I think that Apple may be in for a surprise. Yes, there is a lot of propaganda flying around in regards to just about any OS on the market. However, in my experience, many Apple users (at least in the academic communities) who adamantly claim that their OS is supperior have never even bothered running Microsoft platform--they base such claims solely upon the n-hand accounts. Conversely, from this exposure (even if such was for curiosity sakes) we may end-up seeing quite a few switches, but in the opposite direction. I have personally seen only a few of those, but what made them so powerful for me was the sheer ignorance and amazement that Microsoft's OS is not nearly as bad as the propaganda makes it into (which ultimately makes such an experience positive no matter what, as the expectations are as low as they get). Now, if you are talking about the company's practices, that's a whole another story (which sadly in this case has little or no bearing on the outcome)...
This may seem somewhat tangential, but if you bear with me for long enough, it just may begin to make sense...
1) Dell and Apple have been always at odds, mostly because of animosities between Steve Jobs and Michael Dell
2) With the recent Apple's switch to Intel platform, I think the natural reaction from Dell will be that Intel has betrayed them. Hence, Dell may opt to moving to AMD in part to distinguish themselves from Intel/Apple platform, and in part (by abandoning exclusive use of Intel's chips) to use this as a retribution against Intel.
3) Comments such as this one have historically been generated to prepare consumers to an imminent and often dramatic transition in their business model.
In short, I wouldn't be surprised if we saw AMD Dell machines before the year's end.
Apart from the prevalent "constructive" criticism inherent to the Slashdot community, I happen to have one positive comment for a change. I personally appreciated the layout of the IE7 and its minimalistic top toolbar design. Just by looking at it, it felt like the browser was in fullscreen mode, and the fact that they used space on the right from the tabs is also commendable in terms of space utilization/layout optimization. Granted, until I actually get to mess with it, it is impossible to suggest that the layout is more intutive, but at least in terms of the visual layout, I think that they are on the right track.
While I do understand that this is a proof-of-concept model, there's still something very sardonic about the entire article, especially when it emphasizes the fact that the "mule" "can carry over 40 kg, about 30% of its bodyweight," which implies that "mule's" weight is ~130 kg. Follow that with the "[it can be used] to take the weight off a tired soldier" and you get an interesting dilemma: ok, so it can take the weight off a tired soldier, but what I really wonder is who carries this ~130kg beast during the times when its assistance is not needed and no vehicles are available nearby? If you ask me, I'd rather stick to my 40 kg backpack...
Not true.
I've had an old Inspiron 8000 whose video card (originally ATI 128) I upgraded personally without much trouble by buying a spare part from Dell. First time it was upgraded to Geforce2 (mobile version) for ~$150 and then later to Geforce4 for another ~$150. Eventually, I had an opportunity to also upgrade it to Radeon 9000 but never bothered to as I got a whole new laptop.
Apart from that, something that Dell has that practically no other computer seller does (or perhaps does on paper but never follows through) is that Dell replaces the entire machine if you have problems. Namely, the aforementioned Dell I had bought (it was 800MHz mobile PIII) was refurbished and after a couple weeks it died on me. The Dell tried first repairing the computer by sending a technician to my house within 24 hours, and after they figured out that it was motherboard, I got a whole new computer which had twice the RAM and a 1GHz mobile PIII (!!!). Couple years later, I did a stupid thing by dragging my laptop bag on wheels over a cobble stone street and my laptop naturally started behaving weirdly. The techinican was dispatched again within 24 hours, tried replacing parts, and eventually ordered a new replacement machine and this time I got a mobile P4 at 1.8GHz (!!!). This laptop is still fine 5 years later running Linux and Windows.
For your information, Alienware also has been selling laptops advertising upgradeable video card since 2003: http://www.alienware.com/Press_Kit_Pages/innovatio ns.aspx.
Electromagnetic radiation which drops off exponentially is usually not a problem as you never hold a desktop or a microwave in your lap. However, with laptop only God knows what that does to your "precious." And in the light of recent demo on how to boil an egg with two cellphones (see: http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/02/06/156236 &from=rss), it seems that heat is only a small part of the overall equation.
Yes Dvorak can be full of sh**, and more often than not he is just that, full of sh**. However, he did predict Apple's move to Intel when everyone thought he was again full of sh**, and it did happen, eventually.
That being said, in this case there are a couple additional things to consider:
*developing/maintaining OS is a significant overhead for a company
*currently, even though the sales of computers in Apple generate a large portion of profits, they also amount to a large portion of expenditures (r & d, hardware, software etc.)
*if we compare the cost/performance ratio of iPod/iTunes business, this is really where Apple's bread and butter are
*recently, there have been a lot of rumors that Steve Jobs has gotten more and more disinterested in the Apple, especially around the time he was battling a cancer. This could be in part due to the fact that he is getting more and more involved with Pixar/Disney. See: this and this
*there are signs that OSX is increasingly becoming a mess (somewhat outdated but worth a look, although don't put too much weight into it: click here)
If we consider previous statements, dropping OS may actually free-up a significant portion of Apple's budget to do other things which appear to be more profitable and will definitely become more profitable as they become more dominant on other platforms. So, this does not seem so far-fetched, although I do admit that even I doubt this will happen anytime soon, if at all.
On the other hand, whether you like hearing this or not, Microsoft in all likelihood hopes for Apple to stay independent as that is the last excuse they have to prevent the government from proclaiming them a monopoly (which they arguably already are).
It is interesting to see how much energy and time modern research (whether that be humanities or sciences) spends on studying symptoms and/or repercussions, without too much concern over the actual cause. Just like the modern medicine which is still predominantly a cut'n'paste job (think: a butcher with a pain-numbing injection), this study focuses on the repercussions of something that may very well be preventable.
Many studies have shown that due to the fact that all the hormones which are fed to the plants and animals to bolster yield, do end-up in the final produce/meat/milk/whatever we consume, children are now entering into puberty a lot earlier. No one as of yet knows the repercussions of this trend, but it sure doesn't sound very healthy...
I guess what I am trying to get at is that we should perhaps begin addressing the core problems rather than treating symptoms. Then again, for pharmaceutical companies the current situation sure does look a lot more profitable...
...I've done many of them, including Best Buy and AFAIK I got if not all, then a vast majority of them processed properly. The most important thing when applying for rebates is to make clear and legible copies of everything you send in (especially if they ask you to mail in the original UPC), even the mailing envelope if necessary, so that one can properly dispute any potential mishandling of their rebate application.
That being said, the best rebate deal I ever got was on an old PC game called Cyberstorm 2. I played the 1st part and was very much hooked to it. Unfortunately, the second part was IMHO nowhere as good as the first one. But I digress...
At any rate, I bought the game for $9.99 (it became bargain bin relatively shortly after the game hit the shelves) and on the cover there was still a $13 rebate from the game publisher (I think Sierra). Just for giggles, I filled out the rebate and sent it in with the purchase receipt (this was part of the rebate requirement) and sure enough, a couple weeks later I got $13 back:-). So, in effect I got paid ~3$ (ok, a bit less after taxes) to get the game, lol.
...is that while Apple is not required to do anything for KHTML developers, other than what they already did, the issue is more associated with the sense of OSS etiquette, or "developer-courtesy" if you like, and this is where Apple is at fault. Allow me to explain:
Apple got a very clean codebase from the KHTML developers which they managed to deploy rather rapidly and thus we got Safari, which ultimately helped Apple to move away from Apple version of IE (which, as we all know already, is abysmal version of an already less-than-adequate browser). Apple has clearly profitted from this move.
In return, they have provided patches in order to keep compliant with the LGPL license, but they have done so in much less "courteous" way than what they got from KHTML developers (perhaps buggy, but nonetheless clean code). And this is where the problem starts, especially considering that Apple is a for-profit company. The least they could do is provide such patches in a fashion that all other KHTML developers/contributors adhere to. Why should they be above the etiquette established by the project, especially when they have clearly profitted from this collaboration, while KHTML people have not nearly as much.
And for those of you, especially Mr. Goodger, who as a lead engineer has very likely had his share of patching experiences, who claim that KHTML developers should go ahead and patch the whole project with the bundled superpatch from Apple, perhaps you should try to do that on your own just to realize how much overhead such patching introduces when it comes to debugging and clean-up.
This is why most of above-average programmers will rather not use such patches at all and make comparable fixes from scratch.
So, in short, Apple has not done anything wrong legally, but they surely did prove that they are just another corporation that cares about self-gratification, but then again, is anyone surprised?
"But if it takes 10 hours to do something that could be paid for by 1 hour's work, you're losing out on the deal. So really you're advocating a course of action that is only viable for those who are well versed enough with hardware to do the job quickly (and well; doing it wrong takes twice as long)."
Such observations are simply meaningless as they are presented out of the context. To give you an example, one could very well end up having to order a finished product, wait for its delivery and then find out that it is broken and that you need to RMA it, etc. This would inadvertently be a huge loss of time (and therefore money).
Making comparisons on purely theoretical grounds is useless. It would be more appropriate to simply inferr that at times one or the other approach may yield better results.
Furthermore, it is important to point out long-term benefits (i.e. OS X will change when Apple wants it to change, possibly breaking everything and even forcing the user to get used to the new interface and therefore demanding a constant learning curve. Linux on the other hand, may not require such drastic adjustments once the user traverses the initial learning curve ).
"...Linux is for people who like being a sysadmin first, OS X is for people who like being productive first, and Windows is for people who don't like doing anything first..."
Now, you have to agree that this is stereotyping bollocks. Ultimately everyone wants to be productive, the question is what they consider being productive (hacking, developing, writing, troubleshooting, etc.).
"Why should that be so important?"
Well, judging from your comments you may appear to be favoring Apple. If so, you should definitely know all about that (including tool's deficiencies which, by the way, never stopped anyone from at least feeling as productive as they could ever be using the platform of their choice), as Apple has gone through great lengths to establish this imaginary umbilical cord between its product and end-user;-).
Ultimately, it is all about what you believe, yet it is unquestionable that the cliche argument of "time demands of OSS platform" is not as valid as one would want you to believe.
Yes, it is true that it takes time to build something and that time is money. Therefore, by building something one can conclude that we are investing money.
However, what a lot of people fail to realize is that by buying a more expensive machine (a Mini in this case), you have to work to make that extra money as well. And to make the money you have to invest time.
Therefore, in the end, whether you buy a more expensive piece of equipment or go for a cheaper and then invest some of personal time to bring it to workable state should likely yield comparable amount of investment. Yet, if you build something yourself in an non-restrictive environment you will be ultimately a lot better than simply buying a closed commercial product because you will have the more direct control over the end-product as well as a greater sense of personal attachment with the creation as you have, after all, participated in its conception.
People who hate Windows, don't want to get caught up in the learning curve or zealotry of Linux, and have been waiting for an inexpensive Mac to become available.
Right. You just forgot to add:...and people who really want to get caught up in the zealotry of Apple.
Seriously though, if you tend to burst from your personal bias and yet you want to appear at least somewhat objective, then my suggestion would be to try to put at least some effort into doing so. Otherwise you'll just end-up sounding stupid.
Pardon my language, but what a crock of sh**.
Latest Macs are dustbusters in a nice shrink-wrap (water-cooled 2.5GHz less so), not to mention heat dissipation which is now affecting also higher-end Powerbooks. Try one of mobile AMD64 chips and/or Centrino notebooks, not to mention super-quiet VIA micro computers and attractive (but pricey) Hush solutions and then try talking about something being loud...
Don't get me wrong, I could not care less whether I am using a Mac or a PC but when it comes to being quiet, well Apple has been losing that battle ever since G5 desktops and 1+GHz Powerbooks came out.
Cheers!
2 cpus should be the same or worse than a dual core 1 cpu setup. Please allow me to explain:
If the software is not multithreaded on a dual cpu machine, only one cpu is utilized anyhow. Furthermore, dual cpu computers likely will have slower communication path than a computer having a cpu with two cores on the same die for obvious design reasons. As long as the OS sees two cores as two processors (which in all likelihood will be the case as this will in effect replace hyperthreading), I do not see the reason why two cpu's would have any advantage over dual core chips, except possibly due to fact that cpus do not share the memory bandwidth in the dual cpu setups. Yet, this may be very well thwarted by the fact that the communication between cpus will be slower than in a dual core setup, hence the end-result would be at best comparable and at worst better for dual-core.
If you add to this the fact that single cpu machines will be generally cheaper to produce (simpler motherboard, one cpu to buy, and likely more competitive pricing of a chip since they will be viewed as the next-gen Pentiums and/or Athlons), I'd say that dual core is much better solution than dual processor.
Of course, all this is based on the limited info currently available as there are still many unanswered questions (i.e. does one core go dormant when not used and if so is this done as efficiently as keeping a second cpu idle, etc.). Yet, I fail to agree with AnandTech's reluctance to the dual core setup and dubious preference for a dual cpu setup...
Just as an example, look at Anno 1503 published by Sunflowers and distributed by EA. To this day they failed to provide multiplayer, mistreated customers who inquired about the status of the "patch" that never came, yet even now the demo available online still has a nice outtro screen screaming about the best "multiplayer" experience ever. Only after I had a bout with them and created a Website http://home.fuse.net/slipstreamscapes/ in order to institute a class-action lawsuit, as well as after exposure here on Slashdot http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/02/13/213524 5, did they finally announce that no patch would ever be released. Ironically, they had plenty of time to create a single-player add-on in the meantime. Now they are supposedly working on a new sequel, again promising mountains and valleys...
This trend is more of a rule than exception nowadays (I can think of at least dozen games in no time where I got burned in a similar fashion but never did anything about it) and we as investors in their products should finally stand-up and fight for our rights as consumers. In this case, there is enough of evidence to institute at least a lawsuit in a small claims court demanding money back for a product that did not deliver (especially in my case where I bought the game solely for the multiplayer experience).
I used to buy at least 2 games per month, nowadays (partially because I am not so much interested in gaming any more) I do not buy games any more, mainly because I am sick and tired of the lies and misleading politics by the game publishers.
It's about time to show these corporate bullies that we will not take this any more.
The point is that Apple got a patent on this, yet Synaptics ships its touchpads with this functionality. This either implies that Synaptics has reserved the right to continue to make its own versions of the circular scroll wheel despite the Apple's patent, or that they are doing so unlawfully. Otherwise, we should see a mp3 player soon with a Synaptics touchpad which behaves in exactly the same fashion as iPod without breaking Apple's patent...
The reason why I say this is not because I want to troll but because I recently found out that all Synaptics notebook touchpads have ability to make their scrolling option to work in a circular fashion. Linux version (X server's) of the touchpad driver allows for this functionality via GUI configurator. It behaves almost identically as the iPod's circular scroll wheel and in that way makes me wonder who really made the first circular scroll wheel and furthermore is it Synaptics or Apple that is unlawfully using other company's patent, or even more interestingly that the Apple's patent does not restrict other companies from using it in the context of a touchpad?
According to your statement, Microsoft would also be classified a "legal" monopoly. To use your analogy, no one is pressuring you to use Windows OS and hence it should not be considered a monopoly (even more so as you can install other OS's on the same hardware quite easily). Furthermore, Apple _is_ already killing competition by holding a significant portion of the market with its media player which is strongly tied with the iTunes software (and/or store), while preventing the competition (or in this case at least trying to) from using its proprietary DRM knowing that no other company will be able to distribute mp3's just to make them playable on iPod, as this format does not offer DRM and as such is a copyright liability.
Coming back to my original claim, just like Windows did not start off as a "standard-setting-OS" (here I do not mean through innovation) to which many others would be compared to and arguably try to conform to, but became exactly that through its market dominance (i.e. KDE tries to emulate Win desktop to make user experience easier even though there is no proof that Win desktop should be considered the best way to organize desktop, yet it is considered a standard because majority of users are using it and are accustomed to it; even the innovative Apple caved-in under its pressure with the OSX's dock and its taskbar-like behavior), Apple's DRM has become a standard-setting DRM of choice for online music simply due to its dominance and as such introduces Apple to the aforementioned liability. And as someone else has already pointed it out somewhere in the discussion of this topic, Apple is likely waiting for opportunity to sell this stuff for big bucks down the road when they really pinch the market with their dominance.
Finally, an argument that Apple cannot be a monopoly because any other company could, if they wanted to, come out with a media player and music service to compete with Apple's is as laughable at this point as saying, if we want to break Windows monopoly we should get another company to create an alternative OS (please notice that I said "company" not the open source community, as the two are not the same). Even if someone releases cheaper and better alternative to iPod, they will at this point have to live with multi-million losses for many years before they turn profitable. Consider that even with all the sales iTunes/iPods have had, this division of Apple is barely turning profitable today. In addition, iPods are much cheaper to manufacture due to their sales volume, so for someone to catch-up now with Apple would have to have as deep of a pocket as Redmond giant (consider just how much money Microsoft lost before making Xbox more than just a console wannabe, but while doing so also consider the amount of influence they have as well as the similarity with the PC architecture which must have greatly helped them bring Xbox much faster on its own feet than any other company ever could -- it is conceivable that they might be still losing money from it). Now, how much chance does one company like Real stand against Apple? Little to none. That pretty much sums-up a legal definition of anti-competitive monopoly right there.
I guess that this issue is really more about the Apple's Fairplay than the iTunes or iPods. Nonetheless, in the end the result is the same: less choice for the end-user = higher prices = anti-competitive practice.
You are right on the distinctions between the two examples but they do not negate what is essential in both cases and that is that a dominating company is exerting pressure to lock-in users to their product and therefore shield their dominance from competition. This simply spells out anti-competitive practice and as such poses as a monopolistic situation prone to lawsuit, regardless of who designed what and how. Once you are on top you are a target for this kind of development and it's only a matter of time before either Apple starts losing its market share (unlikely at least in the short-term), or is sued for uncompetitive practices due to fact that they own vast majority of the online music market and are suppressing other companies from penetrating the largest slice of it (namely iTunes/iPod users).
This will surely to some look like a flamebait, but honestly it is not intended as such.
Please consider the following:
Some years ago, Microsoft held a browser monopoly (arguably still does) and pushed out Netscape by implementing all kinds of nasty stuff into their Windows service packs. Netscape did some annyoing things too but in the end IE prevailed. Sometime later, there is a lawsuit against Microsoft for uncompetitive practices as it became clear that they at that point held a monopoly on both the browsers and the OS.
It is probably not surprising that Real during this time resorted to all kinds of ways to gain attention as they were likely also being pushed around by Microsoft and its at that point rather cludge-like Windows media player. So in that respect they perhaps simply tried to stay afloat. Nonetheless, I still would not call their actions right nor desirable. They should have taken their fight to the courts, rather than hampering end-user with their crud. But, at least understanding the situation they were (and likely still are) in, we can at least consider to forgive them their trespasses of the past.
Now, let's look today's online music store market: Apple is clearly monopoly here with likely 80%+ of the market. Real is trying to penetrate market and at the same time cannot do much as it is unable to provide DRM'ed format that will play on most widespread media player (please remember that RIAA will not allow any online music sales unless they are somehow protected from unauthorized reproduction -- so no matter how much we, the end-users do not like the fact that the stuff we buy is "crippled" by DRM, we need to understand that no online sales will ever be allowed by RIAA if they do not have the protection in the first place as that would be almost as bad as free sharing of music via P2P). In this respect that Apple can be accused of similar wrong-doing as Microsoft during the browser wars: while Microsoft could claim that other software browsers could run on Windows (or in the case of Apple one could run other music formats on iPod), there are in both cases similar limitations which prevent the competition from penetrating into that market (in the case of Windows there were and to some extent still are obfuscations which made Netscape run like crud, while in the case of iPod you can play other file formats but none of them are DRM-ed so none of them could be used by competition to target Apple iPod/iTunes customers).
So, what is my point then you ask?
While we had a lot of people scream bloody murder during the browser wars era and the Microsoft did eventually get into the court (although it also got away relatively unscathed, but that is beside the point), and people were and still are screaming bloody murder over Real's past record, there is awful lot of people defending Apple in the current situation. At best I would say that while Real's actions were certainly unconventional perhaps even illegal (something that courts may get a chance to decide upon in the recent future), Apple has been certainly doing all it can to maintain and even further expand its monopoly (something that even Jobs admitted to having in one of his interviews), so in that respect I think that in this situation Apple is just as bad as Real and that it's only a matter of time before someone decides to sue Apple for uncompetitive practices.
Now, many Apple followers will not admit to this and likely find this post a flamebait, and believe me, it is not my intention to trash Apple. But, you'll have to agree with me that being on top (in Apple's case this being in respect to online music and media player market) brings with it some of very unwanted "benefits" and "responsibilities," such as how to continue expanding the market and making the stock owners happy, while trying to convince both people and the government that you are not a monopoly. Considering that Apple historically does not have much experience in this department, boasts a very short fuse in terms of tolerating intrusions of other companies into its market, is lead by an impulsive Steve Jobs, and holds 80%+ of this market, the best thing I can do at this point is to quote good ole' oddtodd.com: "good luck with all that!"
Slashdot Mirror
I think that Apple may be in for a surprise. Yes, there is a lot of propaganda flying around in regards to just about any OS on the market. However, in my experience, many Apple users (at least in the academic communities) who adamantly claim that their OS is supperior have never even bothered running Microsoft platform--they base such claims solely upon the n-hand accounts. Conversely, from this exposure (even if such was for curiosity sakes) we may end-up seeing quite a few switches, but in the opposite direction. I have personally seen only a few of those, but what made them so powerful for me was the sheer ignorance and amazement that Microsoft's OS is not nearly as bad as the propaganda makes it into (which ultimately makes such an experience positive no matter what, as the expectations are as low as they get). Now, if you are talking about the company's practices, that's a whole another story (which sadly in this case has little or no bearing on the outcome)...
This may seem somewhat tangential, but if you bear with me for long enough, it just may begin to make sense...
1) Dell and Apple have been always at odds, mostly because of animosities between Steve Jobs and Michael Dell
2) With the recent Apple's switch to Intel platform, I think the natural reaction from Dell will be that Intel has betrayed them. Hence, Dell may opt to moving to AMD in part to distinguish themselves from Intel/Apple platform, and in part (by abandoning exclusive use of Intel's chips) to use this as a retribution against Intel.
3) Comments such as this one have historically been generated to prepare consumers to an imminent and often dramatic transition in their business model.
In short, I wouldn't be surprised if we saw AMD Dell machines before the year's end.
Cheers!
Apart from the prevalent "constructive" criticism inherent to the Slashdot community, I happen to have one positive comment for a change. I personally appreciated the layout of the IE7 and its minimalistic top toolbar design. Just by looking at it, it felt like the browser was in fullscreen mode, and the fact that they used space on the right from the tabs is also commendable in terms of space utilization/layout optimization. Granted, until I actually get to mess with it, it is impossible to suggest that the layout is more intutive, but at least in terms of the visual layout, I think that they are on the right track.
LOL! The only thing that I could think of when I visited the "pictures" page with the link "headshot" was... BOOM HEADSHOT
Ding! Ding! Ding! Wake-up call:
o m/drivers/Catalyst_63_release_notes.html
https://a248.e.akamai.net/f/674/9206/0/www2.ati.c
While I do understand that this is a proof-of-concept model, there's still something very sardonic about the entire article, especially when it emphasizes the fact that the "mule" "can carry over 40 kg, about 30% of its bodyweight," which implies that "mule's" weight is ~130 kg. Follow that with the "[it can be used] to take the weight off a tired soldier" and you get an interesting dilemma: ok, so it can take the weight off a tired soldier, but what I really wonder is who carries this ~130kg beast during the times when its assistance is not needed and no vehicles are available nearby? If you ask me, I'd rather stick to my 40 kg backpack...
Not true. I've had an old Inspiron 8000 whose video card (originally ATI 128) I upgraded personally without much trouble by buying a spare part from Dell. First time it was upgraded to Geforce2 (mobile version) for ~$150 and then later to Geforce4 for another ~$150. Eventually, I had an opportunity to also upgrade it to Radeon 9000 but never bothered to as I got a whole new laptop. Apart from that, something that Dell has that practically no other computer seller does (or perhaps does on paper but never follows through) is that Dell replaces the entire machine if you have problems. Namely, the aforementioned Dell I had bought (it was 800MHz mobile PIII) was refurbished and after a couple weeks it died on me. The Dell tried first repairing the computer by sending a technician to my house within 24 hours, and after they figured out that it was motherboard, I got a whole new computer which had twice the RAM and a 1GHz mobile PIII (!!!). Couple years later, I did a stupid thing by dragging my laptop bag on wheels over a cobble stone street and my laptop naturally started behaving weirdly. The techinican was dispatched again within 24 hours, tried replacing parts, and eventually ordered a new replacement machine and this time I got a mobile P4 at 1.8GHz (!!!). This laptop is still fine 5 years later running Linux and Windows. For your information, Alienware also has been selling laptops advertising upgradeable video card since 2003: http://www.alienware.com/Press_Kit_Pages/innovatio ns.aspx.
Electromagnetic radiation which drops off exponentially is usually not a problem as you never hold a desktop or a microwave in your lap. However, with laptop only God knows what that does to your "precious." And in the light of recent demo on how to boil an egg with two cellphones (see: http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/02/06/156236 &from=rss), it seems that heat is only a small part of the overall equation.
Yes Dvorak can be full of sh**, and more often than not he is just that, full of sh**. However, he did predict Apple's move to Intel when everyone thought he was again full of sh**, and it did happen, eventually.
That being said, in this case there are a couple additional things to consider:
*developing/maintaining OS is a significant overhead for a company
*currently, even though the sales of computers in Apple generate a large portion of profits, they also amount to a large portion of expenditures (r & d, hardware, software etc.)
*if we compare the cost/performance ratio of iPod/iTunes business, this is really where Apple's bread and butter are
*recently, there have been a lot of rumors that Steve Jobs has gotten more and more disinterested in the Apple, especially around the time he was battling a cancer. This could be in part due to the fact that he is getting more and more involved with Pixar/Disney. See: this and this
*there are signs that OSX is increasingly becoming a mess (somewhat outdated but worth a look, although don't put too much weight into it: click here)
If we consider previous statements, dropping OS may actually free-up a significant portion of Apple's budget to do other things which appear to be more profitable and will definitely become more profitable as they become more dominant on other platforms. So, this does not seem so far-fetched, although I do admit that even I doubt this will happen anytime soon, if at all. On the other hand, whether you like hearing this or not, Microsoft in all likelihood hopes for Apple to stay independent as that is the last excuse they have to prevent the government from proclaiming them a monopoly (which they arguably already are).
It is interesting to see how much energy and time modern research (whether that be humanities or sciences) spends on studying symptoms and/or repercussions, without too much concern over the actual cause. Just like the modern medicine which is still predominantly a cut'n'paste job (think: a butcher with a pain-numbing injection), this study focuses on the repercussions of something that may very well be preventable.
Many studies have shown that due to the fact that all the hormones which are fed to the plants and animals to bolster yield, do end-up in the final produce/meat/milk/whatever we consume, children are now entering into puberty a lot earlier. No one as of yet knows the repercussions of this trend, but it sure doesn't sound very healthy...
I guess what I am trying to get at is that we should perhaps begin addressing the core problems rather than treating symptoms. Then again, for pharmaceutical companies the current situation sure does look a lot more profitable...
...I've done many of them, including Best Buy and AFAIK I got if not all, then a vast majority of them processed properly. The most important thing when applying for rebates is to make clear and legible copies of everything you send in (especially if they ask you to mail in the original UPC), even the mailing envelope if necessary, so that one can properly dispute any potential mishandling of their rebate application.
:-). So, in effect I got paid ~3$ (ok, a bit less after taxes) to get the game, lol.
That being said, the best rebate deal I ever got was on an old PC game called Cyberstorm 2. I played the 1st part and was very much hooked to it. Unfortunately, the second part was IMHO nowhere as good as the first one. But I digress...
At any rate, I bought the game for $9.99 (it became bargain bin relatively shortly after the game hit the shelves) and on the cover there was still a $13 rebate from the game publisher (I think Sierra). Just for giggles, I filled out the rebate and sent it in with the purchase receipt (this was part of the rebate requirement) and sure enough, a couple weeks later I got $13 back
Too bad there aren't more deals like this one...
...is that while Apple is not required to do anything for KHTML developers, other than what they already did, the issue is more associated with the sense of OSS etiquette, or "developer-courtesy" if you like, and this is where Apple is at fault. Allow me to explain:
Apple got a very clean codebase from the KHTML developers which they managed to deploy rather rapidly and thus we got Safari, which ultimately helped Apple to move away from Apple version of IE (which, as we all know already, is abysmal version of an already less-than-adequate browser). Apple has clearly profitted from this move.
In return, they have provided patches in order to keep compliant with the LGPL license, but they have done so in much less "courteous" way than what they got from KHTML developers (perhaps buggy, but nonetheless clean code). And this is where the problem starts, especially considering that Apple is a for-profit company. The least they could do is provide such patches in a fashion that all other KHTML developers/contributors adhere to. Why should they be above the etiquette established by the project, especially when they have clearly profitted from this collaboration, while KHTML people have not nearly as much.
And for those of you, especially Mr. Goodger, who as a lead engineer has very likely had his share of patching experiences, who claim that KHTML developers should go ahead and patch the whole project with the bundled superpatch from Apple, perhaps you should try to do that on your own just to realize how much overhead such patching introduces when it comes to debugging and clean-up.
This is why most of above-average programmers will rather not use such patches at all and make comparable fixes from scratch.
So, in short, Apple has not done anything wrong legally, but they surely did prove that they are just another corporation that cares about self-gratification, but then again, is anyone surprised?
"But if it takes 10 hours to do something that could be paid for by 1 hour's work, you're losing out on the deal. So really you're advocating a course of action that is only viable for those who are well versed enough with hardware to do the job quickly (and well; doing it wrong takes twice as long)."
;-).
Such observations are simply meaningless as they are presented out of the context. To give you an example, one could very well end up having to order a finished product, wait for its delivery and then find out that it is broken and that you need to RMA it, etc. This would inadvertently be a huge loss of time (and therefore money).
Making comparisons on purely theoretical grounds is useless. It would be more appropriate to simply inferr that at times one or the other approach may yield better results.
Furthermore, it is important to point out long-term benefits (i.e. OS X will change when Apple wants it to change, possibly breaking everything and even forcing the user to get used to the new interface and therefore demanding a constant learning curve. Linux on the other hand, may not require such drastic adjustments once the user traverses the initial learning curve ).
"...Linux is for people who like being a sysadmin first, OS X is for people who like being productive first, and Windows is for people who don't like doing anything first..."
Now, you have to agree that this is stereotyping bollocks. Ultimately everyone wants to be productive, the question is what they consider being productive (hacking, developing, writing, troubleshooting, etc.).
"Why should that be so important?"
Well, judging from your comments you may appear to be favoring Apple. If so, you should definitely know all about that (including tool's deficiencies which, by the way, never stopped anyone from at least feeling as productive as they could ever be using the platform of their choice), as Apple has gone through great lengths to establish this imaginary umbilical cord between its product and end-user
Ultimately, it is all about what you believe, yet it is unquestionable that the cliche argument of "time demands of OSS platform" is not as valid as one would want you to believe.
Yes, it is true that it takes time to build something and that time is money. Therefore, by building something one can conclude that we are investing money.
However, what a lot of people fail to realize is that by buying a more expensive machine (a Mini in this case), you have to work to make that extra money as well. And to make the money you have to invest time.
Therefore, in the end, whether you buy a more expensive piece of equipment or go for a cheaper and then invest some of personal time to bring it to workable state should likely yield comparable amount of investment. Yet, if you build something yourself in an non-restrictive environment you will be ultimately a lot better than simply buying a closed commercial product because you will have the more direct control over the end-product as well as a greater sense of personal attachment with the creation as you have, after all, participated in its conception.
Seriously though, if you tend to burst from your personal bias and yet you want to appear at least somewhat objective, then my suggestion would be to try to put at least some effort into doing so. Otherwise you'll just end-up sounding stupid.
Cheers!
Pardon my language, but what a crock of sh**. Latest Macs are dustbusters in a nice shrink-wrap (water-cooled 2.5GHz less so), not to mention heat dissipation which is now affecting also higher-end Powerbooks. Try one of mobile AMD64 chips and/or Centrino notebooks, not to mention super-quiet VIA micro computers and attractive (but pricey) Hush solutions and then try talking about something being loud... Don't get me wrong, I could not care less whether I am using a Mac or a PC but when it comes to being quiet, well Apple has been losing that battle ever since G5 desktops and 1+GHz Powerbooks came out. Cheers!
2 cpus should be the same or worse than a dual core 1 cpu setup. Please allow me to explain:
If the software is not multithreaded on a dual cpu machine, only one cpu is utilized anyhow. Furthermore, dual cpu computers likely will have slower communication path than a computer having a cpu with two cores on the same die for obvious design reasons. As long as the OS sees two cores as two processors (which in all likelihood will be the case as this will in effect replace hyperthreading), I do not see the reason why two cpu's would have any advantage over dual core chips, except possibly due to fact that cpus do not share the memory bandwidth in the dual cpu setups. Yet, this may be very well thwarted by the fact that the communication between cpus will be slower than in a dual core setup, hence the end-result would be at best comparable and at worst better for dual-core.
If you add to this the fact that single cpu machines will be generally cheaper to produce (simpler motherboard, one cpu to buy, and likely more competitive pricing of a chip since they will be viewed as the next-gen Pentiums and/or Athlons), I'd say that dual core is much better solution than dual processor.
Of course, all this is based on the limited info currently available as there are still many unanswered questions (i.e. does one core go dormant when not used and if so is this done as efficiently as keeping a second cpu idle, etc.). Yet, I fail to agree with AnandTech's reluctance to the dual core setup and dubious preference for a dual cpu setup...
Just as an example, look at Anno 1503 published by Sunflowers and distributed by EA. To this day they failed to provide multiplayer, mistreated customers who inquired about the status of the "patch" that never came, yet even now the demo available online still has a nice outtro screen screaming about the best "multiplayer" experience ever. Only after I had a bout with them and created a Website http://home.fuse.net/slipstreamscapes/ in order to institute a class-action lawsuit, as well as after exposure here on Slashdot http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/02/13/213524 5, did they finally announce that no patch would ever be released. Ironically, they had plenty of time to create a single-player add-on in the meantime. Now they are supposedly working on a new sequel, again promising mountains and valleys...
This trend is more of a rule than exception nowadays (I can think of at least dozen games in no time where I got burned in a similar fashion but never did anything about it) and we as investors in their products should finally stand-up and fight for our rights as consumers. In this case, there is enough of evidence to institute at least a lawsuit in a small claims court demanding money back for a product that did not deliver (especially in my case where I bought the game solely for the multiplayer experience).
I used to buy at least 2 games per month, nowadays (partially because I am not so much interested in gaming any more) I do not buy games any more, mainly because I am sick and tired of the lies and misleading politics by the game publishers.
It's about time to show these corporate bullies that we will not take this any more.
The point is that Apple got a patent on this, yet Synaptics ships its touchpads with this functionality. This either implies that Synaptics has reserved the right to continue to make its own versions of the circular scroll wheel despite the Apple's patent, or that they are doing so unlawfully. Otherwise, we should see a mp3 player soon with a Synaptics touchpad which behaves in exactly the same fashion as iPod without breaking Apple's patent...
The reason why I say this is not because I want to troll but because I recently found out that all Synaptics notebook touchpads have ability to make their scrolling option to work in a circular fashion. Linux version (X server's) of the touchpad driver allows for this functionality via GUI configurator. It behaves almost identically as the iPod's circular scroll wheel and in that way makes me wonder who really made the first circular scroll wheel and furthermore is it Synaptics or Apple that is unlawfully using other company's patent, or even more interestingly that the Apple's patent does not restrict other companies from using it in the context of a touchpad?
According to your statement, Microsoft would also be classified a "legal" monopoly. To use your analogy, no one is pressuring you to use Windows OS and hence it should not be considered a monopoly (even more so as you can install other OS's on the same hardware quite easily). Furthermore, Apple _is_ already killing competition by holding a significant portion of the market with its media player which is strongly tied with the iTunes software (and/or store), while preventing the competition (or in this case at least trying to) from using its proprietary DRM knowing that no other company will be able to distribute mp3's just to make them playable on iPod, as this format does not offer DRM and as such is a copyright liability.
Coming back to my original claim, just like Windows did not start off as a "standard-setting-OS" (here I do not mean through innovation) to which many others would be compared to and arguably try to conform to, but became exactly that through its market dominance (i.e. KDE tries to emulate Win desktop to make user experience easier even though there is no proof that Win desktop should be considered the best way to organize desktop, yet it is considered a standard because majority of users are using it and are accustomed to it; even the innovative Apple caved-in under its pressure with the OSX's dock and its taskbar-like behavior), Apple's DRM has become a standard-setting DRM of choice for online music simply due to its dominance and as such introduces Apple to the aforementioned liability. And as someone else has already pointed it out somewhere in the discussion of this topic, Apple is likely waiting for opportunity to sell this stuff for big bucks down the road when they really pinch the market with their dominance.
Finally, an argument that Apple cannot be a monopoly because any other company could, if they wanted to, come out with a media player and music service to compete with Apple's is as laughable at this point as saying, if we want to break Windows monopoly we should get another company to create an alternative OS (please notice that I said "company" not the open source community, as the two are not the same). Even if someone releases cheaper and better alternative to iPod, they will at this point have to live with multi-million losses for many years before they turn profitable. Consider that even with all the sales iTunes/iPods have had, this division of Apple is barely turning profitable today. In addition, iPods are much cheaper to manufacture due to their sales volume, so for someone to catch-up now with Apple would have to have as deep of a pocket as Redmond giant (consider just how much money Microsoft lost before making Xbox more than just a console wannabe, but while doing so also consider the amount of influence they have as well as the similarity with the PC architecture which must have greatly helped them bring Xbox much faster on its own feet than any other company ever could -- it is conceivable that they might be still losing money from it). Now, how much chance does one company like Real stand against Apple? Little to none. That pretty much sums-up a legal definition of anti-competitive monopoly right there.
I guess that this issue is really more about the Apple's Fairplay than the iTunes or iPods. Nonetheless, in the end the result is the same: less choice for the end-user = higher prices = anti-competitive practice.
You are right on the distinctions between the two examples but they do not negate what is essential in both cases and that is that a dominating company is exerting pressure to lock-in users to their product and therefore shield their dominance from competition. This simply spells out anti-competitive practice and as such poses as a monopolistic situation prone to lawsuit, regardless of who designed what and how. Once you are on top you are a target for this kind of development and it's only a matter of time before either Apple starts losing its market share (unlikely at least in the short-term), or is sued for uncompetitive practices due to fact that they own vast majority of the online music market and are suppressing other companies from penetrating the largest slice of it (namely iTunes/iPod users).
This will surely to some look like a flamebait, but honestly it is not intended as such.
Please consider the following:
Some years ago, Microsoft held a browser monopoly (arguably still does) and pushed out Netscape by implementing all kinds of nasty stuff into their Windows service packs. Netscape did some annyoing things too but in the end IE prevailed. Sometime later, there is a lawsuit against Microsoft for uncompetitive practices as it became clear that they at that point held a monopoly on both the browsers and the OS.
It is probably not surprising that Real during this time resorted to all kinds of ways to gain attention as they were likely also being pushed around by Microsoft and its at that point rather cludge-like Windows media player. So in that respect they perhaps simply tried to stay afloat. Nonetheless, I still would not call their actions right nor desirable. They should have taken their fight to the courts, rather than hampering end-user with their crud. But, at least understanding the situation they were (and likely still are) in, we can at least consider to forgive them their trespasses of the past.
Now, let's look today's online music store market: Apple is clearly monopoly here with likely 80%+ of the market. Real is trying to penetrate market and at the same time cannot do much as it is unable to provide DRM'ed format that will play on most widespread media player (please remember that RIAA will not allow any online music sales unless they are somehow protected from unauthorized reproduction -- so no matter how much we, the end-users do not like the fact that the stuff we buy is "crippled" by DRM, we need to understand that no online sales will ever be allowed by RIAA if they do not have the protection in the first place as that would be almost as bad as free sharing of music via P2P). In this respect that Apple can be accused of similar wrong-doing as Microsoft during the browser wars: while Microsoft could claim that other software browsers could run on Windows (or in the case of Apple one could run other music formats on iPod), there are in both cases similar limitations which prevent the competition from penetrating into that market (in the case of Windows there were and to some extent still are obfuscations which made Netscape run like crud, while in the case of iPod you can play other file formats but none of them are DRM-ed so none of them could be used by competition to target Apple iPod/iTunes customers).
So, what is my point then you ask?
While we had a lot of people scream bloody murder during the browser wars era and the Microsoft did eventually get into the court (although it also got away relatively unscathed, but that is beside the point), and people were and still are screaming bloody murder over Real's past record, there is awful lot of people defending Apple in the current situation. At best I would say that while Real's actions were certainly unconventional perhaps even illegal (something that courts may get a chance to decide upon in the recent future), Apple has been certainly doing all it can to maintain and even further expand its monopoly (something that even Jobs admitted to having in one of his interviews), so in that respect I think that in this situation Apple is just as bad as Real and that it's only a matter of time before someone decides to sue Apple for uncompetitive practices.
Now, many Apple followers will not admit to this and likely find this post a flamebait, and believe me, it is not my intention to trash Apple. But, you'll have to agree with me that being on top (in Apple's case this being in respect to online music and media player market) brings with it some of very unwanted "benefits" and "responsibilities," such as how to continue expanding the market and making the stock owners happy, while trying to convince both people and the government that you are not a monopoly. Considering that Apple historically does not have much experience in this department, boasts a very short fuse in terms of tolerating intrusions of other companies into its market, is lead by an impulsive Steve Jobs, and holds 80%+ of this market, the best thing I can do at this point is to quote good ole' oddtodd.com: "good luck with all that!"
Do the following search on Google: bitch make me a sandwich Then press, "I'm feeling lucky" :-)
http://www.bitchmakemeasandwich.com/