Rants, raves and thoughts by Bob Hodgen

We got the Volt back yesterday. It was gone far too long, but we’re glad to have it back.

The dealer replaced the “Power Inverter Module.” They kept it an extra day to go through several drive and charge cycles.

Today, my daughter and I drove the Volt to Lakeland for the Sun n Fun airshow. It’s the longest trip we’ve taken so far. I thought it would make a good test to see if the repair holds up.

The image above is the Volt’s summary for the trip. Almost all of the trip was on the Interstate at 65 miles per hour. We went 42 electric miles before the gas engine came on. And got a 67.3 mpg average for the 125 mile trip. With 41 mpg in “charge sustaining” (gas engine on) mode. Electric efficiency was an impressive 4.3 miles per kilowatt hour. Not a bad overall performance.

There is a new Volt commercial which says, “The Volt is the only Electric car that can be your only car.” I think they’re right!

Yesterday afternoon the FedEx man dropped off my new iPad. I spent the afternoon getting it set up and loading apps. I had no trouble syncing my contacts bookmarks and calendars with iCloud. All my data is synced between my Mac my iPad and my iPhone. My data came over to the new iPad without a hitch.

The new ipad is only a millimeter thicker than the iPad 2, and only an ounce or two heavier. These changes are not noticeable.

What is strikingly apparent is the new screen. The new screen’s resolution is double that of the old iPad, it has four times the amount of pixels. At 2048 x 1536 pixels it’s higher than most desktop monitors! Other reviewers have compared it to seeing HD TV for the first time. Without using a magnifying glass or holding the display an inch from my face it’s impossible to see individual pixels. Text is particularly impressive, it looks like a printed page. The rounded edges of letters which typically show stair steps are crisp and sharp. Colors are bright and saturated, and the display appears to have a wider color gamut.

A few apps have been updated to use the full size of the new iPad’s display, those that have look spectacular. All of the Apple apps, iWork, iBooks, and iPhoto have been updated and look really really nice. Amazon’s Kindle app has been updated as well, the text looks like it’s printed on the page. StarWalk, the astronomy app, is particularly impressive on the new display.

Sometimes the left edge of the new iPad feels warm. I’m not surprised given that the new iPad’s display has four times the number of pixels. However, the battery life seems to be as good as if not slightly better than the old iPad. The new iPad’s battery is 70% larger than the old iPad.

The other big change with the new iPad is the rear facing camera. It’s now a five megapixel camera identical to the camera on the iPhone 4. It’s about time, the iPad 2s camera was pretty bad.

Speed and usability wise the new iPad is almost identical to the iPad 2 with no noticeable differences. The user interface is snappy, webpages scroll without delay, pinch to zoom works immediately. iOS, the iPad’s operating system, is world class, the best of the best.

The new iPad lacks Siri but does have a dictation mode when the keyboard pops up. I’m using that to write this blog. It works just like the dictation mode on the iPhone 4S.

Bottom line, is it worth upgrading an older iPad? If you have the first generation iPad, absolutely! There’s less of a need to upgrade the second-generation iPad, but if you have the scratch, it’s worth it.

If you’ve been on the fence, thinking about buying a tablet, the iPad is really the only one worth considering. Apple invented the category and the competition is so far behind it’s not even funny.

My iPad is the Wi-Fi only version. I don’t really recommend the AT&T or Verizon data versions. Most places I go have Wi-Fi, and in a pinch I can use my iPhone as a mobile hotspot. The iPad data plans are expensive, particularly if you travel abroad like I do.

iOS and the multitouch interface are the future of computing, what Apple calls the “post PC world.” The desktop computer is on it’s way out. Unless you’re a high end photo or video editor, there are few compelling reasons to own a desktop these days. The conventional laptop will be next to go, lightweight laptops like the MacBook Air are selling very well. Sales of the iPad are taking off like a rocketship!

I can just about do it all on my iPad, there are only a few things I need my Mac for these days. In time, I expect I’ll jettison my Mac Pro.

We’re storing more and more of our data in the cloud. My documents and photos are synched with and available to all of my devices. The PC, tablet, or phone is just a conduit–it’s the data that’s really important.

Photographers have a saying about the “best” camera, “the best camera is the one you have with you.”

Computing is like that too. The best device is the one you have with you.

Our Volt is still in the shop. Today makes it two weeks! It’s been frustrating, I paid the dealer a visit today for an update and took these pictures.

The battery has been lowered from the car and it’s insulating cover removed.

They told me that the problem which caused the check engine light was a power contactor/relay on the battery. The contactor connects or disconnects the battery from the rest of the car when it’s turned on or off.

Most of the delay was for the fixture to lower the battery from the car. The battery weighs over 400 pounds! They say the parts are all here and work is underway.

While the battery is out they’re doing the recall that resulted from the infamous battery fire. Three weeks after the NTSB crash tested and rolled a Volt it’s battery caught fire. After further testing, Chevy came out with a fix which reinforces the battery box and prevents a loss of coolant. The recall is voluntary. The NTSB has since completed it’s investigation and proclaimed the Volt safe.

It’s unfortunate the Volt has become politicized and reviled by many right wing pundits. They’re against the $7500 federal incentive for buying a plug in car. They forget the billions in dollars of subsidies the oil companies recieve. The Tesla, Nissan Leaf, and Fisker Karma also are eligible for the incentive.

I’m hoping it won’t be too much longer, I miss our Volt!

I just got a Lytro camera. It’s an entirely new type of camera which captures the “light field.” There is no fixed plane of focus in a picture. Focus can be changed when viewing online or in their Mac app.

Pictures can be saved a jpegs and exported with different planes of focus. For example, this jpeg has it’s focus on the background:

This jpeg has it’s focus on the foreground flowers:

Both jpegs are from the same exposure. The full focusable image is available here.

The science behind the Lytro light field camera is pretty interesting, and can be viewed here.

The final images are pretty low res, 1080 X 1080 pixels. But the camera essentially records a separate image for many different planes of focus. For online viewing the images are about the right size. In spite of it’s f 2.0 lens, the Lytro camera needs a lot of light. Indoor images are pretty noisy. The lytro software can share the images via Facebook or Twitter. More software features are promised later this year–including 3D images!

I think the Lytro camera is truly groundbreaking. I can’t wait until Nikon or Canon licenses the technology in a full frame DSLR.

I’ll be putting my Lytro images up in my gallery here.

Today we reached the milestone of 200 mpg! Our mileage keeps moving up. Haven’t bought any gas yet in over a thousand miles!