Barry Gershenfeld wrote:
I would be more likely to attend beginner sessions. This may be a
personal preference thing, especially as I like teaching as much as
learning. As I hinted above, I consider exploring the basics (the
underpinnings) more worthwhile than learning too much about this or
that new package. Rather than an in depth presentation, I think an
appropriate overview is consumable by newbies anyway.
As an example, I did learn about MythTV from the presentations, but I
really never knew anything about it until I tried it myself.
Do you think I could run MythTV on seriously older hardware (PII-350) if
I'm willing to run it in resolution just adequate enough for a 2-inch
diagonal? I'm probably wrong, but I think what needs most of the
compute-cycles is all the pixels of running (either recording or
displaying) in a larger window. Eventually, I'll get some giveaway
hardware that will run circles around what I'm on. And until then, I
would be happy (I think) with a 2-inch diagonal. (I would want decent
sound from the start, although I don't need anywhere near CD quality.
Vinyl record or stereo radio quality would be good enough.) Recordings
could be done in analog format (.wav for sound and .??? for video).
(Ripping from a CD happens at nearly 4x on my hardware.) Compression to
digital formats (.mp3 and .???) could be done when no recordings are
going. (My hardware encodes .wav to .mp3 (or .ogg) at about 2x.) If my
hardware can keep up with a 3-inch diagonal, so much the better. I
currently watch TV on a 19" screen from about 12 feet away. If I were
to watch from only about 1.5' away and keep the same ratio, then 2.25"
would be roughly equivalent.
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