Re:Both nuisance and blessing... mostly nuisance.
on
OSx86 Cracked Again
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· Score: 1
Only while the price of that Apple stays constant for the year(s) that it is produced with no meaningful upgrades, the PC (Dell or other) will come down in price and become faster. I like the design of macs, but unless you are buying hardware when it's bleeding edge, the price is anything but similar.
What the heck are you talking about?
Historically, Apple updates their product lines, either improving components or reducing price ( usually improving components ) about once every 6-8 months. The only places/times during which this has not been the case has been when it's difficult to do... i.e., their PowerPC processor suppliers aren't providing expected improvements. The Intel switch removes that last remaining inequity, and I'm going to guess that going forward we're not going to see that problem much anymore.
Frankly, I have no idea why I bothered to reply to you just now... I've offered you a chance to directly compare Apple's *current* offering with that of other Intel computer OEMs, and you've offered nothing but a demonstratably untrue platitude with nothing to back it up. I call B.S. In fact, unless you're going to point to the G4 in the Mac mini and eMac as being slower than other low-end PCs, or point to offers that discount such low-end PCs with rebates and bundles and pathetic PCs with not enough memory and shared-memory on-board GPUs, your statement is completely false on the decidingly _non_ cutting-edge low-end as well... what precisely is the product line on which Apple has kept the price the same for years without real improvements? The only thing that comes to mind is the PowerBook over the past couple of years, and hey... we all know that problem ( getting improvements on laptop chips beyond the G4 1.6Ghz ) is exactly what pushed Apple into Intel's arms... any other improvement to the PowerBook ( and they've been done over the past year and a half ) amount to the "not meaningful" variety you allude to.
Re:Both nuisance and blessing... mostly nuisance.
on
OSx86 Cracked Again
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· Score: 1
Don't get me wrong, I love OS X. I like Apple's designs, too. But it is a little ridiculous that I can buy a very, very similarly specc'd machine (slower processor/video card, but 2GB ram and 120 hd standard) for ~$1000 less. That's a big premium for OS X, on a machine that has 100% driver support from OS X (yes, even the ATI card.)
Dude... you've been snookered. Check out my other post on this thread. There's a reason I picked Dell's machine to compare, not Acer's, and it's not Acer's low price. The Acer you're talking about uses lower-performance components across the board... video is slower... memory speed is slower... screen resolution is lower... the processor is slower...
as for 100% driver support, uh... you really think OS X would instantly recognize that card reader? Really?
Anyway, the main point remains... this machine is nearly a thousand bucks less than Dell's or Gateway's ( or anyone else's ) laptop that is *truly* similarly spec'd to Apples, because this one is *not* actually similarly spec'd... unless by 'similar' you mean "the same type, except cheaper or slower in almost every regard".
It's rather enlightening to me that, now that you actually *can* compare Apple's hardware to that of other manufacturers, there remain people who insist on continuing the practice of comparing it to *lesser* hardware and then complaining about the price of Apple's offering.
Note that I'm not saying Apple's hardware isn't just a *little* pricier in some regards... but it's minor stuff, at best... the pricing really does look competitive when you really put together *truly* similar-spec'd machines. But this Acer? That's a poor comparison. Spec out a Dell, a ThinkPad, or a Gateway with the same clockspeed, comprable graphics systems, and the same speed memory, or you're just looking like you're not giving Apple a fair shake.
Re:If you replace enough files...
on
OSx86 Cracked Again
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· Score: 2, Insightful
This is why standards are important, genius. Write your operating system against commonly-known hardware standards, and it works. If the standards-based OS breaks, it's the hardware's fault, and would be easily provable so. That's why Windows works on all the "hacked-up systems" of the world.
Ummm... is that really so ?
Let me ask, does Linux work on all variety of laptop out there ? Does it support all of the video cards that Windows does ?
Let me answer: No. It does not. Do you know why Windows supports all of those graphics cards and other strange little devices out there that Linux does not?
Again, let me answer : it's because the hardware manufacturers make sure the drivers are written. That's right; it's not as if Microsoft is out there writing device drivers for every video card out there. As to standards, which standard? There are so many to choose from... DirectX ? Sure, Apple should license that from Microsoft... WTF are you talking about? That's not even right, or probably doable, and it's still video card makers who write drivers for Microsoft, or "partner" or otherwise pay Microsoft to support their hardware...
WTF? What standards are you talking about here? How do you think this stuff works?
You are right about one thing, though... the blame is properly placed with the hardware makers... and I'm not so sure Windows works on "all of the hacked-up systems" out there... certainly it doesn't without third-party device drivers. It's those drivers that are at the heart of this issue, and if you think they're all working on some sort of magic, open standards, or that Microsoft writes or funds the creation of all of those drivers... pass the pipe, please...
Re:Don't be so dismissive of generic hardware.
on
OSx86 Cracked Again
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· Score: 1
I would pay more for OS X on a Thinkpad.
So would I, but the thing is, we need to talk to Lenovo about this, not Apple. The simple fact is that there is too much variety in hardware out there for Apple to single-handedly support it all. On the other hand, if Lenovo or HP or even Dell drove a *big enough* dump truck full of cash and development resources up to Apple's front door, it might be difficult enough for them to turn it down. Sure, it'd have to be a huge offer, maybe to the tune of "if we end up eating *all* of your hardware sales, you'll *still* make more money per unit than before"... but it could possibly be done, and that's what it'd take... and we wouldn't be talking about 'generic' hardware, we'd be talking about OEM systems.
We all need to grow up and face facts: Windows hardware support, and to a large extent existing Linux hardware support, is a result of manufacturers and individuals writing drivers ( not, say, Microsoft writing drivers for everyone )... until hardware folks start doing 'free' work for Apple and/or directly adding to their bottom line, there's no *good* reason for Apple to support their hardware... it would need to make real, serious, obvious business sense, and I don't think it's as obvious as a lot of people want to make it out to be.
I don't much care for Apple's laptop keyboards ( in particular ) myself... but if I have to choose between Windows and Apple's keyboard, I'll make do with Apple's keyboard. You have a similar choice to make, but I'm not sure it's right to complain that Apple won't give you OS X for ThinkPad; rather just complain that you don't like this or that about the MacBook Pro or whatever it is you don't like...
Re:Both nuisance and blessing... mostly nuisance.
on
OSx86 Cracked Again
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· Score: 1
I'm an apple fan, however this is total bullshit:
However, when you look at Dell's Core Duo laptop and Apple's Core Duo laptop... the differences aren't much. That's the big win for Apple in switching to Intel hardware- the systems are really comparable and fairly easily similarly priced.
http://www.compusa.com/products/product_info.asp?p roduct_code=336978&pfp=srch1
Slightly slower processor. 2 GB ram, base. Slightly slower video vard (ATI Radeon X1400). SD card reader, firewire, DVD burner, yadda yadda. 120 GB harddrive, which is slightly greater.
$1299.99
Slow down there, cowboy. Acer != Dell, for starters. Mmmm... *slightly* slower video? That's an X1400 vs a X1600, I'd like to see that benchmark. Similarly for the CPU, 1.66Ghz vs 1.83Ghz ? Oh you forgot to mention memory : 533Mhz memory vs 677Mhz ? 1280x800 display vs Apple's 1440x900? It appears I could go on and on, but... you get the point. This is not the laptop you're looking for.
Oh, and that's a retailer-discounted price, after rebate. The real price is $1499. Sure, you get it for $1299 eventually, but... meh. Point is, there are more than a few ways that the Acer isn't equivalent even "functionally" whatever that means ; it's more like what I'd expect the iBook replacement to be, except I expect that to be Core Solo and even cheaper...
These are not "similar" specs, and it's only $500 cheaper, really. Find a machine with actually similar ( as opposed to consitiently inferior ) specs, then get back to me. I suggest checking Dell's website. Oh, that Gateway laptop? $2099-2,809.95 depending on configuration... again... maybe a bit cheaper, but not a really, definitely not a big difference, sorry... Apple is competitive here. The only real issue is they don't have the mind-boggling wide arrange of choices you find from the 8 other larger manufacturers. Sure, that's an issue for some, but if that's a bigger issue than Windows vs OS X... use Windows. Really. You want to have your cake and eat it to ?? Um... so do I, but I'm not going to tell Apple they need to support other hardware manufacturers' businesses, and I'm not sure why you'd think they should.
I'm going to guess that if Dell or HP or Sony offered Apple a really, really good deal ( including co-development, etc ), they *might* get an OEM deal out of Apple... but they'd really, really have to make it worth Apple's while. Apple *could* release OS X for more generic systems, but should they really, would it be a wise business move? How much would it cost to write drivers for all of those video chipsets and memory cards and...uh, why was it again that you can't run Linux on that laptop? I see... sorry, Dell or someone offering Apple a giant stack of cash is the best you're going to hope for, if OS X on their hardware is somehow what you really, really want. Start yourself a letter writing campaign... to the hardware manufacturers, though, not to Apple...
Whoa, whoa, whoa. I'm on board that just "downloading a DVD" is unethical, but if I BUY an official copy of OS/X, then who the hell is Steve Jobs to tell me what I can or can't do with it?
While I agree with you in principle, and also think a *lot* of other companies should be more flexible about what you do with their software, consider for a moment that we're not talking about Apple Computer, here, but the entire software... scratch that, the entire electronics industry.
First, I'm selling this bit of software, along with future support, including open-box returns. Would you expect that, if some user buys a box labeled "OS FooBar for Intel" and tries unsuccessfully to instal it on their old home-built AMD or P4 system, even though the box clearly says "only supported on FooBar Computer, Inc machines"... FooBar Inc should treat it like any open-box return? Do you expect to be able to legally copy the pre-installed OS from one FooBar, Inc handheld or router or other small device, and use it to upgrade an older FooBar, Inc device, and yet expect that when your device is rendered inoperable that FooBar's tech support should help you? When FooBar, Inc, pushes out a software update or patch, should they be sure to read your mind about what modifications you've made and test your hacked-up system so that the update doesn't break things for you? Will you call support and complain on forums when an update does break your system?
I grant that these are somewhat extreme examples, but you must see what I'm getting at here. Ponder that in fact Apple ( or at least some percentage of people working there ) might like to see OS X sold generically, but consider the support nightmare for a minute. Pretend it's your company. What would you rather do, spend tons of money fielding calls, dealing with complaints in forums and such from people installing your OS on a myriad of systems so diverse you'd go bankrupt testing all those combinations, and for what business advantage? How would Apple be more successful doing that? How would Apple be more successful letting Real pack iPods with reverse-engineered *still DRMd* audio files that, who knows, might just be slightly off-format in a way that could cause problems, maybe somehow resulting in support calls to iTunes for files that they didn't make a cent in selling? Actually... I think the Real case is a poor example, Apple didn't sue them to keep you from using your iPod, they sued them to keep competitors from getting away with reverse engineering thier DRM. There, you have to complain about the law, not Apple in particular. If you want to put non-Apple files on your iPod, turn them into MP3s, anything else is just iTunes competitors' whines... I know *you* don't want that DRM there anyway.
Frankly, Apple is just like any other proprietary technology company about letting you do what you want... compare them to Microsoft and Sun and any other operating system vendor if you'd like, and what I think you'll find is they're way more open : want to get the source code to the core of OS X and compile it... it's *FREE*. That's way more open than their competitors. Sorry, I'd like everyone to just give me all of their toys in exactly the form I'd like, too, but I really don't get the argument that Apple is "arrogant" for dictating the types of terms they do for the use of OS X and the iPod... the terms are not unreasonable, and you have options if you find them too restrictive for some reason. You want to use the hardware you own, and it's not Apple hardware? Install Linux. Or Darwin, if you must. But complain about Apple's arrogance? Who are you? Start your own less "arrogant" company, you'll "be so much more successful", I'm sure...
Both nuisance and blessing... mostly nuisance.
on
OSx86 Cracked Again
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· Score: 4, Interesting
If Apple's hardware were really a lot more expensive than competing hardware, it would be a really serious nuisance, as there'd be a larger number of people willing to run a seriously hacked-up system in order to avoid paying extra.
However, when you look at Dell's Core Duo laptop and Apple's Core Duo laptop... the differences aren't much. That's the big win for Apple in switching to Intel hardware- the systems are really comparable and fairly easily similarly priced.
People hacking OS X to run on non-Apple Intel hardware *is* a blessing in a sense, because those who do go through the extra hassle to install OS X on non-Apple hardware are certainly asserting, beyond their hacking ( or simple file-sharing ) skills, that OS X is a really, really worthy bit of software to have... and they'll find, I suspect, that some things, in particular Software Update, won't play nicely at all with their very non-standard system. They're a seriously small number of people, probably, and are folks who either wouldn't for whatever reason buy *either* a Dell or an Apple system ( because it's all about building it yourself ), or, quite possibly, they're buying Apple hardware or software already ( don't you think the folks who worked out how to do this bought Apple hardware in order to do so ? ) in which case... well, let's just say Apple doesn't exactly go to great lengths to keep you from installing the same copy of OS X on multiple Apple machines... it's just not something they're worried about preventing. The notion that hacked x86 systems amount to try-before-you buy is probably not unfounded.
In short, while it's interesting to us geeks, it's not exactly a threat to Apple's business model... in a very real way, the fact that someone would want to do this pays quite a compliment to Apple's software, and is not terribly significant otherwise... just normal and likely small-scale software piracy, really.
As a third-party OS X software developer, it's just another ( small, likely ) set of machines I might be able to sell software or online services to, so it's all good for everyone except maybe Apple, and it's just not a big deal to them either, since hacked versions of OS X aren't going to be installed on over 1% of existing Windows PCs any time soon.
Ok, so... who is it exactly that doesn't play video games because the word "game" is used ? That'd be a nobody, right ?
Who doesn't play video games because they're too serious, 'grown-up' whatever that means, and can't take the time out to have fun ? Fine for them. Some people don't dance, some people don't watch TV. To each their own.
Then there are the people who want to decide that someone else shouldn't play video games, or someone else shouldn't watch what they want or hear what they want or read what they want, to protect the children or because those ideas are dangerous, and there's a word for those people. They're fascists. Plain and simple. They can come about that viewpoint from cultural conservatism or misguided 'progressive' socialism, but either way, people who value art and freedom need to stand up to the fascists, explain to them repeatedly that there is room for all sorts of points of view and expression, that parents are to be made responsible for their children, and that their decision to use censorship as a means of controlling culture is to be questioned at it's core as an attack on freedom and democracy.
Must be a slow newsday. This is a dumb article. Anyone who wants to can start calling video games "interactive entertainment" ( leave out the word "adult" unless there's real porn involved, thanks ), but don't expect anyone else to follow suit. Video games are aptly named _games_ that you play on a _video_ display... changing the name would change nothing and serve no purpose.
I really don't usually post this kind of stuff, but I'm looking to kill time and hadn't seen this one posted yet.
The first computer I learned to program was a Vector MZ ( along with a similar "Vector 3" ) made by a company called Vector Graphics. It ran CP/M and I learned to program in a version of BASIC made by some company called Microsoft. This was equipment I managed to talk a high school teacher into letting me use at weird hours, since I was in sixth grade, not high school.
True story: I briefly considered taking my summer work check and buying Microsoft stock, then realized I had no idea how to do so ( didn't know anyone, even an adult, who bought stock in any company ), so I bought a jacket instead. Sucks to be me, huh?
Later, after being exposed to many, many other kinds of computers, my parents were finally able to buy a TI-99/4A. Despite having 'color', I learned a lot more from the CP/M machines than I ever learned from the TI-99 ( except that using a tape to store data *sucks* ).
I also started with a TI-99/4A. Still have it. Started coding in the included BASIC and quickly needed to buy the Extended BASIC to access the voice synthesizer I got for free by purchasing 6 cartridges (and sending the tops to TI). Boy, those were fun days. Call Clear
Yea. Kids these days with their PS2 games and web browsers... they have no idea the FUN they're missing out on.
Here are some recent $0 experiences which no amount of 7800GTX SLI cards can come close to:...
Boy, you do not get it at all.
I'm beat. I just finally got the kid(s) to bed ( or got back home after hard day, or whatever ), and I have at most a couple of hours during which I'd like to sit down, be entertained, and not have to use my brain much if at all. Perfect choices seem to include a good book, a fun video game, or a TV show or movie, or maybe checking out some random piece of crap websites if I get really bored.
I'm willing to hear about your other options, but if you can only fill my weekends, you're missing the time I actually use my TV, computer, and video game console.
And yea. Wife and kids. Your schoolboy fantasies about meeting women aren't going to do me any good. Going to bars, wasting loads of time hanging out drinking with friends... well, that happens, but it's a happy special occasion, not a daily source of entertainment. You're not better than someone else because you don't watch TV, you're just different. I have a full life, but most of it involves taking care of my kid and house; give me something fun I can do in the 2 hours after the kid goes to be and before my wife and I go to bed. Otherwise, keep your attitude to yourself, because your ideas aren't near as interesting as you think they are.
They tend to only get OS upgrades when they get a new computer, or when a techie pushes them to. The non-tech users that are likely to upgrade are more the gamer/power user types that are likely to have a card that'll handle the UI.
Good point. Although surely someone out there will buy Vista because they want to play the new version of Halo, after they try to actually play it, they'll hopefully run out and buy a graphics card, too... all the while cursing Microsoft/Bungie, which they probably won't realise is the same company...
Can I get a grant? I mean... any 12-year-old can summarize groupthink for you, even if they don't know to call it groupthink.
C'mon, everyone else is doing it... you don't want to be a loner, do you? Don't be left out! It's the hot new thing!
F'ing lemmings. Of course, the irony is that this is so ingrained in our behavior that it works even for counter-culture subgroups, too, people just end up picking small subgroups to conform to.
Well, nobody's perfect. Still, with all of their accomplishments we should forgive them for having done so much to propagate C++.
I bow before you, sir. You are seriously knocking them dead with your comments on this story. It's hilarious. I think I'm just going to go to your user page and read just your comments on this one. You're killing me, and when you're not being hilarious, you're being crazy insightful about the real, original stupid SGI business decision:
Alienware doesn't make enough money to service SGI's debt.
Haa, snort.
What killed SGI was the standard Big Computer squeeze... commodity hardware improved enough to eat their lunch... SGI could have survived by returning to their roots as a graphics hardware maker. Instead of ATI and Nvidia, we'd have SGI and a handful of also-rans, but SGI's management thought that making graphics boards for PCs was beneath them.
Some might say that they realized they had screwed up and lost the talent and desire to compete in such an obviously competetive area, but it's lucrative enough, how dumb were they to screw up a lead in that market in the first place ? Oh, I know, we'll make more money by competing with commodity hardware in a niche market! Ouch.
Not hardly. Linux hasn't killed any vendor, but it's fooled a couple of struggling ones by looking like a life preserver.
That may be the funniest, most insightful comment in the whole story, and yet it's not moderated at all. Interesting.
Everything Apple could possibly want from SGI can be had without buying the company.
Same goes for almost any other possible buyer, as well... I mean, don't companies usually sell *before* they go bankrupt, if possible?
For me, this story is just deja vu all over again; I'm amazed the company is still around. Sure, it's done some great stuff over the years, and turned out some amazing ( though always overpriced ) products, but it always seems to end up with diminishing profits, dumping the old successful business model, and starting out on some new business plan. It's impressive they've been able to repeat that as many times as they have.
What's this "Golf" video game, am I missing out?
on
WoW the Next "Golf"?
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· Score: 1
Oh... wait. I get it. They're talking about that old white man ( and Tiger Woods ) thing where you wear lame clothes and hit a tiny white ball around a big, expensive, manicured lawn.
Dude, I don't care if it's WoW as long as *something* replaces that kind of thing as a business tool... I couldn't afford green fees as a kid, and I'm not about to learn to golf *now*.
I see the foot, but is it funny ? mod down story.
on
No Time Travel, Sorry
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· Score: 1
It had to be said... I'm not sure just sticking an article in "Funny" makes a troll/hoax post OK unless there's a real joke... although... I guess it's a joke... is it meant to be a joke, though? Is it actually funny ? Do people pay attention to those category icons ?
I mean... it's less offensive than a few 'stories' from the past week, and yet, still... no. It's a little close on a few things, and we know ( really ) little enough that I'm not sure the post or the article is funny. It certainly doesn't *intend* to be funny, and if you're looking for crackpot quasi-scientific rants on the 'net, your surely can find more amusing ones. I mean... do we know space to be really, really empty ? Errr... we know space to have very little in it... we can't create or measure a space that's really, really empty except to say it'll be empty most of the time, and have a particle in it some of the time ( like space between particles... but you could still argue that space is there due to the force of particles, no? )... though this isn't my field, meh, I'm not sure... and regardless of crackpottedness... it's just not funny.
I'd much rather see stories about iPod rumors, Lemmings online, and Intel Macs booting from USB drives, all of which are top-rated stories on um, some other news website today. Nice try, Taco, but it's kinda not such a great story, don't you think ?
Star Trek (the original series) could also be done, as it was entirely produced on film
You're crapping me. Really?
Well... I was kinda kidding. I can see this giant multi-disc Star Trek set ( and many other multi-disc TV series and such ) being re-released as SD content on HD discs, just to replace 5 discs with 1. But you wouldn't re-buy your current DVDs to get that, unless you *really* need the convenience and space savings.
I suppose for stuff like Star Trek where there's a real fanatical following, someone might remaster film from SD-produced film content into HD, but... you're going to have to be the guy who gets a kick out of seeing the flaws on the set props and makeup to really enjoy it.
Uh... damn. I thought that there would be maybe ONE thread of comment around here that was actually about the WEBSITES being taken down, like... from a security perspective, were they really super easy to deface, how were they defaced, are we really just talking about spam-bombed blogs and public-comment websites... anything about, you know, the *technical* aspect of the *websites* talked about in the story ?
But no. Everyone just wants to vent about how stupid religious extremists are. And, hey, I understand- religious extremists have been screwing up the world for, oh, as long as anyone has history to guide us, but... that doesn't make it news, or interesting.
Anyone want to talk about how to make websites more difficult to take over, or how these ones were taken over? Or is that just not interesting?
And the moral of the story is: zealotry, of any variety = bad.
Yea. We should kill all violent extremists.
Better yet, let's get them to do it for themselves; find some nice wasteland, divide it up into 4 or 5 separate sections, give everyone a quiz along the lines of fill in the blank : "I hate ______ enough to go to war to kill them", then ship 'em off to their designated area so they can duke it out. Should one sect obliterate all of the others, probably enough time will have passed to weed out the next generation of extremists.
I'm talking about violent extremists here. You want to boycott a bakery because of what some newspaper publisher printed ? You're stupid, but go ahead... throwing firebombs, that's a line you just shouldn't cross.
Honestly, it's just a real shame all of the rational, relatively peaceful folks have to put of with these jackasses in our midst. I don't have, nor do I want to have, any *serious* beef with *anyone* who isn't trying to kill someone, and I'm sure the vast majority of folks, even in a place like Iran or Palistine, actually feel much the same way... damn bro, we're just busy trying to make a living and raise our families... it's just that we have this group of folks looking for a fight, and their dogmatic leaders looking for an enemy to help them consolidate power. And they're causing us all a whole lot of grief... on *all* sides.
Hey, come to think of it, there really isn't a lot of that rioting and setting-things-ablaze-for-days thing at all here in The West. Why d'you suppose that is?
Because they feel they have money, control, and power ? All they need to do is wack a few doctors and install a few Supreme Court Judges. No need to burn down buildings where *you* work. You're not talking about a people who feel oppressed, as much as some folks would like to express it that way. The only 'oppression' western Christian fundamentalists occassionaly face is dealing with the rights of folks with other belief systems.
am I going to have to pay Amazon to re-buy that $1700 Ultimate Star Trek collection... how pathetic will I have to be to re-buy that in Blu-Ray (possibly on many many less discs)
Uhhhhh... was *any* of that shot in HD or a format that could even remotely be remastered to HD with any noticable improvement in quality over DVD ?
Were you going for a funny mod there ?
The question you need to ask is how pathetic you had to be to buy that in the first place, isn't it ?
Sorry, that's a cheap shot. Anyway, my real point is that there's a whole bunch of content that won't make sense to re-release in HD. The DVD is not going away any time soon.
5-8 years ago that they were asked to re-purchase their entire video library. Now they're going to be encouraged to do so again.
Well, to be fair, it's unlikely that most of us will re-purchase our entire video library, even those of us who feel we can afford a several-thousand-dollar HDTV before much decent content for it is even available. I mean, I don't have an HDTV set yet so maybe I can't speak for those people, but there's not a very high probability that I'm going to ever buy a Blu-Ray copy of "Best in Show" or "A Mighty Wind" to replace my current DVD copies, even if I could. I'll buy HD versions of a subset of my collection, like the Lord of the Rings films - things where the detailed cinematic scenes are really spectacular.
The high-end, early adopter crowd *is* going to replace much of their collection... don't forget these are the people you knew who had laserdiscs. Most of us will replace movies very selectively, buy only new movies, and wait for the price to come dow,... and it will. To be honest, I thought these things would start out at around $50, about the price of a new video game, and from this it looks like they may be cheaper than that, really sooon.
Another thing that's different- I think you'll be able to sell your old DVDs pretty readily. The HD discs and DVD discs will live side-by-side for some time. Premium stuff does sell, though, and there's a lot of demand for HD content that currently isn't being met by the 10 or so HD TV channels most folks in the U.S. are currently limited to.
I thought the/. difference is that it wouldn't expose its readers to these higly vapourous 'fairy articles'.
I almost prefer the "bored reporter predicts XYZ" stories to the clear troll or hoax stories, which we've seen both of in the past few days... not that I like these pointless articles, either. I mean, I'm here to waste time, but this is just stupid. It would make just as much sense for HP or Microsoft to buy Palm.
I'm starting to think the 'editorial' choices around here won't start improving until we start staying away. Really, I'm not about to start staying away and I don't want to; Slashdot's threaded comment system and comment moderation puts sites like Digg to shame, but... I'm disappointed in the story choices of the staff here on a daily basis.
I guess what I'm saying is that I'm waiting for (a) Slashdot editors to get their act together and post fewer troll/BS/lame stories (b) Slashdot to implement some sort of story moderation system (c) Digg to implement a reply-to-comment, threaded discussion system.
Once one of these things happen, I'll be able to settle on one website to visit, and likely ditch the other. As things stand now, I'm left wondering if I value quality stories more than good discussion... but since truly good discussion ( as opposed to redundant, if occasionally interesting flamefests ) rarely come from poor stories, though, I'm currently leaning towards the site with better stories... I only wish I could say that site was my beloved Slashdot.
My reasons for an older PowerBook are longer battery and less heat, and I like the lower resolution screens.
The current iBook is about equivalent to the older PowerBook, isn't it ?
Comparing the current iBook and PowerBook specs really highlights the reason for Apple's switch to Intel, though... they haven't been able to bump the PowerBook enough, at this point the $600 difference between a 14-inch iBook and a 15-inch PowerBook boils down to a tiny processor upgrade, a reasonable, but not huge video upgrade, and... what, a slightly larger hard disk? That $1999 PowerBook needs to either be dual core or have a higher clock speed *and* FSB... things that were not going to happen on PowerPC... click over to the ( crappily named ) MacBook Pro, there it is : dual core, faster FSB.
I don't have two grand to drop right now, and I'm not usually in on buying the first rev of any hardware, but I'd be tempted on this one if I had the cash.
Your attitude typifies something that is an increasing problem for computer manufacturers, though. When your hardware does what you want it to do, it's tough to justify buying a new machine just because it's a little faster. Plenty of people who are perfectly happy with their 3 or 4 year old iBooks and PowerBooks. My home machine is a 800Mhz G4, and I'm not upgrading anytime soon.
Have you been to a technical conference lately? 1/2 or more of the laptops you will see there are PowerBooks.
Well, it depends on the technical conference, but Apple's thinking about 2 years down the road, not today. What are the low-power laptop-friendlly chips Apple could get from IBM and ( ha ha ) Freescale 2 years from now going to look like ? How are they going to compare to the chips ( not to mention associated platform ) from Intel ?
Despite current Freescale G4s being "good enough" for "most applications" for laptop users, it's undeniable that the performance on your modern Powerbook or iBook trails similarly-priced ( and sometimes even cheaper ) Intel-based laptops. While that's OK with you and I, that situation isn't going to grow market share, especially with the lack of progress in that area from Freescale and IBM.
I do find very interesting the notion that Apple hasn't 'completed' any transition, and as a matter of fact does ( for the next few years, at least ) have the ability to push a server or workstation PPC platform if the market opportunity for such a thing is strong. That's a heck of an investment in design and production, though... how many are you going to buy?
As for Apple's laptops... I'm an admitted fan of Apple's stuff, but seriously, other than minor speed bumps, a PowerBook today is largely unchanged from a Powerbook, what, 2 years ago ? That's not OK. Apple's decision to go Intel had *nothing* to do with the type of chip being discussed in the article. What we have here is just another example of someone putting a spin on a story that doesn't belong there, and editors posting it just because they know it'll stir up discussion.
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What the heck are you talking about?
Historically, Apple updates their product lines, either improving components or reducing price ( usually improving components ) about once every 6-8 months. The only places/times during which this has not been the case has been when it's difficult to do... i.e., their PowerPC processor suppliers aren't providing expected improvements. The Intel switch removes that last remaining inequity, and I'm going to guess that going forward we're not going to see that problem much anymore.
Frankly, I have no idea why I bothered to reply to you just now... I've offered you a chance to directly compare Apple's *current* offering with that of other Intel computer OEMs, and you've offered nothing but a demonstratably untrue platitude with nothing to back it up. I call B.S. In fact, unless you're going to point to the G4 in the Mac mini and eMac as being slower than other low-end PCs, or point to offers that discount such low-end PCs with rebates and bundles and pathetic PCs with not enough memory and shared-memory on-board GPUs, your statement is completely false on the decidingly _non_ cutting-edge low-end as well... what precisely is the product line on which Apple has kept the price the same for years without real improvements? The only thing that comes to mind is the PowerBook over the past couple of years, and hey... we all know that problem ( getting improvements on laptop chips beyond the G4 1.6Ghz ) is exactly what pushed Apple into Intel's arms... any other improvement to the PowerBook ( and they've been done over the past year and a half ) amount to the "not meaningful" variety you allude to.
Dude... you've been snookered. Check out my other post on this thread. There's a reason I picked Dell's machine to compare, not Acer's, and it's not Acer's low price. The Acer you're talking about uses lower-performance components across the board... video is slower... memory speed is slower... screen resolution is lower... the processor is slower...
as for 100% driver support, uh... you really think OS X would instantly recognize that card reader? Really?
Anyway, the main point remains... this machine is nearly a thousand bucks less than Dell's or Gateway's ( or anyone else's ) laptop that is *truly* similarly spec'd to Apples, because this one is *not* actually similarly spec'd... unless by 'similar' you mean "the same type, except cheaper or slower in almost every regard".
It's rather enlightening to me that, now that you actually *can* compare Apple's hardware to that of other manufacturers, there remain people who insist on continuing the practice of comparing it to *lesser* hardware and then complaining about the price of Apple's offering.
Note that I'm not saying Apple's hardware isn't just a *little* pricier in some regards... but it's minor stuff, at best... the pricing really does look competitive when you really put together *truly* similar-spec'd machines. But this Acer? That's a poor comparison. Spec out a Dell, a ThinkPad, or a Gateway with the same clockspeed, comprable graphics systems, and the same speed memory, or you're just looking like you're not giving Apple a fair shake.
Ummm... is that really so ?
Let me ask, does Linux work on all variety of laptop out there ? Does it support all of the video cards that Windows does ?
Let me answer: No. It does not. Do you know why Windows supports all of those graphics cards and other strange little devices out there that Linux does not?
Again, let me answer : it's because the hardware manufacturers make sure the drivers are written. That's right; it's not as if Microsoft is out there writing device drivers for every video card out there. As to standards, which standard? There are so many to choose from... DirectX ? Sure, Apple should license that from Microsoft... WTF are you talking about? That's not even right, or probably doable, and it's still video card makers who write drivers for Microsoft, or "partner" or otherwise pay Microsoft to support their hardware...
WTF? What standards are you talking about here? How do you think this stuff works?
You are right about one thing, though... the blame is properly placed with the hardware makers... and I'm not so sure Windows works on "all of the hacked-up systems" out there... certainly it doesn't without third-party device drivers. It's those drivers that are at the heart of this issue, and if you think they're all working on some sort of magic, open standards, or that Microsoft writes or funds the creation of all of those drivers... pass the pipe, please...
So would I, but the thing is, we need to talk to Lenovo about this, not Apple. The simple fact is that there is too much variety in hardware out there for Apple to single-handedly support it all. On the other hand, if Lenovo or HP or even Dell drove a *big enough* dump truck full of cash and development resources up to Apple's front door, it might be difficult enough for them to turn it down. Sure, it'd have to be a huge offer, maybe to the tune of "if we end up eating *all* of your hardware sales, you'll *still* make more money per unit than before"... but it could possibly be done, and that's what it'd take... and we wouldn't be talking about 'generic' hardware, we'd be talking about OEM systems.
We all need to grow up and face facts: Windows hardware support, and to a large extent existing Linux hardware support, is a result of manufacturers and individuals writing drivers ( not, say, Microsoft writing drivers for everyone )... until hardware folks start doing 'free' work for Apple and/or directly adding to their bottom line, there's no *good* reason for Apple to support their hardware... it would need to make real, serious, obvious business sense, and I don't think it's as obvious as a lot of people want to make it out to be.
I don't much care for Apple's laptop keyboards ( in particular ) myself... but if I have to choose between Windows and Apple's keyboard, I'll make do with Apple's keyboard. You have a similar choice to make, but I'm not sure it's right to complain that Apple won't give you OS X for ThinkPad; rather just complain that you don't like this or that about the MacBook Pro or whatever it is you don't like...
Slow down there, cowboy. Acer != Dell, for starters. Mmmm... *slightly* slower video? That's an X1400 vs a X1600, I'd like to see that benchmark. Similarly for the CPU, 1.66Ghz vs 1.83Ghz ? Oh you forgot to mention memory : 533Mhz memory vs 677Mhz ? 1280x800 display vs Apple's 1440x900? It appears I could go on and on, but... you get the point. This is not the laptop you're looking for.
Oh, and that's a retailer-discounted price, after rebate. The real price is $1499. Sure, you get it for $1299 eventually, but... meh. Point is, there are more than a few ways that the Acer isn't equivalent even "functionally" whatever that means ; it's more like what I'd expect the iBook replacement to be, except I expect that to be Core Solo and even cheaper...
These are not "similar" specs, and it's only $500 cheaper, really. Find a machine with actually similar ( as opposed to consitiently inferior ) specs, then get back to me. I suggest checking Dell's website. Oh, that Gateway laptop? $2099-2,809.95 depending on configuration... again... maybe a bit cheaper, but not a really, definitely not a big difference, sorry... Apple is competitive here. The only real issue is they don't have the mind-boggling wide arrange of choices you find from the 8 other larger manufacturers. Sure, that's an issue for some, but if that's a bigger issue than Windows vs OS X... use Windows. Really. You want to have your cake and eat it to ?? Um... so do I, but I'm not going to tell Apple they need to support other hardware manufacturers' businesses, and I'm not sure why you'd think they should.
I'm going to guess that if Dell or HP or Sony offered Apple a really, really good deal ( including co-development, etc ), they *might* get an OEM deal out of Apple... but they'd really, really have to make it worth Apple's while. Apple *could* release OS X for more generic systems, but should they really, would it be a wise business move? How much would it cost to write drivers for all of those video chipsets and memory cards and...uh, why was it again that you can't run Linux on that laptop? I see... sorry, Dell or someone offering Apple a giant stack of cash is the best you're going to hope for, if OS X on their hardware is somehow what you really, really want. Start yourself a letter writing campaign... to the hardware manufacturers, though, not to Apple...
While I agree with you in principle, and also think a *lot* of other companies should be more flexible about what you do with their software, consider for a moment that we're not talking about Apple Computer, here, but the entire software... scratch that, the entire electronics industry.
First, I'm selling this bit of software, along with future support, including open-box returns. Would you expect that, if some user buys a box labeled "OS FooBar for Intel" and tries unsuccessfully to instal it on their old home-built AMD or P4 system, even though the box clearly says "only supported on FooBar Computer, Inc machines"... FooBar Inc should treat it like any open-box return? Do you expect to be able to legally copy the pre-installed OS from one FooBar, Inc handheld or router or other small device, and use it to upgrade an older FooBar, Inc device, and yet expect that when your device is rendered inoperable that FooBar's tech support should help you? When FooBar, Inc, pushes out a software update or patch, should they be sure to read your mind about what modifications you've made and test your hacked-up system so that the update doesn't break things for you? Will you call support and complain on forums when an update does break your system?
I grant that these are somewhat extreme examples, but you must see what I'm getting at here. Ponder that in fact Apple ( or at least some percentage of people working there ) might like to see OS X sold generically, but consider the support nightmare for a minute. Pretend it's your company. What would you rather do, spend tons of money fielding calls, dealing with complaints in forums and such from people installing your OS on a myriad of systems so diverse you'd go bankrupt testing all those combinations, and for what business advantage? How would Apple be more successful doing that? How would Apple be more successful letting Real pack iPods with reverse-engineered *still DRMd* audio files that, who knows, might just be slightly off-format in a way that could cause problems, maybe somehow resulting in support calls to iTunes for files that they didn't make a cent in selling? Actually... I think the Real case is a poor example, Apple didn't sue them to keep you from using your iPod, they sued them to keep competitors from getting away with reverse engineering thier DRM. There, you have to complain about the law, not Apple in particular. If you want to put non-Apple files on your iPod, turn them into MP3s, anything else is just iTunes competitors' whines... I know *you* don't want that DRM there anyway.
Frankly, Apple is just like any other proprietary technology company about letting you do what you want... compare them to Microsoft and Sun and any other operating system vendor if you'd like, and what I think you'll find is they're way more open : want to get the source code to the core of OS X and compile it... it's *FREE*. That's way more open than their competitors. Sorry, I'd like everyone to just give me all of their toys in exactly the form I'd like, too, but I really don't get the argument that Apple is "arrogant" for dictating the types of terms they do for the use of OS X and the iPod... the terms are not unreasonable, and you have options if you find them too restrictive for some reason. You want to use the hardware you own, and it's not Apple hardware? Install Linux. Or Darwin, if you must. But complain about Apple's arrogance? Who are you? Start your own less "arrogant" company, you'll "be so much more successful", I'm sure...
However, when you look at Dell's Core Duo laptop and Apple's Core Duo laptop... the differences aren't much. That's the big win for Apple in switching to Intel hardware- the systems are really comparable and fairly easily similarly priced.
People hacking OS X to run on non-Apple Intel hardware *is* a blessing in a sense, because those who do go through the extra hassle to install OS X on non-Apple hardware are certainly asserting, beyond their hacking ( or simple file-sharing ) skills, that OS X is a really, really worthy bit of software to have... and they'll find, I suspect, that some things, in particular Software Update, won't play nicely at all with their very non-standard system. They're a seriously small number of people, probably, and are folks who either wouldn't for whatever reason buy *either* a Dell or an Apple system ( because it's all about building it yourself ), or, quite possibly, they're buying Apple hardware or software already ( don't you think the folks who worked out how to do this bought Apple hardware in order to do so ? ) in which case... well, let's just say Apple doesn't exactly go to great lengths to keep you from installing the same copy of OS X on multiple Apple machines... it's just not something they're worried about preventing. The notion that hacked x86 systems amount to try-before-you buy is probably not unfounded.
In short, while it's interesting to us geeks, it's not exactly a threat to Apple's business model... in a very real way, the fact that someone would want to do this pays quite a compliment to Apple's software, and is not terribly significant otherwise... just normal and likely small-scale software piracy, really.
As a third-party OS X software developer, it's just another ( small, likely ) set of machines I might be able to sell software or online services to, so it's all good for everyone except maybe Apple, and it's just not a big deal to them either, since hacked versions of OS X aren't going to be installed on over 1% of existing Windows PCs any time soon.
Who doesn't play video games because they're too serious, 'grown-up' whatever that means, and can't take the time out to have fun ? Fine for them. Some people don't dance, some people don't watch TV. To each their own.
Then there are the people who want to decide that someone else shouldn't play video games, or someone else shouldn't watch what they want or hear what they want or read what they want, to protect the children or because those ideas are dangerous, and there's a word for those people. They're fascists. Plain and simple. They can come about that viewpoint from cultural conservatism or misguided 'progressive' socialism, but either way, people who value art and freedom need to stand up to the fascists, explain to them repeatedly that there is room for all sorts of points of view and expression, that parents are to be made responsible for their children, and that their decision to use censorship as a means of controlling culture is to be questioned at it's core as an attack on freedom and democracy.
Must be a slow newsday. This is a dumb article. Anyone who wants to can start calling video games "interactive entertainment" ( leave out the word "adult" unless there's real porn involved, thanks ), but don't expect anyone else to follow suit. Video games are aptly named _games_ that you play on a _video_ display... changing the name would change nothing and serve no purpose.
The first computer I learned to program was a Vector MZ ( along with a similar "Vector 3" ) made by a company called Vector Graphics. It ran CP/M and I learned to program in a version of BASIC made by some company called Microsoft. This was equipment I managed to talk a high school teacher into letting me use at weird hours, since I was in sixth grade, not high school.
True story: I briefly considered taking my summer work check and buying Microsoft stock, then realized I had no idea how to do so ( didn't know anyone, even an adult, who bought stock in any company ), so I bought a jacket instead. Sucks to be me, huh?
Later, after being exposed to many, many other kinds of computers, my parents were finally able to buy a TI-99/4A. Despite having 'color', I learned a lot more from the CP/M machines than I ever learned from the TI-99 ( except that using a tape to store data *sucks* ).
Yea. Kids these days with their PS2 games and web browsers... they have no idea the FUN they're missing out on.
Wow, you had the voice synth cart?
Lucky.
Boy, you do not get it at all.
I'm beat. I just finally got the kid(s) to bed ( or got back home after hard day, or whatever ), and I have at most a couple of hours during which I'd like to sit down, be entertained, and not have to use my brain much if at all. Perfect choices seem to include a good book, a fun video game, or a TV show or movie, or maybe checking out some random piece of crap websites if I get really bored.
I'm willing to hear about your other options, but if you can only fill my weekends, you're missing the time I actually use my TV, computer, and video game console.
And yea. Wife and kids. Your schoolboy fantasies about meeting women aren't going to do me any good. Going to bars, wasting loads of time hanging out drinking with friends... well, that happens, but it's a happy special occasion, not a daily source of entertainment. You're not better than someone else because you don't watch TV, you're just different. I have a full life, but most of it involves taking care of my kid and house; give me something fun I can do in the 2 hours after the kid goes to be and before my wife and I go to bed. Otherwise, keep your attitude to yourself, because your ideas aren't near as interesting as you think they are.
Good point. Although surely someone out there will buy Vista because they want to play the new version of Halo, after they try to actually play it, they'll hopefully run out and buy a graphics card, too... all the while cursing Microsoft/Bungie, which they probably won't realise is the same company...
C'mon, everyone else is doing it... you don't want to be a loner, do you? Don't be left out! It's the hot new thing!
F'ing lemmings. Of course, the irony is that this is so ingrained in our behavior that it works even for counter-culture subgroups, too, people just end up picking small subgroups to conform to.
I bow before you, sir. You are seriously knocking them dead with your comments on this story. It's hilarious. I think I'm just going to go to your user page and read just your comments on this one. You're killing me, and when you're not being hilarious, you're being crazy insightful about the real, original stupid SGI business decision :
Alienware doesn't make enough money to service SGI's debt.
Haa, snort.
What killed SGI was the standard Big Computer squeeze... commodity hardware improved enough to eat their lunch... SGI could have survived by returning to their roots as a graphics hardware maker. Instead of ATI and Nvidia, we'd have SGI and a handful of also-rans, but SGI's management thought that making graphics boards for PCs was beneath them.
Some might say that they realized they had screwed up and lost the talent and desire to compete in such an obviously competetive area, but it's lucrative enough, how dumb were they to screw up a lead in that market in the first place ? Oh, I know, we'll make more money by competing with commodity hardware in a niche market! Ouch.
Not hardly. Linux hasn't killed any vendor, but it's fooled a couple of struggling ones by looking like a life preserver.
That may be the funniest, most insightful comment in the whole story, and yet it's not moderated at all. Interesting.
Everything Apple could possibly want from SGI can be had without buying the company.
Same goes for almost any other possible buyer, as well... I mean, don't companies usually sell *before* they go bankrupt, if possible?
For me, this story is just deja vu all over again; I'm amazed the company is still around. Sure, it's done some great stuff over the years, and turned out some amazing ( though always overpriced ) products, but it always seems to end up with diminishing profits, dumping the old successful business model, and starting out on some new business plan. It's impressive they've been able to repeat that as many times as they have.
Dude, I don't care if it's WoW as long as *something* replaces that kind of thing as a business tool... I couldn't afford green fees as a kid, and I'm not about to learn to golf *now*.
I mean... it's less offensive than a few 'stories' from the past week, and yet, still... no. It's a little close on a few things, and we know ( really ) little enough that I'm not sure the post or the article is funny. It certainly doesn't *intend* to be funny, and if you're looking for crackpot quasi-scientific rants on the 'net, your surely can find more amusing ones. I mean... do we know space to be really, really empty ? Errr... we know space to have very little in it... we can't create or measure a space that's really, really empty except to say it'll be empty most of the time, and have a particle in it some of the time ( like space between particles... but you could still argue that space is there due to the force of particles, no? )... though this isn't my field, meh, I'm not sure... and regardless of crackpottedness... it's just not funny.
I'd much rather see stories about iPod rumors, Lemmings online, and Intel Macs booting from USB drives, all of which are top-rated stories on um, some other news website today. Nice try, Taco, but it's kinda not such a great story, don't you think ?
You're crapping me. Really?
Well... I was kinda kidding. I can see this giant multi-disc Star Trek set ( and many other multi-disc TV series and such ) being re-released as SD content on HD discs, just to replace 5 discs with 1. But you wouldn't re-buy your current DVDs to get that, unless you *really* need the convenience and space savings.
I suppose for stuff like Star Trek where there's a real fanatical following, someone might remaster film from SD-produced film content into HD, but... you're going to have to be the guy who gets a kick out of seeing the flaws on the set props and makeup to really enjoy it.
But no. Everyone just wants to vent about how stupid religious extremists are. And, hey, I understand- religious extremists have been screwing up the world for, oh, as long as anyone has history to guide us, but... that doesn't make it news, or interesting.
Anyone want to talk about how to make websites more difficult to take over, or how these ones were taken over? Or is that just not interesting?
Yea. We should kill all violent extremists.
Better yet, let's get them to do it for themselves; find some nice wasteland, divide it up into 4 or 5 separate sections, give everyone a quiz along the lines of fill in the blank : "I hate ______ enough to go to war to kill them", then ship 'em off to their designated area so they can duke it out. Should one sect obliterate all of the others, probably enough time will have passed to weed out the next generation of extremists.
I'm talking about violent extremists here. You want to boycott a bakery because of what some newspaper publisher printed ? You're stupid, but go ahead... throwing firebombs, that's a line you just shouldn't cross.
Honestly, it's just a real shame all of the rational, relatively peaceful folks have to put of with these jackasses in our midst. I don't have, nor do I want to have, any *serious* beef with *anyone* who isn't trying to kill someone, and I'm sure the vast majority of folks, even in a place like Iran or Palistine, actually feel much the same way... damn bro, we're just busy trying to make a living and raise our families... it's just that we have this group of folks looking for a fight, and their dogmatic leaders looking for an enemy to help them consolidate power. And they're causing us all a whole lot of grief... on *all* sides.
Because they feel they have money, control, and power ? All they need to do is wack a few doctors and install a few Supreme Court Judges. No need to burn down buildings where *you* work. You're not talking about a people who feel oppressed, as much as some folks would like to express it that way. The only 'oppression' western Christian fundamentalists occassionaly face is dealing with the rights of folks with other belief systems.
Uhhhhh... was *any* of that shot in HD or a format that could even remotely be remastered to HD with any noticable improvement in quality over DVD ?
Were you going for a funny mod there ?
The question you need to ask is how pathetic you had to be to buy that in the first place, isn't it ?
Sorry, that's a cheap shot. Anyway, my real point is that there's a whole bunch of content that won't make sense to re-release in HD. The DVD is not going away any time soon.
Well, to be fair, it's unlikely that most of us will re-purchase our entire video library, even those of us who feel we can afford a several-thousand-dollar HDTV before much decent content for it is even available. I mean, I don't have an HDTV set yet so maybe I can't speak for those people, but there's not a very high probability that I'm going to ever buy a Blu-Ray copy of "Best in Show" or "A Mighty Wind" to replace my current DVD copies, even if I could. I'll buy HD versions of a subset of my collection, like the Lord of the Rings films - things where the detailed cinematic scenes are really spectacular.
The high-end, early adopter crowd *is* going to replace much of their collection... don't forget these are the people you knew who had laserdiscs. Most of us will replace movies very selectively, buy only new movies, and wait for the price to come dow,... and it will. To be honest, I thought these things would start out at around $50, about the price of a new video game, and from this it looks like they may be cheaper than that, really sooon.
Another thing that's different- I think you'll be able to sell your old DVDs pretty readily. The HD discs and DVD discs will live side-by-side for some time. Premium stuff does sell, though, and there's a lot of demand for HD content that currently isn't being met by the 10 or so HD TV channels most folks in the U.S. are currently limited to.
I almost prefer the "bored reporter predicts XYZ" stories to the clear troll or hoax stories, which we've seen both of in the past few days... not that I like these pointless articles, either. I mean, I'm here to waste time, but this is just stupid. It would make just as much sense for HP or Microsoft to buy Palm.
I'm starting to think the 'editorial' choices around here won't start improving until we start staying away. Really, I'm not about to start staying away and I don't want to; Slashdot's threaded comment system and comment moderation puts sites like Digg to shame, but... I'm disappointed in the story choices of the staff here on a daily basis.
I guess what I'm saying is that I'm waiting for
(a) Slashdot editors to get their act together and post fewer troll/BS/lame stories
(b) Slashdot to implement some sort of story moderation system
(c) Digg to implement a reply-to-comment, threaded discussion system.
Once one of these things happen, I'll be able to settle on one website to visit, and likely ditch the other. As things stand now, I'm left wondering if I value quality stories more than good discussion... but since truly good discussion ( as opposed to redundant, if occasionally interesting flamefests ) rarely come from poor stories, though, I'm currently leaning towards the site with better stories... I only wish I could say that site was my beloved Slashdot.
The current iBook is about equivalent to the older PowerBook, isn't it ?
Comparing the current iBook and PowerBook specs really highlights the reason for Apple's switch to Intel, though... they haven't been able to bump the PowerBook enough, at this point the $600 difference between a 14-inch iBook and a 15-inch PowerBook boils down to a tiny processor upgrade, a reasonable, but not huge video upgrade, and... what, a slightly larger hard disk? That $1999 PowerBook needs to either be dual core or have a higher clock speed *and* FSB... things that were not going to happen on PowerPC... click over to the ( crappily named ) MacBook Pro, there it is : dual core, faster FSB.
I don't have two grand to drop right now, and I'm not usually in on buying the first rev of any hardware, but I'd be tempted on this one if I had the cash.
Your attitude typifies something that is an increasing problem for computer manufacturers, though. When your hardware does what you want it to do, it's tough to justify buying a new machine just because it's a little faster. Plenty of people who are perfectly happy with their 3 or 4 year old iBooks and PowerBooks. My home machine is a 800Mhz G4, and I'm not upgrading anytime soon.
Well, it depends on the technical conference, but Apple's thinking about 2 years down the road, not today. What are the low-power laptop-friendlly chips Apple could get from IBM and ( ha ha ) Freescale 2 years from now going to look like ? How are they going to compare to the chips ( not to mention associated platform ) from Intel ?
Despite current Freescale G4s being "good enough" for "most applications" for laptop users, it's undeniable that the performance on your modern Powerbook or iBook trails similarly-priced ( and sometimes even cheaper ) Intel-based laptops. While that's OK with you and I, that situation isn't going to grow market share, especially with the lack of progress in that area from Freescale and IBM.
I do find very interesting the notion that Apple hasn't 'completed' any transition, and as a matter of fact does ( for the next few years, at least ) have the ability to push a server or workstation PPC platform if the market opportunity for such a thing is strong. That's a heck of an investment in design and production, though... how many are you going to buy?
As for Apple's laptops... I'm an admitted fan of Apple's stuff, but seriously, other than minor speed bumps, a PowerBook today is largely unchanged from a Powerbook, what, 2 years ago ? That's not OK. Apple's decision to go Intel had *nothing* to do with the type of chip being discussed in the article. What we have here is just another example of someone putting a spin on a story that doesn't belong there, and editors posting it just because they know it'll stir up discussion.