Author: DOuG pRATt

P.S. to TV ’74

tastewar pointed out this video, about DVD reissues of TV series that squeeze more than two hours of video onto single-layer discs.

The first disc in the 5-disc Kolchak: The Night Stalker DVD set I bought is about 7.5 GB. So, it’s a double-layer disc, and I’m assuming all of them are. The video quality really is quite good, considering the source material.

There is one tiny technical quirk that can show up, especially when credits are overlayed on the screen. You’ll never see it, unless your player supports 24 frames per second on DVDs. If it does, you can almost certainly disable it.

The Heat Is On

My oil burning furnace in 2006, when it was less than ten years old

Here it is again, the heating season. Keeping the house warm from October-April costs up to $5000/year, when including year-round hot water and the service contract. Now that the furnace is almost thirty years old, I am worrying not only about the replacement cost, but whether or not to get another oil burner.

There is no gas service on the street. The all-season porch has eight feet of electric baseboard heat along one wall. That thing by itself can kick up the wintertime electric bill by almost $200/month. I can imagine how much it would cost heating the entire house electrically.

I’m not convinced that heat pumps will do the job in winter, without supplemental electric heating elements. The house has forced hot water heat, so there is no ductwork. Which means each room would need an unsightly, wall-mounted fixture.

Ye Olde Commonwealth of Massachusetts is determined to see old oil-fired furnaces replaced with heat pumps. But when the air temperature is freezing or below, where will the heat come from for the transfer? Going underground is an option.

My utility is Eversource. Not very far from here, in Framingham, Eversource has a geothermal pilot program.