MoD spends £40k on the speaking clock...

[twocvbloke]

Thought this was quite amusing, the MoD banning the use of the speaking clock, but still racking up a £40k bill...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-23814934

[gpo706]

Not surprised, unless they are all governed by the atomic clock.

All the IT and hardware in my work run to different times, even when I synch them all up they start drifting off faster or slower, after about a fortnight they run minutes different, I find this weird seeing as its all digital technology. you would think they would all be in-synch with each other?

[twocvbloke]

The fun thing about consumer digital clocks is they all rely on quartz timing, which isn't a fixed-rate mechanism, the quartz vibrates at different speeds depending on temperature so that it'll gain time or lose time if it gets hot or cold, especially inside of computers or even wristwatches, all the environmental variations in temperatures adds up (or subtracts from) and messes up the average quartz clock...

And depending on the quality of the circuits, they can really vary quite badly, even apparently identical timepieces can drift at different rates if they're subject to different variables...

[Owain]

You'd think they could have bought one of these

http://strowger-net.telefoonmuseum.com/tel_info_tim2000.html

Or just phoned this
http://www.telephonesuk.co.uk/speaking_clock.htm

[twocvbloke]

I wouldn't mind one of them TIM 2000 units, put it on extension 23 (can't be 123, so 23 would have to do!!) of the 616 and have my own speaking clock...