So what? A Pentium 4 with enough RAM is adequate, and most users do not leave their machines on 24/7. If you only use that computer a few hours a day, then the power-savings take an eternity to amortize. Now I agree that, if you find a Core 2 Duo in a dumpster, you might as well upgrade. Up till now, I only have found one. Best machines I found are 939 socket AMD64, which is a nice step up from a P-IV.
Alternatively, just go for an Atom. I use an Atom D525 with 2GB RAM for my normal desktop-usage (it runs Ubuntu though). It is more than sufficient.
All this, still doesn't make the case to upgrade to Windows 7. Older Core 2 Duo, dumpster sourced AMD64 or even "modern" Atom (on par with that Pentium IV) still are better served with Windows XP as the "64-bit" argument isn't as important as they rarely support more than 2GB RAM. Yes, I know an AMD64 is 64-bit, but most motherboards of that time are limited to 2GB, and the Atoms can support 4GB RAM and 64-bit mode, but you rarely see an Atom coupled with that much RAM).
Luxembourg here. Haven't seen a single non-iPad device in usage "in the wild" yet. iPads? Sure, you see them. I have seen the brands you say at retailers, but that's about it. Recently an Archos for 350€ on sale. No idea what it runs. I was tempted for two minutes, but since I just bought a new laptop, I decided to let it slide. You know what products they put on sale? Those that don't sell well, especially in electronics.
Driving style? I've got a 2000 Audi TT 1.8T with 225HP. On the highway, I can easly get down 8.0l/100km (29mpg), normal traffic is a bit above 9l/100km (26mpg). It still is a gas guzzler to European standards, but I like the car and see no advantage of decommissioning a car I had for over 11 years.
I have to admit, I changed my driving style radically after a DUI + speeding. If I get caught again, I lose my license for 22 months plus whatever I get for the second infraction.
It's "Office Open XML"... "Open Office XML" would probably have put them in a lot of trouble because that's the name of a software product owned by Oracle (back then, Sun).
I don't blame WebDAV for the clients failings. I just say that it's not a workable solution when your clients are Windows (and you can't change that). Big difference.
Just checked, it's Digest Auth. Damn... Our main troubles lie within the fact that PDFs work badly on it (Load in a browser in the Adobe Plugin), sometimes office files corrupt on it and in rare cases files just vanish. It's always office files that vanish. My users usually want my head at that point and I have to go and fetch from backup.
My WebDAV experience is from work. We have a valid wildcard certificate, so that should be covered. I'll have to look into using Digest Auth, as I think (but might recall incorrectly) that we use Basic. Thanks for the tip.
My experience with WebDAV is that Windows support for it beyond XP is sucky. Heck, even under XP you can't mount it as a drive (that's what users want and expect) if you're using https. There are commercial WebDAV clients and there is an abandonware Novell client, but isn't this stuff that should be supported out of the box? WebDAV is not a solution.
Furthermore, DropBox is more something like an automatic rsync to a remote drive. I can do this on Linux, using rsync (duh) and a ssh-server (preferably using ssh keys). Windows used to have a half-baked sultion called "Briefcases", but it didn't work all that well. I'm not all up to snuff with Windows recently, so it might have become better.
A DIY dropbox alternative thus needs:
Accessible from everywhere on the Internet, encrypted
Integration in your desktop environment (regardless platform): It must look and act as a local drive and be usable for non-command-line users.
Automatic synchronization from the local files (local cache) with the remote "share"
Ability to share certain files (or at least folders) with other people using the same DIY system.
I'm probably forgetting something. Can you do it with off the shelf open source software? With Windows as a client. As said, I do fine with rsync and a remote sftp machine, but it doesn't really integrate with my desktop environment, I can't really share files unless I move them to my ~/www folder and I use Linux on the desktop.
... and yet they sell. Perception of a product is very important. People know that iPhones are "good" (enough), they know that everyone and their dog know how to handle them and thus cannot be too complicated to use (whether this is true or not). One final thing that Apple does correctly: restrict choice. That might be counter-intuitive to you, but when you buy an iPhone you know exactly what you get. The only differences consist in how much storage space you have and whether you get the black or the white one. That's it.
You might think that bad, but in a sense it isn't. How many HTC phones you you have? A shitload and you aren't sure whether the one you get is going to fit. I happen to have a HTC Smart. Bad choice? At first you think it's one of the "good" ones because it really looks like it runs HTC Sense. It was also damned cheap and that should have raised a red flag. Now, last time, I came up with this in a discussion, I got slammed because I didn't get the 500€ HTC running (Desire, etc...). Yes, true... My mistake... Still, if I was going to spend 600€, why not get the iPhone as I know that it is decent quality and easy to use.
The iPhone has in a sense become the "Windows of Smartphones": The baseline everything else is compared with. To make a phone better than the iPhone it needs to be cheaper (very important! If it's more expensive or on par, the choice falls on the iPhone), as easy or easier to use than the iPhone, and be able to compete on the "apps" (hate the word) that you can install.
We have one iPhone in the household. It belongs to my wife, and while I wouldn't mind having one myself, I simply cannot justify another 50€/month plan (sure the phone is "only" 49€ then). I keep the crap phone with the cheap plan. My wife, a computer neophyte, has never been so happy with a phone. She now actually uses the Internet on it, buys songs, uses facebook and writes email. Something I never managed to get her to do on her computer.
Up until last weekend, I had a GeForce 440MX running in my mothers Ubuntu desktop. I replaced the motherboard (because it was an old socket 754 motherboard and I had a socket 939 motherboard with dual core CPU lying around, and why not give her a free upgrade?). That 440MX worked perfectly fine (including Compiz and the whole shebang). How old is that card? It was with the proprietary drivers, though.
The new motherboard has ATI onboard graphics, I think a HD4200 or somesuch. Works fine too.
So, I can assert the binary drivers of NVidia work well and have long support cycles, but my main point was that the old ATI worked very well too while using the OSS drivers.
I'm a dumpster diver. I might have some TNT2 lying around, but frankly, with GeForce 6600GT and above being commonly thrown away, why bother? Okay, in some sense, I prefer the older cards because they have passive cooling. (GeForce2 MX has been a very popular card, compiz runs fine on it last time I tested... I have stacks of them) Passive cooling is one thing less to break, one reason less to call me.
For some cards there aren't even any proprietary drivers. I have a laptop with an ATI X1100 chipset, and it never came up with the proprietary drivers notification, so I must assume I use the Open Source drivers. They work perfectly fine and do Compiz.
Oh, you know slashdot... I did realize you were trying to be funny, I just went on with standard nerd reaction. That said, I failed miserably, as I picked the one game that didn't have the flaw we were talking about.
Ah, I'm not contradicting you. As far as I can see 1GB is plenty if you're running Ubuntu or Windows XP and for most tasks a 1.6GHz processor is just fine. That's my experience, but I'm probably biased as I'm a dumpster diver (and I love it). I'm typing this on a new machine, but it's a nettop. Atom D525 with 2GB RAM. According to the Gnome task manager, it only uses 40% for programs, meaning that I'm using less than 1GB.
Have you tried with 1x512MB and 1x1GB? That might just work. I have another laptop (which I bought January 2007), which is specced 2GB RAM max. It came with 2x512MB. I replaced it with the specced max. When I got hold of 2GB modules (this is a DDR-2 laptop), I tried. It boots but only detects 2.4GB. So sometimes there really is weird stuff going on.
Anyway, glad to hear there are other people like me who don't buy in the upgrade treadmill anymore.
I have a (few) licenses, it works and I don't want to spend money for nothing? I still have to see what Windows 7 brings to the table that interests me. Apart from having moved every possible setting under the sun, confusing users of a stable well known interface.... Yes, 64-bit... That would be the only point. However, for my day to day Internet antics a Atom D525 suffices with 2GB RAM. (It runs Ubuntu, but if I wanted Windows, I really should opt for XP). Again. 64-bit? Who cares. Computer performance is "there" for most users, regardless of what they do. Games, scientific computing and CAD are excluded of that.
That's/really/ old DOS games (Think Alley Cat), and DoxBox handles those situation just fine. The later Win9x games (not runninig under DOS or the DOS4GW extender) were already correctly time. Well, I haven't ever encountered one that wasn't.
1.6GHz Celeron, maxed out with 1GB RAM, ATI Mobility Radeon 9600 graphics.
This is DDR-1 SO-DIMM right? Many of the laptops of this generation state in their specs that their maximum amount of RAM is 1GB (being 2x512MB) As a matter of fact, it seems that these usually do support two modules of 1GB. I have tested this personally in two cases: a Compaq N800c and a Packard Bell E1 245. Both specced max 1GB, both work perfectly fine with 2GB.
I don't agree, mostly because the abbreviations have meaning and you totally disregard those. It might be that it is "generally accepted", but it puts your RAM and ROM definition in the same line as a "PIN Number" or and "ATM Machine": the abbreviation has become void of all meaning.
Then go read the original post by myth24601, which said "Better yet, a protocol for allowing a wireless connection to an external monitor. If not through WiFi, maybe using some sort of IR?". Assuming WiFi would be 802.11n but myth24601 discards the idea, but proposes IR, my first thought was Bluetooth as it doesn't have the downsides of IR (Point to point, direct line of sight required). You said Bluetooth won't work, because of bandwith issues, which I accept... So, that leaves IR and hence the question was... "and IR does Gigabits?". Obviously in fibre, it can but then it wouldn't be wireless...
Slashdot Mirror
So what? A Pentium 4 with enough RAM is adequate, and most users do not leave their machines on 24/7. If you only use that computer a few hours a day, then the power-savings take an eternity to amortize. Now I agree that, if you find a Core 2 Duo in a dumpster, you might as well upgrade. Up till now, I only have found one. Best machines I found are 939 socket AMD64, which is a nice step up from a P-IV.
Alternatively, just go for an Atom. I use an Atom D525 with 2GB RAM for my normal desktop-usage (it runs Ubuntu though). It is more than sufficient.
All this, still doesn't make the case to upgrade to Windows 7. Older Core 2 Duo, dumpster sourced AMD64 or even "modern" Atom (on par with that Pentium IV) still are better served with Windows XP as the "64-bit" argument isn't as important as they rarely support more than 2GB RAM. Yes, I know an AMD64 is 64-bit, but most motherboards of that time are limited to 2GB, and the Atoms can support 4GB RAM and 64-bit mode, but you rarely see an Atom coupled with that much RAM).
Luxembourg here. Haven't seen a single non-iPad device in usage "in the wild" yet. iPads? Sure, you see them. I have seen the brands you say at retailers, but that's about it. Recently an Archos for 350€ on sale. No idea what it runs. I was tempted for two minutes, but since I just bought a new laptop, I decided to let it slide. You know what products they put on sale? Those that don't sell well, especially in electronics.
Driving style? I've got a 2000 Audi TT 1.8T with 225HP. On the highway, I can easly get down 8.0l/100km (29mpg), normal traffic is a bit above 9l/100km (26mpg). It still is a gas guzzler to European standards, but I like the car and see no advantage of decommissioning a car I had for over 11 years.
I have to admit, I changed my driving style radically after a DUI + speeding. If I get caught again, I lose my license for 22 months plus whatever I get for the second infraction.
It's "Office Open XML"... "Open Office XML" would probably have put them in a lot of trouble because that's the name of a software product owned by Oracle (back then, Sun).
Will do, but it really looks like that it's the clients. People using Linux or Mac OS X do not have the problem at all.
Windows 7 desktops are different?
Wouldn't token ring be the better choice in an environment with many interferences, which space probably is. ;-)
I don't blame WebDAV for the clients failings. I just say that it's not a workable solution when your clients are Windows (and you can't change that). Big difference.
Just checked, it's Digest Auth. Damn... Our main troubles lie within the fact that PDFs work badly on it (Load in a browser in the Adobe Plugin), sometimes office files corrupt on it and in rare cases files just vanish. It's always office files that vanish. My users usually want my head at that point and I have to go and fetch from backup.
My WebDAV experience is from work. We have a valid wildcard certificate, so that should be covered. I'll have to look into using Digest Auth, as I think (but might recall incorrectly) that we use Basic. Thanks for the tip.
My experience with WebDAV is that Windows support for it beyond XP is sucky. Heck, even under XP you can't mount it as a drive (that's what users want and expect) if you're using https. There are commercial WebDAV clients and there is an abandonware Novell client, but isn't this stuff that should be supported out of the box? WebDAV is not a solution.
Furthermore, DropBox is more something like an automatic rsync to a remote drive. I can do this on Linux, using rsync (duh) and a ssh-server (preferably using ssh keys). Windows used to have a half-baked sultion called "Briefcases", but it didn't work all that well. I'm not all up to snuff with Windows recently, so it might have become better.
A DIY dropbox alternative thus needs:
I'm probably forgetting something. Can you do it with off the shelf open source software? With Windows as a client. As said, I do fine with rsync and a remote sftp machine, but it doesn't really integrate with my desktop environment, I can't really share files unless I move them to my ~/www folder and I use Linux on the desktop.
... and yet they sell. Perception of a product is very important. People know that iPhones are "good" (enough), they know that everyone and their dog know how to handle them and thus cannot be too complicated to use (whether this is true or not). One final thing that Apple does correctly: restrict choice. That might be counter-intuitive to you, but when you buy an iPhone you know exactly what you get. The only differences consist in how much storage space you have and whether you get the black or the white one. That's it.
You might think that bad, but in a sense it isn't. How many HTC phones you you have? A shitload and you aren't sure whether the one you get is going to fit. I happen to have a HTC Smart. Bad choice? At first you think it's one of the "good" ones because it really looks like it runs HTC Sense. It was also damned cheap and that should have raised a red flag. Now, last time, I came up with this in a discussion, I got slammed because I didn't get the 500€ HTC running (Desire, etc...). Yes, true... My mistake... Still, if I was going to spend 600€, why not get the iPhone as I know that it is decent quality and easy to use.
The iPhone has in a sense become the "Windows of Smartphones": The baseline everything else is compared with. To make a phone better than the iPhone it needs to be cheaper (very important! If it's more expensive or on par, the choice falls on the iPhone), as easy or easier to use than the iPhone, and be able to compete on the "apps" (hate the word) that you can install.
We have one iPhone in the household. It belongs to my wife, and while I wouldn't mind having one myself, I simply cannot justify another 50€/month plan (sure the phone is "only" 49€ then). I keep the crap phone with the cheap plan. My wife, a computer neophyte, has never been so happy with a phone. She now actually uses the Internet on it, buys songs, uses facebook and writes email. Something I never managed to get her to do on her computer.
Up until last weekend, I had a GeForce 440MX running in my mothers Ubuntu desktop. I replaced the motherboard (because it was an old socket 754 motherboard and I had a socket 939 motherboard with dual core CPU lying around, and why not give her a free upgrade?). That 440MX worked perfectly fine (including Compiz and the whole shebang). How old is that card? It was with the proprietary drivers, though.
The new motherboard has ATI onboard graphics, I think a HD4200 or somesuch. Works fine too.
So, I can assert the binary drivers of NVidia work well and have long support cycles, but my main point was that the old ATI worked very well too while using the OSS drivers.
I'm a dumpster diver. I might have some TNT2 lying around, but frankly, with GeForce 6600GT and above being commonly thrown away, why bother? Okay, in some sense, I prefer the older cards because they have passive cooling. (GeForce2 MX has been a very popular card, compiz runs fine on it last time I tested... I have stacks of them) Passive cooling is one thing less to break, one reason less to call me.
For some cards there aren't even any proprietary drivers. I have a laptop with an ATI X1100 chipset, and it never came up with the proprietary drivers notification, so I must assume I use the Open Source drivers. They work perfectly fine and do Compiz.
Oh, you know slashdot... I did realize you were trying to be funny, I just went on with standard nerd reaction. That said, I failed miserably, as I picked the one game that didn't have the flaw we were talking about.
Ah, I'm not contradicting you. As far as I can see 1GB is plenty if you're running Ubuntu or Windows XP and for most tasks a 1.6GHz processor is just fine. That's my experience, but I'm probably biased as I'm a dumpster diver (and I love it). I'm typing this on a new machine, but it's a nettop. Atom D525 with 2GB RAM. According to the Gnome task manager, it only uses 40% for programs, meaning that I'm using less than 1GB.
Have you tried with 1x512MB and 1x1GB? That might just work. I have another laptop (which I bought January 2007), which is specced 2GB RAM max. It came with 2x512MB. I replaced it with the specced max. When I got hold of 2GB modules (this is a DDR-2 laptop), I tried. It boots but only detects 2.4GB. So sometimes there really is weird stuff going on.
Anyway, glad to hear there are other people like me who don't buy in the upgrade treadmill anymore.
Yes, yes, I've been corrected already. I just remember it as insanely fast. Seems, the fast pace was intended.
Probably myself, as I have played Alley Cat (and have fond memories of it)... I don't know Death Track though...
Really? Damnit, that means it was meant to be played in that insane pace...
I have a (few) licenses, it works and I don't want to spend money for nothing? I still have to see what Windows 7 brings to the table that interests me. Apart from having moved every possible setting under the sun, confusing users of a stable well known interface.... Yes, 64-bit... That would be the only point. However, for my day to day Internet antics a Atom D525 suffices with 2GB RAM. (It runs Ubuntu, but if I wanted Windows, I really should opt for XP). Again. 64-bit? Who cares. Computer performance is "there" for most users, regardless of what they do. Games, scientific computing and CAD are excluded of that.
That's /really/ old DOS games (Think Alley Cat), and DoxBox handles those situation just fine. The later Win9x games (not runninig under DOS or the DOS4GW extender) were already correctly time. Well, I haven't ever encountered one that wasn't.
It is by my definition, and I said so in my original post.
This is DDR-1 SO-DIMM right? Many of the laptops of this generation state in their specs that their maximum amount of RAM is 1GB (being 2x512MB) As a matter of fact, it seems that these usually do support two modules of 1GB. I have tested this personally in two cases: a Compaq N800c and a Packard Bell E1 245. Both specced max 1GB, both work perfectly fine with 2GB.
Just saying, in case it would be useful.
I don't agree, mostly because the abbreviations have meaning and you totally disregard those. It might be that it is "generally accepted", but it puts your RAM and ROM definition in the same line as a "PIN Number" or and "ATM Machine": the abbreviation has become void of all meaning.
Then go read the original post by myth24601, which said "Better yet, a protocol for allowing a wireless connection to an external monitor. If not through WiFi, maybe using some sort of IR?". Assuming WiFi would be 802.11n but myth24601 discards the idea, but proposes IR, my first thought was Bluetooth as it doesn't have the downsides of IR (Point to point, direct line of sight required). You said Bluetooth won't work, because of bandwith issues, which I accept... So, that leaves IR and hence the question was... "and IR does Gigabits?". Obviously in fibre, it can but then it wouldn't be wireless...
To summarize this whole mess: Context, it matters