Probably the same Genius that will sue Microsoft for "Monopolistic Practices" two years from now once people ditch Acrobat for a adware free alternative to Acrobat. (like XPS)
And Yes I know Foxit exists, but your assuming that Foxit Software still exists. I'm sure that same genius would sue Foxit out of existence before tackling MS.
In the Article, they talk specificially about Windows server update services (WSUS).
About a year ago, MS sent windows desktop search through WSUS. All you had to do was decline the update and done. Apparently on 10/23/2007 They updated the install files and on my WSUS 3.0 server they are still declined without any user interaction on my part.
For whatever reason, MS considers WDS a Windows XP Feature Pack instead of a Windows Live technology. If WSUS Admins were telling them to approve everything automaticially and not checking their updates and approving them manually, like they should be doing IMHO, then they probably got it.
The best part about this, you cannot tell WSUS to uninstall it. it's a good thing MS has that option in WSUS, even though 1 of the 300 updates actually uses thisw feature.
Also for a heads up, Outlook 2007 constantly askes users to install WDS unless they tell it not to, and even then it keeps a bar on the screen to "Enable Instant search".
Since when does Ubuntu and OSX have IE installed? Dell and Apple are both OEM's and they both use alternative OS'es which has alternative browsers. Just because it's not running windows doesn't mean it's not competing with IE.
Regardless, There's a definite rising trend of market share in alternative browsers, especially FireFox. Most likely the OEM's are not including Firefox (as well as other free software, such as Openoffice) because the Mozilla Foundation isn't willing to pay the OEM's (unlike Google, AOL, ETC) to install it on pre configured PC's.
1) A Key Stealing virus infects all of your Windows 98 Machines, and you'll need to clean them, and at worse reimage them.
or
2) A Key Stealing virus infects all of your Windows XP Machines, and you'll need to clean them, and at worse reimage them, and to top it all off, change their XP key a few days down the road because MS thinks your a pirate.
Don't think it can't happen or can't be done since you're patched? it's easy. Send an E-mail to John Q Igoramus, which he will promply open and attempt to open an attachment in the email telling him that his daughter posted something lewd in her myspace account and to click here to see it, only that what he clicked on was a Trojan Horse, which promptly posts your corporate XP key to freexpwarez.com, which is used by 1,000,000 people to get free XP, which MS detects and promptly locks out all your corporate PC with a "You are a pirate" message.
Exploits just automates the process. Social Engenneering works just as well.
At the time we made the OS decision, We were running Windows 98/ME for whatever reason and XP was out for 5-6 months. Since we knew 2000 was on the way out and XP didn't have WGA or activation at the time for corporate accounts, we didn't see any reason not to switch to XP.
Eventually WGA came out, but it was still optional with corporate accounts. WSUS servers don't send out or receive the WGA updates Even if you wanted them. You would only get the updates by going directly to Windows Update or if you did not setup a WSUS server on the local PC's.
Right now, from the sound of this article, it looks like SP3 is going to try to push Volume Activation 2.0 on XP users, where previously Volume Activation 1.0 was used. and our IT depatrment does not want to deal with MAK keys or KMS servers.
If it's got WGA like Windows Vista? Then no thanks.
That's the only reason we're staying away from Vista, and if this new activation is anything like that then it's SP2 until they drop support for it, and maybe something else (Linux, OSX) after that.
I've said my reasons we stay away from Vista In my Journal. I'm sure we're not the only workplaces saying the same thing. Especially if the computers are not anchored to the network and are off the network for months at a time like our systems are.
It's a good thing my COV character is called Jackie Thompson, Because A villian that learned all of his Nijitsu arts from playing Ninja Gaiden to prove that video games are just mindless cop killing simulators that turn kids into violent sociopaths doesn't sound like something Mr. Thompson would do at all.
At least they're doing something
on
MSN Censors Your IM
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· Score: 4, Informative
Personally, I'd rather they fix the vulnerabilities that make those strings dangerous in the first place
At least their trying something (albeit a weak approach) to stop automated scripts from sending viruses all over their chat protocol.
When you work on 1000+ college student laptops, you learn a lot of things about software students use in general, and one of these things you learn is:
1) AIM is a Virus downloading service disguised as a chat protocol.
I know that AOL doesn't do this on purpose, but it is so easy to hack that it might as well be. it's great when a 12 year old downloads a virus that infects Aim thinking it was some game (probably from AIM i might add), it sends "Hey check this out!" to his sister at the college containing an infected link or program, and the next thing you know you're running Aimfix and cleaning Zlob off on 300 PC's.
If Aim would simply filter out the bad traffic (and they should be able to know if a client is spamming the servers like crazy by heuristics alone) it would stop a lot of scams dead in their tracks.
Not exactly. Most businesses would upgrade over time. The gleaming example of this is windows 2000 to XP. There was no technical reason to go from 2000 to XP, but many businesses did it anyway over time and a service pack release.
Their IT dept's are most likely looking at what hell they would have to go through to appease Vista Genuine Advantage and are throwing it out the window. It would be a safe bet that if MS changed the licencing scheme for Vista from Key Management Server/Volume Activation 2.0 back to Volume Activation 1.0, (the old method) adoption would be much higher than it is right now.
The reason you're not seeing the business side jump all over this OS isn't because of just compatibility issues. It's the Genuine advantage.
For example. here where I work, we had Vista running everything most office workers need; Office, IE, SCT, Even wintegrate, which is an ancient terminal program from 96. There was three reasons we didn't go to vista. One was the System requirements we were not ready to meet, another was that F-secure did not have an official Vista version at the time, but the real reason we decided to stay with XP was simple. The Genuine Advantage is for lack of a better word a total pain in the ass.
In vista there are two ways of handling corporate keys. One with a Key Management server and the other with a Multiple Activation Key. Under KMS. You are required to have a KMS server on your network, tie it to DNS and give it your VLK (which can be changed if your old key is disabled and propagated to networked PC's). once you do that it will activate any Business version of vista automatically every 3-6 months without entering any keys, but if the computer is no longer on the network (say a Laptop) after 3 months, the system locks you out in a reduced functionality mode which can be described as useless.
The Second method; MAK isn't much better. basically MS handles the KMS for you. this means that you don't have to worry about traveling users not being disconnected from your network for too long since it works over the internet, but now MS is handling your activations, and you have to contact them every time you hit your quota in order to activate more windows. (which isn't as bad as it sounds. According to MS activation isn't counted against your licence count, and you can request indefinitely) However, if MS sees a huge activation spike. (say your activation rate average goes from 100 a day to 10000000 a day) they disable your key (which brings us to reduced functionality mode for all MAK'ed PC's) and then you must go to each and every MAK managed PC and change the key to a new one supplied by MS.
So basically, to use Vista you either have a server on your network and pray no one's laptop cripples while their on a business trip, or you contact MS until the break of dawn and pray that no one pirates your key so you don't have to touch 1000 Crippled PC's with the Dreaded "YOU ARE A PIRATE!" message
Office 2007, however, doesn't have the "YOU ARE A PIRATE!" system built in it and still has the old VLK licencing system like XP. I can guarantee that it's adoption in business is much higher than Vista. I know we're using it here, but Vista is sitting on the shelf.
I don't know much about the emulation, since I don't own a PS3 let alone a European one, but I would think that hardware would be better and more reliable than software in many cases. as for the points.
A) If the emulation is good than yes, it wouldn't matter, however the emulation would have to be a total emulation including hacks and bugs that may have existed in the previous PS2 architectures. some games may use unorthodox methods to squeeze maximum performance out of the PS2 Hardware. The emulation would have to take this into account.
B) this would result in lower prices and possibly more units produced per month and not necessary result in hardware more prone to failure, Especially since the PS3 has had a good hardware record so far with the EE on board. Currently supply is not a problem so they are doing this to save money. Something they should be passing back to customers (in a price cut) as soon as they can.
C) This actually would be more of a problem under emulation than hardware. the EE anymore is small. very small. just look at the new PS2's. These new EE units put out much less heat then their predecessors or the PS3 hardware. if you have the hardware system, then that's less work that Cell and RSX would have to do in order to play the game, which would result in lower temperatures. Under emulation, Cell and RSX would be doing the heavy hitting and would result in much higher temps when you play a PS1/2 game.
I know that hardware can have problems too. The Newest PS2's have compatibility problems since they changed the systems. The PS one's also had minor incompatibilities, And I know that emulation has an advantage when it comes to updating it to increase compatibility. if Sony thinks they can emulate the previous systems better than hardware, then more power to them, but considering that the 360, which is doing emulation, doesn't have a high degree of compatibility, and that emulators I have seen in the past run into compatibility issues, I would rather have a hardware interface to fall back on rather than not.
Yeah. because Great Graphics == Great game. I better Toss Twilight Princess out the window and go play Spiderman 3 on the PS3/360 then.
no good games since launch
There are some great games for the Wii. Just not a ton of them. and there is still the Gamecube lineup and virtual console to fall back on. The 360 never had great backward compatibility to begin with, but at least the 360 library is rather strong to fall back on. The PS3 hasn't had a breakout game yet and they had the PS1/PS2 to fall back on, but now they decided that pocketing $50 is more important than backwards compatibility, even though it was one of the big selling points of the PS3.
wii-fit(whoopity dooo)
well at least we agree on something
no fun alone
Although the Wii mostly focuses on party type minigames, there are single player games out there that are fun to play, and most of the party games have a single player requirement.
And apparently, the 80GB PS3 removes the Emotion Engine (PS2) hardware and replaces it with software emulation. So not only are they not dropping the price, their making it less backwards compatible as well but hey, here's an extra 20GB and the only game worth playing on the PS3 to make up for it...
It wasn't even a price cut to begin with. at most, it was a SKU shift. it would be the same thing if MS ditched the core system, dropped the premium to core prices, and priced the Elite and the original's premium price.
I'm so glad I bought a Wii. No Backwards compatibility problems, no Blinking Red Rings of Death, and more Ben Franklins in my wallet.
In a way, Google's complaint mirrors that of Netscape but instead of browsers, it's search applications.
Not exactly.
In the Netscape case, they had an established product, then MS started to compete. In this case, Vista (originally Longhorn) had a powerful search functionality built in since it's inception. (2001) In fact that was one of the first features that was announced about Vista. Even Windows 2000 and above had text search indexing (indexing service) integrated, although it's not as powerful as the indexers today, it still was in the OS.
Google's desktop beta was released in October 2004. Even the complete Vista overhaul (which happened in August 2004) happened before Google's Desktop was released to beta.
The other thing that needs to be asked is, "Does this deep inclusion severely hurt Google's bottom line overall?" and the answer is probably not. Unlike Netscape, where much of it's revenue was generated by Navigator, GDS is a very small revenue generator for google Vs it's other properties, Especially Vs Google Search or Google AdSense. I'd bet the Google Toolbar has more market penetration than Google Desktop, and the Security/privacy issues that were brought up by the press against GDS couldn't have helped it's penetration as well.
the wifi is the best thing going for the zune...If they would use it right.
1) The Three play limit is just stupid and needs to die: I can understand if you don't have a Zune pass or something like that, but if you do, (which is all you can eat music like napster to go) there should be no limit to anything you download from wifi. even if it's ripped. (unless they actually do this. I don't own a zune or any MP3 Player for that matter)
2) Utilize wifi hotspots to their fullest: why is MS so scared of allowing a zune to work wirelessly on hotspots? It would be great to download/sync your zune from the marketplace using your zune at a cafe, or stream internet radio/video, or connect to my media center PC using my wireless network anywhere in my house, or even browse the web using the screen it has. This alone would make wifi the killer app for the Zune.
3) how about ZuneStreaming?: Technically, they could create a program that steams music from your zune (while you're listening to it) and broadcast it to other zunes nearby in realtime. people are doing it with the Zune FM Transmitter and using other zunes to listen in using the built in FM radio. Why not use wifi for this? (which I guess would have better range and sound quality as well as give you the song information if you actually want it, or even offer to download it to your library if you have zune pass (see #1)
Simply put, the wifi could be the killer app, and it is the edge Microsoft has on the Ipod, but they don't want to take the simple steps to make wifi the killer app it should be.
I'd start looking for my lighting arrangement. Primarialy because I'm forced to.
In some of my light fixtures, you're forced to use Incandesent bulbs because the lights are attached to a dimmer switch. To this day I haven't found a CFL that works with these, and I like the variable light adjustment and don't want to rip out the wall switch just to save 30-50 watts on a light fixture that's barely used.
Although CFL's work well for the rest of the house, and have been saving me a lot of money over 2-3 years since I converted, I don't see how a CFL could work for these dimmable fixtures.
better yet, How would playing the game in it's entirity or even having full access to the RTM Disk Code/images/audio/ETC find something like "Hot Coffee"? Especially considering that it was impossible to trigger Hot Coffee without a gameshark or equivelent cheat device and nothing in the "Hot coffee" scandal audio or in game text would hint to sex outside of the act being rendered in real time.
Exactly. This is why the Vista UAC UI team needs to be taken out back and shot.
This security problem was so easy to fix, they could have done it in three steps.
1) Make XP's setup installer prompt for a password for "Administrator" 2) Make the "Your Name" Account (The Account you have to create with up to five other users when XP setup first runs) a user or power user account. 3) Replace any "Access Denied" dialog boxes with "This operation requires elevated Privileges. Please enter an administrator account here" box. complete with Username/Password prompts. (Like they already do when a User or Power User runs a setup.exe file in XP)
Using an XP user account, I can guarantee that you will see a lot less "access denied" Prompts (the closest thing to a UAC prompt) than UAC privilege escalation prompts using an administrator account in Vista. And it shouldn't be that way. They should only see it when something needs elevation, not when your doing something at the user privilage level such as coping a file or changing the desktop properties.
Like I've said before. a user will get so indoctrinated with prompts that they will simply say yes no matter what they are trying to run. Don't believe me? how fast can you click on "yes to all" when you're copying files into an already existing folder? Do you even read the dialog anymore? Did you realize you could be overwriting newer documents with older revisions of the same document? Also, you could have 20 complex steps involved and users will go through all 20 steps if they really want to run something. So what's the point of prompting them to death if their going to do it anyway?
I swear, they had the Microsoft Bob Designer design this UI. The only thing I haven't seen is the "you must have forgotten your password. Let me remove the password for you and let you in" security model. Although this article comes really close.
I'm still trying to find out how F-secure passed this test.
I don't know how many times I had to do virus cleanup on an F-secure PC because it couldn't delete the file, or it would happily let the virus run in the background, or not detect it at all. and that if it's running, since it wouldn't run in safe mode and half the time get corrupted by the virus.
you could train this until the cows come home and people will still do it.
At this point, Computer exploitation has been in the news for almost a generation now, and people to this day still don't protect themselves against malware or inform themselves about scams. Hell, Windows screams at you if you don't have protection and still people run unprotected, Although it doesn't help much when MS scares people away from updating their OS with their Genuine Advantage program.
I'm a staunch believer of the 1% rule, which is 99% of computer users don't know what they are doing. Based on this study, I would call this probably in the margin of error, since 3.3% actually knew what they were doing. Of course with a bigger sample size, that value will most likely drop closer to the 1%.
I'm already paying $130 for cable right now, and actually I'm waiting for them to switch over to TWC billing so I can knock that down $20-$30 Adelphia used to be a great value, then Rigas bankrupted the thing and whoever took his job basicially raised the rates by roughly 50% My bill went from $85 to $115 overnight for the same service minus 10 channels. Then add the DVR box and we're in $130 territory.
So far, it looks like TWC has the same prices that Adelphia had Pre Bankruptcy. looking at what other TWCNEO venues are charged (particularry Youngstown OH, since they've had it for years now.) They list Digital tuner as well as dual tuner (my guess the DVR) at $8. They also list DVR at $6 as a service but don't really say if it's per box or per household.
Even so. if they charge me DVR service per box, then they will go back, but until then why not get the better box at the same price as the lower end box?
I'll second that. you can't go wrong with an 89. Particulary the Ti-89 Titanium, which is the latest in the series. I own a lot of Ti calcs since I program them for a hobby. I've had an 81 and currently have an 83, 85, 86, 89 and 92, and out of all of them I use the 89 the most by far.
The only problem I would say are the Standarized Tests. Some tests don't allow 89's because of their power. In that case then get an Ti-86 if you can still find one. If tests are not your concern, also look into the voyage 200, which is the Ti-92 replacement. It's got a great screen and it's qwerty keyboard works great for programming and taking notes. it's also very identical to the 89 OS.
I'm a recent Adelphia to TWC transfer. Adn I can tell you that it's not exactly HDTV demand that pushing these units.
Under Adelphia, it was roughly $5 for a standard digital box, and $10 for a HD DVR. last month, I get a rate adjustment that raised the Standard box by $3 and dropped the HD DVR by $2. That's right, the HD DVR is now the same price as the cheap SD box with no DVR. So basicially, if you already had DVR service, you might as well replace all of your SD units with the HD DVR's because you're paying the same price anyway for the SD units, and you can get the free HD channels as well. (even without an HDTV, the HD local channels are much clearer than their analog equivelant)
I'm sure I'm not the only person from the Adelphia changeover that noticed this.
Slashdot Mirror
I personally Like my list better.
It makes me feel like I fought off true villany.
What genius came up with this stellar idea?
Probably the same Genius that will sue Microsoft for "Monopolistic Practices" two years from now once people ditch Acrobat for a adware free alternative to Acrobat. (like XPS)
And Yes I know Foxit exists, but your assuming that Foxit Software still exists. I'm sure that same genius would sue Foxit out of existence before tackling MS.
In the Article, they talk specificially about Windows server update services (WSUS).
About a year ago, MS sent windows desktop search through WSUS. All you had to do was decline the update and done. Apparently on 10/23/2007 They updated the install files and on my WSUS 3.0 server they are still declined without any user interaction on my part.
For whatever reason, MS considers WDS a Windows XP Feature Pack instead of a Windows Live technology. If WSUS Admins were telling them to approve everything automaticially and not checking their updates and approving them manually, like they should be doing IMHO, then they probably got it.
The best part about this, you cannot tell WSUS to uninstall it. it's a good thing MS has that option in WSUS, even though 1 of the 300 updates actually uses thisw feature.
Also for a heads up, Outlook 2007 constantly askes users to install WDS unless they tell it not to, and even then it keeps a bar on the screen to "Enable Instant search".
Since when does Ubuntu and OSX have IE installed? Dell and Apple are both OEM's and they both use alternative OS'es which has alternative browsers. Just because it's not running windows doesn't mean it's not competing with IE.
Regardless, There's a definite rising trend of market share in alternative browsers, especially FireFox. Most likely the OEM's are not including Firefox (as well as other free software, such as Openoffice) because the Mozilla Foundation isn't willing to pay the OEM's (unlike Google, AOL, ETC) to install it on pre configured PC's.
Ok Whats worse then.
1) A Key Stealing virus infects all of your Windows 98 Machines, and you'll need to clean them, and at worse reimage them.
or
2) A Key Stealing virus infects all of your Windows XP Machines, and you'll need to clean them, and at worse reimage them, and to top it all off, change their XP key a few days down the road because MS thinks your a pirate.
Don't think it can't happen or can't be done since you're patched? it's easy. Send an E-mail to John Q Igoramus, which he will promply open and attempt to open an attachment in the email telling him that his daughter posted something lewd in her myspace account and to click here to see it, only that what he clicked on was a Trojan Horse, which promptly posts your corporate XP key to freexpwarez.com, which is used by 1,000,000 people to get free XP, which MS detects and promptly locks out all your corporate PC with a "You are a pirate" message.
Exploits just automates the process. Social Engenneering works just as well.
Why are you using xp then
At the time we made the OS decision, We were running Windows 98/ME for whatever reason and XP was out for 5-6 months. Since we knew 2000 was on the way out and XP didn't have WGA or activation at the time for corporate accounts, we didn't see any reason not to switch to XP.
Eventually WGA came out, but it was still optional with corporate accounts. WSUS servers don't send out or receive the WGA updates Even if you wanted them. You would only get the updates by going directly to Windows Update or if you did not setup a WSUS server on the local PC's.
Right now, from the sound of this article, it looks like SP3 is going to try to push Volume Activation 2.0 on XP users, where previously Volume Activation 1.0 was used. and our IT depatrment does not want to deal with MAK keys or KMS servers.
If it's got WGA like Windows Vista? Then no thanks.
That's the only reason we're staying away from Vista, and if this new activation is anything like that then it's SP2 until they drop support for it, and maybe something else (Linux, OSX) after that.
I've said my reasons we stay away from Vista In my Journal. I'm sure we're not the only workplaces saying the same thing. Especially if the computers are not anchored to the network and are off the network for months at a time like our systems are.
It's a good thing my COV character is called Jackie Thompson, Because A villian that learned all of his Nijitsu arts from playing Ninja Gaiden to prove that video games are just mindless cop killing simulators that turn kids into violent sociopaths doesn't sound like something Mr. Thompson would do at all.
Personally, I'd rather they fix the vulnerabilities that make those strings dangerous in the first place
At least their trying something (albeit a weak approach) to stop automated scripts from sending viruses all over their chat protocol.
When you work on 1000+ college student laptops, you learn a lot of things about software students use in general, and one of these things you learn is:
1) AIM is a Virus downloading service disguised as a chat protocol.
I know that AOL doesn't do this on purpose, but it is so easy to hack that it might as well be. it's great when a 12 year old downloads a virus that infects Aim thinking it was some game (probably from AIM i might add), it sends "Hey check this out!" to his sister at the college containing an infected link or program, and the next thing you know you're running Aimfix and cleaning Zlob off on 300 PC's.
If Aim would simply filter out the bad traffic (and they should be able to know if a client is spamming the servers like crazy by heuristics alone) it would stop a lot of scams dead in their tracks.
Not exactly. Most businesses would upgrade over time. The gleaming example of this is windows 2000 to XP. There was no technical reason to go from 2000 to XP, but many businesses did it anyway over time and a service pack release.
Their IT dept's are most likely looking at what hell they would have to go through to appease Vista Genuine Advantage and are throwing it out the window. It would be a safe bet that if MS changed the licencing scheme for Vista from Key Management Server/Volume Activation 2.0 back to Volume Activation 1.0, (the old method) adoption would be much higher than it is right now.
The reason you're not seeing the business side jump all over this OS isn't because of just compatibility issues. It's the Genuine advantage.
For example. here where I work, we had Vista running everything most office workers need; Office, IE, SCT, Even wintegrate, which is an ancient terminal program from 96. There was three reasons we didn't go to vista. One was the System requirements we were not ready to meet, another was that F-secure did not have an official Vista version at the time, but the real reason we decided to stay with XP was simple. The Genuine Advantage is for lack of a better word a total pain in the ass.
In vista there are two ways of handling corporate keys. One with a Key Management server and the other with a Multiple Activation Key. Under KMS. You are required to have a KMS server on your network, tie it to DNS and give it your VLK (which can be changed if your old key is disabled and propagated to networked PC's). once you do that it will activate any Business version of vista automatically every 3-6 months without entering any keys, but if the computer is no longer on the network (say a Laptop) after 3 months, the system locks you out in a reduced functionality mode which can be described as useless.
The Second method; MAK isn't much better. basically MS handles the KMS for you. this means that you don't have to worry about traveling users not being disconnected from your network for too long since it works over the internet, but now MS is handling your activations, and you have to contact them every time you hit your quota in order to activate more windows. (which isn't as bad as it sounds. According to MS activation isn't counted against your licence count, and you can request indefinitely) However, if MS sees a huge activation spike. (say your activation rate average goes from 100 a day to 10000000 a day) they disable your key (which brings us to reduced functionality mode for all MAK'ed PC's) and then you must go to each and every MAK managed PC and change the key to a new one supplied by MS.
So basically, to use Vista you either have a server on your network and pray no one's laptop cripples while their on a business trip, or you contact MS until the break of dawn and pray that no one pirates your key so you don't have to touch 1000 Crippled PC's with the Dreaded "YOU ARE A PIRATE!" message
Office 2007, however, doesn't have the "YOU ARE A PIRATE!" system built in it and still has the old VLK licencing system like XP. I can guarantee that it's adoption in business is much higher than Vista. I know we're using it here, but Vista is sitting on the shelf.
I don't know much about the emulation, since I don't own a PS3 let alone a European one, but I would think that hardware would be better and more reliable than software in many cases. as for the points.
A) If the emulation is good than yes, it wouldn't matter, however the emulation would have to be a total emulation including hacks and bugs that may have existed in the previous PS2 architectures. some games may use unorthodox methods to squeeze maximum performance out of the PS2 Hardware. The emulation would have to take this into account.
B) this would result in lower prices and possibly more units produced per month and not necessary result in hardware more prone to failure, Especially since the PS3 has had a good hardware record so far with the EE on board. Currently supply is not a problem so they are doing this to save money. Something they should be passing back to customers (in a price cut) as soon as they can.
C) This actually would be more of a problem under emulation than hardware. the EE anymore is small. very small. just look at the new PS2's. These new EE units put out much less heat then their predecessors or the PS3 hardware. if you have the hardware system, then that's less work that Cell and RSX would have to do in order to play the game, which would result in lower temperatures. Under emulation, Cell and RSX would be doing the heavy hitting and would result in much higher temps when you play a PS1/2 game.
I know that hardware can have problems too. The Newest PS2's have compatibility problems since they changed the systems. The PS one's also had minor incompatibilities, And I know that emulation has an advantage when it comes to updating it to increase compatibility. if Sony thinks they can emulate the previous systems better than hardware, then more power to them, but considering that the 360, which is doing emulation, doesn't have a high degree of compatibility, and that emulators I have seen in the past run into compatibility issues, I would rather have a hardware interface to fall back on rather than not.
and no good graphics
Yeah. because Great Graphics == Great game. I better Toss Twilight Princess out the window and go play Spiderman 3 on the PS3/360 then.
no good games since launch
There are some great games for the Wii. Just not a ton of them. and there is still the Gamecube lineup and virtual console to fall back on. The 360 never had great backward compatibility to begin with, but at least the 360 library is rather strong to fall back on. The PS3 hasn't had a breakout game yet and they had the PS1/PS2 to fall back on, but now they decided that pocketing $50 is more important than backwards compatibility, even though it was one of the big selling points of the PS3.
wii-fit(whoopity dooo)
well at least we agree on something
no fun alone
Although the Wii mostly focuses on party type minigames, there are single player games out there that are fun to play, and most of the party games have a single player requirement.
And apparently, the 80GB PS3 removes the Emotion Engine (PS2) hardware and replaces it with software emulation. So not only are they not dropping the price, their making it less backwards compatible as well but hey, here's an extra 20GB and the only game worth playing on the PS3 to make up for it...
It wasn't even a price cut to begin with. at most, it was a SKU shift. it would be the same thing if MS ditched the core system, dropped the premium to core prices, and priced the Elite and the original's premium price.
I'm so glad I bought a Wii. No Backwards compatibility problems, no Blinking Red Rings of Death, and more Ben Franklins in my wallet.
In a way, Google's complaint mirrors that of Netscape but instead of browsers, it's search applications.
Not exactly.
In the Netscape case, they had an established product, then MS started to compete. In this case, Vista (originally Longhorn) had a powerful search functionality built in since it's inception. (2001) In fact that was one of the first features that was announced about Vista. Even Windows 2000 and above had text search indexing (indexing service) integrated, although it's not as powerful as the indexers today, it still was in the OS.
Google's desktop beta was released in October 2004. Even the complete Vista overhaul (which happened in August 2004) happened before Google's Desktop was released to beta.
The other thing that needs to be asked is, "Does this deep inclusion severely hurt Google's bottom line overall?" and the answer is probably not. Unlike Netscape, where much of it's revenue was generated by Navigator, GDS is a very small revenue generator for google Vs it's other properties, Especially Vs Google Search or Google AdSense. I'd bet the Google Toolbar has more market penetration than Google Desktop, and the Security/privacy issues that were brought up by the press against GDS couldn't have helped it's penetration as well.
the wifi is the best thing going for the zune...If they would use it right.
1) The Three play limit is just stupid and needs to die: I can understand if you don't have a Zune pass or something like that, but if you do, (which is all you can eat music like napster to go) there should be no limit to anything you download from wifi. even if it's ripped. (unless they actually do this. I don't own a zune or any MP3 Player for that matter)
2) Utilize wifi hotspots to their fullest: why is MS so scared of allowing a zune to work wirelessly on hotspots? It would be great to download/sync your zune from the marketplace using your zune at a cafe, or stream internet radio/video, or connect to my media center PC using my wireless network anywhere in my house, or even browse the web using the screen it has. This alone would make wifi the killer app for the Zune.
3) how about ZuneStreaming?: Technically, they could create a program that steams music from your zune (while you're listening to it) and broadcast it to other zunes nearby in realtime. people are doing it with the Zune FM Transmitter and using other zunes to listen in using the built in FM radio. Why not use wifi for this? (which I guess would have better range and sound quality as well as give you the song information if you actually want it, or even offer to download it to your library if you have zune pass (see #1)
Simply put, the wifi could be the killer app, and it is the edge Microsoft has on the Ipod, but they don't want to take the simple steps to make wifi the killer app it should be.
So under this definition, wouldn't filming the Zidane Headbutt in the World Cup be considered criminal to the cameraman that filmed it?
I guess sports cameramen better start practicing their journalism skills.
I'd start looking for my lighting arrangement. Primarialy because I'm forced to.
In some of my light fixtures, you're forced to use Incandesent bulbs because the lights are attached to a dimmer switch. To this day I haven't found a CFL that works with these, and I like the variable light adjustment and don't want to rip out the wall switch just to save 30-50 watts on a light fixture that's barely used.
Although CFL's work well for the rest of the house, and have been saving me a lot of money over 2-3 years since I converted, I don't see how a CFL could work for these dimmable fixtures.
better yet, How would playing the game in it's entirity or even having full access to the RTM Disk Code/images/audio/ETC find something like "Hot Coffee"? Especially considering that it was impossible to trigger Hot Coffee without a gameshark or equivelent cheat device and nothing in the "Hot coffee" scandal audio or in game text would hint to sex outside of the act being rendered in real time.
Exactly. This is why the Vista UAC UI team needs to be taken out back and shot.
This security problem was so easy to fix, they could have done it in three steps.
1) Make XP's setup installer prompt for a password for "Administrator"
2) Make the "Your Name" Account (The Account you have to create with up to five other users when XP setup first runs) a user or power user account.
3) Replace any "Access Denied" dialog boxes with "This operation requires elevated Privileges. Please enter an administrator account here" box. complete with Username/Password prompts. (Like they already do when a User or Power User runs a setup.exe file in XP)
Using an XP user account, I can guarantee that you will see a lot less "access denied" Prompts (the closest thing to a UAC prompt) than UAC privilege escalation prompts using an administrator account in Vista. And it shouldn't be that way. They should only see it when something needs elevation, not when your doing something at the user privilage level such as coping a file or changing the desktop properties.
Like I've said before. a user will get so indoctrinated with prompts that they will simply say yes no matter what they are trying to run. Don't believe me? how fast can you click on "yes to all" when you're copying files into an already existing folder? Do you even read the dialog anymore? Did you realize you could be overwriting newer documents with older revisions of the same document? Also, you could have 20 complex steps involved and users will go through all 20 steps if they really want to run something. So what's the point of prompting them to death if their going to do it anyway?
I swear, they had the Microsoft Bob Designer design this UI. The only thing I haven't seen is the "you must have forgotten your password. Let me remove the password for you and let you in" security model. Although this article comes really close.
I'm still trying to find out how F-secure passed this test.
I don't know how many times I had to do virus cleanup on an F-secure PC because it couldn't delete the file, or it would happily let the virus run in the background, or not detect it at all. and that if it's running, since it wouldn't run in safe mode and half the time get corrupted by the virus.
you could train this until the cows come home and people will still do it.
At this point, Computer exploitation has been in the news for almost a generation now, and people to this day still don't protect themselves against malware or inform themselves about scams. Hell, Windows screams at you if you don't have protection and still people run unprotected, Although it doesn't help much when MS scares people away from updating their OS with their Genuine Advantage program.
I'm a staunch believer of the 1% rule, which is 99% of computer users don't know what they are doing. Based on this study, I would call this probably in the margin of error, since 3.3% actually knew what they were doing. Of course with a bigger sample size, that value will most likely drop closer to the 1%.
I'm already paying $130 for cable right now, and actually I'm waiting for them to switch over to TWC billing so I can knock that down $20-$30 Adelphia used to be a great value, then Rigas bankrupted the thing and whoever took his job basicially raised the rates by roughly 50% My bill went from $85 to $115 overnight for the same service minus 10 channels. Then add the DVR box and we're in $130 territory.
So far, it looks like TWC has the same prices that Adelphia had Pre Bankruptcy. looking at what other TWCNEO venues are charged (particularry Youngstown OH, since they've had it for years now.) They list Digital tuner as well as dual tuner (my guess the DVR) at $8. They also list DVR at $6 as a service but don't really say if it's per box or per household.
Even so. if they charge me DVR service per box, then they will go back, but until then why not get the better box at the same price as the lower end box?
I'll second that. you can't go wrong with an 89. Particulary the Ti-89 Titanium, which is the latest in the series. I own a lot of Ti calcs since I program them for a hobby. I've had an 81 and currently have an 83, 85, 86, 89 and 92, and out of all of them I use the 89 the most by far.
The only problem I would say are the Standarized Tests. Some tests don't allow 89's because of their power. In that case then get an Ti-86 if you can still find one. If tests are not your concern, also look into the voyage 200, which is the Ti-92 replacement. It's got a great screen and it's qwerty keyboard works great for programming and taking notes. it's also very identical to the 89 OS.
I'm a recent Adelphia to TWC transfer. Adn I can tell you that it's not exactly HDTV demand that pushing these units.
Under Adelphia, it was roughly $5 for a standard digital box, and $10 for a HD DVR. last month, I get a rate adjustment that raised the Standard box by $3 and dropped the HD DVR by $2. That's right, the HD DVR is now the same price as the cheap SD box with no DVR. So basicially, if you already had DVR service, you might as well replace all of your SD units with the HD DVR's because you're paying the same price anyway for the SD units, and you can get the free HD channels as well. (even without an HDTV, the HD local channels are much clearer than their analog equivelant)
I'm sure I'm not the only person from the Adelphia changeover that noticed this.