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Tech News & Commentary
“Into Gaming Update” Weekly Feature with Mark Lautenschlager
Guest Segment:
Wayne Schuurman, President – Pangea Audio
Speaker Stands, Power Cable Adapters and HDMI cables
“IFA History Feature” brought to you by Messe-Berlin
In 1968 the first car radio with integrated compact cassette player was introduced by Philips, but still only in mono. Only one year later, at the Funkausstellung, or IFA, stereo arrived in the car as Blaupunkt introduced the first car radio in stereo sound. Becker, another German manufacturer, integrated a compact cassette player into the model “Mexico” with stereo sound for the cassette, but still only mono for the radio.
Greg in Manchester, Tennessee listens on WTN 99.7 FM asked: “Is it okay to leave a flash drive plugged in all the time? Does is cause any more wear and tear on the drive?”
Greg, Leaving a flash drive plugged in all the time won’t do any damage to the particular drive but it may shorten the lifespan of the USB drive because the PC is constantly communicating with it. Really the only thing that can go wrong is if you accidently bump or kick the USB, physically damaging the connection.
It also depends on the flash drive. Some drives use MLC (multi-level cell) based memory that’s good for 3,000 to 5,000 program-erase cycles, but others have SLC (single-level cell) memory that’s good for almost 100,000 writes.
Also, keep in mind that reading from a flash drive causes no wear and tear at all. It’s only when new information is written that you get into a cycle of erasing and programming the memory chips.
And finally, the USB connector itself is specified to only withstand about 1,500 insertions and removals. So the case of the drive usually gives up before the memory chips do.
For more information, tune in to Hour 3 of our podcast.
If you have any questions about any of this week’s show info, please email us here.
This Week’s Prizes for Our Listeners
Brother: A bunch of Tape Measures and Cleaning Cloths for your computer screens
Happy Plugs: A variety of their Happy EarBuds, Charging Cables and iPad Cases
HD Radio: “Into Tomorrow” branded Portable AM/FM/HD Radios
OkiDokeys: Complete SmartPhone Operated Smart Lock for your home – including wristband & key FOBS
G-Technology: Several 500GB 7200 RPM Touro S High performance portable Hard drives with easy & local Cloud Backup and in a variety of colors!
NanoTech: Several UltraFlix Gift Cards for 4K Content, like movies and a ton of other cool stuff. Let us know if you have a 4K Ultra HD TV!