No, you took my comment exactly as I intended. But as I posted to someone below you, I believe the idea of culture and passing on knowledge is important ONLY to humans. Why is technology important in the grand scheme of things? Our development has lead from the discovery of fire to exploration of other planets. But I ask, what is the significance of this? The only meaning behind such things is the meaning we give them. The moon does not care that we landed on it. Fish don't care that we've joined them at the bottom of many seas. Only we care. And we care, because accomplishing previously unimaginable feats makes us feel good about ourselves.
I do not mean to say that it is wrong for us to explore and be curious. Far from it. I think it's a truly wondrous thing. But we should realize that "meaning," "purpose," and "superiority" are all human-constructs.
So then what you are saying is that we are "better" than other animals because we strive to "improve" ourselves (either as individuals, a culture, or both), whereas other animals strive simply to survive?
In my book, that makes us "better" than animals. I know that I, for one, would be bored out of my mind picking bugs off of others in my "group" and throwing poo.
Americans hold 2.6 Billion credit cards in their wallets.
That's a BIG wallet!
Re:You still have service fees?
on
ATM Turns 40
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This is the US right? in the UK they tried to introduce them and suffered a serious consumer revolt. I haven't seen one that charges fees for years. In fact, the first bit of text on the screen of almost all UK ATMS is "you will not be charged for this" such was the backlash.
I've used three banks in my years of having bank accounts.
Wellsfargo, Bank of Kirksville, and USBank.
Not one of the three charged for use of their ATM's. If I used the ATM of a bank I did not have an account at, there was usually a $1.25 charge by that bank, but I don't recall having been charged by my bank for doing so (though it's been a while -- I've been with USBank for some years now).
It doesn't matter. AT&T is an upstream ISP. Some content you want, at some point, may very well travel through their network. IOW, you don't need to be a customer to be affected.
Part of the charm of "the internet" is that the ability exists to route around "broken" parts of the network, correct?
Lets use my ISP for example:
If CableOne customers (such as myself) start noticing problems with certain areas, and these areas go through AT&T lines, we will start calling our ISP to complain. When enough people complain, CableOne will put pressure on AT&T to stop it/fix it. If they don't, and CableOne values the cash coming in, they will switch to someone else for their connections.
If the people they are getting their connections aren't AT&T directly, then CableOne will complain to their provider, who will switch or loose CableOne...
Repeat until AT&T stops fucking around or until no one is purchasing their services.
Another option is for Congress/FCC/Whoever has jurisdiction jumps on their back and forces them to quit.
Dealing with AT&T is just not worth it for cheap Internet Service. Even if it were free, I don't think I'd go for it. Besides, if it goes anything like my experience getting phone service from them, that $10 will really be $25 a month with all the extra fees and surcharges they are sure to add on.
Funny you should mention the "extra fees".
I moved into my house March 15'th. I called them (from my cell phone) to see how much "naked" DSL would run me a month. At the time, they had their $19.95 package (Still do). The fee was $24.95 ON TOP OF the $19.95 a month.
Care to guess what a basic phone line costs from them (after fees and taxes)? If you guessed $24.95, you win! I told the lady, "So, to get 'naked dsl', you are charging me exactly the same price as a phone, in the form of a 'fee'. To top it off, you're not going to provide the phone service! How the hell do you people get away with this?!". Her response? "Nooo, sir.. this fee is actually cheaper than bundling in phone service!". My reply was "Lady, I may not have done very well with math when I was in school, however, I'm pretty damned sure $24.95 for a basic phone is the *same* price as the $24.95 "fee" you just tried to charge me for NOT getting phone service." As she started to bumble on, I told her AT&T could stuff the service where the sun isn't shining, and that I was going to call my local cable company (who just started offering phone service).
AT&T can kiss my hairy white ass. They drove me right into the wide-open arms of my local cable provider (CableONE). I have no need for a phone line (haven't had one since I was 20, I'm 30 now...), and I'm not about to sit here and be treated like a fucking moron when I have other choices (there is also a wireless provider in town in addition to the cable company).
Now that many cable companies are starting to offer phone services, I wonder if that will spark a wave of change in how AT&T operates. I'm not going to hold my breath waiting for it, though.
If Wal-Mart decides not to stock HD-DVD (or, for that matter, Blu-Ray) titles, then that's more interesting.
How short the collective/. memory is...
Have we already forgotten about Wal*Mart's plans for HD-DVD?
There were many replies along the lines of "Well, Walmart........", indicating they might/would not carry HD-DVD.
There have been many articles on/. about how Wal*Mart is one of (if not THE) largest video seller in the US right now. There have also been articles about Wal*Mart quickly shooting to the position of #1 seller of HD TV's (outselling Best Buy, Circuit City, etc). That being the case, their carrying of a $300 HD-DVD player in a time when the BD players are twice that can only help HD-DVD.
If IT were unionizable, I'd be on-board in a second. Think about all the stuff you don't typically get as an IT employee... Generous vacation you're actually allowed to take. Clear definitions of your work hours, duties and rules. Not having to play the salary-negotiation shell game. Encouraged long-term employment, and therefore better domain-specific knowledge within your industry. Paid training. Etc.
I have all that, all without the union overhead. Good pay, 15 days vacation per year (starting from the day I was hired), health/dental/vision/disability insurance (that is quite cheap compared to a couple other companies I have worked with), 401k that the employer matches a percentage of (100% match up to 4% of each pay period). Hell, I gave them a pay range I was expecting and they offered the highest number I mentioned, without so much as a dialog (beyond "Hey.. what kind of pay were you expecting?"). In my talking to other employees in the same company, I am paid in the same pay range as they were when they were first hired (we obviously couldn't mention specific numbers -- against the rules, and all that)...
In addition, they offer training courses (online), my hours are set (Monday through Friday, 08:00 to 17:00, with exceptions (event support, etc)), there is lots of opportunity to move up in the company, etc. Our job duties are set when we are hired, but can be changed if *both* parties agree to the changes (good example : both my and my office mates official titles were "Tech Support Specialist II". She recently moved up to lab manager..).
I could keep going on, but I think my point has been made. You *can* find a good company to work for in IT, without the need for a union. If a company you are working for sucks that badly, move on. Eventually they will burn through the workforce and either change their ways, or go under. "But I can't quit my job until I find another!".. Fast food places are always looking, as are grocery stores. Hell, Wal*Mart always needs employees. The pay may not be what you are getting now, but you should be able to "get by" until you can find another IT job. I did it, no reason anyone else couldn't. I had a job at Wal*Mart *and* a local computer shop until I landed my current job -- Full 8 hour shifts at the local computer shop Monday through Friday, and full 8 hour shifts at Wal*Mart (overnight grocery and, later, Deli) 5 days a week (days off varied).
Yes, it sucked working 80 hours a week, having virtually no time for a social life, but it was what life required at the time. If you aren't willing to put up with a little hardship in life to get to a better place, you don't deserve to complain in the first place (in my opinion).
can you come over and clean my house please, since i guess your time is free. how long did it take you to put together that contraption, load the software, check to see that everything works, then start searching for the proper drivers (or compiling your own if you didn't shell out money for windows) for that "$1500 cheaper" hardware you put together?
I knew *someone* would step up with this, too bad it was an AC.
One of the better local computer shops up here charges $80 an hour in shop (which is pretty high -- I've been doing this work for 13-ish years and never encountered shop labor that high). They charge 1 hour labor for installing Windows XP, hardware drivers, and doing all available Critical Windows updates. They also generally charge 1 more hour for assembling the system (depending on how detailed it gets -- sometimes it's only half an hour). This fits well within the $1000-ish difference in price between what I selected and the lowest end Mac Pro.
Why do I know how much they charge? I used to work there before I moved to a better paying position with a multi-national company that provides IT services for Higher Education.
i double checked newegg.com. so yes, ONE 2.66ghz woodcrest xeon is $713.00. soooo... multiply that by two and we have $1426.00 already and that doesn't include the motherboard, FB-DIMM RAM, hard drive, case, cooling, etc. etc. etc. even with just the processors alone it is not a $1500 difference.
so, pray tell, how did you get $1000.43?
To answer both of your questions:
Yes, I did notice that all the Mac Pro's are dual processor (read, two dual core Xeons) *capable*. What you seem to have failed to notice is that they don't all come with dual processors, you jackass.
Also, 2gb of FB-DIMM RAM apparently isn't as expensive as you thought. Here is the best rated set of 1gb FB-DIMM's. $170. Well within what I quoted above.
As I said in a previous message, if you want the parts list I selected (obviously, with updated mainboard/processor), I'll gladly send it along. I admitted the mistake I made when I didn't notice they used a woodcrest processor, and I fixed it (and, obviously, I'm still correct in my pricing or that comment wouldn't be sitting at +4, now would it?).
Now, anything *else* you want to make your self look like more of an idiot over?
...hat $300 Windows Vista Home Basic or XP Home PC is going to be good enough for them to use, and affordable as well. That $579 Mac Mini is going to look like it costs twice as much. They won't know that the Mac Mini has a dual-core processor, or a better video adapter, or a more energy efficient design, or a better DVD drive. All they want is something that works and fits their budget. Unless they got a $579 budget, the Mac Mini would not fit it, but that $300 AMD Septron powered PC with Windows fits their budget.
Things just got worse for you since my last post.
Dell has the Dimension C521 Desktop system with 20" widescreen digital flat panel monitor for $779 - $300 instant discount = $479 + Free Shipping.
That's quite a bit better a machine that I originally quoted.
Face it. Apple hardware *IS* still more expensive than similar (or better!) spec'ed PC's.
your right that the Mac mini is like over a year old with no updates or price changes and is way overpriced... but thats it. Your comments on the Mac Pro show you do not know much about "workstation" level hardware... you even admit it wasn't a dual socket board you used...Which means you didnt even price how much a Xeon system would cost.
Strike 1
The mini received it's updates when the announcement of the switch to Intel came out. Now, whether this was a year ago or not, doesn't matter. What matters is that it has, in fact, had an update.
Sure you can build a highly specific machine that meets your individual needs usually cheaper than buying a pre-made system... but thats about all you proved pricing out your parts at newegg... nothing to do with Apple. The Mac Pro is even cheaper than Dell workstations with similiar configuration.
Strike 2
Nice of you to sling your crap around without actually having seen the parts I selected. Seagate HDD (one of the most expensive of the brands), Thermaltake 600w PS with cable management (bet the Apple doesn't have that!), the same Xeon, a nice case (it was a case that even had sound dampening material in it), a nice Microsoft keyboard and optical mouse (not the most expensive, by far, but still nice), a SATA CD-ROM that was *faster* than listed in the Apple specs. I even chose a 7300gt with the same 256mb RAM.
No.. no.. don't go by what I actually chose. Just pick the part where I said Newegg didn't have the same mainboard, so I chose one as close to what was in the Apple machine as possible, and then decide that everything else I chose was substandard crap (hell, the mainboard was an Asus! Hardly crap... It was also one of the most expensive boards in the catagory (if not the most expensive)).
Looking back, I did spec the wrong processor when I was pricing my machine (I didn't notice that it specified a "woodcrest" core, so I chose the first 2.66ghz I saw in the "Xeon" list). More about that below...
As I said, feel free to email me with the parts list request. I'll gladly send it along.
People get upset about Apple being "overpriced" not because they are, but because they simply do not understand that Apple has no want to compete in all areas of the market. They take Apple machines focused at a different area of the market and try to fit it into their comparisons. Apple really doesn't want everyones business... if you want to custom build a machine with the exact parts you want... you know what... Apple does NOT want your business at all...
Strike 3, you're out!
FUD. Period. I speced out a "Mac Pro", but with 'PC parts', and it came in $1500 LESS than the lowest end Apple Mac Pro. Yes, it didn't have a "server class" mainboard, but those are not $1500, my fiend. Not even close. I just got to looking at the Apple web site and saw they are listing a "woodcrest" processor, so I went back to my list and noticed I did not choose a Woodcrest. Ok. I find the *exact* processor. $713 from Newegg. Newegg doesn't carry any socket 771 boards (that I could find in their "advanced list" of category selections. I go to Tyan's web site, find an 8 ddr2 socket havin', 2 cpu socket sportin' board. Search google for it's model number (Tempest i5000PX), and choose the first link (so I could probably have gotten a better deal if I looked). Find the board for $426 at superwarehouse.com. That is $1138.99. That fits in the price difference between what I spec'ed and Apple's price! That doesn't even include me REMOVING the processor and board I chose in the first place. That means I'm *still* $300-ish cheaper than the Mac Pro!
but the Dell is bigger and louder, probably consumes more electricity, and doesn't run OS X. And 60 GB is plenty for the system drive. By a 500 GB drive from Lacie for $240 and put all your music/video on that instead (and the form factor is a perfect match with the mini's case, and combined will still be smaller than the Dell). So now it's $349 for a machine that is larger and louder than it needs to be, or $839 for a small/quiet machine with 3.5 times the disk space that can run more software.
$249?! for a 500gb drive?! Where the hell are you shopping? Newegg has a 500gb (From Lacie!) for $134! $160 will get you a USB/Firewire drive @ 500gb too!
What, are you Apple users just brainwashed into buying expensive crap, or are you a special case?
(Oooh.. I can feel the karma burning for this post....)
...that $300 Windows Vista Home Basic or XP Home PC is going to be good enough for them to use, and affordable as well. That $579 Mac Mini is going to look like it costs twice as much. They won't know that the Mac Mini has a dual-core processor, or a better video adapter, or a more energy efficient design, or a better DVD drive. All they want is something that works and fits their budget. Unless they got a $579 budget, the Mac Mini would not fit it, but that $300 AMD Septron powered PC with Windows fits their budget.
Mac Mini $599 1.66GHz Core Duo 512mb RAM 60gb SATA DVD Combo Drive (24x) Intel GMA 950 IGP No mouse/keyboard! No monitor No modem
Dell Dimension E521 $529 AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 3800+ 1gb Dual Channel DDR2 @ 667MHz 160gb SATA @ 7200RPM DVD Combo Drive (48x CD-RW) nVidia GeForce 6150 LE IGP Integrated 7.1 Channel Audio Dell USB Keyboard and Dell Optical Mouse 15" Analog Flat Panel 56k Modem
This is why people think Apple is more expensive than, well, any other PC. If you want to keep the processor the same, there is a Dell in the same price range. To add a display from the "customize" page of the mini, you ONLY have a 20" or 23" FP available as a choice (at $599 and $899). Looking at their store, they don't seem to OFFER a 15", 17", or even 19" screen. That is ridiculous. That is why people complain about Apple hardware prices.
I agree with what the article says about the higher-end laptop prices. I thought, when I first read what was in the article "Psssshh.. What a bunch of bull. There has to be several that are very similar in both hardware specs and prices...".. What did I get after about 30 minutes of looking? I couldn't even *find* a 2.4ghz machine in Dell, Lenovo, Compaq/HP, Toshiba, let alone the rest of the hardware. So he was right -- for high end stuff. Many (probably most) will simply not buy it because they don't perceive the need for it (they complain, SURPRISE, about the price!)
For kicks and giggles, I tried to find another "desktop" that would match the price of the Dell I quoted above. Nothing. Closest you'll get is the 17" iMac, which is at 1.83GHz Cor 2 Duo, 160gb HDD, the same 24x "combo drive", and the same video. At $999!
For more kicks and giggles, I decided to also take on the "Mac Pro". At $2499 (I upgraded the ram to 2gb instead of 1gb because I got a good combo deal on a mainboard/2gb RAM -- everything else was stock), putting parts together on NewEgg (sorted by "best rating", not "lowest price", I came up with a similar system, though with only 4 memory slots instead of 8, for $1000.43 (that includes 3 day UPS shipping). Yes, you are reading that correctly. $1500 LESS than the Apple, for essentially the same machine. Newegg didn't have a LGA775 board with 8 slots, though I very much doubt the difference between the one I selected and an 8-slotter would be $1500. It also wasn't a dual-cpu board, but again, there won't be a $1500 price difference. I just realized I didn't add in an OS. If you want to keep the price down, use what you had or linux. Or add $89.99 for XP Home. Still substantially less than the "Mac Pro".
So, overall, I'm going to stick with the "Apple hardware is overpriced compared to PC's!" line, because for the most part, they are.
Is the price difference as HUGE today as it was "back in the day"? No. Is it there? Most definitely.
Incidentally, I saved the part list for the "Mac Pro" counterpart. If anyone would like to see it, contact me at m i k e at s i n e p d o t g o t d n s d o t c o m (Yes, it is a real domain, and yes, the address works -- it's hosted via Google's mail for domains hosting). Realize, though, that I use it for spam catching, mostly, so if you just decide to sign me up for crap, you aren't really going to hurt me. I do check the address each day, so if you really want to see the parts I chose, feel free to email me.
Hot swap is part of the specifications for SATA. Whether any given motherboard or operating system actually supports it...
The board I have (Biostar TForce 550) does bad things when you plug in a SATA drive while the system is in Windows.
I upgraded from another board to this one. Installed Windows onto a freshly formatted drive, then stuck my old drive/windows install onto this board -- no data on the drive! I checked on my brothers machine and the drive was EMPTY. No partitions. I don't know what happened, but I lost a lot of data (though nothing I couldn't recreate/redownload).
I was pissed because I never had a SATA controller do that before. But I learned my lesson -- I'll never hotplug a SATA drive into that board again.
The whole reason both companies do not wish to open up is that it is the software that mostly differentiates the different card lines. When card A is merely Card B at a different clock speed. And Card C is a slower clock and fewer pipelines, who is going to buy card A when they could use card C and get virtually the same performance at half the cost. The community has already come up with overclocking utils. Think of what they could do with full specs?
That isn't our problem, and it isn't something ATI/nVidia *needs* to do (nor do I think they *should* be doing it). They only do it because it's easier to create one card, then cripple it in it's software/onboard BIOS than it is to actually create two cards. This has several side effects that I don't like, including the creation of a "one size fits all" drive that, as nearly all of us have experienced, doesn't work as well as it could (Jack of all trades, master of none? I guess hardware companies skipped that lesson...) *dreaming of a day when hardware vendors will start giving two flying fucks about their customers again*
Doubt me? Look at the default Linksys router Firmware and DD_WRT.
Errr.. I don't understand what you are getting at here. I know the 3rd party firmware offers features that Linksys decided, for whatever reason, not to include. I run tomato on my own WRT54g. I don't do anything fancy with it, but I liked several of its features over the stock firmware (including the ability of it to be a wireless client for a collection of wired PC's).
When hardware companies try to make software, the result is almost inevitably shit. There are some exceptions, but big hardware companies tend to see software development as a 'cost center,' an afterthought to be minimized as much as possible, rather than a critical and major part of their product.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with this, SO LONG AS THEY OPEN UP THE DAMNED SPECS SO THE COMMUNITY CAN WORK WITH IT PROPERLY. I can only assume I'm not the only one who thinks so, either.
I'm sure "the community" would be quite content to have a sample available to them before the hardware comes out (so they can write a driver/software package for it) to help the hardware company. Hell, I'm sure the developers (and the community) would be HAPPY to PAY for the development hardware (don't most console game companies doe this?). I know I'd chip in where I could, and I very much doubt I'm not the only one.
How the hell is my comment flamebait? It is a factual observation of his blog entries. If whatever coward decided to mod me down instead of reply to me did so 'cause of the gay comment, then you apparently don't know about the rules where only gay people can talk about such things and not get in trouble...
Reading through his blogs, he either doesn't have good proofreading skills, or the blogs were made in a hurry. Lots of spelling errors (that *would* have been caught by a spell checker), several sentences that look like the thought train derailed, etc.
If he's a TRUE geek, he'll probably ignore that she's most likely interested in him (or be too shy to ask her, or further still, be gay and not care).
I was going to reply to someone else, further down, but this seems like as good a spot as any.
I can't decide, what do people think, 65 years is basically a life sentence. Is that excessive?
Hell no, 65 years isn't excessive. I've read about 2/3 of the replies to this story and what you ALL seem to have missed is that he's not convicted solely of sending SPAM. Didn't you even read the damned BLURB, let alone TFA? Each crime he committed has a separate punishment and, when combined, equals the 65 years.
Money Laundering, fraud (mail, wire, email), identity theft, evading detection by forging email headers of REAL, INNOCENT, people, using botnets to send his crap (helped him evade detection/arrest, and probably can also be a separate charge for theft of services (computer time, network usage, power consumption).
This bastard BELONGS in jail where he can live with his own kind. All we can hope for is that at least *some* of the inmates he ends up with have received SPAM before they got in there so they can "take care" of him.
Let's all quit shedding tears for this cunt. He doesn't deserve them.
Catch-22. They like to have a "real" number before the car starts selling, but via your method they'd need to sell enough to get an accurate sample.
Many cars are driven around in "normal situations" by test drivers. Many car magazine photographers do their best to try to get snaps of these cars.. They could use the data from these cars to do their estimates. For cars that aren't test driven, they could start.
My car (an '07 Caliber) was rated at "28 to 32 MPG". I consistently get 26 or less.:(
To those who are saying "CCA doesn't recognize perfectly good antivirus packages" (and other sorts of comments). Most, if not all, of that is configurable on the backend. If your school forces McAfee, they likely removed (or never added) other products to the CCA server. The college for which I work supports Symantec, McAfee (which we give away to students), AVG, and at least a few others.
If your CCA isn't acceping an antivirus scanner you like, why not go through the proper channels to find out *why* it's not supported and see about getting that fixed?
That's why I buy Epson and generic ink. It costs me $2.50 for black, $2.75/color(3=RGB). That's $10.75 to fully restock the printer. They last just a tad shorter than the OEM due to dry-out, but have excellent quality.
(guy-who-has-had-to-repair-way-too-many-Epson-prin ters) Yeah. It's too bad, that ink dry-out. Ruins a lot of print heads that are, in some cases, just as expensive (if not more-so) than HP's cartridges. (/guy-who-has-had-to-repair-way-too-many-Epson-pri nters)
I downloaded the plugin just to give it a try. Never had any problems with embedded video except at cnn.com I thought maybe the plugin would fix that problem. After installing and giving firefox a restart, it still won't work with the cnn.com and nothing else appears to be different. Not sure what the point of the plugin was, but don't waste your time with it like I did. It solved nothing from what it appears to me. Using Firefox 2.0.0.3 on Windows XP Pro SP2
Worked perfectly for me in Vista Enterprise. I didn't even have to restart Firefox (2.0.0.3). I'll be testing an XP machine I just put together shortly.
For those wishing not to use this update, for whatever your reasons, you can take three.dll files from an XP/WMP10 install and have working embedded video in Firefox under Vista.
Those three files are : npdsplay.dll, npdrmv2.dll, and npwmsdrm.dll
The last two are most likely optional, but I copied them anyway. The only drawback (if you can really call it that) is that the lower part of the embedded window are cut off by a few pixels, but it works perfectly fine.
Luckily for me, I'm surrounded by roughly 1800-ish XP machines, so I had no problems finding the files. I'm sure you all have someone you know with an XP machine that you could grab a copy of these files from.
This information is also available at various web pages if you look in Google.
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Why does no one ever show love for LANTastic?!
No, you took my comment exactly as I intended. But as I posted to someone below you, I believe the idea of culture and passing on knowledge is important ONLY to humans. Why is technology important in the grand scheme of things? Our development has lead from the discovery of fire to exploration of other planets. But I ask, what is the significance of this? The only meaning behind such things is the meaning we give them. The moon does not care that we landed on it. Fish don't care that we've joined them at the bottom of many seas. Only we care. And we care, because accomplishing previously unimaginable feats makes us feel good about ourselves.
I do not mean to say that it is wrong for us to explore and be curious. Far from it. I think it's a truly wondrous thing. But we should realize that "meaning," "purpose," and "superiority" are all human-constructs.
So then what you are saying is that we are "better" than other animals because we strive to "improve" ourselves (either as individuals, a culture, or both), whereas other animals strive simply to survive?
In my book, that makes us "better" than animals. I know that I, for one, would be bored out of my mind picking bugs off of others in my "group" and throwing poo.
Americans hold 2.6 Billion credit cards in their wallets.
That's a BIG wallet!
This is the US right? in the UK they tried to introduce them and suffered a serious consumer revolt. I haven't seen one that charges fees for years. In fact, the first bit of text on the screen of almost all UK ATMS is "you will not be charged for this" such was the backlash.
I've used three banks in my years of having bank accounts.
Wellsfargo, Bank of Kirksville, and USBank.
Not one of the three charged for use of their ATM's. If I used the ATM of a bank I did not have an account at, there was usually a $1.25 charge by that bank, but I don't recall having been charged by my bank for doing so (though it's been a while -- I've been with USBank for some years now).
It doesn't matter. AT&T is an upstream ISP. Some content you want, at some point, may very well travel through their network. IOW, you don't need to be a customer to be affected.
Part of the charm of "the internet" is that the ability exists to route around "broken" parts of the network, correct?
Lets use my ISP for example:
If CableOne customers (such as myself) start noticing problems with certain areas, and these areas go through AT&T lines, we will start calling our ISP to complain. When enough people complain, CableOne will put pressure on AT&T to stop it/fix it. If they don't, and CableOne values the cash coming in, they will switch to someone else for their connections.
If the people they are getting their connections aren't AT&T directly, then CableOne will complain to their provider, who will switch or loose CableOne...
Repeat until AT&T stops fucking around or until no one is purchasing their services.
Another option is for Congress/FCC/Whoever has jurisdiction jumps on their back and forces them to quit.
Dealing with AT&T is just not worth it for cheap Internet Service. Even if it were free, I don't think I'd go for it. Besides, if it goes anything like my experience getting phone service from them, that $10 will really be $25 a month with all the extra fees and surcharges they are sure to add on.
Funny you should mention the "extra fees".
I moved into my house March 15'th. I called them (from my cell phone) to see how much "naked" DSL would run me a month. At the time, they had their $19.95 package (Still do). The fee was $24.95 ON TOP OF the $19.95 a month.
Care to guess what a basic phone line costs from them (after fees and taxes)? If you guessed $24.95, you win! I told the lady, "So, to get 'naked dsl', you are charging me exactly the same price as a phone, in the form of a 'fee'. To top it off, you're not going to provide the phone service! How the hell do you people get away with this?!". Her response? "Nooo, sir.. this fee is actually cheaper than bundling in phone service!". My reply was "Lady, I may not have done very well with math when I was in school, however, I'm pretty damned sure $24.95 for a basic phone is the *same* price as the $24.95 "fee" you just tried to charge me for NOT getting phone service." As she started to bumble on, I told her AT&T could stuff the service where the sun isn't shining, and that I was going to call my local cable company (who just started offering phone service).
AT&T can kiss my hairy white ass. They drove me right into the wide-open arms of my local cable provider (CableONE). I have no need for a phone line (haven't had one since I was 20, I'm 30 now...), and I'm not about to sit here and be treated like a fucking moron when I have other choices (there is also a wireless provider in town in addition to the cable company).
Now that many cable companies are starting to offer phone services, I wonder if that will spark a wave of change in how AT&T operates. I'm not going to hold my breath waiting for it, though.
If Wal-Mart decides not to stock HD-DVD (or, for that matter, Blu-Ray) titles, then that's more interesting.
/. memory is...
/. about how Wal*Mart is one of (if not THE) largest video seller in the US right now. There have also been articles about Wal*Mart quickly shooting to the position of #1 seller of HD TV's (outselling Best Buy, Circuit City, etc). That being the case, their carrying of a $300 HD-DVD player in a time when the BD players are twice that can only help HD-DVD.
How short the collective
Have we already forgotten about Wal*Mart's plans for HD-DVD?
There were many replies along the lines of "Well, Walmart........", indicating they might/would not carry HD-DVD.
There have been many articles on
That webpage says "We goofed", but I don't see the most important part of an apology.
The "These are the steps that we have taken to insure that this does not happen in the future" part.
Not only that, but it reads like a big advertisement..
"We goofed. We admit it. Here's all the stuff we want you to look at while you're considering buying another computer..."
Not good. I build my own systems, but guess where I *won't* be sending friends/co-workers/family in the future?
If IT were unionizable, I'd be on-board in a second. Think about all the stuff you don't typically get as an IT employee... Generous vacation you're actually allowed to take. Clear definitions of your work hours, duties and rules. Not having to play the salary-negotiation shell game. Encouraged long-term employment, and therefore better domain-specific knowledge within your industry. Paid training. Etc.
I have all that, all without the union overhead. Good pay, 15 days vacation per year (starting from the day I was hired), health/dental/vision/disability insurance (that is quite cheap compared to a couple other companies I have worked with), 401k that the employer matches a percentage of (100% match up to 4% of each pay period). Hell, I gave them a pay range I was expecting and they offered the highest number I mentioned, without so much as a dialog (beyond "Hey.. what kind of pay were you expecting?"). In my talking to other employees in the same company, I am paid in the same pay range as they were when they were first hired (we obviously couldn't mention specific numbers -- against the rules, and all that)...
In addition, they offer training courses (online), my hours are set (Monday through Friday, 08:00 to 17:00, with exceptions (event support, etc)), there is lots of opportunity to move up in the company, etc. Our job duties are set when we are hired, but can be changed if *both* parties agree to the changes (good example : both my and my office mates official titles were "Tech Support Specialist II". She recently moved up to lab manager..).
I could keep going on, but I think my point has been made. You *can* find a good company to work for in IT, without the need for a union. If a company you are working for sucks that badly, move on. Eventually they will burn through the workforce and either change their ways, or go under. "But I can't quit my job until I find another!".. Fast food places are always looking, as are grocery stores. Hell, Wal*Mart always needs employees. The pay may not be what you are getting now, but you should be able to "get by" until you can find another IT job. I did it, no reason anyone else couldn't. I had a job at Wal*Mart *and* a local computer shop until I landed my current job -- Full 8 hour shifts at the local computer shop Monday through Friday, and full 8 hour shifts at Wal*Mart (overnight grocery and, later, Deli) 5 days a week (days off varied).
Yes, it sucked working 80 hours a week, having virtually no time for a social life, but it was what life required at the time. If you aren't willing to put up with a little hardship in life to get to a better place, you don't deserve to complain in the first place (in my opinion).
can you come over and clean my house please, since i guess your time is free.
how long did it take you to put together that contraption, load the software, check to see that everything works, then start searching for the proper drivers (or compiling your own if you didn't shell out money for windows) for that "$1500 cheaper" hardware you put together?
I knew *someone* would step up with this, too bad it was an AC.
One of the better local computer shops up here charges $80 an hour in shop (which is pretty high -- I've been doing this work for 13-ish years and never encountered shop labor that high). They charge 1 hour labor for installing Windows XP, hardware drivers, and doing all available Critical Windows updates. They also generally charge 1 more hour for assembling the system (depending on how detailed it gets -- sometimes it's only half an hour). This fits well within the $1000-ish difference in price between what I selected and the lowest end Mac Pro.
Why do I know how much they charge? I used to work there before I moved to a better paying position with a multi-national company that provides IT services for Higher Education.
i double checked newegg.com. so yes, ONE 2.66ghz woodcrest xeon is $713.00. soooo... multiply that by two and we have $1426.00 already and that doesn't include the motherboard, FB-DIMM RAM, hard drive, case, cooling, etc. etc. etc. even with just the processors alone it is not a $1500 difference.
so, pray tell, how did you get $1000.43?
To answer both of your questions:
Yes, I did notice that all the Mac Pro's are dual processor (read, two dual core Xeons) *capable*. What you seem to have failed to notice is that they don't all come with dual processors, you jackass.
Also, 2gb of FB-DIMM RAM apparently isn't as expensive as you thought. Here is the best rated set of 1gb FB-DIMM's. $170. Well within what I quoted above.
As I said in a previous message, if you want the parts list I selected (obviously, with updated mainboard/processor), I'll gladly send it along. I admitted the mistake I made when I didn't notice they used a woodcrest processor, and I fixed it (and, obviously, I'm still correct in my pricing or that comment wouldn't be sitting at +4, now would it?).
Now, anything *else* you want to make your self look like more of an idiot over?
...hat $300 Windows Vista Home Basic or XP Home PC is going to be good enough for them to use, and affordable as well. That $579 Mac Mini is going to look like it costs twice as much. They won't know that the Mac Mini has a dual-core processor, or a better video adapter, or a more energy efficient design, or a better DVD drive. All they want is something that works and fits their budget. Unless they got a $579 budget, the Mac Mini would not fit it, but that $300 AMD Septron powered PC with Windows fits their budget.
Things just got worse for you since my last post.
Dell has the Dimension C521 Desktop system with 20" widescreen digital flat panel monitor for $779 - $300 instant discount = $479 + Free Shipping.
That's quite a bit better a machine that I originally quoted.
Face it. Apple hardware *IS* still more expensive than similar (or better!) spec'ed PC's.
your right that the Mac mini is like over a year old with no updates or price changes and is way overpriced... but thats it. Your comments on the Mac Pro show you do not know much about "workstation" level hardware... you even admit it wasn't a dual socket board you used...Which means you didnt even price how much a Xeon system would cost.
Strike 1
The mini received it's updates when the announcement of the switch to Intel came out. Now, whether this was a year ago or not, doesn't matter. What matters is that it has, in fact, had an update.
Sure you can build a highly specific machine that meets your individual needs usually cheaper than buying a pre-made system... but thats about all you proved pricing out your parts at newegg... nothing to do with Apple. The Mac Pro is even cheaper than Dell workstations with similiar configuration.
Strike 2
Nice of you to sling your crap around without actually having seen the parts I selected. Seagate HDD (one of the most expensive of the brands), Thermaltake 600w PS with cable management (bet the Apple doesn't have that!), the same Xeon, a nice case (it was a case that even had sound dampening material in it), a nice Microsoft keyboard and optical mouse (not the most expensive, by far, but still nice), a SATA CD-ROM that was *faster* than listed in the Apple specs. I even chose a 7300gt with the same 256mb RAM.
No.. no.. don't go by what I actually chose. Just pick the part where I said Newegg didn't have the same mainboard, so I chose one as close to what was in the Apple machine as possible, and then decide that everything else I chose was substandard crap (hell, the mainboard was an Asus! Hardly crap... It was also one of the most expensive boards in the catagory (if not the most expensive)).
Looking back, I did spec the wrong processor when I was pricing my machine (I didn't notice that it specified a "woodcrest" core, so I chose the first 2.66ghz I saw in the "Xeon" list). More about that below...
As I said, feel free to email me with the parts list request. I'll gladly send it along.
People get upset about Apple being "overpriced" not because they are, but because they simply do not understand that Apple has no want to compete in all areas of the market. They take Apple machines focused at a different area of the market and try to fit it into their comparisons. Apple really doesn't want everyones business... if you want to custom build a machine with the exact parts you want... you know what... Apple does NOT want your business at all...
Strike 3, you're out!
FUD. Period. I speced out a "Mac Pro", but with 'PC parts', and it came in $1500 LESS than the lowest end Apple Mac Pro. Yes, it didn't have a "server class" mainboard, but those are not $1500, my fiend. Not even close. I just got to looking at the Apple web site and saw they are listing a "woodcrest" processor, so I went back to my list and noticed I did not choose a Woodcrest. Ok. I find the *exact* processor. $713 from Newegg. Newegg doesn't carry any socket 771 boards (that I could find in their "advanced list" of category selections. I go to Tyan's web site, find an 8 ddr2 socket havin', 2 cpu socket sportin' board. Search google for it's model number (Tempest i5000PX), and choose the first link (so I could probably have gotten a better deal if I looked). Find the board for $426 at superwarehouse.com. That is $1138.99. That fits in the price difference between what I spec'ed and Apple's price! That doesn't even include me REMOVING the processor and board I chose in the first place. That means I'm *still* $300-ish cheaper than the Mac Pro!
You Fail It!
but the Dell is bigger and louder, probably consumes more electricity, and doesn't run OS X. And 60 GB is plenty for the system drive. By a 500 GB drive from Lacie for $240 and put all your music/video on that instead (and the form factor is a perfect match with the mini's case, and combined will still be smaller than the Dell). So now it's $349 for a machine that is larger and louder than it needs to be, or $839 for a small/quiet machine with 3.5 times the disk space that can run more software.
$249?! for a 500gb drive?! Where the hell are you shopping? Newegg has a 500gb (From Lacie!) for $134! $160 will get you a USB/Firewire drive @ 500gb too!
What, are you Apple users just brainwashed into buying expensive crap, or are you a special case?
(Oooh.. I can feel the karma burning for this post....)
...that $300 Windows Vista Home Basic or XP Home PC is going to be good enough for them to use, and affordable as well. That $579 Mac Mini is going to look like it costs twice as much. They won't know that the Mac Mini has a dual-core processor, or a better video adapter, or a more energy efficient design, or a better DVD drive. All they want is something that works and fits their budget. Unless they got a $579 budget, the Mac Mini would not fit it, but that $300 AMD Septron powered PC with Windows fits their budget.
.. What did I get after about 30 minutes of looking? I couldn't even *find* a 2.4ghz machine in Dell, Lenovo, Compaq/HP, Toshiba, let alone the rest of the hardware. So he was right -- for high end stuff. Many (probably most) will simply not buy it because they don't perceive the need for it (they complain, SURPRISE, about the price!)
Mac Mini
$599
1.66GHz Core Duo
512mb RAM
60gb SATA
DVD Combo Drive (24x)
Intel GMA 950 IGP
No mouse/keyboard!
No monitor
No modem
Dell Dimension E521
$529
AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 3800+
1gb Dual Channel DDR2 @ 667MHz
160gb SATA @ 7200RPM
DVD Combo Drive (48x CD-RW)
nVidia GeForce 6150 LE IGP
Integrated 7.1 Channel Audio
Dell USB Keyboard and Dell Optical Mouse
15" Analog Flat Panel
56k Modem
This is why people think Apple is more expensive than, well, any other PC. If you want to keep the processor the same, there is a Dell in the same price range. To add a display from the "customize" page of the mini, you ONLY have a 20" or 23" FP available as a choice (at $599 and $899). Looking at their store, they don't seem to OFFER a 15", 17", or even 19" screen. That is ridiculous. That is why people complain about Apple hardware prices.
I agree with what the article says about the higher-end laptop prices. I thought, when I first read what was in the article "Psssshh.. What a bunch of bull. There has to be several that are very similar in both hardware specs and prices..."
For kicks and giggles, I tried to find another "desktop" that would match the price of the Dell I quoted above. Nothing. Closest you'll get is the 17" iMac, which is at 1.83GHz Cor 2 Duo, 160gb HDD, the same 24x "combo drive", and the same video. At $999!
For more kicks and giggles, I decided to also take on the "Mac Pro". At $2499 (I upgraded the ram to 2gb instead of 1gb because I got a good combo deal on a mainboard/2gb RAM -- everything else was stock), putting parts together on NewEgg (sorted by "best rating", not "lowest price", I came up with a similar system, though with only 4 memory slots instead of 8, for $1000.43 (that includes 3 day UPS shipping). Yes, you are reading that correctly. $1500 LESS than the Apple, for essentially the same machine. Newegg didn't have a LGA775 board with 8 slots, though I very much doubt the difference between the one I selected and an 8-slotter would be $1500. It also wasn't a dual-cpu board, but again, there won't be a $1500 price difference. I just realized I didn't add in an OS. If you want to keep the price down, use what you had or linux. Or add $89.99 for XP Home. Still substantially less than the "Mac Pro".
So, overall, I'm going to stick with the "Apple hardware is overpriced compared to PC's!" line, because for the most part, they are.
Is the price difference as HUGE today as it was "back in the day"? No. Is it there? Most definitely.
Incidentally, I saved the part list for the "Mac Pro" counterpart. If anyone would like to see it, contact me at m i k e at s i n e p d o t g o t d n s d o t c o m (Yes, it is a real domain, and yes, the address works -- it's hosted via Google's mail for domains hosting). Realize, though, that I use it for spam catching, mostly, so if you just decide to sign me up for crap, you aren't really going to hurt me. I do check the address each day, so if you really want to see the parts I chose, feel free to email me.
Hot swap is part of the specifications for SATA. Whether any given motherboard or operating system actually supports it...
The board I have (Biostar TForce 550) does bad things when you plug in a SATA drive while the system is in Windows.
I upgraded from another board to this one. Installed Windows onto a freshly formatted drive, then stuck my old drive/windows install onto this board -- no data on the drive! I checked on my brothers machine and the drive was EMPTY. No partitions. I don't know what happened, but I lost a lot of data (though nothing I couldn't recreate/redownload).
I was pissed because I never had a SATA controller do that before. But I learned my lesson -- I'll never hotplug a SATA drive into that board again.
The whole reason both companies do not wish to open up is that it is the software that mostly differentiates the different card lines. When card A is merely Card B at a different clock speed. And Card C is a slower clock and fewer pipelines, who is going to buy card A when they could use card C and get virtually the same performance at half the cost. The community has already come up with overclocking utils. Think of what they could do with full specs?
That isn't our problem, and it isn't something ATI/nVidia *needs* to do (nor do I think they *should* be doing it). They only do it because it's easier to create one card, then cripple it in it's software/onboard BIOS than it is to actually create two cards. This has several side effects that I don't like, including the creation of a "one size fits all" drive that, as nearly all of us have experienced, doesn't work as well as it could (Jack of all trades, master of none? I guess hardware companies skipped that lesson...) *dreaming of a day when hardware vendors will start giving two flying fucks about their customers again*
Doubt me? Look at the default Linksys router Firmware and DD_WRT.
Errr.. I don't understand what you are getting at here. I know the 3rd party firmware offers features that Linksys decided, for whatever reason, not to include. I run tomato on my own WRT54g. I don't do anything fancy with it, but I liked several of its features over the stock firmware (including the ability of it to be a wireless client for a collection of wired PC's).
When hardware companies try to make software, the result is almost inevitably shit. There are some exceptions, but big hardware companies tend to see software development as a 'cost center,' an afterthought to be minimized as much as possible, rather than a critical and major part of their product.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with this, SO LONG AS THEY OPEN UP THE DAMNED SPECS SO THE COMMUNITY CAN WORK WITH IT PROPERLY. I can only assume I'm not the only one who thinks so, either.
I'm sure "the community" would be quite content to have a sample available to them before the hardware comes out (so they can write a driver/software package for it) to help the hardware company. Hell, I'm sure the developers (and the community) would be HAPPY to PAY for the development hardware (don't most console game companies doe this?). I know I'd chip in where I could, and I very much doubt I'm not the only one.
How the hell is my comment flamebait? It is a factual observation of his blog entries. If whatever coward decided to mod me down instead of reply to me did so 'cause of the gay comment, then you apparently don't know about the rules where only gay people can talk about such things and not get in trouble...
Reading through his blogs, he either doesn't have good proofreading skills, or the blogs were made in a hurry. Lots of spelling errors (that *would* have been caught by a spell checker), several sentences that look like the thought train derailed, etc.
If he's a TRUE geek, he'll probably ignore that she's most likely interested in him (or be too shy to ask her, or further still, be gay and not care).
I was going to reply to someone else, further down, but this seems like as good a spot as any.
I can't decide, what do people think, 65 years is basically a life sentence. Is that excessive?
Hell no, 65 years isn't excessive. I've read about 2/3 of the replies to this story and what you ALL seem to have missed is that he's not convicted solely of sending SPAM. Didn't you even read the damned BLURB, let alone TFA? Each crime he committed has a separate punishment and, when combined, equals the 65 years.
Money Laundering, fraud (mail, wire, email), identity theft, evading detection by forging email headers of REAL, INNOCENT, people, using botnets to send his crap (helped him evade detection/arrest, and probably can also be a separate charge for theft of services (computer time, network usage, power consumption).
This bastard BELONGS in jail where he can live with his own kind. All we can hope for is that at least *some* of the inmates he ends up with have received SPAM before they got in there so they can "take care" of him.
Let's all quit shedding tears for this cunt. He doesn't deserve them.
Catch-22. They like to have a "real" number before the car starts selling, but via your method they'd need to sell enough to get an accurate sample.
:(
Many cars are driven around in "normal situations" by test drivers. Many car magazine photographers do their best to try to get snaps of these cars.. They could use the data from these cars to do their estimates. For cars that aren't test driven, they could start.
My car (an '07 Caliber) was rated at "28 to 32 MPG". I consistently get 26 or less.
To those who are saying "CCA doesn't recognize perfectly good antivirus packages" (and other sorts of comments). Most, if not all, of that is configurable on the backend. If your school forces McAfee, they likely removed (or never added) other products to the CCA server. The college for which I work supports Symantec, McAfee (which we give away to students), AVG, and at least a few others.
If your CCA isn't acceping an antivirus scanner you like, why not go through the proper channels to find out *why* it's not supported and see about getting that fixed?
That's why I buy Epson and generic ink. It costs me $2.50 for black, $2.75/color(3=RGB). That's $10.75 to fully restock the printer. They last just a tad shorter than the OEM due to dry-out, but have excellent quality.
n ters)i nters)
(guy-who-has-had-to-repair-way-too-many-Epson-pri
Yeah. It's too bad, that ink dry-out. Ruins a lot of print heads that are, in some cases, just as expensive (if not more-so) than HP's cartridges.
(/guy-who-has-had-to-repair-way-too-many-Epson-pr
I downloaded the plugin just to give it a try. Never had any problems with embedded video except at cnn.com I thought maybe the plugin would fix that problem. After installing and giving firefox a restart, it still won't work with the cnn.com and nothing else appears to be different. Not sure what the point of the plugin was, but don't waste your time with it like I did. It solved nothing from what it appears to me. Using Firefox 2.0.0.3 on Windows XP Pro SP2
.dll files from an XP/WMP10 install and have working embedded video in Firefox under Vista.
Worked perfectly for me in Vista Enterprise. I didn't even have to restart Firefox (2.0.0.3). I'll be testing an XP machine I just put together shortly.
For those wishing not to use this update, for whatever your reasons, you can take three
Those three files are : npdsplay.dll, npdrmv2.dll, and npwmsdrm.dll
The last two are most likely optional, but I copied them anyway. The only drawback (if you can really call it that) is that the lower part of the embedded window are cut off by a few pixels, but it works perfectly fine.
Luckily for me, I'm surrounded by roughly 1800-ish XP machines, so I had no problems finding the files. I'm sure you all have someone you know with an XP machine that you could grab a copy of these files from.
This information is also available at various web pages if you look in Google.