adjustable clocks

R

Reason

Guest
It's been 30 years now since I bought my first digital watch, and to this
day, I've never seen an electronic clock which could be adjusted to keep
more accurate time.

It would appear to be the simplest of programming tasks. If your clock has
lost a minute in 10 days, when you reset your time, the microprocessor
should be able to increase the speed of the clock by 1 minute over 10 days
with a simple math formula.

Such a task was achieved quite early on with mechanical clocks. For
centuries they have had an adjustment which alters the speed of the clock to
keep more accurate time. In some clocks, the speed is adjusted
automatically by the amount you advance or retard the time in a 24 hour
period. After a few daily adjustments, the clock will be keeping time more
accurately than a typical digital clock today.

Most of the computers I have had over the years can precess quite badly over
a few months, being off by a dozen minutes or more. Many computers can be
off by much more than that, not having been reset for a long time.

The latest version of Windows XP has an internet synchronization feature,
which seems mostly unnecessary if digital clocks had been designed to adjust
their speed whenever the time is corrected. I can't believe such a simple
feature has not been designed into a digital clock, at least the ones
commonly used in devices today.
 
On Mon, 10 May 2004 05:04:18 GMT, "Reason" <PDexter@hotmail.com>
wrote:
It's been 30 years now since I bought my first digital watch, and to this
day, I've never seen an electronic clock which could be adjusted to keep
more accurate time. It would appear to be the simplest of programming tasks.
Most of the computers I have had over the years can precess quite badly over
a few months, being off by a dozen minutes or more. Many computers can be
off by much more than that, not having been reset for a long time.

The latest version of Windows XP has an internet synchronization feature,
which seems mostly unnecessary if digital clocks had been designed to adjust
their speed whenever the time is corrected. I can't believe such a simple
feature has not been designed into a digital clock, at least the ones
commonly used in devices today.
Click to expand...
Many electronic clock ic's have an adjustment option. But it is up to
the programmer to use it. Remember: Your PC is not there for you, you
are there for your PC!

Pieter
 
For what it's worth, NIST has a small program that can be used to
synchronize your computer (IBM & Mac) clock over the internet:
http://www.boulder.nist.gov/timefreq/service/its.htm
Bryan

"Reason" <PDexter@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:m3Enc.20284$F04.10358@clgrps13...
It's been 30 years now since I bought my first digital watch, and to this
day, I've never seen an electronic clock which could be adjusted to keep
more accurate time.

It would appear to be the simplest of programming tasks. If your clock
has
lost a minute in 10 days, when you reset your time, the microprocessor
should be able to increase the speed of the clock by 1 minute over 10 days
with a simple math formula.

Such a task was achieved quite early on with mechanical clocks. For
centuries they have had an adjustment which alters the speed of the clock
to
keep more accurate time. In some clocks, the speed is adjusted
automatically by the amount you advance or retard the time in a 24 hour
period. After a few daily adjustments, the clock will be keeping time more
accurately than a typical digital clock today.

Most of the computers I have had over the years can precess quite badly
over
a few months, being off by a dozen minutes or more. Many computers can be
off by much more than that, not having been reset for a long time.

The latest version of Windows XP has an internet synchronization feature,
which seems mostly unnecessary if digital clocks had been designed to
adjust
their speed whenever the time is corrected. I can't believe such a simple
feature has not been designed into a digital clock, at least the ones
commonly used in devices today.
Click to expand...
 
"Bryan Swadener" <bryan.swadenerNOSPAM@comcast.net> wrote in message
news:_xWoc.44004$536.7760328@attbi_s03...
For what it's worth, NIST has a small program that can be used to
synchronize your computer (IBM & Mac) clock over the internet:
http://www.boulder.nist.gov/timefreq/service/its.htm
Bryan
Click to expand...
Windows XP has it built-in, as I said.

Why keep adding or subtracting forever, when you can multiply it by a
correction factor and make it more accurate instead? Does that make sense?



"Reason" <PDexter@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:m3Enc.20284$F04.10358@clgrps13...
It's been 30 years now since I bought my first digital watch, and to
this
day, I've never seen an electronic clock which could be adjusted to keep
more accurate time.

It would appear to be the simplest of programming tasks. If your clock
has
lost a minute in 10 days, when you reset your time, the microprocessor
should be able to increase the speed of the clock by 1 minute over 10
days
with a simple math formula.

Such a task was achieved quite early on with mechanical clocks. For
centuries they have had an adjustment which alters the speed of the
clock
to
keep more accurate time. In some clocks, the speed is adjusted
automatically by the amount you advance or retard the time in a 24 hour
period. After a few daily adjustments, the clock will be keeping time
more
accurately than a typical digital clock today.

Most of the computers I have had over the years can precess quite badly
over
a few months, being off by a dozen minutes or more. Many computers can
be
off by much more than that, not having been reset for a long time.

The latest version of Windows XP has an internet synchronization
feature,
which seems mostly unnecessary if digital clocks had been designed to
adjust
their speed whenever the time is corrected. I can't believe such a
simple
feature has not been designed into a digital clock, at least the ones
commonly used in devices today.
Click to expand...
 
"Reason" <PDexter@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:p8fpc.3602$9P6.1956@clgrps12...
"Bryan Swadener" <bryan.swadenerNOSPAM@comcast.net> wrote in message
news:_xWoc.44004$536.7760328@attbi_s03...
For what it's worth, NIST has a small program that can be used to
synchronize your computer (IBM & Mac) clock over the internet:
http://www.boulder.nist.gov/timefreq/service/its.htm
Bryan

Windows XP has it built-in, as I said.

....making the NIST utility useful, to those not using Windoughs XP.
Click to expand...
 
Quartz clocks and watches don't necessarily have a microprocessor. Most have
a simple divider chip which divides the oscillator frequency by two the
right number of times to give one second pulses to drive the stepper motor
which drives the seconds hand or to drive the counter circuitry for the LCD
display.

Some have a trimmer capacitor in parallel with the quartz crystal which can
be adjusted, but not all. It'll look like a small screw head with a bit of
ceramic and solder around it.

With clocks you can add one, but if the clock is already running slow this
will make it slower, so you'll have to add a small inductor in series with
the crystal to speed it up first. Try a couple of turns on a small ferrite
bead first and get it right from there by experiment.

The trouble with PCs is that the early ones used the electronics from cheap
digital watches and the standard of timekeeping hasn't improved much since.
That's why there was so much kerfuffle about the Millenium Bug.

I don't know about elsewhere, but in the UK we can buy "Timecode Clocks"
which contain radio receivers which keep them calibrated to the caesium
master clock at the National Physical Laboratory. They're only about two to
three times the price of an ordinary quartz clock so if you're really
concerned about accuracy, you could buy on of these and set everything else
to it.

I'd dare say other countries have something similar.

Hope this helps,

Nemo


Reason <PDexter@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:m3Enc.20284$F04.10358@clgrps13...
It's been 30 years now since I bought my first digital watch, and to this
day, I've never seen an electronic clock which could be adjusted to keep
more accurate time.

It would appear to be the simplest of programming tasks. If your clock
has
lost a minute in 10 days, when you reset your time, the microprocessor
should be able to increase the speed of the clock by 1 minute over 10 days
with a simple math formula.

Such a task was achieved quite early on with mechanical clocks. For
centuries they have had an adjustment which alters the speed of the clock
to
keep more accurate time. In some clocks, the speed is adjusted
automatically by the amount you advance or retard the time in a 24 hour
period. After a few daily adjustments, the clock will be keeping time more
accurately than a typical digital clock today.

Most of the computers I have had over the years can precess quite badly
over
a few months, being off by a dozen minutes or more. Many computers can be
off by much more than that, not having been reset for a long time.

The latest version of Windows XP has an internet synchronization feature,
which seems mostly unnecessary if digital clocks had been designed to
adjust
their speed whenever the time is corrected. I can't believe such a simple
feature has not been designed into a digital clock, at least the ones
commonly used in devices today.
Click to expand...
 
"nemo" <nemo@naughtylass2.wet> wrote in message
news:c864t1$v87$1@news.wplus.net...
Quartz clocks and watches don't necessarily have a microprocessor. Most
have
a simple divider chip which divides the oscillator frequency by two the
right number of times to give one second pulses to drive the stepper motor
which drives the seconds hand or to drive the counter circuitry for the
LCD
display.

Some have a trimmer capacitor in parallel with the quartz crystal which
can
be adjusted, but not all. It'll look like a small screw head with a bit of
ceramic and solder around it.

With clocks you can add one, but if the clock is already running slow this
will make it slower, so you'll have to add a small inductor in series with
the crystal to speed it up first. Try a couple of turns on a small ferrite
bead first and get it right from there by experiment.

The trouble with PCs is that the early ones used the electronics from
cheap
digital watches and the standard of timekeeping hasn't improved much
since.
That's why there was so much kerfuffle about the Millenium Bug.

I don't know about elsewhere, but in the UK we can buy "Timecode Clocks"
which contain radio receivers which keep them calibrated to the caesium
master clock at the National Physical Laboratory. They're only about two
to
three times the price of an ordinary quartz clock so if you're really
concerned about accuracy, you could buy on of these and set everything
else
to it.

I'd dare say other countries have something similar.

Hope this helps,

Nemo
Click to expand...
Thanks for the "help" but that's not really why I posted my comment. I know
about trimmer capacitors and network synching with atomic clocks, but I
wanted to get someone thinking about designing a digital clock that can
"learn" how inaccurate it is. Then by calculating the amount of manual
adjustment made to it since the last time it was set, it could then apply a
correction factor and adjust it's rate to compensate, making it more
accurate, and thereby making subsequent manual adjustments unnecessary.
Don't you think such a simple innovation for digital clocks is long overdue?

If anyone got my point, they don't seem to have posted it in a reply here.


Reason <PDexter@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:m3Enc.20284$F04.10358@clgrps13...
It's been 30 years now since I bought my first digital watch, and to
this
day, I've never seen an electronic clock which could be adjusted to keep
more accurate time.

It would appear to be the simplest of programming tasks. If your clock
has
lost a minute in 10 days, when you reset your time, the microprocessor
should be able to increase the speed of the clock by 1 minute over 10
days
with a simple math formula.

Such a task was achieved quite early on with mechanical clocks. For
centuries they have had an adjustment which alters the speed of the
clock
to
keep more accurate time. In some clocks, the speed is adjusted
automatically by the amount you advance or retard the time in a 24 hour
period. After a few daily adjustments, the clock will be keeping time
more
accurately than a typical digital clock today.

Most of the computers I have had over the years can precess quite badly
over
a few months, being off by a dozen minutes or more. Many computers can
be
off by much more than that, not having been reset for a long time.

The latest version of Windows XP has an internet synchronization
feature,
which seems mostly unnecessary if digital clocks had been designed to
adjust
their speed whenever the time is corrected. I can't believe such a
simple
feature has not been designed into a digital clock, at least the ones
commonly used in devices today.
Click to expand...
 
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