My favorites (I own 2 or more copies of each) : Chromebook with Celeron 2955U and m2 msata 2242 drive : Acer c720 4GB ; Toshiba Chromebook 2 2015 model. Both are also available in i3 models but I have never been able to tell the difference between the i3 and Pentium-class Celeron models (2955U and 3215U). Chromebooks have a very high standard for sound and horizontal viewing angles and so they are GREAT streaming devices - much better than most sub-$400 windows devices! These models can also do some lightweight 3D games (league of legends at 25-40 fps with 10-12 shaders or 20-23 shaders for the i3 models.)
All the extra portability is canceled out by the 12 dongles you have flopping around whenever you pick up the laptop to carry it to a meeting. END STORY.
Look carefully and you will see tremendous UI improvements; They screen is WAY better, brightest in its class; The sound is WAY better, best of any laptop. The disk is WAY faster, really astonishingly fast; The touchbar is WAY better only because it includes TouchID which means instant logins (no more fumbling with CAPS LOCK key!) The keyboard absolutely sucks, but it sucks no worse than any other stupid-thin keyboard on a device in this class. So overall, this machine is an amazing improvement, completely ruined by a brain-dead mania for USB 3.1c ports...
Next year they will replace the top row (0-9) with another touchbar and so forth until 2020 when Tim Cook will reveal that the MacBook Pro is just a tablet!
They needed to include ONE regular USB 3.0 port. There are a zillion devices that fit *inside* a USB port, such as a YubiKey, and nobody wants to carry those $50 security items around on a dongle so that they have to "dongle in" whenever they login. Apple blew it bigtime on the MacBook Pro redesign. They had it made in the shade until Tim Cook got this idea : https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
For so many years in a row, Intel has been making faster and faster processors. This year, for a change, they have decided to focus on making only slower processors, and the Broadwell series is the result! This year they are slowing down the CPUs, next year they will slow down the system bus...
Hey I consider myself a power user. I use a $2200 laptop. It's a 2006 laptop, but it was still a $2200 laptop in 2006. And there is no way I'm trading in this beautiful all-metal machine for some piece of $1000 plastic lower-res non-IPS garbage that is sold today. My $2200 machine is still plenty fast and the repair parts cost ALMOST NOTHING and are PLENTIFUL so why should I mess with Windows 8, 9, 10 or anything else for that matter ??
Try google docs or libre office. Libre office has a horrible draw program, and so does google docs, but the spreadsheet and word processing systems are virtually indistinguishable for all but a book-length project. Viola, no need for MS-Office !! PS. Open Office is a dead project.
The entire Windows ecosystem sucks, not just Windows 8. With computers not getting faster, Microsoft has a business model predicated on, "Force the user to throw away their perfectly good computer, and buy a newer cost-reduced model in order to get the next generation of Operating System". I'm sorry Steve but you'll never get me to pay $90-$130 to install Windows 7 on my $160 used computer which is 10 years old (Thinkpad T42p or T60p) and kicks the butt of any netbook or chromebook in performance! And I doin't have 4+ hours to get the install CD to work, including that nice 30-minute conversation with the fellow in India who holds my testicles in his hand while I beg for a security code!
Wake up and smell the reality! Forcing people to trade older high-end old computers for newer low-end new computers (the only thing that is offered) is a FAIL !!
What is happening, is people who had 1000 sq ft. apartments for 20 years, and who are paying only $1400 a month (instead of $3000) due to the magic of rent controls, are getting turfed out of their homes because the landlord is selling the place for a condo conversion. This is the only way for the landlord to monetize a NET LOSS on their investment in the apartment building, after inflation, due to the compounding of rent controls over a decade before [ heard on KQED public radio in the Bay Area]. And these people who had a "free ride" over the last 15 years, are angry that their free ride is over. COMPLETELY over.
You forgot the sunk costs of the college education, which today is paid for with borrowed money at usurious interest rates. But after these costs are taken into account, the software engineer probably makes $14 an hour vs. the $8 per hour for the minimum wage. This is just how the bourgeoisie have always organized it : keep the lower classes fighting each other so as to detract attention from the raping an pillaging that is happening at the top!
In case you didn't notice, many of the Google and Apple employees themselves are refugees from the high housing prices ($700-$1000 per sq ft) in places like Palo Alto, Mountain View, and Cupertino. What goes around, comes around. Northern CA has this anti-growth mentality that makes housing horribly expensive no matter what job you work, no matter where you work.
If they were serious about asking people to upgrade from XP, they wouldn't be asking $90-$130 for a retail copy of Windows 7, the last Microsoft Operating System that worked...
Windows XP was released at the Zenith for hardware quality in some respects (think 4:3 screens, thinkpad keyboards). Microsoft forcing people to buy a computer is forcing people to downgrade their computer. It aint gonna happen!!
I don't recommend a computer at age 4. My 4-year old jumped on our laptop screen (SXGA, a $700 repair). I mail-ordered a new screen from Malaysia and repaired it myself (cost: $240).
At age four, I highly recommend www.headsprout.com. My kids went through it and then began to REALLY AND TRULY READ. We gave them NO COMPUTER = NO TV = NO VIDEO GAMES, and by 2nd grade, they were reading 30,000 pages per year. That's what NO COMPUTER will do to your kid ==> Make them more engaged in reading and that will make them smarter !!!
Very interesting. With most people in this world carrying around more compute power in their laptop than existed in the world in 1975, and with free compilers and programming environments ubiquitous, there is really nothing stopping ordinary Mothers from New Zealand or anywhere else from becoming high-powered research scientists. Let's make that happen!
Kind of reminds me of those guys in the Netherlands who decided to produce and render a Star-Trek like feature film with a couple of home computers in their kitchen. AND THEY SUCCEEDED! They took most of the film of their captain kirk barking his orders from a kitchen chair, and composited in everything else they needed to make the film look real..
It also suggests an intriguing line of research. Wikipedia has harnessed the power of mass thought for developing encyclopedias, dictionaries, etc. Fight-Aids-At-Home has harnessed home computing meshes for drug discovery. Can we "open up" the fields of scientific research again with a few publicly available pieces of infrastructure that any normal citizen could leverage? For example, perhaps a class library for gas nebula simulations, or other mind-amplifying tools to support intellectual pursuits in a wide range of fields?
== I've been saying it for years now. Windows should either be an open standard for operating systems to be built or be a desktop manager built on a Linux kernel. ==
This is rather hilarious. Are you saying that Linux is something other than an open standard for operating systems ?? I personally think Linux is an open standard - like a garbage disposal - and the way you win at Linux (the MIT way, actually) is to write the largest piece of software you can and do not document it according to any particular standard. In fact, every manpage for Linux should follow a slightly different format, and it does...
Remember, it's coherence that lets light reflect off of a surface and lets me see it.
Coherence is not something that linux developers ever have to worry about!
Slashdot Mirror
A USB-C Monitor can charge your MacBook (hopefully) so the 2 ports can do the work of 3 ports (HDMI, Power, USB) while docked.
They could have at least provided a Lanyard Loop for the 12 dongles you'll need to carry to make your MacBook Pro usable ...
The book is just a collection of pages held together with giant binder clips because Apple has Revolutionized the Design of a Book.
Like all Apple product features, the second edition of the book will be deleted, get one while you can!
This is the end. Their hubris knows no limit, so it is time for them to take a huge fall. Let's not buy any more iPhone 7's, that will teach them!
My favorites (I own 2 or more copies of each) : Chromebook with Celeron 2955U and m2 msata 2242 drive : Acer c720 4GB ; Toshiba Chromebook 2 2015 model. Both are also available in i3 models but I have never been able to tell the difference between the i3 and Pentium-class Celeron models (2955U and 3215U). Chromebooks have a very high standard for sound and horizontal viewing angles and so they are GREAT streaming devices - much better than most sub-$400 windows devices! These models can also do some lightweight 3D games (league of legends at 25-40 fps with 10-12 shaders or 20-23 shaders for the i3 models.)
All the extra portability is canceled out by the 12 dongles you have flopping around whenever you pick up the laptop to carry it to a meeting. END STORY.
Look carefully and you will see tremendous UI improvements; They screen is WAY better, brightest in its class; The sound is WAY better, best of any laptop. The disk is WAY faster, really astonishingly fast; The touchbar is WAY better only because it includes TouchID which means instant logins (no more fumbling with CAPS LOCK key!) The keyboard absolutely sucks, but it sucks no worse than any other stupid-thin keyboard on a device in this class. So overall, this machine is an amazing improvement, completely ruined by a brain-dead mania for USB 3.1c ports ...
Next year they will replace the top row (0-9) with another touchbar and so forth until 2020 when Tim Cook will reveal that the MacBook Pro is just a tablet!
They needed to include ONE regular USB 3.0 port. There are a zillion devices that fit *inside* a USB port, such as a YubiKey, and nobody wants to carry those $50 security items around on a dongle so that they have to "dongle in" whenever they login. Apple blew it bigtime on the MacBook Pro redesign. They had it made in the shade until Tim Cook got this idea : https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
It's pretty clear that fan-films are okay as long as they are crap. Once you raise enough $$$ to produce something good CBS/Paramount will rob you ...
For so many years in a row, Intel has been making faster and faster processors. This year, for a change, they have decided to focus on making only slower processors, and the Broadwell series is the result! This year they are slowing down the CPUs, next year they will slow down the system bus ...
Hey I consider myself a power user. I use a $2200 laptop. It's a 2006 laptop, but it was still a $2200 laptop in 2006. And there is no way I'm trading in this beautiful all-metal machine for some piece of $1000 plastic lower-res non-IPS garbage that is sold today. My $2200 machine is still plenty fast and the repair parts cost ALMOST NOTHING and are PLENTIFUL so why should I mess with Windows 8, 9, 10 or anything else for that matter ??
Try google docs or libre office. Libre office has a horrible draw program, and so does google docs, but the spreadsheet and word processing systems are virtually indistinguishable for all but a book-length project. Viola, no need for MS-Office !! PS. Open Office is a dead project.
The entire Windows ecosystem sucks, not just Windows 8. With computers not getting faster, Microsoft has a business model predicated on, "Force the user to throw away their perfectly good computer, and buy a newer cost-reduced model in order to get the next generation of Operating System". I'm sorry Steve but you'll never get me to pay $90-$130 to install Windows 7 on my $160 used computer which is 10 years old (Thinkpad T42p or T60p) and kicks the butt of any netbook or chromebook in performance! And I doin't have 4+ hours to get the install CD to work, including that nice 30-minute conversation with the fellow in India who holds my testicles in his hand while I beg for a security code!
Wake up and smell the reality! Forcing people to trade older high-end old computers for newer low-end new computers (the only thing that is offered) is a FAIL !!
What is happening, is people who had 1000 sq ft. apartments for 20 years, and who are paying only $1400 a month (instead of $3000) due to the magic of rent controls, are getting turfed out of their homes because the landlord is selling the place for a condo conversion. This is the only way for the landlord to monetize a NET LOSS on their investment in the apartment building, after inflation, due to the compounding of rent controls over a decade before [ heard on KQED public radio in the Bay Area]. And these people who had a "free ride" over the last 15 years, are angry that their free ride is over. COMPLETELY over.
You forgot the sunk costs of the college education, which today is paid for with borrowed money at usurious interest rates. But after these costs are taken into account, the software engineer probably makes $14 an hour vs. the $8 per hour for the minimum wage. This is just how the bourgeoisie have always organized it : keep the lower classes fighting each other so as to detract attention from the raping an pillaging that is happening at the top!
In case you didn't notice, many of the Google and Apple employees themselves are refugees from the high housing prices ($700-$1000 per sq ft) in places like Palo Alto, Mountain View, and Cupertino. What goes around, comes around. Northern CA has this anti-growth mentality that makes housing horribly expensive no matter what job you work, no matter where you work.
If they were serious about asking people to upgrade from XP, they wouldn't be asking $90-$130 for a retail copy of Windows 7, the last Microsoft Operating System that worked ...
Windows XP was released at the Zenith for hardware quality in some respects (think 4:3 screens, thinkpad keyboards). Microsoft forcing people to buy a computer is forcing people to downgrade their computer. It aint gonna happen!!
Windows 8 is not a piece of crap, there is a killer app for it called "START MENU" *snicker* ..
I don't recommend a computer at age 4. My 4-year old jumped on our laptop screen (SXGA, a $700 repair). I mail-ordered a new screen from Malaysia and repaired it myself (cost: $240).
At age four, I highly recommend www.headsprout.com. My kids went through it and then began to REALLY AND TRULY READ. We gave them NO COMPUTER = NO TV = NO VIDEO GAMES, and by 2nd grade, they were reading 30,000 pages per year. That's what NO COMPUTER will do to your kid ==> Make them more engaged in reading and that will make them smarter !!!
Give me your tired, your weary, your ignorant, yearning to think not!
oh let's call a spade a spade, just give me your conservatives !!!
Very interesting. With most people in this world carrying around more compute power in their laptop than existed in the world in 1975, and with free compilers and programming environments ubiquitous, there is really nothing stopping ordinary Mothers from New Zealand or anywhere else from becoming high-powered research scientists. Let's make that happen!
..
Kind of reminds me of those guys in the Netherlands who decided to produce and render a Star-Trek like feature film with a couple of home computers in their kitchen. AND THEY SUCCEEDED! They took most of the film of their captain kirk barking his orders from a kitchen chair, and composited in everything else they needed to make the film look real
It also suggests an intriguing line of research. Wikipedia has harnessed the power of mass thought for developing encyclopedias, dictionaries, etc. Fight-Aids-At-Home has harnessed home computing meshes for drug discovery. Can we "open up" the fields of scientific research again with a few publicly available pieces of infrastructure that any normal citizen could leverage? For example, perhaps a class library for gas nebula simulations, or other mind-amplifying tools to support intellectual pursuits in a wide range of fields?
How about a Researchtool-o-pedia project?
This is rather hilarious. Are you saying that Linux is something other than an open standard for operating systems ?? I personally think Linux is an open standard - like a garbage disposal - and the way you win at Linux (the MIT way, actually) is to write the largest piece of software you can and do not document it according to any particular standard. In fact, every manpage for Linux should follow a slightly different format, and it does ...
Remember, it's coherence that lets light reflect off of a surface and lets me see it.
Coherence is not something that linux developers ever have to worry about!