"He is tired of the security problems with his PCs."
The biggest one being himself.
Ahh, yes. The old slashdot standby...blame the stupid user! How is it that Apple tends to avoid blaming the user, yet has a seemingly more secure system?
Even if a user has the know how to use bootcamp, I believe that although it may work, it is discontinued/unsupported with the latest version of OSX.
No, no no no....wait...no! Bootcamp WAS beta but now it is officially supported in Leopard. You've got it exactly backwards. Secondly, you hold the OPTION key down to pick Windows or Mac OS. Is that really hard to show somebody, or find online? Not really. If you really want to idiot proof it, it will boot up in Windows mode EVERY time you power it up, if you like.
Virtualization isn't really a joke, but I've had nothing but bad luck with Parallels. It has corrupted my Windows startup partition three times, and caused my first ever kernel panic in OSX (I've been using since 10.0). It even broke booting up in Bootcamp mode because of whatever it did to Windows.
Excellent point about the G4, as I've been saying the same thing forever on slashdot about my old 350mhz G4. I would suggest that 10.4 is a bit too intense for a 400mhz G4 though (unless you've really maxed out the ram). 10.3 seems to be about the sweet spot for me.
It makes me wonder though about my current iMac. See, I upgraded my 350mhz G4 about 3 or 4 years ago to 800mhz and the whole thing took about 5 minutes and cost about $25. For some reason, in 4 years I don't think I'll be able to do the same thing with this 2.33ghz Intel Core 2 Duo, but here's to hoping.
So does Apple, but you have to add them. Even then, the iMac is still $100 less once you configure it with wireless mouse and keyboard, and you get a wired keyboard and mouse as a backup too.
Apple wins in processor speed, video, integrated camera, and price. Dell wins via the 8-in-1 card reader and 1 year extra warranty.
Design and Industrial Design aren't the same thing...that's why.
From Wikipedia on Industrial Design: "Industrial Design (ID) is the professional service of creating and developing concepts and specifications that optimize the function, value and appearance of products and systems for the mutual benefit of both user and manufacturer."
What you cited was my editorial comment, hardly disguised as fact. As a matter of fact, I think it is pretty satirical in tone and pretty obvious that it was my comments on the whole topic and not to be taken as truth. The link I posted was at the bottom.
If you want to rip on Car and Driver, that's fine, but you obviously know nothing of Patrick Bedard's lifelong journalistic accomplishments.
Well you are inferring that one side is right (the greenies) and the other is wrong, when it is obvious, that this is still a point of contention. The "common view" you point to is not so common, because the "common view" I'm seeing in a lot of the articles is that the needed increase in power plant output would be worse for the environment than the same amount of gas engines. Like I said, read the research, and make up your own mind. Quit preaching at me, just because you THINK you are right. I am merely opening up the floor for a contrarian point of view, and am far from convinced that I am correct. I was humbly put in my place by a real electrical engineer, after all. You also gain no credibility by trying to tie the military to oil interests. That's a tired and inaccurate assessment. As for a conspiracy of silence -- I just don't see that in my posts.
I'd take a computer running OSX without a built-in media card reader anyday over a computer running Vista with all the media card readers in the world built-in.
Why anyone would actually pay $100 more for a Dell than a roughly equivalent iMac is also mysterious. I thought Dell's strong point was their ability to undercut their own Mothers.
What? Huh? As if the current administration is to blame? Plus, the insidious tone of your post is not anywhere near reality. If every ISP flagged every home user for illegal content, we'd all be scared to tears to use P2P software. I just don't see it happening. Conspiracies are fun, though.
LimeWire happens to be 100 percent compatible with the most popular media player on the planet.
Uh, as is pretty much ANY bittorrent client, or things like Acquisition, BearShare(still around?). Don't credit LimeWire for doing something that they all do, and don't try to imply that iPods are some sort of magical closed music box. Plus, since Limewire and the likes can host ANY computer file, I would suggest that the content of any given Limewire connection is no where near 100% compatible with an iPod. Or at least I haven't figured out how to play.wmv natively (codec of choice for porn) and it's not like there is any shortage of Word and PDF documents out there in bittorrent land either. Those pesky.exe's don't seem to work either.
Hey, at least I posted a link! And, surprise, I haven't stooped to calling complete strangers who disagree with me "twits". Would you care to follow your own self-imposed rules and post some of your findings for "well to wheel efficiencies" (whatever that is)? I'm open minded enough that I at least have listened to the Electrical Engineer guy and have expanded my research a bit more.
What I'm not (in addition to not being some random nerd on the net calling other random nerds a twit) is smart enough to know that coal might be dirtier to burn than gas, so I DID do some research. Or in your mind, I just made the figures up, then hacked Car-and-Driver, then wrote a phony article and back dated it to 2005? What I've found is two different sides of the argument citing the same findings to support their own agenda. Car-and-Driver cites the big Southern California energy company to say how much extra coal burning it would take to power up hydrogen cells (my mistake, for diverting the conversation to hydrogen from electric). Yet a white paper from "Green Car Journal" used the same figures from the same company to show that, even with 50% of energy coming from coal plants, EVs would require less energy from coal plants than the equivalent gas powered engines. You be the judge.
There are plenty of stupid myths out there, such as a hybrid battery costs $15,000 to replace (quick Internet search returns a more believable $1500-$3000 range), or that Hybrids take 10 years to recoup the extra cost of the hybrid drive. Equally stupid are myths perpetuated by the other side (my hybrid is saving the world!). All I'm waiting for is an electric car that can drive all day long without a recharge and is 100% electric; no hybrid gimmicks required, thanks. Battery technology might be there (as some others suggest in this thread), but they sure are doing a poor job of advertising their presence.
Can you fairly compare the Beatles to bands before them.
Well the Kinks are credited with some earlier recordings than the Beatles (I think), but that's not the point. The point is that the Beatles were new and exciting, 70s Punk was new and exciting, Journey (bear with me) was a new and exciting mainstream-ization of Fusiony-Rock-Pop, Hair Metal (cough, bad, but) new, exciting...Nirvana...new and exciting. What has the current crop given us that is new AND exciting? Emo? Black Metal? People who are famous solely because they are famous? Or, how about, well, nothing?
Current music is at a lapse of creativity and is just rehashing the same teen angst-driven themes of every genre since the 50s. That's why songs like "Smells like Teen Spirit", "Enter Sandman" or "Welcome to the Jungle" don't seem like they are 15-20 years old. It's also why bands like Nickelback can make hits out of mediocre Elton John songs from the 1970s.
Who knows, maybe there is nothing left to innovate in music? If that is the case, then at least just don't suck while you are rehashing old musical themes. That's all I ask.
We also use oil because we have "much of it" as well. Doesn't that make buring gas in cars a good thing, or am I missing the point of your third point?
Since you are an electrical engineering, I'm undoubtedly not qualified to discuss the finer details with you. However, we all carry personal interests and biases directly related to our chosen professions. I like Macs and Flash because that's how I make my living, when according to common slashdot knowledge, I shouldn't like either.
Also, I'm not against EVs at all. I'm actually just anti-coal. I grew up in the Pacific NW with mostly hydro and nuclear power and I see what natural beauty looks like. I've been to the North East and have seen what ravaging the Earth for coal does to the scenery and what burning coal does to the air quality.
As for the misinformation, I picked one of the more credible looking ones out of hundreds. Granted, Bedard is an auto-enthusiast and editor of a major Car magazine, he has a long track-record of good reporting and insightful discussions on the topics of alternative fuel cars and the environment. He's not in with Big Oil, and he's not Anti-Hippy. He, more than most people, advocates alternative fuel sources, but like myself, doesn't like the fact that switching from one evil to another (hidden) evil is no solution.
I personally love the idea of alternate fuels, but I'm not hypocritical enough think that a Hybrid is actually doing anything to save the environment (as long as we keep burning coal to make electricity).
I would be interested to know if you can disprove the facts that powering hydrogen cells by coal (and all other sources combined) would require roughly twice the amount of power as is burned by gas powered cars in 2000, as cited in the article. I find it to be an interesting claim, from a seemingly credible source, but can't really find any proof beyond that.
Off topic, but I like a good car conversation. The new Focus seems to suffer from "Americanization". The old Focus was actually a really good car, because like most good Fords, it was bred from Ford UK. I just moved from the UK and the second gen Focus is NOTHING like the US Spec 2nd gen Focus. I read somewhere that the 2nd gen US Focus has lost all the soul and detail that made the first one such a big hit with car enthusiasts and Soccer Mom's alike.
I would pay $10k extra for the new Mondeo (as seen in the latest Bond movie) if they'd only sell it in the US market. I currently drive a 99 SVT Contour, so that would be the perfect replacement for the best car I've ever owned.
Here's something to chew on, and this is just in the context of powering hydrogen cells, which is arguably more efficient than plugging a car straight into an AC outlet.
According to Southern California Edison, the electricity needed per mile for passenger cars is at least 0.46 kilowatt-hour. For the whole U.S. vehicle fleet, that works out to 1.16 trillion kilowatt-hours. You'll need 32 quads of coal, which is twice the energy actually consumed in 2000 with gasoline.
As for global-warming implications, the use of hydrogen from coal instead of gasoline would produce a 2.7-fold increase in carbon emissions.
Of course, all of today's electricity doesn't come from coal. But even with the current mix of sources, including natural gas, nuclear, hydro, solar, and wind, that much hydrogen would raise our carbon output to about twice the 2000 level.
This is a 2005 article, but this has been pretty common knowledge to anyone who can see past the Green Agenda as far back as I can remember reading about it (ca. 1988?)
There is no magic bullet for clean cars unless you invent a new type of energy altogether, or if you don't mind driving around with a nuclear reactor under the hood. It is mind boggling how many people think electricity just comes from nothing and is "clean energy".
Interesting you mention Microsoft. I was considering buying the Ford Focus because of the cool multimedia control thingy, until I saw the ad on tv saying it is "Powered by Microsoft".
2) Traffic engineers might not be that bad, but they're implementing stupid rules required by local governments whose real interest is not traffic safety and efficiency, but rather revenue from traffic tickets.
Slashdot Mirror
Virtualization isn't really a joke, but I've had nothing but bad luck with Parallels. It has corrupted my Windows startup partition three times, and caused my first ever kernel panic in OSX (I've been using since 10.0). It even broke booting up in Bootcamp mode because of whatever it did to Windows.
Not to mention, there is the little known secret called Bootcamp that actually lets you run Windows on a Mac! OMG!
It makes me wonder though about my current iMac. See, I upgraded my 350mhz G4 about 3 or 4 years ago to 800mhz and the whole thing took about 5 minutes and cost about $25. For some reason, in 4 years I don't think I'll be able to do the same thing with this 2.33ghz Intel Core 2 Duo, but here's to hoping.
From Wikipedia on Industrial Design: "Industrial Design (ID) is the professional service of creating and developing concepts and specifications that optimize the function, value and appearance of products and systems for the mutual benefit of both user and manufacturer."
If you want to rip on Car and Driver, that's fine, but you obviously know nothing of Patrick Bedard's lifelong journalistic accomplishments.
Well you are inferring that one side is right (the greenies) and the other is wrong, when it is obvious, that this is still a point of contention. The "common view" you point to is not so common, because the "common view" I'm seeing in a lot of the articles is that the needed increase in power plant output would be worse for the environment than the same amount of gas engines. Like I said, read the research, and make up your own mind. Quit preaching at me, just because you THINK you are right. I am merely opening up the floor for a contrarian point of view, and am far from convinced that I am correct. I was humbly put in my place by a real electrical engineer, after all. You also gain no credibility by trying to tie the military to oil interests. That's a tired and inaccurate assessment. As for a conspiracy of silence -- I just don't see that in my posts.
Not sure why they modded you troll, unless it's possible to mod: "Funny, Troll"
No wait. Let me expand that. I just reread. No dedicated video card on the Dell???? Mooohahahahhah.
Why anyone would actually pay $100 more for a Dell than a roughly equivalent iMac is also mysterious. I thought Dell's strong point was their ability to undercut their own Mothers.
What? Huh? As if the current administration is to blame? Plus, the insidious tone of your post is not anywhere near reality. If every ISP flagged every home user for illegal content, we'd all be scared to tears to use P2P software. I just don't see it happening. Conspiracies are fun, though.
What I'm not (in addition to not being some random nerd on the net calling other random nerds a twit) is smart enough to know that coal might be dirtier to burn than gas, so I DID do some research. Or in your mind, I just made the figures up, then hacked Car-and-Driver, then wrote a phony article and back dated it to 2005? What I've found is two different sides of the argument citing the same findings to support their own agenda. Car-and-Driver cites the big Southern California energy company to say how much extra coal burning it would take to power up hydrogen cells (my mistake, for diverting the conversation to hydrogen from electric). Yet a white paper from "Green Car Journal" used the same figures from the same company to show that, even with 50% of energy coming from coal plants, EVs would require less energy from coal plants than the equivalent gas powered engines. You be the judge.
There are plenty of stupid myths out there, such as a hybrid battery costs $15,000 to replace (quick Internet search returns a more believable $1500-$3000 range), or that Hybrids take 10 years to recoup the extra cost of the hybrid drive. Equally stupid are myths perpetuated by the other side (my hybrid is saving the world!). All I'm waiting for is an electric car that can drive all day long without a recharge and is 100% electric; no hybrid gimmicks required, thanks. Battery technology might be there (as some others suggest in this thread), but they sure are doing a poor job of advertising their presence.
Current music is at a lapse of creativity and is just rehashing the same teen angst-driven themes of every genre since the 50s. That's why songs like "Smells like Teen Spirit", "Enter Sandman" or "Welcome to the Jungle" don't seem like they are 15-20 years old. It's also why bands like Nickelback can make hits out of mediocre Elton John songs from the 1970s.
Who knows, maybe there is nothing left to innovate in music? If that is the case, then at least just don't suck while you are rehashing old musical themes. That's all I ask.
We also use oil because we have "much of it" as well. Doesn't that make buring gas in cars a good thing, or am I missing the point of your third point?
Also, I'm not against EVs at all. I'm actually just anti-coal. I grew up in the Pacific NW with mostly hydro and nuclear power and I see what natural beauty looks like. I've been to the North East and have seen what ravaging the Earth for coal does to the scenery and what burning coal does to the air quality.
As for the misinformation, I picked one of the more credible looking ones out of hundreds. Granted, Bedard is an auto-enthusiast and editor of a major Car magazine, he has a long track-record of good reporting and insightful discussions on the topics of alternative fuel cars and the environment. He's not in with Big Oil, and he's not Anti-Hippy. He, more than most people, advocates alternative fuel sources, but like myself, doesn't like the fact that switching from one evil to another (hidden) evil is no solution.
I personally love the idea of alternate fuels, but I'm not hypocritical enough think that a Hybrid is actually doing anything to save the environment (as long as we keep burning coal to make electricity).
I would be interested to know if you can disprove the facts that powering hydrogen cells by coal (and all other sources combined) would require roughly twice the amount of power as is burned by gas powered cars in 2000, as cited in the article. I find it to be an interesting claim, from a seemingly credible source, but can't really find any proof beyond that.
I would pay $10k extra for the new Mondeo (as seen in the latest Bond movie) if they'd only sell it in the US market. I currently drive a 99 SVT Contour, so that would be the perfect replacement for the best car I've ever owned.
They'll all wait until Bush is out of office, so they don't appear to be in agreement with him.
There is no magic bullet for clean cars unless you invent a new type of energy altogether, or if you don't mind driving around with a nuclear reactor under the hood. It is mind boggling how many people think electricity just comes from nothing and is "clean energy".
link: http://www.caranddriver.com/columns/9978/the-case-for-nuke-cars-its-called-hydrogen-page2.html
Interesting you mention Microsoft. I was considering buying the Ford Focus because of the cool multimedia control thingy, until I saw the ad on tv saying it is "Powered by Microsoft".
...and those thumb-like thingies on the ends of our arms.