If you hold monopoly status in the market (which is what AMD is alledging) then making a deal that locks potential competitors out of the market violates antitrust rules.
Personally, I think it shows how incredibly stupid this move was on Intel's part. They're in the middle of an ongoing antitrust suit with AMD and this just gives AMD more ammo to use against them without giving any kind of real gain.
If they were bit players in the market, it'd be one thing. Considering they're already going through antitrust litigation and thus under greater scrutiny than normal, this move just had "dumb, dumb, dumb" written all over it.
Well like I said in my post, it all depends on your usage pattern.
1-I wouldn't want to take my laptop in my bike bag every day, I don't think it would last long. I ride some pretty rough roads in places.
Understandable. I drive my car and carry the notebook in a backpack or carrying case depending on where I'm headed. So that's a different situation. That said, I know several people that ride to work with their Powerbooks (not what I consider the sturdiest of notebooks from past experience) on their backs each day with no problems.
2-I'm not sure why I would want to have my personal laptop at work; the only use I can think of is to waste time. I like to spend my time at work doing work so that I can go back home again.
My personal notebook *is* my work notebook. The joys of running a small IT bussiness.:-)
3-We're not allowed to attach personal devices to the network at work. I thought this was pretty much standard these days?
Depending on your job and work place, yes. Again, I run the network at work and my job would require me to be able to hook up arbitrary machines to the network even if that weren't the case.
4-On occasions where I do want to get access to or use home computers from work, that's what VPN is for. Why would I carry the computer and risk damage/loss when I can just access it remotely?
That's one set of considerations and another solution, sure. I need the ability to access documents, use any number of programs, and have a machine that I *know* works at home, work, and customer sites that being able to carry a laptop's my only real viable solution.
When my last one broke (see above about not being impressed with Powerbook reliability;-)), I tried going without one for around a month. It got to the point that I absolutely could not function in an efficient manner using only home desktop, work machines, and flying blind on client sites. I ended up breaking down and buying a decent midrange notebook with good battery life and life's been much easier since.
You sound like you could've gotten away without a laptop, yes. On the other hand, I own both a notebook, which I invested about $1000 in, and a high end desktop, which, including the 20" widescreen LCD I've got about $1500 in.
The notebook gets carried to work every day, used throughout the day, taken home, used to surf and watch videos in the living and dining room and any time I'm at a customer site. The desktop, on the other hand, gets used to work with RAW files in Photoshop, play games and watch the occasional DVD (hey, that 20" UltraSharp is *really* nice;-)).
All told I probably spend at least 6 hours a day on my notebook, which is about how much I use my desktop in a week's time. It's all in what suits your usage pattern best.
There's also very clearly a USB cable plugged into the top of the keyboard on the upper left side. So the mouse plugs into the keyboard and you only have to worry about keeping batteries charged in one device.
Are you missing the fact that this chipset is aimed at mobile phones and PDAs? I don't think many people are really interested in hooking their cell phone up to their HDTV.
You're also ignoring Intel's plans to introduce Merom in 2H of this year. It's an all new architechture, so we don't know overly much about how it's going to perform, but all indications point toward even better IPC and thermal efficiency than Yonah.
The biggest improvement you'll see on the AMD side this year is going to be Socket M2, which adds DDR support along with a few other tweaks, but nothing too drastic. The ZRAM deal *just* happened, so don't expect to see any results from that for some time to come.
AMD builds great chips, but Intel was something of a sleeping giant. AMD should maintain a lead through the end of 2006, but it's going to be much narrower after Merom's release than it has been in years.
I'm not informed enough on this matter to come down on one side or another, but your post does little convince me if for no other reason than all but one of your several references goes to the same source. Even if we were to ignore the fact that this particular source is going to have a clear, known bias, it's just plain poor form.
Don't take this as me bashing the National Review. My point is merely that if you're going to go to the trouble of citing multiple times to make a point, seeing [somesite.com] [somesite.com] [somesite.com] over and over in your post diminishes the value of said citations. It just makes it look like you're parroting the view of a single source.
As a user who would try this out, it sounds fishy in terms of any practical use. You type something, the screensaver vanishes.
Not really. Windows screensavers are just executables with the file extension changed to.SCR. The program itself dictates what causes it to quit. Now, most screesavers do exit when there's any kind of keyboard or mouse activity, but it's nothing built into the screensaver framework itself.
SP2 certainly made things better, but I still have problems with my personal notebook which is 3 months old and using an Intel IPW2200 MiniPCI card and see it all the time with my clients. Yes, SP2 is worlds better, but still has more problems than most third party connection managers.
I'll agree with you whole-heartedly on HP drivers and general annoyance at unwanted extra apps.
However the Wireless Connection Managers are a totally different story. XP's Wireless ZeroConf service is horrifically unstable. It'll drop connections at random, and everyone once in a while, will claim it's connected but not actually *do* anything. While I'm saavy enough to fire up services.msc and restart the service on machines that don't come with a third party connection manager, most users are not.
For people like that, having a third party connection manager that actually works and doesn't mysteriously refuse to connect is far better for the average user than just having to resort to rebooting at random intervals to maintain connectivity.
Agreed. DD-WRT has not only caught up with Sveasoft feature wise, but these days is passing it. I've also found it to be more stable than Sveasoft's firmware - I was having issues with random reboots on Talisman. Not so with any of the v23 betas of DD-WRT.
You can now to an extent, there are two problems though:
The first is different carriers use different network protocols. If the carriers you want to switch between are on the same type network, it'll work. For example, Cingular and T-Mobile are both on GSM networks, so an unlocked GSM phone will work with either service.
The word 'unlocked' in that last sentence leads to the other catch. The phones you get with service are rather heavily subsidized by the cell companies, and as such, are generally 'locked' to only work with their phone service. Some carriers (T-Mobile) will unlock the phone for you after your contract has expired. You can also buy unlocked phones, but they're generally very expensive still.
# Disabling completely disfunctional features like "hibernate" on standard desktops... I installed Ubuntu at least 20 times on different hw and I haven't found a PC on which this would not cause a complete hang up.
I've found that it works, it's just ungodly slow, taking almost as much time to load as a full boot, which sort of defeats the point of hybernating.
If I'm not mistaken, HURD recently scrapped a good amount of the work that's been done to migrate to a new Kernel. Amused me because it was just after they'd finally gotten their first userspace binary running on the system.
Lost in Translation made $106 million off of a $4 million dollar budget, $44 million of that being domestic box office. Not exactly what I'd call overlooked.:-)
I've stated this elsewhere in the thread, but I work for a local PC shop, and deal with a good number of both ECS and PC Chips boards. ECS definitely makes the better boards of the two (especially within the last year. The KN1 line of motherboards are absolutely great to work with), but for the most part, PC Chips boards are OK. Nothing phenomenal, but we've not had any real problems with them either. They serve their role as a cheap, 'good enough' board just fine for the people that are looking for that.
The other brands you mention are fine as well. I've had great luck with BioStar (used two of their boards in my personal machines for several years), my experience with Abit has been a bit mixed, and Asus boards are solid, but I find they tend to be overpriced compared to similar boards from other "top tier" manufacturers. IE: The A8N-E in the system I'm typing this on has fewer features and a poorer layout than boards that cost $15-20 less from makes like Gigabyte, ABit, even MSI (who I find are even more overpriced) etc.
Either way, I'm definitely a big believer in going with what works well for you, just thought I'd give my opinion as someone who deals with a bit more volume than most slashdotters do.
For normal use, neither company's products are that bad anymore. In fact, ECS has been building some superb boards in the AMD64 world with their KN1 line. I've yet to see a better board for the money than the KN1 Extreme, and I've talked to a reviewer that was rather happy with their SLI version of the same board.
I work for a local shop, and we've used PC Chips boards with great success in their niche - inexpensive machines. I've not seen them fail any more than any other brand motherboard we've used in the past. I really think they've picked up a reputation as cheap junk simply because they're cheap. Personally, I've encountered more odd problems with top tier makers like Asus and MSI than I have with PC Chips (let alone ECS) boards.
It looks good, has an easy to use interface, and making it work with your Mac or PC is easy for someone that's not a computer geek. It's the combination of all this that's made it a success.
I'm not sure what you're talking about with regards to drivers - on the Mac it Just Works(TM) and on the PC it's recognized as a standard USB mass storage device. Yes, you'll need drivers for connection by Firewire on PC, but if you're trying to do that, chances are, you know what you're doing anyway. And DRM is only for songs purchased from iTMS. Any existing mp3s you have (whether they're ripped from CDs you own, downloaded, whatever) will work just fine with an iPod.
No, it's not the greatest thing ever, but it's an extremely solid, well rounded player, which is all 95+% of the target audience cares about anyway.
Honestly, Bugzilla's web interface is awful. Sure, it does what it's supposed to, but that doesn't negate the fact that it's confusing and intimidating to many users. Personally, I could see a desktop front end being great for an in-house help desk. The backend's already there and solid, this just provides (what appears to be) a friendlier interface.
That's definitely part of it. There's another factor though, and that's the attitude of the user community. Debian's user base tends to be fairly elitist, and quite frankly, that scares users off. The Ubuntu forums are one of the best community resources I've come across for any distribution in the many years I've been toying with Linux now.
The fact that "RTFA" and "Why didn't you just hit the search button" responses on the forum are almost unheard of says a lot, IMO. People generally either try to help work through a problem or link to the threads that the clueless noobs of this world "could've just searched for." A community like that can save so much headache that that alone can make using a distro work it for me and many others like me.
Slashdot Mirror
If you hold monopoly status in the market (which is what AMD is alledging) then making a deal that locks potential competitors out of the market violates antitrust rules.
Personally, I think it shows how incredibly stupid this move was on Intel's part. They're in the middle of an ongoing antitrust suit with AMD and this just gives AMD more ammo to use against them without giving any kind of real gain.
If they were bit players in the market, it'd be one thing. Considering they're already going through antitrust litigation and thus under greater scrutiny than normal, this move just had "dumb, dumb, dumb" written all over it.
Understandable. I drive my car and carry the notebook in a backpack or carrying case depending on where I'm headed. So that's a different situation. That said, I know several people that ride to work with their Powerbooks (not what I consider the sturdiest of notebooks from past experience) on their backs each day with no problems.
My personal notebook *is* my work notebook. The joys of running a small IT bussiness.
Depending on your job and work place, yes. Again, I run the network at work and my job would require me to be able to hook up arbitrary machines to the network even if that weren't the case.
That's one set of considerations and another solution, sure. I need the ability to access documents, use any number of programs, and have a machine that I *know* works at home, work, and customer sites that being able to carry a laptop's my only real viable solution.
When my last one broke (see above about not being impressed with Powerbook reliability
Like I said, usage pattern is everything.
You sound like you could've gotten away without a laptop, yes. On the other hand, I own both a notebook, which I invested about $1000 in, and a high end desktop, which, including the 20" widescreen LCD I've got about $1500 in.
;-)).
The notebook gets carried to work every day, used throughout the day, taken home, used to surf and watch videos in the living and dining room and any time I'm at a customer site. The desktop, on the other hand, gets used to work with RAW files in Photoshop, play games and watch the occasional DVD (hey, that 20" UltraSharp is *really* nice
All told I probably spend at least 6 hours a day on my notebook, which is about how much I use my desktop in a week's time. It's all in what suits your usage pattern best.
There's also very clearly a USB cable plugged into the top of the keyboard on the upper left side. So the mouse plugs into the keyboard and you only have to worry about keeping batteries charged in one device.
I fail to see what the big deal is.
Are you missing the fact that this chipset is aimed at mobile phones and PDAs? I don't think many people are really interested in hooking their cell phone up to their HDTV.
From the roadmaps I've seen, not until at least 2008. 5 years is a long time to allow AMD to embed themselves in the market as *the* chip for servers.
You're also ignoring Intel's plans to introduce Merom in 2H of this year. It's an all new architechture, so we don't know overly much about how it's going to perform, but all indications point toward even better IPC and thermal efficiency than Yonah.
The biggest improvement you'll see on the AMD side this year is going to be Socket M2, which adds DDR support along with a few other tweaks, but nothing too drastic. The ZRAM deal *just* happened, so don't expect to see any results from that for some time to come.
AMD builds great chips, but Intel was something of a sleeping giant. AMD should maintain a lead through the end of 2006, but it's going to be much narrower after Merom's release than it has been in years.
Oceania has always been at war with Eurasia.
I'm not informed enough on this matter to come down on one side or another, but your post does little convince me if for no other reason than all but one of your several references goes to the same source. Even if we were to ignore the fact that this particular source is going to have a clear, known bias, it's just plain poor form.
Don't take this as me bashing the National Review. My point is merely that if you're going to go to the trouble of citing multiple times to make a point, seeing [somesite.com] [somesite.com] [somesite.com] over and over in your post diminishes the value of said citations. It just makes it look like you're parroting the view of a single source.
Not really. Windows screensavers are just executables with the file extension changed to
SP2 certainly made things better, but I still have problems with my personal notebook which is 3 months old and using an Intel IPW2200 MiniPCI card and see it all the time with my clients. Yes, SP2 is worlds better, but still has more problems than most third party connection managers.
I'll agree with you whole-heartedly on HP drivers and general annoyance at unwanted extra apps.
However the Wireless Connection Managers are a totally different story. XP's Wireless ZeroConf service is horrifically unstable. It'll drop connections at random, and everyone once in a while, will claim it's connected but not actually *do* anything. While I'm saavy enough to fire up services.msc and restart the service on machines that don't come with a third party connection manager, most users are not.
For people like that, having a third party connection manager that actually works and doesn't mysteriously refuse to connect is far better for the average user than just having to resort to rebooting at random intervals to maintain connectivity.
Go rent the movie the Girl from Monday. It's a low budget indie flick, but does a great job of exploring just why such a system is a terrible idea.
Agreed. DD-WRT has not only caught up with Sveasoft feature wise, but these days is passing it. I've also found it to be more stable than Sveasoft's firmware - I was having issues with random reboots on Talisman. Not so with any of the v23 betas of DD-WRT.
You can now to an extent, there are two problems though:
The first is different carriers use different network protocols. If the carriers you want to switch between are on the same type network, it'll work. For example, Cingular and T-Mobile are both on GSM networks, so an unlocked GSM phone will work with either service.
The word 'unlocked' in that last sentence leads to the other catch. The phones you get with service are rather heavily subsidized by the cell companies, and as such, are generally 'locked' to only work with their phone service. Some carriers (T-Mobile) will unlock the phone for you after your contract has expired. You can also buy unlocked phones, but they're generally very expensive still.
I suppose it depends on the cost of this particular rocket as well, given that each shuttle launch costs in the range of a half-billion dollars.
I've found that it works, it's just ungodly slow, taking almost as much time to load as a full boot, which sort of defeats the point of hybernating.
If I'm not mistaken, HURD recently scrapped a good amount of the work that's been done to migrate to a new Kernel. Amused me because it was just after they'd finally gotten their first userspace binary running on the system.
Lost in Translation made $106 million off of a $4 million dollar budget, $44 million of that being domestic box office. Not exactly what I'd call overlooked. :-)
I've stated this elsewhere in the thread, but I work for a local PC shop, and deal with a good number of both ECS and PC Chips boards. ECS definitely makes the better boards of the two (especially within the last year. The KN1 line of motherboards are absolutely great to work with), but for the most part, PC Chips boards are OK. Nothing phenomenal, but we've not had any real problems with them either. They serve their role as a cheap, 'good enough' board just fine for the people that are looking for that.
The other brands you mention are fine as well. I've had great luck with BioStar (used two of their boards in my personal machines for several years), my experience with Abit has been a bit mixed, and Asus boards are solid, but I find they tend to be overpriced compared to similar boards from other "top tier" manufacturers. IE: The A8N-E in the system I'm typing this on has fewer features and a poorer layout than boards that cost $15-20 less from makes like Gigabyte, ABit, even MSI (who I find are even more overpriced) etc.
Either way, I'm definitely a big believer in going with what works well for you, just thought I'd give my opinion as someone who deals with a bit more volume than most slashdotters do.
For normal use, neither company's products are that bad anymore. In fact, ECS has been building some superb boards in the AMD64 world with their KN1 line. I've yet to see a better board for the money than the KN1 Extreme, and I've talked to a reviewer that was rather happy with their SLI version of the same board.
I work for a local shop, and we've used PC Chips boards with great success in their niche - inexpensive machines. I've not seen them fail any more than any other brand motherboard we've used in the past. I really think they've picked up a reputation as cheap junk simply because they're cheap. Personally, I've encountered more odd problems with top tier makers like Asus and MSI than I have with PC Chips (let alone ECS) boards.
It looks good, has an easy to use interface, and making it work with your Mac or PC is easy for someone that's not a computer geek. It's the combination of all this that's made it a success.
I'm not sure what you're talking about with regards to drivers - on the Mac it Just Works(TM) and on the PC it's recognized as a standard USB mass storage device. Yes, you'll need drivers for connection by Firewire on PC, but if you're trying to do that, chances are, you know what you're doing anyway. And DRM is only for songs purchased from iTMS. Any existing mp3s you have (whether they're ripped from CDs you own, downloaded, whatever) will work just fine with an iPod.
No, it's not the greatest thing ever, but it's an extremely solid, well rounded player, which is all 95+% of the target audience cares about anyway.
Honestly, Bugzilla's web interface is awful. Sure, it does what it's supposed to, but that doesn't negate the fact that it's confusing and intimidating to many users. Personally, I could see a desktop front end being great for an in-house help desk. The backend's already there and solid, this just provides (what appears to be) a friendlier interface.
That's definitely part of it. There's another factor though, and that's the attitude of the user community. Debian's user base tends to be fairly elitist, and quite frankly, that scares users off. The Ubuntu forums are one of the best community resources I've come across for any distribution in the many years I've been toying with Linux now.
The fact that "RTFA" and "Why didn't you just hit the search button" responses on the forum are almost unheard of says a lot, IMO. People generally either try to help work through a problem or link to the threads that the clueless noobs of this world "could've just searched for." A community like that can save so much headache that that alone can make using a distro work it for me and many others like me.