Who’s Peta Wilson? and other midnight minutae
I don’t know who he or Peta Wilson is (but suspect from the context it’s a “she”), not why people seem so keen to leave links to a site about her on a certain other railway modelling forum (other than that they’re friendless saddo’s).
It seems somewhat incongruous, thought, that the latest spammer used a freebiblemail.com address.
Have slept intermittently since this afternoon I’ve been for a pootle to Tesco. As it’s no longer raining I jammed on a chavcap and lowered the roof before zipping there through the wonderfully empty and twisty Norfolk lanes - just me and a bunch of wildlife. I’m delighted to say that, in spite of the local wildlife appearing to be manically suicidal, not one perished at my hands - the road holding allowing me to swerve around stoats, voles and even a stupid fox who decided that the perfect time to step out into the road was just as I approached. At speed.
I’m getting used to the interest the car’s getting now - people seem to struggle to believe it exists and many of them stare open-jawed in awe at the beastlet.
I’d (casually and coolly) asked Stubby whether she was interested in going out for a spin at some time (to a romantic destination, of course, although I’ve kept that detail from her for obvious reasons).
“Is the Pope a Catholic?”
“I think so. Is that relevant?”
I seem to have pulled a muscle - at some stage during my early attempts to climb into the new car, I suspect. Ow, it smarts.
I’m not sure that my plan to sleep, eat and then sleep on until morning is going to work - I feel worryingly awake now.
I’m used to the slight delay between terrestial TV and its digital equivalent due to the time it takes signals to bounce back off the satellite. I’ve noticed recently, though, that my DAB radio lags behind both the analog radio signals and, more puzzlingly, the digital radio I get via Sky. It’s occurred to me, then, that I can no longer trust time signals on Radio 4, which is a worrying turn of events.
I must find another word to use instead of “worrying”.
That Andrex advert with the puppy. The one where the puppy has the “inspired” idea to “improve” the product by putting puppies on the roll. Why? It’s put better here.
September 26th, 2006 at 1:48 pm
Re Digi time - Yes it is about 6 seconds out on all the digi channels - BBC has had MULTIPLE complaints, but the techies say there is no cure - so if you want real time, you need to switch to FM (thats the attitude- FM All! as per the BBCs “cure”). Although, lets’ be honest - it is all irrelevant anyway in the broad scheme of things - unless, I suppose, it happens to be the last six seconds of your life - in which case it’ll be too late to matter!
Lionel: Yes, but why isn’t the digibox signal the same as the DAB?
September 26th, 2006 at 1:50 pm
BTW - any Bear will tell you that rabbits are better, because it sticks to their fur!
September 26th, 2006 at 9:12 pm
Re: DAB/Satellite. The satellite signal comes from a single source and the delay is simply propagation related (it’s a long way up and down again!). DAB HAS to be delayed because all the transmitters are on the same frequency so you have to allow for the distribution delay as well.
The distribution is done by microwave I think (I’m an analogue man myself so don’t know too much about it) and this has inherent delays. To make the system work you need to delay all the transmitters to the equivalent of the one with the longest distribution delay.
It’s all bollocks anyway because DAB sounds shit compared to good FM and it’s old technology (MP2 compression fixed in the spec) with no chance of upgrade although DAB with MP3/4 compression is going to be introduced in Australia and other countries bright enough to not have jumped in too early. Then we’ll have two different DAB specs, the US HD Radio spec and DRM which is another system designed initially to “digitise” SW radio but now with a DRM option that takes on DAB.
It’s all very confusing - no wonder the consumer is baffled and is staying away in droves (despite the spin from the industry that would have you believe otherwise).
Right, I’ll take my anorak off now!
Andy B
September 26th, 2006 at 10:36 pm
There’s no reason that the radio content should be in-sync due to the fact that their sources are different; FM, DAB, Digital satellite, Freeview radio are all separate transmissions of the same content. I guess it’s just convenient for users (and reduces complaints to the broadcaster) if the programmes start/end at approximately the same time as advertised in the listings pages. Now for some nerdy stuff about why you might want to listen to your satellite/Freeview rather than DAB (in absence of FM), see here and related page.
I found Andy’s discussion of DAB distribution delay strangely interesting. I’ll get my anorak on and conduct some further research.