All prior Macs with optical digital output were able to pass Dolby Digital through the digital out, so I see no reason why the new mini would be any different.
Yup, and what's worse, if you have your credit card number stolen, you just cancel the card and get a new one. If you have your fingerprint stolen, the thief has a permanent personal identifier for you forever.
1) Apple never stated that PPC chips weren't more powerful now, only that according to Intel's and IBM's roadmaps, they won't be more powerful in the future. And they actually didn't make any mention of total power, just "power per watt", and we all knew that this was the reason they couldn't get a G5 in a PowerBook anyway.
2) Your friend's computer is going to be just as useful as it would have been if they hadn't announced the switch. They're not even going to start switching for another year, and that's likely to be the platforms that require low heat dissipation requirements, i.e. notebooks.
3) This will have virtually no effect on most end users. All software will run seamlessly on both Intel and PPC for years. The software that needs to have a speedup on Intel will of course have to be recompiled, but much software probably won't show a demonstrable difference (especially software that's primarily just a front-end for Apple technologies like QuickTime or Core Image).
4) This will have no effect on Java developers, perl developers, web hosting, etc., and virtually no effect on developers who use XCode (e.g. Mathmatica, which was ported in 2 hours, despite having "code dating back to the Reagan administration"). The only developers who will suffer a significant impact are the 20% of developers who haven't started a switch from Metrowerks.
1) DirecTV boxes with TiVo have supported recording two channels at once for several years. The new HD DirecTiVo actually has four tuners -- two HD DirecTV and two OTA HD. It can even record two shows while watching a third show live. So the issue of recording two shows is not an architectural one, rather just a limitation of the current hardware.
2) Most people who don't have DirecTV (or competing Dish Network) and have interest in DVRs also have cable, and more and more of the channels available on cable are available only as digital channels, which means it does you absolutely no good to have two tuners built-into your KnoppMyth box (or your Media Center PC, etc.) if you want to record anything on a digital cable channel. TiVo knows this, and understands that even if it were possible for the connected IR blaster to distinguish between two digital cable boxes, it would be out of the question to ask an average consumer to set up a system with two separate cable boxes connected to the same DVR, controlled with different IR blasters.
3) TiVo has said repeatedly that they will support multiple channel recording for cable once the cable industry stops dragging its feet and releases two-way CableCard, which will work to allow TiVo to decrypt the digital signals, therefore eliminating the huge hassle of the separate cable box (just like they did with the hassle of a separate DirecTV box). But unfortunately the cable companies have a conflict of interest in wanting to be able to lock consumers into their crappy DVR boxes for as long as possible, so they're more than happy to fight CableCard as long as they can.
Conclusion? It's really not TiVo's fault that you can't record more than one channel at once if you have cable. If you are upset at the vertical monopoly the cable companies are creating with this behavior, contact them and your federal lawmakers.
Sorry, this doesn't sound comparable to me. What Vonage is doing, according to your article, corresponds to what US mobile phone carriers have been doing since the dawn of time: they both sell you hardware at a subsidized price, with the catch that it's locked to only work with their network. And Vonage isn't even keeping you from using a non-Vonage branded VOIP box with their network, which gives them a leg up on at least Sprint PCS (who won't activate any non-Sprint branded phone on their network).
Yes, it's another entirely ironic aspect of Windows: you have to use their insecure web browser to update their buggy OS. I'm really surprised that the detaching of WU from IE wasn't part of some antitrust settlement.
Seeing as how Nextel is going to have to give out all new phones anyway when they move their network spectrum, there's absolutely no functional reason why they wouldn't move to CDMA 1xRTT at the same time. That way they can use Sprint's network on 1900MHz while they're building out their own network. Which would be a much better plan than AT&T had when they moved everybody from their IS-136 TDMA network to a GSM network with a fraction of the coverage area.
Sprint will make Nextel Direct Connect (using iDEN) seamless with ReadyLink (using CDMA 1xRTT), then eventually move all Nextel customers over to CDMA. iDEN is a technological dead-end used by virtually no one other than Nextel.
The reason that Sprint wants Nextel is that Nextel is the network that has best been able to take advantage of the Network Effect, i.e. the effect where each node on a network is made more valuable by each additional node that is added. Nextel has Direct Connect, its walkie-talkie service that is hugely popular with businesses, and the main reason that Nextel has the lowest "churn" rate in the industry. Nextel business customers won't switch to another network because then they won't be able to Direct Connect with other Nextel phones anymore. Period.
So, Sprint/Qualcomm came up with a competing alternative to Direct Connect called ReadyLink, but it's not anywhere near as useful as Direct Connect because there aren't nearly as many other people who have it.
So in the short term, what Sprint is going to do is to make changes on the network side to allow Sprint phones to walkie-talkie with Nextel phones. That will effectively instantly make more valuable both Nextel's phones and Sprint's phone.
In the longer term, Nextel is going to have to move to new spectrum that the FCC has given them due to Nextel phones interfering with emergency vehicle communication. Because of this, they will have to move customers to new phones. So since they have to move their network and swap out their customers' phones anyway, there is no reason that they wouldn't just take the opportunity to move to the significantly more efficient, flexible, and forwards-compatible CDMA 1xRTT (and soon EV-DO high-speed data) standard (that Sprint just happens to run on.
CDMA or GSM? I'm referring to the CDMA version as that's the only 650 that's currently available. BTW, signal strength meters cannot be directly compared between different models of phones, much less between manufacturers. Every CDMA Treo 600 I've seen has no problem making and holding a call with 1 bar of signal.
One would think they'd take the good parts of the 600 (namely the radio/phone part) and merely add a higher resolution screen and other small improvements rather than seemingly designing it from the gound up again.
Yes, you'd think. Apparently Palm traded in the 600's Sierra Wireless chipset/radio for a Qualcomm chipset/radio. No one would claim the Treo 600 had the best sound quality in the world, but it was completely passable, and it had fantastic reception. Boo, Palm.
Displays have approximately 100 DPI (dots per inch) of resolution. Printing on a cheapie inkjet has 300 DPI. Printing on a high-quality but still consumer-level laser printer tops out around 1200 DPI. Each time you double the DPI, you need 4 times as many pixels to attain it.
Technically true, but misleading. Displays have 100dpi at 24 bits per "dot" (pixel) for a possibility of any of 16.7 million colors per pixel; printers have (approximately, since black is basically equivalent to adding the other colors other colors) 3 bits per dot (On or Off for Cyan, Magenta and Yellow) for a total of 8 possible colors per dot. This means that you have to use a matrix of at least eight dots to even attempt to replicate the same color space that a monitor can display with one dot. This is why antialiasing is so effective on monitors, because a monitor's resolution is three-dimensional instead of two-dimensional
The audio quality was dire (ATRAC-3 is even worse then MP3).
ATRAC3 is different from the original ATRAC formats that allowed 74 minute playback on MiniDisc. The original ATRAC formats were only approx. 5:1 compression, and according to many listening tests were indistinguishable from CD.
My TWC DVR box, 2 replacement boxes (that they provided to attempt to fix problems), and 2 friends' TWC DVR boxes (on different TWC cable systems) had every single problem that I described. Loud, incompatible, crashy (crashing is also well documented by others in this thread, and unplugging the unit is directed by TWC customer service, and is no different to the box than force-rebooting by holding down the power button), and incredibly poor interface. Like I said, you cannot search for a program. Scrolling through programs by "Theme" does nothing to alleviate the limitations I listed. If you think that the TWC DVR box is easier, then you haven't used a TiVo for more than two minutes (I've lived with both, and used the TWC DVR as my only DVR for four weeks until I simply couldn't take it any more). The TiVo is consistent in its entire menuing system (for example, "Select" always represents OK/Yes/Confirm/etc and the left arrow ("Back") always represents No/Cancel/etc.
For example, when I attempt to Delete a show, on TiVo, it pops up a confirmation menu where I scroll from Do Not Delete to Delete Now and press Select.
By contrast, on the TWC DVR, when I try to Erase Recording it pops up a menu overlay and randomly assigns Yellow Triangle A to Erase and Red Circle C to Cancel (completely bypassing both the natural order of the ubiquitous web browser metaphor of using the left button as a "Back" button, and even bypassing the Exit button on the remote. So you first have to decipher from the screen which button does what, then look down at the remote to figure out where the button is since the extra buttons don't fall under your fingers like the nav buttons do. Yeah, much easier than using a five-way nav system. Maybe web browsers, cell phones, Pocket PCs, Palms, etc. should adopt extra A, B, C and Exit buttons since they're clearly a sign of a superior interface.
My original statement still stands: If you have a TiVo (not just used one for two minutes), you'll never be satisfied with the TWC DVR.
I had a TiVo, then TiVo Series2, and got the Time Warner DVR box as a 30-day free trial to see if it compared to TiVo since it had the advantages of recording two channels at once and costing less.
It's not a TiVo.
First, the interface is simply rotten. While on the TiVo you use a simple five-way navigation system for all menus, (with all menus working consistently), the Time Warner DVR uses a bizarre system of five-way navigation keys, plus an Exit button, plusa yellow triangle "A", blue square "B, and round circle "C" "soft" buttons (unfortunately familiar to those who use the similarly junky Time Warner Digital Cable boxes) to variously (never consistently) "Select" "Cancel" "Record" etc.
The TWC DVR often takes up to 3 seconds (almost never less than one second) to respond to a button press on the remote. Result? You often assume that the DVR didn't register the button press, and you press the button again. This very often leads to the DVR doing something other than what you intended.
On the TWC DVR, you only get approx. 3 days of program guide data. Want to record something more than 3 days away? Better know what channel and time it's on! Defeats the purpose of a DVR, doesn't it?
On the TWC DVR, there's no way to actually search for a program to record. The only navigation through the list of available programs is to select the first letter of the program, then arrow through pages and pages of programs to find the one you want. And what's worse is that each instance of each program is listed separately. Result? Say you want to record Pretty Woman when it comes on (assuming it comes on in the next three days) -- first you have to scroll through dozens of pages of Paid Programming (among others) just to find it. Not easy, useful, or faster than looking the movie up in TV Guide and programming the VCR.
Unlike TiVo, the TWC DVR doesn't keep track of which episodes of a show that it's recorded. Result? You end up with several of the exact same episode of South Park recorded, one for each time it's shown during the week, which effectively reduces the total recording capacity. This problem is compounded by the fact that the TWC DVR really only holds closer to 35 hours of TV.
The TWC DVR is loud -- it hums and the hard disk constantly clatters (so much that I have had to turn up the TV to hear over it). All TiVos are basically silent.
The TWC DVR doesn't have Recommendations -- it won't tell you and/or automatically record shows that it thinks you might like.
The TWC DVR crashes. At least once a week, it will crash in some (usually new and spectacular) manner. It will freeze, start stuttering, the menus will crash, the audio will start recording poorly, and other problems. Sometimes it will restart itself, sometimes you have to pull its power cable and force it to restart. I have yet to have even the slightest software glitch in my TiVo Series2.
The TWC DVR doesn't combine episodes of a show into groups, can't be remotely programmed, doesn't play music and slideshows over a network, doesn't support WishLists, has poor conflict resolution capabilities, doesn't allow adjustment of the start or end times of a show, and won't tell you which episodes of a show won't be recorded when conflicts occur.
Again, the TWC DVR is not a TiVo. Despite the lower cost and the two-channel recording, if you have a TiVo you will never be satisfied with the TWC DVR. If you get a TWC DVR and it is unsatisfactory to you, do notassume that you will be unsatisfied with other DVRs (i.e. TiVo or ReplayTV) because all DVRs are not created equal.
I took my TWC DVR back. They may be able to eventually fix some of its deficiencies, but they will never be able to fix its dreadful interface due to its integration with the bizarrely designed remote. Amazing that they've had four years and they weren't even able to duplicate the quality of TiVo 1.0.
So you could guess that a dual 2.66ghz would get about 499-500MFLOPS...
Except that there's no such thing as dual P4 at any MHz. To get multiprocessing on Intel, you have to go Xeon or Itanium.
Re:Anyone seen real specs for Apple's format?
on
AAC vs. OGG vs. MP3
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· Score: 1
You may be right about no support for AAC, however the TiVo server software for Mac was just the iTunes Sharing preferences separated from iTunes -- it had an identical interface to the new Preferences pane in iTunes 4, and it was quite clearly at least co-devloped by Apple.
TiVo supports Rendezvous natively, thus it doesn't require specific server software for Mac as it does for Windows.
Slashdot Mirror
All prior Macs with optical digital output were able to pass Dolby Digital through the digital out, so I see no reason why the new mini would be any different.
Yup, and what's worse, if you have your credit card number stolen, you just cancel the card and get a new one. If you have your fingerprint stolen, the thief has a permanent personal identifier for you forever.
RTFA, dude.
1) Apple never stated that PPC chips weren't more powerful now, only that according to Intel's and IBM's roadmaps, they won't be more powerful in the future. And they actually didn't make any mention of total power, just "power per watt", and we all knew that this was the reason they couldn't get a G5 in a PowerBook anyway.
2) Your friend's computer is going to be just as useful as it would have been if they hadn't announced the switch. They're not even going to start switching for another year, and that's likely to be the platforms that require low heat dissipation requirements, i.e. notebooks.
3) This will have virtually no effect on most end users. All software will run seamlessly on both Intel and PPC for years. The software that needs to have a speedup on Intel will of course have to be recompiled, but much software probably won't show a demonstrable difference (especially software that's primarily just a front-end for Apple technologies like QuickTime or Core Image).
4) This will have no effect on Java developers, perl developers, web hosting, etc., and virtually no effect on developers who use XCode (e.g. Mathmatica, which was ported in 2 hours, despite having "code dating back to the Reagan administration"). The only developers who will suffer a significant impact are the 20% of developers who haven't started a switch from Metrowerks.
2) Most people who don't have DirecTV (or competing Dish Network) and have interest in DVRs also have cable, and more and more of the channels available on cable are available only as digital channels, which means it does you absolutely no good to have two tuners built-into your KnoppMyth box (or your Media Center PC, etc.) if you want to record anything on a digital cable channel. TiVo knows this, and understands that even if it were possible for the connected IR blaster to distinguish between two digital cable boxes, it would be out of the question to ask an average consumer to set up a system with two separate cable boxes connected to the same DVR, controlled with different IR blasters.
3) TiVo has said repeatedly that they will support multiple channel recording for cable once the cable industry stops dragging its feet and releases two-way CableCard, which will work to allow TiVo to decrypt the digital signals, therefore eliminating the huge hassle of the separate cable box (just like they did with the hassle of a separate DirecTV box). But unfortunately the cable companies have a conflict of interest in wanting to be able to lock consumers into their crappy DVR boxes for as long as possible, so they're more than happy to fight CableCard as long as they can.
Conclusion? It's really not TiVo's fault that you can't record more than one channel at once if you have cable. If you are upset at the vertical monopoly the cable companies are creating with this behavior, contact them and your federal lawmakers.
Sorry, this doesn't sound comparable to me. What Vonage is doing, according to your article, corresponds to what US mobile phone carriers have been doing since the dawn of time: they both sell you hardware at a subsidized price, with the catch that it's locked to only work with their network. And Vonage isn't even keeping you from using a non-Vonage branded VOIP box with their network, which gives them a leg up on at least Sprint PCS (who won't activate any non-Sprint branded phone on their network).
Actually they've increased it to five computers, as indicated in their support document here.
They already have.
Firefox on the Mac asks you "You are about to close X open tabs. Are you sure you want to continue?" Safari, unfortunately, works how you describe.
Yes, it's another entirely ironic aspect of Windows: you have to use their insecure web browser to update their buggy OS. I'm really surprised that the detaching of WU from IE wasn't part of some antitrust settlement.
Nothing comes close.
Seeing as how Nextel is going to have to give out all new phones anyway when they move their network spectrum, there's absolutely no functional reason why they wouldn't move to CDMA 1xRTT at the same time. That way they can use Sprint's network on 1900MHz while they're building out their own network. Which would be a much better plan than AT&T had when they moved everybody from their IS-136 TDMA network to a GSM network with a fraction of the coverage area.
iDEN is definitely a TDMA-based technology, as is GSM. It's not CDMA.
Sprint will make Nextel Direct Connect (using iDEN) seamless with ReadyLink (using CDMA 1xRTT), then eventually move all Nextel customers over to CDMA. iDEN is a technological dead-end used by virtually no one other than Nextel.
Affiliate area. Probably Horizon Wireless, which filed for bankruptcy a year ago
So, Sprint/Qualcomm came up with a competing alternative to Direct Connect called ReadyLink, but it's not anywhere near as useful as Direct Connect because there aren't nearly as many other people who have it.
So in the short term, what Sprint is going to do is to make changes on the network side to allow Sprint phones to walkie-talkie with Nextel phones. That will effectively instantly make more valuable both Nextel's phones and Sprint's phone.
In the longer term, Nextel is going to have to move to new spectrum that the FCC has given them due to Nextel phones interfering with emergency vehicle communication. Because of this, they will have to move customers to new phones. So since they have to move their network and swap out their customers' phones anyway, there is no reason that they wouldn't just take the opportunity to move to the significantly more efficient, flexible, and forwards-compatible CDMA 1xRTT (and soon EV-DO high-speed data) standard (that Sprint just happens to run on.
Bingo. Now it begins to make sense, eh?
CDMA or GSM? I'm referring to the CDMA version as that's the only 650 that's currently available. BTW, signal strength meters cannot be directly compared between different models of phones, much less between manufacturers. Every CDMA Treo 600 I've seen has no problem making and holding a call with 1 bar of signal.
Technically true, but misleading. Displays have 100dpi at 24 bits per "dot" (pixel) for a possibility of any of 16.7 million colors per pixel; printers have (approximately, since black is basically equivalent to adding the other colors other colors) 3 bits per dot (On or Off for Cyan, Magenta and Yellow) for a total of 8 possible colors per dot. This means that you have to use a matrix of at least eight dots to even attempt to replicate the same color space that a monitor can display with one dot. This is why antialiasing is so effective on monitors, because a monitor's resolution is three-dimensional instead of two-dimensional
And keep in mind that Wal-Mart is the United States' biggest music retailer.
ATRAC3 is different from the original ATRAC formats that allowed 74 minute playback on MiniDisc. The original ATRAC formats were only approx. 5:1 compression, and according to many listening tests were indistinguishable from CD.
For example, when I attempt to Delete a show, on TiVo, it pops up a confirmation menu where I scroll from Do Not Delete to Delete Now and press Select.
By contrast, on the TWC DVR, when I try to Erase Recording it pops up a menu overlay and randomly assigns Yellow Triangle A to Erase and Red Circle C to Cancel (completely bypassing both the natural order of the ubiquitous web browser metaphor of using the left button as a "Back" button, and even bypassing the Exit button on the remote. So you first have to decipher from the screen which button does what, then look down at the remote to figure out where the button is since the extra buttons don't fall under your fingers like the nav buttons do. Yeah, much easier than using a five-way nav system. Maybe web browsers, cell phones, Pocket PCs, Palms, etc. should adopt extra A, B, C and Exit buttons since they're clearly a sign of a superior interface. My original statement still stands: If you have a TiVo (not just used one for two minutes), you'll never be satisfied with the TWC DVR.
It's not a TiVo.
First, the interface is simply rotten. While on the TiVo you use a simple five-way navigation system for all menus, (with all menus working consistently), the Time Warner DVR uses a bizarre system of five-way navigation keys, plus an Exit button, plusa yellow triangle "A", blue square "B, and round circle "C" "soft" buttons (unfortunately familiar to those who use the similarly junky Time Warner Digital Cable boxes) to variously (never consistently) "Select" "Cancel" "Record" etc.
The TWC DVR often takes up to 3 seconds (almost never less than one second) to respond to a button press on the remote. Result? You often assume that the DVR didn't register the button press, and you press the button again. This very often leads to the DVR doing something other than what you intended.
On the TWC DVR, you only get approx. 3 days of program guide data. Want to record something more than 3 days away? Better know what channel and time it's on! Defeats the purpose of a DVR, doesn't it?
On the TWC DVR, there's no way to actually search for a program to record. The only navigation through the list of available programs is to select the first letter of the program, then arrow through pages and pages of programs to find the one you want. And what's worse is that each instance of each program is listed separately. Result? Say you want to record Pretty Woman when it comes on (assuming it comes on in the next three days) -- first you have to scroll through dozens of pages of Paid Programming (among others) just to find it. Not easy, useful, or faster than looking the movie up in TV Guide and programming the VCR.
Unlike TiVo, the TWC DVR doesn't keep track of which episodes of a show that it's recorded. Result? You end up with several of the exact same episode of South Park recorded, one for each time it's shown during the week, which effectively reduces the total recording capacity. This problem is compounded by the fact that the TWC DVR really only holds closer to 35 hours of TV.
The TWC DVR is loud -- it hums and the hard disk constantly clatters (so much that I have had to turn up the TV to hear over it). All TiVos are basically silent.
The TWC DVR doesn't have Recommendations -- it won't tell you and/or automatically record shows that it thinks you might like.
The TWC DVR crashes. At least once a week, it will crash in some (usually new and spectacular) manner. It will freeze, start stuttering, the menus will crash, the audio will start recording poorly, and other problems. Sometimes it will restart itself, sometimes you have to pull its power cable and force it to restart. I have yet to have even the slightest software glitch in my TiVo Series2.
The TWC DVR doesn't combine episodes of a show into groups, can't be remotely programmed, doesn't play music and slideshows over a network, doesn't support WishLists, has poor conflict resolution capabilities, doesn't allow adjustment of the start or end times of a show, and won't tell you which episodes of a show won't be recorded when conflicts occur.
Again, the TWC DVR is not a TiVo. Despite the lower cost and the two-channel recording, if you have a TiVo you will never be satisfied with the TWC DVR. If you get a TWC DVR and it is unsatisfactory to you, do notassume that you will be unsatisfied with other DVRs (i.e. TiVo or ReplayTV) because all DVRs are not created equal.
I took my TWC DVR back. They may be able to eventually fix some of its deficiencies, but they will never be able to fix its dreadful interface due to its integration with the bizarrely designed remote. Amazing that they've had four years and they weren't even able to duplicate the quality of TiVo 1.0.
Except that there's no such thing as dual P4 at any MHz. To get multiprocessing on Intel, you have to go Xeon or Itanium.
TiVo supports Rendezvous natively, thus it doesn't require specific server software for Mac as it does for Windows.