"There is much pleasure to be gained from useless knowledge."
  - Bertrand Russell



Site
Basics

Introduction:
           The Why
Preface and Canon:  
           The How 
Overview:
           The What



Recent
Updates


11-24-07:   So, in case you're wondering (and I know you are), I do have a perfectly good excuse for a total lack of updates for the past 5-and-a-half months. More than one, actually. First, I've been helluva-busy. Second, I've been working in my virtually non-existent spare time on what may end up being a massive overhaul of the site. I didn't want to mention it at first, but as the days have ticked by and I've kept noticing that the last update on here was from June, I figured I ought to say something. So here it is. :P

06-11-07:   Mea culpa. See, way back when on the STrek forum someone whose name now escapes me caught a math error of mine on the Death Star scaling page regarding DS1. And though it seemed like he had a point, something just didn't feel right with the way the math worked otherwise. Part of the problem was simply that the DS1 and DS2 sizes fit elegantly with the conclusion I had, whereas the alternative would force a contradiction. And some of it was just gut feeling. And, too, some of it was sheer laziness on my part, since I tied the matter to the enormous task of determining the scales of Star Wars vessels based on the canon alone (instead of accepting out-of-universe stats like a 1600m Star Destroyer), and that's one project I've managed to procrastinate on quite efficiently. And though I've always said when the topic of the Death Star I size has come up that yes, there may be a problem there with my scaling, I never got around to doing anything more about it.
But at long last, the time has come. And there wasn't just one error . . . there were two. At one point I'd counted three pixels when I ought to have counted as many as five . . . which is a problem when each one counted for hundreds of meters and were being used to scale something else. It was entirely my fault for picking a too-distant image to scale from instead of something better. 
As luck would have it, the two errors cancelled out to within a few percentage points. Sometimes, the gut is right. So, without further ado, take a peek at the revised Death Star scaling page, now with HD shots from ANH (no more 3px scalings for me).

06-06-07:   I've updated with some special treats. For starters, check out the Basics section, where the Screenshots and Resolutions page has been updated with notes about the High-Definition broadcasts of the Star Wars films and what they mean for us. I've also done a quickie update of the stormtrooper armor page with HD TESB shots, and have heavily revamped the ISD bridge tower asteroid collision page, now with almost totally-new images, more than enough to put that long-sleeping puppy to bed. But don't worry, 800x600-screen-resolution-visitors . . . I'm not leaving you behind just yet. :-)

04-15-07:   I've greatly expanded the old page on "The Wounded" weapon range example, turning it into a survey of Trek weapon ranges from across the canon. Combined with the Star Wars weapons range page, I thus basically have the issue knocked out. I've therefore made a dedicated comparison page. Enjoy.

04-07-07:   Though I'd tried to be generous with the "To Vaporize a Small Town" page, I finally had to admit to myself that I'd gone too far with that, deep into unrealistic territory. Also, I found something Star Wars based to work from instead of strictly the American small town I'd destroyed initially. So, I've updated the page to account for both factors.


Site
Minutiae

- Weblog - Tech Archives
Site Search Basics (in progress) Newsfeeds
Site History Guest Submissions The Store

Articles:

Ground & Personal Combat Technology

  Star Trek Ground Combat
  Imperial Probe Droids, In-Depth
  A Brief Look at Phasers vs. Lightsabres
  The AT-ST  - An Imperial 'Armored Vehicle'
  Invincible Stormtrooper Armor
  A Few Words on Blaster Firepower

Space & Starship Technology

  Propulsion and Power Generation

  Discerning Canon Hyperdrive Speeds
  Facts about Warp Maneuvering and Strafing
  Millennium Falcon Acceleration Ability 
  Federation Starship Power Generation

  Weapons and Defense

       Beam and Missile Weapons

  See Star Trek Kick Asteroids
  Star Wars: Vaporizing a Small Town
  The "Outrageous Okona" Falsehood
  Photon Torpedo Shielding
  Post-launch Torpedo Shield Glow Growth
  Comparison:  Weapons Range and Targeting
  The X-Wing Firepower Falsehood

       Armor and Shields

  Ramming and Shields in Star Trek
  The ISD Bridge Tower - Asteroid Impact
  The Hull Strength Falsehood
  The "Survivors"[TNG] Falsehood
  The Alderaan Planetary Shield Falsehood

  General or Multi-Topic

  Ramming and Subspace Physics
  Estimating The Size of The Imperial Fleet
  The Romulan technology of "Balance of Terror"[TOS]
  The Battle Against "The Doomsday Machine"[TOS]
  A Couple of Words on Cloaking
  Bullets and the Borg

Special Projects

   Research Projects

  Starship Volumetrics
& ChronoVolumetrics
  The Death Star Research Project
  San Francisco, Et Cetera:
Cities of the Sagas
The Obsidian Order Project  
  Star Trek 
Episode Listing

   Debates and Site 
   Attack Responses

  2002:  Mike Wong 
 - On Canon and the Superlaser
 
  2003: SD.Net
 - ST-v-SW.Net Goes To War
(aka "The Battle of Britain")

 
  2003: Stas
 - To Russia, With Love (incomplete)

Tales From the Non-Canon

  A Brief History of
Base Delta Zero
  The Neutronium Hull Falsehood
  Regarding the ICS Books
  The 1.02 Gigawatt Fallacy
  Origins of the New Non-Canon
 - Re: The Star Wars Support Group

Essays, Errata, Et Cetera:

  Remember Columbia
E3:RoTS Versions
Analysis and Review
Star Trek: Nemesis
Analysis and Review
  FirstTVDrama
A Rebuttal
  Just for Kicks:
Fun Pages
  <— What the heck is this?
  Ye Olde Pages
  Incomplete Pages and Materials
  When Rabid Warsies Attack 
 - A look at the silly smear campaigns and threats of the opposition

Links and Feedback:

Some Star Trek and Star Wars Links

  A Random Smattering of Cosmic Thoughts

Questions? Comments?  Send me some Feedback

Prior Feedback  

The Necessary Legal Disclaimer.

Original Content - © Me, 2000-2006 :-)
Site composed using the Pico UNIX editor, Notepad . . . and, alas, GUI editors.