Work is going well (though one of the other guys in the office remarked that he didn't see too much going "well," rather he saw it as "well, I've got more to do..."). I have to admit, though every project I've ever been involved with gets complicated for reasons that are outside of my control, this project has seemed like a can-of-worms at almost all turns. I guess that means that I'm learning a lot (which makes me happy), so this is how I replied to my pessimistic co-worker. =D
Hilary, I haven't yet gotten the approval I need from my supervisor to post the video, so hopefully that will happen next week. I'll "do it up special" so that it has more footage and better explanations than the other one too! lol, far be it from me to just "get'r'done". I guess I use a lot of quotes these days, but "it is what is!"
I can share some things from work. This last week, I was working on troubleshooting an amplifier and realized that the major problem was not with the amplifier at all (it was due to a component in my model that was doing exactly what i told it to do). I was thinking how funny that is that when things aren't going right, we sometimes don't look at ourselves as the culprit until there are no more "outside" places to point at. Kind of a get-the-spec-out-of-your-own-eye thing (or maybe a you-shouldn't-use-so-many-dashes-thing).
Anyway, after that round of toubleshooting, I had several conclusions. first that since my system operates at a fixed frequency (somewhere between 4000 and 8000 cycles/second) and the signals i'm generating can range up to rather high frequencies themselves (92 cycles/second under normal conditions and possibly up to 1000 cycles/second) this means that the number of "points" that my system is generating get kinda sparse in the output waveform. Here's an example. If I want to generate a nice clean waveform, I'll use a lot of points (500) along it so that is is approximately smooth.
a plot like the one above would happen if we were using a 4000 cycles/second signal generator to generate an 8 cycles/second waveform (4000/8 = 500). But since my system is generating signals at a fixed rate (approximately 4000 cycles/sec), as we increase the waveform frequency, our points/cycle decreases. below is a plot of 100 points/cycle.
Notice the "stair-step" like appearance. This is because we have fewer points, and in-between points the signal generator does not update it output value. If we push this further to 43 points/cycle (below) we see that the signal is looking less and less smooth.
This is the problem I am running into (one of them at least). Since my signal is not smooth at higher frequencies, I need to smooth it out after I generate it. This is done with what is called a "low-pass" filter (which means that it only lets the low frequencies pass through it and attenuates the higher frequencies). In the picture below I have made a cool Simulink model (part of MATLAB) which does two things: it generates exactly the same signal as my data system (my data system was prorammed using the same code), and then it simulates what effect a proposed analog low-pass filter would have on that generated signal.
Here is the plot this model produced (below)
See how nice and smooth the red is? very nice! =D So I've been playing a little with that today, trying to find a reasonble filter design to handle my needs (the output amplitudes are similar, as in this one, but also the phase shift can't be too much, notice how in this one the red output signal is shifted to the right...)
Yeah, so that's what I've been working on lately. There are some other cool things that I've been playing with, but I'll save 'em for later. In other news, I have been thinking a lot about a new truck! It has been awhile since I have really seriously considered buying a new vehicle, but things are at a points where it seems reasonble. I have been doing some research on it (that is what I do, I guess), and come up with the following spec that i'm looking for: 2007 chevy silverado extended cab, 1/2-ton, supersport, lifted with 35x12.50 tires and nice alloy wheels. With a little snooping around on the net, I found a picture of *almost* exactly what I'm looking for... :P
Wow, that's pretty, eh! So I've been pursuing that a little and watching some different ads to see if I come across anything interesting. It is so strange to actually have some money to think about these things, I'm really not used to having any money! :P
On the topic of money, I've also been thinking about a killer workstation laptop. This isn't a popular idea with any of my advisors, but man, how sweet would it be! For those of you that are into the techy stuff, I'm thinking about a Lenovo W701, 2GHz, 16GB RAM, 256GB ss hard drive, 1TB secondary, 17" uwxga display (FHD, LED backlit), blu-ray burner onboard, Quadro 3800 video card with 1TB of memory. Pretty much maxing everything out the way I like it there. Of course, the major problem is that it is so stinkin' expensive. Ah well, for the moment, dreaming is free...
On another front altogether, I have made some great strides in my eating habits this last week.
This here picture is a sandwich I made for myself at lunch. Now, mind you, making food is not all that difficult a task, so I'm not expecting a bouquet of roses, but for some reason I have something of a mental block about making my lunches, cooking at home, etc. this week I only eat out twice; both times because I needed something to eat for lunch and I didn't have time to make it the night before or the morning of. Other than that, this week has been completely "homemade." Yay!! ...and there was great rejoicing!
There is often more going on that I can't blog about, but there is a similar phenomenon that there is more blogged about than you are interested in, so I think it balances itself out. I'm missing all you friends and family out there, but I'm trying to be content in my situation and take full advantage of it.
Oh, one other thing. I almost forgot to tell you... I have changed a little! See if you can find the difference in these next too pictures (queue the music, "one of these pictures is not like the other")
And of course, my post wouldn't be complete without mentioning that I've been having a great time with my girlfriend Elisa. This pic was taken before we went out to eat a few weeks ago... it's funny, the stairs do a tolerable job of holding the camera, but I still can't get them to take it where I look as good as she does! Oh well, I guess I'll just keep workin' on my guns and hope for the best! =P
Adieu!
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