On Jun 25, 2011, at 4:59 PM, Joel Jaeggli wrote: > > On Jun 25, 2011, at 4:47 PM, Andrew D Kirch wrote: > >> On 6/25/2011 7:43 PM, Paul Graydon wrote: >>> Take a guess what the datacenter our equipment is currently hosted in uses. >>> Yet another reason to be glad of a datacenter move that's coming up. >>> >> Why can't we just all use DC and be happy? > > motors don't produce DC? > They can.
> tesla vs edison? > Tesla was right, Edison was a better marketing person. AC works better for long-distance transmission. AC could have been made much safer had we chosen a 2Khz+ frequency rather than a 60Hz frequency. > human safe dc voltage requires comically large conductors for the sorts of > loads we energize? > So does human safe AC voltage. The key difference is that AC voltage is much easier to change efficiently (transformers) whereas DC-DC voltage transitions require either an inverter (DC->AC->DC) inefficient and usually mechanical, a motor/generator set (inefficient and mechanical), or a DC-DC converter circuit which tends to be horribly inefficient and expensive, especially at high amperage. Owen
