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When dumb is usually smart enough

Analysis Imagine if Intel had decided in the 1980s that all of its CPUs henceforth would have a vast parallel processing unit worth of a Cray supercomputer, integrated into every chip. This would quadruple the price of an Intel microprocessor, but “future-proof” its PCs.…

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Source:: TheRegister

Current limited power supplies are a ubiquitous feature of the bench, and have no doubt helped prevent many calamities and much magic smoke being released from pieces of electronics. But for all their usefulness they are a crude tool that has a current resolution in the range of amps rather than single digit milliamps or microamps.

To address this issue, [Yann Guidon] has produced a precision current source, a device designed to reliably inject tiny currents. And in a refreshing twist, it has an extremely simple circuit in the form of a couple of PNP transistors. It has a range from 20 mA to 5 µA which is set and fine-tuned by a pair of pots, and it has a front-panel ammeter hacked from a surplus pocket multimeter, allowing the current to be monitored. Being powered by its own internal battery (and a separate battery for the ammeter) it is not tied to the same ground as the circuit into which its current is being fed.

[Yann] is a prolific builder whose work has featured here more than once. Take a look at his rubidium reference and his discrete component clocks, for example, and his portable LED flash.

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Source:: Hackaday

DeX Pad doesn’t have an obvious role, but finding one will be fun

Hands-On I’m typing this story on a phone – a Galaxy S9+ to be precise, lodged in Samsung’s new “DeX Pad” not-a-dock that turns its high-end handsets into passable desktops when connected to a monitor or tellie over HDMI.…

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Source:: TheRegister

“His actions against me do not justify my actions against him,” Musk tweeted. …read more

Source:: CNet

Chinese citizens aren’t excited about it. …read more

Source:: CNet

Rick Allen had been missing for 36 hours, according to the BBC. …read more

Source:: CNet

If ye can board Microsoft accounts, Azure AD or even OpenID without the skipper knowing, loot be your reward

Microsoft’s launched a new bug bounty program, this time for identity services.…

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Source:: Register

Chip ships 6,400 Mbps, cuts power consumption

Samsung has shown off the first prototype of a somewhat-bonkers DRAM chip: at 8 Gbits, it’s not news in terms of scale, but the LPDDR5 silicon pushes bits out the door at 6,400 megabits per second.…

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Source:: TheRegister

A pledge has been signed by over 2,400 individuals working in artificial intelligence and robotics against the use of the technology for lethal reasons. …read more

Source:: ZDNet

Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchierai of Motherboard has a chilling story on how hackers flip seized Instagram handles and cryptocurrency in a shady, buzzing underground market for stolen accounts and usernames. Their victim’s weakness? Phone numbers. He writes: First, criminals call a cell phone carrier’s tech support number pretending to be their target. They explain to the company’s employee that they “lost” their SIM card, requesting their phone number be transferred, or ported, to a new SIM card that the hackers themselves already own. With a bit of social engineering — perhaps by providing the victim’s Social Security Number or home address (which is often available from one of the many data breaches that have happened in the last few years) — the criminals convince the employee that they really are who they claim to be, at which point the employee ports the phone number to the new SIM card. Game over.

of this story at Slashdot.

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Source:: Slashdot