So when the salesman tells her that the Canon that's on sale for 20% less is even better and will make her photos look "super-duper-realistic", you're fucked.
That may well be true - however, the fact of the matter is that most of my hardware has problems functioning under Linux. MS may be the big bad wolf here, but they have hardware vendor support, which makes life as a consumer much easier...
I just don't see Grandma picking out her next printer based on whether or not there are working Linux drivers available...
If all they want to do is run a browser and possibly Open Office, anyone should be fine with Linux... but what if you, say, want to install new hardware? How about a printer? New WiFi card/dongle? Oooooh, how about one of those nifty wireless WAN thingamajiggies?
Or how about clicking the "Update to latest release" button? Tried that yesterday on a Virtualbox VM of Ubuntu 9.04, and after an hour of downloading and installing crap, the VM rebooted and got stuck in an endless loop of flashing text - I'm having a hard time believing that Virtualbox is at fault...
Meh. Most people have trouble distinguishing 10-year-old 128kbps CBR MP3s from the CD... I was surprised that I actually had trouble with a blind test (albeit with a modern encoder... latest LAME version, probably - they didn't tell me) a few months ago - looks like MP3 encoders are getting better as quickly as my hearing's getting worse.
Funnily enough, the thing that gave it away was the lack of bass response on the 128kbps version - the mids and highs were incredibly detailed... nothing like 128kbps MP3s back in the day, when they were still used for... well, everything. I still have a few of those, and they sound horrible.
Huh... I thought the obvious solution was just setting up amping + speakers in each room and carrying around the source. Why set up a streaming source or whatever when you can just move your MP3 player/laptop/netbook/phone from one room to another and plug in a single cable? Streaming from the NAS via WiFi is still possible with the latter three options...
Studio monitors with a decent amp on my office/music room desk, 5.1 surround setup in the living room, 2.1 setup in the bedroom, cheap 2.0 setup in the kitchen... all with either a 3.5mm jack or XLR ins and the appropriate adapters.
What do you need a centralized solution for? Is it about playing the same music in more than one room at the same time? Can't really see a use for that, unless you use your home (including the kitchen, bedroom, office, den and living room) as a cocktail lounge and don't want guests to have a moment of awkward silence (hint: if that's necessary, find more interesting people to have over!)...
Aren't they required to do that in order to give you headroom for staying under the speed limit? Sure, an exact reading would be better, but what if they indicated 4-6MHP UNDER true speed?:P
The prompts wouldn't have been a problem if they hadn't taken a second to dim the screen and another second to show the buttons... if they'd been instant I would've put up with 'em, but even on dual core machines with 4GB of RAM the prompts were still sluggish.
I'm not a pet owner, but I thought cats were _supposed_ to be let out on their own (at least that's what cat owners tell me), because otherwise they go crazy and tear up furniture or start eating the children...
Maybe it'd just be easier not to have pets in densely populated areas...
Actually, I've found that these problems are usually just caused by Lenovo's crappy programming. Access Connections is a horrible utility that only works half the time:(
"If you really like shortcuts, Ctrl+Shift+Esc is another handy one. Ctrl+Alt+Del takes you to the Windows Security screen instead of Task Manager on some computers, but Ctrl+Shift+Esc always brings up the Task Manager."
You know what's the worst part is? The programs that slow down Thinkpads the most aren't even crapware (like Real Player, Adobe Reader, stuff like that), but system utilities/drivers... ThinkVantage is crap - the slowest software I've ever seen and extremely buggy too.:(
You mean there are smartphones on the market that DON'T support those features?
Hell, with the exception of that auto-SMS feature (which is awesome, by the way... I gotta find a way to do that) and the scripting, all my WinMo phones have been able to do these things... I was under the impression that only dumb phones still locked you in (i.e. only carrier-approved themes, ringtones, backgrounds and crap like that).
It isn't, but what's surprising is how EASY it is to hit 10GB with a PST file - you'd think that that the incredible slowness in Outlook was caused by some sort of mega compression that reduces the file size to a tenth of what it was, but nooooo, I guess it's just a feature - gotta have time to drink some coffee and have a donut while switching between IMAP folders...
Quick, someone write an app that syncs my contacts from Outlook 2007 (or WM6.1/6.5) to Thunderbird... Google's buggy Exchange Activesync implementation is driving me bat shit crazy.:(
I'm guessing people are buying cheap versions that are meant to be sold with Macs...
I've got to say, though, I'm surprised Apple doesn't just start selling $300 (or the same price as Win Ultimate) versions that are allowed to be installed on any hardware, but without support. Wouldn't be much of a burden for Apple, would it?
Actually, the DII:LOD keys I got from there were banned pretty quickly. Maybe I was just unlucky, but I'm guessing they sold the same keys to a bunch of people...
Unless you regularly go without charging that iPhone of yours for a week at a time, why would that matter? You're probably charging every night anyway, aren't you?
I'd also bet that the iPhone lasts a lot longer than just 8 hours of reading eBooks... hell, my HTC Prophet does that, and it's ancient. Newer WinMo devices will double or triple that...
Sure, but there's nothing to upgrade to right now - top of the line is a Snapdragon based handset or an N900 or *gasp* an iPhone...
It's not the same as with regular computers, where pretty much anything you can buy these days (let's disregard netbooks and nettops for a moment) will pull off 1080p MKV rips and YouTube HD without a hitch... there's just not enough headroom, IMO.
Obviously I'm not going to let that stop me from buying smartphones, but I wish web developers would stop to think about where they're going with their site designs - Slashdot is a prime example... performs extremely badly even on decent hardware (C2D @ 2GHz lags in the dynamic view), provides absolutely no advantages over plain old HTML from the 90s (hell, it even LOOKS like plain old HTML from the 90s!), and most smartphones won't even open it. We need to develop new technologies, sure, but please, show some restraint and only use them for things where they actually make a difference...
Slashdot Mirror
So when the salesman tells her that the Canon that's on sale for 20% less is even better and will make her photos look "super-duper-realistic", you're fucked.
I'm not buying it...
That may well be true - however, the fact of the matter is that most of my hardware has problems functioning under Linux. MS may be the big bad wolf here, but they have hardware vendor support, which makes life as a consumer much easier...
I just don't see Grandma picking out her next printer based on whether or not there are working Linux drivers available...
If all they want to do is run a browser and possibly Open Office, anyone should be fine with Linux... but what if you, say, want to install new hardware? How about a printer? New WiFi card/dongle? Oooooh, how about one of those nifty wireless WAN thingamajiggies?
Or how about clicking the "Update to latest release" button? Tried that yesterday on a Virtualbox VM of Ubuntu 9.04, and after an hour of downloading and installing crap, the VM rebooted and got stuck in an endless loop of flashing text - I'm having a hard time believing that Virtualbox is at fault...
Now that I understand - I'm just wondering why a "custom AV" vendor would install a $100 speaker or, god forbid, a $100 amp in the first place :P
Meh. Most people have trouble distinguishing 10-year-old 128kbps CBR MP3s from the CD... I was surprised that I actually had trouble with a blind test (albeit with a modern encoder... latest LAME version, probably - they didn't tell me) a few months ago - looks like MP3 encoders are getting better as quickly as my hearing's getting worse.
Funnily enough, the thing that gave it away was the lack of bass response on the 128kbps version - the mids and highs were incredibly detailed... nothing like 128kbps MP3s back in the day, when they were still used for... well, everything. I still have a few of those, and they sound horrible.
Huh... I thought the obvious solution was just setting up amping + speakers in each room and carrying around the source. Why set up a streaming source or whatever when you can just move your MP3 player/laptop/netbook/phone from one room to another and plug in a single cable? Streaming from the NAS via WiFi is still possible with the latter three options...
Studio monitors with a decent amp on my office/music room desk, 5.1 surround setup in the living room, 2.1 setup in the bedroom, cheap 2.0 setup in the kitchen... all with either a 3.5mm jack or XLR ins and the appropriate adapters.
What do you need a centralized solution for? Is it about playing the same music in more than one room at the same time? Can't really see a use for that, unless you use your home (including the kitchen, bedroom, office, den and living room) as a cocktail lounge and don't want guests to have a moment of awkward silence (hint: if that's necessary, find more interesting people to have over!)...
You charge more then $200 to install $200 worth of amping and speakers? Where do you live that people are dumb enough to pay for this? :O
Aren't they required to do that in order to give you headroom for staying under the speed limit? Sure, an exact reading would be better, but what if they indicated 4-6MHP UNDER true speed? :P
The prompts wouldn't have been a problem if they hadn't taken a second to dim the screen and another second to show the buttons... if they'd been instant I would've put up with 'em, but even on dual core machines with 4GB of RAM the prompts were still sluggish.
I'm not a pet owner, but I thought cats were _supposed_ to be let out on their own (at least that's what cat owners tell me), because otherwise they go crazy and tear up furniture or start eating the children...
Maybe it'd just be easier not to have pets in densely populated areas...
So... Thinkpads aren't consumer grade hardware? Sure, I love mine, but calling 'em space-grade isn't exactly being honest, IMO ;)
Actually, I've found that these problems are usually just caused by Lenovo's crappy programming. Access Connections is a horrible utility that only works half the time :(
Try MWConn. :)
"If you really like shortcuts, Ctrl+Shift+Esc is another handy one. Ctrl+Alt+Del takes you to the Windows Security screen instead of Task Manager on some computers, but Ctrl+Shift+Esc always brings up the Task Manager."
You are a God.
The newer Thinkpads have Start Buttons, btw. :)
You know what's the worst part is? The programs that slow down Thinkpads the most aren't even crapware (like Real Player, Adobe Reader, stuff like that), but system utilities/drivers... ThinkVantage is crap - the slowest software I've ever seen and extremely buggy too. :(
If he was flying, he'd probably be on WoW ;)
You mean there are smartphones on the market that DON'T support those features?
Hell, with the exception of that auto-SMS feature (which is awesome, by the way... I gotta find a way to do that) and the scripting, all my WinMo phones have been able to do these things... I was under the impression that only dumb phones still locked you in (i.e. only carrier-approved themes, ringtones, backgrounds and crap like that).
It isn't, but what's surprising is how EASY it is to hit 10GB with a PST file - you'd think that that the incredible slowness in Outlook was caused by some sort of mega compression that reduces the file size to a tenth of what it was, but nooooo, I guess it's just a feature - gotta have time to drink some coffee and have a donut while switching between IMAP folders...
Quick, someone write an app that syncs my contacts from Outlook 2007 (or WM6.1/6.5) to Thunderbird... Google's buggy Exchange Activesync implementation is driving me bat shit crazy. :(
I'm guessing people are buying cheap versions that are meant to be sold with Macs...
I've got to say, though, I'm surprised Apple doesn't just start selling $300 (or the same price as Win Ultimate) versions that are allowed to be installed on any hardware, but without support. Wouldn't be much of a burden for Apple, would it?
Actually, the DII:LOD keys I got from there were banned pretty quickly. Maybe I was just unlucky, but I'm guessing they sold the same keys to a bunch of people...
I guess telling you to get a spare battery would be mean, huh? :p
Unless you regularly go without charging that iPhone of yours for a week at a time, why would that matter? You're probably charging every night anyway, aren't you?
I'd also bet that the iPhone lasts a lot longer than just 8 hours of reading eBooks... hell, my HTC Prophet does that, and it's ancient. Newer WinMo devices will double or triple that...
...it's gonna be awesome.
H264 is supported, but not in Flash Video, as far as I know... Flash-based H264 needs a lot more power to decode on X86 platforms as well.
Sure, but there's nothing to upgrade to right now - top of the line is a Snapdragon based handset or an N900 or *gasp* an iPhone...
It's not the same as with regular computers, where pretty much anything you can buy these days (let's disregard netbooks and nettops for a moment) will pull off 1080p MKV rips and YouTube HD without a hitch... there's just not enough headroom, IMO.
Obviously I'm not going to let that stop me from buying smartphones, but I wish web developers would stop to think about where they're going with their site designs - Slashdot is a prime example... performs extremely badly even on decent hardware (C2D @ 2GHz lags in the dynamic view), provides absolutely no advantages over plain old HTML from the 90s (hell, it even LOOKS like plain old HTML from the 90s!), and most smartphones won't even open it. We need to develop new technologies, sure, but please, show some restraint and only use them for things where they actually make a difference...