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So-called “Circuits in Plastic” (CIP) technology is making your nasty unrecyclable circuit board a thing of the past.  Professor David Thiel and MadhusudanRao Neeli at the faculty of engineering and information technology at Griffith University in Brisbane are set to shake up the computer and electronics industries by discovering a way to make circuits out of plastic.

“The circuit board is a plastic sheet in which all components are placed in divots,” Thiel said. “The conductor is screen-printed into a thin cover sheet which is then thermally bonded to the circuit board.”

I for one am looking forward to this product being widely available in manufacture.  I figure once they get the manufacturing to a point where circuits of a reasonable size can be created, portable electronics will be the first to really benefit from this.  Just imagine not having to buy a new cell phone every time you dumpy our in the toilet, or digital watches which are truly water proof, or cameras that you can actually use underwater.  I think this type of technology has implications far beyond just simple circuit boards.  I can see it used to wire cars or other transportation where short circuits would be a thing of the past.

CIP aim to be more environmentally friendly than traditional circuits as they can be made from recycled plastic, don’t contain any hazardous substances, and since packaging is part of the base circuit board there is no need additional packaging material.

How cool will this be used in actually packaging with e-ink paper… The package could be more fun than the product it holds.

Looks like the old incadescent bulb is getting a face lift, or a new heart as the case may be.  I didn’t think it would be long before CF bulbs and their slim margins took a back seat to the old tried, tested, loved and big margin incandescent bulbs.

The NY Times’ Green Inc. blog says the inner capsule of these new bulbs, developed by California-based Deposition Sciences, is coated with a material that is able to reflect the heat back onto the filament, part of which is converted back into light. This technology, currently featured in Philips Halogena Energy Savers line, has resulted in the bulb using 30% less power and lasting 3x longer than normal incandescents.

CF bulbs are still about 2.5x more efficient than these new incandescent bulbs. But these new bulbs will get more efficient with time, don’t take forever to warm up to full brightness, don’t make your home feel like a lab or mental institution and don’t contain mercury.

once the tech is sorted out and mas production starts, these bulbs could go for the same costs as old style incandescents.  I for one will gladly pay $5 for a bulb like this just to stay away from the mercury and horrible headache inducing light a CF gives off.

If you want to get a few of these, they can be purchased through Amazon here.  More information about the Philips Halogena Energy Savers line of bulbs can be found here.

Now that you have read my article on Ubuntu and want to take a look at it, but are still not quite ready to make a CD, you can try it out right in Windows.  Portable Ubuntu for Windows is a Ubuntu system running as a Windows application.  You can download it here.  Now if you are running Vista you may not be able to get this to work for you as I have read elsewhere on line, but if you are on Windows XP it should be just fine.  Take a look at the project web site, it is really small and has just enough to get you started.  If you don’t like it, you just uninstall it the same way you uninstall any other progeam that doesn’t fit your fancy.  If you do like it, hop on over to Ubuntu.com and get the full version to try out.

Well I’ve done it. I have moved to Linux. Well, almost. You see, I can’t use 3D Max or Illustrator on Linux and they are two of the programs I have to have on my system. Other than that, I am done with Windows for good this time. So what is the big deal with moving to Linux? Why doesn’t everyone move over? Well, this is where we seem to get into the standard objections. What if I have to send a file to someone? Isn’t it really hard to run Linux? Won’t my computer not work with everyone else’s? Will my camera/iPod/printer/ you name it work on Linux? Linux won’t run the newest programs or hardware.

Linux used to be hard to use, all those command line entries, sudo this, apt-get install that, but not any more. Linux has come as far forward as Vista has gone backwards. You don’t worry about viruses, applications that mess up your system, or updates that come too late to protect your computer. All these are Windows problems. I’m not going to give you a step by stem on how to install and use Linux, well maybe I will later, but not now. Suffice to say, there are loads of Linux distros or distributions to choose from which tend to scare people away. I suggest you go to Ubuntu, download the latest version and use Nero on your Windows computer to burn an ISO CD. Pop it into your hard drive and try Linux right off the disk. Yep, that’s right. Right off the CD you can try out Linux, see what it is like, how it is the same or different. If you don’t like it, just pop it out and stay with Windows.

Most of these excuses, and I call them excuses are false. Think about what you use your home computer for. Really? Be serious. Think about what you really use it for. Email. Surfing the web. The occasional word document… Ah, your taxes… Saving your pictures, music, video. All of these you can do on Linux as easily as you can on Windows. You can still send files to people. Granted, you do have to use the Save As option and usually select a windows format so your recipient can open the file. And by doing so, you can still open it on your Linux system just by clicking it. You see Linux doesn’t care if it is a Windows format. It just opens it. If you write a word document in Open Office Writer and save it as a Microsoft Word document, anyone you send it to who uses windows can open it and is none the wiser of your elite computer skills.

I’ll be honest though. It is different. It takes a bit of getting used to, the same as relearning how to judge the length of your car when you buy a new one and you are in a tight situation. But you do get used to it quickly. And, you get bragging rights. I have been using Open Office for a couple of years now and have been a user of Firefox Web browser and Thunderbird Mail for years on my Windows computer. Open source, or free programs are nothing new to me, but, Linux as a full time desktop is. I have used other operating systems on and off over the years way back before windows I used Dr.DOS and have occasionally put Linux on well out dated computers. This though is the first time I have had it on a new computer that was my main system. In the past, Linux on an old computer made it faster, gave me great performance gains on a toy system. This time on a newer computer it is really fast.

My brother in-law came to me the other day and asked me if I could help him reinstall Windows onto his year old Toshiba laptop that he uses for work. I offered to put Ubuntu Linux on it instead. It took about 2 hrs to install it, update it, connect to his wireless Internet, get connected to his windows network at home for file sharing and add the free programs so he could do everything he needs to do. All this was done in a very familiar Windows style environment with a few mouse clicks and a bit of text entry. I had to select things like his user name and password… tough stuff that. Great thing is that when he goes to the library, or coffee shop and uses their unsecured wireless network, he doesn’t have to worry about anyone hacking his computer, or getting viruses on line.

I have asked my brother in law to keep me up to date on how he enjoys the system and I will be posting updates as they come in. He is a great test subject as he would be considered a casual computer user. I will also be posting my own experiences with Linux as a desktop system and as a whole home automation server as I get it installed in our house. If you think you might be interested in trying it out, there is loads of get started information on the net that is easy to understand. Below I have put a few links to get you started.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux
http://www.ubuntu.com
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/GraphicalInstall

Hmmm… Think about this for yourself.
Given that all the US car companies are rushing out vehicles with astounding MPG and new shapes, platforms etcetera, begs the question as to if we be concerned for quality of design and engineering?

Consider only months ago they were complaining that building fuel efficient cars, in their large car size range, would be something that could push them over the edge of profitability.  Yet now in record time they seem to be releasing new cars almost on a weekly basis.  How can an industry which for years which told us that a platform takes 4 years to develop and test and hundreds of millions of dollars all of a sudden pop them out in record time.  Even recently 18 months was the bare minimum to bring a new model on an existing platform to market.

Something is rotten in the State of United.