Is that really how it works? I've heard otherwise. You are saying that when you launch an app it searches the whole app tree for newer versions of the library (or is there some symlink magic going on)?
My understanding is that the OS does dynamic linking the first time an application is installed and then uses either the included copy or the OS's copy. I've read it also uses copies linked from other applications, but I'm not sure if that is the case. This might just have been a poorly worded reference to updated copies the OS owns.
Gee, who should I believe, wikipedia and several pseudo-anonymous posters here, or the anonymous coward who cites no references at all. If you bothered to look at the wikipedia reference for "ps/2 connector" you'd see they cite numerous sources. Among them are:
Adam Chapweske, from "how things work" : "Vcc/Ground provide power to the keyboard/mouse. The keyboard or mouse should not draw more than 100 mA from the host and care must be taken to avoid transient surges. Such surges can be caused by "hot-plugging" a keyboard/mouse (ie, connect/disconnect the device while the computer's power is on.) Older motherboards had a surface-mounted fuse protecting the keyboard and mouse ports. When this fuse blew, the motherboard was useless to the consumer, and non-fixable to the average technician. Most newer motherboards use auto-reset "Poly" fuses that go a long way to remedy this problem. However, this is not a standard and there's still plenty of older motherboards in use. Therefore, I recommend against hot-plugging a PS/2 mouse or keyboard."
IBM, "Per the PS/2 specification, both connections should be plugged in while the computer is "off." This will ensure proper communication to the computer system at start-up. Although the keyboard and mouse may operate properly when plugged in to a running computer ("Hot Swapped"), corruption of data and the system may occur since this operation is not defined in the PS/2 specification. Backlighting (if available) is powered by the PS/2 keyboard cable and will operate even if the mouse is not plugged in."
You seem to very intent on misleading people into thinking hot swapping PS/2 devices is kosher, when in fact it may or may not cause damage to a machine and may or may not function properly besides. Cite some references to support this new, version of the PS/2 of which you speak, or give it up already.
Better yet is to not use shared libraries at all! It's not as if we have 10 meg hard drives any more, the size of any DLL compared to the drive it's on is miniscule.
I think OS X has the best solution for this I've seen. Programs all have a copy of the libraries they need included in the application package, but when the application is run it will actually use the most up to date, compatible version of the library available to any available application. In this way software can benefit from minor bug fixes to libraries included with other applications. Uninstallation is as easy as throwing the.app in the trash. There is never any installing or uninstalling.
What happens if the program installs a shared library?
The library remains within the application package. If you delete it, tother programs default to using the most recent compatible version of the library in any remaining application. Since every package has a copy, you don't really have to worry about this.
And what about configuration files? Sometimes I uninstall an application because I want it gone. Sometimes I uninstall it because I want to install a new version. In the first case, I want configuration information to be deleted. In the second, I want it retained. The uninstaller needs to know which of these I'm doing.
I don't think there is a lot of reason to remove config files unless you are really space constrained (this is just a text/xml file) or unless you want to wipe the config for security reasons. In OS X, the preferences remain by default, which is nice if you use programs off a thumb drive or other temporary volumes. It also allows for global, group, and user level preferences which can be really handy. Since all of these are installed in a specific folder it does not seem unreasonable to add a "clean uninstall" option to applications that purges this file as well. Right now you just have to go delete it by hand. And, well that is pretty much it.
99bottles, I think you just disproved your own argument about macs being so easy.
I think we'd need a lot more information to make that call, even in regard to this one situation. We don't know what is broken and to what severity. Is the power coming over the USB likely to damage the device plugged in? What is the "easiest" way to handle the broken power, to ignore it and potentially fry digital camera after digital camera with no warning, or to provide a warning and insure you get your machine fixed before anything breaks? Depending on just what is occurring and the potential problems, the answer to this varies greatly.
"NOTE: PS/2 ports are designed to connect the digital I/O lines of the microcontroller in the external device directly to the digital lines of the microcontroller on the motherboard. They are not designed to be hot swappable. The fact that hot swapping PS/2 devices usually doesn't cause damage is only due to the fact that more modern microcontrollers tend to have more robust I/O lines built into them which are harder to damage; it's still not a good idea to hot swap them. Accidentally shorting one pin to another on a PS/2 port can easily kill one or both microcontrollers."
KVM's work around this by leaving the connectors in theri sockets and separating the pins out into insulated wires so they can't short while switching, but this has nothing to do with the connectors or their likelihood of shorting when hot swapped.
Ok, I see your problem. You just don't read what you are replying to. Many people have computers that already have PS2 ports. They cannot remove those, and add USB ports instead. Such computers often only have 2 USB ports. These people are annoyed that the only keyboards and mice you can buy now are USB, because it wastes their USB ports for no reason. Make sense now?
The original poster was complaining about mac minis. They complained that they use USB ports+USB mice and keyboards in preference to PS/2. He was apparently ignoring the fact that if they added PS/2 ports they could just as easily have add more USB ports and then went on to complain about how expensive USB keyboards are.
It is your comment that the USB ports are being wasted on keyboards that is out of context with the earlier posts, since imacs don't have PS/2 ports.
The only items from that list that my current desktop actually has are the firewire target mode and the startup chime. And the firewire target mode only matters because the stupid thing is so crippled by Apple's desire to make it "tiny" that pulling the drive is an ordeal.
For pretty much everyone pulling a laptop's disk drive out, putting it in an external case (which you have to buy), transferring the data, and then putting it back into the old laptop so that you can resell it, is a huge pain in the ass. I've thanked Apple every time I get a laptop upgrade and the transition is a reboot and a few clicks and then I go get a beer while it all seamlessly hops from the old machine to the new.
As for the previous poster's comments. Apple makes some pretty decent quality gear, but it is not to everyone's taste. They will never be able to compete on having as many combinations of hardware as the PC world combined and that is just something you have to deal with if you want the OS. Unless the courts actually enforce the antitrust laws against Microsoft, Apple would be foolish to enter that market and die like every other company/product that tried. I have just about zero confidence that the courts and executive branch will ever do this because they are a bunch of corrupt scumbags interested in getting reelected and gathering more money and power. We just have to deal with it.
t's only OSX that thinks these external devices need to be powered.
Interesting. Have submitted it as a bug? I've never had any problems with this with either my laptop, tower, or work laptop, not have I ever heard anyone else say they have a problem. It could be a hardware problem OS X is identifying, or it could be something peculiar to certain types of devices. Certainly if you can't plug your iPod in, it sounds like you have an unusual problem.
If these exist, I honestly didn't know it.
Currently the Mac Pros and the Xserves have USB ports on the front. The laptops have them on the side. The imac and mac mini rely upon the port on the keyboard. Also, I believe apple displays all have a built in powered hub, like many high end displays these days.
So the solution to a problem as simple as the placement of USB ports on a Mac is to purchase additional hardware to make up for the shortcomings in the initial design?
Umm, you're the only one I've ever heard who has a problem plugging things into their keyboard. So it isn't exactly a shortcoming for most people (anyone else?).
On what planet? I plug and unplug PS2 mice and keyboards all the time. Or did you mean windows is too shitty to handle plugging in PS2 mice while running? The hardware allows it no problem.
Actually, the hardware specification for PS/2 does not handle hot plugging. There are reports where people have fried their ports doing just that. If you do it occasionally, you are probably fine, but if you do it regularly you're really asking for trouble and it certainly is not something a manufacturer should recommend, regardless of the OS.
Duh? That's why people don't want to have to waste the USB ports they have on shit like keyboard and mouse, which work fine as PS2, and have absolutely no need to be USB devices.
In the space used by two PS/2 ports on the back of my machine I can fit 2-4 USB ports. The cost difference at this point is negligible. Unless I'm trying to support ancient, legacy hardware, I'd much rather have four chain-able USB ports (1 for my keyboard, mouse, and the open slot on the keyboard; plus three more empty ports I can run other chains off of) rather than two USB ports and two ports that are wasted just for my keyboard and mouse. In the former case I have a keyboard, mouse and four to six open USB ports. In the latter I have a keyboard, mouse, and two open USB ports. Your definition of a waste, seems quite different than mine.
My 6 month old iMac provides only unpowered USB connections from its keyboard.
Interesting. Have you tried using a different keyboard, or a simple USB extension cable and viewing the results? It sounds like you might have a defective port or keyboard or that your keyboard will pass on a lot less juice than mine, and it is sending errors in response to bad or less than 500mA of power coming out of it. My guess is that OS X is paying attention to these and giving you errors, while Linux is ignoring them. The chances are, the power fluctuations are not severe enough for the devices to not work, or to damage them.
I'm not sure where you'd go to fix this, but my guess is the device drivers.
Note: Some people incorrectly use "the market" as a synonym for corporate activity, and sometimes for customers.
I was using the term "market" as it applies to economic models. In this context free goods and services are not properly part of a market. I understand the meaning of your argument and for the most part agree, but that is really moving more into the realm of socioeconomics and at that point I don't think ignoring the stigma of illegal activity and equating it, or treating it exactly the same as legal activity, is ideal. Nonetheless, your point is well taken.
Because that's the whole justification for it? If you can't copy it, you obviously can't violate copyright*. Any other reason why you would want in whole or in part to copy it is collateral damage.
But you can copy DRM'd materials. You can make an exact copy, you can strip the DRM, or you can plug your speakers straight into a recording jack. It is an inconvenience to copying, but for the most part you can just download a DRM-free copy elsewhere and the fact that it is illegal does not matter if you're a pirate to start with.
I thought the myth that DRM stops piracy or even is intended to stop piracy was debunked long ago by a huge variety of different people. It is useful to make things hard for the law abiding, not for pirates.
It seems fair game now to compare the very highest end PC with a Mac Pro also running Windows Games, it would have been nice to see that as a comparison point.
I suppose, but I doubt it is useful. Mac Pro's are designed as pro workstations, not gaming machines. This is mostly reflected in the graphics cards, which I suppose you can normalize if you're so inclined.
Doesn't work - you get an error message saying that there isn't enough power. You have to plug it directly into the back of the Mac. Brilliant.
What kind of a keyboard are you using and what version iMac? As far as I know all the iMacs for the last four or five years have shipped with only powered USB. A defective or very low quality USB cable to the keyboard could prevent power from being drawn through it, but I've never had any problems with powered devices using either the included Apple keyboard or third party ones I've purchased (although all were fairly nice ones). If you're using a USB-2 capable drive you might have issues, as only some of the imac ports are USB-2 on some models, and the USB spec calls for all devices on a USB-2 chain to degrade if a USB 1 device is in the chain. I can see where that might cause an issue. In any case, thumb dives work just fine in all my free keyboard ports.
Granted, a better way to be would simply to have avoided buying DRMed music in the first place, but not everyone has that foresight.
That would be better, if music distribution was not run by a cartel, repeatedly convicted of abusing their control of the market. I'd love to see everyone become enlightened and move to all DRM-free indy music, but realistically, the market will not properly counter a monopoly or cartel and the legal system and legislature are corrupt and easily bribed.
Some of us don't have this fixation on the thought that software and music should be free. Regardless of what you think, its currently not, right or wrong. Piracy of software and music is still piracy and still illegal.
Then why on Earth didn't they name them something sane and meaningful like Core Duo 32 and Core Duo 64?
I suspect they did not name them as you suggest because consumers would be convinced that because 64 is twice as big as 32, it was twice as fast. Others would believe that the 32 bit was somehow an inferior, older platform and avoid it, even if it was the best chip for their needs. Thus, since to the average user the chips are not very different at all, they named them in a way to emphasize that. In fact, with the currently available versions, benchmarks show they are almost identical in performance for almost all applications a normal person would be doing.
Of course now that Microsoft has decided to cripple the Vista OS on 32-bit chips by refusing to decode new copy protected videos on them, there may be a difference for the average user after all, but a wholly artificial one.
And that's when I stopped listen to your crazy rantings.
I know it's all the rage to use the style of argument, but it undermines your credibility. If you only read the assertion and not the support you are not addressing those arguments and thus your comments have failed before they have begun.
Apple sells hardware bundled with software. They do their damnedest to make sure their software only runs on their hardware, and vice versa.
Apple sells hardware/software bundles, but to argue they go out of their way to make sure their hardware won't work with other people's software is ridiculous. They went so far as to provide an official bootloader mechanism and Windows drivers bundled into an install package that makes running Windows on their hardware very simple. For that matter, much of the software they produce is provided either for free of for sale for the Windows platform.
They blatantly lie in their ads...
Great assertion, now provide some support or it is empty rhetoric.
...they use anti-competitive methods to sell their products...
Well, Apple has one potential monopoly I know of and thus only one way they can be using anti-competative methods. If you feel Apple is wielding monopoly influence on the music player market via their iPods, what evidence do you have to support that belief?
...and have been cutting corners in hardware production for years.
That is the market neighbor. It is very price sensitive. Apple still manages to be at the top of the list for hardware reliability according to spot checking by consumer reports and other independent companies. If you want more reliable and hence more expensive machines than their professional line, then I'm afraid you're in too small of a market for them to enter just now. Perhaps you should try a high-end Sun workstation.
Stop acting like Apple's the best just because they say so. If they're so great you can probably come up with something better than "experience vendor".
If you had bothered to read the rest of the post, you might know the previous poster was simply using the term "experience vendor" to describe a company that sells a bundled hardware and software package, subject to certain market constraints as far as third-party partnerships and interoperability are concerned.
Is there any way to tell which of these intel chips are 64 bit?
Core Duo = 32 bit. Core 2 Duo = 64 bit.
Re:I don't care for these commercials
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New "Get a Mac" TV ads
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· Score: 5, Informative
Honestly I am not sure why all the keyboards and mice are USB now, the plug is no smaller, and you also give up at least one USB port to something that every non-server computer has.
USB can be plugged in and unplugged while the machine is running. PS/2 cannot. USB can be chained. PS/2 cannot. USB can be used for higher speed connections to cameras, and the like. PS/2 cannot. As for every non-server having a P/2 port, they take up space that could be used for other ports and they take up more space than USB ports which can provide greater functionality.
My Mac Mini at home only has 2 USB ports, and because I didn't want to drop $120 on a keyboard & mouse for a $450 computer, I have no free USB ports by default.
As I mentioned, USB is chainable. If you buy a keyboard from a reputable company, they will spend the extra $2 it costs to put at least one more USB port on the keyboard. The same goes for most other devices you might want plugged in permanently. In this way, adding peripherals takes up no additional ports. If you go to froogle.com and enter "usb keyboard" the resulting keyboards start at $3.99. The first one with extra ports on it was $9.99. Do you think you can afford that?
And can we get a Mac with a USB port on the front of the box? I know that it's supposed to look like a simple design, but when I have to drag the expensive and fragile screen of the iMac I have at work around to get at the back of it so I can plug in the cable/thumb drive, so I can turn the screen around again so I can see it, so I can copy a file off of it, then turn it around and unplug it again, before turning it straight again so I can go back to work, it suddenly stops seeming like such a simple design.
So plug it into the empty port on your keyboard. Or, buy one of the macs that comes with ports on the front. Or, buy a hub.
Whatever happened to form following function? Macs are all about being pretty, and somehow most people accept this as actually meaning "more user friendly."
Most people find macs easier to use for a lot of reasons. Some people who pick a machine aimed at one demographic and then use it in ways unusual for that demographic have problems. You're probably one of them.
The successful in this country (the United States of America) have overwhelmingly worked for it!
The link you provided requires registration. Here is a study of my own that gives you a good idea of how upward mobility in the US really works. Here's a handy graphic. You'll note that over a decade or so that in the richest 1% half of them were still in the richest 1% and 80% of them were still in the richest 20%. Are you telling me that of the people born into the top 1% almost all of them worked harder than the other 99% of society to remain in that position?
I am by no means a millionaire or even close, but I also know that I do not have the same desire/drive to do certain things that most millionaires do possess at this time in my life.
I'm not a millionaire either, but I am very smart and have made good economic decisions most of my life. I've worked hard and I fully expect I will be a millionaire by the time I retire, so long as my investments and plans work as well as they have been. That does not, however, mean I am blind to accurately interpreting the statistics. For every dollar of that million I earn over the course of my lifetime, I'm earning about $1.80 for someone else who has done nothing other than loan their money to me through a bank for mortgages and other loans I need in order to have the capital to make money in the first place. In my particular case that means one dollar to person from a less affluent background moving up for two dollars to someone already at the top of the heap. At this rate, I might move to the middle of the pack, but in general it means more and more wealth is consolidating in fewer and fewer hands. It is called condensation of wealth and if you ever to an economics class you should know it plays a big part in almost every economic model.
Wealth disparity in the US is increasing and is higher than about 1/3 of the rest of the world. That isn't terrible, but it is by no means "THE best country for ANYONE to change their status in society."
Some private equity firm thinks Microsoft, one of the richest companies in the world, would be better off borrowing money?!?
No, some private equity firm thinks the private equity firm would be better off using MS to borrow money, while gutting the long-term investments in order to inflate the stock, before said firm bailed on MS, leaving MS in rough shape and the private equity firm swimming in money. You've made the mistake of thinking investors and executives are acting in the best interests of the company, instead of in their own best interests. This hasn't been the case in American business in a long time.
Apple could do that *now*, if they'd sell MacOS for commodity systems.
You're both wrong. MS's monopoly is not dependent upon the quality of their OS compared to other vendors as much as it is upon lock-in and market position. Apple can't compete outside its vertical monopoly unless they can get OEMs to pre-install. OEMs won't pre-install because MS will kill their entire Windows business with discriminatory pricing and that means they're betting the company on the single, unlikely possibility that all the lock-in strategies MS has built into Windows won't work. At the same time Apple is betting their company on the same since they are then decapitating their hardware business and most of their profits.
In short, for both Apple and at least two other, major companies to all take such a huge risk is highly unlikely and could very well get whoever made such a risky decision sued to oblivion.
i sorta like not having to pay 50-70% of my income in taxes even if my broadband bill is $20/mo higher.
Umm, the US spends more money subsidizing telecoms, not less. Several studies now have shown that US telecom companies have larger margins than other places, because they usually have a government granted, regional monopoly, but the government does not restrain those monopolies. The real difference is in the US telecom companies spent millions lobbying politicians to get billions in subsidies and laws that are more favorable to them and allow them to gouge you more than in other countries.
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Is that really how it works? I've heard otherwise. You are saying that when you launch an app it searches the whole app tree for newer versions of the library (or is there some symlink magic going on)?
My understanding is that the OS does dynamic linking the first time an application is installed and then uses either the included copy or the OS's copy. I've read it also uses copies linked from other applications, but I'm not sure if that is the case. This might just have been a poorly worded reference to updated copies the OS owns.
Don't cite nonsense as a source.
Gee, who should I believe, wikipedia and several pseudo-anonymous posters here, or the anonymous coward who cites no references at all. If you bothered to look at the wikipedia reference for "ps/2 connector" you'd see they cite numerous sources. Among them are:
Adam Chapweske, from "how things work" : "Vcc/Ground provide power to the keyboard/mouse. The keyboard or mouse should not draw more than 100 mA from the host and care must be taken to avoid transient surges. Such surges can be caused by "hot-plugging" a keyboard/mouse (ie, connect/disconnect the device while the computer's power is on.) Older motherboards had a surface-mounted fuse protecting the keyboard and mouse ports. When this fuse blew, the motherboard was useless to the consumer, and non-fixable to the average technician. Most newer motherboards use auto-reset "Poly" fuses that go a long way to remedy this problem. However, this is not a standard and there's still plenty of older motherboards in use. Therefore, I recommend against hot-plugging a PS/2 mouse or keyboard."
IBM, "Per the PS/2 specification, both connections should be plugged in while the computer is "off." This will ensure proper communication to the computer system at start-up. Although the keyboard and mouse may operate properly when plugged in to a running computer ("Hot Swapped"), corruption of data and the system may occur since this operation is not defined in the PS/2 specification. Backlighting (if available) is powered by the PS/2 keyboard cable and will operate even if the mouse is not plugged in."
You seem to very intent on misleading people into thinking hot swapping PS/2 devices is kosher, when in fact it may or may not cause damage to a machine and may or may not function properly besides. Cite some references to support this new, version of the PS/2 of which you speak, or give it up already.
Better yet is to not use shared libraries at all! It's not as if we have 10 meg hard drives any more, the size of any DLL compared to the drive it's on is miniscule.
I think OS X has the best solution for this I've seen. Programs all have a copy of the libraries they need included in the application package, but when the application is run it will actually use the most up to date, compatible version of the library available to any available application. In this way software can benefit from minor bug fixes to libraries included with other applications. Uninstallation is as easy as throwing the .app in the trash. There is never any installing or uninstalling.
Uninstalling is not a trivial problem.
Have you used normal applications on OS X?
What happens if the program installs a shared library?
The library remains within the application package. If you delete it, tother programs default to using the most recent compatible version of the library in any remaining application. Since every package has a copy, you don't really have to worry about this.
And what about configuration files? Sometimes I uninstall an application because I want it gone. Sometimes I uninstall it because I want to install a new version. In the first case, I want configuration information to be deleted. In the second, I want it retained. The uninstaller needs to know which of these I'm doing.
I don't think there is a lot of reason to remove config files unless you are really space constrained (this is just a text/xml file) or unless you want to wipe the config for security reasons. In OS X, the preferences remain by default, which is nice if you use programs off a thumb drive or other temporary volumes. It also allows for global, group, and user level preferences which can be really handy. Since all of these are installed in a specific folder it does not seem unreasonable to add a "clean uninstall" option to applications that purges this file as well. Right now you just have to go delete it by hand. And, well that is pretty much it.
99bottles, I think you just disproved your own argument about macs being so easy.
I think we'd need a lot more information to make that call, even in regard to this one situation. We don't know what is broken and to what severity. Is the power coming over the USB likely to damage the device plugged in? What is the "easiest" way to handle the broken power, to ignore it and potentially fry digital camera after digital camera with no warning, or to provide a warning and insure you get your machine fixed before anything breaks? Depending on just what is occurring and the potential problems, the answer to this varies greatly.
Yes it does.
From Wikipedia:
"NOTE: PS/2 ports are designed to connect the digital I/O lines of the microcontroller in the external device directly to the digital lines of the microcontroller on the motherboard. They are not designed to be hot swappable. The fact that hot swapping PS/2 devices usually doesn't cause damage is only due to the fact that more modern microcontrollers tend to have more robust I/O lines built into them which are harder to damage; it's still not a good idea to hot swap them. Accidentally shorting one pin to another on a PS/2 port can easily kill one or both microcontrollers."
KVM's work around this by leaving the connectors in theri sockets and separating the pins out into insulated wires so they can't short while switching, but this has nothing to do with the connectors or their likelihood of shorting when hot swapped.
Ok, I see your problem. You just don't read what you are replying to. Many people have computers that already have PS2 ports. They cannot remove those, and add USB ports instead. Such computers often only have 2 USB ports. These people are annoyed that the only keyboards and mice you can buy now are USB, because it wastes their USB ports for no reason. Make sense now?
The original poster was complaining about mac minis. They complained that they use USB ports+USB mice and keyboards in preference to PS/2. He was apparently ignoring the fact that if they added PS/2 ports they could just as easily have add more USB ports and then went on to complain about how expensive USB keyboards are.
It is your comment that the USB ports are being wasted on keyboards that is out of context with the earlier posts, since imacs don't have PS/2 ports.
The only items from that list that my current desktop actually has are the firewire target mode and the startup chime. And the firewire target mode only matters because the stupid thing is so crippled by Apple's desire to make it "tiny" that pulling the drive is an ordeal.
For pretty much everyone pulling a laptop's disk drive out, putting it in an external case (which you have to buy), transferring the data, and then putting it back into the old laptop so that you can resell it, is a huge pain in the ass. I've thanked Apple every time I get a laptop upgrade and the transition is a reboot and a few clicks and then I go get a beer while it all seamlessly hops from the old machine to the new.
As for the previous poster's comments. Apple makes some pretty decent quality gear, but it is not to everyone's taste. They will never be able to compete on having as many combinations of hardware as the PC world combined and that is just something you have to deal with if you want the OS. Unless the courts actually enforce the antitrust laws against Microsoft, Apple would be foolish to enter that market and die like every other company/product that tried. I have just about zero confidence that the courts and executive branch will ever do this because they are a bunch of corrupt scumbags interested in getting reelected and gathering more money and power. We just have to deal with it.
t's only OSX that thinks these external devices need to be powered.
Interesting. Have submitted it as a bug? I've never had any problems with this with either my laptop, tower, or work laptop, not have I ever heard anyone else say they have a problem. It could be a hardware problem OS X is identifying, or it could be something peculiar to certain types of devices. Certainly if you can't plug your iPod in, it sounds like you have an unusual problem.
If these exist, I honestly didn't know it.
Currently the Mac Pros and the Xserves have USB ports on the front. The laptops have them on the side. The imac and mac mini rely upon the port on the keyboard. Also, I believe apple displays all have a built in powered hub, like many high end displays these days.
So the solution to a problem as simple as the placement of USB ports on a Mac is to purchase additional hardware to make up for the shortcomings in the initial design?
Umm, you're the only one I've ever heard who has a problem plugging things into their keyboard. So it isn't exactly a shortcoming for most people (anyone else?).
On what planet? I plug and unplug PS2 mice and keyboards all the time. Or did you mean windows is too shitty to handle plugging in PS2 mice while running? The hardware allows it no problem.
Actually, the hardware specification for PS/2 does not handle hot plugging. There are reports where people have fried their ports doing just that. If you do it occasionally, you are probably fine, but if you do it regularly you're really asking for trouble and it certainly is not something a manufacturer should recommend, regardless of the OS.
Duh? That's why people don't want to have to waste the USB ports they have on shit like keyboard and mouse, which work fine as PS2, and have absolutely no need to be USB devices.
In the space used by two PS/2 ports on the back of my machine I can fit 2-4 USB ports. The cost difference at this point is negligible. Unless I'm trying to support ancient, legacy hardware, I'd much rather have four chain-able USB ports (1 for my keyboard, mouse, and the open slot on the keyboard; plus three more empty ports I can run other chains off of) rather than two USB ports and two ports that are wasted just for my keyboard and mouse. In the former case I have a keyboard, mouse and four to six open USB ports. In the latter I have a keyboard, mouse, and two open USB ports. Your definition of a waste, seems quite different than mine.
My 6 month old iMac provides only unpowered USB connections from its keyboard.
Interesting. Have you tried using a different keyboard, or a simple USB extension cable and viewing the results? It sounds like you might have a defective port or keyboard or that your keyboard will pass on a lot less juice than mine, and it is sending errors in response to bad or less than 500mA of power coming out of it. My guess is that OS X is paying attention to these and giving you errors, while Linux is ignoring them. The chances are, the power fluctuations are not severe enough for the devices to not work, or to damage them.
I'm not sure where you'd go to fix this, but my guess is the device drivers.
Note: Some people incorrectly use "the market" as a synonym for corporate activity, and sometimes for customers.
I was using the term "market" as it applies to economic models. In this context free goods and services are not properly part of a market. I understand the meaning of your argument and for the most part agree, but that is really moving more into the realm of socioeconomics and at that point I don't think ignoring the stigma of illegal activity and equating it, or treating it exactly the same as legal activity, is ideal. Nonetheless, your point is well taken.
Because that's the whole justification for it? If you can't copy it, you obviously can't violate copyright*. Any other reason why you would want in whole or in part to copy it is collateral damage.
But you can copy DRM'd materials. You can make an exact copy, you can strip the DRM, or you can plug your speakers straight into a recording jack. It is an inconvenience to copying, but for the most part you can just download a DRM-free copy elsewhere and the fact that it is illegal does not matter if you're a pirate to start with.
I thought the myth that DRM stops piracy or even is intended to stop piracy was debunked long ago by a huge variety of different people. It is useful to make things hard for the law abiding, not for pirates.
It seems fair game now to compare the very highest end PC with a Mac Pro also running Windows Games, it would have been nice to see that as a comparison point.
I suppose, but I doubt it is useful. Mac Pro's are designed as pro workstations, not gaming machines. This is mostly reflected in the graphics cards, which I suppose you can normalize if you're so inclined.
Who would mod this as a troll? I It is a valid question based upon the previous poster's presupposition.
Doesn't work - you get an error message saying that there isn't enough power. You have to plug it directly into the back of the Mac. Brilliant.
What kind of a keyboard are you using and what version iMac? As far as I know all the iMacs for the last four or five years have shipped with only powered USB. A defective or very low quality USB cable to the keyboard could prevent power from being drawn through it, but I've never had any problems with powered devices using either the included Apple keyboard or third party ones I've purchased (although all were fairly nice ones). If you're using a USB-2 capable drive you might have issues, as only some of the imac ports are USB-2 on some models, and the USB spec calls for all devices on a USB-2 chain to degrade if a USB 1 device is in the chain. I can see where that might cause an issue. In any case, thumb dives work just fine in all my free keyboard ports.
Granted, a better way to be would simply to have avoided buying DRMed music in the first place, but not everyone has that foresight.
That would be better, if music distribution was not run by a cartel, repeatedly convicted of abusing their control of the market. I'd love to see everyone become enlightened and move to all DRM-free indy music, but realistically, the market will not properly counter a monopoly or cartel and the legal system and legislature are corrupt and easily bribed.
Some of us don't have this fixation on the thought that software and music should be free. Regardless of what you think, its currently not, right or wrong. Piracy of software and music is still piracy and still illegal.
What does DRM have to do with Piracy?
Then why on Earth didn't they name them something sane and meaningful like Core Duo 32 and Core Duo 64?
I suspect they did not name them as you suggest because consumers would be convinced that because 64 is twice as big as 32, it was twice as fast. Others would believe that the 32 bit was somehow an inferior, older platform and avoid it, even if it was the best chip for their needs. Thus, since to the average user the chips are not very different at all, they named them in a way to emphasize that. In fact, with the currently available versions, benchmarks show they are almost identical in performance for almost all applications a normal person would be doing.
Of course now that Microsoft has decided to cripple the Vista OS on 32-bit chips by refusing to decode new copy protected videos on them, there may be a difference for the average user after all, but a wholly artificial one.
And that's when I stopped listen to your crazy rantings.
I know it's all the rage to use the style of argument, but it undermines your credibility. If you only read the assertion and not the support you are not addressing those arguments and thus your comments have failed before they have begun.
Apple sells hardware bundled with software. They do their damnedest to make sure their software only runs on their hardware, and vice versa.
Apple sells hardware/software bundles, but to argue they go out of their way to make sure their hardware won't work with other people's software is ridiculous. They went so far as to provide an official bootloader mechanism and Windows drivers bundled into an install package that makes running Windows on their hardware very simple. For that matter, much of the software they produce is provided either for free of for sale for the Windows platform.
They blatantly lie in their ads...
Great assertion, now provide some support or it is empty rhetoric.
Well, Apple has one potential monopoly I know of and thus only one way they can be using anti-competative methods. If you feel Apple is wielding monopoly influence on the music player market via their iPods, what evidence do you have to support that belief?
That is the market neighbor. It is very price sensitive. Apple still manages to be at the top of the list for hardware reliability according to spot checking by consumer reports and other independent companies. If you want more reliable and hence more expensive machines than their professional line, then I'm afraid you're in too small of a market for them to enter just now. Perhaps you should try a high-end Sun workstation.
Stop acting like Apple's the best just because they say so. If they're so great you can probably come up with something better than "experience vendor".
If you had bothered to read the rest of the post, you might know the previous poster was simply using the term "experience vendor" to describe a company that sells a bundled hardware and software package, subject to certain market constraints as far as third-party partnerships and interoperability are concerned.
Is there any way to tell which of these intel chips are 64 bit?
Core Duo = 32 bit. Core 2 Duo = 64 bit.
Honestly I am not sure why all the keyboards and mice are USB now, the plug is no smaller, and you also give up at least one USB port to something that every non-server computer has.
USB can be plugged in and unplugged while the machine is running. PS/2 cannot. USB can be chained. PS/2 cannot. USB can be used for higher speed connections to cameras, and the like. PS/2 cannot. As for every non-server having a P/2 port, they take up space that could be used for other ports and they take up more space than USB ports which can provide greater functionality.
My Mac Mini at home only has 2 USB ports, and because I didn't want to drop $120 on a keyboard & mouse for a $450 computer, I have no free USB ports by default.
As I mentioned, USB is chainable. If you buy a keyboard from a reputable company, they will spend the extra $2 it costs to put at least one more USB port on the keyboard. The same goes for most other devices you might want plugged in permanently. In this way, adding peripherals takes up no additional ports. If you go to froogle.com and enter "usb keyboard" the resulting keyboards start at $3.99. The first one with extra ports on it was $9.99. Do you think you can afford that?
And can we get a Mac with a USB port on the front of the box? I know that it's supposed to look like a simple design, but when I have to drag the expensive and fragile screen of the iMac I have at work around to get at the back of it so I can plug in the cable/thumb drive, so I can turn the screen around again so I can see it, so I can copy a file off of it, then turn it around and unplug it again, before turning it straight again so I can go back to work, it suddenly stops seeming like such a simple design.
So plug it into the empty port on your keyboard. Or, buy one of the macs that comes with ports on the front. Or, buy a hub.
Whatever happened to form following function? Macs are all about being pretty, and somehow most people accept this as actually meaning "more user friendly."
Most people find macs easier to use for a lot of reasons. Some people who pick a machine aimed at one demographic and then use it in ways unusual for that demographic have problems. You're probably one of them.
The successful in this country (the United States of America) have overwhelmingly worked for it!
The link you provided requires registration. Here is a study of my own that gives you a good idea of how upward mobility in the US really works. Here's a handy graphic. You'll note that over a decade or so that in the richest 1% half of them were still in the richest 1% and 80% of them were still in the richest 20%. Are you telling me that of the people born into the top 1% almost all of them worked harder than the other 99% of society to remain in that position?
I am by no means a millionaire or even close, but I also know that I do not have the same desire/drive to do certain things that most millionaires do possess at this time in my life.
I'm not a millionaire either, but I am very smart and have made good economic decisions most of my life. I've worked hard and I fully expect I will be a millionaire by the time I retire, so long as my investments and plans work as well as they have been. That does not, however, mean I am blind to accurately interpreting the statistics. For every dollar of that million I earn over the course of my lifetime, I'm earning about $1.80 for someone else who has done nothing other than loan their money to me through a bank for mortgages and other loans I need in order to have the capital to make money in the first place. In my particular case that means one dollar to person from a less affluent background moving up for two dollars to someone already at the top of the heap. At this rate, I might move to the middle of the pack, but in general it means more and more wealth is consolidating in fewer and fewer hands. It is called condensation of wealth and if you ever to an economics class you should know it plays a big part in almost every economic model.
Wealth disparity in the US is increasing and is higher than about 1/3 of the rest of the world. That isn't terrible, but it is by no means "THE best country for ANYONE to change their status in society."
Some private equity firm thinks Microsoft, one of the richest companies in the world, would be better off borrowing money?!?
No, some private equity firm thinks the private equity firm would be better off using MS to borrow money, while gutting the long-term investments in order to inflate the stock, before said firm bailed on MS, leaving MS in rough shape and the private equity firm swimming in money. You've made the mistake of thinking investors and executives are acting in the best interests of the company, instead of in their own best interests. This hasn't been the case in American business in a long time.
Apple could do that *now*, if they'd sell MacOS for commodity systems.
You're both wrong. MS's monopoly is not dependent upon the quality of their OS compared to other vendors as much as it is upon lock-in and market position. Apple can't compete outside its vertical monopoly unless they can get OEMs to pre-install. OEMs won't pre-install because MS will kill their entire Windows business with discriminatory pricing and that means they're betting the company on the single, unlikely possibility that all the lock-in strategies MS has built into Windows won't work. At the same time Apple is betting their company on the same since they are then decapitating their hardware business and most of their profits.
In short, for both Apple and at least two other, major companies to all take such a huge risk is highly unlikely and could very well get whoever made such a risky decision sued to oblivion.
i sorta like not having to pay 50-70% of my income in taxes even if my broadband bill is $20/mo higher.
Umm, the US spends more money subsidizing telecoms, not less. Several studies now have shown that US telecom companies have larger margins than other places, because they usually have a government granted, regional monopoly, but the government does not restrain those monopolies. The real difference is in the US telecom companies spent millions lobbying politicians to get billions in subsidies and laws that are more favorable to them and allow them to gouge you more than in other countries.