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I'd like to take advantage of this topic to ask /.ers a very general question about Apple policy regarding softwares.

I've noticed that many of readers here seem to appreciate Apple as much as Linux. However, I do not understand why. Let me explain.

Despite the fact that Apple is very successful with its hardware, and for some good reasons indeed - they make very nice computers, and have a quite clever way of dealing with IT marketing - I still do not understand why anyone did not revolt yet against the fact that Apple is rewarding their audience by making them pay the upgrade of a FreeBSD-based platform for (I think some will become angry with my statement...) 129 USD (you might just have noticed that I didn't take into account the 'free' upgrade that allows you to benefit from Panther if you purchased a Mac after October the 8th, which is two weeks before the official release ; indeed it would have been beyond the human limits of decency).

As every geek, I'm interested in aesthetics. This is why I own an iPod. A windows iPod that I make run on Linux. But again this is deceiving.
I've been using an older 5 Gb iPod on a friend's iMac, it was working *so* well. But the present one is all the more buggy with every day passing.

It may sounds weird, but my point is that Apple is taking advantage of its position of Windows' crusher, alongside with Linux and others (just look how clever it was from a marketing point of view to use a free platform). But in my opinion Apple is far far far away from the Linux community's state of mind. How can free-minded persons visit Apple Web Site and not be shocked by the understatement "The Best OS in The World ?" How can the GNU/Linux community allows, without saying a word, a multinational to take advantage of what has been built over for so many years ? How can Mac users keep waiting hours for a software that is overrated, both on financial and on technical points of view ?

The late misfortunes I had with my so beloved iPod made me realise that Apple developpers might not be so good as they appear to be. Again, one could answer that the FreeBSD license is completely free, and that maybe I'm not well informed of the very philosophical core of the problem. But even on a commercial plan, I've seen nothing worse than Apple business plan. They make good, not great, softwares, and they make you pay something about three time the price you would be able to bear for Microsoft XP, which is at last, a respectable OS.

My step-father did buy a 15'' G4 last year. We made comparisons between Linux, XP, OS9 and OSX. Despite the fact that my step-father is part of the strong community that is blindly backing up Apple choices, we were both compelled to acknowledge that - yes, yes- his G4 when running Mac OS X was beaten by WinXP running on my Centrino 1,3 Ghz, 512 RAM, slow IDE disk, when making graphic processing with Photoshop. When switching back to Mac OS 9, of course Mac was eventually faster. Not fast enough for Linux and the Gimp, but this is another problem.

These are just thoughts in the air. And I would be glad if some good soul could give me some answers about the ever-growing support, amongst the free software community, for Apple, no matter the orientations.

Regards,
Jdif

For admins: take a look under Group Policy "Computer Configuration - Securiy Settings - Local Policies - Security Options" for "Rename administrator account" and "Rename guest account".

...Would describe my relationship with the Finder.

But let's not forget ArsTechnica's review of Panther. Nor their thoughts on Panther's Finder.

Both articles are, of course, written by John Siracusa, but I shouldn't have to mention this because I was in the middle of reading his Panther review last week when I was rudely Slashdotted. Anyway, I tend to agree with his analysis of the situation.

...Would describe my relationship with the Finder.

But let's not forget ArsTechnica's review of Panther. Nor their thoughts on Panther's Finder.

Both articles are, of course, written by John Siracusa, but I shouldn't have to mention this because I was in the middle of reading his Panther review last week when I was rudely Slashdotted. Anyway, I tend to agree with his analysis of the situation.

Apple's explination
A good description from Ars Technica

Thanks! That looks awesome. The only thing I think would still be nice in OSX is multiple desktops, like most Linux wms have. It might be confusing to new users, though, so it would be something you have to enable manually, rather than a default-on setting. Multiple desktops is a really useful feature.

Apple's explination
A good description from Ars Technica

Oddly enough, last weeks linux.ars had a cursory look at Fedora Core 1. Go check it out.

Soko

Replying to myself... Linux.Ars did a short intro to Fedora here, though it is not a full review.

If you need help installing it, checkout the #fedora unofficial FAQ, it answers 90% of people's questions, and if you're new to Linux, we have thread at Ars that should help you along.

If you want to know how Fedora is, you should probably ask people that use it, it's unfortunate that such a good release is mired with the typical anti-Red Hat sentiment. What's next? "OMFG Red Hat is sleeping with my wife!"

Replying to myself... Linux.Ars did a short intro to Fedora here, though it is not a full review.

If you need help installing it, checkout the #fedora unofficial FAQ, it answers 90% of people's questions, and if you're new to Linux, we have thread at Ars that should help you along.

If you want to know how Fedora is, you should probably ask people that use it, it's unfortunate that such a good release is mired with the typical anti-Red Hat sentiment. What's next? "OMFG Red Hat is sleeping with my wife!"

I don't trust Eugenia either. She seems much more obsessed with screenshots and themes than anything else(such as usability).

If you had actually read the article, it's all pretty darn obvious.

An observation I made when reading this is that Mac really is the system I'll use for our upcoming DooM3 Project, because it just seems much smarter to develop graphics and games on a Mac, and Panther seems like a really nice OS that no only will handle what I want to do (with cinematics, textures, sound and code), but it also seems like it'll be a solution for cross-platform testing, with the X11 and Windows support. Unless I'm mistaken, Mac now seems to be the system for development, more than ever, and that spells progress in the right direction for developers everywhere.

A comment about Fast User Switching (FUS), from the article, kinda made me think about how the author used different applications to make sure his prefs didn't get changed by his spouse. This seems good in some ways, but in others it means less programs will be in use, while the most effective programs will be staple. For example, I used Pegasus while my wife was using Outlook. With my Mac, we'll both use the same mail prog, whatever it is. Does this cut down on variety? Does it cut down on experimentation? I think so.

Ars Technica has a good summary of what you can do with SSID's and WEP to improve your wireless network's security:-

ArsTechnica

It doesn't take much, really...

I'm running an AthlonXP 1500+ at stock speeds and it's almost silent. To start with, I picked up an oversized heatsink with a 80mm fan (nothign fancy, just a $10ish low-noise model). Then I got myself a -good- PSU (350W Vantec with dual temp-controlled fans) and one of those oh-so-sexy Zalman fan speed controllers.

I'm sure, if I wanted, I could've gone even more extreme, but as it is (coupled with my fanless graphics card) I can barely hear it. I'm sure with something like an Antec Sonata and one of those oversized Zalman heatsinks.

"Steve Jobs hid aqua until right before the OS X launch."

"Steve Jobs hid aqua until right before the OS X launch."

I wonder if any of the videos feature the Orgasmatron.

The blue box was fiction. No such work was ever "started at NeXT".

The Blue Box, in fact, existed as part of OSX server. Before Jobs closed off the Rhapsody on Intel product, the Red Box would have let users run Win32 apps, The Blue Box later became the TrueBlueEnvironment, and the Yellow Box became Cocoa.

But this article is moronic, as if there is nothing that Apple can do wrong. May be this guy needs to hang out in the OSX Forums and take a look if the great great OSX is indeed problem-free, or securely bulletproof? I mean, who is he kidding? I love OSX running on my dual g4 500, but I'm also realistic about running my software update from time to time, just like any Windows users out there.

Just like the article that was published yesterday on /. about a Panther review from the WSJ, perhaps they should stick their nose to 'Wall Street' stuff and let sites like Ars to provide factual review, instead of raving of how great Apple is (we know it is ! :) Thank you.

I think we should be more concerned with bringing up the audiovideo quality of videoconferencing.

Well, that's all well and good, but even though there's one-to-one Internet video conferencing technology good enough that TechWeb thought it was a satellite feed when they saw it last week, it still needs extensions to support one-to-many, many-to-one and many-to-many conferencing.

And even then you'd still have the onerous task of convincing everyone to use iChat AV. After all, it's an Apple product, and everyone knows that Windows users aren't going to want to use an Apple product!

I own a 2003 Honda Civic Hybrid, and the thing came standard with a 7 year warranty on the battery pack. Most car parts are designed to fail just after the warranty expires. So if these vehicles use similiar batteries, I don't think you'll have to change out the battery in 1-2 years.

About the iTunes "features" that seem to be impacting a significant number of people, particularly on 2K. Many systems won't boot (and it doesn't seem repairable in many cases) and some are getting their mp3 files scrambled and renamed without any clear warning.

At the least it sounds incredibly buggy. I'm sure people will be "switching" in droves now.

http://arstechnica.com/wankerdesk/03q2/i-tunes-1.h tml

Sorry I meant GB. And SCSI has less need for a big cache to overcome it's deficiencies.

SCSI-3 also does well.

Yeah, especially as people re-purchase the music that Apple rearranged for them that they can no longer find, or that they may have lost when their computer refused to boot because of iTunes.

http://arstechnica.com/wankerdesk/03q2/i-tunes-1.h tml

Could be a solid business model for them.

Right... Troll...

I got my info here and here.

The guy from ars even says he likes the system... As a matter of fact, I like the system. They should just drop the iPod only restrictions for the MP3 player supported. iPod's have been selling just fine without specific backing from a music service.

So if Apple gets $.33 on each song, and credit card and hosting (might be cheap, but still costs money) companies bite a chunk out of that for each sale, how much profit is really left? Methinks not much.

And how many of you are really going to buy an iPod just because iTunes supports it?

Right then. I'll continue trolling.

I agree. This editorial at ars technica looks at some of the points you bring up.

Talk about out of touch... Yes, this is possibly the cheapest rig you can toss together, but for only a few dollars more you can get -far- more performance.

Duron's (200 (100x2)FSB) are dead, pick up at least a 266(133x2)FSB Athlon XP, if not the 333 or 400; when you're dealing with clock multipliers that are over 10x, FSB is a -major- bottleneck, and DDR prices are pretty constant up to PC3000.

No-name mobo with AC97? Can you say "Snap - crackle - pop"? At the same price point, you could at least suggest a first-gen nForce board, getting better performance -and- better sound.

A copper heatsink? Please. For a low end rig, Al ones are going to work just fine; you should have no problem picking up something with a slow & silent 80mm or 92mm fan for under $10; I doubt you'll find any Cu parts for under $20.

"Any noname nvidia Geforce 4MX"? There's 2 things wrong with this: First, GF4mx boards can be SDR or DDR and dif't speeds, this is important to performance (not so much to price); secondly - the low-end Radeon 9x00 line (9000, 9100, 9200) are going to significantly outperform the GeForce at the same price-point. The only reason I'd go with an nVidia card is for their Linux support.

Only 256MB of RAM? At the price it's running right now, 512MB is painless enough to buy, and, considering that you'll likely be running win2k or XP on a gaming rig, is well worth the extra $40.

Of course, we're still pinching pennies here, check out this article for a slightly more optimized reccomendation.

[Text of the article in case it gets Slashdotted. Posting AC so I can't be accused of karma whoring.]

Can I accuse you of being an idiot instead?

"The article" is entirely hosted on /.! You think /. is going to /. itself?

Here's a clue: if you're going to repost an article, repost them only if they're on another site, such as the Ars Technica review.

of course, with multi panel screens, and other pricey toys, etc. it is possible to go slightly bonkers.

of course, with multi panel screens, and other pricey toys, etc. it is possible to go slightly bonkers.

A statement easily disproven: HP Dynamo

For those of you who live mainly in the software world (myself included) there's a very good overview of all things CPU on Arstechnica. Detailed enough to be interesting but starts at a basic enough level.

And remember than nothing impresses the ladies more than sombody who knows why multiple cores might be interesting

(p.s. I call shenanigans on this review's author! Take a look at that collar in her profile! Can you say Apple shill? ;^) )

(p.s. I call shenanigans on this review's author! Take a look at that collar in her profile! Can you say Apple shill? ;^) )

Yes, the daddy of all OS X reviews are from Ars Technica

Well, you can build one yourself. For example, get a Antec Sonata case. Put Athlon64 in there (it runs pretty cool, so you don't need loud fans. Or Opteron 24x if you want to go dual. that alone would be pretty quiet.

Or maybe something like this

And why would it be misleading? If Xeons would be used, surely the researchers would optimize for SSE2, as x87 on the Pentium 4 has been crippled.
Scientific Computing has always emphasized numerical linear algebra. An entire strain of supercomputer processors was developed to support such requirements.

Besides, the final "score" will be produced by benchmarking with LINPACK. It's not merely a matter of taking manufacturer supplied numbers, multiplying them together, and claiming a spot.

#2 seems to be on M$FT's mind as well.

If the graphics processor hangs (in the middle of a game for example), VPU Recover acts by resetting the VPU, enabling the end user to continue right where he left off. Depending on the state of the system when VPU Recover was activated, you may be able to recover with all of your open applications intact. In other cases, these applications may have to be closed and you're kicked back to the Windows desktop, but at least you don't have to go through the slow process of a complete system reboot.
According to ATI, this feature is a requirement in Microsoft's next-generation Windows operating system, codenamed "Longhorn". So essentially, ATI is ahead of the curve, to the advantage of anyone who owns an ATI-based video card.

Source

I couldn't find a neutral (not associated with the new ATI drivers) reference to this requirement. Wonder if this feature with manifest itself in ATI's promised regular updates to their Linux driver.

Well, if you're going to be confrontational about it, let's go:

Feel free to quote meaningless news quips all you like as long as they imply whatever you want to imply.

Me? I'll take some facts and numbers out of official specification documents: The G5 runs between 19 watts of heat dissipation and 42 watts, depending on its clock speed (source as HTML, as PDF)

The Pentium 4 desktop version runs between 60 and 80 watts (source). Indeed, the G5 in its desktop version is in fact competitive with Intel's low power Mobile Pentium 4-M processor for notebooks, which ranges from an impressive 7 watts up to 35 watts (source).

Put that in your pipe and smoke it.

P.S.
This is the direction in which intel is headed with its Mobile Pentium 4 (not M) processor. 70 watts in a laptop.

Mac.ars has a much more thoughtful response to this.

Headline: "Should Apple be concerned about the recent launch of MusicMatch Downloads? Will not having first-mover advantage on the Wintel platform hurt Apple?"

Here's my theory on the HL2 delay. Since VU is operating at a substantial lost, they are prime to be saved by Bill Gate's wallet. Since Half Life2 and Xbox2 are both optimized to run on ATI's hardware, I can see the Richmond's Borg needing their killer app for XBOX2. Gates says "Hmmmm, Half Life2 sounds good. Buy them out boys!"

At the risk of being Offtopic... I know it's fashionable to bash MS and their products, but this statement is simply silly. What you're referring to MS doing with the X-Box is called a "loss leader." They make the platform at a loss with the hopes of making up the dividends on the individual games. All the major consoles do the exact same thing as do manufacturers of printers (ever wonder why you can get a printer for 80 bucks, but the carts are 15-30 bucks each, not to mention paper?), and several other industries.

Sorry to burst your bubble, but what lexmark does is profitable to them, what microsoft is doing is still losing them money. They are using the xbox merely to get their foot in the proverbial console door, in preparation hopefully to become profitable with the xbox2.

Next time someone mentions microsoft and one of their products, they might not be just trying to blame the problems of the world on them, and the poster might actually be talking about something that pertains to the subject.

Imagine that.

"some 9,000 tons of home-use computers were scrapped -- the equivalent of 460,000 units."

Let's hope that their idea of equivalency isn't the same as the the RIAA's

Well, I have 4 computers powering 8 CD-RWs... oh, wait, that's just one computer with a 32X burner... the RIAA has me all confused with their math!

Hehe, and I love the hierarchical browsing in OS X; gives you a sense of path, location, and depth all in one compact space.

I wonder what the impetus for BeOS is; I perfectly understand the *hobbiest* drive, it's what keeps interest in Amiga alive... but is there a business demand for BeOS?

ArsTechnica has a link:

ArsTechnica

Apple has apparently improved CSS in Safari. The Complex Spiral Demo previously mentioned via the Mac Browser Smackdown, which in turn was mentioned on slashdot, now renders correctly in Safari. (Previously Safari was coloring black the parts which weren't in the blue box and were off the screen when the page finished loading.)

(As a side note, I couldn't load the Ars Technica article without turning off Javascript. It kept sending me to some crappy ad that was supposed to redirect me back to the article but didn't.)

The difference is that all the existing apps would need to be recompiled to fully use the 64bit. Even lowly DOS can use performance improvements with a larger cache. And with Hyperthreading the number of clocks per instruction is very small, this lends itself to using a larger cache more often.

See also:

Ars Technia on Caching

I just read an article about a bill introduced by Sen. Brownback which would "require owners of digital media to file a John Doe lawsuit to obtain the identifying information of an Internet user, rather than simply requesting a subpoena. Currently, the Digital Millennium Copyright Act permits copyright holders to subpoena an Internet service provider for the name and address of a person they believe is violating a copyright. The one-page subpoena request can be issued by a court clerk and doesn't require a judge's signature."

"'There are no checks, no balances, and the alleged pirate has no opportunity to defend themselves,' Brownback said when introducing the bill. 'My colleagues, this issue is about privacy, not piracy. 'This will provide immediate privacy protections to Internet subscribers by forcing their accusers to appear publicly in a court of law, where those with illicit intentions will not tread, and provides the accused with due process required to properly defend themselves.'"