This & That

This & That

Efficient industrial

The move to more efficient products isn’t limited to consumer items and servers. Many industrial control systems operate 24/7. In the past, little attention was paid to their energy usage, but that’s not true any longer.

While lower-power processors are helping SBCs in industrial systems save energy right now, a key feature to be looked at is being able to go into a low-power standby mode when the system is not in active use and being able to turn off subsystems not being used such as com ports. Other key factors are the application of intelligent motor drives and whether end-users will be willing to upgrade their existing systems.

Prints for half price

High-quality color prints can be made on ink-jet printers that cost only $50. But one set of ink cartridges for the printer can cost that much and more. Some cynics even think that the manufacturers are making the printers inexpensive and getting a bundle on the high-markup ink cartridges.

Last February, Kodak brought out three versions of an all-in-one printer that features lower-cost ink said to cut print costs in half. The printers use Kodak’s premium pigment-based ink, priced at $9.99 for a black and $14.99 for a five-ink color cartridge. When an ink/paper value pack is purchased, Kodak says a 4 x 6-in. photo costs as little as 10 cents. That’s a significant savings. If you look around, you can find reports of some buyers that had some problems with these units, but a lot more that love them like crazy.

Now Kodak has added the model ESP 3, which adds something called “facial retouch,” a feature that clears up any facial blemishes on images with one click. This could cut both the cost of ink and the cost of makeup! The printer/scanner has a manufacturer’s suggested retail price of $130.