No, it didn't, but they can't afford to deal with the lawsuits and pressure being applied by Sony towards them. So, even though this was only a portion of their business, the pressure is enough to force them to close down.
Many years ago, when the 3d video card revolution was taking place under the helm of companies like 3dfx, Intel announced that eventually video cards would become obsolete. I forget the exact time frame but I believe they said by 2006 to 2008 cpus would be handling the majority of video processing.
Now, this statement was made before the cpu manufacturers started hitting the brick wall, and 3d video technology was still in relative infancy. So, to be fair, we should probably tack on another 5 years onto that estimate. Once we do so, the market seems to be heading in the very direction Intel predicted between Cell and GPU/CPU integration, we aren't too far off from this becoming common place at all.
Basically, they say if you drink 3 of these a day and get some mild exercise you will burn x number of calories. When, in truth, drinking a current zero calorie beverage and getting the same amount of exercise will give you an almost equivilant result, and it will be $1 cheaper per can.
If you think that's bad, an electrical failure caused an unarmed atomic gravity bomb to be dropped in South Carolina back in 1958 from a B-47. When it fell, it landed on a house and all the TNT used to trigger the bomb detonated, causing a massive explosion that killed several people. Thankfully, there was little to no radiation due to the bomb itself not being "armed". Had it been armed, however, a large portion of South Carolina, Georgia, and North Carolina would now be uninhabitable.
The best bet would be to schedule in a repair stop during one of the space shuttle's remaining 13(?) scheduled space flights to deliver parts to the ISS. Otherwise, as valuable a tool as the hubble is, the cost just isn't worth it since the hubble's days are numbered as is. It just wasn't designed to last too much longer without a complete replacement.
Intel(and AMD for that matter) need to design some sort of application layer that handles parcing out tasks to the various cores regardless of the number of them. The biggest problem with multi-core applications right now is many many programs simply don't take multiple cores into account. In addition, this is going to become a huge hassle for future programmers unless this is done: "Well how many cores are we going to write this program to take advantage of?".
Also, this is something that intel/amd are definitely going to have to do on their own. They simply can't leave it up to the operating system makers to create this. I mean, look at Microsoft's 64bit Windows Vista for a great example for why you can't leave it to the OS people to do.
Until something like this is done, I doubt you'll see much enthusiasm beyond dual and quad core processors because it will take too much effort to tailor software for x number of cores with x changing on a monthly basis.
It's an issue with Lithium-Ion batteries in general. The Sony faults just make the problems even worse for laptops. All Lithium-Ion batteries have safety concerns when exposed to rapid discharging or overcharging. Specifically, the batteries will become quite hot when this occurs beyond a certain rate. My father, who is not normally a tech savy person, has even known about this flaw for years now because of his hobby: Radio Controlled Airplanes.
People who use electric motors on their RC Planes frequently use Lithium Ion batteries, however, because of the nature of the hobby, the batteries tend to discharge at an extremely high rate, or people in a rush can not pay attention and overcharge them. Apparantly there have been many reports over the years in this hobby of planes exploding in mid air or people's cars/homes catching fire because of a rapid buildup in heat by the batteries. The issue got so prevelant that they actually sell pots for people to place their batteries in so that if they do go up in smoke, they won't catch anything else on fire in the process.
Now, of course, this is a hobby where the batteries are being put under unusual and frequent stress, and I'm sure some of the cases were also due to poor quality control. However, it is just one example of many that shows that the problem is not Sony alone, it is a fundamental problem with Lithium-Ion battery technology in the first place. A significant enough problem that the smallest iregularity can result in potentially major issues. All of this is just another example of why, given the increasing portability demands in the technology sector, we need new battery technologies.
As others have posted, using a variety of games, or even certain non-gaming activities, can give the same benefits as Brain Age. However, after using Brain Age/Big Brain Academy for several months I can safely say the two games are far more effective because they are specifically designed for this purpose. I'm a pretty die hard gamer myself, but after a month of using Brain Age I began to notice a marked improvement in how quickly I could mentally respond to a given task. This wasn't something I just noticed myself, some of my friends and co-workers even commented about how sharper I seemed.
Of the two games, I think most people would enjoy Big Brain Academy more because it feels more like a game, while Brain Age feels more like homework. However, I found Brain Age to be the better of the two simply because its math games are great for people who want to improve their basic math skills.
Sony has been shooting themselves in the foot with every single Playstation based lauch. The difference in the past was, Nintendo screwed up on their console design during the original playstation era, giving Sony a foothold with the original Playstation. Despite doing everything possible to completely screw up the PS2 launch as well, Sony still came out ahead because they were riding the wave of success from the Playstation 1 as well as the quickly rising DVD craze. They just managed to be in the right place at the right time to maintain their lead.
Since the PS2 look at the pattern. Sony completely messed up their PSP launch and has managed the system extremely poorly since, as evidenced by how much more successful the DS is over the PSP. And now they are repeating history again with the PS3. The difference this time is their market share has finally eroded, people have caught on to their launching strategies, and no one but Sony and a few videophiles is really super excited about Blu-ray(or even HD-DVD) at this time. Sony doesn't have the presence they had with the PS2 launch to ride them through these initial difficulties with the PS3 unscathed.
Does that mean the PS3 is going to be a total bomb? Of course not, people are still going to buy it. But I do think Sony is really really going to impact their marketshare this generation, and if this trend continues they probably will lose it all by the generation after this one.
Also, to an earlier commentor, I wouldn't say Sony is trying to "innovate too much". I mean seriously, very little of what the PS3 offers beyond Cell and maybe Blu-ray is a major innovation of any sort. It is mostly copying or building on ideas created by their competitors. The correct wording would be: "Sony is trying to sell too many of their products in a single package".
I wouldn't say HDMI is a *complete* piece of garbage. I agree completely that the DRM puts a downer on it, but it is nice simply because of the size of the cable. As for the wireless iteration, yeah the loss on it is going to make it a no go for me, but it is nice to see someone finally step up to the plate on the concept. Like all technologies, this one will either die or improve over time. I personally am hoping it improves because anything that reduces the number of wires needed to set up a quality home entertainment center is a plus.
While the analogy is similar, there is a big difference. Linux is designed from the ground up to be fully customizable, that's part of the advantage of it. Windows and Mac OS X, however, are designed to be cohesive unified user experiences. Everything should have a logical and intuitive feel to its interface, in large part because the modifications you can make on the OSes is far more limited than you can in a Linux environment.
In Linux terms, it would be like if half the user interface was Gnome, the other half KDE, and you were locked out of making any changes to resolve it. That's sort of how Vista feels right now. It also will be a big turnoff to the average consumer who doesn't really want a ton of customizability, they want an unified interface they are familiar with. That, in large part, is why Linux has yet to really become "the OS" for your average Joe consumer while Mac OS X has done exceedingly well. Both have a *nix background to them, but the interface design is what sells OS X.
The performance is closer to Windows XP if you factor out the still awful sidebar. In some areas it equals XP's performance, in other areas it still lags a bit behind. Compatability isn't much of an issue either at this point. Honestly, compatability wise, considering the changes under the hood, the changeover to Vista should be a lot smoother than when everyone started transitioning over to Windows 2000 several years back.
The reason why Vista is definitely *not* ready for release though, is the overall design of the OS itself. Vista has no unified feel to its design, and certain key changes from Windows xp feel more cumbersome(or at the very least awkward to get adjusted to).
Vista really does highlight the differences in design philosophy that went into it versus Mac OS X. While technology implementation wise the two OS's are rather similar in what they can offer the user, OS X goes to great pains to offer a unified and relatively easy to use design. Vista, on the other hand, feels exactly the way it was designed: done in pieces by various different groups then pieced together.
The short of it is the core of Vista, baring a few more bug fixes and performance improvements, is certainly there. But, Vista right now is like that unassembled bike you got as a kid for Christmas. All the parts are there but you can't quite get it fitted together right.
In my honest opinion Vista needs about 3 more months and one more major release to get the final kinks out of the system performance and bug wise, but then it needs another 6 months of heavy and pure public beta use and feedback to get the interface and design unified into a user friendly operating system. As it stands right now, I think performance and bug wise Vista should be pretty much ok by the time the consumer release hits in January, but it is going to be far more cumbersome and even less intuitive to use than Windows XP is on release.
I wouldn't be surprised to see next generation OSs beyond Mac OS X and Vista to take a more modular approach in terms of design. It makes more sense from a development cost standpoint as well. The idea being there is just one "windows" (for example) and Microsoft on a regular basis would sell/release replacement modules for the operating system. Need a server OS? No problem, just install the server core module. Want a fancier new desktop/interface? No problem, install the new graphical upgrade module.
Basically, make it more akin to Linux and other open source products. However, since it would be a single company developing these modules, they would have a unified design to them, which is arguably the biggest flaw from an every day Joe consumer standpoint with linux: the fact that by its nature, open source design is all over the place. That doesn't make open source a bad thing, because if you have the know-how you can customize it into exactly what you want/need. But your everyday consumer wants a unified feel to their product with minimal hassle. Something a Microsoft/Apple OS with a modular design could easily accomplish.
Considering how most major corporations are giving politicians money hats every day to pass/support bills that will benefit their business, and considering the depth of corperate involvement in the US government these days, to argue that companies and/or individuals should not be liable for illegal activities involving collaboration with the US government would be giving these entities a free pass.
I do agree that under this practice the little guy could be hurt in the process, or that massive legal battles could ensue. But, rather than give corporate entities a free pass by letting these companies get away scott free, what really needs to happen is this slippery slope of liability needs to be precisely defined through law in order to prevent future instances like this as well as provide protections for people who were used by the government instead of collaborating with them.
The universe is a pretty vast thing. The general idea, as I understand it looking at this theory, is that space is an illusion that we perceive due to the genetic design of our brains and senses. Basically our minds couldn't handle the vast scope of what is really there; so, in order to handle it all our brains generate this illusion of space and a series of fundimental laws(common sense stuff) so that we can function in our environment.
I don't necessarily agree with the theory, but it is interesting in concept. It would explain a few things like our inability to "explain how everything works" because we are trying to force the functions of the universe into our perceptions of how the universe works, which are inherantly flawed from the get go. It would also explain why Time, such a fundimental aspect of our lives, is so hard to conceptually visualise, and so on.
In essense, we've all been overcomplicating matters to try and fit with the way we "perceive" reality when, in fact, reality doesn't work at all like we experience it mentally. Again, I don't necessarily agree with this theory, but it is interesting.
My question would be, however, if space is an illusion and our perception of how the universe works is vastly different from how it functions, how can we be sure that any theory on how the universe functions is correct when we are incapable of observing the results correctly? It's like the old book that explains how dimensions work when the alien sphere travels down to visit the people of the 2 dimensional "Line Land". None of the people of line land can properly perceive the sphere because they live in a 2 dimensional world and only see him as an ever changing line that intersects their plane of reality. It's the same situation here only instead of dimensions, we are talking the fundimental functions of the universe versus our perception of them.
Anyway, this discussion is all philosphic in nature. The correct scientific approach is what we have been doing for ages now. Exhaust all possibilities through observation and experimentation, and should we eventually reach a point where nothing we try "works" then we know, beyond a doubt, that the correct answer is "none of the above" then start all over from a different approach. Which is why the goal of all scientists is to eventually come up with a "Theory of Everything" with one equation that explains everything. Because when we find that single equation that means we have correctly identified how the universe operates and can easily derive from that equation any alternate perceptions of the universe itself. The trick is getting there;)
This is a prime example of how politics works when it comes to "studies" and "statistical data". If you held 100 studies and 99 of them said Pacman was a harmless game, and one kook with a phd said it was violent, which study do you think a government organization is going to pick?
Answer: whichever one supports there agenda. There is an active political group, which includes Hillary Clinton, whose goal is to legislate video games to heck and back again. Like in all political moves, they are only going to pick out studies that back up their arguements whether they are legitimate or not. And why do these studies make news when the other ones do not? Simple, the other studies are, what we call in the non-political world, "logical" and "common sense". So why report on news that everyone knows to be true? It's like fielding a news story saying "sugar is sweet".
So, when a political group latches on to a crazy study, it makes news because it's so outlandish. That's what politicians are hoping for because they are hoping it makes enough news that people start accepting it to be true because "everyone else is reporting this so it must be true!". This is not to say all studies held up and waved by members of the government are crazy. A lot of them are factual and make sense. But, again, this just goes to show take what you hear with a grain of salt, use a little common sense, and make your own judgements based on actual experiences.
GSOS and the Apple IIGs was quite the sophisticated platform and I'm surprised the author left out the little bit about how Apple alienated a large majority of its customers thanks to the Apple IIGS. The GS was my first "real" computer as a kid. My parents had and I had dabbled with an Amiga long before the GS, but the GS was my first real "work" computer where I did word processing and more with it. It was also my entry point into the early days of the internet and the first computer I ever upgraded with double density disk drives, a 40mb hard drive, various dial up modems, etc.
For me the AppleIIGS was really the "begining" of my current career in the computer industry. It was also a really slick operating system. But the most significant impact the AppleIIGS had on the market was it was the start of Apple's trend of abandoning old technologies. Almost as soon as the AppleIIGs was released, Apple had abandoned it and the Apple II platform for its new Macintosh systems. When Apple did this they abandoned the large majority of their customers. The early Macs were relatively expensive versus the bargin prices on Apple IIs, and a number of schools were deeply invested in the Apple II platform.
When Apple abandoned the II with the GS it was the start of the first major shift in the personal computer marketplace. A number of Apple customers felt gilted by Apple so they began to look for alternatives. Compared to the expensive Macintosh, the relatively cheap PC clone industry seemed like a huge bargin. It was at this moment that Microsoft really took control of the Operating System/platform market as a large portion of Apple's customer base abandoned the company and switched over to PC clones powered by Microsoft's Operating Systems. In truth, it has only been with Mac OS X and their Mactel platforms that Apple has truly succeeded in significantly expanding their marketshare since the AppleIIGS fiasco.
As I said, for an operating system and product that had such a profound impact on the future of Apple, I'm surprised to see so little mention of the AppleIIGS and GSOS.
The recent announcement by Apple that they are going to be partnering with Nvidia for future ipod use. This could be the first step in them getting ready to switch over to Nvidia for their graphics processors since they use Intel chipsets and ATI graphics cards currently. I'm sure AMD is bitter over Intel being picked instead of AMD for the new "Mactels" too, so I could easily see them withdrawing ati support if the merger takes place.
Which is largely responsible for a lot of inaccuracies in battery life. Specifically, the Windows implementation of usb polling can prevent machines from entering their lowest sleep states when idle. I havn't been following this issue in the last month or two, however, so I don't know if the problem has been rectified. I do know that early test reports on Conroe indicated that, due to its design, it was even more succeptable to this problem on Windows machines than prior processors. The issue doesn't show up in other operating systems, however, its a pure Windows issue.
Once you go beyond a certain point, even before you start "weighing too much" you start to lose a lot of mobility due to the bulk and tension of your muscles. It also can cause a whole host of health problems. Its basically the polar opposite of being way too fat. There are extremes in both directions where problems arise once you cross a certain point. Like most things in life, ideeally you want to be somewhere in the middle.
You have to remember though that Carmack's specialty is in designing graphics engines. And, in this area he really is quite good at what he does. While I certainly agree with you that gameplay is an area that needs substantial growth in this industry, as Carmack put it himself, he doesn't really design the gameplay anymore, he just makes engines for people to use. Despite the need for much more varied gameplay concepts, people like Carmack and what they do are still very important to the industry.
By designing new tools and methods to display all types of graphics, graphic's designers help to open up things more for the gameplay designers. And, for companies like Id that liscence their engines, it allows designers to get all the visual tools they need right out of the box, so they can spend more time on the actual gameplay and design of the game itself.
The article itself and its theory is rediculous, but it does serve to show how Sony is really slipping from their position as market leader in some areas because such thoughts are even being considered as possible. This trend isn't really surprising though. For the last decade or so Sony's focus has been on selling as many services and/or products as possible instead of focusing on selling quality hardware. Such was not the case when the Sony brand boom first took place. Back then the reason Sony products became so popular was that they were really well built machines. For example, I still have a sony TV/Monitor from 1986 that runs perfectly after 20 years of constant use.
However, at some point during the early to mid-90s Sony shifted their focus to brand name reliance/market penetration to sell as many products as possible. Because of this ideological shift, the quality of Sony products has continued a slow but continuous slide downwards, while at the same time Sony has slowly built up a reputation of trying to sell consumers as much junk as possible for as high a price as possible. To compound this problem, other companies whose focus has been more on selling quality products have, over time, caught up to Sony on the technological forefront. As such, they have slowly eaten into Sony's marketshare as higher quality, more focused alternatives to Sony products have become increasingly more common. An excellent example of this is how Apple has really eaten into Sony's marketshare in the portable music arena.
Now, on the Microsoft side of things, you could also argue that their focus is very much identical to Sony's: selling as many products and services as possible to the consumer while ignoring potential quality issues. However, Microsoft has been far more cautious about expansion into other markets. As such, the company is significantly more focused than Sony, and, through this, Microsoft has been able to maintain careful marketshare dominance by not spreading themselves too thin.
The notion that Microsoft will buy out Sony is fairly rediculous. Sony's brand name has been tarnished over time and the company's structure is massive. Such a buyout would only strain Microsoft even more and have very few benefits for them. The better choice is to do what Microsoft has been doing, purchasing smaller companies and practicing careful market expansion to slowly remove Sony's impact on the market.
What I do see as a more plausible reality for Sony's future is a massive internal restructuring of the company in the not too distant future. Seeing Sony pull itself back from certain markets and increasing it's focus on re-building the quality of its brand name and products. At least, such an action is what Sony should be doing lest they continue their slow downward slide until they reach a point where their impact and share of the market renders the company as insignificant.
I own this monitor myself and am nothing but pleased with it. It honestly is a very awesome little piece of hardware and I recommend any monitor buyers check this bugger out before making any final decisions. You'll usually find some on display at Office Depot or Best Buy stores too, so it's pretty easy to track one down in a store where you can actually look at it and see for yourself.
I do think the Dell models are great too. They are a really nice value and I certainly recommend them as well. But, imho, the gateway monitor is the best all around multi-purpose LCD computer display available for the 21 inch size range. And, if you are going larger than 21 inches, the apple displays are probably your ideal choice.
I think Napster's rent option is the one single best thing about the service. The real problems, imho are:
1) Even when you do buy your options with what you can do with the song are incredibly limited.
2) The application itself is gaudy and awkward to use.
3) Incompatability with apple's ipod, the market leader in mp3 devices.
4) A limited selection of mp3 players that work with it's "napster to go" rent service.
One of my good friends uses napster and the napster to go service. The service itself is rather awesome and he has ammased a huge music collection for his mp3 player. It's the one thing I wish I had an option for with itunes. But, he hates everythign else about napster himself and really dislikes the mp3 player he is being forced to use(it's file system becomes corrupted very easily, etc.). At this point he is waiting for his mp3 player to die then he is planning on buying an ipod and switching to itunes.
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No, it didn't, but they can't afford to deal with the lawsuits and pressure being applied by Sony towards them. So, even though this was only a portion of their business, the pressure is enough to force them to close down.
Many years ago, when the 3d video card revolution was taking place under the helm of companies like 3dfx, Intel announced that eventually video cards would become obsolete. I forget the exact time frame but I believe they said by 2006 to 2008 cpus would be handling the majority of video processing.
Now, this statement was made before the cpu manufacturers started hitting the brick wall, and 3d video technology was still in relative infancy. So, to be fair, we should probably tack on another 5 years onto that estimate. Once we do so, the market seems to be heading in the very direction Intel predicted between Cell and GPU/CPU integration, we aren't too far off from this becoming common place at all.
Basically, they say if you drink 3 of these a day and get some mild exercise you will burn x number of calories. When, in truth, drinking a current zero calorie beverage and getting the same amount of exercise will give you an almost equivilant result, and it will be $1 cheaper per can.
If you think that's bad, an electrical failure caused an unarmed atomic gravity bomb to be dropped in South Carolina back in 1958 from a B-47. When it fell, it landed on a house and all the TNT used to trigger the bomb detonated, causing a massive explosion that killed several people. Thankfully, there was little to no radiation due to the bomb itself not being "armed". Had it been armed, however, a large portion of South Carolina, Georgia, and North Carolina would now be uninhabitable.
The best bet would be to schedule in a repair stop during one of the space shuttle's remaining 13(?) scheduled space flights to deliver parts to the ISS. Otherwise, as valuable a tool as the hubble is, the cost just isn't worth it since the hubble's days are numbered as is. It just wasn't designed to last too much longer without a complete replacement.
Intel(and AMD for that matter) need to design some sort of application layer that handles parcing out tasks to the various cores regardless of the number of them. The biggest problem with multi-core applications right now is many many programs simply don't take multiple cores into account. In addition, this is going to become a huge hassle for future programmers unless this is done: "Well how many cores are we going to write this program to take advantage of?".
Also, this is something that intel/amd are definitely going to have to do on their own. They simply can't leave it up to the operating system makers to create this. I mean, look at Microsoft's 64bit Windows Vista for a great example for why you can't leave it to the OS people to do.
Until something like this is done, I doubt you'll see much enthusiasm beyond dual and quad core processors because it will take too much effort to tailor software for x number of cores with x changing on a monthly basis.
It's an issue with Lithium-Ion batteries in general. The Sony faults just make the problems even worse for laptops. All Lithium-Ion batteries have safety concerns when exposed to rapid discharging or overcharging. Specifically, the batteries will become quite hot when this occurs beyond a certain rate. My father, who is not normally a tech savy person, has even known about this flaw for years now because of his hobby: Radio Controlled Airplanes.
People who use electric motors on their RC Planes frequently use Lithium Ion batteries, however, because of the nature of the hobby, the batteries tend to discharge at an extremely high rate, or people in a rush can not pay attention and overcharge them. Apparantly there have been many reports over the years in this hobby of planes exploding in mid air or people's cars/homes catching fire because of a rapid buildup in heat by the batteries. The issue got so prevelant that they actually sell pots for people to place their batteries in so that if they do go up in smoke, they won't catch anything else on fire in the process.
Now, of course, this is a hobby where the batteries are being put under unusual and frequent stress, and I'm sure some of the cases were also due to poor quality control. However, it is just one example of many that shows that the problem is not Sony alone, it is a fundamental problem with Lithium-Ion battery technology in the first place. A significant enough problem that the smallest iregularity can result in potentially major issues. All of this is just another example of why, given the increasing portability demands in the technology sector, we need new battery technologies.
As others have posted, using a variety of games, or even certain non-gaming activities, can give the same benefits as Brain Age. However, after using Brain Age/Big Brain Academy for several months I can safely say the two games are far more effective because they are specifically designed for this purpose. I'm a pretty die hard gamer myself, but after a month of using Brain Age I began to notice a marked improvement in how quickly I could mentally respond to a given task. This wasn't something I just noticed myself, some of my friends and co-workers even commented about how sharper I seemed.
Of the two games, I think most people would enjoy Big Brain Academy more because it feels more like a game, while Brain Age feels more like homework. However, I found Brain Age to be the better of the two simply because its math games are great for people who want to improve their basic math skills.
2015, give or take any tampering with history between now and then.
Sony has been shooting themselves in the foot with every single Playstation based lauch. The difference in the past was, Nintendo screwed up on their console design during the original playstation era, giving Sony a foothold with the original Playstation. Despite doing everything possible to completely screw up the PS2 launch as well, Sony still came out ahead because they were riding the wave of success from the Playstation 1 as well as the quickly rising DVD craze. They just managed to be in the right place at the right time to maintain their lead.
Since the PS2 look at the pattern. Sony completely messed up their PSP launch and has managed the system extremely poorly since, as evidenced by how much more successful the DS is over the PSP. And now they are repeating history again with the PS3. The difference this time is their market share has finally eroded, people have caught on to their launching strategies, and no one but Sony and a few videophiles is really super excited about Blu-ray(or even HD-DVD) at this time. Sony doesn't have the presence they had with the PS2 launch to ride them through these initial difficulties with the PS3 unscathed.
Does that mean the PS3 is going to be a total bomb? Of course not, people are still going to buy it. But I do think Sony is really really going to impact their marketshare this generation, and if this trend continues they probably will lose it all by the generation after this one.
Also, to an earlier commentor, I wouldn't say Sony is trying to "innovate too much". I mean seriously, very little of what the PS3 offers beyond Cell and maybe Blu-ray is a major innovation of any sort. It is mostly copying or building on ideas created by their competitors. The correct wording would be: "Sony is trying to sell too many of their products in a single package".
I wouldn't say HDMI is a *complete* piece of garbage. I agree completely that the DRM puts a downer on it, but it is nice simply because of the size of the cable. As for the wireless iteration, yeah the loss on it is going to make it a no go for me, but it is nice to see someone finally step up to the plate on the concept. Like all technologies, this one will either die or improve over time. I personally am hoping it improves because anything that reduces the number of wires needed to set up a quality home entertainment center is a plus.
While the analogy is similar, there is a big difference. Linux is designed from the ground up to be fully customizable, that's part of the advantage of it. Windows and Mac OS X, however, are designed to be cohesive unified user experiences. Everything should have a logical and intuitive feel to its interface, in large part because the modifications you can make on the OSes is far more limited than you can in a Linux environment.
In Linux terms, it would be like if half the user interface was Gnome, the other half KDE, and you were locked out of making any changes to resolve it. That's sort of how Vista feels right now. It also will be a big turnoff to the average consumer who doesn't really want a ton of customizability, they want an unified interface they are familiar with. That, in large part, is why Linux has yet to really become "the OS" for your average Joe consumer while Mac OS X has done exceedingly well. Both have a *nix background to them, but the interface design is what sells OS X.
The performance is closer to Windows XP if you factor out the still awful sidebar. In some areas it equals XP's performance, in other areas it still lags a bit behind. Compatability isn't much of an issue either at this point. Honestly, compatability wise, considering the changes under the hood, the changeover to Vista should be a lot smoother than when everyone started transitioning over to Windows 2000 several years back.
The reason why Vista is definitely *not* ready for release though, is the overall design of the OS itself. Vista has no unified feel to its design, and certain key changes from Windows xp feel more cumbersome(or at the very least awkward to get adjusted to).
Vista really does highlight the differences in design philosophy that went into it versus Mac OS X. While technology implementation wise the two OS's are rather similar in what they can offer the user, OS X goes to great pains to offer a unified and relatively easy to use design. Vista, on the other hand, feels exactly the way it was designed: done in pieces by various different groups then pieced together.
The short of it is the core of Vista, baring a few more bug fixes and performance improvements, is certainly there. But, Vista right now is like that unassembled bike you got as a kid for Christmas. All the parts are there but you can't quite get it fitted together right.
In my honest opinion Vista needs about 3 more months and one more major release to get the final kinks out of the system performance and bug wise, but then it needs another 6 months of heavy and pure public beta use and feedback to get the interface and design unified into a user friendly operating system. As it stands right now, I think performance and bug wise Vista should be pretty much ok by the time the consumer release hits in January, but it is going to be far more cumbersome and even less intuitive to use than Windows XP is on release.
I wouldn't be surprised to see next generation OSs beyond Mac OS X and Vista to take a more modular approach in terms of design. It makes more sense from a development cost standpoint as well. The idea being there is just one "windows" (for example) and Microsoft on a regular basis would sell/release replacement modules for the operating system. Need a server OS? No problem, just install the server core module. Want a fancier new desktop/interface? No problem, install the new graphical upgrade module.
Basically, make it more akin to Linux and other open source products. However, since it would be a single company developing these modules, they would have a unified design to them, which is arguably the biggest flaw from an every day Joe consumer standpoint with linux: the fact that by its nature, open source design is all over the place. That doesn't make open source a bad thing, because if you have the know-how you can customize it into exactly what you want/need. But your everyday consumer wants a unified feel to their product with minimal hassle. Something a Microsoft/Apple OS with a modular design could easily accomplish.
Considering how most major corporations are giving politicians money hats every day to pass/support bills that will benefit their business, and considering the depth of corperate involvement in the US government these days, to argue that companies and/or individuals should not be liable for illegal activities involving collaboration with the US government would be giving these entities a free pass.
I do agree that under this practice the little guy could be hurt in the process, or that massive legal battles could ensue. But, rather than give corporate entities a free pass by letting these companies get away scott free, what really needs to happen is this slippery slope of liability needs to be precisely defined through law in order to prevent future instances like this as well as provide protections for people who were used by the government instead of collaborating with them.
The universe is a pretty vast thing. The general idea, as I understand it looking at this theory, is that space is an illusion that we perceive due to the genetic design of our brains and senses. Basically our minds couldn't handle the vast scope of what is really there; so, in order to handle it all our brains generate this illusion of space and a series of fundimental laws(common sense stuff) so that we can function in our environment.
;)
I don't necessarily agree with the theory, but it is interesting in concept. It would explain a few things like our inability to "explain how everything works" because we are trying to force the functions of the universe into our perceptions of how the universe works, which are inherantly flawed from the get go. It would also explain why Time, such a fundimental aspect of our lives, is so hard to conceptually visualise, and so on.
In essense, we've all been overcomplicating matters to try and fit with the way we "perceive" reality when, in fact, reality doesn't work at all like we experience it mentally. Again, I don't necessarily agree with this theory, but it is interesting.
My question would be, however, if space is an illusion and our perception of how the universe works is vastly different from how it functions, how can we be sure that any theory on how the universe functions is correct when we are incapable of observing the results correctly? It's like the old book that explains how dimensions work when the alien sphere travels down to visit the people of the 2 dimensional "Line Land". None of the people of line land can properly perceive the sphere because they live in a 2 dimensional world and only see him as an ever changing line that intersects their plane of reality. It's the same situation here only instead of dimensions, we are talking the fundimental functions of the universe versus our perception of them.
Anyway, this discussion is all philosphic in nature. The correct scientific approach is what we have been doing for ages now. Exhaust all possibilities through observation and experimentation, and should we eventually reach a point where nothing we try "works" then we know, beyond a doubt, that the correct answer is "none of the above" then start all over from a different approach. Which is why the goal of all scientists is to eventually come up with a "Theory of Everything" with one equation that explains everything. Because when we find that single equation that means we have correctly identified how the universe operates and can easily derive from that equation any alternate perceptions of the universe itself. The trick is getting there
This is a prime example of how politics works when it comes to "studies" and "statistical data". If you held 100 studies and 99 of them said Pacman was a harmless game, and one kook with a phd said it was violent, which study do you think a government organization is going to pick?
Answer: whichever one supports there agenda. There is an active political group, which includes Hillary Clinton, whose goal is to legislate video games to heck and back again. Like in all political moves, they are only going to pick out studies that back up their arguements whether they are legitimate or not. And why do these studies make news when the other ones do not? Simple, the other studies are, what we call in the non-political world, "logical" and "common sense". So why report on news that everyone knows to be true? It's like fielding a news story saying "sugar is sweet".
So, when a political group latches on to a crazy study, it makes news because it's so outlandish. That's what politicians are hoping for because they are hoping it makes enough news that people start accepting it to be true because "everyone else is reporting this so it must be true!". This is not to say all studies held up and waved by members of the government are crazy. A lot of them are factual and make sense. But, again, this just goes to show take what you hear with a grain of salt, use a little common sense, and make your own judgements based on actual experiences.
GSOS and the Apple IIGs was quite the sophisticated platform and I'm surprised the author left out the little bit about how Apple alienated a large majority of its customers thanks to the Apple IIGS. The GS was my first "real" computer as a kid. My parents had and I had dabbled with an Amiga long before the GS, but the GS was my first real "work" computer where I did word processing and more with it. It was also my entry point into the early days of the internet and the first computer I ever upgraded with double density disk drives, a 40mb hard drive, various dial up modems, etc.
For me the AppleIIGS was really the "begining" of my current career in the computer industry. It was also a really slick operating system. But the most significant impact the AppleIIGS had on the market was it was the start of Apple's trend of abandoning old technologies. Almost as soon as the AppleIIGs was released, Apple had abandoned it and the Apple II platform for its new Macintosh systems. When Apple did this they abandoned the large majority of their customers. The early Macs were relatively expensive versus the bargin prices on Apple IIs, and a number of schools were deeply invested in the Apple II platform.
When Apple abandoned the II with the GS it was the start of the first major shift in the personal computer marketplace. A number of Apple customers felt gilted by Apple so they began to look for alternatives. Compared to the expensive Macintosh, the relatively cheap PC clone industry seemed like a huge bargin. It was at this moment that Microsoft really took control of the Operating System/platform market as a large portion of Apple's customer base abandoned the company and switched over to PC clones powered by Microsoft's Operating Systems. In truth, it has only been with Mac OS X and their Mactel platforms that Apple has truly succeeded in significantly expanding their marketshare since the AppleIIGS fiasco.
As I said, for an operating system and product that had such a profound impact on the future of Apple, I'm surprised to see so little mention of the AppleIIGS and GSOS.
The recent announcement by Apple that they are going to be partnering with Nvidia for future ipod use. This could be the first step in them getting ready to switch over to Nvidia for their graphics processors since they use Intel chipsets and ATI graphics cards currently. I'm sure AMD is bitter over Intel being picked instead of AMD for the new "Mactels" too, so I could easily see them withdrawing ati support if the merger takes place.
Which is largely responsible for a lot of inaccuracies in battery life. Specifically, the Windows implementation of usb polling can prevent machines from entering their lowest sleep states when idle. I havn't been following this issue in the last month or two, however, so I don't know if the problem has been rectified. I do know that early test reports on Conroe indicated that, due to its design, it was even more succeptable to this problem on Windows machines than prior processors. The issue doesn't show up in other operating systems, however, its a pure Windows issue.
Once you go beyond a certain point, even before you start "weighing too much" you start to lose a lot of mobility due to the bulk and tension of your muscles. It also can cause a whole host of health problems. Its basically the polar opposite of being way too fat. There are extremes in both directions where problems arise once you cross a certain point. Like most things in life, ideeally you want to be somewhere in the middle.
You have to remember though that Carmack's specialty is in designing graphics engines. And, in this area he really is quite good at what he does. While I certainly agree with you that gameplay is an area that needs substantial growth in this industry, as Carmack put it himself, he doesn't really design the gameplay anymore, he just makes engines for people to use. Despite the need for much more varied gameplay concepts, people like Carmack and what they do are still very important to the industry.
By designing new tools and methods to display all types of graphics, graphic's designers help to open up things more for the gameplay designers. And, for companies like Id that liscence their engines, it allows designers to get all the visual tools they need right out of the box, so they can spend more time on the actual gameplay and design of the game itself.
The article itself and its theory is rediculous, but it does serve to show how Sony is really slipping from their position as market leader in some areas because such thoughts are even being considered as possible. This trend isn't really surprising though. For the last decade or so Sony's focus has been on selling as many services and/or products as possible instead of focusing on selling quality hardware. Such was not the case when the Sony brand boom first took place. Back then the reason Sony products became so popular was that they were really well built machines. For example, I still have a sony TV/Monitor from 1986 that runs perfectly after 20 years of constant use.
However, at some point during the early to mid-90s Sony shifted their focus to brand name reliance/market penetration to sell as many products as possible. Because of this ideological shift, the quality of Sony products has continued a slow but continuous slide downwards, while at the same time Sony has slowly built up a reputation of trying to sell consumers as much junk as possible for as high a price as possible. To compound this problem, other companies whose focus has been more on selling quality products have, over time, caught up to Sony on the technological forefront. As such, they have slowly eaten into Sony's marketshare as higher quality, more focused alternatives to Sony products have become increasingly more common. An excellent example of this is how Apple has really eaten into Sony's marketshare in the portable music arena.
Now, on the Microsoft side of things, you could also argue that their focus is very much identical to Sony's: selling as many products and services as possible to the consumer while ignoring potential quality issues. However, Microsoft has been far more cautious about expansion into other markets. As such, the company is significantly more focused than Sony, and, through this, Microsoft has been able to maintain careful marketshare dominance by not spreading themselves too thin.
The notion that Microsoft will buy out Sony is fairly rediculous. Sony's brand name has been tarnished over time and the company's structure is massive. Such a buyout would only strain Microsoft even more and have very few benefits for them. The better choice is to do what Microsoft has been doing, purchasing smaller companies and practicing careful market expansion to slowly remove Sony's impact on the market.
What I do see as a more plausible reality for Sony's future is a massive internal restructuring of the company in the not too distant future. Seeing Sony pull itself back from certain markets and increasing it's focus on re-building the quality of its brand name and products. At least, such an action is what Sony should be doing lest they continue their slow downward slide until they reach a point where their impact and share of the market renders the company as insignificant.
I own this monitor myself and am nothing but pleased with it. It honestly is a very awesome little piece of hardware and I recommend any monitor buyers check this bugger out before making any final decisions. You'll usually find some on display at Office Depot or Best Buy stores too, so it's pretty easy to track one down in a store where you can actually look at it and see for yourself.
I do think the Dell models are great too. They are a really nice value and I certainly recommend them as well. But, imho, the gateway monitor is the best all around multi-purpose LCD computer display available for the 21 inch size range. And, if you are going larger than 21 inches, the apple displays are probably your ideal choice.
I think Napster's rent option is the one single best thing about the service. The real problems, imho are:
1) Even when you do buy your options with what you can do with the song are incredibly limited.
2) The application itself is gaudy and awkward to use.
3) Incompatability with apple's ipod, the market leader in mp3 devices.
4) A limited selection of mp3 players that work with it's "napster to go" rent service.
One of my good friends uses napster and the napster to go service. The service itself is rather awesome and he has ammased a huge music collection for his mp3 player. It's the one thing I wish I had an option for with itunes. But, he hates everythign else about napster himself and really dislikes the mp3 player he is being forced to use(it's file system becomes corrupted very easily, etc.). At this point he is waiting for his mp3 player to die then he is planning on buying an ipod and switching to itunes.