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FireWire Developer Note: FireWire Product-Specific Details Mac Pro Computers (January 2008) The Mac Pro computers with Quad-Core Intel Xeon 5400 Series microprocessors were introduced in January 2008. The Mac Pro provides two FireWire 800 IEEE 1394b ports and two FireWire 400 IEEE 1394a ports. The four FireWire ports are on the same FireWire bus and share a single 12V DC-regulated power supply that can provide 18 W per port, for up to 28 W total. If a device is added that exceeds the power limit, the port will be disabled but the other ports will continue to function. Unplug the device, and the disabled port will recover in a short amount of time. FireWire port power is provided when the computer is on, in sleep, or off. The Open Host Controller Interface (OHCI) connects to the South Bridge IC via a PCI Express 1-lane 2.5 GHz bus. The front and rear FireWire PHYs interface via the OHCI. The Mac Pro provides front and rear port repeating when the computer is powered on or asleep. Front and rear repeating is also available when the computer is off, unless the computer was shut down from Mac OS X with no FireWire devices connected.
So I wonder, can you add a PCI card for Firewire 800/400 to just power the front ports so that the power limitation can be increased?
Obscure Tax Breaks Increase Cost of Financial Rescue - WSJ.com The biggest beneficiary so far is likely to be Wells Fargo. The big San Francisco-based bank recently agreed to buy Wachovia Corp. of Charlotte, N.C., which has been hammered by huge losses on mortgage-related securities and loans. Wells Fargo has said it expects to take $74 billion in write-downs on the Wachovia portfolio.
Several factors are behind the shakeout in banking. But the overarching reason is that bankers, governments, investors and customers simply have lost faith in the lending system on a number of fronts.
A potential new area of concern is the speed with which retail bank customers are moving deposits, sometimes by using the Internet, challenging the most stable source of funding that banks have. In recent days, Bradford & Bingley customers pulled out several billion pounds and moved them to bigger banks such as Royal Bank of Scotland Group PLC and HSBC Holdings PLC.
IndyMac Bancorp Inc., of Pasadena, Calif., was already struggling with heavy losses from mortgage defaults when worried depositors started pulling out their money. The mortgage lender’s depositors withdrew $1.3 billion in late June and early July, leaving the bank with roughly $19 billion in deposits when it was seized by regulators on July 11.
Banks are also facing looming repayments of the short-term and medium-term loans that many have come to rely on in recent years to finance a bigger chunk of their operations. This month alone, $95 billion in so-called floating-rate notes mature, according to a recent J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. report. (Floating-rate notes are borrowings with variable interest rates that run for approximately two years.)
Among the big borrowers is Wachovia. This week, Wachovia faces some $3.5 billion in debt repayments, according to J.P. Morgan’s debt analysis. Wachovia has said it has the ability to handle the refinancing of debt given its prudent liquidity strategies.
The troubles at Wachovia, based in Charlotte, N.C., and of Fortis, based in Utrecht and Brussels, signal the first time that major commercial banks are now at risk of being forced into sales or breakups since the onset of the credit crisis a little more than a year ago. Wachovia is a big lender to midsize U.S. companies, and at the end of last year, it oversaw a commercial-loan portfolio totaling $190 billion. In the real-estate industry, Wachovia had signed off on $35 billion in loans. More….(wall street journal)
Screen preference in the Mac OS X:
To change your screen resolution. Launch the System Preferences application or choose System Preferences from the apple menu in the upper left hand corner.
Then choose Displays:
Best way is to detect displays - it should give you the optimal resolution for your monitor. This is also useful if you have two monitors connected. You can pick any resolution that works for you and your eyes. You may also want to use the displays manual controls to change the width and hight.
Mark you calenders for Sept 8 as Apple says "Let’s Rock." in a special event to probably announce new iPods that are cheaper, and re-designed. Per CNN/Money:
Apple executives in the past have said that the future of iPods lies in more powerful devices able to connect wirelessly to the Internet, rather than standalone entertainment gadgets. The company’s first step in that direction is the iPod touch, a version of the product that resembles the iPhone with its large touch-sensing screen and wi-fi wireless technology. The iPod touch also has the ability to run much of the software now being created by independent developers for the iPhone, including everything from games to a program for accessing the Facebook social network. Apple executives have hinted recently that a price cut for the iPod touch, which starts at
$299, was likely soon. more…
There are sorts of Mac Rumors out there from a new Nano that follows the old form factor long and thin but all screen to reduced prices for the iTouch. YouTube Video from Kevin Rose on the new Nano and a bit more on new iPods and the 2008 roadmap.
More Artists Steer Clear of iTunes
Per this article. Maybe the data isn’t there but it would have been interesting to compare this to the gold age of the 45s (whenever that was) - we didn’t have that many when I was a kid in the early 70’s but what about the 60’s? Come to think of it, I did have friends with reasonably large stacks - Quite frankly I could imagine that there were a lot more one hit wonders back then as we bought 45’s rather then albums. I do remember some 2 to 3 song LP’s. Maybe iTunes could go to a two song option with the bonus "flip side". Anyway - I wonder what the empirical data shows for that scenario. My point is, this isn’t that new of a model. Maybe if all these single song downloads were not there these artists wouldn’t be selling anything (Big difference between .99 and $14 for a CD). Maybe today’s artists simply cannot fill an album. I was a fan of bands like Genesis, YES and Pink Floyd as a kid - so I "Had" to buy the album to get the full picture. However I never would have bought an album from Gary Wright even though I knew Dream Weaver by heart after making my "tape mix" from a friend or the radio.
www.windaction.org | Tilting at T. Boone Picken’s windmills
I’m not sold on this windmill thing either. T. Boone is a terrific capitalist but this post makes a really good point, you can’t strap a windmill on a car - and that’s where the oil is going. What’s one got to do with the other?
FOXNews.com - Recycling Nuclear Fuel: The French Do It, Why Can’t Oui? - Opinion
Maybe when gas hits $5/ gallon and the other fossil fuels start to rise we will consider this. We cannot get Yucca Mountain operational and why put it all there if we can recycle it. Why store it when you can reuse it. I just makes sense. If I have to live with a liberal president in Obama then I hope they do some progressive things like this in his administration. Rather then hiding further in the fantasy that we can reduce our energy needs and save the environment. I’m all for reducing the use of Coal and other fossil fuels, and we can see that France is using nuclear power in a positive way (Can you think of a more liberal country?) so lets just do it already!
FORTUNE: Apple 2.0 iPhone vs. BlackBerry 9000: The keyboard wars, round 2 «
I have to say that the keyboard is the biggest reason I’m not sold yet on the iPhone. Okay for the weekend but I really type a lot on my Blackberry. I do it with my thumbs - not sure I could get the speed I need with the virtual keyboard and not "feeling it"
With 3G coming out - it will be hard to resist though. Maybe they should come out with a version based on the old iPod design with a keyboard instead of the spin wheel. I wonder what other models will come out next year?
