Interesting Information

It's not often that some event comes along to really show humanity its true place in the universe, but two NASA spacecraft have just managed just that. I'm talking, of course, about the spectacular NASA photos of Earth as it appeared from Saturn —nearly 900 million miles away (1.4 billion kilometers) —as well as a photo of our planet as it appeared from Mercury, nearly 61 million miles (98 million km) distant. NASA took the photos Friday (July 19) using the Cassini spacecraft around Saturn and the Messenger spacecraft around Mercury as part of a global campaign to show the world how the solar system views our planet Earth. The space agency even worked to coordinate campaigns to involve space fans by having them wave at Saturn. The images, by far, are amazing. Earth and its moon stand out as bright pinpricks of light in Messenger's view from Mercury, while our planet is a pale, fuzzy dot nestled between Saturn's rings in the Cassini view. From my perspectiv...

The last thing a spy wants is to have his or her own data stolen. Going beyond encryption and biometrics, a new form of magnetoresistive RAM will render data unusable if the chip is compromised. Philips is currently

Let’s be honest; a mechanical computer probably isn’t practical in this day and age. Back in the 1800s, mechanical computers were works of modern art and a huge step in engineering. All you history buffs might recall Charles Babbage’s “Difference Engine,” (1822), or even the “Kerrison Predictor” (late 1930s). But the only place you’re likely to see a mechanical computing creation today is at your local science museum. At least, that used to be the case, until one brave electrical engineer decided to create his own version. An inventive chap, known simply as “Chris” used his electrical engineering background to put together a simplistic mechanical device that tabulates numbers. The Turbo Entabulator, as Chris dubbed it, uses a construct to punch out a series of numbers onto cards that would make any Fibonacci fan proud. That’s the extent of this archaic-looking machine, and although it doesn’t do much more than tabulate, the key feature of this machine separates it from all oth...

Ladies and gentlemen, we have a new winner. Clocking in at the remarkable processing speed of 30.65 petaflops without breaking a virtual sweat, it’s our pleasure to introduce the Tianhe-2, a Chinese super computer that is quite comfortably the fastest computer on Earth. The Tianhe-2, also known as the Milky Way 2, is the creation of China’s National University for Defense Technology. The device was built to “provide an open platform for research and education and provide high performance computing service for southern China,” according to the University of Tennessee’s Jack Dongarra. Dongarra helped compile a list of the Top 500 supercomputers in the world, and wrote a report on this latest machine.

PC sales fell 4.3 per cent in the fourth quarter despite the release of Windows 8, the latest independent figures have shown. In further bad news for the industry, which is struggling against growing smartphone and tablet sales, Gartner said worldwide PC shipments declined to 90.3 million units in the last three months of 2012, indicating that the sector was suffering from a shift in consumer habits as much as a weak global economy. The figures roughly agree with those released by rival analyst house IDC at on Friday. If said fourth quarter sales were down 6.4 per cent on 2011, the first slip for five years. "Tablets have dramatically changed the device landscape for PCs, not so much by 'cannibalizing' PC sales, but by causing PC users to shift consumption to tablets rather than replacing older PCs," said Mikako Kitagawa, principal analyst at Gartner.

A new Microsoft Office app will allow users to edit Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents on iOS. Microsoft's app is available free for subscribers to Office 365, a web-based platform that allows users to access Office via the cloud. The company released the app in the US today and will continue to launch Office Mobile across 136 markets in 29 languages over the coming days. Apple will take a percentage of subscriptions purchased from the iPhone, though neither company has said how much. The announcement, which follows news from Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference that the default search engine for Siri will be Bing instead of Google, suggests the two companies are working closer together.

If you wonder when you should turn off your personal computer for energy savings, here are some general guidelines to help you make that decision. Though there is a small surge in energy when a computer starts up, this small amount of energy is still less than the energy used when a computer is running for long periods of time. For energy savings and convenience, consider the following guidelines: Turn off the monitor if you aren't going to use your PC for more than 20 minutes. Turn off both the CPU and monitor if you're not going to use your PC for more than 2 hours. Make sure your monitors, printers, and other accessories are on a power strip/surge protector. When this equipment is not in use for extended periods, turn off the switch on the power strip to prevent them from drawing power even when shut off. If you don't use a power strip, unplug extra equipment when it's not in use. Most PCs reach the end of their "useful" life due to ...