That brings up a question I have concerning these dedicated players... how do they handle multiple audio tracks or subtitles? Last time I tried asking fansub people what they use I got a 'use an old PC!'
My mini runs into a similiar problem only with the video component instead. If the TV goes to sleep (or is shut off) and I wake the mini, it reverts back to 640x480 and I have to manually tell it to redetect the display.
Having tried the 'VGA to HDMI' solution, I would not recommend it. One of the reasons there are so few of these converters on the market is they can be really picky about what is on both ends of them. My system usually got caught up in a long loop of autodetect and finally gave up. Attempts to manually set the resolution (under windows at least) never worked since the time for HDMI to settle down and accept the signal was longer then the time box for accepting.
That could go down a really scary slope since your argument basically says that companies should refuse to sell goods to all soldiers because some might have a reaction to the content.
This highlights one of the major problems with the legal system.. while in theory everyone is supposed to have access, the reality is that most people do not know the rules, do not know where to look for the rules, and have no idea what options (or consequences) are available to them unless they hire someone to help defend them.. at which point they have already been punished.
Depends on where you want to draw the lines. DSL suppliers used to be classified under common carrier with the ISP component being decoupled. Cable never was. A few years back the FCC allowed DSL based ISPs to combine their business into a single unit, which was not covered.
So it would be more accurate to say a subset of ISPs, the ones who also owned lines, the ones that are relevant to the NN discussion, some where common carriers and some were not.
Returning to common carrier rules would not prohibit prioritization of traffic based off types, so VoIP and such would still get the bandwidth they need.
This is what is frustrating about this debate.. the telecoms have done an amazingly effective job at getting misinformation out there about what re-establishing these rules would do. So no.... bringing back the old rules will not cause torrents to bump VOIP off... there is nothing stating that VIOP traffic, or any type of packet, can not be prioritized for bandwidth, and there never was. Completely made up talking point that the industry pushed into the discussion that people keep parroting.
They failed because common carrier rules allowed people to switch their ISP.
Those walled gardens would not fail today after the telecoms were reclassified to exempt them from this regulation. In other words, the failure of those semi-closed systems was an example of net neutrality working and why it should be put back in place, since without it consumers do not have enough power to actually shape what is offered to them.
Yes, they should, which net neutrality does not stop them from doing. Putting them back under common carrier rules would NOT stop them from prioritizing traffic of their own customers.
So many holes have been carved out, at this point the first amendment is only useful when judges want it to be. They can claim tradition or evolving standards to justify going either way.
Even then it was more of a procedural tool then anything else.
Not.. really. The code did the exact opposite of what you describe, it mandated stories with no complexity, no depth.
Characters were required to be simple and shallow since good characters with bad traits/outcomes or bad characters with good traits/outcomes were verboten.
It was felt that complexity might confuse children,.. thus writers were required to use the bluntest, least ambiguous moral messages possible, and the morals were already defined for them.
Hard to say if showing backbone would have worked. They were a weak and unpopular industry in the middle of a moral panic in an age where blasphemy was still a punishable offense. The few publishers that did try to stick up for themselves were tarred and feathered and, more importantly, did not survive as companies.
*nod* That has been my problem with working around untrained 'rockstars'... they can be really bright, but they spend all their time reinventing things that have been around for decades because they did not know the solution already existed off the shelf.
That was my initial reaction to this. When I was in school and they wanted us to learn what working close to the computer was like, they gave us a bunch of 6811s. Though more useful to this discussion, we also had a 6811 simulator that ran on modern hardware so we could watch exactly what the CPU and memory were doing in real time without needing access to exotic hardware.
While I agree I have been seeing pieces like this for years, I think since the 80s they have gotten louder.
Many companies have moved from 'find long term employee with solid fundamentals' to 'find employee with exact needed skills already so we do not have to invest in them'... so many schools that in the past focused on fundamentals have shifted to more tool based training since that is what has been getting them the highest employed/graduated ratio.
I got to watch the process first hand in my engineering school, as classes I had taken on things like programming languages (learning functional vs procedural vs oop etc) were swapped out for 'learn the fundamental web languages!'
*shrug* and I might spend an hour maintaining my OSX machines per month, if that... and set up time from 'install new hard drive' to 'play games' tends to be pretty short.
And yes, Pros are overkill. Buying one for gaming would be like getting server or workstation....
Depends on which univ you are talking. The one I am at, people who fall out of the MBA programs would not be likely to surive even the first year of the engineering program, if they could even get into the dept in the first place.
*sigh* I am constantly frustrated by the 'if someone likes a mac, they must have been manipulated into it' meme. Most of the students (undergrad, masters, and PhD) student I know with macs use them because they are low maintenance and good for getting work done. They are good solutions for their situations and tasks... esp among the PhD students who really just do need a computer that works, lets them do their research, and does not burn time with fiddling or maintenance. Mac can be very good for that group.
I disagree that most mac users are 'technophobic'. I see the lions share of our engineering students using them now, and many CS students have macs that dual boot or just go with linux boxes.
And yes, you can get a cheaper Dell. You can always get a cheaper Dell. I can go down the local korean computer shop and get something cheaper then that. There will always be cheap solutions that have the same 4 or 5 basic metrics people use to compare systems when they are lazy.
I have been building custom game rigs since the 80s and am still running one when my MacBook is not sufficient. I agree, you can get the best $/Perf out of role your own, but it also eats time. I spend more time maintaining my windows gaming rig then all my OSX machines put together, which when I only have a few hours for gaming per week can really add up. Next non-trivial part that fails (last one was just the CMOS battery) I will probably be simply replacing the machine.
One of the 'places' where macs excel is for people who just want (or only have the time) to use the computer, not treat the computer as part of the experience.
I will agree though, having some mac offerings in the midrange (Mac Pros are serious overkill for gaming) that you can swap out the video and sound systems would be nice.
I imagine they are looking into it, but supporting Linux is a huge headache and I imagine they decided against it due to the complexities of not only supporting so many distributions but making things work with a rapidly changing kernel. Binary only releases for Linux have always been difficult for vendors to support.
Not only are they a small market, they are market with a vicious hostility towards macs... getting converts from that group is unlikely to be economically viable.
That being said, they do service the 'less then hardcore but more then casual' market pretty well. I have been playing StarCraft2 on my 6 year old MacBook Pro pretty comfortably.
Slashdot Mirror
Wow. I had not thought about that crazy lady in years......
That brings up a question I have concerning these dedicated players... how do they handle multiple audio tracks or subtitles? Last time I tried asking fansub people what they use I got a 'use an old PC!'
My mini runs into a similiar problem only with the video component instead. If the TV goes to sleep (or is shut off) and I wake the mini, it reverts back to 640x480 and I have to manually tell it to redetect the display.
Having tried the 'VGA to HDMI' solution, I would not recommend it. One of the reasons there are so few of these converters on the market is they can be really picky about what is on both ends of them. My system usually got caught up in a long loop of autodetect and finally gave up. Attempts to manually set the resolution (under windows at least) never worked since the time for HDMI to settle down and accept the signal was longer then the time box for accepting.
The poster probably (as is often the case) meant a Dell mini-tower with similar CPU/Memory/Drive.
What does Plex get you that using the file browser and double clicking does not?
That could go down a really scary slope since your argument basically says that companies should refuse to sell goods to all soldiers because some might have a reaction to the content.
So American soldiers shooting American soldiers would be better?
*nod* my guess is, all this will get them is some pissed off soldiers who were looking forward to the game....
This highlights one of the major problems with the legal system.. while in theory everyone is supposed to have access, the reality is that most people do not know the rules, do not know where to look for the rules, and have no idea what options (or consequences) are available to them unless they hire someone to help defend them.. at which point they have already been punished.
Depends on where you want to draw the lines. DSL suppliers used to be classified under common carrier with the ISP component being decoupled. Cable never was. A few years back the FCC allowed DSL based ISPs to combine their business into a single unit, which was not covered.
So it would be more accurate to say a subset of ISPs, the ones who also owned lines, the ones that are relevant to the NN discussion, some where common carriers and some were not.
Returning to common carrier rules would not prohibit prioritization of traffic based off types, so VoIP and such would still get the bandwidth they need.
This is what is frustrating about this debate.. the telecoms have done an amazingly effective job at getting misinformation out there about what re-establishing these rules would do. So no.... bringing back the old rules will not cause torrents to bump VOIP off... there is nothing stating that VIOP traffic, or any type of packet, can not be prioritized for bandwidth, and there never was. Completely made up talking point that the industry pushed into the discussion that people keep parroting.
They failed because common carrier rules allowed people to switch their ISP.
Those walled gardens would not fail today after the telecoms were reclassified to exempt them from this regulation. In other words, the failure of those semi-closed systems was an example of net neutrality working and why it should be put back in place, since without it consumers do not have enough power to actually shape what is offered to them.
Yes, they should, which net neutrality does not stop them from doing. Putting them back under common carrier rules would NOT stop them from prioritizing traffic of their own customers.
So many holes have been carved out, at this point the first amendment is only useful when judges want it to be. They can claim tradition or evolving standards to justify going either way.
Even then it was more of a procedural tool then anything else.
Not.. really. The code did the exact opposite of what you describe, it mandated stories with no complexity, no depth.
Characters were required to be simple and shallow since good characters with bad traits/outcomes or bad characters with good traits/outcomes were verboten.
It was felt that complexity might confuse children,.. thus writers were required to use the bluntest, least ambiguous moral messages possible, and the morals were already defined for them.
Hard to say if showing backbone would have worked. They were a weak and unpopular industry in the middle of a moral panic in an age where blasphemy was still a punishable offense. The few publishers that did try to stick up for themselves were tarred and feathered and, more importantly, did not survive as companies.
*nod* That has been my problem with working around untrained 'rockstars'... they can be really bright, but they spend all their time reinventing things that have been around for decades because they did not know the solution already existed off the shelf.
That was my initial reaction to this. When I was in school and they wanted us to learn what working close to the computer was like, they gave us a bunch of 6811s. Though more useful to this discussion, we also had a 6811 simulator that ran on modern hardware so we could watch exactly what the CPU and memory were doing in real time without needing access to exotic hardware.
While I agree I have been seeing pieces like this for years, I think since the 80s they have gotten louder.
Many companies have moved from 'find long term employee with solid fundamentals' to 'find employee with exact needed skills already so we do not have to invest in them'... so many schools that in the past focused on fundamentals have shifted to more tool based training since that is what has been getting them the highest employed/graduated ratio.
I got to watch the process first hand in my engineering school, as classes I had taken on things like programming languages (learning functional vs procedural vs oop etc) were swapped out for 'learn the fundamental web languages!'
*shrug* and I might spend an hour maintaining my OSX machines per month, if that... and set up time from 'install new hard drive' to 'play games' tends to be pretty short.
And yes, Pros are overkill. Buying one for gaming would be like getting server or workstation....
Depends on which univ you are talking. The one I am at, people who fall out of the MBA programs would not be likely to surive even the first year of the engineering program, if they could even get into the dept in the first place.
*sigh* I am constantly frustrated by the 'if someone likes a mac, they must have been manipulated into it' meme. Most of the students (undergrad, masters, and PhD) student I know with macs use them because they are low maintenance and good for getting work done. They are good solutions for their situations and tasks... esp among the PhD students who really just do need a computer that works, lets them do their research, and does not burn time with fiddling or maintenance. Mac can be very good for that group.
I disagree that most mac users are 'technophobic'. I see the lions share of our engineering students using them now, and many CS students have macs that dual boot or just go with linux boxes.
And yes, you can get a cheaper Dell. You can always get a cheaper Dell. I can go down the local korean computer shop and get something cheaper then that. There will always be cheap solutions that have the same 4 or 5 basic metrics people use to compare systems when they are lazy.
I have been building custom game rigs since the 80s and am still running one when my MacBook is not sufficient. I agree, you can get the best $/Perf out of role your own, but it also eats time. I spend more time maintaining my windows gaming rig then all my OSX machines put together, which when I only have a few hours for gaming per week can really add up. Next non-trivial part that fails (last one was just the CMOS battery) I will probably be simply replacing the machine.
One of the 'places' where macs excel is for people who just want (or only have the time) to use the computer, not treat the computer as part of the experience.
I will agree though, having some mac offerings in the midrange (Mac Pros are serious overkill for gaming) that you can swap out the video and sound systems would be nice.
I imagine they are looking into it, but supporting Linux is a huge headache and I imagine they decided against it due to the complexities of not only supporting so many distributions but making things work with a rapidly changing kernel. Binary only releases for Linux have always been difficult for vendors to support.
Not only are they a small market, they are market with a vicious hostility towards macs... getting converts from that group is unlikely to be economically viable.
That being said, they do service the 'less then hardcore but more then casual' market pretty well. I have been playing StarCraft2 on my 6 year old MacBook Pro pretty comfortably.