There's a lot of free and commercial programs for remapping keys. I use Controllermate, which has all the GUI loveliness you could like and a reasonably versatile flowchart-style configurator.
But, yes, Microsoft's user interface is more keyboardable, and more consistently keyboardable. Though I will never forgive them for deciding that the standard keyboard navigation would bypass the task bar, requiring a separate set of keystrokes to access it, and that toolbars wouldn't be keyboard accessible at all. Windows 95 has much to answer for.
Something like Controllermate, but operating at a higher level (generating events like 'paste' or 'beginning of line') and that applications would register hotkeys with ('expose - show desktop', 'spotlight - search selected word') is something that Apple should have had long ago. Automator, Applescript, Spotlight, all these tools are frustratingly close to the tool that's needed...
As soon as Apple either update the quicktime engine to playback all mpg and avi variations, or better yet allow a codec system for third partys to add support, then the mini will be perfect for this type of use.
When Quicktime finds a codec it can't play, it brings up a dialog box offering to take you to Apple's page for all the third party codecs and other plug-ins supported under quicktime.
If you need a third-party codec that's not supported, that's a problem... but it's not caused by Apple missing the "codec system" you're looking for.
Amazingly enough, in Windows XP you can set up multiple accounts!
In OSX the 'Administrator' account has very few more rights than any other user ID, it's a user ID that is allowed to run privileged programs after a manual authentication step. It's more like a toned down version of "Power User" in Windows. The OSX version of the Windows XP 'Administrator' account, 'root', is disabled by default.
And in OSX you don't have to perform that authentication step and become 'Administrator' for a lot of operations that Microsoft requires you to be 'Administrator' for.
Finally, the higher level of local security in OS X (or, allegedly, in Vista) is a relatively minor advantage over Windows, compared with the higher level of remote security. Without the integrated browser and desktop, and with services that don't bind to non-local interfaces by default, an OS X box with no firewall software running is still much better protected from remote attacks than a Windows box with a full panoply of firewalls and anti-virus.
In terms of *user interface*? I don't know who's in the top 50% now - I haven't even looked at the lineup in two years - though I'd put the iPod shuffle at or near the top of the "bare bones" category. The iPod interface hasn't changed significantly since then, and while the "best products" have been different every time I looked at them there have always been products better than the iPod from every manufacturer but Sony... though there's rarely been any with my preferred interface (which, ironically, was invented by Sony).
When I bought my daughter her first MP3 player I ended up going with one from a company I'd never heard of before, and I've never seen their products in a store: "Magic Star". Here's what I liked about it:
1. It looked like a flash drive to the computer. You just dragged files into it, and it played them - you didn't need any special software on the computer. 2. The controls were solid enough that they wouldn't be accidentally jiggled in a pocket or purse. 3. The controls could be reliably worked by feel.
#1 means it was automatically compatible with iTunes, and every other music player program out there. I'd been using it with iTunes pretty much like an iPod shuffle (without thinking that I was doing anything unusual, though according the the Steve I must have been:) ) for a couple of years before the Shuffle came out.
#2 and #3 means you don't have to look at it to do basic operations, and you don't have unnecessary extra steps (locking and unlocking the UI) every time you want to skip a song or tweak the volume. As far as I'm concerned, any music player that doesn't do #2 and #3 is automatically out of the "top 50%".
You can have a swivelling camera. I dearly wish my Macbook Pro did.:(
The problem with a swivelling camera on a cellphone, though, is that it's Yet Another Joint to break. I'm already unhappy about the hinge on my current flip phone, and wish I still had the old "clumsy" Nokia "bar" phone I used before they switched us from Cingular to Verizon at work.
Plus, I really can't see Apple doing anything that sensible.:(
You just turn the phone around to take your picture or video.
Have you ever seen a camera where the viewfinder was facing the subject? Think about it, how do you frame your snap if you can't see what your camera's pointing at?
Or would you have screens on *both* sides? It would be cheaper to include two cameras!
I can upgrade a component in the Macintosh but only after doing extensive research on what is and what is not Macintosh compatable.
Unless you have two grand to spend on a Powermac you can't even do that much.
That's what kept my upgrading my old G3/266 all the way up to a G4/466, 768M RAM, Radeon 9200... right up until the Mac mini came out. It would have cost more than the price of the mini to upgrade my G3 to 1GHz.
But now... I'm stagnating again.
I have a Macbook Pro through work, but like all laptops it's got the same problems of upgradability as most of Apple's desktops.
Apple really needs a "Mac mini Pro":
* Either a "fat" Mac mini or a Next-style "slab"
(if they could make it a thin slab 1RU high it could also serve as an "XServe mini"). * Socketed Core Duo CPU. * 16x PCI-E slot for video. * At least one 1x or 2x PCI-E slot for other peripherals. * Accessible 3.5" drive bay. * Accessible 5.25" drive bay. * Two RAM slots.
Basically, comparable to a typical Mini-ITX motherboard.
With a video slot they can keep using the GMA950 for motherboard video, though I'd like to see at least the Radeon X200 there.
Base price should be no more than $600 *without* bluetooth or airport express (for the thin-server role where they're redundant) to maintain their traditional 40% margins.
Oh, and it should have at least one USB and firewire port on the front of the case.:)
This is a popular meme, but the evidence is that the $150 million settlement-disguised-as-investment wasn't critical. Apple wasn't hurting financially, they were flailing around technically. Steve's axe wasn't so much about saving money as giving Apple a direction... any direction.
Because if Apple designs the phone, they'll make big mistakes like they make in all their hardware, and sell the mistakes as "style", and never fix them.
People who carry cell phones that can play music also carry MP3 players because those cell phones suck at being music players.
The whole "thing plus music player" idea is shonky.
If the other thing you do with the device is important, then you quickly discover that you'd rather save your battery for whatever that is instead of playing music. I've had a "music player phone" that was a Pocket PC, so I could run a variety of music software on it, and did. Briefly. First time I couldnt place a call because the battery was low I quit playing music on it.
If the other thing you do with the device isn't important, you just paid more for less music player.
There are some poorly designed music players and some well designed ones. The iPod isn't the worst, but it's not in the top 50%. The problem is that nobody else had produced designs that are as consistent (consistently good, consistently bad, consistently ANYTHING), and nobody else has maintained reasonably standardised interfaces that would let a peripheral ecosystem evolve around them.
but if nothing else you would think an "extremely bad design" wouldn't last for five generations and three different models
Why not? Apple learned long ago that it's more important to sales to stick by your designs no matter how bad they are (one button mouse, anyone?), and that changing a design will always get you hammered even if you're right.
The click-wheel in particular is horribly finicky to use and since it's touch-sensitive you have to lock it when it's in your pocket... so Apple gets to sell you a wired remote for more money that's got the solid controls that should have been on the case in the first place.
Nothing would kill an Apple phone faster than a camera that you can't use to send people snaps and movies of what you're looking at. The screen of the camera phone is the viewfinder, friend. And videoconferencing on a cellphone? Let's share pictures of our ears!
But you may be onto something. After discovering how perfectly useless the camera on my Macbook Pro is, I can well believe that Apple would put an equally useless camera in a phone.
Actually, I'm a programmer, which is why I didn't get back into the Mac until they had an operating system not built out of snot and head cheese under the pretty user interface.
As opposed to Microsoft who stuck the layer of snot and head cheese in between the good operating system and the applications.:)
Everything I need to know I learned on Slashdot #101: "Don't dis Apple's hardware". That's an even bigger no-no than "Don't defend Microsoft".
Somehow features that would get any other company nailed on Slashdot are seen as virtues when Apple puts them in their computers. But I'm not going to dis them any further in this message.
I'll just say that Apple badly needs to get some help from some company that builds hardware that has to sell on how well it works... not on the software, on the name, or on style. Not Dell, for God's sake... if there is a worse choice that's still in business I don't know it... but they teamed up with IBM Japan once before and produced one of the best-designed Powerbooks ever. I'm sure they could get Lenovo to give them a hand.
It's pointless to compare the iTMS with other music stores since Apple users can only use the iTMS anyway
When I buy music I check eMusic.com first, then I go to iTunes or Amazon. Quite often I find what I'm looking for on eMusic.com - for 1/4 the price at my subscription rate, and without DRM. I've bought music by popular artists there, and on occasion I've found what I'm looking for on eMusic and iTunes didn't carry it. The fact that iTunes has a wider selection of big-name popular music doesn't mean that it's the only music store you can use, any more than the fact that Windows has a wider selection of big-name popular software means it's the only operating system you can use. Frankly, getting that kind of argument from someone who is presumably using a Mac seems bizarre in the extreme.
Last time I checked, QuickTime does play iTMS songs if the computer is authorized.
No, it doesn't. The system is authorized, not the library. I have had to re-authorize my computer every time I have lost the system disk. If you think about it, it has to work that way, otherwise you could back up your iTunes library and restore it on another computer and get around the DRM that way.
If you want to rip these CDs on your Mac, you can't, so they only way to get the music is through the iTMS.
If you can play the CD on your Mac, you can rip the CD on your Mac. If you can't play the CD on your Mac it's not a CD... it's just a different distribution format for some proprietary DRM encoded data files. If the artist or label has chosen not to release their software on actual CDs, then you should treat them with no less disdain than some software vendor who chooses not to release their software on the Mac, or some website that refuses to display if you're not running Internet Explorer.
[Reposting because the < in "1440x900 < 1400x1050" munched part of the response]
whats wrong with the MacBook Pro wrist rests?
Wrist rests are irrelevant. Resting your wrists on something when you're typing is one of the things that causes repetitive strain injury, so the presence or absence of "wrist rests" isn't the point.
The problem is with the keyboards on almost every Apple laptop have poor tactile feedback and a flat response, as well as far too short a throw. Combine that with the flat keyboard and keys and you've got a recipe for causing (or in my case agravating) nerve damage.
I literally can not use my Macbook Pro's built-in keyboard intensively for more than a quarter of an hour without intense pain from my little fingers all the way to my shoulderblades. The only other laptop keyboard that I've had that problem with is the tiny toy keyboard on a Toshiba Libretto I used to have.
Connectors on the back would rule out the nicer hinge, and have to divert cooling to the sides and bottom... meaning it would have to sit up higher too, possibly make the whole machine bigger like similiar thinkpads.
The 15" Macbook Pro is larger than my Thinkpad was. It's not as thick, but it's wider and deeper, and it weighs more, and has a lower pixel density - the 14" Thinkpad still has more pixels than the 15" Macbook (1440x900 < 1400x1050). Diverting cooling to the sides would allow more efficient flow-through cooling, allowing it to remain cooler and quieter. The extra space would make room for a better keyboard, it would fit better into standard laptop bags and carriers, it would take up less room in my backpack, and the smaller pixels would make for sharper display at normal viewing range for a laptop.
Every time I've closed the lid and came back later to get on it, it was always alseep.
Until I started checking I was routinely finding my Macbook Pro's battery flat by the time I got home. My boss, who has had three Powerbooks, checks for the light to shut down too. Ironically I never had a problem on my Thinkpad... sleep and hibernation worked perfectly. And while I'm on the subject, the Macbook Pro does not support hibernation in hardware: it's not the OS... I've run FreeBSD (which shares a huge amount of code with OS X) on multiple Wintel laptops and have never had a problem using hardware hibernation there.
"Safe Sleep" is not a substitute for hibernation.
If it were not for the software, there owould be nothing to this laptop that is remotely attractive once you take it out of the store display or photo session and actually start using it. Since it';s the only way to legally run OS X on a laptop, I put up with it... but if I had to pay $500 for a generic copy of OS X I could run on a Thinkpad... even one that cost as much as a Macbook Pro... I'd still consider it the better deal.
Wrist rests are irrelevant. Resting your wrists on something when you're typing is one of the things that causes repetitive strain injury, so the presence or absence of "wrist rests" isn't the point.
The problem is with the keyboards on almost every Apple laptop have poor tactile feedback and a flat response, as well as far too short a throw. Combine that with the flat keyboard and keys and you've got a recipe for causing (or in my case agravating) nerve damage.
I literally can not use my Macbook Pro's built-in keyboard intensively for more than a quarter of an hour without intense pain from my little fingers all the way to my shoulderblades. The only other laptop keyboard that I've had that problem with is the tiny toy keyboard on a Toshiba Libretto I used to have.
Connectors on the back would rule out the nicer hinge, and have to divert cooling to the sides and bottom... meaning it would have to sit up higher too, possibly make the whole machine bigger like similiar thinkpads.
The 15" Macbook Pro is larger than my Thinkpad was. It's not as thick, but it's wider and deeper, and it weighs more, and has a lower pixel density - the 14" Thinkpad still has more pixels than the 15" Macbook (1440x900 Every time I've closed the lid and came back later to get on it, it was always alseep.
Until I started checking I was routinely finding my Macbook Pro's battery flat by the time I got home. My boss, who has had three Powerbooks, checks for the light to shut down too. Ironically I never had a problem on my Thinkpad... sleep and hibernation worked perfectly. And while I'm on the subject, the Macbook Pro does not support hibernation in hardware: it's not the OS... I've run FreeBSD (which shares a huge amount of code with OS X) on multiple Wintel laptops and have never had a problem using hardware hibernation there.
"Safe Sleep" is not a substitute for hibernation.
If it were not for the software, there owould be nothing to this laptop that is remotely attractive once you take it out of the store display or photo session and actually start using it. Since it';s the only way to legally run OS X on a laptop, I put up with it... but if I had to pay $500 for a generic copy of OS X I could run on a Thinkpad... even one that cost as much as a Macbook Pro... I'd still consider it the better deal.
And that goes for the iPod too: the click-wheel is a daft idea. Their build quality is better than Dell, but then so is that of any any five year old with a pile of legos.
Personally, I would love to see Apple get out of the hardware business. Not so much because their hardware is unexceptional and expensive, but because it's an ergonomic nightmare... whoever is responsible for the keyboard on my Macbook Pro has a special place reserved in hell being forced to climb flaming rocks while his wrists are flayed to the bone. I'd prefer a Thinkpad and a copy of generic OS X to run on it any day.
Speaking of Thinkpads... they have style. It's stealth-fighter-black industrial-chic style, but it's style nonetheless. They don't make you strip tiny screws and unglue parts of the computer, or pull the case apart with a putty knife. They give you a nice knurled black screw that fits in a recess in the magnesium and matte black plastic case, undo that and pull out the drive caddy. Swap it out, put it back, and the screw looks like a decorative bump on the case
And there's a ridge around the screen to keep dust and debris out when the lid's closed.
And the connectors are all on the back so you don't have the USB connector for your mouse sticking out right where you need to PUT the mouse on an airline lap tray.
And you don't have to sit there and watch the computer for 30 seconds EVERY TIME you close it to make sure it's gone into sleep mode, because it doesn't slowly throb ONE status light to tell you it's asleep... now is that throbbing yet? No, that a reflection off the monitor... oh... no, OK, it's sleep.
And the Thinkpad has the best laptop keyboard on the planet bar none.
Don't compare Apple with Dell, though. That's like praising a Big Mac because it tastes better than dog food. They should be getting Lenovo to do their design.
So you yourself are telling me that you can't avoid using the iTMS. Which was my point.
I don't see where I have said anything that would lead you to think you needed to make that point.
What I said was that the iTunes store was unique in my experience of digital services, in that it didn't allow you to redownload your music, and that this is a shortcoming of the iTunes store. If Mac users had to exclusively using the iTunes store, then that shortcoming would be even more important. Are you taking a devils-advocate position to try and make Apple look bad by making the problems seem worse than they are?
Do the CDs you've burned still work in 20 years?
Who cares? It's the data on them that matters, not the CDs. That data is stored in multiple places in multiple formats, along with the music I've also ripped from my regular CD collection and keep with the rest of my personal backups... that I've migrated from floppies and quarter inch tape through Exabyte and DLT to stacks of DVDs... all stored in multiple locations. And, yes, I've pulled 20 year old files out of them on more than one occasion.
We only need QuickTime or one of the hacks available on the Internets.
Um, those files are encrypted using a key you have to download from the iTunes store. A copy of those files without that key are just random numbers. Unless your backup strategy includes using a tool to ferret that key out and store it with the backup you're not going to be able to use it without access to the same account at the iTunes store that you started with.
While some (or most) copy-protected CDs work on Macs, some don't.
The ones that don't... don't count. They're not audio CDs. Labelling them as CDs is a violation of Philips trademark.
Apple's products are better because of the software, the industrial design and the build quality.
As I sit here with my overheating Macbook Pro using a Dell keyboard and a Microsoft mouse because Apple's horrid keyboards and stylish-but-unusable "might mouse" aggravate my RSI something awful, I can only say "one out of three ain't bad". It's the software:
But the real kicker is that if you want to run Mac OSX you have to buy Apple hardware.
The clones didn't work because there was no huge pool of manufacturers making Power PC based motherboards, and no huge pool of potential customers running something else on their Power PC boxes who'd be interested in buying Mac OS to run on them.
I've never been quite sure WHY Apple decided to promote clone hardware. It seemed like they were overextended trying to make too many models of Macs and this was a way to let them shed the unprofitable models and concentrate the product line, unfortunately the cloners ALSO decided to target the profitable part of the market.
Jobs solved the problem in a much more straightforward way... albeit one that eliminated people loking for a conventional desktop from their customer base. They briefly opened that up a smidgen with the Mini... but using the GMA950 chip in the Intel mini... oy...
Slashdot Mirror
Trying to recreate Usenet with a fancy GUI by screen-scraping web forums?
Rotsa Ruck.
There's a lot of free and commercial programs for remapping keys. I use Controllermate, which has all the GUI loveliness you could like and a reasonably versatile flowchart-style configurator.
But, yes, Microsoft's user interface is more keyboardable, and more consistently keyboardable. Though I will never forgive them for deciding that the standard keyboard navigation would bypass the task bar, requiring a separate set of keystrokes to access it, and that toolbars wouldn't be keyboard accessible at all. Windows 95 has much to answer for.
Something like Controllermate, but operating at a higher level (generating events like 'paste' or 'beginning of line') and that applications would register hotkeys with ('expose - show desktop', 'spotlight - search selected word') is something that Apple should have had long ago. Automator, Applescript, Spotlight, all these tools are frustratingly close to the tool that's needed...
Have you tried following the directions?
As soon as Apple either update the quicktime engine to playback all mpg and avi variations, or better yet allow a codec system for third partys to add support, then the mini will be perfect for this type of use.
When Quicktime finds a codec it can't play, it brings up a dialog box offering to take you to Apple's page for all the third party codecs and other plug-ins supported under quicktime.
If you need a third-party codec that's not supported, that's a problem... but it's not caused by Apple missing the "codec system" you're looking for.
Amazingly enough, in Windows XP you can set up multiple accounts!
In OSX the 'Administrator' account has very few more rights than any other user ID, it's a user ID that is allowed to run privileged programs after a manual authentication step. It's more like a toned down version of "Power User" in Windows. The OSX version of the Windows XP 'Administrator' account, 'root', is disabled by default.
And in OSX you don't have to perform that authentication step and become 'Administrator' for a lot of operations that Microsoft requires you to be 'Administrator' for.
Finally, the higher level of local security in OS X (or, allegedly, in Vista) is a relatively minor advantage over Windows, compared with the higher level of remote security. Without the integrated browser and desktop, and with services that don't bind to non-local interfaces by default, an OS X box with no firewall software running is still much better protected from remote attacks than a Windows box with a full panoply of firewalls and anti-virus.
Now I'm curious, who IS in the top 50%?
:) ) for a couple of years before the Shuffle came out.
In terms of *user interface*? I don't know who's in the top 50% now - I haven't even looked at the lineup in two years - though I'd put the iPod shuffle at or near the top of the "bare bones" category. The iPod interface hasn't changed significantly since then, and while the "best products" have been different every time I looked at them there have always been products better than the iPod from every manufacturer but Sony... though there's rarely been any with my preferred interface (which, ironically, was invented by Sony).
When I bought my daughter her first MP3 player I ended up going with one from a company I'd never heard of before, and I've never seen their products in a store: "Magic Star". Here's what I liked about it:
1. It looked like a flash drive to the computer. You just dragged files into it, and it played them - you didn't need any special software on the computer.
2. The controls were solid enough that they wouldn't be accidentally jiggled in a pocket or purse.
3. The controls could be reliably worked by feel.
#1 means it was automatically compatible with iTunes, and every other music player program out there. I'd been using it with iTunes pretty much like an iPod shuffle (without thinking that I was doing anything unusual, though according the the Steve I must have been
#2 and #3 means you don't have to look at it to do basic operations, and you don't have unnecessary extra steps (locking and unlocking the UI) every time you want to skip a song or tweak the volume. As far as I'm concerned, any music player that doesn't do #2 and #3 is automatically out of the "top 50%".
You can have a swivelling camera. I dearly wish my Macbook Pro did. :(
:(
The problem with a swivelling camera on a cellphone, though, is that it's Yet Another Joint to break. I'm already unhappy about the hinge on my current flip phone, and wish I still had the old "clumsy" Nokia "bar" phone I used before they switched us from Cingular to Verizon at work.
Plus, I really can't see Apple doing anything that sensible.
You just turn the phone around to take your picture or video.
Have you ever seen a camera where the viewfinder was facing the subject? Think about it, how do you frame your snap if you can't see what your camera's pointing at?
Or would you have screens on *both* sides? It would be cheaper to include two cameras!
I can upgrade a component in the Macintosh but only after doing extensive research on what is and what is not Macintosh compatable.
... right up until the Mac mini came out. It would have cost more than the price of the mini to upgrade my G3 to 1GHz.
:)
Unless you have two grand to spend on a Powermac you can't even do that much.
That's what kept my upgrading my old G3/266 all the way up to a G4/466, 768M RAM, Radeon 9200
But now... I'm stagnating again.
I have a Macbook Pro through work, but like all laptops it's got the same problems of upgradability as most of Apple's desktops.
Apple really needs a "Mac mini Pro":
* Either a "fat" Mac mini or a Next-style "slab"
(if they could make it a thin slab 1RU high it could also serve as an "XServe mini").
* Socketed Core Duo CPU.
* 16x PCI-E slot for video.
* At least one 1x or 2x PCI-E slot for other peripherals.
* Accessible 3.5" drive bay.
* Accessible 5.25" drive bay.
* Two RAM slots.
Basically, comparable to a typical Mini-ITX motherboard.
With a video slot they can keep using the GMA950 for motherboard video, though I'd like to see at least the Radeon X200 there.
Base price should be no more than $600 *without* bluetooth or airport express (for the thin-server role where they're redundant) to maintain their traditional 40% margins.
Oh, and it should have at least one USB and firewire port on the front of the case.
This is a popular meme, but the evidence is that the $150 million settlement-disguised-as-investment wasn't critical. Apple wasn't hurting financially, they were flailing around technically. Steve's axe wasn't so much about saving money as giving Apple a direction... any direction.
Because if Apple designs the phone, they'll make big mistakes like they make in all their hardware, and sell the mistakes as "style", and never fix them.
People who carry cell phones that can play music also carry MP3 players because those cell phones suck at being music players.
The whole "thing plus music player" idea is shonky.
If the other thing you do with the device is important, then you quickly discover that you'd rather save your battery for whatever that is instead of playing music. I've had a "music player phone" that was a Pocket PC, so I could run a variety of music software on it, and did. Briefly. First time I couldnt place a call because the battery was low I quit playing music on it.
If the other thing you do with the device isn't important, you just paid more for less music player.
There are some poorly designed music players and some well designed ones. The iPod isn't the worst, but it's not in the top 50%. The problem is that nobody else had produced designs that are as consistent (consistently good, consistently bad, consistently ANYTHING), and nobody else has maintained reasonably standardised interfaces that would let a peripheral ecosystem evolve around them.
but if nothing else you would think an "extremely bad design" wouldn't last for five generations and three different models
Why not? Apple learned long ago that it's more important to sales to stick by your designs no matter how bad they are (one button mouse, anyone?), and that changing a design will always get you hammered even if you're right.
The click-wheel in particular is horribly finicky to use and since it's touch-sensitive you have to lock it when it's in your pocket... so Apple gets to sell you a wired remote for more money that's got the solid controls that should have been on the case in the first place.
The shuffle is a much better designed product.
Nothing would kill an Apple phone faster than a camera that you can't use to send people snaps and movies of what you're looking at. The screen of the camera phone is the viewfinder, friend. And videoconferencing on a cellphone? Let's share pictures of our ears!
But you may be onto something. After discovering how perfectly useless the camera on my Macbook Pro is, I can well believe that Apple would put an equally useless camera in a phone.
Actually, I'm a programmer, which is why I didn't get back into the Mac until they had an operating system not built out of snot and head cheese under the pretty user interface.
:)
As opposed to Microsoft who stuck the layer of snot and head cheese in between the good operating system and the applications.
Everything I need to know I learned on Slashdot #101: "Don't dis Apple's hardware". That's an even bigger no-no than "Don't defend Microsoft".
Somehow features that would get any other company nailed on Slashdot are seen as virtues when Apple puts them in their computers. But I'm not going to dis them any further in this message.
I'll just say that Apple badly needs to get some help from some company that builds hardware that has to sell on how well it works... not on the software, on the name, or on style. Not Dell, for God's sake... if there is a worse choice that's still in business I don't know it... but they teamed up with IBM Japan once before and produced one of the best-designed Powerbooks ever. I'm sure they could get Lenovo to give them a hand.
It's pointless to compare the iTMS with other music stores since Apple users can only use the iTMS anyway
When I buy music I check eMusic.com first, then I go to iTunes or Amazon. Quite often I find what I'm looking for on eMusic.com - for 1/4 the price at my subscription rate, and without DRM. I've bought music by popular artists there, and on occasion I've found what I'm looking for on eMusic and iTunes didn't carry it. The fact that iTunes has a wider selection of big-name popular music doesn't mean that it's the only music store you can use, any more than the fact that Windows has a wider selection of big-name popular software means it's the only operating system you can use. Frankly, getting that kind of argument from someone who is presumably using a Mac seems bizarre in the extreme.
Last time I checked, QuickTime does play iTMS songs if the computer is authorized.
No, it doesn't. The system is authorized, not the library. I have had to re-authorize my computer every time I have lost the system disk. If you think about it, it has to work that way, otherwise you could back up your iTunes library and restore it on another computer and get around the DRM that way.
If you want to rip these CDs on your Mac, you can't, so they only way to get the music is through the iTMS.
If you can play the CD on your Mac, you can rip the CD on your Mac. If you can't play the CD on your Mac it's not a CD... it's just a different distribution format for some proprietary DRM encoded data files. If the artist or label has chosen not to release their software on actual CDs, then you should treat them with no less disdain than some software vendor who chooses not to release their software on the Mac, or some website that refuses to display if you're not running Internet Explorer.
[Reposting because the < in "1440x900 < 1400x1050" munched part of the response]
whats wrong with the MacBook Pro wrist rests?
Wrist rests are irrelevant. Resting your wrists on something when you're typing is one of the things that causes repetitive strain injury, so the presence or absence of "wrist rests" isn't the point.
The problem is with the keyboards on almost every Apple laptop have poor tactile feedback and a flat response, as well as far too short a throw. Combine that with the flat keyboard and keys and you've got a recipe for causing (or in my case agravating) nerve damage.
I literally can not use my Macbook Pro's built-in keyboard intensively for more than a quarter of an hour without intense pain from my little fingers all the way to my shoulderblades. The only other laptop keyboard that I've had that problem with is the tiny toy keyboard on a Toshiba Libretto I used to have.
Connectors on the back would rule out the nicer hinge, and have to divert cooling to the sides and bottom... meaning it would have to sit up higher too, possibly make the whole machine bigger like similiar thinkpads.
The 15" Macbook Pro is larger than my Thinkpad was. It's not as thick, but it's wider and deeper, and it weighs more, and has a lower pixel density - the 14" Thinkpad still has more pixels than the 15" Macbook (1440x900 < 1400x1050). Diverting cooling to the sides would allow more efficient flow-through cooling, allowing it to remain cooler and quieter. The extra space would make room for a better keyboard, it would fit better into standard laptop bags and carriers, it would take up less room in my backpack, and the smaller pixels would make for sharper display at normal viewing range for a laptop.
Every time I've closed the lid and came back later to get on it, it was always alseep.
Until I started checking I was routinely finding my Macbook Pro's battery flat by the time I got home. My boss, who has had three Powerbooks, checks for the light to shut down too. Ironically I never had a problem on my Thinkpad... sleep and hibernation worked perfectly. And while I'm on the subject, the Macbook Pro does not support hibernation in hardware: it's not the OS... I've run FreeBSD (which shares a huge amount of code with OS X) on multiple Wintel laptops and have never had a problem using hardware hibernation there.
"Safe Sleep" is not a substitute for hibernation.
If it were not for the software, there owould be nothing to this laptop that is remotely attractive once you take it out of the store display or photo session and actually start using it. Since it';s the only way to legally run OS X on a laptop, I put up with it... but if I had to pay $500 for a generic copy of OS X I could run on a Thinkpad... even one that cost as much as a Macbook Pro... I'd still consider it the better deal.
whats wrong with the MacBook Pro wrist rests?
Wrist rests are irrelevant. Resting your wrists on something when you're typing is one of the things that causes repetitive strain injury, so the presence or absence of "wrist rests" isn't the point.
The problem is with the keyboards on almost every Apple laptop have poor tactile feedback and a flat response, as well as far too short a throw. Combine that with the flat keyboard and keys and you've got a recipe for causing (or in my case agravating) nerve damage.
I literally can not use my Macbook Pro's built-in keyboard intensively for more than a quarter of an hour without intense pain from my little fingers all the way to my shoulderblades. The only other laptop keyboard that I've had that problem with is the tiny toy keyboard on a Toshiba Libretto I used to have.
Connectors on the back would rule out the nicer hinge, and have to divert cooling to the sides and bottom... meaning it would have to sit up higher too, possibly make the whole machine bigger like similiar thinkpads.
The 15" Macbook Pro is larger than my Thinkpad was. It's not as thick, but it's wider and deeper, and it weighs more, and has a lower pixel density - the 14" Thinkpad still has more pixels than the 15" Macbook (1440x900 Every time I've closed the lid and came back later to get on it, it was always alseep.
Until I started checking I was routinely finding my Macbook Pro's battery flat by the time I got home. My boss, who has had three Powerbooks, checks for the light to shut down too. Ironically I never had a problem on my Thinkpad... sleep and hibernation worked perfectly. And while I'm on the subject, the Macbook Pro does not support hibernation in hardware: it's not the OS... I've run FreeBSD (which shares a huge amount of code with OS X) on multiple Wintel laptops and have never had a problem using hardware hibernation there.
"Safe Sleep" is not a substitute for hibernation.
If it were not for the software, there owould be nothing to this laptop that is remotely attractive once you take it out of the store display or photo session and actually start using it. Since it';s the only way to legally run OS X on a laptop, I put up with it... but if I had to pay $500 for a generic copy of OS X I could run on a Thinkpad... even one that cost as much as a Macbook Pro... I'd still consider it the better deal.
And that goes for the iPod too: the click-wheel is a daft idea. Their build quality is better than Dell, but then so is that of any any five year old with a pile of legos.
Personally, I would love to see Apple get out of the hardware business. Not so much because their hardware is unexceptional and expensive, but because it's an ergonomic nightmare... whoever is responsible for the keyboard on my Macbook Pro has a special place reserved in hell being forced to climb flaming rocks while his wrists are flayed to the bone. I'd prefer a Thinkpad and a copy of generic OS X to run on it any day.
Speaking of Thinkpads... they have style. It's stealth-fighter-black industrial-chic style, but it's style nonetheless. They don't make you strip tiny screws and unglue parts of the computer, or pull the case apart with a putty knife. They give you a nice knurled black screw that fits in a recess in the magnesium and matte black plastic case, undo that and pull out the drive caddy. Swap it out, put it back, and the screw looks like a decorative bump on the case
And there's a ridge around the screen to keep dust and debris out when the lid's closed.
And the connectors are all on the back so you don't have the USB connector for your mouse sticking out right where you need to PUT the mouse on an airline lap tray.
And you don't have to sit there and watch the computer for 30 seconds EVERY TIME you close it to make sure it's gone into sleep mode, because it doesn't slowly throb ONE status light to tell you it's asleep... now is that throbbing yet? No, that a reflection off the monitor... oh... no, OK, it's sleep.
And the Thinkpad has the best laptop keyboard on the planet bar none.
Don't compare Apple with Dell, though. That's like praising a Big Mac because it tastes better than dog food. They should be getting Lenovo to do their design.
Declare a state of sentinEl porcupine. The colorless gReen dreams sleep furiously. Lillypond overflows with deadly bUnnies. Happy birthday WaltEr?
So you yourself are telling me that you can't avoid using the iTMS. Which was my point.
I don't see where I have said anything that would lead you to think you needed to make that point.
What I said was that the iTunes store was unique in my experience of digital services, in that it didn't allow you to redownload your music, and that this is a shortcoming of the iTunes store. If Mac users had to exclusively using the iTunes store, then that shortcoming would be even more important. Are you taking a devils-advocate position to try and make Apple look bad by making the problems seem worse than they are?
Do the CDs you've burned still work in 20 years?
Who cares? It's the data on them that matters, not the CDs. That data is stored in multiple places in multiple formats, along with the music I've also ripped from my regular CD collection and keep with the rest of my personal backups... that I've migrated from floppies and quarter inch tape through Exabyte and DLT to stacks of DVDs... all stored in multiple locations. And, yes, I've pulled 20 year old files out of them on more than one occasion.
We only need QuickTime or one of the hacks available on the Internets.
Um, those files are encrypted using a key you have to download from the iTunes store. A copy of those files without that key are just random numbers. Unless your backup strategy includes using a tool to ferret that key out and store it with the backup you're not going to be able to use it without access to the same account at the iTunes store that you started with.
While some (or most) copy-protected CDs work on Macs, some don't.
The ones that don't... don't count. They're not audio CDs. Labelling them as CDs is a violation of Philips trademark.
Apple's products are better because of the software, the industrial design and the build quality.
As I sit here with my overheating Macbook Pro using a Dell keyboard and a Microsoft mouse because Apple's horrid keyboards and stylish-but-unusable "might mouse" aggravate my RSI something awful, I can only say "one out of three ain't bad". It's the software:
But the real kicker is that if you want to run Mac OSX you have to buy Apple hardware.
Yep. that's the one.
The clones did NOT work, remember?
The clones didn't work because there was no huge pool of manufacturers making Power PC based motherboards, and no huge pool of potential customers running something else on their Power PC boxes who'd be interested in buying Mac OS to run on them.
I've never been quite sure WHY Apple decided to promote clone hardware. It seemed like they were overextended trying to make too many models of Macs and this was a way to let them shed the unprofitable models and concentrate the product line, unfortunately the cloners ALSO decided to target the profitable part of the market.
Jobs solved the problem in a much more straightforward way... albeit one that eliminated people loking for a conventional desktop from their customer base. They briefly opened that up a smidgen with the Mini... but using the GMA950 chip in the Intel mini... oy...