Sure you can't upgrade the video card. But it already comes with a pretty good card anyway, and will hold up for many years...
No. It comes with a card that will play WoW on middle-quality settings. It won't make Oblivion look nice, nor F.E.A.R., nor Ghost Recon, nor other new games and those just around the corner.
Let's see on apple's site. I can buy an iMac with a Radeon X1600. That card retails online for $90. For $180 I can get a GeForce 7900 GS that has close to three times the performance. More importantly, it will run today's and tomorrow's games satisfactorily. The X1600 will not. Furthermore, the X1600 only comes with 128MB, unless I pay Apple $75 for 256MB. The 7900 GS of course comes with 256MB.
Ohh, or I can buy a $2000 iMac with a GeForce 7300 GT. Too bad the 7900 GS is still twice as powerful. And if I want it with 256MB or RAM I have to pay Apple $125. Wait. WHAT? According to pricegrabber.com, I can buy that card for $100. What a way to screw the consumers.
Apple has no gaming machines because nobody in their right mind would game on a Mac. Gaming is all about breadth of software support, and there is no way Apple is going to compete with Microsoft on that front.
BS. What about Boot Camp to run XP?
Now the iMacs just need a video card that isn't a piece of junk. I can buy an iMac with a Radeon X1600? That card retails online for $90. For $180 I can get a GeForce 7900 GS that has close to three times the performance. More importantly, it will run today's and tomorrow's games satisfactorily. The X1600 will not. Furthermore, the X1600 only comes with 128MB, unless I pay Apple $75 for 256MB. The 7900 GS of course comes with 256MB.
Ohh, or I can buy a $2000 iMac with a GeForce 7300 GT. Too bad the 7900 GS is still twice as powerful. And if I want it with 256MB or RAM I have to pay Apple $125. Wait. WHAT? According to pricegrabber.com, I can buy that card for $100. What a way to screw the consumers.
With the exception of the video card the iMac hardware is fine for casual gamers. It's such a waste. Consider all the PC gamers from 4th to 12th grade who get their parents to buy them PCs because those can game but Macs can't really. These kids go to college and get PCs too. Not all of them are the enthusiasts who pay $200 to $600 for a video card, but 99% of enthusiasts started gaming as kids. Even before the xBox there were enough of these people to keep ATi, 3dfx and nVidia in the market. Consider if a whole lot of them could get mini-tower-cased headless iMacs for them to game on and upgrade if they wanted to. The boxes wouldn't even have to be that big. Just wide enough for the card and two quiet 120mm fans in the front and back.
As for an upgradeable video card, the only way I see that making sense is if you're a serious gamer, in which case the mac is indeed the wrong box for you.
BS. What about Boot Camp to run XP?
How about a casual gamer who doesn't want a piece of shit Radeon X1600? That card retails online for $90. For $180 I can get a Geforce 7900 GS that has close to three times the performance. More importantly, it will run today's and tomorrow's games satisfactorily. The X1600 will not. Furthermore, the X1600 only comes with 128MB, unless I pay Apple $75 for 256MB. The 7900 GS of course comes with 256MB.
With the exception of the video card the iMac hardware is fine for casual gamers. What a waste. Consider all the PC gamers from 4th to 12th grade who get their parents to buy them PCs because those can game but Macs can't really. These kids go to college and get PCs too. Not all of them are the enthusiasts who pay $200 to $600 for a video card, but 99% of enthusiasts started gaming as kids. Even before the xBox there were enough of these people to keep ATi, 3dfx and nVidia in the market. Consider if a whole lot of them could get mini-tower-cased iMacs for them to game on and upgrade.
I do learn by trying. I'm not like some of my relatives who are too afraid to try because they worry they'll mess something up. Except that I have messed stuff up by trying, and occasionally not been able to fix it. So while trying often works, the risk of damaging or breaking something is real and often significant.
Have you actually seen a 720p movie stored in 4.3GB? No? I think you'll be surprised how much detail is there that a plain DVD doesn't have. Yes there's much more artifacting in the non-detailed/high contrast areas, but a dual layer disc would solve that.
HTPC means Home Theater PC. The point is to use a HTPC to output the movie to a projector or plasma screen, NOT a monitor.
Oh, and damn near nobody has a projector in their house capable of true 1080p. Newegg has one for $11,800. A 720/768p projectors start at $1,800. People are buying the $2,000 projectors instead of a $2,000 plasma TV. If the HD-rip is done properly it means it can be displayed with 720p hardware and not need a deinterlacer to make it look good.
I had a todo list, and I stopped using it because for every five things I added I only completed four. It's demoralizing and discouraging to always see the list getting longer even when acomplishing items on it. I have several dozen goals and projects partially completed or never started that come to mind from time to time since I don't write them down anymore.
But saying that people should lose rights because they're dumb voters is basically promoting a style of government fundamentally different from everything the USA has ever stood for.
But again, that means you're supporting what the USA stands for even if it's against your self-interests. I think you're saying the USA stands for personal freedom over intelligence. Well since 1791 there's been lots of academic research and actual experiments into alternative governments. It's worth at least considering that perhaps personal freedom over intelligence is overrated. Maybe they should be weighted equally, or their balance shifted a bit.
Except that, to exaggerate, if Windows' Control Panel has 100 options to tweak, and OSX's has only 10, there's a possibly valid argument that Apple isn't offering enough built-in options in its GUI.
Except it wouldn't be thousands of settings, it would be more like dozens, or several hundred. The vast majority of settings in the Windows Registry are things I'd never want to tweak, but there are a hundred or so I would like conrol over. That's why TweakUI exists and I believe was bought by Microsoft. Now you say Onyx has settings like that, and other replies have mentioned other software to fix the gripes on the list, requiring the user to install several programs to enable power user functionality is a poor design choice.
Apple seems devoted to figuring out the way their products and software should be used, then limiting users' ability to use it any other way. Consequently, iTunes 6 doesn't have bookmarks so I can easily resume play in multiple playlists, because I'm supposed to use Party Shuffle so I don't have to drag through a long list and I'm never supposed to restart my computer.
Why not make it an option in the Advanced Settings somewhere? That way a power user can find it without having to scour the net for obscure command line info.
The gameplay has to differ if a new MMO is going to expand the total of MMO players by very much. WoW's gameplay attracted millions of new players. If Fallout copies WoW or an existing MMO, the additional playerbase will be basically limited to anyone who hasn't given those MMO's a try. A Fallout MMO needs to differentiate in fun ways to get new players who have their reasons for not already playing an MMO.
So maybe the/. crowd is the exception, but thanks to your examples, we ARE willing to seriously consider what you're suggesting. The immense technological gains of the past century have shown even everyday people that many things are possible that previously were unbelievable. With a combination of breakthroughs in physics and materials science we really could be colonizing several planets by 2106. Private enterprise would be doing far more in space right now if they could just get people and cargo up there more cheaply by an order of magnitude. Then they just need a better way to get to the planets.
You realized you were probably going to get fired when you did that right? As long as you accepted it, I'm sure you enjoyed the extra time while you were getting paid the same.
What on Earth are you saying? That Sega shouldn't have released the Saturn to compete against the Playstation? Sega made tons of mistakes, but a huge one was letting Sega of America release the 32X. I doubt the Sega CD hurt profitability very much since it was presumably sold at a near break-even price.
The amazing thing is it might not even be prettier than the 360 in many cases. I remember hearing Sony cut the speed of one or both chips by 10% to improve yields. It's coming out a year later, meaning about the best nVidia's chip could do is double ATI's, but that seems unlikely, depending on how much Sony ever really thought about a May/June launch this year. We'll see for next Christmas what the PS3 can really do.
I also find the PS3 case laughable. Between 2005 and 2006 it grew thicker by and inch to fit the 160mm fan and other hardware. The case looks sleek when horizontal, but when vertical for best cooling and space saving, it's blocky and misshapen. The protruding fan intake spoils it's aethetics. Though I wish the 360 had done a big fan like that because it's so quiet.
I'm guessing requests@net.org, of course if I'm right, that means very little since the majority of people won't guess that. The majority probably won't even guess, they'll just look at it befuddled.
Right. Except you didn't explain a) why Terminator 4 couldn't have been made regardless, nor b) why not having Terminator 4 would be a bad thing, nor c) why the same movie simply couldn't have been made cheaper.
Because in an IP-protected world, Hollywood would make T4 is its own way. I don't want T4 made on the cheap. As for T4 not existing possibly being good, that's for you to argue. I'm in favor of Hollywood blockbusters because I like them as they are. I don't have to give those explanations, because it's obvious that without IP the movie would either be made differently, or not at all. As for why it's obvious, well even the homeless know people are pirating movies, and in the history of the arts, there's never been funding for frivolous, hugely expensive entertainment productions for the masses. I'm giving you and others the benefit of intelligence.
For the drugs, I have no doubt you know all about how when patents expire on drugs the profits drop as generics become available. Or back when India was making generics in violation of patents. You probably also know how the drug corps work to make variations of their drugs that can then be patented giving them a new product. I just credited you with some intelligence and jumped to the counter- and counter-counter arguments.
"The world would fall apart without draconian IP laws because I think that's the only way it can work."
BS. I never said that's the only way it can work, and that's now how I mean my arguments to be taken. I'm pointing out the effects a non-IP world would have on the IP-production industries in place today. Others can argue why a non-IP world would be better in spite of those effects.
Slashdot Mirror
Sure you can't upgrade the video card. But it already comes with a pretty good card anyway, and will hold up for many years...
No. It comes with a card that will play WoW on middle-quality settings. It won't make Oblivion look nice, nor F.E.A.R., nor Ghost Recon, nor other new games and those just around the corner.
Let's see on apple's site. I can buy an iMac with a Radeon X1600. That card retails online for $90. For $180 I can get a GeForce 7900 GS that has close to three times the performance. More importantly, it will run today's and tomorrow's games satisfactorily. The X1600 will not. Furthermore, the X1600 only comes with 128MB, unless I pay Apple $75 for 256MB. The 7900 GS of course comes with 256MB.
Ohh, or I can buy a $2000 iMac with a GeForce 7300 GT. Too bad the 7900 GS is still twice as powerful. And if I want it with 256MB or RAM I have to pay Apple $125. Wait. WHAT? According to pricegrabber.com, I can buy that card for $100. What a way to screw the consumers.
Apple has no gaming machines because nobody in their right mind would game on a Mac. Gaming is all about breadth of software support, and there is no way Apple is going to compete with Microsoft on that front.
BS. What about Boot Camp to run XP?
Now the iMacs just need a video card that isn't a piece of junk. I can buy an iMac with a Radeon X1600? That card retails online for $90. For $180 I can get a GeForce 7900 GS that has close to three times the performance. More importantly, it will run today's and tomorrow's games satisfactorily. The X1600 will not. Furthermore, the X1600 only comes with 128MB, unless I pay Apple $75 for 256MB. The 7900 GS of course comes with 256MB.
Ohh, or I can buy a $2000 iMac with a GeForce 7300 GT. Too bad the 7900 GS is still twice as powerful. And if I want it with 256MB or RAM I have to pay Apple $125. Wait. WHAT? According to pricegrabber.com, I can buy that card for $100. What a way to screw the consumers.
With the exception of the video card the iMac hardware is fine for casual gamers. It's such a waste. Consider all the PC gamers from 4th to 12th grade who get their parents to buy them PCs because those can game but Macs can't really. These kids go to college and get PCs too. Not all of them are the enthusiasts who pay $200 to $600 for a video card, but 99% of enthusiasts started gaming as kids. Even before the xBox there were enough of these people to keep ATi, 3dfx and nVidia in the market. Consider if a whole lot of them could get mini-tower-cased headless iMacs for them to game on and upgrade if they wanted to. The boxes wouldn't even have to be that big. Just wide enough for the card and two quiet 120mm fans in the front and back.
As for an upgradeable video card, the only way I see that making sense is if you're a serious gamer, in which case the mac is indeed the wrong box for you.
BS. What about Boot Camp to run XP?
How about a casual gamer who doesn't want a piece of shit Radeon X1600? That card retails online for $90. For $180 I can get a Geforce 7900 GS that has close to three times the performance. More importantly, it will run today's and tomorrow's games satisfactorily. The X1600 will not. Furthermore, the X1600 only comes with 128MB, unless I pay Apple $75 for 256MB. The 7900 GS of course comes with 256MB.
With the exception of the video card the iMac hardware is fine for casual gamers. What a waste. Consider all the PC gamers from 4th to 12th grade who get their parents to buy them PCs because those can game but Macs can't really. These kids go to college and get PCs too. Not all of them are the enthusiasts who pay $200 to $600 for a video card, but 99% of enthusiasts started gaming as kids. Even before the xBox there were enough of these people to keep ATi, 3dfx and nVidia in the market. Consider if a whole lot of them could get mini-tower-cased iMacs for them to game on and upgrade.
Is she okay at installing new programs or compiling ones that aren't in a package?
On most of the stuff they demoed I was thinking to myself, "I've had this on Mac OS X for a few years now."
As true as that may be, Vista has them now, and it's going to be harder to get people to switch to OSX.
How would compare the heat ray to tear gas in terms of torture?
I do learn by trying. I'm not like some of my relatives who are too afraid to try because they worry they'll mess something up. Except that I have messed stuff up by trying, and occasionally not been able to fix it. So while trying often works, the risk of damaging or breaking something is real and often significant.
Have you actually seen a 720p movie stored in 4.3GB? No? I think you'll be surprised how much detail is there that a plain DVD doesn't have. Yes there's much more artifacting in the non-detailed/high contrast areas, but a dual layer disc would solve that.
HTPC means Home Theater PC. The point is to use a HTPC to output the movie to a projector or plasma screen, NOT a monitor.
Oh, and damn near nobody has a projector in their house capable of true 1080p. Newegg has one for $11,800. A 720/768p projectors start at $1,800. People are buying the $2,000 projectors instead of a $2,000 plasma TV. If the HD-rip is done properly it means it can be displayed with 720p hardware and not need a deinterlacer to make it look good.
I had a todo list, and I stopped using it because for every five things I added I only completed four. It's demoralizing and discouraging to always see the list getting longer even when acomplishing items on it. I have several dozen goals and projects partially completed or never started that come to mind from time to time since I don't write them down anymore.
You're forgetting about /.ers who got kicked out of college because of procrastination.
But saying that people should lose rights because they're dumb voters is basically promoting a style of government fundamentally different from everything the USA has ever stood for.
But again, that means you're supporting what the USA stands for even if it's against your self-interests. I think you're saying the USA stands for personal freedom over intelligence. Well since 1791 there's been lots of academic research and actual experiments into alternative governments. It's worth at least considering that perhaps personal freedom over intelligence is overrated. Maybe they should be weighted equally, or their balance shifted a bit.
Except that, to exaggerate, if Windows' Control Panel has 100 options to tweak, and OSX's has only 10, there's a possibly valid argument that Apple isn't offering enough built-in options in its GUI.
Except it wouldn't be thousands of settings, it would be more like dozens, or several hundred. The vast majority of settings in the Windows Registry are things I'd never want to tweak, but there are a hundred or so I would like conrol over. That's why TweakUI exists and I believe was bought by Microsoft. Now you say Onyx has settings like that, and other replies have mentioned other software to fix the gripes on the list, requiring the user to install several programs to enable power user functionality is a poor design choice.
Apple seems devoted to figuring out the way their products and software should be used, then limiting users' ability to use it any other way. Consequently, iTunes 6 doesn't have bookmarks so I can easily resume play in multiple playlists, because I'm supposed to use Party Shuffle so I don't have to drag through a long list and I'm never supposed to restart my computer.
Why not make it an option in the Advanced Settings somewhere? That way a power user can find it without having to scour the net for obscure command line info.
The gameplay has to differ if a new MMO is going to expand the total of MMO players by very much. WoW's gameplay attracted millions of new players. If Fallout copies WoW or an existing MMO, the additional playerbase will be basically limited to anyone who hasn't given those MMO's a try. A Fallout MMO needs to differentiate in fun ways to get new players who have their reasons for not already playing an MMO.
So maybe the /. crowd is the exception, but thanks to your examples, we ARE willing to seriously consider what you're suggesting. The immense technological gains of the past century have shown even everyday people that many things are possible that previously were unbelievable. With a combination of breakthroughs in physics and materials science we really could be colonizing several planets by 2106. Private enterprise would be doing far more in space right now if they could just get people and cargo up there more cheaply by an order of magnitude. Then they just need a better way to get to the planets.
You realized you were probably going to get fired when you did that right? As long as you accepted it, I'm sure you enjoyed the extra time while you were getting paid the same.
How long ago was this and if it was within the last five years why'd you even think Best Buy would carry it?
What on Earth are you saying? That Sega shouldn't have released the Saturn to compete against the Playstation? Sega made tons of mistakes, but a huge one was letting Sega of America release the 32X. I doubt the Sega CD hurt profitability very much since it was presumably sold at a near break-even price.
Anyone?
The amazing thing is it might not even be prettier than the 360 in many cases. I remember hearing Sony cut the speed of one or both chips by 10% to improve yields. It's coming out a year later, meaning about the best nVidia's chip could do is double ATI's, but that seems unlikely, depending on how much Sony ever really thought about a May/June launch this year. We'll see for next Christmas what the PS3 can really do.
I also find the PS3 case laughable. Between 2005 and 2006 it grew thicker by and inch to fit the 160mm fan and other hardware. The case looks sleek when horizontal, but when vertical for best cooling and space saving, it's blocky and misshapen. The protruding fan intake spoils it's aethetics. Though I wish the 360 had done a big fan like that because it's so quiet.
No. Now we put more trust in science and want evidence for claims.
I'm guessing requests@net.org, of course if I'm right, that means very little since the majority of people won't guess that. The majority probably won't even guess, they'll just look at it befuddled.
If from time to time you can't enjoy the immature option of dealing with something or someone, you might be a curmudgeon. Congrats.
Right. Except you didn't explain a) why Terminator 4 couldn't have been made regardless, nor b) why not having Terminator 4 would be a bad thing, nor c) why the same movie simply couldn't have been made cheaper.
Because in an IP-protected world, Hollywood would make T4 is its own way. I don't want T4 made on the cheap. As for T4 not existing possibly being good, that's for you to argue. I'm in favor of Hollywood blockbusters because I like them as they are. I don't have to give those explanations, because it's obvious that without IP the movie would either be made differently, or not at all. As for why it's obvious, well even the homeless know people are pirating movies, and in the history of the arts, there's never been funding for frivolous, hugely expensive entertainment productions for the masses. I'm giving you and others the benefit of intelligence.
For the drugs, I have no doubt you know all about how when patents expire on drugs the profits drop as generics become available. Or back when India was making generics in violation of patents. You probably also know how the drug corps work to make variations of their drugs that can then be patented giving them a new product. I just credited you with some intelligence and jumped to the counter- and counter-counter arguments.
"The world would fall apart without draconian IP laws because I think that's the only way it can work."
BS. I never said that's the only way it can work, and that's now how I mean my arguments to be taken. I'm pointing out the effects a non-IP world would have on the IP-production industries in place today. Others can argue why a non-IP world would be better in spite of those effects.