2007 Camry: It’s Time To Go With The Youth

I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw the next generation of Toyota Camry, 2007 Camry. 2007 Camry, revealed in Detroit Motor Show last week, is sportier, younger, and prettier than ever. And its exterior body looks like a Lexus too, and this is exactly what I’m after: expensive look with low price. 😀

MacBook Pro: How Does Steve Jobs Measure That 4x Performance/Watt Thingy

ZDNet has published a psychic review for the most talked-about gadget on the planet so far this year. It’s quite amazing how people can review something without getting their hands on the reviewed stuffs these days. That’s why I call it a psychic review. Anyway, the downside part of the review is particularly interesting, because ZDNet really looked into something of paramount importance in mobile computing, but yet was constantly overlooked during the hype surrounding MBP for the past week: how long can the juice stand.

Whilst Jobs neglected to mention the battery life in his keynote, he did leave a couple of hints for us to decipher: MBP will deliver performance that’s 4x faster, and 4x as much performance per watt as the PowerBook G4. The question is, how did his underlings come up with those numbers? If you think really hard with the GOL (good old logic), you will come up with an answer like this: battery in MBP unit may be the same battery unit as the one in PB G4. And if you come up with that answer, ta-da, you’re right! Steve Jobs confirmed it in his interview with Newsweek. Here’s the excerpt:

How is battery life with the MacBook?
About the same—this with a dual processor [chip]! Each processor is as fast as a G5, and the battery life will be the same as [the previous PowerBook’s] G4.

Of course! What’s the unit normally used for measuring battery capacity? mAH, AH? mAH stands for milli-ampere-hour and AH stands for ampere-hour, which measures the amount of electricity current flowing for one hour. Electronics 101: watt is the unit for power, and the relationships between watt and ampere is P = VI (P = Power, V= Voltage, and I = Current). So if you take out V (Voltage) by assuming that output voltage is equal, then P will be proportional to I. In English, the fact that MBP performance is roughly 4x as much as PB G4 (that’s from the SPEC benchmarking performed by Jobs’ underlings), 4x Performance/Watt really means 4x performance out of the same amount battery juice. You can’t come up with 4x Performance/Watt if the batteries used in MBP and PB G4 are different. 

Disappointed? Uhmm, hell yeah…, no.1 rule for mobile computing is longer battery life, and it must be respected.

C’Moonnnnn

Quip of the day from today’s hardcopy of The Age: sport persons usually make excuses after they lose, but Lleyton Hewitt made excuses before he loses. Smart thinking Lleyton, why didn’t we think of that before, DUH!

Update: Hewitt bowed out to his latest archenemy Juan Ignacio Chela (yes, the one who spat at him last year as a retaliation against an equally idiotic C’Mon and fist-pumping from Hewitt) in the second round of Aussie Open.

House-isms Reviewed

Soon or later, “houseisms” word will be put into the dictionary. If you don’t know what it is, take a look at the picture, and it should ring a bell. If it doesn’t, either you’ve been living under the rock, or you’ve been watching too many get-rich-quick TV quizzes and shallow soap-operas with corny dialogs.

Anyway, Scott Morrison, of PoliteDissent.com, has written pretty good reviews for every “House, M.D” episode already aired. His review is a bit of a nitpick (but a good one), based on his knowledge, experience, and logic. Check it out, you’ll love it!

Also, there’s a clipping of memorable quips from Dr. House that defines the cult of houseisms. A must read, and you’ll start talking like House in no time!

Good Bumper Sticker

I saw a good bumper sticker last week that goes like this: “don’t lie, cheat, nor steal. The government hates competition”. It’s good because it’s funny and sarcastic, yet it holds some daring truth, with all due respect to whatever governments out there. And I’m not trying to be subversive here, I just like that bumper sticker. 😀