TV, but can store video, audio, or data on them. DVD-RAM is a different format and is used only for data, and cannot be played on a DVD player attached to a TV. DVD-RAM drives and cartridges are much cheaper than DVD-ROM at the moment. |
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