What’s that image? That’s a cross section of the main suspension cable for the new Self Anchored Span (SAS) on the new San Francisco – Oakland Bay Bridge. The SAS main cable is made up of 137 individually pulled segments, a total of over 17,000 individual wires. And they just completed the stringing operation, a month early:
I love this kind of thing; I’m addicted to shows like Build It Bigger, World’s Toughest Fixes, Big, Bigger, Biggest, etc. I own a few books on Boston’s Big Dig and other such projects. There have already been episodes on the new Bay Bridge, and I’m sure there will be more once it is completed. Anything with extreme engineering. (Yes, I watched all of Extreme Engineering too.)
In 1912 the Alco Hydro-Aeroplane Company was founded, and later renamed the Loughead Aircraft Manufacturing Company after the founding brothers, Allan and Malcolm Loughead. In 1926 the company became the Lockheed Aircraft Company – using the phonetic spelling.
Also founded in 1912 was the Glenn L. Martin Company. In 1961 they merged with the American-Marietta Corporation to become the Martin Marietta Corporation. After years of ups and downs, mergers, buyouts, spin-off, etc., Lockheed and Martin Marietta merged in 1995, creating Lockheed Martin. This year marks the 100th anniversary of Lockheed Martin – doubly so as both parent corporations were founded the same year.
To mark the anniversary they’ve released the following video:
Watching the video it is hard not to note the many significant developments along the way – the Vega, the P-38 Lightning, the SR-71 Blackbird, the Trident SLBM, the C-130 Hercules, the B-26 Marauder, the U-2, the C-5 Galaxy, the F-117 Nighthawk, the F-22 Raptor, the F-16 Fighting Falcon, the F-35 Lightning II, the Titan I, II, III & IV ICBM/launchers, the Littoral Combat Ship, the Orion space capsule, and a lot more. Not to mention all of the milestones not shown in the video like the P-80 Shooting Star, the F-104 Starfighter, the Electra, the P-3 Orion, C-141 Starlifter, the Constellation and Super Constellation, the L-1011 TriStar, the Atlas series of ICBM/launchers, etc. That’s a packed 100 years.
What’s in a name? That which we call an Elite by any other name would still be a killer DVR. Drama aside, the TiVo Premiere Elite is no more. It has been replaced by the TiVo Premiere XL4. Which has an identical feature set. And model number. OK, so all that has changed is the branding. The XL4 is simply the Elite with a new badge.
I’ve known this was coming for a while, it was one of the things we discussed during my call with TiVo back in February. I’d heard about it through the grapevine before the call, but TiVo asked me to sit on the news until they made it official – which happened this weekend. They feel the ‘XL4′ branding is more in line with the Premiere and Premiere XL branding, and more clearly indicates where the product sits in the lineup. (Note there has been at least one report out there than the XL is becoming the XL2. I confirmed with TiVo that that is incorrect, the XL remains the XL.)
So nothing changes feature-wise, it is just a change to branding – which includes new, glossy retail packaging, more retail marketing, etc. The Elite was initially sold in a plain brown box, primarily through custom installers and high-end A/V retailers. For example, Best Buy sold the Elite through their Magnolia centers – kind of high-end sub-stores within the Best Buy. But the XL4 looks like it will be on shelves alongside the Premiere and Premiere XL.
So now we have the Premiere for $149.99 – now with 500GB drive and dual cable(analog/digital)/FiOS/antenna tuners, the Premiere XL for $249.99 – with 1TB and dual cable(analog/digital)/FiOS/antenna tuners, and the Premiere XL4 for $399.99 – with 2TB and four cable(digital only)/FiOS tuners. The XL & XL4 are THX Certified and come with Glo backlit remotes, but otherwise the features are the same across the three units.
And since this is kind of a non-event, some entertainment:
TiVo is running another sweepstakes, this one is dubbed TiVo’s Big Gas Sweepstakes. You can enter the sweepstakes via TiVo’s Facebook page, but it is probably easier to just do it through sweeps.tivo.com. The sweepstakes began on 4/17/12 at 12:00:00 PT and ends on 5/17/12 at 20:59:59 PT.
As you might expect, this time around they’re giving away gas – or, rather, $1000 in gas cards. Four people will each win ten $100 Chevron gift cards. It looks like they’ll work at Texaco as well, as Chevron and Texaco are sister companies. Which would be good for me if I win; there are no Chevron stations in my area, but there are a few Texaco stations.
In connection with the sweepstakes, TiVo is also running a promotion – purchase a new $149.99 TiVo Premiere with $499.99 product lifetime service or a one-year commitment to $14.99 monthly service, and receive a TiVo 802.11n WiFi adapter free. See www.tivo.com/freeadapter for details. TiVo calls it an $89.99 value, but that’s the full MSRP. Amazon has them for $64.50.
The sweepstakes is open to everyone, so you may as well enter. Even if you don’t have a car you can always sell the cards to someone else for less than face value. Selling them for 75 cents on the dollar still nets you $750, and the buyer saves 25% on gas.
What’s that image? That’s a cross section of the main suspension cable for the new Self Anchored Span (SAS) on the new San Francisco – Oakland Bay Bridge. The SAS main cable is made up of 137 individually pulled segments, a total of over 17,000 individual wires. And they just completed the stringing operation, a month early:
