I, too, don't understand why Apple decided to replace the ExpressCard slot with an SD slot on a supposedly pro-level notebook.
The ExpressCard slot provided the only high-speed expansion option on Apple's notebooks. Maybe I'd understand this move if there was a docking station available that added other expansion options, but there isn't.
I do a lot of photography and often shoot gigabytes of raw photos in a single shoot with my dSLR (which uses CF, not SD). Yeah, the sort of work the MacBook Pro is supposed to be aimed at. Besides that, I also do a lot of work with large disk images for the IT work I do.
Doing such work on my aging MBP is a joy because I have an ExpressCard Serial ATA adapter that lets me use external hard drives without the limitations and overhead of USB, FireWire or ethernet. If I wanted, I could also use the card to connect to an external RAID enclosure at SATA II speeds.
What good are the performance increases with the CPU, memory, graphics, etc if the only expansion option that provided the quickest data transfer speeds is now gone? Disk i/o will be an even worse bottleneck for me on a new MBP than my old one. No thanks.
I was looking to upgrade my 2.5 year old MBP with a newer model, but I refuse to do so until Apple brings back an ExpressCard slot or something better.
Actually, HP/Compaq did recall many notebook batteries this year (April) due to fire hazards. I'm not sure if the batteries recalled were made by Sony, but the flaw seems to be the same.
The DOS command route -p add 207.46.0.0 mask 255.255.0.0 [192.168.0.254] (replace the address in brackets with a random address on your current subnet) will permanently route all would-be "phone home" packets to the random address that you specified.
What makes you so sure this will work now and in the future when all MS has to do to make your solution useless is modify their networking code to ignore any custom routing rules to their class B? MS did something like this with the HOSTS file, so I wouldn't be taken completely by surprise if they did this.
Because of this, I'd rather trust a firewall that isn't running on a Windows box to get the job done.
"If a business or other enterprise asks you for your SSN, you can refuse to give it. However, that may mean doing without the purchase or service for which your number was requested. For example, utility companies and other services ask for a Social Security number, but do not need it; they can do a credit check or identify the person in their records by alternative means."
Also, your SSN is required for more than just tax purposes, as you claimed:
"Specific laws require a person to provide his/her SSN for certain purposes. While we cannot give you a comprehensive list of all situations where an SSN might be required or requested, an SSN is required/requested by:
Internal Revenue Service for tax returns and federal loans
Employers for wage and tax reporting purposes
States for the school lunch program
Banks for monetary transactions
Veterans Administration as a hospital admission number
Department of Labor for workers compensation
Department of Education for Student Loans
States to administer any tax, general public assistance, motor vehicle or drivers license law within its jurisdiction
States for child support enforcement
States for commercial drivers licenses
States for Food Stamps
States for Medicaid
States for Unemployment Compensation
States for Temporary Assistance to Needy Families
U.S. Treasury for U.S. Savings Bonds"
The Privacy Act regulates the use of SSNs by government agencies. When a Federal, State, or local government agency asks an individual to disclose his or her Social Security number, the Privacy Act requires the agency to inform the person of the following: the statutory or other authority for requesting the information; whether disclosure is mandatory or voluntary; what uses will be made of the information; and the consequences, if any, of failure to provide the information.
(from the same page linked to above)
Finally, to the grandparent: yes, you can get a new SSN number assigned to you. Here's how:
80 mph on a traffic-free straight highway in good weather in daylight is safer than 55 mph on a crowded sleet-covered twisty road at night, yet it's the former that could get me a ticket.
Ideally, we need dynamic speed limits...
I couldn't agree with you more. There is absolutely no reason a speed limit should be constant under all weather, traffic, and time conditions. Just last year, I was fortunate to drive a few hundred miles on Germany's Autobahns. Yes, I was cruising around 100 MPH for extended periods of time, but was this dangerous? No, not really (as a matter of fact, people were passing me at much faster speeds than that). There's something called lane manners that Germans seem to adhere to fairly well, meaning that they stick to the right lanes unless passing. Combine this with better driver education and awareness and you have a huge improvement in safety compared to that of the States. Also, when traffic becomes more congested or as the autobahn is near a city, a speed limit is often set in place with dynamic values according to various conditions.
I'm told the situation is better elsewhere in the States, but highways here in the north east (especially CT) are a joke. Many officials and media try to blame the high amount of accidents here on speeding, but after driving on some of Germany's excellent autobahns, I've come to realize that much of it here has to do with poorly designed roadways and lack of driver education.
I can't believe they're actually trusting some random company with handling and counting votes. What makes this company so secure? I've personally never heard of them, and I'm sure most others haven't either, so why should I trust them?
They're not exactly just any random company. They've been in the election machine business, among others, for quite some time. Yahoo has a short profile of Diebold.
Anyways, I agree with you that no single company should have control over something as important as electronic voting machines. Something as important as a machine that decides the fate of democracy should be a community effort--not just some project managed by a single corporation. If there is one place a democratic government can use open source, its with the voting machines.
My 2001 VW Jetta TDI once achieved 54 MPG on a road trip with the AC on, 4 adults, and a packed trunk. 785 miles on a single tank.
I have a 5-speed manual transmission which helps a lot. I hate it when they compare an automatic TDI to the hybrids because the automatics get considerably less mileage than one with a manual transmission. Automatic TDIs usually get at least 5-7 MPG less than manual ones. Still, the mileage is awesome considering the fact that there are no differences between a regular gas Jetta from a diesel one besides the engine.
Stock TDIs may be a bit slow, but that is easily solved by a $300 software upgrade to the ECU. The torque is addicting and hills are an absolute blast!
It would be nice if they offered bounties for catching online scammers like they do for other types of criminals. Maybe having online bounty hunters would be an effective way of fighting online scams? I bet thousands of hackers would love to hunt down scammers if there was a monetary reward.
I see some logic to that, but you forget who we are dealing with. During Napsters "golden days," when record sales went *up*, they still went after Napster. Unless they change, the RIAA/MPAA will always go after the file sharing networks and try to gain as much control over media distribution as they can.
If sales happened to go down because of this, they would probably blame lack of sales on file sharing and piracy. They've done it before.
For this reason and because we geeks make up a small portion of all who give money to them, it's probably best for us to increase awareness of all the bad that the MPAA/RIAA are doing and support groups like the EFF.
I don't think it's SUVs that we should be worried about. Why am I not hearing anyone complain about how bad trucks (specifically the ones that haul freight or those old, big pickup trucks) are when it comes to emissions? Whenever I am on the road, I usually see trucks emitting dark brown/black, thick, smoke. I can't say I've seen an SUV emit anything close to that. Yes, I understand that trucks are much bigger, but there's no reason why you should have to breath that smoke in when you are driving behind one.
And remember, some people really do need SUVs. Some need it for the 4 wheel drive. Some need it to carry their sports stuff or some bigger items that wouldn't fit in a sedan. In addition, there are some obese people that just can't fit in one of those more conservative sedans that you want to throw them in. But, I do agree that there are many people that buy them that don't need that big of a car.
Also, would you rather be in an SUV or small two-seater when you're in an accident? People are so bad at driving nowadays that I just don't feel safe at all in a smaller car. Until people can figure out how to drive well, people will continue to buy those SUVs or larger cars.
Btw, my dad's SUV, a Mercedes ML-320, gets an average of 25mpg (it has a computer which tells you this). There are many sedans which get worse mileage. If they really felt there was no better method than to burn an SUV dealership to the ground, they should have burned down a used car dealership. It's the older cars we need to phase out fast.
For anyone with the Abit KT7 and KT7-RAID, the chrome orb will not fit without a little modification. What I did was use a metal file to file away some of the metal on the bottom of one side of the heatsink where it was being blocked. Only the bottom part of the side needs to shaved off. I shaved off less than 1/8 of an inch and you can't notice it unless if you really look hard.
Just prepare to be filing that sucker for a good half hour:)
I'm curious.. Does this bill apply to people living outside of PA? What if someone from another state attacked a server that was in PA? Wouldn't federal law apply then? I don't believe the federal law is as harsh as that though. Does anyone have a URL for the full text of the bill? I'd like to see it.
Slashdot Mirror
I, too, don't understand why Apple decided to replace the ExpressCard slot with an SD slot on a supposedly pro-level notebook.
The ExpressCard slot provided the only high-speed expansion option on Apple's notebooks. Maybe I'd understand this move if there was a docking station available that added other expansion options, but there isn't.
I do a lot of photography and often shoot gigabytes of raw photos in a single shoot with my dSLR (which uses CF, not SD). Yeah, the sort of work the MacBook Pro is supposed to be aimed at. Besides that, I also do a lot of work with large disk images for the IT work I do.
Doing such work on my aging MBP is a joy because I have an ExpressCard Serial ATA adapter that lets me use external hard drives without the limitations and overhead of USB, FireWire or ethernet. If I wanted, I could also use the card to connect to an external RAID enclosure at SATA II speeds.
What good are the performance increases with the CPU, memory, graphics, etc if the only expansion option that provided the quickest data transfer speeds is now gone? Disk i/o will be an even worse bottleneck for me on a new MBP than my old one. No thanks.
I was looking to upgrade my 2.5 year old MBP with a newer model, but I refuse to do so until Apple brings back an ExpressCard slot or something better.
Actually, HP/Compaq did recall many notebook batteries this year (April) due to fire hazards. I'm not sure if the batteries recalled were made by Sony, but the flaw seems to be the same.
. htmlx
Some info on the HP recall:
http://www.cpsc.gov/cpscpub/prerel/prhtml06/06145
http://bpr.hpordercenter.com/ebpr/landingpage.asp
What makes you so sure this will work now and in the future when all MS has to do to make your solution useless is modify their networking code to ignore any custom routing rules to their class B? MS did something like this with the HOSTS file, so I wouldn't be taken completely by surprise if they did this.
Because of this, I'd rather trust a firewall that isn't running on a Windows box to get the job done.
Which federal law? I couldn't find anything about that from the SSA's website, but I did find this page:
When am I legally required to provide my Social Security number?:
Also, your SSN is required for more than just tax purposes, as you claimed:
(from the same page linked to above)
Finally, to the grandparent: yes, you can get a new SSN number assigned to you. Here's how:
How can I get a different Social Security number assigned to me?
There is a Texas Hold'em game that is advertised to work in Linux and is written in Java:
http://www.ddpoker.com/
I've never played it, so I can't vouch for its quality. I've seen it sold at a lot of retail outlets though.
I couldn't agree with you more. There is absolutely no reason a speed limit should be constant under all weather, traffic, and time conditions. Just last year, I was fortunate to drive a few hundred miles on Germany's Autobahns. Yes, I was cruising around 100 MPH for extended periods of time, but was this dangerous? No, not really (as a matter of fact, people were passing me at much faster speeds than that). There's something called lane manners that Germans seem to adhere to fairly well, meaning that they stick to the right lanes unless passing. Combine this with better driver education and awareness and you have a huge improvement in safety compared to that of the States. Also, when traffic becomes more congested or as the autobahn is near a city, a speed limit is often set in place with dynamic values according to various conditions.
I'm told the situation is better elsewhere in the States, but highways here in the north east (especially CT) are a joke. Many officials and media try to blame the high amount of accidents here on speeding, but after driving on some of Germany's excellent autobahns, I've come to realize that much of it here has to do with poorly designed roadways and lack of driver education.
They're not exactly just any random company. They've been in the election machine business, among others, for quite some time. Yahoo has a short profile of Diebold.
Anyways, I agree with you that no single company should have control over something as important as electronic voting machines. Something as important as a machine that decides the fate of democracy should be a community effort--not just some project managed by a single corporation. If there is one place a democratic government can use open source, its with the voting machines.
My 2001 VW Jetta TDI once achieved 54 MPG on a road trip with the AC on, 4 adults, and a packed trunk. 785 miles on a single tank.
I have a 5-speed manual transmission which helps a lot. I hate it when they compare an automatic TDI to the hybrids because the automatics get considerably less mileage than one with a manual transmission. Automatic TDIs usually get at least 5-7 MPG less than manual ones. Still, the mileage is awesome considering the fact that there are no differences between a regular gas Jetta from a diesel one besides the engine.
Stock TDIs may be a bit slow, but that is easily solved by a $300 software upgrade to the ECU. The torque is addicting and hills are an absolute blast!
For more on TDIs, I suggest visiting TDICLUB.com.
This being slashdot, at least I know there are the tinfoil jokes to look forward to.
It would be nice if they offered bounties for catching online scammers like they do for other types of criminals. Maybe having online bounty hunters would be an effective way of fighting online scams? I bet thousands of hackers would love to hunt down scammers if there was a monetary reward.
I see some logic to that, but you forget who we are dealing with. During Napsters "golden days," when record sales went *up*, they still went after Napster. Unless they change, the RIAA/MPAA will always go after the file sharing networks and try to gain as much control over media distribution as they can.
If sales happened to go down because of this, they would probably blame lack of sales on file sharing and piracy. They've done it before.
For this reason and because we geeks make up a small portion of all who give money to them, it's probably best for us to increase awareness of all the bad that the MPAA/RIAA are doing and support groups like the EFF.
I hope this isn't the case with this new promise of theirs...
I don't think it's SUVs that we should be worried about. Why am I not hearing anyone complain about how bad trucks (specifically the ones that haul freight or those old, big pickup trucks) are when it comes to emissions? Whenever I am on the road, I usually see trucks emitting dark brown/black, thick, smoke. I can't say I've seen an SUV emit anything close to that. Yes, I understand that trucks are much bigger, but there's no reason why you should have to breath that smoke in when you are driving behind one.
And remember, some people really do need SUVs. Some need it for the 4 wheel drive. Some need it to carry their sports stuff or some bigger items that wouldn't fit in a sedan. In addition, there are some obese people that just can't fit in one of those more conservative sedans that you want to throw them in. But, I do agree that there are many people that buy them that don't need that big of a car.
Also, would you rather be in an SUV or small two-seater when you're in an accident? People are so bad at driving nowadays that I just don't feel safe at all in a smaller car. Until people can figure out how to drive well, people will continue to buy those SUVs or larger cars.
Btw, my dad's SUV, a Mercedes ML-320, gets an average of 25mpg (it has a computer which tells you this). There are many sedans which get worse mileage. If they really felt there was no better method than to burn an SUV dealership to the ground, they should have burned down a used car dealership. It's the older cars we need to phase out fast.
For anyone with the Abit KT7 and KT7-RAID, the chrome orb will not fit without a little modification. What I did was use a metal file to file away some of the metal on the bottom of one side of the heatsink where it was being blocked. Only the bottom part of the side needs to shaved off. I shaved off less than 1/8 of an inch and you can't notice it unless if you really look hard. Just prepare to be filing that sucker for a good half hour :)
I'm curious.. Does this bill apply to people living outside of PA? What if someone from another state attacked a server that was in PA? Wouldn't federal law apply then? I don't believe the federal law is as harsh as that though. Does anyone have a URL for the full text of the bill? I'd like to see it.