Because it looks unprofessional (may be a pro or con depending on the business) ie mike@mikesauto.com versus mike34534@hotmail.com
There is also the superficial sense of security. When I send email to Mike at his domain I'm pretty sure he is the only one reading it (although it very well could also be the isp, hosting domain, his sysadmin, and NSA). When I send email to hotmail or gmail, perhaps unfounded, I have the feeling that if they felt like it MS or google could be reading the emails and no-one would know it and/or a security breach could leak access to everyone's email.
I'm sure AOL's IM portion is lucrative. With MS messenger and AIM, and already existing compatibility with yahoo networks, that pretty much leaves no-one else (with any significant market share).
Taking your cue, the thing is you can often get laptops from dell for under $600 that fits the needs of 90% of consumers. Grandma and mom don't care if it is heavier and lower specced than a macbook, what they care about is that it is cheap and fast enough (which it is, even under vista, for surfing, email, etc). So it doesn't matter if you can spec a laptop to match a dell, what matters is the race for the bottom.
*note I'm not one of the 90%, I spent over 2 grand for a 3 lb tablet pc (fujitsu t4220), but my wife is perfectly happy with her crappy dell.
Actually I believe it only runs like crap because adobe, java, apple, microsoft, antivirus etc all have autoupdate services installed which for some unknown reason slow the machine to a crawl. Turn these off and install a lightweight antivirus (ie nod32, avast).
I dualboot xp and vista on my laptop (xp for sound editing) and performance (other than network transfer speed and cold boot) is about the same with all the above crap turned off.
All MS needs to do for win7 is speed up the OS a bit and clean up UAC. Yah, it would be great if they had a minikernal and ran everything under virtualization, but we might as well expect a free blowjob while they're at it.
I use nod32 which is incredibly lightweight and I only run spyware checking apps once a month, so I doubt any of that has much of an effect on performance, plus I'm running the same apps on my vista laptop.
I use avast, but when intentionally bullshitting around and doing things I shouldn't have been doing it let a couple things through that it wasn't able to clean up. NOD32 picked up the mess, but unfortunately after the trial it costs $ compared to avast. I'll probably just stop trudging through the cesspool of the internets and keep using avast.
Looks like the study was sponsored by MS, so that probably won't sway you, but either way I don't give a shit. Perhaps you're right, my qi-enhanced magical laptop just has its meridians inline while my desktop must have liver fire rising.
I probably use about ~40gb a month, which I believe is below COX's limit of 60gb/month. I have a decent torrent ratio so I'm probably uploading 20gb a month as well ~5gb movies streamed from 360 ~3gb movies streamed from netflix. I have no idea what the netflix size-per-movie is, but my wife watches about 5 of them per month. ~30gb porn ~10gb tv shows ~2gb checking email, web surfing, youtube, downloading linux distros, etc.
My laptop with vista is noticeably faster than my desktop with XP (with the exception of network transfer speed), even though they have the same specs (2.1ghz core 2 duo, 2gb ram. The desktop has a better videocard).
For me at least XP seems to get much slower with age while vista does not do so. Yah, a fresh install of XP is blinding fast, even more so than Ubuntu IMO, but after several weeks just slows to a crawl (yah I scandisk, reg clean, defrag, spyware/virus check, etc) while Vista takes a couple days to get fast (due to indexing and prefetching, or whatever they call it).
Yah but if they're like my parents they paid $20 a month for dialup and $20 a month for a second landline. Cellphones have pretty much negated the need for this, but some families may want to keep their landline unlocked, and in that case broadband isn't that much more expensive.
You may want to try a one-time scan by another antivirus program such as nod32, avast, etc. ClamAV constantly gets poor results in antivirus tests: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clamav
...since Baldur's Gate 2. NWN's story sucked but some of the mutliplayer was great; it's a shame NWN2 didn't follow through. The Temple of Elemental Evil could have led to a new golden box age by licensing out the engine if it wasn't such a bug ridden mess. Oblivion just didn't do it for me and Fable/Mass Effect were o.k.
Fable 2 looks interesting and Dragon Age is supposed to be Bioware's spiritual successor to Baldur's Gate 2; hopefully it will pan out and not just be another Jade Empire/Mass Effect.
I understand what you are getting at, but XP shouldn't crash, and if it does you likely have a driver or hardware problem. However, if it makes you feel better under Vista firefox 3 crashes constantly while firefox 2 only rarely crashed. I would switch back if firefox 3 wasn't so much faster.
I must be retarded as well because I can't find it anywhere. Maybe they locked it so that while people with profiles don't get canceled, but those without them can't add them.
People here will tell you that you are doing something wrong, but it crashes constantly for me as well. Some blame it on flash, but why should a plugin crash my browser? This isn't 2002, browsers should be above that.
We'll, supposedly they reworked the network stack, and it is faster since sp1, but I agree they dropped the ball. I bought a 200gb 7200rpm hard drive for my laptop as I rarely spend time on my desktop, so I figured I'd move most things to my laptop.
Slashdot Mirror
Regarding vista's DRM: http://blogs.zdnet.com/Ou/?p=429
Because it looks unprofessional (may be a pro or con depending on the business)
ie mike@mikesauto.com versus mike34534@hotmail.com
There is also the superficial sense of security. When I send email to Mike at his domain I'm pretty sure he is the only one reading it (although it very well could also be the isp, hosting domain, his sysadmin, and NSA). When I send email to hotmail or gmail, perhaps unfounded, I have the feeling that if they felt like it MS or google could be reading the emails and no-one would know it and/or a security breach could leak access to everyone's email.
For some unknown reason a lot of small business owners, rather than paying 5.99/month for a domain name and email, use gmail/hotmail/aol.
According to wikipedia:
AIM: 53m active
Jabber 40-90m total
MS: 294m active
Yahoo: 22m total
ICQ: 15m active
I'm sure AOL's IM portion is lucrative. With MS messenger and AIM, and already existing compatibility with yahoo networks, that pretty much leaves no-one else (with any significant market share).
A desktop mac you can stick a graphics card into under 2k?
I dropped my fujitsu laptop multiple times this year and it styiklkl worklsd fklaweklersdsdklerty
Taking your cue, the thing is you can often get laptops from dell for under $600 that fits the needs of 90% of consumers. Grandma and mom don't care if it is heavier and lower specced than a macbook, what they care about is that it is cheap and fast enough (which it is, even under vista, for surfing, email, etc). So it doesn't matter if you can spec a laptop to match a dell, what matters is the race for the bottom.
*note I'm not one of the 90%, I spent over 2 grand for a 3 lb tablet pc (fujitsu t4220), but my wife is perfectly happy with her crappy dell.
Actually I believe it only runs like crap because adobe, java, apple, microsoft, antivirus etc all have autoupdate services installed which for some unknown reason slow the machine to a crawl. Turn these off and install a lightweight antivirus (ie nod32, avast).
I dualboot xp and vista on my laptop (xp for sound editing) and performance (other than network transfer speed and cold boot) is about the same with all the above crap turned off.
All MS needs to do for win7 is speed up the OS a bit and clean up UAC. Yah, it would be great if they had a minikernal and ran everything under virtualization, but we might as well expect a free blowjob while they're at it.
I use nod32 which is incredibly lightweight and I only run spyware checking apps once a month, so I doubt any of that has much of an effect on performance, plus I'm running the same apps on my vista laptop.
I use avast, but when intentionally bullshitting around and doing things I shouldn't have been doing it let a couple things through that it wasn't able to clean up. NOD32 picked up the mess, but unfortunately after the trial it costs $ compared to avast. I'll probably just stop trudging through the cesspool of the internets and keep using avast.
Well, I use a private tracker, so none of this 120x120 youporn/redtube crap. As for your wedding plans, good luck :)
Wow, step in dogshit this morning?
http://www.principledtechnologies.com/Clients/Reports/Microsoft/VistaSP1XPVistaHomeResp0208.pdf
Looks like the study was sponsored by MS, so that probably won't sway you, but either way I don't give a shit. Perhaps you're right, my qi-enhanced magical laptop just has its meridians inline while my desktop must have liver fire rising.
I probably use about ~40gb a month, which I believe is below COX's limit of 60gb/month. I have a decent torrent ratio so I'm probably uploading 20gb a month as well
~5gb movies streamed from 360
~3gb movies streamed from netflix. I have no idea what the netflix size-per-movie is, but my wife watches about 5 of them per month.
~30gb porn
~10gb tv shows
~2gb checking email, web surfing, youtube, downloading linux distros, etc.
The benefit is if your fridge is in a different room than the room you want cooled.
My laptop with vista is noticeably faster than my desktop with XP (with the exception of network transfer speed), even though they have the same specs (2.1ghz core 2 duo, 2gb ram. The desktop has a better videocard).
For me at least XP seems to get much slower with age while vista does not do so. Yah, a fresh install of XP is blinding fast, even more so than Ubuntu IMO, but after several weeks just slows to a crawl (yah I scandisk, reg clean, defrag, spyware/virus check, etc) while Vista takes a couple days to get fast (due to indexing and prefetching, or whatever they call it).
They're probably going to have one landline either way so it is:
1) landline x2 ($40) + dialup ($20)
2) landline ($20) + broadband ($20-50)
Yah but if they're like my parents they paid $20 a month for dialup and $20 a month for a second landline. Cellphones have pretty much negated the need for this, but some families may want to keep their landline unlocked, and in that case broadband isn't that much more expensive.
You may want to try a one-time scan by another antivirus program such as nod32, avast, etc. ClamAV constantly gets poor results in antivirus tests: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clamav
...since Baldur's Gate 2. NWN's story sucked but some of the mutliplayer was great; it's a shame NWN2 didn't follow through. The Temple of Elemental Evil could have led to a new golden box age by licensing out the engine if it wasn't such a bug ridden mess. Oblivion just didn't do it for me and Fable/Mass Effect were o.k.
Fable 2 looks interesting and Dragon Age is supposed to be Bioware's spiritual successor to Baldur's Gate 2; hopefully it will pan out and not just be another Jade Empire/Mass Effect.
I understand what you are getting at, but XP shouldn't crash, and if it does you likely have a driver or hardware problem. However, if it makes you feel better under Vista firefox 3 crashes constantly while firefox 2 only rarely crashed. I would switch back if firefox 3 wasn't so much faster.
I must be retarded as well because I can't find it anywhere. Maybe they locked it so that while people with profiles don't get canceled, but those without them can't add them.
Amazon, Newegg, and Fujitsu have all been good to me. The worst has been Wells Fargo and Verizon. Wells Fargo must purposefully hire idiots.
People here will tell you that you are doing something wrong, but it crashes constantly for me as well. Some blame it on flash, but why should a plugin crash my browser? This isn't 2002, browsers should be above that.
We'll, supposedly they reworked the network stack, and it is faster since sp1, but I agree they dropped the ball. I bought a 200gb 7200rpm hard drive for my laptop as I rarely spend time on my desktop, so I figured I'd move most things to my laptop.