271
this post was submitted on 08 Oct 2025
271 points (97.9% liked)
Technology
75758 readers
3082 users here now
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
Our Rules
- Follow the lemmy.world rules.
- Only tech related news or articles.
- Be excellent to each other!
- Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
- Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
- Politics threads may be removed.
- No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
- Only approved bots from the list below, this includes using AI responses and summaries. To ask if your bot can be added please contact a mod.
- Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
- Accounts 7 days and younger will have their posts automatically removed.
Approved Bots
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
It might have had something that can shift its frequency.
What happens in most microwaves is you get a standing wave. The high and low parts of the wave are always at the same spot. You then get a hot spot at the peak (and trough) of the wave, and a cold spot when the wave is near the zero node.
By shifting the frequency, even just a little, you can shift the hot spots around and more evenly cook the food.
This is obviously more expensive, and these days you can get it in higher end residential microwaves. Way back when, though, it was only something you'd see in industrial models.
If I'm thinking about it correctly then either the standing wave is intentional or the oven is designed badly. You know the wavelength so you can make sure the oven is not an integer multiple of it and the hot spots move around on their own, no fancy frequency shifting required.