It must be the most limiting factor inside any desktop PC. In my tower I have trouble making even long cables reach drives at the top of the case, so they have to be mounted halfway down.
You really ought to look inside the case of a current PowerMac tower sometime, just to see how unobtrusive ribbon cables can be, if some though it put into the case design. They've done an amazing job of designing the thing to keep ribbon cables out of the way. Even the otherwise horrible 8100 case design of years ago had good cable routing.
A few years back I found some backup cartridge tapes (the big 4x6 kind) and a couple of tape drives at a Goodwill store. While there wasn't anything particularly useful on it, I could tell that it was the shell account machine used by half a dozen or so Ingres developers.
No database code or data, just typical home directories and stuff. And they were running SCO, but boot blocks and stuff don't generally get written to tapes, so no chance of warezzing from it.
I also snag SCSI hard drives and SyQuest cartridges when they show up for five bucks or less at thrift stores, since most of that is Mac stuff and I'm a Mac-head.
Once I got a 6100 at a thrift store. I presume the owner stopped using it when the PRAM battery died. (When a 6100's PRAM battery dies, the video settings go with it, and unless you're using a fixed-frequency monitor, you get no video unless you hold down command-option-P-R. Looks like real bad a hardware problem when it's just the battery.) I could tell it was used by some college guy, studying to be a lawyer, I think.
"Thrift store hard drives are like a box of chocolates... you never know what you'll find!"
I had a problem like that with my WAP11. It seemed to me like the task that was supposed to broadcast the SSID was crashing within a couple of hours. After much e-mail back-and-forth with a Linksys tech support guy, it got to the point where I was convinced it was hardware problem and demanded an RMA. Then he attached me a beta firmware that fixed the bug.
So if this guy knows there's an update out there, why isn't he using it?
The first microcomputer hard drive I ever used was 5 megs, and it was on a CP/M 80 system. It was in four partitions as well. No subdirectories, just a "user" nibble to classify the files.
Apple is going to put one of those tri-color LED night lights from Sharper Image into the soft-white case of a typical iBook/iMac/eMac. They may need three or four sets for sufficient coverage, but this would allow it to glow in almost any color of light.
One day, the disciple said unto the master: "Master, there are so many free software licenses with so many different requirements that nobody can possibly remember them all. I shall design my own set of unified free software licenses to replace all the others, and thereby set us all free!"
The master immediately slapped the disciple upside his head.
"Master, why did you strike me?"
"We have no need for yet another free software license!"
Maybe if we weren't putting all our law enforcement dollars into trivial, non-violent drug "crimes" (or would be non-violent if they weren't illegal) we would have time, money and energy to pursue things like theft, fraud, forgery, utterance, grand theft auto, etc.
But then law enforcement wouldn't be able to buy themselves as many new toys from all the siezure money that they can generate from the so-called "drug war"!
Not to mention that mailing the check (via USPS rather than having Fedex/UPS deliver the COD check) brings the mail fraud statutes into play. You don't fuck with the USPS.
You do realize this is $500 just for the bare motherboard? And it's a G3 600 at that? You'd be better off getting a G3 off of ebay or a Mac reseller site like MacResQ. (I gave that as an example it's the one I can remember.) They currently have a G3/400 blue&white with 128 meg RAM, 6G hard disk, and DVD-ROM for $530. Lose a few megahertz, get RAM and a hard drive for $30 more. They also have various G4/450 systems for $900.
And you don't have to wait until January for them to be released, either.
FRIGGIN THING KEEPS AUTO-INDENTING FOR ME! WHY DO PEOPLE BUY PRODUCTS THAT REQUIRE 8 KEYSTROKES TO GET A NEWLINE?
Why do people keep cursing Orifice when they could get in there and turn off all that marketroid-driven auto-format crap. It's even satisfying to turn all those features off, in the same way that Dave Bowman turned off HAL.
I never canceled AOL because I've been getting billed $5/mo for it. I don't know whether it was because I was a "charter subscriber" or because I never signed up for unlimited usage when AOL offered it, but for $5 I have a screen name (multiple ones, even), and maybe 10 hours per month of dial-up access. I don't even know whether it's possible for a new AOL account to be set up this way any more.
For a while I was letting my mom use it for e-mail, but now I'm getting her to move to the mail server that I run on my fixed-IP DSL. There's the risk of a little spam getting in (I had her AOL e-mail set up in whitelist mode), but now there's no auto-purging of old mail, and no requirement to use AOL's clunky client.
Lately I've noticed a few things (like the overhead photos in MapQuest) that can be accessed free as long as you have an AOL screen name. So I plan to keep it for as long as they don't raise my rate.
You don't hear much these days about the "fifth generation" computing projects that Japan was spending a lot of money on back in the early '90s, do you? This is why.
Firstly, can anyone envision what could possibly do this? Does your browser have to be trojoned to accomplish this feat? Could it be an IE-only kind of design bug?
All you need is a certain popular insecure operating system, which has this "feature" turned on by default, so you can see when your network print job finishes, etc.
This is one of the many wonderful reasons why I run OS X and Linux at home.
Re:On the death of video games...
on
Electronic Life
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· Score: 3, Insightful
Intel had nothing to do with Intellivision. Mattel made it, based on a chipset made by (I think) GI. And Coleco wasn't going broke because of Colecovision, it was going broke because of Adam. It took Nintendo (the only company "stupid" enough to believe there was still a market for video games and sell one) to bring the market back to life.
As for Atari (Computer, not Games), if they hadn't shelved the 7800 for two years (it was manufactured and ready to ship, but they warehoused it at the last minute), or even if they hadn't refused the option on the NES, they might still be around today, and not just a name that changed owners twice so far.
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You really ought to look inside the case of a current PowerMac tower sometime, just to see how unobtrusive ribbon cables can be, if some though it put into the case design. They've done an amazing job of designing the thing to keep ribbon cables out of the way. Even the otherwise horrible 8100 case design of years ago had good cable routing.
Nothing beats the companies who decided that a great site for their "offsite backups" was in the other tower.
No database code or data, just typical home directories and stuff. And they were running SCO, but boot blocks and stuff don't generally get written to tapes, so no chance of warezzing from it.
I also snag SCSI hard drives and SyQuest cartridges when they show up for five bucks or less at thrift stores, since most of that is Mac stuff and I'm a Mac-head.
Once I got a 6100 at a thrift store. I presume the owner stopped using it when the PRAM battery died. (When a 6100's PRAM battery dies, the video settings go with it, and unless you're using a fixed-frequency monitor, you get no video unless you hold down command-option-P-R. Looks like real bad a hardware problem when it's just the battery.) I could tell it was used by some college guy, studying to be a lawyer, I think.
"Thrift store hard drives are like a box of chocolates... you never know what you'll find!"
So if this guy knows there's an update out there, why isn't he using it?
They're not quite that cheap yet. And yes, I do go by there every now and then. Might even swing by there today.
The first microcomputer hard drive I ever used was 5 megs, and it was on a CP/M 80 system. It was in four partitions as well. No subdirectories, just a "user" nibble to classify the files.
Apple is going to put one of those tri-color LED night lights from Sharper Image into the soft-white case of a typical iBook/iMac/eMac. They may need three or four sets for sufficient coverage, but this would allow it to glow in almost any color of light.
The master immediately slapped the disciple upside his head.
"Master, why did you strike me?"
"We have no need for yet another free software license!"
The disciple was suddenly enlightened.
But then law enforcement wouldn't be able to buy themselves as many new toys from all the siezure money that they can generate from the so-called "drug war"!
Not to mention that mailing the check (via USPS rather than having Fedex/UPS deliver the COD check) brings the mail fraud statutes into play. You don't fuck with the USPS.
Actually, considering all the stories about wood chippers and such, this sounds like a whole new way for idiots to get a Darwin Award.
...and I've got OS/10 running on my Powerbook!
He's in Dallas, I think.
And you don't have to wait until January for them to be released, either.
You know what they say... "First rule in government spending: why build one when you can have two at twice the price."-Hadden, Contact
I hear the new title will be The Two Trolls.
Why do people keep cursing Orifice when they could get in there and turn off all that marketroid-driven auto-format crap. It's even satisfying to turn all those features off, in the same way that Dave Bowman turned off HAL.
"Dammit, Jim, I'm a doctor, not a CCIE!"
For a while I was letting my mom use it for e-mail, but now I'm getting her to move to the mail server that I run on my fixed-IP DSL. There's the risk of a little spam getting in (I had her AOL e-mail set up in whitelist mode), but now there's no auto-purging of old mail, and no requirement to use AOL's clunky client.
Lately I've noticed a few things (like the overhead photos in MapQuest) that can be accessed free as long as you have an AOL screen name. So I plan to keep it for as long as they don't raise my rate.
You don't hear much these days about the "fifth generation" computing projects that Japan was spending a lot of money on back in the early '90s, do you? This is why.
If I was going to anger a mobster, I would certainly hope my gun was loaded! (But I'm still wondering how that elephant got into my pajamas.)
In other news, the BBC encourages you to avoid walking off of fifth floor balconies.
And now, the news for parrots...
French toast comes from Quebec, with a branch office in New Orleans.
I was just thinking that. But then I realized that you might get lucky and they'd try to prove it by opening their helmet.
All you need is a certain popular insecure operating system, which has this "feature" turned on by default, so you can see when your network print job finishes, etc.
This is one of the many wonderful reasons why I run OS X and Linux at home.
As for Atari (Computer, not Games), if they hadn't shelved the 7800 for two years (it was manufactured and ready to ship, but they warehoused it at the last minute), or even if they hadn't refused the option on the NES, they might still be around today, and not just a name that changed owners twice so far.