Tech Smorgasbord Archives - 5

RF Cafe University"Factoids," "Kirt's Cogitations," and "Tech Topics Smorgasbord" are all manifestations of my ranting on various subjects relevant (usually) to the overall RF Cafe theme. All may be accessed on these pages:

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Cyber Attacks on Cellphone Batteries

Draining cellphone batteries is a new sport by hackers. By usurping control of communications channels that a cellphone uses for broadband data transfer, an attacker repeatedly awakens a victim phone from its low-power mode. Verification tests were run on a Nokia 6620 phone at UC Davis that were able to reduce a battery's lifetime from 156 hours to a mere 7 hours from a fully-charged state. The process was carried out through two commercial networks without triggering any intruder alarms.

Unemployed Electrical & Electronics Engineers

 EE Times Research 2006

Year Qty. %
2005 6000 1.8
2004 18,000 2.4
2003 24,000 6.3
2002 16,000 3.8
2001 6,000 1.6
2000 6,000 1.4

Planned Retirement Income Sources by Age Group

IEEE-USA Research 2006

Source Ages %
IRA and/or

401(k)

18-34 65
35-49 57
50-64 41
65+ 23
Pension 18-34 29
35-49 37
50-64 37
65+ 38
Stocks

and/or

Mutual Funds

18-34 42
35-49 33
50-64 27
65+ 33
Social

Security

18-34 24
35-49 29
50-64 44
65+ 60

Semiconductor Component Spending by Country

 Microwaves & RF Research 2005

Country $109 %Mkt
U.S. 58.70 33.5
Japan 45.72 26.1
Taiwan 17.34 9.9
Germany 10.21 5.8
China 9.514 5.4
S. Korea 9.233 5.3
Others   14.1

 

September 2005 Internet Statistics

 Scientific American Research 2006

Every Day of the Month:

94 million people use the Internet
77% wrote/read e-mail
63% used search engines
46% read online news
29% did job-related research
18% instant messaged
18% banked online
5% booked travel
3% read blogs
3% participated in an auction

 

2005 EE Salaries U.S., E.U., & India

EE Times Research 2006

Title $US Mean
VP of Engr. 128,079
Tech. Director 119,127
Principal Engr. 109,962
Consultant 95,085
Group Leader 93,514
Sr. Engineer 91,903
Systems Engr. 86,596
Sr. Test Engr. 85,222
Project Engr. 80,124
Software Engr. 74,235
Design Engr. 71,659
Test Engr. 69,649

Perfect 2-Carat Man-Made Diamonds

A perfect man-made, single-crystal, 2-carat diamond.Perfect single-crystal diamonds of more than two carats are churned out in a single day. The gemstones are created using a process called chemical vapor deposition (CVD), which grows diamond crystals one carbon atom at a time. CVD is the same technique used to process many semiconductor circuits.

 

Gallium is a byproduct of smelting aluminum and zinc, and is more rare than gold. It, along with mercury, cesium, and rubidium, are the only metals which can be liquid near room temperature.

Arsenic is a deadly poison that is made by heating composite minerals in the absence of air.

Acting together in compound form, gallium arsenide (GaAs) has been the basis of the personal communications revolution.

Amount of Greenhouse Gases (CO2) Emitted by Household Appliance Use

Item lbs/yr
Heating 6643
Air Conditioning 4566
Hot Water Heater 2384
Refrigerator 2032
Dryer 1770
Dishwasher 840
Computer 430
Microwave 343
Washer 197
Television 196
VCR 90
Ceiling Fan 82
Printer 74
Alarm Clock 74

 

The world is running out of Internet addresses. No worries, however, because Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) will solve that problem by providing up to 2128 unique IP addresses. That is the equivalent of roughly 2,000 addresses for every square meter on the Earth's surface. Question: If IPv6 replaces IPv4, what happened to IPv5?