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Old 03-18-2009, 10:57 AM   #1
Phogg
PHD in Horribleness
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Posts: 2,320
Karma: 23599604
Join Date: Dec 2008
Location: In the ironbound section, near avenue L
Device: Just a whole bunch. I guess I am a collector now.
Color E-ink, and the price tipping point

When I was in the third grade, I built my first crystal radio set. By seventh grade I was drawing circuit patterns in wax on copperclad boards and etching my own circuits. I wanted better soldering irons, better wire strippers, and a host of expensive tools. A digital multimeter that measured capacitance? Might have well wished for the moon.

When I joined the millitary They hat better equipment - but even they weren't shelling out for many digital multimeters. Some things just cost too much you know?



Then when Reagan came in - the US government bought them anyway - they had much longer calibration cycles, and didn't have to be calibrated during exercises so often. They didn't just go to depot maintenance or ELMAICO, they went to techs in every line unit and reserve station. I suspect they also went to every DOD shop with radios, and all the federal aviation personnel.



That was a lot of digital multimeters.

And what had been a pipe dream for most geeks, became affordable. Air conditioner repairers and construction electricians sprouted digital multimeters. Analog multimeters began to fade to the back tier.

The military has a host of specialized equipment that has to be repaired on site. So does aviation, and the transportation department. The communications unit in an infantry battalion used to carry three embark boxes or TMs around - and that doesn't count the manuals for admin, the armory, or motor transport. This is both a huge cost, and a logistics hassle that can now be reduced. I have been out since the soviet collapse - but I imagine that some manuals have already gone to .pdf files on lap tops.

I predict that fairly quickly - say by 2012 That the US government will switch from paper to color readers for technical manuals. This alone will be a massive high volume purchase that will yank the cost of color readers down to a level most readers can come up with. Not gradually, but pretty much overnight.

Not Nostradamus, just seeing a parallel.
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