Site severely/.ed... Why, then, does the blurb mention the AAC's as being "Apple ripped"?
Sure, it's nice to live in a hermetically-sealed labratory environment where everybody has to rip from 16-bit AIFF's on equal footing, but that's not the case with AppleMusic's AAC's...
I was at the SoHo GAPple screening and from the looks of it, only certain albums were available at the $9.99 bulk price, whereas other you'd have to purchase track-by-track. I might be wrong on that note, but that's what I recalled from Jobs' iTunes pane.
A 50% increase in clock frequency... and a 100% increase in L2 cache. A 900Mhz PowerPC 750fx will blow past a 1Ghz 7455 with its limp 256k L2 in a lot of instances.
My figure regarding the Xeon's peak performance is based on the only data I could readily find - from a 2.53 Ghz P4 (@ 5.06 PTGigaFLOPS) - keep in mind that the P4/Xeon's now have a faster bus and 512k L2 cache - I'd suspect these factors might afford a dual 3.02Ghz Xeon rig another 10-30% on top of my peak theoretical figure.
IOW, Take the above Xeon figure with a grain of salt - but also acknowledge that $5000 would buy you around double the peak theoretical floating point performance if you were to go the Apple route.
This is actually Apple's top-end solution - buy as much power as you need - and cluster.
When You'd have to distribute the After Effects rendering in the exact same manner on Dual Xeons/XP (as to my knowledge, AE-for-Windows doesn't multithread natively either) what difference does it make if you pump your frames out of one enclosure or two (or 16?)
The only flaw is, would two separate instances of Adobe's "Render Engine" run on the auxillary XServe (to take advantage of both of its CPU's) without a gruelling software hack? Dunno... On the other hand, I would assume Apple's Shake rendering distribution system properly multithreads on dual systems...
If we could, how about a fair comparison: Mac G4 dual 1.42 GHz versus dual P4 3.06 GHz. Dual versus dual, or dumb down the Mac, single versus single.
Better still, let's compare a cluster of G4's versus a cluster of Pentium 4's... Taking in to account OS X's native Multilink Multihoming capabilities and freedom from the shackles of the PCI bus.
Or, we could just compare prices, in that two 1.25 Ghz G4's from Apple cost roughly the same as a single 3.06 Ghz P4 from Dell... Any idea what two 3Ghz Xeons would cost? Any idea what two XServe Dual 1.3 Ghz "Cluster Models" would cost?
On a side note, have you noticed the mass proliferation of Gill Sans over the last 6-12 months? While it's always been a popular font, I have a feeling that its inclusion with both OS X and XP has caused its frequency of usage to skyrocket...
Did you know that you can buy a plain, white t-shirt with a Tommy Hilfiger label inside the collar and pay several times more than you would for an identical t-shirt without that label?
I think your analogy delves further in to the issue than you realize. While a Hanes plain white T-shirt will only cost a consumer so much, there will always be those who opt for the Tommy Hilfiger T-shirt for the cut and materials... The 'Tommy cut' may not fit certain people as well as others; they perhaps prefer the way a Hanes hangs off their shoulders...
The majority of Hanes-wearers probably think: "WTF? It's a T-shirt?" and can't/won't perceive the less-obvious advantages of a 'designer' shirt.
(for the record: no, I'm not gay - My designer-clothes-wearin' girlfriend's been 'breaking my spirit' over the last 2 years;(
Besides, it's not true anymore, but until say six months or a year back, Apple really *was* the choice if you wanted to do any serious video editing, photoshopping, etc.
Really? That's funny, the last time I compared the two (1.42ghz Mac vs. 2.8Ghz Pentium) I discovered that Photoshop was still a nuisance to use under Windows. Disk caching still sucks, Windows' linear mouse acceleration is a complete joke when it comes to fine manipulation, no matter how hard I tried to notch it down.
How about you stick to professing on subjects you truly have some level of expertise on and let those of us that perform these tasks every day prognisticate on which tools best perform tasks, what say?
Now as for those who use Macs in the home... Well sometimes people are just stupid AND rich.
Oops, I see... You're just a petty troll. Carry on...
As you can see as indicated from posts below this thread, it appears that AppleTalk would broadcast to/from the neighbor under OS9, and this isn't infact an OS X/Rendezvous peculiarity.
I'm trying to figure out the Mindspring/Earthlink POP server deal... Try looking for AppleCare documents with Sherlock.
The built-in firewall's been set up to only allow printer and file sharing, and the neighborhood in question is a quaint suburban/rural safety zone.
On the other hand, if I found the same thing happening here in the Big City I might be a little bit more paranoid, and would likely get a Linksys to cap it off. I was curious if there was a way to 'anonymize' the machine without resorting to hardware firewalls.
Wow, hilarious. Guess what? Dad started out in the industry by programming tabulation machines in the 60's, later IBM mainframes, partnered in a business renting time on Harvard's mainframe to calculate regional school system schedules and even co-authored a Lord of the Rings game for the MiniPDP he'd bring home to us on weekends back in the early 80's.
I don't think he needs some greenhorn pissant telling him what platform best suits his needs.
Rather than reply to individual posters all I can do is shake my head at the all-to-predictable lack of vision and Fear Uncertainty and Doubt by users in face of moving away from the methods Adobe has foisted upon them.
Well, that was pretty insulting. I certainly don't feel that Adobe has "foisted" any methods on me, rather that I've been privy to and used their products due to the pioneering of two crucial fields: feature sets and UI congruency.
While GIMP offers a few sprinklings of features from both Photoshop and Illustrator, it is currently by no means ready to replace either in my Dock. As the sibling poster also expressed, I'm not one to cower from new tools or interfaces. I simply appreciate a tool for its face-value; what it offers and how it offers it. Once Adobe released InDesign 1.5, I was ready to abandon QuarkXPress entirely (too bad this sentiment wasn't/isn't more widespread), despite performance deficiencies and lacking features (and plugins).
Again, this wasn't because Adobe has somehow brainwashed me in to some sort of AdobeNazi, but because they had delivered the best tool for the job when the tools were weighed against one another.
You may be afraid of change you may fail to compare the product on a open bases (despite that I am sure many of you will deny you are doing this, you will at the same time openly declare that 'GIMP should follow the conventions in PhotoShop because it is the current dominant application'), but you will simply be made irrelevant by the next generation of designers who have a new fresh approach to design and who are untainted by pre-conceptions about how a particular program should behave, or brand loyalty to Adobe.
I don't want GIMP to integrate in to the Adobe (Macromedia, Corel) workflow simply because it's the "dominant application". I want it to integrate so I won't ever have to think: "Now what key-combo did they assign to standard-feature-X again?" I'm lead to believe that you've ever seen someone truly masterful at Photoshop/Illustrator/InDesign/Quark playing the keyboard like an adept pianist. I like the fact that 'command-option-shift-click, drag' works the same between Illustrator, Photoshop and InDesign. I don't need some ugly-stepchild application getting in my way, forcing me to think about 'the alternative key-chord needed to accomplish duplicate-constrain-drag'.
Could I just as easily learn a new set of standardized key-chords? Sure! It's fun! S'like learning a new musical instrument, even. Do I want to have to switch between Trumpet and Oboe all day? Not really.
...a good software engineer is able to adopt a new methodology or language that has an entirely new paradigm and requires a significant re-working of his typical design approach - if he can objectively see that this newer approach is on balance better than his existing approach. A bad engineer, on the other hand, will lack such objectivity and cling defensively to the approach he already understands, because it is more convenient
Suppose you're visiting a city in a foreign land. You've rented a car, and the fact that they drive on the opposite side of the street doesn't bother you all too much, you'll adapt. On the other hand, the monarch of this country - a great thinker who is unencumbered by 'universal semaphore methodology' - decided that Red = Go, Yellow = Stop and Green = Yield on the nation's traffic lights. To top this off, the monarch decided that in order to signal a right-hand turn, you must apply the left-hand directional (as this nation has a great sea-faring history and this is how rudders work) and lines painted on the road are center-markers rather than dividers.
Bravo for innovative thinking! I'm sure this system works fine for the people of this land. It's just too bad that people from the rest of the world will find driving there an absolute nightmare. Guess they don't intend to foster too much international trade.
I was reading through the compilation book of Laz Long's wisdom a couple years back. When I came to that one I said to myself: "exactly";D most +5 Insightful advice in the entire book.
Just becase GIMP has a 'different' interface to Photoshop doesn't mean that it's automatically 'worse'.
Actually, I'd argue that that is the ultimate reason the interface is 'worse'. The reason being, it deviates so radically from Illustrator and InDesign that the streamlined psychological effect of switching between the "Trio of Might" all day long completely vanishes.
Photoshop is merely Adobe's idea of what a software package should look like - and frankly most Adobe tools have a *hideous* user interface (just look at Acrobat Reader!).
While You're entirely entitled to your opinion on this matter, I respectfully disagree (Acrobat Reader being an exception). Having been an intensive Adobe design suite user for the past 7 years, and having somewhat extensively demoed much of the 'competition's' offerings, I find Adobe's interface design to be the most thorough and ubiquitous in the design suite industry (if not the entire software industry).
I think a lot of graphic designers have grown up on Photoshop and maybe have forgotten how hard it was to learn how to use Photoshop properly and get use to it.
Any application, whether GUI-based or CLI-based, requires a certain period of familiarization. We need to look at conditions that alleviate the need to learn or re-learn methods of achieving common functionality between both OS-wide abstractions and abstractions found within other applications. Apple has covered a good deal of this ground with a wide palate of standardized command-key functions that Adobe has strived to adhere to for many years. To be fair, Macromedia and Corel have also strived to adhere to these standards; in my opinion, not quite as thoroughly as Adobe.
If GIMP could be rearranged to sufficiently integrate with an Adobe (or perhaps Macromedia, QuarkXPress) workflow, eliminate the perceptible "clunkiness", and add crucial functionalities found in PS (CMYK, Adjustment Layers) then maybe GIMP will find some adoption within design ranks. I am by no means holding my breath.
...I *really* wouldn't want GIMP to try and duplicate Photoshop's interface! It may be 'established' but, as I've said, I think it's a bit of a disaster from a Humane Interface POV.
I'd really like you to qualify that argument with some examples. If you don't have the time/effort to list them, don't sweat it.
I do think however, that the lack of a Mac OS X Aqua port is slowing it's slow adoption rate amoung established professionals.
I would tend to agree, assuming by "Aqua port" you mean a true integration with and adherence to Apple's HIG. Simply slapping a Quartz/Aqua face on the standard functions/layout/menu trees won't do a damned thing in that regard.
Wow! that "anecdote" was a hilarious read. I myself have been playing TacOps lately as Trent_Lott(Seg)MS - no cheating mind you (not sure there are actually any cheats for the Mac) - so I can fully appreciate your little cultural stunt.
You've also convinced me that not all game hackers are slug-fellating scum;D If I was a CS player and saw you on servers I'd always jump on your team and back your diatribes by declaring the bitch-n-moaners "Unpatriotic Nigger-Lovers" (which is, of course, in direct opposition to my 'meatspace' political and philosophical stances)
Slashdot Mirror
Site severely /.ed... Why, then, does the blurb mention the AAC's as being "Apple ripped"?
Sure, it's nice to live in a hermetically-sealed labratory environment where everybody has to rip from 16-bit AIFF's on equal footing, but that's not the case with AppleMusic's AAC's...
Don't forget that Apple's AAC's aren't ripped from 48.8 16-bit AIFF's, but re-mastered directly to AAC.
"I am never paying for your walkway design again"
That is the mind-set. That is the causal event. I want it, so it will be so.
The end
I was at the SoHo GAPple screening and from the looks of it, only certain albums were available at the $9.99 bulk price, whereas other you'd have to purchase track-by-track. I might be wrong on that note, but that's what I recalled from Jobs' iTunes pane.
Hey, I sent a mail to your yahoo spam account re: decotura, but you never replied back on your 'real' mail account.
Send me another (to above address) so I know where to send you an attachment/url/whatever...
A 50% increase in clock frequency... and a 100% increase in L2 cache. A 900Mhz PowerPC 750fx will blow past a 1Ghz 7455 with its limp 256k L2 in a lot of instances.
Alright, let's try and squeeze as much PowerPC in to your $5000 ballpark figure as possible:
Xserve Dual 1.33 base model - $2699 USD
Xserve Dual 1.33 base model - $2699 USD
Total: $5398 USD
Accumulative peak theoretical FLOPS: 38 GigaFLOPS
And against this, a Dual Xeon 3.06Ghz workstation, within the $5000 price range would give you an estimated:
Accumulative peak theoretical FLOPS: 12.24 GigaFLOPS
My figure regarding the Xeon's peak performance is based on the only data I could readily find - from a 2.53 Ghz P4 (@ 5.06 PTGigaFLOPS) - keep in mind that the P4/Xeon's now have a faster bus and 512k L2 cache - I'd suspect these factors might afford a dual 3.02Ghz Xeon rig another 10-30% on top of my peak theoretical figure.
IOW, Take the above Xeon figure with a grain of salt - but also acknowledge that $5000 would buy you around double the peak theoretical floating point performance if you were to go the Apple route.
This is actually Apple's top-end solution - buy as much power as you need - and cluster.
When You'd have to distribute the After Effects rendering in the exact same manner on Dual Xeons/XP (as to my knowledge, AE-for-Windows doesn't multithread natively either) what difference does it make if you pump your frames out of one enclosure or two (or 16?)
The only flaw is, would two separate instances of Adobe's "Render Engine" run on the auxillary XServe (to take advantage of both of its CPU's) without a gruelling software hack? Dunno... On the other hand, I would assume Apple's Shake rendering distribution system properly multithreads on dual systems...
Or, we could just compare prices, in that two 1.25 Ghz G4's from Apple cost roughly the same as a single 3.06 Ghz P4 from Dell... Any idea what two 3Ghz Xeons would cost? Any idea what two XServe Dual 1.3 Ghz "Cluster Models" would cost?
I really wouldn't know, I was basing my knowledge on display-boxen at the local Best Buy...
Nothing to be ashamed of, it's a fun hobby.
On a side note, have you noticed the mass proliferation of Gill Sans over the last 6-12 months? While it's always been a popular font, I have a feeling that its inclusion with both OS X and XP has caused its frequency of usage to skyrocket...
The majority of Hanes-wearers probably think: "WTF? It's a T-shirt?" and can't/won't perceive the less-obvious advantages of a 'designer' shirt.
(for the record: no, I'm not gay - My designer-clothes-wearin' girlfriend's been 'breaking my spirit' over the last 2 years
How about you stick to professing on subjects you truly have some level of expertise on and let those of us that perform these tasks every day prognisticate on which tools best perform tasks, what say? Oops, I see... You're just a petty troll. Carry on...
Heya dad. (yep this is indeed my father)
As you can see as indicated from posts below this thread, it appears that AppleTalk would broadcast to/from the neighbor under OS9, and this isn't infact an OS X/Rendezvous peculiarity.
I'm trying to figure out the Mindspring/Earthlink POP server deal... Try looking for AppleCare documents with Sherlock.
No, it's really not a big deal.
The built-in firewall's been set up to only allow printer and file sharing, and the neighborhood in question is a quaint suburban/rural safety zone.
On the other hand, if I found the same thing happening here in the Big City I might be a little bit more paranoid, and would likely get a Linksys to cap it off. I was curious if there was a way to 'anonymize' the machine without resorting to hardware firewalls.
I don't think he needs some greenhorn pissant telling him what platform best suits his needs. SOMEONE SET UP MY DAD THE RAW SOCKETS
Try again, dingleberry.
Why, then, after 3 years of using this very Cable service has a strange Mac never shown up under the Chooser?
Bingo...
And you wonder why you're constantly modded down...
Do what I do:
:P
System Preferences/Universal Access/Seeing - "Switch to Black on White"
Then, when you need to look at a screenshot/diagram, switch back. Works for me
While GIMP offers a few sprinklings of features from both Photoshop and Illustrator, it is currently by no means ready to replace either in my Dock. As the sibling poster also expressed, I'm not one to cower from new tools or interfaces. I simply appreciate a tool for its face-value; what it offers and how it offers it. Once Adobe released InDesign 1.5, I was ready to abandon QuarkXPress entirely (too bad this sentiment wasn't/isn't more widespread), despite performance deficiencies and lacking features (and plugins).
Again, this wasn't because Adobe has somehow brainwashed me in to some sort of AdobeNazi, but because they had delivered the best tool for the job when the tools were weighed against one another. I don't want GIMP to integrate in to the Adobe (Macromedia, Corel) workflow simply because it's the "dominant application". I want it to integrate so I won't ever have to think: "Now what key-combo did they assign to standard-feature-X again?" I'm lead to believe that you've ever seen someone truly masterful at Photoshop/Illustrator/InDesign/Quark playing the keyboard like an adept pianist. I like the fact that 'command-option-shift-click, drag' works the same between Illustrator, Photoshop and InDesign. I don't need some ugly-stepchild application getting in my way, forcing me to think about 'the alternative key-chord needed to accomplish duplicate-constrain-drag'.
Could I just as easily learn a new set of standardized key-chords? Sure! It's fun! S'like learning a new musical instrument, even. Do I want to have to switch between Trumpet and Oboe all day? Not really. Suppose you're visiting a city in a foreign land. You've rented a car, and the fact that they drive on the opposite side of the street doesn't bother you all too much, you'll adapt. On the other hand, the monarch of this country - a great thinker who is unencumbered by 'universal semaphore methodology' - decided that Red = Go, Yellow = Stop and Green = Yield on the nation's traffic lights. To top this off, the monarch decided that in order to signal a right-hand turn, you must apply the left-hand directional (as this nation has a great sea-faring history and this is how rudders work) and lines painted on the road are center-markers rather than dividers.
Bravo for innovative thinking! I'm sure this system works fine for the people of this land. It's just too bad that people from the rest of the world will find driving there an absolute nightmare. Guess they don't intend to foster too much international trade.
OT .sig comment...
;D most +5 Insightful advice in the entire book.
I was reading through the compilation book of Laz Long's wisdom a couple years back. When I came to that one I said to myself: "exactly"
If GIMP could be rearranged to sufficiently integrate with an Adobe (or perhaps Macromedia, QuarkXPress) workflow, eliminate the perceptible "clunkiness", and add crucial functionalities found in PS (CMYK, Adjustment Layers) then maybe GIMP will find some adoption within design ranks. I am by no means holding my breath.
I'd really like you to qualify that argument with some examples. If you don't have the time/effort to list them, don't sweat it. I would tend to agree, assuming by "Aqua port" you mean a true integration with and adherence to Apple's HIG. Simply slapping a Quartz/Aqua face on the standard functions/layout/menu trees won't do a damned thing in that regard.
Wow! that "anecdote" was a hilarious read. I myself have been playing TacOps lately as Trent_Lott(Seg)MS - no cheating mind you (not sure there are actually any cheats for the Mac) - so I can fully appreciate your little cultural stunt.
;D If I was a CS player and saw you on servers I'd always jump on your team and back your diatribes by declaring the bitch-n-moaners "Unpatriotic Nigger-Lovers" (which is, of course, in direct opposition to my 'meatspace' political and philosophical stances)
You've also convinced me that not all game hackers are slug-fellating scum