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• Couple of things to consider. It is almost certain that electricity will triple or quadruple in cost when a large number of electric cars are plugged into the grid. Your electric bill will be as high or higher only if you make all these changes, otherwise it will be over $500 a month, which is your incentive to change. The electric companies are scrambling to install smart meters. They are not doing this to put meter readers out of a job, they are preparing to capitalize on variable pricing.. Of course we have learned recently the software is hackable and not secure.
  
  Figure $5 gas and convert to electricity and that will be the price. I found a conversion factor of 6 miles per kilowatt-hour. You can't do a btu conversion because gas is soooo inefficient . A car that gets 60 mpg will require an equivalent of 10 kilowatt-hours of electricity at an equivalent price of 50 cents a kilowatt.. Driving around for a day on 60 cents worth of electricity is not going to happen in the future, unless you generate the electricity. Of course you need to buy the equipment which will require a second mortgage. In reply to: "GE: Smart grid yields net-zero energy home"

  July 15, 2009

  0 replies

• A User
  As a user that has been dragged along with every software change and OS upgrade, XP is the first MS OS that has been stable. Why change? Does Vista provide an undeniable advantage that makes a company want to replace all the hardware and software they currently use while suffering downtime and added expense?. Computers are tools, not hobbies. Once the screw driver was perfected, did you buy a new screw driver every two years because they changed the handle? Upgrading or replacing software always carries the burden of a learning curve. As a private user, probably half my productivity apps will not run on Vista and MS will stick it to me as far as requiring new MS apps, even though my current apps meet my needs. That's why some people hate MS. Every two years they sink the hook and drag you into spending more money, much, much, more than just the OS software. Remember the upgradeable towers; you upgraded by throwing them away. Well, you still have to throw everything away. In reply to: "Gartner: Windows is collapsing"

  April 11, 2008

  0 replies

• Another traveler's opinion
  What I want in a device on the road:
  Long battery life
  Ability to work with documents, forms, spreadsheets, mapping like Streets and Trips
  Instant on and off
  Small form factor to work on crowded airplanes
  light weight
  Occasional connectivity to exernal drive for documents and backup.
  Internet access including e-mail
  GPS (wish list)
  Bullet proof and permanent data repository (mandatory)
  MUST BE ABLE TO USE VERIZON AZ ACCESS CARD
  
  I don't want a smart phone, I prefer a simple phone. I really liked my several Palm Pilots but when the program froze solid on the last, I never replaced it. Palm Pilots were easy to use, easy to lose, and they lost important data easily.
  
  My big gripe is all the money I am paying for connectivity in my life. I canceled my land lines and mailboxes and call waiting and dial-up ISP, canceled cable, won't pay for smart phone connectivity. I have pared down to the VZA card and a simple mobile phone, and a gigantic lugtop from HP, costs about $130 a month and I have just about perfect connectivity and productivity anywhere in the US, except on a plane and I spend a lot of time on planes. I swap the card among several of my special purpose computers. I consider the Foleo a special purpose computer that will replace smart phones. I have not found the sub notebook at a reasonable price that meets my travel needs so continue to carry the lugtop with almost no battery life.
  
  Syncronising documents gets to be a real major pain as well as backups and accidental Save? No. I'm not sure what is more traumatic, losing a girl friend or two months worth of contact and billing data among several clients after the Palm Pilot slipped out of my pocket. Or when the %$# Pilot froze, twice, I lost another 2 months of billing data and then a year of billing info on the PC was overwritten with nothingness when I tried to repair it. No more Palm Pilots, they are toys. The Foleo MUST have a bullet proof data repository, otherwise it's a toy, no sale. My USB flash thumbs get scrambled so are now considered toys. I agree with the other poster, some stuff is for kids and some stuff is for adults.
  
  I will always use a wide screen lugtop as a home computer because you can lock it up in a metal box.
  
  Off-topic:
  Big, big market out there for SIMPLE cell phones with pre-paid minutes, no use it or lose it or monthly fee. I'd buy them for my elderly parents for safety reasons. Once they got over the technophobia, they would get and use regular cell phones or re-load minutes. To them, cell phones are star wars technology and I know all are far too complicated for the average 65 let alone 90 year old, yet they are perfect for oldster safety.
  There should be a disaster channel on all cell phones so local emergency information can be broadcast and then dialed into.

  June 2, 2007

  0 replies