why can't we buy and use "PC" Video cards? What is it that makes vendors have to build EPROMs differently (Different?) for the Mac vs. Windows machines for the exact same card otherwise?
Because x86 stores data backwards (the big/little endian thing) as compared to almost every other processor, including the PowerPC.
The new dual 2.5GHz does NOT use a heat pipe! From the webpage, Apple states
Apple designed a sophisticated liquid cooling system that takes off the heat without bumping up the noise. Mac OS X dynamically adjusts the flow of the fluid and the speed of the fans based on temperature.
If it has a pump, it's not a heat pipe.
BTW, the prior G5 models (and new lower-end models) do use heat pipes.
What's odd: no pictures of the internals of the liquid-cooled model yet.
In a related tactic, I recall that SCO complained that IBM provided them AIX source code on CD -- but concatenated as one 800MB file per disc. True? IBM seemed to be above that...
While SCO's lawyers may be looking to increase billable hours, methinks it's more of a delay tactic and fishing expedition.
If an advanced race left their world eons ago, we would see them. They would be here.
They are here: mice (or is it dolphins-- need to brush up on my Douglas Adams).
Seriously though, pretty egotistical to imagine that an advanced race would have the slightest interest in humanity. Hell, most _people_ have no interest in humanity.
Trust me. Running an app on a cluster or a big smp box is just about the same.
No. MPI vs. pthreads can hardly called "about the same."
That sounds like an office lan to me, not a cluster. Clusters havn't used 10mbit ethernet in a long, long time. Many utilize interconnect technology like infiniband, myrinet, or dolphin which can go up to 800 MByte/sec.
I wish you were correct. I know of a new Alpha cluster that uses 100MB ethernet. Specialized interconnects are certainly better, but those in charge do not always wish to pay for them.
I can't have a camera phone, you insensitive clod!
Seriously though, camera phones are being banned by quite a few companies (including Samsung!) -- yet it is very difficult to find anything but the lowest-end (and largest) phone without a camera.
Clear concise programs that allow the programmer to understand -- and easily modify -- what is really happening matter more than worrying about (often) irrelevant details. This is certainly influenced by the language chosen.
e.g. I'm working on a large F77 program (ugh...) that I am certain would be much _faster_ in C++ simply because I could actually understand what the code was doing, rather than trying to trace through tens (if not hundreds) of goto statements. Not to mention actually being able to use CS concepts developed over the past 30 years...
only costs $1000 for unlimited clients. That seems pretty cheap. You have to buy Mac hardware though, so it makes sense that they don't charge as much for the OS.
Note: the new G5 XServes come bundled with an unlimited client license.
the Performance Ratings are a very poor way to describe a processor...
I agree it's all marketing, but...
As a data-point, I recently upgraded from an Athlon 2400 to the 3200 -- a 30% improvement in "PR," and saw my benchmarks go up almost exactly 30%. By benchmarks here I'm talking about a CPU bound computational mechanics code I wrote for my thesis. About as useful to everyone else as SPEC, but very relevant to me.
One word: Photoshop. Bzzt...Gimp doesn't count so don't bother.
I agree that Gimp 1.x has a GUI designed by a masochist. Check out version 2 though -- much better IMHO.
Nevertheless, more commercial apps and a gorgeous desktop that is truly ready for grandma and grandpa, with BSD, X11, and GCC for junior. Other than being completely "free as in freedom," and games, what else could you want?
[Microsoft] will continue to dominate the industry, unless Linux kicks up its advertising campaign and targets the big guys.
Linux who? Linus?
IBM has been advertising linux to some extent, but they are not the unified behemoth that Microsoft is, and neither RedHat or any other distro has the capital necessary to compete with the MS marketing machine. Who else is there? Novell? Hopefully someday.
Microsoft is only really good at one thing: marketing. Unfortunately, it almost seems to be the only thing that matters.
anyways think about the overkill of developing such an elegant solution for such a minor problem. i mean those few percentages of performance enhancement...
I'm sure some people would love a few percent improvement in their SPEC results...
Personally, I have an algorithm that I'm running hundreds of millions of times as part of a larger calculation for my PhD research. I'd love a "few percent" improvement simply by changing the compiler flags.
Acovea is curently a research tool in its own right, and not quite ready for application to general problems. Some issues that require modest effort to resolve:
1) Code currently is pentium3/4 centric 2) Optimizes flags for gcc 3.4 or intel's compiler 3) Cannot easily handle code residing in more than one file.
It is not really 0.4" thick either - but a wedge. With that kind of logic a manufacturer could sharpen the "wedge" into a knife-edge at the front. I can see the new marketing slogan:
It slices, it dices, it runs XL, Word, and Halo. The only laptop that's one atom thick!
That's marketing drivel for you. Nevertheless, other than the keyboard placement, it does look pretty nice (and thin).
Here is the press release from Craig Ventner's 'Institute for Biological Energy Alternatives.'
What an odd name: reading about IBEA at the site's homepage, it seems that their goal is to create fuel using designer microbes to extract carbon from the atmosphere.
Slashdot Mirror
Keep in mind it will almost certainly always be cheaper and easier to send something into space that you don't care about getting back.
Congressmen in space?
why can't we buy and use "PC" Video cards? What is it that makes vendors have to build EPROMs differently (Different?) for the Mac vs. Windows machines for the exact same card otherwise?
Because x86 stores data backwards (the big/little endian thing) as compared to almost every other processor, including the PowerPC.
Thus the card firmware needs to be different...
what i really want to know is can i walk into a place with a pdf and get my own book bound and printed.
... Kinko's? Some of them are able to perfect-bind (like a paperback book).
Uh
Otherwise, do a Google for "short run publishing" -- although many of these will want to do more than one copy.
If it has a pump, it's not a heat pipe.
BTW, the prior G5 models (and new lower-end models) do use heat pipes.
What's odd: no pictures of the internals of the liquid-cooled model yet.
In a related tactic, I recall that SCO complained that IBM provided them AIX source code on CD -- but concatenated as one 800MB file per disc. True? IBM seemed to be above that...
While SCO's lawyers may be looking to increase billable hours, methinks it's more of a delay tactic and fishing expedition.
If an advanced race left their world eons ago, we would see them. They would be here.
They are here: mice (or is it dolphins-- need to brush up on my Douglas Adams).
Seriously though, pretty egotistical to imagine that an advanced race would have the slightest interest in humanity. Hell, most _people_ have no interest in humanity.
Trust me. Running an app on a cluster or a big smp box is just about the same.
No. MPI vs. pthreads can hardly called "about the same."
That sounds like an office lan to me, not a cluster. Clusters havn't used 10mbit ethernet in a long, long time. Many utilize interconnect technology like infiniband, myrinet, or dolphin which can go up to 800 MByte/sec.
I wish you were correct. I know of a new Alpha cluster that uses 100MB ethernet. Specialized interconnects are certainly better, but those in charge do not always wish to pay for them.
Perhaps Big Mac will change this...
I can't have a camera phone, you insensitive clod!
Seriously though, camera phones are being banned by quite a few companies (including Samsung!) -- yet it is very difficult to find anything but the lowest-end (and largest) phone without a camera.
Don't even get me started about color screens...
Not what I got out of it at all, rather:
Clear concise programs that allow the programmer to understand -- and easily modify -- what is really happening matter more than worrying about (often) irrelevant details. This is certainly influenced by the language chosen.
e.g. I'm working on a large F77 program (ugh...) that I am certain would be much _faster_ in C++ simply because I could actually understand what the code was doing, rather than trying to trace through tens (if not hundreds) of goto statements. Not to mention actually being able to use CS concepts developed over the past 30 years...
the search for "ether."
Lemme know when someone figures out what is really going on.
What's to explain: you work in IT, right?
Any manager that has a problem with moving jobs must've been asleep since 2000.
As everyone says: just be honest.
only costs $1000 for unlimited clients. That seems pretty cheap. You have to buy Mac hardware though, so it makes sense that they don't charge as much for the OS.
Note: the new G5 XServes come bundled with an unlimited client license.
You've forgotten the best part about using Firebird & Thunderbird:
your email program doesn't crash when your browser does.
Moz itself doesn't crash that often, but plugins brought it down several times per day for me. A serious flaw in the design IMHO.
the Performance Ratings are a very poor way to describe a processor...
...
I agree it's all marketing, but
As a data-point, I recently upgraded from an Athlon 2400 to the 3200 -- a 30% improvement in "PR," and saw my benchmarks go up almost exactly 30%. By benchmarks here I'm talking about a CPU bound computational mechanics code I wrote for my thesis. About as useful to everyone else as SPEC, but very relevant to me.
As usual, YMMV.
One word: Photoshop.
Bzzt...Gimp doesn't count so don't bother.
I agree that Gimp 1.x has a GUI designed by a masochist. Check out version 2 though -- much better IMHO.
Nevertheless, more commercial apps and a gorgeous desktop that is truly ready for grandma and grandpa, with BSD, X11, and GCC for junior. Other than being completely "free as in freedom," and games, what else could you want?
[Microsoft] will continue to dominate the industry, unless Linux kicks up its advertising campaign and targets the big guys.
Linux who? Linus?
IBM has been advertising linux to some extent, but they are not the unified behemoth that Microsoft is, and neither RedHat or any other distro has the capital necessary to compete with the MS marketing machine. Who else is there? Novell? Hopefully someday.
Microsoft is only really good at one thing: marketing. Unfortunately, it almost seems to be the only thing that matters.
You mean like this one?
batshit insane neocons like Hatch, Coulter, O'Reilly and Hannity
You forgot Ashcroft...
If anyone was the next Hitler, it would be him.
PanoTools: the only (?) image stitching tool available for Linux. Looks pretty powerful, although not as automated as some.
I believe that the author of the article used the Windows version (among other things).
ACME Klein Bottle!
OTOH, they did say science lovers, not topology geeks...
anyways think about the overkill of developing such an elegant solution for such a minor problem. i mean those few percentages of performance enhancement...
I'm sure some people would love a few percent improvement in their SPEC results...
Personally, I have an algorithm that I'm running hundreds of millions of times as part of a larger calculation for my PhD research. I'd love a "few percent" improvement simply by changing the compiler flags.
Acovea is curently a research tool in its own right, and not quite ready for application to general problems. Some issues that require modest effort to resolve:
1) Code currently is pentium3/4 centric
2) Optimizes flags for gcc 3.4 or intel's compiler
3) Cannot easily handle code residing in more than one file.
That's marketing drivel for you. Nevertheless, other than the keyboard placement, it does look pretty nice (and thin).
Here is the press release from Craig Ventner's 'Institute for Biological Energy Alternatives.'
What an odd name: reading about IBEA at the site's homepage, it seems that their goal is to create fuel using designer microbes to extract carbon from the atmosphere.
MMMmmmm carbon!
The article starts out:
It is the stuff of science fiction and bioethical debates: The creation of artificial life.
A virus can reproduce, but does not consume energy -> they are not alive in a technical sense.
Also see this news from Science.
Incredibly cool.
or the Weirding Modules out of Dune
God DAMN it: there are NO "wierding modules" in any written version of Dune. They are just a David Lynch appeasement for the moronic masses.
Sorry: hit a sore point. Those abominations, and the fuckin rain at the end of Lynch's version ruined an otherwise fantastic movie.