Obviously I didn't read TFA, but does anyone know about the possible speeds on these wireless links? As it stands, wifi is still (in practice) a lot slower and less reliable than even 100 mbit ethernet. It'd be pretty interesting if this new technology could offer reliable gigabit ethernet speeds (or better!) and similar reliability over reasonably long distances (similar to current wifi). But, my instincts tell me that that's just a pipe dream.
...at least using windows I get less functionality for $300+, I get an assortment of even more expensive third party software (eg Photoshop) and I get an ugly, barely functional desktop as well!
It looks like the final piece has dropped into place for Linux! Linux is getting preinstalls from major vendors (in Netbooks especially, but moreso in general too). Wine had a 1.0 release quite awhile and is still improving rapidly. Now, the multimedia perplex is also solved.
More importantly, newer kernels *feel* faster. In particular the kernel preemption makes an enormous difference as far as perceived speed goes (for a desktop user).
When I upgraded from 2.4.24 to one of the early 2.6 releases I was astounded at how much faster things felt. On a very modest laptop (1.3 GHz Pentium-M, 512M RAM, 30G 5400 RPM hard drive) from a fresh boot I fired up OpenOffice, Konqueror, Eclipse, Firefox (might have still been Mozilla then, I forget) all at the same time, and the desktop was still liquid smooth and completely responsive. Needless to say, a similar task on 2.4 felt much slower, as actually getting the K menu to open again so I could select another program to start out of it took longer.
Newer kernels are actually faster in a lot of cases too, particularly with scalability, but lots of other optimizations have been done as well, as many kernel developers keep a very close eye on performance. Also, GCC has gotten better over time, and likely optimizes the kernel quite a bit better now than it could several years ago.
So wait, your integrated graphics is *slower* than a low end discrete graphics card that's now 6 generations (or ~6 years) behind... and you find that acceptable?
At the current pace, it'll take them a decade to match a high end card from today with an integrated card, and video cards aren't standing still in the mean time.
You can point at the current integrated market for video cards, but that's not terribly interesting due to the fact that a) current integrated video cards barely do more than send signals to monitor(s), and (as a corollary to a) b) current integrated video cards aren't very fast.
Wake me up when integrated video cards are faster than discrete video cards.
Executives at HP deny that any meaningful amount of resources are being directed into plans for a mass-market operating system...
A meaningful amount of money for a big corporation is very different than a meaningful amount of money for an individual. HP could easily invest several million in Linux without batting an eye (and without making the above statement false).
I keep wondering when Gnome and KDE will ever join forces and do some real damage. But every time I wonder that out loud somebody smacks me down, as though I'm asking the English and German to join forces against tooth decay. I guess it's smack-down time again.
The only damage they'd do is to eachother.
Picture it this way: KDE and Gnome are two trains travelling at high speed, but in opposite directions, and you get the brilliant idea of tying the two trains together ("working together"). Well, guess what happens? Nothing good.
A year ago, 8G flash drives had just slipped under $100. Today, 32G flash drives have slipped under $100. Needless to say, progress probably won't slow down any time soon, and that starts making flash drives look very attractive...
Re:Firefox Damage Control Is More Than Enough
on
Chrome Vs. IE 8
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· Score: 1
Why? Can't the processes share common code and read-only data structures? Or is Windows memory management not as good as fork()?
Windows doesn't have fork() or anything like it. Awfully primitive isn't it?
Will it be Dell? They distribute Ubuntu on some PCs, and even ship it with the licensed codecs, but they don't seem to me as willing to take the Apple route and compete with Microsoft frontally. Also, they don't have anything specific to offer, except pretty cheap prices.
I think you underestimate the power of cheap prices. Witness Wal-Mart, for example.
However, equating Linux with cheap probably isn't the way to victory, as most people see cheap as poor quality. In contrast, Linux is much better quality than the competitors.
Or you could, you know, not install Flash to start with. Besides a crazy amount of ads, you don't really miss anything. As for Youtube, that's what youtube-dl is for.
And of course this will be doomed to fail, like so many other Apple products, because the slashdot crowd are genetically opposed to any keyboard functionality that doesn't have the same feel and *click* of an IBM Model 101 keyboard.:-p
Actually, taking the opposite of the Slashdot reaction is generally a good indicator for how something will do with the general public. Just look at what we thought of the iPod (rightfully so, but apparently that's not important).
...and you can have my IBM Model M over my dead body!
Slashdot Mirror
Obviously I didn't read TFA, but does anyone know about the possible speeds on these wireless links? As it stands, wifi is still (in practice) a lot slower and less reliable than even 100 mbit ethernet. It'd be pretty interesting if this new technology could offer reliable gigabit ethernet speeds (or better!) and similar reliability over reasonably long distances (similar to current wifi). But, my instincts tell me that that's just a pipe dream.
...at least using windows I get less functionality for $300+, I get an assortment of even more expensive third party software (eg Photoshop) and I get an ugly, barely functional desktop as well!
There, fixed that for you.
It looks like the final piece has dropped into place for Linux! Linux is getting preinstalls from major vendors (in Netbooks especially, but moreso in general too). Wine had a 1.0 release quite awhile and is still improving rapidly. Now, the multimedia perplex is also solved.
For those of you not already familiar, World Domination 201.
My main system is A e8400 / 6GB RAM / GTX 260 Video and it absolutely flies. How do I make it slow down and crash?
Install Windows on it.
Pfft, 2 Raptors in RAID 0? That's child's play. Give me a dozen Intel SSDs in RAID 0 and we can start talking.
More importantly, newer kernels *feel* faster. In particular the kernel preemption makes an enormous difference as far as perceived speed goes (for a desktop user).
When I upgraded from 2.4.24 to one of the early 2.6 releases I was astounded at how much faster things felt. On a very modest laptop (1.3 GHz Pentium-M, 512M RAM, 30G 5400 RPM hard drive) from a fresh boot I fired up OpenOffice, Konqueror, Eclipse, Firefox (might have still been Mozilla then, I forget) all at the same time, and the desktop was still liquid smooth and completely responsive. Needless to say, a similar task on 2.4 felt much slower, as actually getting the K menu to open again so I could select another program to start out of it took longer.
Newer kernels are actually faster in a lot of cases too, particularly with scalability, but lots of other optimizations have been done as well, as many kernel developers keep a very close eye on performance. Also, GCC has gotten better over time, and likely optimizes the kernel quite a bit better now than it could several years ago.
So wait, your integrated graphics is *slower* than a low end discrete graphics card that's now 6 generations (or ~6 years) behind... and you find that acceptable?
At the current pace, it'll take them a decade to match a high end card from today with an integrated card, and video cards aren't standing still in the mean time.
You can point at the current integrated market for video cards, but that's not terribly interesting due to the fact that a) current integrated video cards barely do more than send signals to monitor(s), and (as a corollary to a) b) current integrated video cards aren't very fast.
Wake me up when integrated video cards are faster than discrete video cards.
No, Linux is not a trademark.
Says you. But I'll believe kernel.org:
The EULA is a new thing with Firefox 3 it seems.
Linux is a trademark too. Does that mean I need to accept an EULA every time I install a new kernel? No.
Game! is also completely DRM free, and has very modest system requirements!
A meaningful amount of money for a big corporation is very different than a meaningful amount of money for an individual. HP could easily invest several million in Linux without batting an eye (and without making the above statement false).
It's not flamebait if it's accurate.
I keep wondering when Gnome and KDE will ever join forces and do some real damage. But every time I wonder that out loud somebody smacks me down, as though I'm asking the English and German to join forces against tooth decay. I guess it's smack-down time again.
The only damage they'd do is to eachother.
Picture it this way: KDE and Gnome are two trains travelling at high speed, but in opposite directions, and you get the brilliant idea of tying the two trains together ("working together"). Well, guess what happens? Nothing good.
How about paying someone to fix Flash? It's what made me go back to Windows.
And by "fix", I assume you mean completely scour the web of? You might need to pay more than a single person to get that done.
I'm not sure about the toolkit (though I don't think it's QT or GTK), but that's definitely kwin (ie, KDE's window manager).
I doubt Google cares, they throw away any servers older than 3 years or so (dead or not).
Yes, talk about a new generation of water cooling!
No flash? That's a feature, not a bug!
I didn't know the Radeon 9800 Pro was a CPU fan.
A year ago, 8G flash drives had just slipped under $100. Today, 32G flash drives have slipped under $100. Needless to say, progress probably won't slow down any time soon, and that starts making flash drives look very attractive...
Windows doesn't have fork() or anything like it. Awfully primitive isn't it?
I think you underestimate the power of cheap prices. Witness Wal-Mart, for example.
However, equating Linux with cheap probably isn't the way to victory, as most people see cheap as poor quality. In contrast, Linux is much better quality than the competitors.
Or you could, you know, not install Flash to start with. Besides a crazy amount of ads, you don't really miss anything. As for Youtube, that's what youtube-dl is for.
Actually, taking the opposite of the Slashdot reaction is generally a good indicator for how something will do with the general public. Just look at what we thought of the iPod (rightfully so, but apparently that's not important).
...and you can have my IBM Model M over my dead body!