ThinkSecret has an article discussing early benchmarks from Xbench running on Macintel.
From the article: "Overall, the Intel Mac are scoring between 65 and 70 with Xbench, a far cry from the 200+ scores higher-end G5 systems reach."
According to ThinkSecret, this performance discrepancy is largely due to Rosetta. However, it also notes that Rosetta caches it's binary translations so that you may see performance increase the more you use the apps.
If they delayed software purchases then they'll have compatibility problems.
I think what Gartner means is that if they wait until vendors have a "clear roadmap," they will know which vendors intend to move to the Intel Macs, and when. You can be sure that vendors that do this will be shipping "fat" or "universal" binaries that run on both Intel and PowerPC platforms. Thus, waiting on software purchases will not mean that you'll end up with incompatible software -- if anything, you'll get "universally" compatible software. Or you'll know that a certain vendor is going to jump ship and stop supporting Mac after the transition, and plan accordingly. Of course we already know that Adobe (which owns Macromedia), Microsoft, and of course Apple are making the transition quickly. What about Quark?
While I generally agree with you here, let me add something. Public education was set up in the US not so that people would be able to find a job, but so that they would be informed, thoughtful citizens. The line of reasoning was that if the populace is uneducated, democracy cannot be successful. I think we should be asking ourselves not "when these students get out of school, can they get a job?" but "when these students get out of school, are they prepared to enter a democratic society?" That is, are these students prepared to be not just productive, but thoughtful members of society, able to enter into a discussion about the problems our society faces and explore solutions (not just from a policy standpoint, but from the standpoint of a citizen trying to create possitive change). There's a lot more to life than being able to use Word and Excel.
Aren't you forgetting that they sued ThinkSecret before MacWorld -- all but confirming the rumors. If they had wanted to keep the Mac mini in the bottle they would have sued ThinkSecret after the release of the product. The timing on this, I think, kept the story alive. If you look at the articles from around that time, after Apple sued, most of them focused on the fact that this confirmed the rumor -- not that Steve Jobs is the enemy of free speech.
And frankly, I don't think the suit will hurt Apple's bottom line at all. Most people either don't care, or realize that trade secrets are important and worth protecting. I'd be willing to bet that it's only a slim minority of people that strongly feel major corporations are out of line in defending their trade secrets. It's even a smaller portion of those people that would actually let this change their purchasing habits.
Benefiting from somebody's creation without their approval is theft. Pure and simple
Copyright violation is not theft. It is a totally different law. If, for instance, I were to download a song that I wouldn't have paid for anyway, I'm not depriving the artist of income (this doesn't necessarily make it ethical). If, on the other hand, I steal the original recording, which I wouldn't have paid for either, I am actually depriving him of his property. It is essentially a different act to copy something someone has made vs. taking it. Now, I'm not saying it is morally justifiable to violate copyright law, I'm just saying that it is very different from theft.
To argue that file trading networks deprive artists of revenue that they would have otherwise had is an argument that has been made numerous times, but never really convincingly. If you really look at the numbers, there is very little evidence that these networks have hurt the artists' or labels' bottom lines. I believe that breaking the law is almost always wrong, but in this case I think the IP laws, and the stances many artists and labels are taking are also wrong. They are hurting themselves and their customers by clamping down on the music too tightly.
If the artist has died, the copyrights are transfered to whomever controls his/her estate. In most cases, this will be the family of the artist. It is treated as an inheritance. That's just how copyright law works. If the company owns the copyright to the intellectual property in question while the artist is still alive, then they own it after the artist dies. But copyrights aren't transfered from the artist to the label after death. It is, I believe, 75 years after the artist dies that the work goes into the public domain. Then it becomes free. This is a rediculous state of affairs, but that's how our wise leaders have set it up.
The above discussion only applies to US copyright law. Every country has a different set of rules.
Well, let's see... for $499 (after rebates) you can get a comparable Dell with 512mb RAM, a 17" CRT (which many people already have), NO CD burner, WinXP Home, and WordPerfect Office (which no one wants).
For $574 you can get the Mac Mini, with RAM upgraded to 512mb, a CD burner, a powerful OS (that's easy to use), and iLife. Also, you don't have to worry about malware, your computer is compact, silent, and aesthetically pleasing...
Sure, OS X may not really "sing" on this rig, but it is more than adequate for the target audience. Sounds like a good deal to me...
Why don't you also mention the 4-5 DNC voter fraud articles referenced in your previous post today?
Ok, BigChigger, but why didn't you link to them, or give any substance to your post other than whining?
I think this post is representative of what you were talking about. And here is a synopsis of and response to the linked articles. Mostly, we are looking at a flawed system in which people are paid for each registration card that they collect, so their is an incentive to forge registrations. HOWEVER, if I register to vote 35 times (as did one of the guys in one of those articles), that doesn't mean I get to vote 35 times. After the registrations get submitted, they are reviewed for authenticity, and when you go to the polls you have to present a valid ID which cannot be used to vote again. On the other hand, what this heavily RNC funded group is doing is destroying registrations for Democrats, which they would theoretically have a financial incentive not to do. Now, I'm not saying Dems aren't doing this as well. But please give us some evidence to work with.
Michael may be biased, but please at least defend your statements with links and/or arguments. It's the only way you can offset his bias.
Is it a "wink, smile and nod" system or was the RNC truly caught off guard by this (as they will no doubt claim)?
Well, three people who resigned from the South Dakota GOP over the voter fraud scandal, have now been hired to work for the Bush-Cheney campaign in Ohio. I think that's more than just a "wink, smile and nod" system. They are actively being encouraged to maintain these tactics.
If the DNC is involved in this sort of thing, lets see some evidence. And no, the Colorado election day manual is not evidence of voter fraud, or even of false allegations of voter fraud, but merely that the DNC would like to see confirmed stories of GOP voter fraud from the past resurface. Not even remotely comparable.
Here's an explanation of why Sinclair should not be allowed to run this "news segment," in the words of former FCC chairman Reed Hundt (pulled from Talking Points Memo):
Why is it important that Sinclair Broadcasting be urged in all lawful ways that can be imagined to reconsider its decision to broadcast on its television stations the anti-Kerry "documentary"?
Because in a large, pluralistic information society democracy will not work unless electronic media distribute reasonably accurate information and also competing opinions about political candidates to the entire population. Certainly, for the overwhelming number of voters this year, controlling impressions of the candidates for President are obtained from television.
In all countries, candidates for public office governments aspire to have favorable information and a chorus of favorable opinion disseminated through mass media to the citizenry. In a democracy, on the eve of a quadrennial election, the incumbent government plainly has a motive to encourage the media to report positively on its record but also negatively on the rival. But its role instead is to make sure that broadcast television promote democracy by conveying reasonably accurate reflections of where the candidates stand and what they are like.
To that end, since television was invented, Congress and its delegated agency, the Federal Communications Commision, together have passed laws and regulations to ensure that broadcast television stations provide reasonably accurate, balanced, and fair coverage of major Presidential and Congressional candidates. These obligations are reflected in specific provisions relating to rights to buy advertising time, bans against the gift of advertising time, rights to reply to opponents, and various other specific means of accomplishing the goal of balance and fairness. The various rules are part of a tradition well known to broadcasters an honored by almost all of them. This tradition is embodied in the commitment of the broadcasters to show the conventions and the debates.
Part of this tradition is that broadcasters do not show propaganda for any candidate, no matter how much a station owner may personally favor one or dislike the other. Broadcasters understand that they have a special and conditional role in public discourse. They received their licenses from the public -- licenses to use airwaves that, for instance, cellular companies bought in auctions -- for free, and one condition is the obligation to help us hold a fair and free election. The Supreme Court has routinely upheld this "public interest" obligation. Virtually all broadcasters understand and honor it.
Sinclair has a different idea, and a wrong one in my view. If Sinclair wants to disseminate propaganda, it should buy a printing press, or create a web site. These other media have no conditions on their publication of points of view. This is the law, and it should be honored. In fact, if the FCC had any sense of its responsibility as a steward of fair elections its chairman now would express exactly what I am writing to you here.
They may be cutting back more than this article lets on -- the Register reports that MS is also cutting out Avalon. Of course, this is contrary to what CNet, ZDNet, etc are saying, so I'm not sure who's right. Anyone have any info to settle this question?
Hmmm... I don't see Apple going in this direction. These are the markets that tablets have penetrated already (except, perhaps, dope dealers), but I see Apple trying to make more of a consumer electronics device for controlling your desktop in the den without leaving your living room. You could control iTunes (which is streaming to your stereo system), look up info on the web, check your email, stream video and iPhoto slideshows from your desktop to your TV, and possibly use it as a glorified Tivo.
I have to say, the primary Apple reseller in San Antonio, ImagiQ (yeah, stupid name), has always been pretty helpful in my experience. It is a small store in a strip center, and definitely doesn't have the aesthetic appeal of an Apple Store, but they have 7 or 8 computers out there for you to play with, and are friendly and knowledgeable. One of the guys there is even a Unix geek.
However, even in this situation, which according to this thread sounds like one of the best, Apple doesn't have full control of the user experience. And that is what Apple is all about, right? Even if the Apple resellers were all great, how long could Steve be expected to tolerate that lack of control?
Sublime Frequencies only has a handful of releases, but what I've heard from them is amazing. Tamizdat is a distributor of eastern European music. These aren't download sites, but I still thought you may be interested.
I agree with you that it would be *amazing* to see Apple incorporate music from all the countries they distribute in. It would be good for Apple, consumers & music in general.
It's not that expensive to produce high-quality CDs. Yeah, it takes a little work, but the investment is not that high (if you're making 1000 CDs, it's about $1-2 per CD, with liner notes & jewel cases). What costs money is the marketing & distribution, and this is where the RIAA really shines. Anybody with a couple of thousand dollars can put out a short run CD, but getting that CD onto Clear Channel stations, MTV, VH1 and every Best Buy, Blockbuster Music, Tower Records, etc. in the country is the hard part. Sure, it's cheaper to put up an album on a web site than to press CDs, but who's going to download it? If I was the RIAA I would be more scared of having independant artists on iTunes & Napster, right alongside Outkast -- sure, they still don't have the massive advertising budget, but the distribution model legitimizes the music to some extent.
Having clones to Apple hardware is one thing and I can understand Steve killing that idea but this is so totally different. Steve readily admits that iTMS is not a breadwinner. But Steve is a just a bit too protective still to license FairPlay.
...but they already did license the hardware for the iPod to HP. Seems like it would be a lot easier to license out the DRM tech than the precious iPod.
True, but I think the point is that AAC is the technology that Apple has adopted, and the DRM they use with it is their DRM technology. So the point stands, that if they license their DRM layer, they stand to get at least as much out of it as they are getting out of the HP iPod rebranding deal.
However, does anyone else think it might be too late in the game for this? Why weren't they licensing their DRM tech to Wal-Mart, Coca-Cola, etc?
I tried searching for a few songs and groups and got nothing.
I'm all for alternitive groups getting a place to sell music
Ok... so you're all for alternative bands selling their music, but you don't want to buy it unless they have a major ad campaign to make sure you've heard of them. And you don't want to pay full price. Believe me, a lot of the bands on this site are not that obscure. If you are into indie music at all you've probably heard of some of these artists: Iggie Pop & the Stooges, the Modern Lovers, Death Cab for Cutie, Stereolab, NOFX -- these are fairly well-known artists, all featured on this site. And they're just getting started. Not only that, but they stream music through their 'snack bar' so you can sample it as you're browsing the site.
After all, with Jobs as CEO of both companies, why wouldn't Apple be used for Pixar's needs, especially if they're capable?
The reason this is news is that it shows Macs finally are capable of doing this kind of high-end video production. Coupling this with the VA Tech 'Big Mac' shows that Apple is serious about reaching into the high end -- and is ready to be taken more seriously in that role.
So it's not so much a surprise that Pixar would consider this option, but that Pixar hadn't made the move yet said something about the Mac's capabilities.
Sure, if you want to support Viacom's unfair business practices. If they didn't force bundles on the networks, none of this would be going down. Viacom's 'bundling' is certainly no more ethical than Microsoft's 'bundling' that we all hear so much about...
Kind of like how StarOffice "withered away"? I don't understand why the proprietary version couldn't keep folding in new features from the OSS version.
I used a French press for a while, but I found that while it has many advantages, it uses coffee grounds much (2-3 times) faster than a percolator. Otherwise, French presses are quite nice.
Slashdot Mirror
ThinkSecret has an article discussing early benchmarks from Xbench running on Macintel.
From the article:
"Overall, the Intel Mac are scoring between 65 and 70 with Xbench, a far cry from the 200+ scores higher-end G5 systems reach."
According to ThinkSecret, this performance discrepancy is largely due to Rosetta. However, it also notes that Rosetta caches it's binary translations so that you may see performance increase the more you use the apps.
If they delayed software purchases then they'll have compatibility problems.
I think what Gartner means is that if they wait until vendors have a "clear roadmap," they will know which vendors intend to move to the Intel Macs, and when. You can be sure that vendors that do this will be shipping "fat" or "universal" binaries that run on both Intel and PowerPC platforms. Thus, waiting on software purchases will not mean that you'll end up with incompatible software -- if anything, you'll get "universally" compatible software. Or you'll know that a certain vendor is going to jump ship and stop supporting Mac after the transition, and plan accordingly. Of course we already know that Adobe (which owns Macromedia), Microsoft, and of course Apple are making the transition quickly. What about Quark?
Because, as we all know, Microsoft is the market leader in not crashing.
While I generally agree with you here, let me add something. Public education was set up in the US not so that people would be able to find a job, but so that they would be informed, thoughtful citizens. The line of reasoning was that if the populace is uneducated, democracy cannot be successful. I think we should be asking ourselves not "when these students get out of school, can they get a job?" but "when these students get out of school, are they prepared to enter a democratic society?" That is, are these students prepared to be not just productive, but thoughtful members of society, able to enter into a discussion about the problems our society faces and explore solutions (not just from a policy standpoint, but from the standpoint of a citizen trying to create possitive change). There's a lot more to life than being able to use Word and Excel.
Aren't you forgetting that they sued ThinkSecret before MacWorld -- all but confirming the rumors. If they had wanted to keep the Mac mini in the bottle they would have sued ThinkSecret after the release of the product. The timing on this, I think, kept the story alive. If you look at the articles from around that time, after Apple sued, most of them focused on the fact that this confirmed the rumor -- not that Steve Jobs is the enemy of free speech.
And frankly, I don't think the suit will hurt Apple's bottom line at all. Most people either don't care, or realize that trade secrets are important and worth protecting. I'd be willing to bet that it's only a slim minority of people that strongly feel major corporations are out of line in defending their trade secrets. It's even a smaller portion of those people that would actually let this change their purchasing habits.
Benefiting from somebody's creation without their approval is theft. Pure and simple
Copyright violation is not theft. It is a totally different law. If, for instance, I were to download a song that I wouldn't have paid for anyway, I'm not depriving the artist of income (this doesn't necessarily make it ethical). If, on the other hand, I steal the original recording, which I wouldn't have paid for either, I am actually depriving him of his property. It is essentially a different act to copy something someone has made vs. taking it. Now, I'm not saying it is morally justifiable to violate copyright law, I'm just saying that it is very different from theft.
To argue that file trading networks deprive artists of revenue that they would have otherwise had is an argument that has been made numerous times, but never really convincingly. If you really look at the numbers, there is very little evidence that these networks have hurt the artists' or labels' bottom lines. I believe that breaking the law is almost always wrong, but in this case I think the IP laws, and the stances many artists and labels are taking are also wrong. They are hurting themselves and their customers by clamping down on the music too tightly.
If the artist has died, the copyrights are transfered to whomever controls his/her estate. In most cases, this will be the family of the artist. It is treated as an inheritance. That's just how copyright law works. If the company owns the copyright to the intellectual property in question while the artist is still alive, then they own it after the artist dies. But copyrights aren't transfered from the artist to the label after death. It is, I believe, 75 years after the artist dies that the work goes into the public domain. Then it becomes free. This is a rediculous state of affairs, but that's how our wise leaders have set it up.
The above discussion only applies to US copyright law. Every country has a different set of rules.
Well, let's see... for $499 (after rebates) you can get a comparable Dell with 512mb RAM, a 17" CRT (which many people already have), NO CD burner, WinXP Home, and WordPerfect Office (which no one wants).
For $574 you can get the Mac Mini, with RAM upgraded to 512mb, a CD burner, a powerful OS (that's easy to use), and iLife. Also, you don't have to worry about malware, your computer is compact, silent, and aesthetically pleasing...
Sure, OS X may not really "sing" on this rig, but it is more than adequate for the target audience. Sounds like a good deal to me...
What will the Apple trolls carp about now?
Oh, I don't know... no audio in?
Why can't Google just block MS from crawling their site? Wouldn't Google notice if other spiders were crawling them?
Why don't you also mention the 4-5 DNC voter fraud articles referenced in your previous post today?
Ok, BigChigger, but why didn't you link to them, or give any substance to your post other than whining?
I think this post is representative of what you were talking about. And here is a synopsis of and response to the linked articles. Mostly, we are looking at a flawed system in which people are paid for each registration card that they collect, so their is an incentive to forge registrations. HOWEVER, if I register to vote 35 times (as did one of the guys in one of those articles), that doesn't mean I get to vote 35 times. After the registrations get submitted, they are reviewed for authenticity, and when you go to the polls you have to present a valid ID which cannot be used to vote again. On the other hand, what this heavily RNC funded group is doing is destroying registrations for Democrats, which they would theoretically have a financial incentive not to do. Now, I'm not saying Dems aren't doing this as well. But please give us some evidence to work with.
Michael may be biased, but please at least defend your statements with links and/or arguments. It's the only way you can offset his bias.
Is it a "wink, smile and nod" system or was the RNC truly caught off guard by this (as they will no doubt claim)?
Well, three people who resigned from the South Dakota GOP over the voter fraud scandal, have now been hired to work for the Bush-Cheney campaign in Ohio. I think that's more than just a "wink, smile and nod" system. They are actively being encouraged to maintain these tactics.
If the DNC is involved in this sort of thing, lets see some evidence. And no, the Colorado election day manual is not evidence of voter fraud, or even of false allegations of voter fraud, but merely that the DNC would like to see confirmed stories of GOP voter fraud from the past resurface. Not even remotely comparable.
Here's an explanation of why Sinclair should not be allowed to run this "news segment," in the words of former FCC chairman Reed Hundt (pulled from Talking Points Memo):
Why is it important that Sinclair Broadcasting be urged in all lawful ways that can be imagined to reconsider its decision to broadcast on its television stations the anti-Kerry "documentary"?
Because in a large, pluralistic information society democracy will not work unless electronic media distribute reasonably accurate information and also competing opinions about political candidates to the entire population. Certainly, for the overwhelming number of voters this year, controlling impressions of the candidates for President are obtained from television.
In all countries, candidates for public office governments aspire to have favorable information and a chorus of favorable opinion disseminated through mass media to the citizenry. In a democracy, on the eve of a quadrennial election, the incumbent government plainly has a motive to encourage the media to report positively on its record but also negatively on the rival. But its role instead is to make sure that broadcast television promote democracy by conveying reasonably accurate reflections of where the candidates stand and what they are like.
To that end, since television was invented, Congress and its delegated agency, the Federal Communications Commision, together have passed laws and regulations to ensure that broadcast television stations provide reasonably accurate, balanced, and fair coverage of major Presidential and Congressional candidates. These obligations are reflected in specific provisions relating to rights to buy advertising time, bans against the gift of advertising time, rights to reply to opponents, and various other specific means of accomplishing the goal of balance and fairness. The various rules are part of a tradition well known to broadcasters an honored by almost all of them. This tradition is embodied in the commitment of the broadcasters to show the conventions and the debates.
Part of this tradition is that broadcasters do not show propaganda for any candidate, no matter how much a station owner may personally favor one or dislike the other. Broadcasters understand that they have a special and conditional role in public discourse. They received their licenses from the public -- licenses to use airwaves that, for instance, cellular companies bought in auctions -- for free, and one condition is the obligation to help us hold a fair and free election. The Supreme Court has routinely upheld this "public interest" obligation. Virtually all broadcasters understand and honor it.
Sinclair has a different idea, and a wrong one in my view. If Sinclair wants to disseminate propaganda, it should buy a printing press, or create a web site. These other media have no conditions on their publication of points of view. This is the law, and it should be honored. In fact, if the FCC had any sense of its responsibility as a steward of fair elections its chairman now would express exactly what I am writing to you here.
They may be cutting back more than this article lets on -- the Register reports that MS is also cutting out Avalon. Of course, this is contrary to what CNet, ZDNet, etc are saying, so I'm not sure who's right. Anyone have any info to settle this question?
Hmmm... I don't see Apple going in this direction. These are the markets that tablets have penetrated already (except, perhaps, dope dealers), but I see Apple trying to make more of a consumer electronics device for controlling your desktop in the den without leaving your living room. You could control iTunes (which is streaming to your stereo system), look up info on the web, check your email, stream video and iPhoto slideshows from your desktop to your TV, and possibly use it as a glorified Tivo.
I have to say, the primary Apple reseller in San Antonio, ImagiQ (yeah, stupid name), has always been pretty helpful in my experience. It is a small store in a strip center, and definitely doesn't have the aesthetic appeal of an Apple Store, but they have 7 or 8 computers out there for you to play with, and are friendly and knowledgeable. One of the guys there is even a Unix geek.
However, even in this situation, which according to this thread sounds like one of the best, Apple doesn't have full control of the user experience. And that is what Apple is all about, right? Even if the Apple resellers were all great, how long could Steve be expected to tolerate that lack of control?
These two sites are excellent sources for international music:
Tamizdat
Sublime Frequencies
Sublime Frequencies only has a handful of releases, but what I've heard from them is amazing. Tamizdat is a distributor of eastern European music. These aren't download sites, but I still thought you may be interested.
I agree with you that it would be *amazing* to see Apple incorporate music from all the countries they distribute in. It would be good for Apple, consumers & music in general.
It's not that expensive to produce high-quality CDs. Yeah, it takes a little work, but the investment is not that high (if you're making 1000 CDs, it's about $1-2 per CD, with liner notes & jewel cases). What costs money is the marketing & distribution, and this is where the RIAA really shines. Anybody with a couple of thousand dollars can put out a short run CD, but getting that CD onto Clear Channel stations, MTV, VH1 and every Best Buy, Blockbuster Music, Tower Records, etc. in the country is the hard part. Sure, it's cheaper to put up an album on a web site than to press CDs, but who's going to download it? If I was the RIAA I would be more scared of having independant artists on iTunes & Napster, right alongside Outkast -- sure, they still don't have the massive advertising budget, but the distribution model legitimizes the music to some extent.
Having clones to Apple hardware is one thing and I can understand Steve killing that idea but this is so totally different. Steve readily admits that iTMS is not a breadwinner. But Steve is a just a bit too protective still to license FairPlay.
...but they already did license the hardware for the iPod to HP. Seems like it would be a lot easier to license out the DRM tech than the precious iPod.
True, but I think the point is that AAC is the technology that Apple has adopted, and the DRM they use with it is their DRM technology. So the point stands, that if they license their DRM layer, they stand to get at least as much out of it as they are getting out of the HP iPod rebranding deal.
However, does anyone else think it might be too late in the game for this? Why weren't they licensing their DRM tech to Wal-Mart, Coca-Cola, etc?
I tried searching for a few songs and groups and got nothing.
I'm all for alternitive groups getting a place to sell music
Ok... so you're all for alternative bands selling their music, but you don't want to buy it unless they have a major ad campaign to make sure you've heard of them. And you don't want to pay full price. Believe me, a lot of the bands on this site are not that obscure. If you are into indie music at all you've probably heard of some of these artists: Iggie Pop & the Stooges, the Modern Lovers, Death Cab for Cutie, Stereolab, NOFX -- these are fairly well-known artists, all featured on this site. And they're just getting started. Not only that, but they stream music through their 'snack bar' so you can sample it as you're browsing the site.
After all, with Jobs as CEO of both companies, why wouldn't Apple be used for Pixar's needs, especially if they're capable?
The reason this is news is that it shows Macs finally are capable of doing this kind of high-end video production. Coupling this with the VA Tech 'Big Mac' shows that Apple is serious about reaching into the high end -- and is ready to be taken more seriously in that role.
So it's not so much a surprise that Pixar would consider this option, but that Pixar hadn't made the move yet said something about the Mac's capabilities.
DirecTV sounds like a great choice
Sure, if you want to support Viacom's unfair business practices. If they didn't force bundles on the networks, none of this would be going down. Viacom's 'bundling' is certainly no more ethical than Microsoft's 'bundling' that we all hear so much about...
"and the proprietary Java will wither away"
Kind of like how StarOffice "withered away"? I don't understand why the proprietary version couldn't keep folding in new features from the OSS version.
I used a French press for a while, but I found that while it has many advantages, it uses coffee grounds much (2-3 times) faster than a percolator. Otherwise, French presses are quite nice.