14/10/07

Dials are good.

I saw an interesting piece of hardware last week - an old fashioned diagnostic/control panel. It had about fifteen dials on it, and as a result was apparently much easier to read than a digital equivalent. With digital read-outs the operator would have to remember whatever fifteen numbers were the right ones, and then compare them with the fifteen displays - in the process risking misreading a 5 as a 2, or some similar potentially disasterous mix-ups. But with fifteen dials, it's much easier to remember what the right settings are supposed to look like - plus you can put a mark on the dial where the needle is supposed to be pointing. Apparently, people have now developed digital systems that have an analogue dial display, just because they're easier to use.

And have you noticed how you don't see have as many digital watches as you used to? I think most people have realised that a) they're harder to read, and b) they just don't look as elegant as traditional clock faces. You've got admit, a grandfather clock with a digital display would lose pretty much all it's power for drama.