Nied

I think this particular F-5 knock off has been mentioned before. Someone posted this photo of a different F-5 knock off in the Tomcat Sunset forums however unlike the Sageh I haven't been able to find any further info on it. It certainly doesn't look like a photoshop job. Note the high wing and enlarged LERX, combine this with the twin tailed Sageh and you have a YF-17! Rumours are the F/B-44 "Iranian Lion" will also be F-5 based. Honestly if the Iranians are so hard up for a modernized F-5 replacement I don't see why they don't just license produce the FC-1/JF-17 in country. Rumour has it they've successfully reverse engineered a smaller all digital version of the AWG-9 so they wouldn't even need to rely on crappy Chinese avionics.

Might I suggest my old stomping grounds of Washington DC? It's underrated in it's beauty, has plenty of history, and one of the best (if not the best) aviation museums in the country.

Given the small fuselage size and those big CFM-56 engines mated the 737-600 ought to be a pretty hot ride. I've never ridden the -600 specifically but I have been in a few -500 and I can attest that they are pretty quick off the line and are roughly comparable to a 757. It seems like the only things I ride in anymore are members of the 737 or A320 families, with the ocasional 757 thrown in (though since moving to SF the ocasional 767 and even 777 have crept in).

Get thee to an airport and take a vacation somwhere far away! It'll expand your horizons in more ways than one.

That occurred to me after typing out my last reply. Cameron was intimately involved in every aspect of desgning the Marines, which might help explain why we don't really see much of them in the rest of the Alien sequels.

Well technically speaking they will be night bombing, but they won't have much use for NVGs at 50,000 ft. Still I doubt the DoD was willing to trade a sizable RCS increase for better NVG capability. I'm willing to bet that they came up with something that was both NVG compatible and still maintained the RCS aspects. It was probably installed in the Raptor for commonality sake, that and you never know when you might need to quickly integrate NVGs on a new airframe.

That was my assumption as well. Gold isn't exactly inexpensive (it is gold after all) even in the extremely thin layers they use for aircraft canopies. I've noticed that the same is happening for other aircraft that used to have gold tinted canopies (F-16s, Super Hornet) it's likely we have just found a cheaper/more effective/easier to maintain canopy coating than frigging gilding our fighter canopies.

You're not going crazy. I noticed the same thing in this image from the USAF article on the 100th Raptor being delivered.

That's why you set it in a remote colony world that looks just like Earth (either through terraforming or "just because"). Then it's just a matter making a few prop/wardrobe changes. Maybe change the color of the fake blood squirting out of one of the characters in their death scene to white for the big "ZOMG THEY WERE TEH ANDROID!!!!!!11!!one" reveal. You can do all of that without an appreciable effect on the budget.

You know looking at this trailer I'm struck by how easily they could have put the colonial Marines into it. Just change "isolated town in the middle of nowhere" to "Isolated Colony in the middle of space (one that was terraformed to/coincedentally does look like Earth)" change "US military Rolling in to lock the town down" to "US Colonial Marines dropping in to lock the colony down", and change the "Neeto special effects shot of an F-22 Raptor getting ready to nuke the town from the air" to "Neeto special effects shot of a Sulaco clone getting ready to nuke the colony from orbit (it's the only way to be sure)" and bang you have almost what most people wanted out of an Aliens vs Predator movie. I'm willing to bet that 90% of us would even forgive the whole teen slasher aspect of it if they just set in in space.

Meh. Call me when they get this past the greenlight stage. Frankly I'm a little hopeful that this might help actually break the legal impasse we've had all these years. It's one thing for Big west to snub some small import company for some (in the grand scale of things) minor merch rights. It's quite another to snub one of the biggest studios and miss out on the next Transformers (I know I know but you know that's what every one involved is hoping it will be) and all the profits that come with it. Hopefully the combined legal muscle of WB and BW (heh) can work something out, and we can get legally sold Macross merch right here in the states as part of the deal.

The fastener shortage isn't the only problem they're having, it's just the one they've admitted to (and even then it sounds like they're downplaying it significantly). If the people I've talked to within Boeing are correct I'd be mighty surprised if they make the ANA delivery before the end of 2008. I probably shouldn't say more than that.

Like I said before: Tip of the iceburg.

An old warbird is an old warbird. Sure a B-17 or B-29 would be cooler but a ride in a B-24 is nothing to sneeze at. Maybe I'm missing something here but what you're doing sounds like winning a million dollars in the lottery but turning it down because sometimes the jackpot gets up to four or five million and you'd much rather get that.

Oh you do.

I always thought the Quitra Queleual LST would make a good supplementary (or even primary) colonization ship. A landing ship wouldn't be of much use as a fleet escort, but they've got plenty of internal space to use for colonists and supplies. I could see a flotilla of them being sent out with a couple of Zent cruisers and Human carriers for support being a splendid little colonization fleet.

And by blowing up the Death Star the Rebel Alliance wiped their scourge from the face of the universe. See here. Hey the Empire is just the republic with a stronger executive. And who made their executive stronger? Why Jar Jar Binks! Ergo the Empire is the creation of Jar Jar. The day the galaxy is ruled by an organization created by Jar Jar Binks is the day I move to another one. Sure you say that here on your safe message board in a Galaxy far far away, but dude they can rip your arms out of their sockets! Who's going to tell them to put some pants on to their face? You? Do you want to work for Jar Jar and save the Ewoks while you've got no arms?

Uh oh. Did I screw up an organization name again?

Modern guns deal a fair amount of damage to the aircraft that fire them these days too. I remember reading on F-16.net that they try to limit the gun use to a few short bursts during training sorties while in peacetime. The reason being that the vibration and recoil can reduce the airframe life by quite a large amount. One of the more legitimate knocks against all models of the Hornet is that it mounts its gun literally around the radar, and the vibration from firing can cause some serious problems. I think the UK thought that even if they used the gun itself as ballast but never fired it they'd still save themselves millions of pounds a year in maintenance costs, and keep their shiny new Typhoons flying for years longer than they otherwise would have. The thing that really made them change their minds was several instances where guns have come in handy saving the Royal Army and Marines during CAS missions in Iraq and Afghanistan (and several instances where guns would have come in handy but weren't mounted).

Hornets nesting in a Tomcat intake... I'm sure there's a metaphor there.

I haven't jumped into the HD war yet, but you just listed why I'm more inclined to want HD-DVD to come out on top. Both have overly onerous DRM but Blu-Ray is definitely is worse. How is Paramount's exemption of Spielberg's movies affected by the fact that Dreamworks is also moving to HD-DVD exclusivity?

Beat me to it.

And Star Trek, don't forget Star Trek. Hell they're already releasing the first seaons of TOS remastered as an HD-DVD exclusive (although at a price that means I'll only rent it).

I actually know some people at Boeing and talked to them recently. This is just the tip of the iceberg.

I'm thinking of building my own Home Theater/Media Center PC in the next few months, and I'm thinking of finally making the jump to Linux as an OS for it (the two computers currently in the house are tasked almost exclusively for gaming for quite some time now so I haven't had much impetus to switch from XP). My thinking is that with Linux I might have a much better chance of sidestepping some of the more heinous DRM coming down the pike (It'd be nice to throw both a BD-ROM and HD-ROM in there but still avoid all the HDCP BS). Usability is also an issue (my wife is fairly savvy but also really doesn't feel she has the time to deal with a complex/obtuse/buggy UI). Has anyone tried anything similar? Is it worth it or am I better off just grabbing a discounted copy of XP Media Center Edition?