Now that AMD released high-res pictures of this core, Epson can use their transistor printers we have read about and start selling this CPU ahead of AMD. Good job, AMD!
"Eight of the 10 participants expressed a preference for the higher-bit rate songs while listening with the Apple buds, compared to only six who picked the higher-quality track while listening to the Shure's."
I don't buy this. I have a friend who claims to be an audiophile - and he is - with sound equipment worth well over $40,000. He states that the more expensive and professional your gear is, the easier it is to spot low quality music.
So the article contradicts with his statement, and I have to agree with him on this one. Logically speaking, professional speakers should produce results far closer to the source than the ones that aren't.
What exactly is an "infantry" of soldiers? How many soldiers are in one infantry?
Would it matter? Skip the terminology and get to the facts. Needing one soldier is enough to consider it not safe.
Well, strictly speaking, it was much safer for a U.S. Senator to be in Baghdad than just before or after the invasion. So in that sense, he was right, at least.
You are incorrect. If a US senator was walking downtown during the Saddam era, he would probably be invited to the palace since Saddam did not want to provoke the Americans. Also, as quoted on CNN, McCain considered the 'green zone' that he was in to be a safe passage for Americans. If so, why was he surrounded by American soldiers?
[..]the jihadis in the world hate anyone who doesn't follow their brand of Islam. If by "our freedom" they mean "our way of life" and "our values", then, yes, the jihadis do hate us for those things.
That is just nonsense. They hate that their holy lands are invaded by troops and that the Middle East has been occupied by the "free world" (as you would refer to it) for quite some time. If they really hated freedom, they would very likely turn to the Hindu countries and the majority of Asia that does not practice Islam. Why go halfway around the world to state a point when you got non-Islamic neighbors?
Your argument is the typical war mongering propaganda that Bush has deployed on the U.S., because if you are correct, you can only fight them by killing them. Thankfully, you are full of it.
Not a damn thing, the guy is a loon. Have you heard his latest theory on 9/11? Total crackpot, not even worth debating.
First of all, I did not say anything about what he said. I only commented that he would probably cause another upset (WHICH HE DID). Secondly, you have fallen under the false GOP propaganda. What he said was highly accurate. In fact, his argumentation was based on previous experiences, but most vitally, the CIA report that was conducted after 9/11.
You should always take everything with a grain of NaCL when watching FOX, unless you already fully agree on everything Limbaugh, O'Reilly and Coulter say.
There is no chance in hell that McCain will win the race. In my opinion, he has lost all credibility for being the war monger he is.
Does anyone remember when he paraded down the streets of Iraq, protected by a whole infantry of U.S. soldiers (therefore also endangering them greatly), and then claim that it is a very safe and a lot better than a few years ago? He is on par with Rudy.G; both are utterly clueless of the real cause of 9/11. Every time I hear that "them hating us for our freedom" makes me want to puke. Ironically, Bush's stance on freedom is quite the opposite.
It will be interesting to see what Ron Paul will do to the upcoming republican debates. It will also be interesting to see what Hillary, Obama and perhaps even Gore can do in the presidential elections.
Microsoft has cancelled its autumn Professional Developers, Developers, Developers Conference, citing there are too many chairs near the podium. This isn't the first time they have cancelled a PDC, for similar reasons.
For anyone wondering what's going to change in FireFox 3.0 (Wikipedia quotes):
The largest known change for Firefox 3 is the implementation of Gecko 1.9, an updated layout engine. It will also provide CSS3 columns.[90] Firefox 3 will include features that were bumped from Firefox 2, such as the overhauled Places system for storing bookmarks and history in an SQLite backend, according to the wiki.
Also, what's expected to come in FireFox 4.0 (also Wikipedia):
On October 13, 2006, Brendan Eich, Mozilla's Chief Technology Officer, wrote about the plans for Mozilla 2.0, the platform on which Firefox 4.0 is likely to be based. These changes include improving and removing XPCOM APIs, switching to standard C++ features, just-in-time compilation with JavaScript 2 (known as the Tamarin project), and tool-time and runtime security checks.
Aside from the obvious increase in identity thefts risks, I realize that there is a person who thought this up, thinking that one 'all purpose card' would be cool.
I don't think debit cards and driver's licenses should be combined simply because you usually don't carry that many of such cards anyway. What most of us hate is - this problem is applied to women in particular - all the shopping cards people collect. These are the cards that need to be combined into one configurable card, so that people can have only three useful cards. One for shopping discounts, one driver's license and one debit card. But combining them is kind of pointless.
Also, other side effects include situations like not being able to give your husband/wife/daughter/son/xyz your debit card to use at the ATM machine, simply because it is too risky to lend someone a driver's license AND a debit card.
Technology is kind of scary, because you have to realize that the unthinkable will eventually become real.
If you asked a scientist who worked with ENIAC some 50 years ago if he believed that you could put a billion transistors into a 1cm^2 chip, would he believe you? After all, a single transistor was the size of a light bulb back then.
This is why we have to think the unthinkable when speaking of technology. We all know that having a chip inside our head sounds weird and kind of repulsive, but once we have 10 guys doing this, we will have 100 following them, and 10,000 following the first 110.
I personally don't know or care what the outcome will be, but I am sure that we can eventually create organic computers. For example, your left finger nail could in fact be a small computer.
No it is not needed. It is just another attempt to milk to consumer for every penny they have. Just like the memory market, the graphics card market is price fixing at its finest. Why are we still paying so much for a card that does only 100mhz more? or has 100 more megs of ram? Glad I have'nt bought one in a few years.
I could give you a lengthy reply, but most of us already know that what you are saying is just stupid. But since you clearly don't understand how the computer industry works, allow me to explain.
1) X develops hardware x.
2) Y develops hardware y, where y > x.
3) X develops x2, where x2 > y.
4) And so on..
The good thing is that competition usually gets you better pricing and better products. And when people purchase these products, developers adapt to it and find new ways to improve software that takes advantage of the new hardware.
With your thinking, we could go back to the days when Wolfenstein was the latest in graphics and computing, but we don't want that. We need improvements, just like in every other industry.
Also, if you haven't upgraded your computer in years, then you probably don't care much about games. Well, millions of people do. Is Ferrari bankrupt because you're not buying their cars? No, because other people buy them.
I must admit that the idea is interesting, but also very scary. I agree with the professor that computers can store perhaps a bit too much about yourself. On the other hand, you don't want to do much in front of the computer that might end up lost.
Part of the reason that we use computers is because it is a solid way of archiving data. Ultimately, you are responsive for your opinions, views, comments and letters. Should you create and hold sensitive material, then you probably know how important it is to keep it safe anyway.
Just listen to local LIVE bands. If what's on the radio & CD's sucks, do something else entirely! Do your own thing! THINK for yourself!
What exactly are you getting at here? A used record is just a used record. You can buy a Britney Spears CD today and sell it tomorrow as used.
It's not your right to be entertained. If you don't enjoy something anymore, don't use or pay for it anymore! It doesn't give you a right to steal it!
But we are talking about buying real CDs, are we not? With your reasoning, would it also be illegal to give away CDs that you have already purchased?
You don't have to be entertained constantly!!! Support your local artists directly!
Maybe your friends need it. I have no friend who needs 24/7 entertainment. Support my local artists? I listen mostly to radio music and don't give a shit about local artists. Why should I support them just because they create music? In that case, I want them to support me because I am a graphical artists. I demand that they buy my paintings.
The issue is not that we don't want artists to get paid. Quite frankly, there is a lot of great music that is not produced by "local bands" and I like diversity. I don't mind paying for it, but I refuse to sign a contract on what I may and may not do once I purchase a CD. If I have bought it, I want to be able to sell it to anyone I want without having anyone watching my back.
I personally think that the web browser is the best web application. What exactly would we be doing without it? Telnet?
Not sure if it falls into their criteria, but it's a damn good invention.
They just forgot to do the math
on
Death of the UMPC?
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
I think the UMPC is a great idea, but as with any mobile PC, there is a limited market.
There is a reason why ultra portable laptops are expensive and hard to get. The market is simply too small to become mainstream. If you go for desktop replacements ranging from 19" screens and up, you get the same thing.
Also, when you create a far too big hype around it like Microsoft did, you kind of have to expect something superb as well. If only they had released it without all the fuzz about it, media wouldn't kill it. We would look at it as some semi-gadget and semi-useful tool.
Also, why they pushed it so hard before we could actually catch up with the hardware is beyond me. Yes, first generation products are often crap, but if you combine the words ultra mobility with low battery life, you kind of ask for it.
It will include improvements in RSS, CSS, and AJAX support, and will follow Firefox 3 in supporting microformats.
I generally think Microsoft provides solid products and I rarely stumble upon problems with aged products. Look at Office, Windows XP and other operating systems, that are doing just fine.
Internet Explorer is one of the few big mistakes Microsoft has had. IE4 knocked out Netscape and after that, we have seen little and rather futile competition, with Opera being the exception. But even with the release of Firefox, Microsoft has been utterly ignorant. They don't care about perfecting the CSS support and I have little hopes for IE8 after seeing IE7. Sure, it is far better but why is it so damn hard to follow standards?
In my opinion, Microsoft only needs to follow the standards to regain some trust from its lost users and it should have done so with IE7 as it had several years to do what Mozilla did.
We all know why NVIDIA would release such a card - considering how soon the R600 is released. Still, giving this card too much attention is pointless. It will exist in very limited quantities and even if you can afford one, you are highly unlikely to find one.
So basically, we are looking at a card only a few hundred will buy.
Not that the CPU is of low importance in computers, but it is still just a component. Now that Apple switched to x86 architecture, it is definitely able to get the fastest CPU:s available to power their own Macs. Why would they need to buy one from such a risky business and how could this possibly help Apple? Lower priced CPU costs? Yes. Loads of expenses to get there? Yes.
What a great move by the MPAA. I wonder if anyone over there actually thought it would be reasonable to even attempt a stunt like a few numbers when they cannot even bring down Pirate Bay.
Someone must have thought it is possible to stop the spread of it, but any reasonable person knows this is more like a great way of boosting the spread. All sites that refused to spread the code did so. Now that the MPAA created this upset, it is now published all over the world and then commented in thousands of articles, spreading to more places than ever before.
Also, searching "09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0" results in over 1,000 hits, obviously growing rapidly and also cached up by Google.
The MPAA should know that removing a copied movie is difficult and nearly impossible. To remove a piece of text IS impossible.
I am sorry to hear about your disability and what it means to your economy, but without sounding too harsh, you are not the reference customer Dell is going for.
Dell isn't the cheapest alternative you can get, but there is more to it than just price. For example, a lot of people care more about the on-site support and such. And I really can't say they are that expensive either. Surely, a pre-configured computer is almost always cheaper, it is rarely everything you want.
You say that Dell and other big OEM:s are a bad thing. I have to disagree there. Without them, we would have fewer industry standards and we would probably end up having regional settings to everything. At least these giants push to unify hardware. Also, they do bring a lot of competition to the table, which is always a good thing for the customer. A zillion small retail chains around the world would also eventually turn into a few after some time, simply because one would eventually do better than the other, buy the latter one and continue with its expansion. That's how it works.
My company has been buying computers from Dell for years. I don't know how your friends would end up with faulty hardware like that, but it is a rarity here. Of course computers fuck up every now and then, but Apple's batteries explode, the Volvo cars get tire dents and your shoe laces will be torn eventually.
Dell is a great choice, but it has its flaws. In fact, I am surprised they didn't foresee this need long ago. The indications of an increase in laptop sales has been somewhat apparent to most of us.
The reasons people prefer to see the laptop in real life before purchasing it are very simple:
- You cannot hide it in a locker if it's ugly.
- The keyboard and screen must feel good - it's irreplaceable.
- The hardware must meet your demands - most of it is irreplaceable.
- You want to know how the laptop construction feels.
- It is hard to visualize if its weight is appropriate.
- Pictures are easily edited and cannot be trusted. You want to see it irl.
- No manufacturers provide info on heat problems - it must be experienced.
- Unless you get a ruler, it is difficult to picture the size of it.
- And other reasons I didn't come up with.
Lets face it. None of the above really matter with a stationary computer. People suddenly have to become very picky, because buying a laptop mostly means that there is no room for regrets (aside from RAM and HDD). As with stationary computers, they can be hidden, modified, add monitors, mice and keyboards and become very customizable.
Also - and I have no facts to back this up - I think that a lot of young people are switching from stationary computers to laptops, simply to combine school and home entertainment in one package. This generation of iPod freaks (I'm part of it) is likely more picky about the design and feel.
What Dell should do, unless they plan to open up stores or add it to outlets, is to select a few major cities, build a shop in every city and stack each and every consumer model in that store, and then let consumers order each specific computer directly via the previewed computers. Think of it: you see a computer you like, but you want to configure that particular computer. You then check the preloaded site on that computer, edit the specifics, enter credit card info and wait a week to have it delivered to your home or to the store.
I'm pretty sure there are at least a space-shuttleful of people willing to have a go at one of these black holes, but how far is the nearest black hole?
That would be a waste of resources. How about sending a drone with a robotic AI?
Windows XP is a very mature operating system. People rarely experience lockups (I haven't had one for months), it looks OK, it's speedy with today's hardware and it is far more secure than it was a few years ago.
The point is that XP is good to those who currently use it. Those who want 'more' just get Vista. Maybe XP and Vista is going to co-exist longer than any of MS:es previous operating systems ever have before, simply because both products are good (or at least Vista will be in half a year or so). Previously, we had 2K and XP competing, and before that 9x/Me and 2K, where we had a clear winner in both operating systems. Now I can't say that Vista is a clear winner to XP, but rather a good 'alternative'.
Yes, Ubuntu and OSX are great alternatives, but it takes a lot to make a user switch an operating system entirely, so I am not taking this into account.
How many users actually *use* how much power they already have?
I disagree with your thinking. It is not about using 100% of the 'power'. It is about the definition of how much power '100%' is. We all hit 100% during intensive operations, but to a lesser extent if the power is exceedingly efficient.
This is easily the best comment I have ever read on Slashdot. I salute you, because it is actually the first time a Slashdot post made me laugh physically.
Also, you may have saved Michael Richard's life because he can no longer make this joke up and use it in his future shows.
Slashdot Mirror
"You maybe academically retarded."
Check.
Now that AMD released high-res pictures of this core, Epson can use their transistor printers we have read about and start selling this CPU ahead of AMD. Good job, AMD!
"Eight of the 10 participants expressed a preference for the higher-bit rate songs while listening with the Apple buds, compared to only six who picked the higher-quality track while listening to the Shure's."
I don't buy this. I have a friend who claims to be an audiophile - and he is - with sound equipment worth well over $40,000. He states that the more expensive and professional your gear is, the easier it is to spot low quality music.
So the article contradicts with his statement, and I have to agree with him on this one. Logically speaking, professional speakers should produce results far closer to the source than the ones that aren't.
What exactly is an "infantry" of soldiers? How many soldiers are in one infantry?
Would it matter? Skip the terminology and get to the facts. Needing one soldier is enough to consider it not safe.
Well, strictly speaking, it was much safer for a U.S. Senator to be in Baghdad than just before or after the invasion. So in that sense, he was right, at least. You are incorrect. If a US senator was walking downtown during the Saddam era, he would probably be invited to the palace since Saddam did not want to provoke the Americans. Also, as quoted on CNN, McCain considered the 'green zone' that he was in to be a safe passage for Americans. If so, why was he surrounded by American soldiers?
[..]the jihadis in the world hate anyone who doesn't follow their brand of Islam. If by "our freedom" they mean "our way of life" and "our values", then, yes, the jihadis do hate us for those things.
That is just nonsense. They hate that their holy lands are invaded by troops and that the Middle East has been occupied by the "free world" (as you would refer to it) for quite some time. If they really hated freedom, they would very likely turn to the Hindu countries and the majority of Asia that does not practice Islam. Why go halfway around the world to state a point when you got non-Islamic neighbors? Your argument is the typical war mongering propaganda that Bush has deployed on the U.S., because if you are correct, you can only fight them by killing them. Thankfully, you are full of it.
Not a damn thing, the guy is a loon. Have you heard his latest theory on 9/11? Total crackpot, not even worth debating.
First of all, I did not say anything about what he said. I only commented that he would probably cause another upset (WHICH HE DID). Secondly, you have fallen under the false GOP propaganda. What he said was highly accurate. In fact, his argumentation was based on previous experiences, but most vitally, the CIA report that was conducted after 9/11.
You should always take everything with a grain of NaCL when watching FOX, unless you already fully agree on everything Limbaugh, O'Reilly and Coulter say.
There is no chance in hell that McCain will win the race. In my opinion, he has lost all credibility for being the war monger he is.
Does anyone remember when he paraded down the streets of Iraq, protected by a whole infantry of U.S. soldiers (therefore also endangering them greatly), and then claim that it is a very safe and a lot better than a few years ago? He is on par with Rudy.G; both are utterly clueless of the real cause of 9/11. Every time I hear that "them hating us for our freedom" makes me want to puke. Ironically, Bush's stance on freedom is quite the opposite.
It will be interesting to see what Ron Paul will do to the upcoming republican debates. It will also be interesting to see what Hillary, Obama and perhaps even Gore can do in the presidential elections.
I am shocked to say that after signing up to a news letter on a few porn sites, I am now receiving non-porn content e-mails.
Microsoft has cancelled its autumn Professional Developers, Developers, Developers Conference, citing there are too many chairs near the podium. This isn't the first time they have cancelled a PDC, for similar reasons.
For anyone wondering what's going to change in FireFox 3.0 (Wikipedia quotes):
The largest known change for Firefox 3 is the implementation of Gecko 1.9, an updated layout engine. It will also provide CSS3 columns.[90] Firefox 3 will include features that were bumped from Firefox 2, such as the overhauled Places system for storing bookmarks and history in an SQLite backend, according to the wiki.
Also, what's expected to come in FireFox 4.0 (also Wikipedia):
On October 13, 2006, Brendan Eich, Mozilla's Chief Technology Officer, wrote about the plans for Mozilla 2.0, the platform on which Firefox 4.0 is likely to be based. These changes include improving and removing XPCOM APIs, switching to standard C++ features, just-in-time compilation with JavaScript 2 (known as the Tamarin project), and tool-time and runtime security checks.
Aside from the obvious increase in identity thefts risks, I realize that there is a person who thought this up, thinking that one 'all purpose card' would be cool.
I don't think debit cards and driver's licenses should be combined simply because you usually don't carry that many of such cards anyway. What most of us hate is - this problem is applied to women in particular - all the shopping cards people collect. These are the cards that need to be combined into one configurable card, so that people can have only three useful cards. One for shopping discounts, one driver's license and one debit card. But combining them is kind of pointless.
Also, other side effects include situations like not being able to give your husband/wife/daughter/son/xyz your debit card to use at the ATM machine, simply because it is too risky to lend someone a driver's license AND a debit card.
Technology is kind of scary, because you have to realize that the unthinkable will eventually become real.
If you asked a scientist who worked with ENIAC some 50 years ago if he believed that you could put a billion transistors into a 1cm^2 chip, would he believe you? After all, a single transistor was the size of a light bulb back then.
This is why we have to think the unthinkable when speaking of technology. We all know that having a chip inside our head sounds weird and kind of repulsive, but once we have 10 guys doing this, we will have 100 following them, and 10,000 following the first 110.
I personally don't know or care what the outcome will be, but I am sure that we can eventually create organic computers. For example, your left finger nail could in fact be a small computer.
No it is not needed. It is just another attempt to milk to consumer for every penny they have. Just like the memory market, the graphics card market is price fixing at its finest. Why are we still paying so much for a card that does only 100mhz more? or has 100 more megs of ram? Glad I have'nt bought one in a few years. I could give you a lengthy reply, but most of us already know that what you are saying is just stupid. But since you clearly don't understand how the computer industry works, allow me to explain.
1) X develops hardware x. 2) Y develops hardware y, where y > x. 3) X develops x2, where x2 > y. 4) And so on..
The good thing is that competition usually gets you better pricing and better products. And when people purchase these products, developers adapt to it and find new ways to improve software that takes advantage of the new hardware.
With your thinking, we could go back to the days when Wolfenstein was the latest in graphics and computing, but we don't want that. We need improvements, just like in every other industry.
Also, if you haven't upgraded your computer in years, then you probably don't care much about games. Well, millions of people do. Is Ferrari bankrupt because you're not buying their cars? No, because other people buy them.
I must admit that the idea is interesting, but also very scary. I agree with the professor that computers can store perhaps a bit too much about yourself. On the other hand, you don't want to do much in front of the computer that might end up lost.
Part of the reason that we use computers is because it is a solid way of archiving data. Ultimately, you are responsive for your opinions, views, comments and letters. Should you create and hold sensitive material, then you probably know how important it is to keep it safe anyway.
Just listen to local LIVE bands. If what's on the radio & CD's sucks, do something else entirely! Do your own thing! THINK for yourself!
What exactly are you getting at here? A used record is just a used record. You can buy a Britney Spears CD today and sell it tomorrow as used. It's not your right to be entertained. If you don't enjoy something anymore, don't use or pay for it anymore! It doesn't give you a right to steal it!
But we are talking about buying real CDs, are we not? With your reasoning, would it also be illegal to give away CDs that you have already purchased? You don't have to be entertained constantly!!! Support your local artists directly!
Maybe your friends need it. I have no friend who needs 24/7 entertainment. Support my local artists? I listen mostly to radio music and don't give a shit about local artists. Why should I support them just because they create music? In that case, I want them to support me because I am a graphical artists. I demand that they buy my paintings.
The issue is not that we don't want artists to get paid. Quite frankly, there is a lot of great music that is not produced by "local bands" and I like diversity. I don't mind paying for it, but I refuse to sign a contract on what I may and may not do once I purchase a CD. If I have bought it, I want to be able to sell it to anyone I want without having anyone watching my back.
I personally think that the web browser is the best web application. What exactly would we be doing without it? Telnet? Not sure if it falls into their criteria, but it's a damn good invention.
I think the UMPC is a great idea, but as with any mobile PC, there is a limited market.
There is a reason why ultra portable laptops are expensive and hard to get. The market is simply too small to become mainstream. If you go for desktop replacements ranging from 19" screens and up, you get the same thing.
Also, when you create a far too big hype around it like Microsoft did, you kind of have to expect something superb as well. If only they had released it without all the fuzz about it, media wouldn't kill it. We would look at it as some semi-gadget and semi-useful tool.
Also, why they pushed it so hard before we could actually catch up with the hardware is beyond me. Yes, first generation products are often crap, but if you combine the words ultra mobility with low battery life, you kind of ask for it.
It will include improvements in RSS, CSS, and AJAX support, and will follow Firefox 3 in supporting microformats.
I generally think Microsoft provides solid products and I rarely stumble upon problems with aged products. Look at Office, Windows XP and other operating systems, that are doing just fine.
Internet Explorer is one of the few big mistakes Microsoft has had. IE4 knocked out Netscape and after that, we have seen little and rather futile competition, with Opera being the exception. But even with the release of Firefox, Microsoft has been utterly ignorant. They don't care about perfecting the CSS support and I have little hopes for IE8 after seeing IE7. Sure, it is far better but why is it so damn hard to follow standards?
In my opinion, Microsoft only needs to follow the standards to regain some trust from its lost users and it should have done so with IE7 as it had several years to do what Mozilla did.
We all know why NVIDIA would release such a card - considering how soon the R600 is released. Still, giving this card too much attention is pointless. It will exist in very limited quantities and even if you can afford one, you are highly unlikely to find one.
So basically, we are looking at a card only a few hundred will buy.
Not that the CPU is of low importance in computers, but it is still just a component. Now that Apple switched to x86 architecture, it is definitely able to get the fastest CPU:s available to power their own Macs. Why would they need to buy one from such a risky business and how could this possibly help Apple? Lower priced CPU costs? Yes. Loads of expenses to get there? Yes.
What a great move by the MPAA. I wonder if anyone over there actually thought it would be reasonable to even attempt a stunt like a few numbers when they cannot even bring down Pirate Bay.
Someone must have thought it is possible to stop the spread of it, but any reasonable person knows this is more like a great way of boosting the spread. All sites that refused to spread the code did so. Now that the MPAA created this upset, it is now published all over the world and then commented in thousands of articles, spreading to more places than ever before.
Also, searching "09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0" results in over 1,000 hits, obviously growing rapidly and also cached up by Google.
The MPAA should know that removing a copied movie is difficult and nearly impossible. To remove a piece of text IS impossible.
I am sorry to hear about your disability and what it means to your economy, but without sounding too harsh, you are not the reference customer Dell is going for.
Dell isn't the cheapest alternative you can get, but there is more to it than just price. For example, a lot of people care more about the on-site support and such. And I really can't say they are that expensive either. Surely, a pre-configured computer is almost always cheaper, it is rarely everything you want.
You say that Dell and other big OEM:s are a bad thing. I have to disagree there. Without them, we would have fewer industry standards and we would probably end up having regional settings to everything. At least these giants push to unify hardware. Also, they do bring a lot of competition to the table, which is always a good thing for the customer. A zillion small retail chains around the world would also eventually turn into a few after some time, simply because one would eventually do better than the other, buy the latter one and continue with its expansion. That's how it works.
My company has been buying computers from Dell for years. I don't know how your friends would end up with faulty hardware like that, but it is a rarity here. Of course computers fuck up every now and then, but Apple's batteries explode, the Volvo cars get tire dents and your shoe laces will be torn eventually.
Dell is a great choice, but it has its flaws. In fact, I am surprised they didn't foresee this need long ago. The indications of an increase in laptop sales has been somewhat apparent to most of us.
The reasons people prefer to see the laptop in real life before purchasing it are very simple:
- You cannot hide it in a locker if it's ugly.
- The keyboard and screen must feel good - it's irreplaceable.
- The hardware must meet your demands - most of it is irreplaceable.
- You want to know how the laptop construction feels.
- It is hard to visualize if its weight is appropriate.
- Pictures are easily edited and cannot be trusted. You want to see it irl.
- No manufacturers provide info on heat problems - it must be experienced.
- Unless you get a ruler, it is difficult to picture the size of it.
- And other reasons I didn't come up with.
Lets face it. None of the above really matter with a stationary computer. People suddenly have to become very picky, because buying a laptop mostly means that there is no room for regrets (aside from RAM and HDD). As with stationary computers, they can be hidden, modified, add monitors, mice and keyboards and become very customizable.
Also - and I have no facts to back this up - I think that a lot of young people are switching from stationary computers to laptops, simply to combine school and home entertainment in one package. This generation of iPod freaks (I'm part of it) is likely more picky about the design and feel.
What Dell should do, unless they plan to open up stores or add it to outlets, is to select a few major cities, build a shop in every city and stack each and every consumer model in that store, and then let consumers order each specific computer directly via the previewed computers. Think of it: you see a computer you like, but you want to configure that particular computer. You then check the preloaded site on that computer, edit the specifics, enter credit card info and wait a week to have it delivered to your home or to the store.
I'm pretty sure there are at least a space-shuttleful of people willing to have a go at one of these black holes, but how far is the nearest black hole?
That would be a waste of resources. How about sending a drone with a robotic AI?
Maybe this does make sense after all. Here's why:
Windows XP is a very mature operating system. People rarely experience lockups (I haven't had one for months), it looks OK, it's speedy with today's hardware and it is far more secure than it was a few years ago.
The point is that XP is good to those who currently use it. Those who want 'more' just get Vista. Maybe XP and Vista is going to co-exist longer than any of MS:es previous operating systems ever have before, simply because both products are good (or at least Vista will be in half a year or so). Previously, we had 2K and XP competing, and before that 9x/Me and 2K, where we had a clear winner in both operating systems. Now I can't say that Vista is a clear winner to XP, but rather a good 'alternative'.
Yes, Ubuntu and OSX are great alternatives, but it takes a lot to make a user switch an operating system entirely, so I am not taking this into account.
How many users actually *use* how much power they already have?
I disagree with your thinking. It is not about using 100% of the 'power'. It is about the definition of how much power '100%' is. We all hit 100% during intensive operations, but to a lesser extent if the power is exceedingly efficient.
This is easily the best comment I have ever read on Slashdot. I salute you, because it is actually the first time a Slashdot post made me laugh physically.
Also, you may have saved Michael Richard's life because he can no longer make this joke up and use it in his future shows.