Packaging - show me a PC that looks just like the iMac, with the same slim case, the same weight and the same look, that packs into its box in two minutes, including the time it takes to unplug, that can then be carried like a suitcase because the box has a decent handle on it.
It's one of the reasons I like the iMac so much, plus the fact I can easily dual book Windows and OS X on it, and I do move it around a fair bit (it has made several transatlantic trips, for example).
Your second point is what I mean - yes, the Mac is "just a PC", but I like the convenience of OS X with no need to make a hackintosh, and the form factor of the case those PC parts are stuffed into.
Well, given that all of the OS X installers are just DVDs, with no serial number, no online activation, no phoning home and no protections to prevent easy cloning of the disc, I don't think Apple's wrath is is that strong on that front.
It's one of those things - it's only $29 (or $129 in previous releases).
Because if we say "the hardware is like a Ferrari" then you will come back with "no it;s not, its just the same parts as in my PC just costs more!" - which is true. The packaging of the components is what makes it cost more, and the price is at a point the market will bear.
I know I couldn't find anything in the PC world that matched the features of my iMac - the form factor, the weight, the portability, the ability to run OS X without making a hackintosh. I'm not going to "kid myself" that the parts inside it are like a Ferrari though - I mean, it only has a Radeon X1600 which was only a midrange GPU at the time I bought it, and a regular SATA HD that is the same as the one in a normal PC. You get the picture.
It is "good value" if you believe that the price you paid for something (anything you buy, not just computers) is worth the cost, regardless of what it is. My iMac cost me £1200 when I bought it, and it was totally worth the price *to me*. It wasn't the fastest, or the biggest HD, or the best GPU or the most RAM, but it was worth every pound I paid, even if I could buy an equally specced (in terms of just pure computer spec) PC for a lot less. It's not all about raw performance.
What version of the bootcamp software do you have on the MBP - the earlier versions had a problem with SP2 that caused the SP2 installer to report only 3mb of space and fail, due to the way it was looking at partitions on the HD and looking at the wrong one.
If you can get a later copy of bootcamp (the windows part of it that you install with the drivers) then it should cure that issue. There is also a manual registry change you can make that sometimes works.
What content is only available for the iPod? The music sold on the iTMS is unprotected AAC and will play on anything that can read AAC files, which is a patented format (like mp3) but doesn't have to be exclusive to Apple. You can also buy CDs or mp3s and use those on your iPod or other music player of choice.
The movies and TV shows are still DRM locked, but I am sure they are working on that, in the same way they did with the music industry to remove DRM from the music they sell.
"DRM formats" like what? The movies and TV shows have DRM, but none of the music on the iTMS has DRM on it, and you don't even have to use the iTMS - you can rip your music in AAC or mp3 format (or apple lossless, wav or aiff if you choose) which might not be vorbis, but they are free from DRM.
If you have an issue with the fact that the iPod only plays patented music formats, well that's a different issue and it would be nice if the option of a patent-free format was added for those that want it.
You bought the device, yes, but it may be more or less easily modifiable - researching the device beforehand is probably a good idea, and if the "iPod and its ilk" don;t suit you, then DON'T BUY ONE - instead buy something that CAN BE modified the way you want.
My car was partially built by robots on an assembly line, so as a result it's tricky to modify the chassis much from the stock configuration, compared to a different car I have worked on - a Cobra with a separate rolling chassis and body which is much more suited to home tinkering. Building my factory car with a single monocoque design has advantages, but it also has some disadvantages. If I was going to build a new kit car at home I wouldn't start with a chassis like that - why is it different for electronics?
My oven has a computer, albeit a simple one - should I complain that I can't install Linux on it and thus it's tyranny because my oven is closed source/hard to modify, or my DVR, or my sat nav?
Yes, you should have the right to do what you like with things you buy, but you should also consider what you are buying in the first place to determine if the thing you are buying will do what you want it to do. I would argue that if you want to buy an iPhone and install apps that aren't sourced on the app store then you shouldn't have bought an iPhone... you should have bought a Nexus One. (or you could just jailbreak it - Apple doesn't really care if you do, it just doesn't want to support that model)
Also consider that for all the moaning about how Apple locks things up, they have been a major force for online DRM free content: they were on record before the iTMS opened that they wanted it DRM free, plus the "Rip, Mix, Burn" adverts, and even with DRM tracks on the early store implementation including the ability in iTunes to burn them to CD, stripping all DRM off. They just have to do it for movies and TV shows now. I know they're not the only online music store, but they have made major strides in this area.
Sure, the iPhone and the iPad uses a closed developer "appliance device" model, but OS X does not. Their other hardware can be used as you describe - install OS X, install Windows, install Linux, have a blast.
The people who will buy the iPad would spend the money on it.
Look, we get it - you have posted in several iPad threads about how totally useless it is. What you miss out is that it is totally useless TO YOU. It doesn't mean that it can't be the perfect device to someone else.
I personally have absolutely no use at all for a Netbook and after using one for a while decided it was totally not my cup of tea, but I don;t go around telling people who love using them that they are hopelessly awful, since they clearly are very useful to some people.
The iPad's software model is the same as the iPhone's, and that seems to be doing rather well despite its totally closed, walled garden approach. If you want an open app store, wait for the Nexus Slate, which will doubtless come soon.
And you're posting AC - shows how ashamed you are of those comments, even in the practically anonymous/. userland - repost those comments under your actual user name if you really do believe it so strongly.
And people wonder why OSS software zealots are ignored at all the big parties.
Seriously, he is going to do an *incalculable* amount of good with that amount of investment into vaccine and disease research, but as long as you don't have to worry about polio or malaria or HIV while you recompile your kernel in your mom's basement you're going to begrudge the poorest members of humanity an improvement on their survival rate because you think MS is evil.
They very well might, but the argument always seems to be "they should open it up!" and when they actually do open up a little it's not "good start!" it's more aspersions that they want to control your life at every turn.
Tell that to all those locked down handsets that can't use ringtones due to a carrier restriction, not a technical one - to force you to buy ringtones from Verizon and AT&T etc.
The iPhone is not unique in having non-technical restrictions placed on it - the phone market is not a typical fully open environment to start with - something hopefully Android will change.
So, first it's "Apple is evil, it;s so locked down! It sucks! They should open it!", and when they actually do open it up and enable new function that they had previously prevented (for whatever reason) it's "Apple is still evil! They will restrict it again!"
The clone wars were a different matter entirely: the clones nearly killed apple completely and they had no choice. Go out of business or end clones.
My point about opening the iPhone platform isn't that there should be no debate on it, I was just pointing out that quite a lot of complaint about Apple is vitriol for the sake of it, and often baseless and flat out false (check out some of the later comments about "why do you think apple has TPM chips" for example, or revisionist stuff about "the FSF forced Apple to remove DRM from iTMS" when it did nothing of the sort).
When Apple does do what the/. crowd clamours for, like supporting OSS, opening up projects etc then it still gets heavy criticism - "it's not open enough!" "they only contribute tiny amounts and deliberately make it hard to roll their patches into other projects!". I guess at the moment it is cool to rally against Apple - seen to be the enemy of free and open software, despite their other efforts in this area.
You have people on here claiming that the iPad's OS "will be put on the next Mac and it will all be locked up! That's what they do!" despite Apple's recent release of Snow Leopard with some new OSS stuff right off the bat like GCD and OpenCL, not to mention the improvements to Webkit and other open stuff.
I don't mean it to be some sort of discussion ender - sure it would be nice to have an official way to install apps without using the store, but I guarantee if Apple did that right away (or even dumped the OS and went Android) people would still bitterly complain about something to do with it.
The tone of this FSF article is echoing this somewhat. I largely support the FSF's position, but this sort of thing comes off as very preachy. The iPad is a computer, but it's not the only computer and it will not define other computers. You have a choice, which is what the FSF is all about surely, to use the devices that work for you. If it doesn't work for you, don't buy it.
What the FSF is doing is saying I would be morally wrong to buy and use an iPad because they disagree with the software model, and surely that is the antithesis of what they stand for. If I want to exercise my choice to use a closed system I should be able to, just in the same way my DVR box runs an OS that I cannot modify, recording encrypted content to its internal HD. It works for me though, to watch TV shows. Is it morally wrong that it doesn't have a fully OSS, easy to modify OS that records the shows in Theora? (when, if you want a box like that you can make one yourself, or buy one from someone who does make them).
The total elimination of closed software and hardware isn't likely to happen, and demonising people who choose to use such systems because they actually offer them something of value despite the locked-up nature really serves no one.
Now, if the iPad was running Android, or WebOS, or an OS that was easier to tweak into a general purpose computing device, than it's fate might be different. Even then, it's seriously overpriced compared to your average netbook, and I have a feeling that Acer and ASUS's response would be Netbooks sans keyboard.
People just need to face it; as much as John Q Nerd wants a cool-looking Tablet computer, tablet machines continuously fail in the marketplace. Touch devices just don't sell well unless they are pocket portable.
Why might its fate be different? There are already tablet PCs like that out there *right now*, and they are a niche market - extremely useful in the right setting, but generally you would want a laptop, or a phone-sized thing, or so on. The current tablets are tweakble.
If it fails it fails because it's a tablet - a form factor that has historically struggled to really gain wide acceptance. Having a tweakable OS just makes it the same as the current tablets on the market, and people are not setting the world on fire with those (and the Apple one is way more expensive).
I have a feeling that if it really does take off, the next generation of Android will be tailored to run on something like it, and HTC will bring out the "Nexus Slate" or something to fill the gap left by Apple's closed model.
Some Apple machines have TPM hardware, but it is not used, and it is hit and miss - it seems to be a hanger on from the chip makers since there's no coherent logic. Ie, they didn't just start putting them in and have from then onwards - some older models have TPM, some newer ones don't, some in a product line have it while other ones in slightly different configurations do not.
In other words, they are not putting in TPM chips on purpose, some machines just have the tech because it is part of the chipsets they use. It's not universal across their new product lines.
Hardly "introducing" - the micro sim is part of the standard spec for sim cards, and has been around for a very long time. The late 1990s as I remember, back when 3G was being hashed out by the various standards bodies.
I don't think anybody would be complaining if Apple had a nice, tidy app store, but still let people run arbitrary code on their stuff.
I think you seriously underestimate the strength of some of the Apple-hate on here. (ignoring the opposite end of the spectrum). Even when things line up in ways that the haters seem to want, like Apple working with Open Source - Webkit, OpenCL, GCD, Zeroconf, BSD etc then it's not "why doesn't apple help oss" it's "apple steals from the oss community and gives *nothing back*".
If the iPhone went to the Android app model, with third party apps allowed they would just find something else to complain about, like non-removable batteries that only last an hour and explode like a grenade when you gently shake the phone, or the dock connector not being some standard (but equally proprietary) port like usb or eSata or something.
Apple are just doing their thing - if other companies follow their exact business model then so be it, but if everyone does, there will be a gap in the market for an Android-like device with an open-wall approach and someone will make one.
Slashdot Mirror
Packaging - show me a PC that looks just like the iMac, with the same slim case, the same weight and the same look, that packs into its box in two minutes, including the time it takes to unplug, that can then be carried like a suitcase because the box has a decent handle on it.
It's one of the reasons I like the iMac so much, plus the fact I can easily dual book Windows and OS X on it, and I do move it around a fair bit (it has made several transatlantic trips, for example).
Your second point is what I mean - yes, the Mac is "just a PC", but I like the convenience of OS X with no need to make a hackintosh, and the form factor of the case those PC parts are stuffed into.
I hate coffee though. Do I have to drink it?
Well, given that all of the OS X installers are just DVDs, with no serial number, no online activation, no phoning home and no protections to prevent easy cloning of the disc, I don't think Apple's wrath is is that strong on that front.
It's one of those things - it's only $29 (or $129 in previous releases).
Ah of course, I forgot that - hopefully the registry trick does the job for you
Because if we say "the hardware is like a Ferrari" then you will come back with "no it;s not, its just the same parts as in my PC just costs more!" - which is true. The packaging of the components is what makes it cost more, and the price is at a point the market will bear.
I know I couldn't find anything in the PC world that matched the features of my iMac - the form factor, the weight, the portability, the ability to run OS X without making a hackintosh. I'm not going to "kid myself" that the parts inside it are like a Ferrari though - I mean, it only has a Radeon X1600 which was only a midrange GPU at the time I bought it, and a regular SATA HD that is the same as the one in a normal PC. You get the picture.
It is "good value" if you believe that the price you paid for something (anything you buy, not just computers) is worth the cost, regardless of what it is. My iMac cost me £1200 when I bought it, and it was totally worth the price *to me*. It wasn't the fastest, or the biggest HD, or the best GPU or the most RAM, but it was worth every pound I paid, even if I could buy an equally specced (in terms of just pure computer spec) PC for a lot less. It's not all about raw performance.
What version of the bootcamp software do you have on the MBP - the earlier versions had a problem with SP2 that caused the SP2 installer to report only 3mb of space and fail, due to the way it was looking at partitions on the HD and looking at the wrong one.
If you can get a later copy of bootcamp (the windows part of it that you install with the drivers) then it should cure that issue. There is also a manual registry change you can make that sometimes works.
So the $29 cost of Snow Leopard is the crippling factor, not the $100+ cost of the Win7 copy you want to install?
The straw that broke the camel's back perhaps?
Oh wait, you torrented Windows and just want a cheap (ha) dig at Apple.
What content is only available for the iPod? The music sold on the iTMS is unprotected AAC and will play on anything that can read AAC files, which is a patented format (like mp3) but doesn't have to be exclusive to Apple. You can also buy CDs or mp3s and use those on your iPod or other music player of choice.
The movies and TV shows are still DRM locked, but I am sure they are working on that, in the same way they did with the music industry to remove DRM from the music they sell.
"DRM formats" like what? The movies and TV shows have DRM, but none of the music on the iTMS has DRM on it, and you don't even have to use the iTMS - you can rip your music in AAC or mp3 format (or apple lossless, wav or aiff if you choose) which might not be vorbis, but they are free from DRM.
If you have an issue with the fact that the iPod only plays patented music formats, well that's a different issue and it would be nice if the option of a patent-free format was added for those that want it.
You bought the device, yes, but it may be more or less easily modifiable - researching the device beforehand is probably a good idea, and if the "iPod and its ilk" don;t suit you, then DON'T BUY ONE - instead buy something that CAN BE modified the way you want.
My car was partially built by robots on an assembly line, so as a result it's tricky to modify the chassis much from the stock configuration, compared to a different car I have worked on - a Cobra with a separate rolling chassis and body which is much more suited to home tinkering. Building my factory car with a single monocoque design has advantages, but it also has some disadvantages. If I was going to build a new kit car at home I wouldn't start with a chassis like that - why is it different for electronics?
My oven has a computer, albeit a simple one - should I complain that I can't install Linux on it and thus it's tyranny because my oven is closed source/hard to modify, or my DVR, or my sat nav?
Yes, you should have the right to do what you like with things you buy, but you should also consider what you are buying in the first place to determine if the thing you are buying will do what you want it to do. I would argue that if you want to buy an iPhone and install apps that aren't sourced on the app store then you shouldn't have bought an iPhone... you should have bought a Nexus One. (or you could just jailbreak it - Apple doesn't really care if you do, it just doesn't want to support that model)
Also consider that for all the moaning about how Apple locks things up, they have been a major force for online DRM free content: they were on record before the iTMS opened that they wanted it DRM free, plus the "Rip, Mix, Burn" adverts, and even with DRM tracks on the early store implementation including the ability in iTunes to burn them to CD, stripping all DRM off. They just have to do it for movies and TV shows now. I know they're not the only online music store, but they have made major strides in this area.
Sure, the iPhone and the iPad uses a closed developer "appliance device" model, but OS X does not. Their other hardware can be used as you describe - install OS X, install Windows, install Linux, have a blast.
Unaffordable?
Hardly really, plus you can always just build a hackintosh, those are pretty cheap I hear.
The people who will buy the iPad would spend the money on it.
Look, we get it - you have posted in several iPad threads about how totally useless it is. What you miss out is that it is totally useless TO YOU. It doesn't mean that it can't be the perfect device to someone else.
I personally have absolutely no use at all for a Netbook and after using one for a while decided it was totally not my cup of tea, but I don;t go around telling people who love using them that they are hopelessly awful, since they clearly are very useful to some people.
The iPad's software model is the same as the iPhone's, and that seems to be doing rather well despite its totally closed, walled garden approach. If you want an open app store, wait for the Nexus Slate, which will doubtless come soon.
So, I can buy an minivan with 7 seats or a sports car with 2 seats.
The minivan will probably be cheaper, so it must be better in every possible respect because I get more for less, right?
And you're posting AC - shows how ashamed you are of those comments, even in the practically anonymous /. userland - repost those comments under your actual user name if you really do believe it so strongly.
And people wonder why OSS software zealots are ignored at all the big parties.
Seriously, he is going to do an *incalculable* amount of good with that amount of investment into vaccine and disease research, but as long as you don't have to worry about polio or malaria or HIV while you recompile your kernel in your mom's basement you're going to begrudge the poorest members of humanity an improvement on their survival rate because you think MS is evil.
They very well might, but the argument always seems to be "they should open it up!" and when they actually do open up a little it's not "good start!" it's more aspersions that they want to control your life at every turn.
Tell that to all those locked down handsets that can't use ringtones due to a carrier restriction, not a technical one - to force you to buy ringtones from Verizon and AT&T etc.
The iPhone is not unique in having non-technical restrictions placed on it - the phone market is not a typical fully open environment to start with - something hopefully Android will change.
Wait!
So, first it's "Apple is evil, it;s so locked down! It sucks! They should open it!", and when they actually do open it up and enable new function that they had previously prevented (for whatever reason) it's "Apple is still evil! They will restrict it again!"
Which is it?
Do you want them to remove restrictions or not?
The clone wars were a different matter entirely: the clones nearly killed apple completely and they had no choice. Go out of business or end clones.
My point about opening the iPhone platform isn't that there should be no debate on it, I was just pointing out that quite a lot of complaint about Apple is vitriol for the sake of it, and often baseless and flat out false (check out some of the later comments about "why do you think apple has TPM chips" for example, or revisionist stuff about "the FSF forced Apple to remove DRM from iTMS" when it did nothing of the sort).
When Apple does do what the /. crowd clamours for, like supporting OSS, opening up projects etc then it still gets heavy criticism - "it's not open enough!" "they only contribute tiny amounts and deliberately make it hard to roll their patches into other projects!". I guess at the moment it is cool to rally against Apple - seen to be the enemy of free and open software, despite their other efforts in this area.
You have people on here claiming that the iPad's OS "will be put on the next Mac and it will all be locked up! That's what they do!" despite Apple's recent release of Snow Leopard with some new OSS stuff right off the bat like GCD and OpenCL, not to mention the improvements to Webkit and other open stuff.
I don't mean it to be some sort of discussion ender - sure it would be nice to have an official way to install apps without using the store, but I guarantee if Apple did that right away (or even dumped the OS and went Android) people would still bitterly complain about something to do with it.
The tone of this FSF article is echoing this somewhat. I largely support the FSF's position, but this sort of thing comes off as very preachy. The iPad is a computer, but it's not the only computer and it will not define other computers. You have a choice, which is what the FSF is all about surely, to use the devices that work for you. If it doesn't work for you, don't buy it.
What the FSF is doing is saying I would be morally wrong to buy and use an iPad because they disagree with the software model, and surely that is the antithesis of what they stand for. If I want to exercise my choice to use a closed system I should be able to, just in the same way my DVR box runs an OS that I cannot modify, recording encrypted content to its internal HD. It works for me though, to watch TV shows. Is it morally wrong that it doesn't have a fully OSS, easy to modify OS that records the shows in Theora? (when, if you want a box like that you can make one yourself, or buy one from someone who does make them).
The total elimination of closed software and hardware isn't likely to happen, and demonising people who choose to use such systems because they actually offer them something of value despite the locked-up nature really serves no one.
bah, quote fail
Now, if the iPad was running Android, or WebOS, or an OS that was easier to tweak into a general purpose computing device, than it's fate might be different. Even then, it's seriously overpriced compared to your average netbook, and I have a feeling that Acer and ASUS's response would be Netbooks sans keyboard.
People just need to face it; as much as John Q Nerd wants a cool-looking Tablet computer, tablet machines continuously fail in the marketplace. Touch devices just don't sell well unless they are pocket portable.
Why might its fate be different? There are already tablet PCs like that out there *right now*, and they are a niche market - extremely useful in the right setting, but generally you would want a laptop, or a phone-sized thing, or so on. The current tablets are tweakble.
If it fails it fails because it's a tablet - a form factor that has historically struggled to really gain wide acceptance. Having a tweakable OS just makes it the same as the current tablets on the market, and people are not setting the world on fire with those (and the Apple one is way more expensive).
I have a feeling that if it really does take off, the next generation of Android will be tailored to run on something like it, and HTC will bring out the "Nexus Slate" or something to fill the gap left by Apple's closed model.
Some Apple machines have TPM hardware, but it is not used, and it is hit and miss - it seems to be a hanger on from the chip makers since there's no coherent logic. Ie, they didn't just start putting them in and have from then onwards - some older models have TPM, some newer ones don't, some in a product line have it while other ones in slightly different configurations do not.
In other words, they are not putting in TPM chips on purpose, some machines just have the tech because it is part of the chipsets they use. It's not universal across their new product lines.
Hardly "introducing" - the micro sim is part of the standard spec for sim cards, and has been around for a very long time. The late 1990s as I remember, back when 3G was being hashed out by the various standards bodies.
I don't think anybody would be complaining if Apple had a nice, tidy app store, but still let people run arbitrary code on their stuff.
I think you seriously underestimate the strength of some of the Apple-hate on here. (ignoring the opposite end of the spectrum). Even when things line up in ways that the haters seem to want, like Apple working with Open Source - Webkit, OpenCL, GCD, Zeroconf, BSD etc then it's not "why doesn't apple help oss" it's "apple steals from the oss community and gives *nothing back*".
If the iPhone went to the Android app model, with third party apps allowed they would just find something else to complain about, like non-removable batteries that only last an hour and explode like a grenade when you gently shake the phone, or the dock connector not being some standard (but equally proprietary) port like usb or eSata or something.
Apple are just doing their thing - if other companies follow their exact business model then so be it, but if everyone does, there will be a gap in the market for an Android-like device with an open-wall approach and someone will make one.
Beck takes himself and his message seriously, Jon Stewart presents a comedy show, and has stated firmly that he provides entertainment, not news.