I'm straining to think of the last time I bought a CD new at retail price. I believe it was in the winter of 1997 or Spring of 1998.
I get most of my music now on used CDs or vinyl, $2.99 and $1 respectively at Goodwill, a bit more at used music stores. Nowhere close to even the $10 and $12 'reduced' prices.
Before you laugh, I've picked up a lot of great jazz and classical at Goodwill, most in mint condition.
Could the downward price pressure of all the accumulated used CDs hitting the market (and people like me buying them) be responsible for the recent sales declines and price reductions as much as P2P?
Or buy one with any OS and install Knoppix in twelve minutes.
Then try to find some apps
Most are included, apt-get for nearly all the rest.
or gamesthat run on it.
Loki, Wine. Loki games sure are cheap on eBay.
Try to install them. Try to install the myriad of different libraries that each require, and the myriad of libraries that each of these requirements require.
Something particularly difficult about typing 'apt-get update' and 'apt-get install' ?
Try to print something on your printer.
Postscript/CUPS works flawlessly with my APPLE Laserwriter 16/600.
Cry like a baby.
Neener Neener, Windows User!
Try to copy your pictures off your digital camera.
mount/home/knoppix/Olympus. Drag and drop in Konqueror.
Try to share your hard drive so you can access stuff from another computer.
you lack exposure to Samba and the wonders of FTP, the program GFTP specifically.
Cry like a baby.
You sure do bitch a lot.
Hose up system.
Synonomous with installing Windows.
Go to store and buy a retail copy of Windows and wish you had bought a computer with Windows in the first place.
I'm quite confident that day will never come. Buy Windows, you mean people do that? How quaint.
I'll say it again, Linux is great and all, but is not a viable desktop system yet, and won't likely be anytime soon.
Sure it is. I've been using it instead of Mac OS9 since April. Is there a learning curve? Absolutely. What I'd really give my left arm (or at least a couple fingers) for is a good INTUITIVE vector-based drawing program. I'd even PAY HANDSOMELY for a port of Mac Graphic Converter. But not pay handsomely enough to buy a Mac these days. Maybe when the 1GHz iBook makes it under $999.
And yes, I'm sure YOU could do all the above just fine, but really, what Typical End User will, realistically, recompile stuff into their kernel, load/unload modules, download and install stuff from.bz2's,.tgz's, or even rpms?
I've rarely, if ever had to do any of this with the Knoppix hdinstall.
What typical end user just happens to know all about using Samba, manually editing text files, changing run levels, mounting stuff from the command line, etc? NONE!
Finally we can agree on something. Perhaps to my credit, I've been able to apply my generic computer knowledge to learning Linux and use Google for the things I don't understand. But Knoppix really cuts down on those instances. I find it much easier to install and use than many "traditional" distros. Is it perfect? No. But it's damn good. Keep in mind that I jumped in 'cold turkey'. I've run Macs since 1991. I literally sold my much-loved and much-upgraded beige Mac and was left with the dual PIII machine I'm typing this on. I tried Windows 2K and gave up after a week when any attempt to burn CDs resulted in a BSOD and reboot. I began seriously regretting the day I packed up and shipped my Mac. So I installed Mandrake in desparation, used it for a couple months, made some dumb mistakes, then moved to Knoppix. Now I wouldn't have Windows as my desktop OS.
Really, just because you're an elite hacker who does this stuff for fun
Not at all. I'm just a fairly bright guy that can learn new things. I was a custom cabinetmaker for ten years, for heaven's sake.
doesn't mean it's at all within the realm of possibility for REAL consumers/computer users out there.
Let's hook up my SGI Challenge L blower and you stick your fingers in it. At least you won't have to worry about having fingerprints at any point in the future. I've accidentally hit a couple fast metal case fans that drew blood too. And don't forget what happens when fan blades shatter - Ralphie, you'll shoot your eye out.
Believe me, the sea of stupidity is vast. Somebody will figure out how to get hurt with this thing. Especially if there is a payoff at stake.
Apparently, you've never known any of those nice folks who get rear-ended in traffic 'professionally'.
"Cat/Dog/Child encounters 5000 RPM CPU cooling fan in open 'erector-set' computer case, owner/parents sue for $10M."
This does definitely not appear to be critter or chillin friendly. I saw it at Fry's too (set up as an airplane), and that's the first thing that went through my head.
To sell this nowadays, those guys must have some really good liability insurance.
If you can afford a car with OnStar in it you can afford to pay the monthly fee.
You mean like one of the Saturns that has it?
This stuff is for insecure suburbanites who lack any hint of resourcefulness, or simply for the gadget-crazed.
Personally, I've got legs, tools, and ingenuity. I can break into my own Ram pickup in less than 60 seconds with a tree branch.
Fees? Hand-Holding? No thanks.
1) Donate to Goodwill and get a coupon you can use at their local outlet to buy more schlock
2) Donate to somebody needy
3) Scrapfest. Steel can usually be dropped off for free at scrap metal dealers. If you clean the standoffs, nuts, screws, and metal ends off the circuit boards, they should be worth about $0.75 a pound for gold recovery. If all the metal is left on, expect half that. Check the Yellow pages under Scrap Metal.
I have an IceKey that I use with an x86 Linux box, and I love it. But the letters wear off the keys pretty quickly. My 'A' is nearly gone and the left Shift key now appears as 'shit' with an extra squiggle. Hmmm, telling perhaps...............
Nice, and I'm addicted to it, but for $50 at Fry's I'd like to see the keycap letters last a little more than five months.
"True, you can't host yer own servers, which I hate"
Ever hear of port 8080 and dyndns.org?
I'm certain I've hit the download cap as on occasion I've done more than 5GB per DAY. No letters or calls, but my Linksys cable modem seems to hang an awful lot when I run Gnutella, even with uploads disabled. Just power cycle and it dials right back in, but it's a real PITA. I think I've had one drop in two weeks when I haven't been running P2P (on non-standard ports).
So while I can't prove it, empirical evidence sure seems to suggest that they cut the connection off temporarily when the cap is reached.
It's a K1000 but better. Depth of field preview, winder, available battery grip that accepts NiMH 'AA' cells, better metering, so cheap as to be almost disposable NEW.
Plus, it still has KNOBS.
Mine cost about $200 with the battery grip via mail order, and coupled with a 24mm Pentax f/2.0 and Sigma 50-200 APO it was SWEET.
Everybody says lots of used Pentax lenses are available. They are, but they're usually garbage from Taiwan. Pentax Prime lenses are COSTLY and RARE on the used market. The cheapest SMC 24mm f/2.8 I could find was about $279 so I just said the Hell With It and popped $400 on a brand new 24mm f/2.0.
OTOH, If you want something completely bulletproof and big/heavy doesn't scare you, try a Nikon F2A. I still regret selling mine.
Slashdot Mirror
I'm straining to think of the last time I bought a CD new at retail price. I believe it was in the winter of 1997 or Spring of 1998.
I get most of my music now on used CDs or vinyl, $2.99 and $1 respectively at Goodwill, a bit more at used music stores. Nowhere close to even the $10 and $12 'reduced' prices.
Before you laugh, I've picked up a lot of great jazz and classical at Goodwill, most in mint condition.
Could the downward price pressure of all the accumulated used CDs hitting the market (and people like me buying them) be responsible for the recent sales declines and price reductions as much as P2P?
Instead, buy one with Linux.
/home/knoppix/Olympus. Drag and drop in Konqueror.
.bz2's, .tgz's, or even rpms?
Or buy one with any OS and install Knoppix in twelve minutes.
Then try to find some apps
Most are included, apt-get for nearly all the rest.
or gamesthat run on it.
Loki, Wine. Loki games sure are cheap on eBay.
Try to install them. Try to install the myriad of different libraries that each require, and the myriad of libraries that each of these requirements require.
Something particularly difficult about typing 'apt-get update' and 'apt-get install' ?
Try to print something on your printer.
Postscript/CUPS works flawlessly with my APPLE Laserwriter 16/600.
Cry like a baby.
Neener Neener, Windows User!
Try to copy your pictures off your digital camera.
mount
Try to share your hard drive so you can access stuff from another computer.
you lack exposure to Samba and the wonders of FTP, the program GFTP specifically.
Cry like a baby.
You sure do bitch a lot.
Hose up system.
Synonomous with installing Windows.
Go to store and buy a retail copy of Windows and wish you had bought a computer with Windows in the first place.
I'm quite confident that day will never come. Buy Windows, you mean people do that? How quaint.
I'll say it again, Linux is great and all, but is not a viable desktop system yet, and won't likely be anytime soon.
Sure it is. I've been using it instead of Mac OS9 since April. Is there a learning curve? Absolutely. What I'd really give my left arm (or at least a couple fingers) for is a good INTUITIVE vector-based drawing program. I'd even PAY HANDSOMELY for a port of Mac Graphic Converter. But not pay handsomely enough to buy a Mac these days. Maybe when the 1GHz iBook makes it under $999.
And yes, I'm sure YOU could do all the above just fine, but really, what Typical End User will, realistically, recompile stuff into their kernel, load/unload modules, download and install stuff from
I've rarely, if ever had to do any of this with the Knoppix hdinstall.
What typical end user just happens to know all about using Samba, manually editing text files, changing run levels, mounting stuff from the command line, etc? NONE!
Finally we can agree on something. Perhaps to my credit, I've been able to apply my generic computer knowledge to learning Linux and use Google for the things I don't understand. But Knoppix really cuts down on those instances. I find it much easier to install and use than many "traditional" distros. Is it perfect? No. But it's damn good. Keep in mind that I jumped in 'cold turkey'. I've run Macs since 1991. I literally sold my much-loved and much-upgraded beige Mac and was left with the dual PIII machine I'm typing this on. I tried Windows 2K and gave up after a week when any attempt to burn CDs resulted in a BSOD and reboot. I began seriously regretting the day I packed up and shipped my Mac. So I installed Mandrake in desparation, used it for a couple months, made some dumb mistakes, then moved to Knoppix. Now I wouldn't have Windows as my desktop OS.
Really, just because you're an elite hacker who does this stuff for fun
Not at all. I'm just a fairly bright guy that can learn new things. I was a custom cabinetmaker for ten years, for heaven's sake.
doesn't mean it's at all within the realm of possibility for REAL consumers/computer users out there.
Who, pray tell, would be more 'real' than me?
If only there was a way to get explorer plugins to work with Mozilla on Unix...
try www.codeweavers.com.......
Let's hook up my SGI Challenge L blower and you stick your fingers in it. At least you won't have to worry about having fingerprints at any point in the future. I've accidentally hit a couple fast metal case fans that drew blood too. And don't forget what happens when fan blades shatter - Ralphie, you'll shoot your eye out.
Believe me, the sea of stupidity is vast. Somebody will figure out how to get hurt with this thing. Especially if there is a payoff at stake. Apparently, you've never known any of those nice folks who get rear-ended in traffic 'professionally'.
But why do people insist on paying rediclous amounts of money for something that doesn't increase performance?
For the same reason that someone will buy a Ferrari for $80K that is slower in the 1/4 mile than some Honda the Ricers build for $20K.
It has to do with enlargement, IMO. And I don't mean spam.
"Cat/Dog/Child encounters 5000 RPM CPU cooling fan in open 'erector-set' computer case, owner/parents sue for $10M."
This does definitely not appear to be critter or chillin friendly. I saw it at Fry's too (set up as an airplane), and that's the first thing that went through my head.
To sell this nowadays, those guys must have some really good liability insurance.
If you can afford a car with OnStar in it you can afford to pay the monthly fee. You mean like one of the Saturns that has it? This stuff is for insecure suburbanites who lack any hint of resourcefulness, or simply for the gadget-crazed. Personally, I've got legs, tools, and ingenuity. I can break into my own Ram pickup in less than 60 seconds with a tree branch. Fees? Hand-Holding? No thanks.
1) Donate to Goodwill and get a coupon you can use at their local outlet to buy more schlock
2) Donate to somebody needy
3) Scrapfest. Steel can usually be dropped off for free at scrap metal dealers. If you clean the standoffs, nuts, screws, and metal ends off the circuit boards, they should be worth about $0.75 a pound for gold recovery. If all the metal is left on, expect half that. Check the Yellow pages under Scrap Metal.
I have an IceKey that I use with an x86 Linux box, and I love it. But the letters wear off the keys pretty quickly. My 'A' is nearly gone and the left Shift key now appears as 'shit' with an extra squiggle. Hmmm, telling perhaps...............
Nice, and I'm addicted to it, but for $50 at Fry's I'd like to see the keycap letters last a little more than five months.
"True, you can't host yer own servers, which I hate"
Ever hear of port 8080 and dyndns.org?
I'm certain I've hit the download cap as on occasion I've done more than 5GB per DAY. No letters or calls, but my Linksys cable modem seems to hang an awful lot when I run Gnutella, even with uploads disabled. Just power cycle and it dials right back in, but it's a real PITA. I think I've had one drop in two weeks when I haven't been running P2P (on non-standard ports).
So while I can't prove it, empirical evidence sure seems to suggest that they cut the connection off temporarily when the cap is reached.
It's a K1000 but better. Depth of field preview, winder, available battery grip that accepts NiMH 'AA' cells, better metering, so cheap as to be almost disposable NEW.
Plus, it still has KNOBS.
Mine cost about $200 with the battery grip via mail order, and coupled with a 24mm Pentax f/2.0 and Sigma 50-200 APO it was SWEET.
Everybody says lots of used Pentax lenses are available. They are, but they're usually garbage from Taiwan. Pentax Prime lenses are COSTLY and RARE on the used market. The cheapest SMC 24mm f/2.8 I could find was about $279 so I just said the Hell With It and popped $400 on a brand new 24mm f/2.0.
OTOH, If you want something completely bulletproof and big/heavy doesn't scare you, try a Nikon F2A. I still regret selling mine.