Tens of millions of Americans drink large(SB's Venti and grande) as opposed to small(Tall) coffee. Having a larger quantity of liquid, the cups for these larger drinks use up anywhere between 10-25% more material.
The other day I stumbled on something called "Red eye" which is basically drip coffee fortified with a single shot of espresso. And while I find it very strong for my taste, I think that a few million people might enjoy the extreme caffeine buzz and abandon their "super sized" coffee in favour of a smaller sized environmentally friendlier drink.
Monday, October 5, 2009
Cashless Quadcore CPUs
Last month AMD launched their quad core CPUs without level three cash. These CPUs offer 10% lower performance at a 30% lower price with 20% less power. They almost perform on par with the Level 3 cash version expect for games and a few other applications.
Considering that the performance per watt is 10% better, it got me thinking that maybe Intel should follow suit. Not only would this be helpful for the environment, but would also allow more people to adopt quad core processors as these cashless processors are 30% smaller and therefore are cheaper to produce.
It is a shame that AMD was at least six months late with these processors. In any case, the next challenge for AMD is to bring down the power consumption even further. In theory these processors should consume 30% less power(because of the 30% smaller size) as opposed to a "mere" 20% reduction.
Looking back, I think that Level 3 cash looks great on paper, but in reality it is a poor way to spend chip real estate. Maybe in the future both AMD and Intel would restrict level 3 cash to gamer and server oriented chips where a level 3(L3) cash would make a real difference.
I also hope that AMD goes the same root with their desktop 6 core CPU. Without L3 cash the six core CPUs would have the same die area as a regular quad core with L3 cash, this would allow for significant power savings or more headroom for higher clocks. More importantly it would cost the same with at least 20% more performance. But if AMD decides to go the L3 cash root, then they would have the same large die area as they have for their Istanbul server chips(approx 330 mm2), which is currently the largest x86 die area.
Considering that the performance per watt is 10% better, it got me thinking that maybe Intel should follow suit. Not only would this be helpful for the environment, but would also allow more people to adopt quad core processors as these cashless processors are 30% smaller and therefore are cheaper to produce.
It is a shame that AMD was at least six months late with these processors. In any case, the next challenge for AMD is to bring down the power consumption even further. In theory these processors should consume 30% less power(because of the 30% smaller size) as opposed to a "mere" 20% reduction.
Looking back, I think that Level 3 cash looks great on paper, but in reality it is a poor way to spend chip real estate. Maybe in the future both AMD and Intel would restrict level 3 cash to gamer and server oriented chips where a level 3(L3) cash would make a real difference.
I also hope that AMD goes the same root with their desktop 6 core CPU. Without L3 cash the six core CPUs would have the same die area as a regular quad core with L3 cash, this would allow for significant power savings or more headroom for higher clocks. More importantly it would cost the same with at least 20% more performance. But if AMD decides to go the L3 cash root, then they would have the same large die area as they have for their Istanbul server chips(approx 330 mm2), which is currently the largest x86 die area.
Friday, October 2, 2009
Sugar
For many years I noticed that people in developing countries like their coffee or tea very sweet, usually pouring an average of 2.5 tea spoons of sugar per cup. 12 years ago I used to put that much sugar in my coffee, but then I slowly went down, by half a table spoon every couple of weeks until I finally settled at 1 tea spoon per cup. Now I find tea or coffee with just 1.5 tea spoons of sugar extremely sweet.
Whenever I met someone who put too much sugar in their tea I would always tell them how I was able to cut down and I still find my tea sweet. I always told this out of concern for their health since refined sugars are bad for health and artificial sweeteners might not be helpful with weight loss in the long run, not to mention their alleged bad health effects.
But the fact that a reduction in sugar consumption might be also good for the environment did not hit me until today. As far as use with tea or coffee goes, the potential for reduction in developing countries is huge, assuming five cups per day and 1 billion adults, the annual saving could be as large as 18 million tons, almost 10-11% of total world demand. This means that land areas devoted to sugar cane or beet production can be either used for something else that is more worthwhile or reforested.
Will there be a financial loss for sugar producing countries? I doubt it as price is likely to go up a bit and compensate for the lower demand. Also as mentioned above there will be additional land available for other crops.
Whenever I met someone who put too much sugar in their tea I would always tell them how I was able to cut down and I still find my tea sweet. I always told this out of concern for their health since refined sugars are bad for health and artificial sweeteners might not be helpful with weight loss in the long run, not to mention their alleged bad health effects.
But the fact that a reduction in sugar consumption might be also good for the environment did not hit me until today. As far as use with tea or coffee goes, the potential for reduction in developing countries is huge, assuming five cups per day and 1 billion adults, the annual saving could be as large as 18 million tons, almost 10-11% of total world demand. This means that land areas devoted to sugar cane or beet production can be either used for something else that is more worthwhile or reforested.
Will there be a financial loss for sugar producing countries? I doubt it as price is likely to go up a bit and compensate for the lower demand. Also as mentioned above there will be additional land available for other crops.
Saturday, June 6, 2009
Cats and Dogs
Millions of Americans have pets and millions are pondering which pet to get, a cat or a dog. The arguments for and against are somewhat well known.
Cats require little or no toilet training, are independent, do their own thing most of the time, and unless de-clawed can damage furniture and carpets. Still they are cute and have a "sixth sense".
And while dogs require months of toilet training, they have many things going for them; they are very loyal, protective of their owner, and smarter than cats. There is a good reason why it is considered man's best friend.
But these difference aside, I wanted to answer the most important question and that is the environmental one. Here cuteness or intelligence do not matter. Because both animals are carnivores, cats would win hands down as they are much smaller than dogs and therefore consume significantly less food than dogs. If 80% of dog owners switched to cats over the next 10yrs, there would be tremendous environmental savings.
Cats require little or no toilet training, are independent, do their own thing most of the time, and unless de-clawed can damage furniture and carpets. Still they are cute and have a "sixth sense".
And while dogs require months of toilet training, they have many things going for them; they are very loyal, protective of their owner, and smarter than cats. There is a good reason why it is considered man's best friend.
But these difference aside, I wanted to answer the most important question and that is the environmental one. Here cuteness or intelligence do not matter. Because both animals are carnivores, cats would win hands down as they are much smaller than dogs and therefore consume significantly less food than dogs. If 80% of dog owners switched to cats over the next 10yrs, there would be tremendous environmental savings.
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