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My friend has a Merc S500, and he mentions having to go into the shop for a "software update". Sometimes it takes days (tho he gets a loaner). I wonder why he has to... apparently his class of cars comes with a satellite modem to be able to apply patches remotely!

Dude, a Laptop

Gave that one to my girlfriend. Best $1500 (refurbed w/ employee discount) I ever spent.

Fellas if you need a laptop try that one. Or a Thinkpad-w00t!

No, CNET's front page says (direct copy-paste) "Insider Secrets: Firefox sucks... ...unless you've hacked it to make it really cool. We'll show you how."

Look at the "Today's top stories" box.

I suspect he is, deep down, very insecure. It probably goes back to being rejected by girls when he was a teenager that he has so much anger against people society regards as "cool".

CNet Shopper lets you type in your zipcode to get tax and shipping costs along with price listings on their comparison screens.

" Sony's 34-inch wide-screen tube-based direct-view HDTV, the KD-34XBR960, is simply the best-performing television of its kind on the market. Its screen boasts an incredible 1,400 lines of horizontal resolution, which allows it to resolve more detail with high-def sources than any other direct-view tube. It can deliver deeper blacks than any non-tube TV, and it offers two key improvements over last year's excellent KV-34XBR910: accurate color decoding and independent picture memory per input. In the smaller-than-40-inch category, the KD-34XBR960 earns its place as CNET's reference HDTV."

Don't we remember when Thailand's finance minister BMW computer failure with Microsoft WinCE?

MUD @Nexlinks

My setup is a Sony u750p and with a bluetooth cf-card and a cellphone.
Since its bluetooth, the cellphone stays in my pocket (unless it rings!) and the computer fits in my jacket pocket when not in use. This way I get broadband not just within range of my car, but anywhere I go.

Thats from a of a Sub $1000 Nikon (D70). 10% of the price of the camera is no small thing, at least IMO.

Well I didn't mean to sound somewhat fan-boyish by not qualifying my argument.

Basically, it's my position between XP (late October 2001) and today (2005) the changes that have occured consist of patches and slightly extended hardware support I believe. SP2 brought us the integrated firewall and well... you know security stuff. The point being, these are not new features, because they don't add to the user's experience, even the firewall is, functionally, no different from a virus patch, or an integrated virus scanner, neither of which offer an advantage over OS X.

On the other hand, with OS X, while I've only had experience with 10.3, which came out the end of 2003, even from the 10.0 (released March 24th, 2001) or 10.1 baseline, tremendous amounts of progress have been made, and there are a number of great integrated features and frameworks that, in the view of this long-time PCer (since DOS), put current iteration of Windows to shame.

Cool little things like integrated spell checking in cocoa to inter-app services, a ton of frameworks such as core audio and the upcoming stuff, and more advanced graphical handling, and so on. And while the releases are now coming every 18 months instead of every 12 months, they're quite substantial.

And whats exceptional about this is not just that such progress has been made, but that it has been made in such little time, whith comparitively small resource pool.

Meanwhile, we don't yet know what Longhorn will be when it arrives, but the early previews are not encouraging. In any case, we'll have to make the OS X/Longhorn comparison when we actually have something to compare OS X to. And for now, I'm not taking Mr. Thurrot's word for it, that Longhorn will be spectacular. Well, I guess we'll just have to wait another 18 months or so...

CNET had some negative reviews up here
First page is filled with score 1 out of 10.

Sorry to rain on your parade but the article is about an incident that took place in India. If that's not people other than myself talking about outsourcing to India then what is it?

That's why I used the phrase "particular discussion" - the discussion that these points arose in rather than the article itself. It is of course possible to have a discussion that covers wider issues than the article itself, even on slashdot :P

Again, as for my initial comment which you consider irrelevant, it was intended to point out to a poster who was concerned about justice being done that justice was being done, albeit by the relevant Indian authorities rather than their US counterparts.

I don't consider it irrelevant, sorry if I gave that impression. I was just making the point that, if we're throwing anecdotal evidence into the melting pot, mentioning China is just as valid as mentioning India - neither country was explicitly or implicitly mentioned in the question you were responding to.

By the way, the "[W]ho's talking about outsourcing to China?" in my previous post was a question asking for examples of companies who are currently outsourcing to China or even considering it.

Ah, mea culpa, I misinterpreted it as a derogatory "where the heck did China come into it?". China is apparently due to be the next big outsourcing location, so the many horror stories are definitely something to worry about. (The last link isn't strictly related to outsourcing, but the same problems apply)

As for xenophobia you'll notice that I qualified my remarks by saying "sorry, that's what it looks like from where I'm standing", which was my way of saying "hey, you may not have meant it this way, but that's what it's going to look like to some people" but in not so many words.

Ah, thanks for the warning. I hadn't really considered the possibility it might be taken that way. Seems that too long in a sufficiently multicultural society tends to desensitise you to people's sensitivity.

Thanks for a good debate :)

...station to Echostar (Cablevision is the parent of Voom, Echostar the parent of DishNetwork) due to mounting losses at Cablevision attributable to Voom. Echostar was preparing to put up another satellite and the cost of the Voom bird and ground station was comparable to an actual launch, and got the new broadcast capacity operational faster. Basically Cablevision sold the assets and is now down dumping the service.

What Echostar has planned for the new satellite has not been announced (determined?), but the Apr 30 date seems to imply that we may have to wait until at least then to find out exactly what Echostar intends to do with the bird.

About the sale: http://www.thestreet.com/_googlen/tech/georgemanne s/10204508.html

An overview of HDTV over satellite: http://www.cnet.com/4520-7874_1-5108854-4.html

That's my local Best/Worst Buy, and my bank is right across the street @!... oh, and did I mention that I need a CD/RW for my mom's machine this weekend...

Maybe I should have my wife arrange bail now !

Seriously it is right up the street... and also seriously, does BB have any idea what's going to happen now that this is making the broader news (/., CNET Buzz, others) ??? I can just picture cash drawers at BB all over the country filling up with $2 bills (what slot do you put them in)...

Wow. Best Buy gets slammed for what seems to be fraudulous billing practices, poorly trained cashiers, idiotic managesrs, while the overzealous rookies in the BCPD get slammed, the Feds get slammed, and the $2 bill gets the best publicity it's seen since in years... there just SO much to love about this story (Thank you Michael Olesker!) (Obligatory BugMeNot)

But if you're naive about the net and you go online maybe once a month...then you're a raw piece of meat in a pool full of sharks.

I am one of those naive that really don't have a clue what hardware review sites to trust. My comfort is that I am probably far from alone, in this matter.

To assist me and other naives(sp?), please join this silly poll and review the following sites (regarding credibility) with a scale ranging from 1 to 10, where 1 is "No credibility at all" and 10 is "Perfect credibility, these guys wouldn't post a biased review for world domination":

About PC Hardware Reviews
Ace's Hardware
Anandtech
Ars Technica
Beyond 3D
Cnet Reviews
Dan's Data
Dev Hardware
Extremetech
Firingsquad
[H]ard|OCP
Hardware Analysis
Hardwarecentral
Hardwarezone
IT Reviews
OcPrices
Overclockers.com
ProCooling.com
The Tech Report
The Tech Zone
Tom's Hardware
TrustedReviews
Viperlair
Xtreme Resources

If you know only a few of them, give your opinion on those.

Maybe someone with the right facilities could set up an independent poll?

More info can be found here.

Done.
Fox News
The claim is right there in their tag line "Fair & Balanced". Yes, we all know it's bullshit, but they do claim it.
CNet Reviews claims that they offer "unbiased" reviews, read the page title.
The word "unbiased" is all over the place on the internet. Actual unbiased information is harder to come by. About the only, truly, unbiased information you are going to come by are hard facts like 2+2=4. Get beyond that and it all gets subjective.

Read the review from C|net:

http://reviews.cnet.com/4505-6460_7-31293682-2.htm l

How about that thing called encryption?

I remember when a database got hacked and all of the usernames and passwords were in plaintext, which has of course been fixed. More about that breakin here.

TDK already made hardware that is more compact than this. It's an audio player (have to convert MP3s or WMAs to a special format) that has 128MB of flash memory.. Anyway, it might not be the ideal solution, but you still can get the same effect of "singing along with headphones that don't appear to be plugged into anything."

the guy who wrote the article and notified slashdot, wasn't able to keep his site up. What insight can he possibly have when he apparently lacked that kind of obvious foresight?

he's beating up on the weak. I have less respect for people who can't chose difficult targets.

Third, he ignores that Google is highly overvalued for a "search" company.

Finally, he places way too much emphasis on getting Microsoft to play good doggie. Being able to force Microsoft to make their sites compatible with yours isn't that interesting.

Remember when blaster was around? There was the worm Nachi that spread through the same vulnerability and patched up the box.

It caused a lot of problems. Trust me. I worked at Best Buy. I had to clean up SO MANY [explicative]ing computers...

I like Firefox anyway, but it doesn't load certain sites well, so I still use Mozilla.

http://www.cnet.com/4520-6033_1-5666404-1.html?tag =nl.e497

CNet editors seem to think IE7's going to kill firefox, though they present no facts at all or features for IE7, notice how CNet won't so much as let you submit a linux application.

Maybe they need to .... get the facts

http://www.msdn.org/
;-)

Can you get 5+ hours on the Pentium M laptops?

yes, yes, yes, and

There are plenty of others. Just do some research before you say something stupid.

Can you get 5+ hours on the Pentium M laptops?

yes, yes, yes, and

There are plenty of others. Just do some research before you say something stupid.

Bah! Everyone knows that the so-called "tadpoles" are actually living sun creatures. Fortunately, they're unlikely to attack Earth again because the Superfriends defeated them after Lex Luthor foolishly tried to strike a deal with the creatures.

The Sony KD-34XBR960 is probably the best right now in terms of pure picture quality. I got lucky and found a reference monitor on the AVS Forums deals section for $700, best deal of my life. They're going for $1,500 and up according to a Froogle search.

Here's a review.

there is no compelling reason for me to ever want a plasma tv.

Amen. While I love the large screen, the cost and lifetime issues make it a non-starter for me. Personally, I'm holding out hope for OLED TV's. But it looks like we'll need to wait until 2007... hurry up already!

Apparently some Apple resellers and consumers have joined to sue the company over some of its alleged practices, including use of confidential info, manipulating supply, etc. Slightly OT, but it relates to Apple public image. Of course, suits are easy to start but harder to win -- SCO anyone? -- so who knows... http://asia.cnet.com/news/personaltech/0,39037091, 39218703,00.htm/

It's very entertaining to read /. comments on China. These Internet cafes are shutdown to plow the way for bigger, better and nicer franchised Internet cafe chains bankrolled by IBM and Intel!.

Demand for the GameCube last year was hurt by the lack of hit games for the console. - Bloomberg

uters and other news agencies have reported out of Japan that Nintendo's net profit has fallen 43 percent in the latest quarter, and that the videogame maker has also cut its forecast for the full year by more than one fifth, citing a strong yen and weak sales of the GameCube. - Reuters

Only one Nintendo title made it to NPD's Top 10 list: "Pokémon FireRed" for the Game Boy Advance. The company's highest-selling GameCube game, "Pokémon Coliseum," ranked 25th, according to Lowenstein. - Seattle Times

The company now expects that by the end of June it will have sold 21 million to 22 million Xboxes since the product debuted, up from an earlier forecast of less than 20 million. - CNET News.com

The Home and Entertainment division, which includes the Xbox and all games sales, reported sales of the console up 30% on the same period last year... Ferrango

PS: Name one killer game that came with psx2 on launch. Ready to Rumble, Timesplitters.. I think not.

PSPS: I remember having the same type of debate when xbox originally came out. Which just proves slashbotters have no insight on how consumer markets work.

On the heels of Austin, Munich, Vienna and entire countries e.g. in South America, LA City Councilmembers have unveiled plans for an extended transition to FOSS in their press release conspicuously labelled "FREE OPEN SOURCE SOFTWARE MEANS MORE POLICE ON THE STREETS - COUNCIL BETS THAT OPEN SOURCE MOVEMENT CAN SAVE CITY MILLIONS".

Despite the telling omission of "AND" in its caption, the statement actually does look beyond the "...as in beer" part of the equation.

A spokesman also explained the project and its inspiration in greater detail to German heise online news.

For Ballmer and Gates, the good news is that they won't have to travel quite as far any more to try and win back their latest defectors.

The "bad" news (for them!) can be summed up as "Tux ante portas": their arch-enemy and worst nightmare already knocking (or should we say: pecking?) right at their porch now.

On the heels of Austin, Munich, Vienna and entire countries e.g. in South America, LA City Councilmembers have unveiled plans for an extended transition to FOSS in their press release conspicuously labelled "FREE OPEN SOURCE SOFTWARE MEANS MORE POLICE ON THE STREETS - COUNCIL BETS THAT OPEN SOURCE MOVEMENT CAN SAVE CITY MILLIONS".

Despite the telling omission of "AND" in its caption, the statement actually does look beyond the "...as in beer" part of the equation.

A spokesman also explained the project and its inspiration in greater detail to German heise online news.

For Ballmer and Gates, the good news is that they won't have to travel quite as far any more to try and win back their latest defectors.

The "bad" news (for them!) can be summed up as "Tux ante portas": their arch-enemy and worst nightmare already knocking (or should we say: pecking?) right at their porch now.

http://japan.cnet.com/news/biz/story/0,2000050156, 20080442,00.htm

Key days for the patent: Applied for 10-31-1988 Published on 6-20-1991 Registered 7-17-1998

Why does it take so long for a patent to wend its way through the system? Because the system moves GLACIALLY SLOW here. Matsushita is their own prior art here -- the software product in question didn't start using the context-sensitive help tool until the mid-90s when everybody else started getting in on the whole GUI craze (You may remember -- Oh good gracious, we can click things now!).

I still think, pragmatically, its not a feature which should be copyrightable but the "obviousness" of certain key features was less than obvious in the late 1980s.

I'll translate about as much as I can without getting into copyright trouble. The patent includes clicking on one icon displayed somewhere on your console, which attaches a special graphic to your mouse cursor. You then click on another icon or function on your console, and it brings up context-sensitive help. This is specifically distinguished from using context-sensitive help by pressing one special key or icon which is in a constant place, and also from each function embedding an explanation of what it does through other means which do not change the state of the mouse cursor.

The meat of the story is paragraphy #3, although the three screenshots on the front page are understandable even if you don't read Japanese. Due to quirkiness with derivative works law in Japan, tranlating their captions exactly could potentially lead to a lot of trouble. Suffice it to say that the first screenshot shows the offending icon, the second shows the mouse cursor changing as a result of clicking the icon, and the third shows the result of a second click on a generic interface function (an explanation pops up).

The English-language article wasn't as detailed as the Japanese reports. You know how you can hit shift-F1 in MS products and you get the arrow with a question mark which you then use to get help on a subsequent element on the screen... well this is the same except that you can click an icon as an alternative to shift-F1. There are some screen shots at the bottom of this Japanese-language article: http://japan.cnet.com/news/biz/story/0,2000050156, 20080442,00.htm

Scroll down past the Japanese description and you can see some pics of the offending icon in this link: http://japan.cnet.com/news/biz/story/0,2000050156, 20080442,00.htm

December 1994
Apple Computer sues San Francisco Canyon Company for using Apple Computer's QuickTime code to speed up Microsoft's Video for Windows product.

Alot of Ultra-portables, particularly the japanese imports, have the nipple exclusively.
http://webshop.fujitsupc.com/fpc/Ecommerce/buildse riesbean.do?series=P1
http://www.dynamism.com/xp741/gallery.shtml
http://reviews.cnet.com/JVC_MP_XV841/4505-3121_7-3 0981361.html?tag=pdtl-list

And as an added bonus, they're so cute! *drools*

Holy cow, we have a winner! Or maybe not, those articles are almost a year old.

Interesting that, like Tron, WarGames also had a computer game sequel (real-time strategy). And a WarGames 2 movie was rumored for 2004 (google cache).

I watched some CNET videos of the unvailing of the mac mini. Everyone cheered when the price of $499 was shown. But you know thats not the whole price. Did he not think about mouse, keyboard or monitor? Looking at the back of the imac I dont see anywhere I can plug my VGA monitor? Oh and were do I plug my ps/2 mouse and keyboard? These are still standard inputs for new computers.

He mentions that this computer will encourage people to switch. I have three reasons for not doing so:

1)Usually it is only new computers that will have a usb keyboard and mouse. If I already have a new computer why buy another?

2)If I had an old computer I would have to by all new input and output devices to hook up to this thing because older computers are less likely to have usb mouse keyboards and VGA/DVI monitors.

3)I went to the apple site to "buy" one and I don't even see monitor as an option to add to this computer. Sure I can buy a 20inch LCD from apple but then its not "just" $499 anymore is it?

-brian

The defense is native language support and a bunch of edutainment about how to use a mouse. KDE, Gnome and OO all have native language support done by the natives themselves. Microsoft's inability to get their limited software translated is pathetic and underlines the inferiority of the closed source model. The stuff about using mice is not intuitive, as Paul noticed, but can better be taken care of by a decent three page manual, which should have shipped with windoze 3.1 but did not. Failing that, you would think the wonders of the free market would teach people and it does. Five minutes with a friend back in 1993 taught me everything I needed to know about mice and cutting and pasting in any GUI. If extensive user studdies gave them this starter edition, they really asked the wrong questions.

Comcast pushes VoIP to prime time
By Ben Charny CNET News.com January 10, 2005, 9:54 AM PT

Comcast, the nation's largest cable company, on Monday began selling its version of Internet phone service in three markets, kicking off one of the most significant challenges traditional local phone companies have ever faced.

Initially launching its Digital Voice service in three cities--Indianapolis, Philadelphia and Springfield, Mass.--Comcast plans to reach 20 markets by year's end. The Philadelphia-based company says it intends to make the service available to all its 21 million customers six months after that.

Aside from an aggressive rollout schedule, Comcast has a lofty goal for the number of subscribers the service will attract: 8 million customers in five years, or eight times the number of Internet phone subscribers currently in the United States, according to Rian Wren, Comcast's senior vice president of voice services.

Comcast is the latest, and perhaps most important, addition to the roster of companies selling unlimited domestic dialing to any phone number using voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), which sends calls over the Internet or private network. The technology is cheaper for consumers because it avoids the heavily taxed and regulated traditional local phone networks built and controlled by the Baby Bells--the four regional operating companies formed after the breakup of AT&T. While other cable companies and a host of upstarts such as Vonage Holdings have been selling VoIP since 2002, Comcast is considered the most daunting for the Bells because of its size, financial backing and political muscle.

Wren acknowledged that Comcast is introducing its product months, if not years, behind the rest of its cable competitors, as well as VoIP start-ups such as Vonage and copycats such as AT&T, with its CallVantage service. But the wait was worth it, he says.

"What we've been trying to do is come out with equivalent or better service than traditional phone competition," he said Monday. "You only get one shot at this, when it comes to quality of service." Michael Sims is a worthless piece of shit.

Comcast's long-anticipated push into VoIP illustrates the cutthroat competitiveness between cable and the local phone providers. Both sides are trying to become the primary pipelines for delivering an array of entertainment and communications services into households, including broadband Internet access, multichannel television, high-definition programming and voice calling.

After investing an estimated $75 billion upgrading their networks during the 1990s, cable companies are reaping the rewards for selling their "triple play" of voice, data and video into homes. The local phone companies, realizing their disadvantage, have realigned their attention to target cable's success and plan to invest billions of dollars to upgrade their decaying copper network with speedier fiber-optic lines.

Later this year, regional phone providers such as SBC Communications and Verizon Communications plan to introduce their own video service in hopes of stealing customers from cable. But with Monday's announcement, Comcast hopes its VoIP service, cheaper than unlimited calling plans offered by the local providers, will keep customers from defecting.

At $40 a month when purchased with Comcast's cable and broadband service, $54 a month on its own, Digital Voice is more expensive than what competitors such as Vonage or AT&T offer. Unlimited domestic dialing plans from other VoIP providers often costs as little as $25 a month.

While it remains to be seen whether the price will be lowered, Wren said "we're not trying to focus on niche or cheap priced phone service."

It's that lower cost--as little as 50 percent of traditional landline rates--that has made VoIP a threat to the traditional phone companies. Already the Bells have seen

This article is right on target.

What people really want is a Small consumer gadget that can check e-mail and browse the web, not a PC. Perhaps it would even work for corporate networks in the place of PCs.

I bet even Sun Microsystems might have some plans to dominate this market.

I know there are a lot of people interested in what some of the former TechTV employees are doing now. Most of them have webpages but Patrick Norton does not. For those wondering Patrick is currently doing freelance writing. Recent articles have appeared on ExtremeTech, CNet and PC-World amongst others.

Again, Patrick does NOT have a website or blog but I do try to post links to articles he's writen on my blog as I run across them and as time allows.

How can you defend yourself? Go to CNET and download the most popular anti-spyware product produced by a commercial company. Also, buy a commercial anti-virus product: e.g. McAfee. Never respond to e-mail that requests personal information; reputable companies never ask for personal details by e-mail.

The iAudio M3 looks sweet. (Cnet gave it a 8.7 rating.) One thing I'm wondering about: is there a "gap killer" in the iAudio players?

A gap killer is a feature that lets two songs in an album play seamlessly. It's great for (for example) a live album. Without a gap killer it sounds like this: applause... SILENCE... applause, band starts playing. The SILENCE is the gap, and I want to kill the gap.

A gap killer is essential for listening to many of my albums.

steveha

The Japanese fork of Freenet (Winny) was popular, and supposedly included a fundemental flaw in their implimentation (which does not appear in Freenet). Two users were arrested, and the Winny network collapsed.

Linux has approximately 15% of the server market in 2003. And it just keeps growing. That sounds pretty mainstream to me.

http://asia.cnet.com/news/systems/0,39037054,39207 175,00.htm