All posts by MikeB
Below are all of MikeB's postings, with the most recent are at the bottom of the page.
jb38: Sorry about that, but my wife complained that I was using the laptop when she was trying to do some work, so I forgot to change the name!
The vogue for 'adapters' came in some years ago with the D year Samsung LED's - they came with a small plugin thing, which customers had the unfortunate habit of throwing away with the box, not realising what it was, having not read the manual.
Panasonic basically copied the back of the Samsung (but turned it through 180 dgrees), and this included the adapter. However, relatively few still have this (Samsung's not have one scart and RGB/phonos), with only the Panasonic E6/ET61(?) from last year doing this (I really should look at this years models).
However, there should normally be something still (even top end TV's still generally have one), but it might take a careful look to find it!
I can see why manufacturers have this route in reducing the number of scarts, etc. Pretty much everything for the past 5 years or more should(!) have HDMI's, but they still have to think about legacy equipment. But I point out to my customers that rather than spend good money on various adapters to make that DVD work, they are better buying a blu-ray for £60(?), which smart, plays everything, and is of course HDMI. As for video, just how many people still use one?
Of course, since I have an old CRT, with 5 boxes attached, I do actually need an adapter, but its not something I'd recommend!
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John Martin: If you ask MikeP, he might have something to say about the speed of rural internet...and frankly, some of my customers are on slow copper just 3 miles from the centre of a major city - and their development was built no more than 10-15 years ago.
As for Sky...these days, I dont think you'd notice much of a difference between Sky, cable, Freesat or terrestial digital. And judging by the number of questions about Sky reception, I suspect its not perfect all the time yet..
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John Martin: The problem is that broadband provision and speed is very spotty - you might have fantastic speed in one village, but dreadful the next, and this applies to urban areas as well. BT must take its share of the blame for being so slow in rolling out rural broadband, despite being paid by the taxpayer to do so, but its not a problem that can be solved overnight, even with 4G, etc.
I'd say, whatever works for you, but for many people, streaming is not a solution at present.
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RichardB: 'The BBC most certainly is extreme leftist, green and out of touch....socialist bureaucracy' - please dont hold back, say what you really think! Personally, although the BBC is not perfect (as I'll prove in a minute), it tends to work pretty well overall. I simply cannot see the point of putting off its production arm in order to please an ideological situation, not a practical one. Management guru's might think it fashionable to outsource everything, but in the real world much of this outsourcing is being reversed, since it has led to all sorts of problems. If you want something done properly, do it yourself. I do totally agree with you about the public sector not being able to negotiate a decent contract. I often visualise the private and public sector as a couple, walking arm in arm. The private sector is wearing a T-shirt which says 'I'm with stupid'. The public sector's T-shirt reads 'Yes, I am stupid, but I'm in love..' Climate change discussion is not what this website is about, but when considering the treatment the BBC gives of the subject, I would point out that every single scientific academy on the planet, plus those well known treehuggers the Pentagon and the CIA think climate change/global warming is real and a threat. If you dont believe them , try the people who ultimately insure you, such as Munich and Swiss Re Managing climate and natural disaster risk | Swiss Re - Leading Global Reinsurer - Since evidence of climate change has been well established for the past 30 years, you'd think the BBC would be relaxed and familiar in dealing with it, but this is not so. On the contrary, it is incrediably reactive, and basically only covers important reports, etc. This will normally invovle a very cautious report by David Shukman, and often a 'discussion' in the Today studio. I admit that I have complained to the BBC about such debates in the past (I got interviewed about Lawsons appearence by 'Feedback', during which I seemed to talk incrediably, incrediably, slowwwly), so I'm not unbiased. But the BBC has been repeatedly warned by senior scientific figures that their attempt at 'balance' was totally misleading, since they were trying to put two sides to a story, when in reality 97% of published climate scientists agree that climate change is real. John Oliver illustrated this false balance perfectly in his US TV show a little while back - Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Climate Change Debate (HBO) - YouTube , which rightly went viral. Yet the BBC still continues to have debates between hugely eminent scientists and people who have no scientific background or expertise. Lawson was possibly on Today because their researchers tried to find a scientist to argue against the conclusions of the latest IPCC report. They couldn't find anyone (which should have been a sign), so they got him. Would you expect a discussion with a top doctor about the latest advances in brain surgery to stop dangerous fits to be balanced by an ex politician who is convinced that such fits are caused by demonic possession? Even worse, their interviewers dont have a clue about the science (they could do worse than quickly look at the excellent www.skepticalscience.com), and ask daft questions. The male presenters of Today are all pretty bad at this. Hopefully, BBC News will actually start reporting what scientists are saying, rather than treating it as a philosophical discussion point. As for the RM privatisation, this is a business with the lions share of parcel deliveries in the UK (a growing market), a long established infrastructure, and a large property portfolio, often in city centres and close to key transport links. Sounds like a valuable asset to me. I would argue that their was no need to privatise in the first place, but there tends to be a pattern of state assets (which we often rely on) sold off cheaply, only to pay vastly more later with far less control. I would start with the former BR rolling stock being sold off during rail privatisation (ROSCO's), and the profits that have accrued since http://www.official-docum…pdf. This a decent overview of rail privatisation here: Rail privatisation: legalised larceny | Aditya Chakrabortty | Comment is free | The Guardian I like capitalism, but I dont like being ripped off.
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MikeP: I would suggest you have a look at www.skepticalscience.com, since it discusses several of your points. To make things easy, they are no.88, possibly 66, 1(?) and 14. The general theory of climate change/global warming (the terms are largely interchangable) has been around since the time of Arrhenius in 1896, building on Tyndall's work in the 1860's investigated the absorption of infrared radiation in different gases, such as CO2. Callender argued that data showed a correlation between CO2 and tempreture increases in 1938. Edward Teller expressed the possibility of CO2 emissions leading to the melting of the icecaps in 1957. Syukuro Manabe and Richard Wetherald came up with the Manabe-Wetherald one-dimensional radiative-convective model in 1967, which calculated the forcing effect of a doubling of CO2 using the then latest data and computers. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, an adviser to Nixon, wrote a memo in Sept 1969 to the president, warning of climate change and its effects. Roman grapes - try http://www.realclimate.or…ain/ , although the argument is really covered by SkepticalSciences very first point. The BBC's job is to reflect the scientific evidence, and not pander to poltical bias, which is why they should report what the scientific community is actually saying. What they say is very clear, as you can see on the website of the Royal Society.
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Phil Deasey: Since the title of this thread only tends to appear in really good, weather, not bad, you might want to check your system - if your egtting a problem during raid or just after, most likely its rain getting into the cabling.
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michele: Your postcode indicates that you can only get the light transmitters at Arfon or Llandecwyn, but your pretty close to the first, so everything should OK.
First thing - are you tuned to that transmitter? You could have picked up another transmitter, much further away, and so only the strongest signal is showing up. If you are tuned to Arfon, are your aerials pinting the right way? However, if your missing a mux, perhaps its your system - could be frayed or corroded cable or connections. Some one last year said something similar about their system - and it turned out the booster was on the way out (do you actually need a booster? try bypassing it).
If it was all running off one aerial/booster, it would be easier to track down the problem, but two is odd...
Of course it could be that you are getting all the feed from one (duff) aerial connection, with the other connected to nothing - in buildings with all sorts of systems it does happen!
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Jonathan: Com 4 is working fine for me, so perhaps check your system for a loose connection, dodgy cable, etc - might be one reason its vanished.
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Quinnicus: If you had bad weather at the time, check your system, might be moisture getting in.
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Sunday 13 July 2014 12:07PM
jb38: Before buying anything new, almost certainly you already have a scart connection in the back of the TV, although it might be hidden away somewhere (certain Panasonics, for instance). You need to look at your manual.
It does mean that you wont get HD from your Sky box, but if you upgrade to Sky HD, then they will even give you an HDMI lead to plug in. Of course your new TV might (hopefully) have an HD tuner in it (or even a sat tuner), so you can still get HD.
Personally, anyone should buy a new TV expecting to to only have one scart, and certainly dont buy something to match something you bought 5-10 years ago, because HDMI is where things are now, not scart.