Silicon Valley Diary

You SOO need to see this video!!!

Okay check this out guys and gals... there is this website called Tom's Hardware

The conducted this experiment (which I find really cool), where they subjected 4 processors to the expt.
They removed the cooling towers off the processors Intel P4, P3 and AMD Athlon and Palomino. They ran video games on all processors to give it a large load to run.

To see what happened, download this video and enjoy.
If you have a slow connection and you still want to know... I'll put up what happens and why it happens in my next post.

Victory over oneself

I dont know if this is a problem with most people or it is just me... but I have a huge amount
of trouble following timetables that I make for myself. I mean I am supposed to be working
on this layout for my indepedent study but I find myself loitering around a little too much.
What this gives rise to is lack of trust in myself.... I just dont like sitting in one place
and doing what I should be. I just hope this doesnt turn into a major problem later
in my life... I am sort of a deadline driven person I think.

As a kid I never understood what people meant by victory over oneself , and how it is
more difficult to conquer one's own mind than to conquer a country... I used to think,
"well you pretty much control yourself?!". Now I know what they meant.

The genius of Paul Simon

I cant say I used to be a hardcore Paul Simon fan but very long ago
I had heard "You can call me Al" and "Diamonds on the soles of her shoes"
and liked the songs a lot.

But very recently I heard the Sounds of Silence, written by Paul Simon
and I realise that it is not only an amazing song but also a stroke
of poetic genius. These are some of the best and most meaningful
lyrics that I have heard in my entire life.

Check them out:

Hello darkness, my old friend,
I've come to talk with you again,
Because a vision softly creeping,
Left its seeds while I was sleeping,
And the vision that was planted in my brain
Still remains
Within the sound of silence.
In restless dreams I walked alone
Narrow streets of cobblestone,
'Neath the halo of a street lamp,
I turned my collar to the cold and damp
When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light
That split the night
And touched the sound of silence.

And in the naked light I saw
Ten thousand people, maybe more.
People talking without speaking,
People hearing without listening,
People writing songs that voices never share
And no one dare
Disturb the sound of silence.

"Fools" said I, "You do not know
Silence like a cancer grows.
Hear my words that I might teach you,
Take my arms that I might reach you."
But my words like silent raindrops fell,
And echoed
In the wells of silence

And the people bowed and prayed
To the neon god they made.
And the sign flashed out its warning,
In the words that it was forming.
And the sign said, "The words of the prophets
are written on the subway walls
And tenement halls."
And whisper'd in the sounds of silence.

-- Paul Simon

The song was written after the assassination of JFK and talks of how
the world suffers because people cant communicate how they feel,
and are enticed by the commercialism in the world.
Love Paul Simon!!

Two Interesting Websites

I discovered these very interesting websites today. May be
you guys knew about this already but I didnt... but here goes.

Apparently the last two months of Dilbert's strips are online
at Dilbert Online
The best part is that you can choose any given strip and
ask for that to be printed on a Tshirt and sent home.
Something I am surely going to do soon.
This one is my current favourite.

Secondly, Feynmans lectures in NZ are online. Very very interesting
stuff... he makes things so interesting.
Feynman Online

Life, the universe and everything...

Was talking to Nivedita yesterday about the questions of
Life, the universe and everything... we also came out
with the answer 42 in about 5 mins ;-)... kidding.

I've had such a conversation on numerous
occassions with various people and there is finally
a lack of any conclusive means on my part about
everything.

One funny thing that I realised was how much the
movie Matrix seems to have grabbed our minds. Both
of us were quoting from the movie all the time...
about everything being an illusion and so on.
The truth is I think its a load of bullshit. I mean as
a figment of someone's imagination it is a very interesting
idea but somehow I am not convinced that anything
such as the Matrix exists.

Six Flags Rocks!!!!

Well now you know where I had been yesterday. For the uninitiated,
Six Flags is a chain of really cool amusement parks in the US and Europe.
The one closest from Madison is in Gurney, Illinois close to Chicago.
Man is it something!!... there are tonnes of rides there and some really
scary ones, I have to admit.

The one which made me feel the most intimidated was this one called
Vertical Velocity. You have a track which is extended vertically upto
200 feet high on two sides and a fast train oscillates a few times right upto
the top a few times at mindblowing speed. It was a lil bit too tall for me,
and I vacillated like hell before finally deciding that I have to do this
to convince myself of my own courage. And I mustered all my courage
and narrowly managed to not chicken out.... but the outcome was really
worth it. Damn good fun!!... I was in the second row on this ride and trust me,
it looks damn scary but isnt as bad as you think would be. And the adrenalin
rush afterwards is exhilarating.

All day I took various rides, including Superman, Batman, the Raging Bull,
the Giant Drop (this one was really bad too... a lift takes you 227 feet
into the sky and then youre dropped at a very dangerous pace
and suddenly brought to a halt near the ground...), Iron Wolf (standing
rollercoaster)... yeah basically most of these were rollercoasters and
obviously my friends and I like thrill rides the best. They also had an
IMAX theater in Six Flags, where we saw a movie, but this theater
wasnt half as good as the one in Bombay. Ofcourse the quality in IMAX
was as impeccable as ever.

I also did some wall climbing, for the first time in my life and I liked
it too. Almost like rock climbing and thrilling too!! I'll be putting
up my snaps from these rides pretty soon... so you can get to see
them. (Yes my new digicam ... Fuji Finepix 3800... LOVE IT!!)

Got to drive a car for the first time in the US... not a rollercoaster ride
for my fellow passengers I think, but the weather wasnt too conducive,
so didnt enjoy it as much as I would have liked to.

Click here to visit SixFlags.com

Six Degrees of Separation

Have you seen this movie? Its a lovely movie based on a hit Broadway
play. The basic concept behind the movie is this: Any person in the whole
world has a connection with any other person through a chain of at the
most 6 people. Meaning I know Bill Gates through say some friend whose
relative works in Microsoft, whose boss plays golf with Bill Gates. Such a
relation they say exists for everyone on this earth.

Well this sounds like a revolutionary idea, doesnt it? Now the Department
of Sociology at the Columbia University is pursuing this idea further
and wants to find out if this is true. They are testing this hypothesis
with the help of emails and online forms. If youre interested in
participating in this experiment go to
The Small World Project

Testing Times

These are trying times to be an electrical engineer in the US.
According to a recently released survey, unemployment is at
a 10 year high overall. IEEE also claims that its one of the highest
rates of unemployment for EEs ever at 8%, not accounting
for engineers doing odd non-tech jobs.

In such a situation, I really dont know what I should be doing.
People offer all sorts of advice from coercing me to go to
business school, take up a double masters here, or apply
for a PhD somewhere. I still have a long time to go before
I decide what I should do but its still a very confusing thing.
I am hoping I can atleast go back to India and get a job I
can like. Only time shall tell...