ULA1 nextgen idea...

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bwinkel67
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Re: ULA1 nextgen idea...

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Brane2 wrote:
bwinkel67 wrote: I'm in the process right now of installing Windows 7 on my wife's machine that had its disk fail after running for 5 years. On all my installations, the first thing I do is turn updates off. I've never used updates on any of my machines and don't have any compatibility issues (I run the latest version of Chrome as well as other apps with no problem). The nice things about not using updates is you don't eventually experience a system slow down.
OK. So what do you do when you need a new piece of hardware ? Perhaps you need to change graphic card.
Or when nVidia, AMD or Intel improve drivers so taht they run, say 10 or 15% faster in some situations ?
Or when problems crop up, like with task scheduler policy WRT Zen and are then patched ?

You ignore them ?

Why of some of those fixes matter to you ?
I use mostly laptops (though I have a 2013 iMac dual-booted) and have never needed to upgrade any hardware (graphics or otherwise) on any of them (who does that even now days other than if you are building your own system and are a serious gamer). Maybe occasionally replace a broken hard drive but that's it. They kind of work as designed. Like I said, I'm for newer hardware and if that requires newer OS to utilize then so be it. But I've also downgraded a laptop that came with Windows 8 to Windows 7. We also were recently given a Windows 10 all-in-one HP that we are possibly downgrading in the future to Windows 7 because the poor things is crippled and runs dog-slow.


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bwinkel67
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Re: ULA1 nextgen idea...

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Brane2 wrote: And out of all that, on aproject he was supposedly living for, what design work is genuinely his ?
Anywhere I look, he was just finding mules to delegate his work on.

That's how design work. You have someone that has a vision and find a group of people to implement that. Steve Jobs was the same way.
Brane2 wrote: I'm just not buying claims of hims as some great visionary with X-ray vision and insane capabilities.
He was definitely a visionary and his company was one of the few seen on the leading edge for a time. He was able to gather some talent and impact the computing world in the 80's. Lots of people tried doing that and we only get to hear of a few that succeeded.


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bwinkel67
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Re: ULA1 nextgen idea...

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Brane2 wrote: Or when nVidia, AMD or Intel improve drivers so that they run, say 10 or 15% faster in some situations ?
BTW, this happens independent of the OS. The device drivers are something you can update by going to the manufacturer and that happens with Windows 11 as well.


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bwinkel67
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Re: ULA1 nextgen idea...

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Brane2 wrote:Elon Musk is a visionary. He does hire people, but he is deeply ingrained with every apsect of all of his project and he does REGULARLY "dirty" his hands with real work, be it design, some support programming etc.
Not a fan of Musk. But if what you say is true, all I can say is "yikes" as that is not someplace I'd want to be an engineer at. Worst thing is to have the "boss" involved in the details. No one is an expert at everything and his systems are too complex for him to have that expertise. So if he's butting in that would be a horrible experience.


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Re: ULA1 nextgen idea...

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Brane2 wrote: Sandy Munro happens to think otherwise. But what would he know about tech or cars anyway ?
That's irrelevant, I'm speaking about the poor engineering teams that have to deal with a meddling owner. Far too many micro managers out there.


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Re: ULA1 nextgen idea...

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Brane2 wrote:Which fits Tesla's starts 100%. And SpaceX. They were on a brink of bankrupcy, Elon went in with ALL of what he had in they depleted that more than just to dangeruos levels.
And he was part of the team from the start.
Both in SpaceX and Tesla.
Elon's latest work:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t705r8ICkRw

Where can we see anything even approaching this level of insight with Clive and why was he "a genius" ?

As I said, not a fan...I think we're having a vanilla vs strawberry discussion here :-/


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Re: ULA1 nextgen idea...

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bwinkel67 wrote:
Brane2 wrote: Sandy Munro happens to think otherwise. But what would he know about tech or cars anyway ?
That's irrelevant, I'm speaking about the poor engineering teams that have to deal with a meddling owner. Far too many micro managers out there.
Well, reminds me of a great story about Bill Gates: https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2006/06/ ... lg-review/ : "He didn’t meddle in software if he trusted the people who were working on it, but you couldn’t bullshit him for a minute because he was a programmer."


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Re: ULA1 nextgen idea...

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mk79 wrote:
bwinkel67 wrote:
Brane2 wrote: Sandy Munro happens to think otherwise. But what would he know about tech or cars anyway ?
That's irrelevant, I'm speaking about the poor engineering teams that have to deal with a meddling owner. Far too many micro managers out there.
Well, reminds me of a great story about Bill Gates: https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2006/06/ ... lg-review/ : "He didn’t meddle in software if he trusted the people who were working on it, but you couldn’t bullshit him for a minute because he was a programmer."
One thing I loved about working at Microsoft was its hierarchy. Software Engineers were at the top and Software Architects were below them, which is opposite most companies that see software engineering as a commodity.

Mike


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Re: ULA1 nextgen idea...

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I ordered popcorn - I wondered when we might get to the yellow brick road on this thread - I saw the horny back toad already...

I was also thinking of getting one of those hair net's like the old dears in the hairdressers have - so I could get it metallized to reduce RF emissions :D

I invent. I don't do it to make money - but somewhat like a mountain climber climbs mountains because he can and they are there. I invent for pleasure - and sometimes to produce a useful tool or a toy to amuse me.

Anyway back on topic - why did Nasta 'nix' the idea of a combined CPU/ZX8301 plug in PCB?


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Re: ULA1 nextgen idea...

Post by Nasta »

Pr0f wrote: Anyway back on topic - why did Nasta 'nix' the idea of a combined CPU/ZX8301 plug in PCB?
I did not - Sinclair did in a way (more below).
Somewhere at the start of the thread it was stipulated that the basic version of this 8301 replacement would be a board that plugs into the original 8301 socket. I just said this limits what you can do quite a lot (for instance you can't bank-interlieve because the address multiplexing scheme has already been set up by the 8301 and the 74LS257 on the motherboard.
The problem with making it a board that also plugs into the CPU socket is that the CPU socket is (on non-Samsung QLs) utter cr*p. In most cases even the ULA, IPC and ROM socket which in all it's cheapness is much better, tends to have problems with pins you can get to 'emulate' IC pins.
In most cases these are turned pin headers, which fit perfectly into turned pin sockets - if only those were used originally. When plugged into standard sockets these will mate OK though if one is not careful may break if not aligned properly and forced into the socket, but they have a tendency to creep out of the socket with thermal cycling.
The regular square pin headers use thicker pins, and while it is certainly possible to insert them into a regular low cost socket (they do not fit turned pin sockets), that socket will thereafter never sit a regular IC properly.
The original QL motherboard 48 pin sockets has pins made of tinfoil (there it is again...) or something made of a butter+turnip alloy* They barely survive inserting the original CPU while maintaining contact, let alone something with thicker pins, AND they are higher profile compared to the 8301 socket so more problems there.

* Butter+turnip alloy is any material that at first glance looks a bit lighter than one expects (kind of like comparig a turnip with a potato) and on applying force initially seems quite hard and elastic, but on application of the same force in non-test conditions suddenly goes to permanent plastic deformation, similar to butter.


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