crappyjones123

the mechanical portion of calculus can be taught to a 6th grader. i learnt it then. so did friends of mine. its all just methodical junk at the non application level. the thinking portion comes with experience but i certainly dont agree with it being hard course. in india its part of the curriculum in 10th grade. every kid in high school (public or private) has to take it. china and japan work similarly from what i have heard from the other phd people here. it is public perception that makes math hard. anyone who can learn how to tie a shoe lace or a tie or any procedural task can learn at least the mechanical portion of calculus. bperboy, that sounds very troubling. today i stopped 2 people from stealing the food i had kept in the fridge in the graduate student lounge. guess i have to start writing my name on it from now on.

worse...math for arts kids. its the lowest level of math the school offers. pretty annoying to have to sit there and try to get people to get from 6/8 to 3/4 and connect that to (4x^2)/(2x^3). some people just dont make the connection no matter how much you try.

had some lousy luck with laptops in the past few days. just got my eee pc netbook from woot today and the damn thing froze every time i moved the mouse. after about an hours use, the hard drive stopped responding. called the tech line and they said i had to reformat after i told them the error codes. that was all fine because the machine was new so didnt have anything on it. after a reformat, same error popped up again after a few minutes. sent an email to woot for an rma. lets hope they authorize it. at school, i taught 3 sections of college algebra today. after teaching higher level courses, teaching something elementary can really knock you on your ass. its so much easier dealing with people in their graduate degrees because i can assume a lot of things. with these freshman, i cant assume anything at all. hard to even get them to pay attention in 100 student lectures. but it was a fun experience.

im not sure i follow whats going on here...the amp itself was playing music? with no speakers/headphones attached? if yes, thats WEIRD!

happy birthday good sir.

every single ent doc ive been to has been dead against using q-tips or any kind of bulby swabing thingamajiggy. instead of cleaning the ear canals, it packs the wax tighter and closer to the ear drum causing pain and hearing loss causing one to turn up the volume which in turn causes further damage. all of them suggested ear irrigation. but im sure theres another side to the story.

not really a meet. went to carls awesome house for a few hours and listened to some tunes via speakers. in the line up were super small fonkens (forget if they were micro or mini fonkens) but the damn things were tiny and metronomes. some uber apogee speakers i hadnt known about were added to the mix towards the end for a song. amp of choice was some unknown 10 watt tube concoction which sounded quite nice feeding the metronomes. the fostex fe 127e drivers were enabled and the midrange was everything that it was hyped up to be if not better. the top end was lot a little but it was just the right amount of loss for a really nice listening session. even at louder volumes the music wasnt fatiguing. the metronomes by themselves put out a reasonable amount of bass but throwing in a subwoofer tended to balance out the sound. we kept throwing in the sub randomly and the metronomes sounded excellent both with and without them. without, the midrange and the highs were better expressed. the bottom end suffered a tad though. the sound also seemed to be coming from these two general blobs in the air. with the sub, the bottom end got better but the highs took a back seat but only to a point where they werent piercing or distracting. the blobs had increased in radius and instrument placement in front of me was bettered. sound was no longer as beamy. sara k's voice sounded every bit as raspy as i had previously heard. for near field listening i cant imagine a better speaker for its size/cost/ease to power. there is certainly a sweet spot (speakers were toed in heavily imo, forgot to play with their angles of placement) however off axis listening wasnt bad at all. metronomes werent very warm, midrange was superb, a small sub would help a lot (cant expect too much from a 4.5" driver), no shrieks or hot treble. very musical speaker with absolutely no ear fatigue. i like. next came the tiny fonkens which were every bit as detailed as the metronomes but had a very funky top end. very bright and cold sound signature even with a tube amp. with a sub they sounded remarkable in the dynamic range dept, far better than i was expecting out of them but they were removed from the party after a 3 song stint given their super analytic nature and hot treble. i didnt like it all that much. buddy guy sounded very thin and boring. went back to the metronomes and immediately the head ache from the fonkens was gone. played a few songs from my own cd's. last time i had heard godspeed you black emperor sound this good was at the sarasota meet (hi gene ) from a woo 6 se + 650. but this was better. better drum kicks. much nicer rise to the crescendo. every single note was distinct but only in the crescendo which was odd because as it was getting there, the driver was having difficulty reproducing all the different sounds which gave the impression it was trying to do too much leading to the sound being a little blurry. single driver speakers arent supposed to do very well with complex pieces but after hearing beethoven's 7th and some godspeed, im a little confused because at the height of all the action the driver performed flawlessly but while getting there, it wasnt as impressive. the speakers werent as warm as the 650s but they were much faster which i enjoyed. everything seemed to be in the right proportion. if my bibs dont materialize i will certainly be looking at the metronomes as the next option. lastly i was introduced to some planar/ribbon apogee speaker, the name of which i forget already. WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY nicer than the metronomes. given their placement in the house and the accompanying gear i have a feeling they were quite expensive but man they sounded mighty nice. just heard one song by sara k on them. her voice was as smooth as silk. the music was very polite but it sounded realistic. even at a higher volume it wasnt even close to being as fatiguing as the metronomes which were very comfortable to my ears but after hearing the apogee speakers i could catch where the 127e drivers were lacking (but for $50 drivers i dont expect much from them). the apogee's reminded me of gary's he90 rig at the plantation meet. very polite but authoritative. everything from top to bottom in perfect proportions with a very delicate sound. i would imagine it would sound great with classical and acoustic music. rock perhaps not so much - might be a little thin on the bottom end. but from what i heard it was certainly one of the better speaker rigs ive heard. hope to spend some more time with it in the future. thanks again to carl for letting me hang out at his place and listen to some good tunes. a great time was had. ps. the metronomes are a work of art. i dont like veneers but the speakers looked amazing. very cleanly put together. i really do hope carl posts some pictures of his den. awesome man cave.

Woot : One Day, One Deal (SM) ordered 1 already. they usually go for that much refurbished. (asus 900a netbook)

god damn that looks comfortable todd. enjoy.

logic gates remain open until apple comes out with the netbook itself. i wonder if that infrared keyboard would be any good for use with it.

ORRRRRRRR what if tethering works and flash doesnt

i have no intention to buy any apple products. i think it would be a reasonable assumption that with everyone running to buy the new apple netbook, their competitors might drop the prices by a few bucks. may or may not happen. i dont know for certain.

ive decided to wait until the apple netbook surfaces or black friday whichever comes first. should either drive the price of netbooks down or get me a reduction in price of a x200 (hopefully i can get it with a 3 year warranty by that time for under 1k)

thanks for the offer absorbine but i have very fat fingers. 7" will probably far too tight for even pecking. thanks though.

thanks to both ^ a quite nicely configured x200 can be had for $1100. dont know if the netbook is worth the money at this point...perhaps ill wait for back to school sales. maybe i can catch something cheaper at best buy (have $250 in gift cards for there so trying to stick to it).

currently looking at acer aspire one (aod250). can be had from sams club for $294. i dont HAVE to spend the above mentioned amount. also cant find any real information about the differences between the z-series chips and the n-series chips except for just a different in the bus speeds. anyone actually know more about them? requirements (things i would like to have) windows xp/linux (NO VISTA. under no conditions) < 3 lbs battery should hold charge for at least 2.5 hours. (heavier laptop is ok if battery lasts longer) fanless would be nice but active cooling is ok as long as its not too loud. color must be black. dont want a fingerprint magnet but if its cheap ill live with it. dont care for hdd size/gpu etc. netbook will only be used at school for doing math shit/open office/internet. basically either all this or i just save for another month and get a lenovo x200. any thoughts/suggestions?

battery powered tube amps look cool. (is that what they are?)

for a stereo config, how big of a room would be required/adequate for these speakers?

i have a few different copies of vista licenses + xp tablet 2005 edition + windows 7 rc. no charge. i get them for free through msdnaa. just pay for shipping and i can send over the dvd/cd by thursday/friday. take a look at the following. the flagged names are ones that i have already used up. unflagged ones are what i can get licenses for.

ive been looking at the arcam solo/solo mini for a friend. depending on how much power you need and if you really really really like your sources, it may or may not be worth looking at. that said, ive done only a little research into the matter so take this post lightly.

im starting to believe the whole garbage in garbage out idea. on the run of the mill shitty mp3 encodes, the laptop speakers sound exactly like one would assume - shitty. however, on the tracks i got from hdtracks and some other hi rez stuff and well recorded albums (sara k, patricia barber, dave koz) they actually dont sound half bad. better than ibuds at least. i cant stand them with good quality music (higher bitrate etc etc)

damn i feel stupid. thanks.

anyone know the first song in the intro of the above posted video?

happy birthday sir dac.

happy birthday!