I doubt MS will enable an autoupdate feature. Too many people have had their systems slagged by crap ms updates to make it worth the negative publicity.
Case in point (anecdote) I had just installed Windows XP (for the third time, something turns me off to computers that act smarter than I) and I decided I would let XP do everything on its own. I was going to be the clueless user and everything would be fine. Ran Windows Update, got buggy vidoe drivers (updated drivers) and poof, I was having BSOD fun.
Until Microsoft can completly prevent events such as this AND erase all doubt in people's mind they will not have auto downloaded auto installed updates.
I have absolutly nothing to add of a technical nature to this story, so I will delude you with a rambling trip down memory lane (comprised completly of anecdotes from 2.2).
My first taste of linux was phatLinux on my brand new p2-400 (128MB of pc 100 ram I liked). 3 months later I had built a sub 400 dollar computer to play around with and bought (yes paid money for) Linux Mandrake 6.5 from Wal-Mart. From there I began learning about this kernel thing (and my joys when I found make menuconfig and make xconfig, have you ever tried make config? ewww...) Well that went fine and fun, I added options, made modules all the fun stuff you do, but it was still in the same 2.2 vein that came with mandrake. Then 2.4.0 final was relased and I compiled and installed my first new kernel. Everything was new and faster. DevFS was a godsend, the ppp and bsd compression routines made my modem fast (or somthing I went from 2.5 kb/s downloads to 5-6 kb/s after recompiling). Since then I have also come to love dri, premptive and low latency patches, and all these other backported goodies. I am waiting on 2.6 final before I play with any of the new features (I didn't play with 2.3 or 2.5). Ok I am done. And I didn't even mention Gentoo... oh wait... damn.;)
Those monopolistic bastards and Micro$haft have gone too far for the last time. We all know how since they have bought two-thirds of the US Govt. and DOJ that they can now do anything. I mean 100,000$ settlement? What is that? This company is worth billions. I will never use IE again...
Realms of the Haunting was a moody, creepy game from the doom era. Basically it was a first person resident evil game before RE was around. 4 CD's of movies, music, levels, and scary.
Of course this was when I was much younger (and a 100 MB install was enormous). So maybe it is nostalga kicking in.
I don't really know much about the company but I got it from my boyfriend more than 18months ago and never had aproblem. (It is a 15 inch LCD). I will never buy a crt for me again, LCD's are too bright, too crisp, and too cool (physically and metaphorically) to go back to CRT. Just make sure you have a low shift latency for the pixels (~35 ms or less I think) and you should have no ghosting at all.
Put this in your typical MiT dorm and count the seconds down until someone gets it printing out porn... in the girls dorm... of the dean... 's daughter... (and this list goes on).
Is it my imagination or have the stories since april fools been better than the april fools stories themselves?
Exactly! CD's just aren't worth it. For $15-$20 I could get a 45 minute long cd or a DVD-music video with 2-3 hours of footage/music on it. And for another $2 I could rip the auido and burn to a CD (the $2 comes from the cost of the CD-r and the time it takes you to do it. Come on I should be able to use RIAA math as well).
Of course if the industry went to selling Multiformat DVD's for 15 dollars (a dvd layer for music videos and a CD layer for audio cd players) they would see an explosion in sales I bet. But as long as my 20$ are better spent on a DVD (or broadband) I will buy somthing else.
I only trust an operating system as far as I can throw it. After comprehensive tests windows XP CD's fly 300 feet when launched from my skeet shooter and are still bootable. But most of my Linux CD's never survive the launch process so I there fore I can not trust Linux since I can't throw it.
Do I want competition to the Xeon in 4 way systems? (price and spec them, it is insane! 1.6 Ghz and 1200 a pop). Hell^yeah.
Opteron is not about 64 bits, it is just a nice addition. Opteron is about competition in the low end server/high end desktop market (which is intel dominated btw). The reaosn intel is naysaying 64 bits is because they have no competing thec in this area other than the Xeon which has terrible price/performance numbers.
Yes, but what kind of cooling does the psu get when you are pulling 450 watts from a 350 watt PS? I have seen many a PC nuke itself when the power supply overheated, melted solder down which then ran and shorted vairous connectors. (A actually fused an ATX connector to the mother board this way). So, what kind of protect does a psu have?
... those of us who don't have tivo's but instead have set top boxes based on a c3 933 and a Radeon AIW? Oh and only get broadcast because we live in the (*#($@)#@*$ sticks.
My login password is a 30 digit alpha numeric with special characters in it. I don't even know what my farking admin password (except it is of equal insanity and yes I am su). It is annoying to type it in but goth damn I feel like a secure guy, then I read somthing like this and feel even better.
SCO is suing the company that owns the patent on hardware and the OS, (maybe not quite but IBMs IP is quite extensive) and I expect them to get countersued into oblivion.
Back on topic though, who should buy it? I use Open Office and have no problems doing anything (writing papers, making spread sheets etc). Is Office now more for workgroup environments? Or is Office just another Office suite that costs much more?
Yes but some of us would actually stand to benefit from a commodity 64 bit proc. Those of us (like my Physics teach with a Phd in Biomolecular Physics) do active research and number crunching on molecular designs. People such as me need the boost to video/3d modelling apps where hitting 4gb memory limits is common. True that 64 bit solutions exist, but the problem is making them affordable. (And at 5k each, Sun Workstations and SGI boxen are not to the average college student).
Before I get into my rant, I would like to explain my credintials. I am a CS major en route to GA tech (currently enrolled at Middle GA College), and I have been running linux for 5 years now. I am proficient with Java, Basic, C++, apache, Tomcat, Adobe Premiere, and general computer maintainance/upgrades. Ok now onto what Linux neds for the Desktop.
More hardware support! I have a Radeon 7500 AIW and gettin VIVO to work was evil and a half. Output to TV was worse, (framebuffer crashes and the like).
Multimedia support, Real One Player, Xine, XMMS, mplayer do alot here, but it could be better. Real One is slow and buggy (but better than nothing and now it has fullscreen support), Xine needs to be more user friendly (to be a desktop candidate) and mplayer needs a good, consistant frontend (at least it is stable and fast as hell though). I had no problem with command line though, and associating files with it in kde was a snap.
Video Editing needs to exist. Cinelerra is ok for now (I never got kino to work), but it is slow, unstable, and lacks many features (like chroma keying for green-screen effects). I did manage to create a video project though to completion on my box, but it was not easy.
What does Linux have that makes it a Windows competitor? One word, KDE. Konq is an awesome web browser and file manager (kills anything the explorer can do) Kicker is way more useful than the XP task bar, and themeing is easy. I would give Bill Gate's left arm for these featurs to be ported to Windows.
Oh yeah, Linux is also way faster than XP ever dreamed of being (gentoo w/ prelinking anyone?).
SecondSun
PS before I get anyone flaming me about GNOME, 5 years ago GNOME was slow and unstable. I went to KDE and have no other experience with GNOME, and I know nothing about GNOME. I am sure by now it is much different than it was back then and that it has many features, but I still use KDE exclusivly.
Slashdot Mirror
To keep me employed.
I doubt MS will enable an autoupdate feature. Too many people have had their systems slagged by crap ms updates to make it worth the negative publicity.
Case in point (anecdote) I had just installed Windows XP (for the third time, something turns me off to computers that act smarter than I) and I decided I would let XP do everything on its own. I was going to be the clueless user and everything would be fine. Ran Windows Update, got buggy vidoe drivers (updated drivers) and poof, I was having BSOD fun.
Until Microsoft can completly prevent events such as this AND erase all doubt in people's mind they will not have auto downloaded auto installed updates.
Redhat
Debian
SuSe
Apple
Linux-Mandrake
Gentoo
FreeBSD
I have absolutly nothing to add of a technical nature to this story, so I will delude you with a rambling trip down memory lane (comprised completly of anecdotes from 2.2).
;)
My first taste of linux was phatLinux on my brand new p2-400 (128MB of pc 100 ram I liked). 3 months later I had built a sub 400 dollar computer to play around with and bought (yes paid money for) Linux Mandrake 6.5 from Wal-Mart. From there I began learning about this kernel thing (and my joys when I found make menuconfig and make xconfig, have you ever tried make config? ewww...) Well that went fine and fun, I added options, made modules all the fun stuff you do, but it was still in the same 2.2 vein that came with mandrake. Then 2.4.0 final was relased and I compiled and installed my first new kernel. Everything was new and faster. DevFS was a godsend, the ppp and bsd compression routines made my modem fast (or somthing I went from 2.5 kb/s downloads to 5-6 kb/s after recompiling). Since then I have also come to love dri, premptive and low latency patches, and all these other backported goodies. I am waiting on 2.6 final before I play with any of the new features (I didn't play with 2.3 or 2.5). Ok I am done. And I didn't even mention Gentoo... oh wait... damn.
Those monopolistic bastards and Micro$haft have gone too far for the last time. We all know how since they have bought two-thirds of the US Govt. and DOJ that they can now do anything. I mean 100,000$ settlement? What is that? This company is worth billions. I will never use IE again...
Wait... Netscape... My head... OWIEEEEE... *BOOM*
Realms of the Haunting was a moody, creepy game from the doom era. Basically it was a first person resident evil game before RE was around. 4 CD's of movies, music, levels, and scary.
Of course this was when I was much younger (and a 100 MB install was enormous). So maybe it is nostalga kicking in.
"This bill [most recent bellsouth bill] is going to be filed under w, for why the hell do I have a telephone"
Correction, it should be 20 ms or less. At 16 ms you can get 60 redraws per second, which is very very smooth.
I don't really know much about the company but I got it from my boyfriend more than 18months ago and never had aproblem. (It is a 15 inch LCD). I will never buy a crt for me again, LCD's are too bright, too crisp, and too cool (physically and metaphorically) to go back to CRT. Just make sure you have a low shift latency for the pixels (~35 ms or less I think) and you should have no ghosting at all.
Put this in your typical MiT dorm and count the seconds down until someone gets it printing out porn... in the girls dorm... of the dean... 's daughter... (and this list goes on).
Is it my imagination or have the stories since april fools been better than the april fools stories themselves?
Exactly! CD's just aren't worth it. For $15-$20 I could get a 45 minute long cd or a DVD-music video with 2-3 hours of footage/music on it. And for another $2 I could rip the auido and burn to a CD (the $2 comes from the cost of the CD-r and the time it takes you to do it. Come on I should be able to use RIAA math as well).
Of course if the industry went to selling Multiformat DVD's for 15 dollars (a dvd layer for music videos and a CD layer for audio cd players) they would see an explosion in sales I bet. But as long as my 20$ are better spent on a DVD (or broadband) I will buy somthing else.
I only trust an operating system as far as I can throw it. After comprehensive tests windows XP CD's fly 300 feet when launched from my skeet shooter and are still bootable. But most of my Linux CD's never survive the launch process so I there fore I can not trust Linux since I can't throw it.
The enemy of my enemy is they guy I pick off after the fight is over.
Radio shack has already released a patch for these cds.
Do I need 64 bits? No.
Do I want competition to the Xeon in 4 way systems? (price and spec them, it is insane! 1.6 Ghz and 1200 a pop). Hell^yeah.
Opteron is not about 64 bits, it is just a nice addition. Opteron is about competition in the low end server/high end desktop market (which is intel dominated btw). The reaosn intel is naysaying 64 bits is because they have no competing thec in this area other than the Xeon which has terrible price/performance numbers.
...this be like comparing Apples to Athlons?
Ba du dum.
All you need is the nuclear missile and the 100m doesn't matter anymore.
Yes, but what kind of cooling does the psu get when you are pulling 450 watts from a 350 watt PS? I have seen many a PC nuke itself when the power supply overheated, melted solder down which then ran and shorted vairous connectors. (A actually fused an ATX connector to the mother board this way). So, what kind of protect does a psu have?
... those of us who don't have tivo's but instead have set top boxes based on a c3 933 and a Radeon AIW? Oh and only get broadcast because we live in the (*#($@)#@*$ sticks.
My login password is a 30 digit alpha numeric with special characters in it. I don't even know what my farking admin password (except it is of equal insanity and yes I am su). It is annoying to type it in but goth damn I feel like a secure guy, then I read somthing like this and feel even better.
SCO is suing the company that owns the patent on hardware and the OS, (maybe not quite but IBMs IP is quite extensive) and I expect them to get countersued into oblivion.
And their server is already grinding.
Back on topic though, who should buy it? I use Open Office and have no problems doing anything (writing papers, making spread sheets etc). Is Office now more for workgroup environments? Or is Office just another Office suite that costs much more?
Yes but some of us would actually stand to benefit from a commodity 64 bit proc. Those of us (like my Physics teach with a Phd in Biomolecular Physics) do active research and number crunching on molecular designs. People such as me need the boost to video/3d modelling apps where hitting 4gb memory limits is common. True that 64 bit solutions exist, but the problem is making them affordable. (And at 5k each, Sun Workstations and SGI boxen are not to the average college student).
Well the Bios almost outlived the floppy ;).
Before I get into my rant, I would like to explain my credintials. I am a CS major en route to GA tech (currently enrolled at Middle GA College), and I have been running linux for 5 years now. I am proficient with Java, Basic, C++, apache, Tomcat, Adobe Premiere, and general computer maintainance /upgrades. Ok now onto what Linux neds for the Desktop.
More hardware support! I have a Radeon 7500 AIW and gettin VIVO to work was evil and a half. Output to TV was worse, (framebuffer crashes and the like).
Multimedia support, Real One Player, Xine, XMMS, mplayer do alot here, but it could be better. Real One is slow and buggy (but better than nothing and now it has fullscreen support), Xine needs to be more user friendly (to be a desktop candidate) and mplayer needs a good, consistant frontend (at least it is stable and fast as hell though). I had no problem with command line though, and associating files with it in kde was a snap.
Video Editing needs to exist. Cinelerra is ok for now (I never got kino to work), but it is slow, unstable, and lacks many features (like chroma keying for green-screen effects). I did manage to create a video project though to completion on my box, but it was not easy.
What does Linux have that makes it a Windows competitor? One word, KDE. Konq is an awesome web browser and file manager (kills anything the explorer can do) Kicker is way more useful than the XP task bar, and themeing is easy. I would give Bill Gate's left arm for these featurs to be ported to Windows.
Oh yeah, Linux is also way faster than XP ever dreamed of being (gentoo w/ prelinking anyone?).
SecondSun
PS before I get anyone flaming me about GNOME, 5 years ago GNOME was slow and unstable. I went to KDE and have no other experience with GNOME, and I know nothing about GNOME. I am sure by now it is much different than it was back then and that it has many features, but I still use KDE exclusivly.