See: natural ice age cycles. We're still coming out of an ice age right now. It's going to get a lot warmer regardless of human activities. Then, it will become cold again eventually, repeating the cycle.
Better firewalls, including even the lowly dd-wrt and the now-defunct Snapgear, support syslog so you can capture and create your own custom reports, and dd-wrt reports total bandwidth usage on a daily, monthly and and annual basis and will retain that info until you do a reset (or until it runs out of NVRAM). It can come in very handy if your ISP claims you hit your bandwidth cap.
Another thing you might want to try is IMFIREWALL/WFilter in monitoring mode to see which users are doing what on your network. What is required is to either put a port on your switch (connected to your gateway/firewall) in either promiscuous mode or a two-way mirror to the port that connects to the firewall.
It will report the number of hits to instant messaging, streaming, social networking, porn, gambling, stock trading, and any other criteria you can think of configuring. You can also put it in filter mode so it will basically kill any requests that you disapprove of, but in monitoring mode you can create custom reports of who is doing what.
Other firewalls will include these features as integrated, but some vendors (Cisco, Sonicwall) won't sell you the complete feature set for a flat price; they nickle and dime you because it's more profitable, and when the unit dies, good luck transferring those purchases.
You might want to check out m0n0wall as well, and get a good syslog app so you can capture detailed logs and create your own detailed status reports.
Those $599 notebooks often cost more than the high end ones because they fall apart and need replacement far sooner. My M6400 is obsolete but thanks to the easy service and upgradability (hybrid hard drives, 12GB RAM, Quadro video card) it still feels plenty fast.
"at least twice as much" is a bit of an exaggeration, don't you think?
Sure, you can buy an i7 PC a bit cheaper than the cheapest i7 equipped Mac, but the case will be louder, more flimsy, probably more gaudy. and won't have bluetooth and wifi integrated out of the box. Is it cheaper? Yes, depending on your perspective. Add in a good case, good keyboard and mouse, WiFi, equivalent interfaces (DisplayPort/Mini-DisplayPort/HDMI) then you've surpassed the price of the Mac.
Notebooks: Yes, you can get cheaper notebooks, but they will be flimsy pieces of crap than a Macbook, with a higher failure rate. My notebook (a 17" Dell Precision Mobile Workstation) with a full desktop chipset, Core 2 Quad Extreme, WUXGA+ (1920x1200) display with RGB-LED backlighting covering the full Adobe color gamut, internal RAID support (dual hard drives - newer ones support THREE hard drives!), and a THREE-button trackpointer AND touchpad, is actually more solidly built than my Macbook Pro (which I also have but never use; it's a Core Duo) but costs far more. I've dropped it from a 4' high ledge onto a tiled concrete floor with the screen open, and it never stopped running and the screen and everything else is fine. Very solid, but definitely cheap, either. I could buy a much cheaper PC notebook, but it will not have the fast desktop chipset, won't have an NVIDIA Quadro video card, won't have DisplayPort, and will have fewer USB ports than I have, and likely won't have ESATA and definitely won't have multiple hard drive bays. So, will it (a cheap notebook) save money? It depends on your needs.
I needed desktop/workstation performance on the go and that's what I have. You can't even get a desktop chipset in an Apple notebook. The great thing about PCs is there is a huge expanse of options ranging from ultra-cheap notebooks with integrated graphics and mobile chipsets, but flimsy cases. Decent notebooks with mobile chipsets but will last longer. Mobile chipsets in solid cases (equivalent to the Macbook Pro) but will have a low failure rate of only 2%-4%, and then you have the true mobile Desktop/Workstation offerings from Dell and Lenovo that are built like tanks, include desktop chipsets and workstation graphics cards and multiple hard drive support, and are priced accordingly. And, that selection works. The ironic thing is the more expensive notebooks (Latitude, Precision, Thinkpad, Toughbook) are cheaper for some people who are on the go a lot and work in both professional and industrial environments; the notebooks can take a real beating, and if you do break something, every individual part can be ordered, be it a screen hinge, a bezel, motherboard, hard drive sled/tray/bracket, or the entire chassis. The cheaper notebooks are disposable. Macbook Pro? Built like a tank but still has the retarded one-button mouse (yes yes I know about the "virtual" second button, but try using middle-button functionality in X in Linux!!), and when you do need a part, good luck ordering it, You have to deal with the "not"-genius bar who will only want to sell you on a new Macbook, or you need to go to feeBay or to a few other sites that offer the parts. Oh, and you can't get a Macbook with a desktop chipset.
Why is the desktop chipset a big deal? Faster throughput, better performance, and yes, there is a tradeoff of battery life, but IMHO it is worth it. Even with an outdated CPU and video card, my notebook still feels plenty fast, especially since I upgraded it with "hybrid" hard drives.
Conclusion: comparing apples to apples (no pun intended), a Macintosh notebook, iMac or Mac Mini is not really more expensive than the equivalent PC. The Mac Pro is a different story, though - but honestly if you go with something like a Supermicro workstation (which will have far faster throughput and more PCI-E x16 slots) it will be MUCH louder, unless you buy just the board and install your EATX board into a third-party chassis.
Citizen (and very few others) make a pilot's watch with a thing called a "tachymeter". I haven't shopped one in years, but it used to be that the bottom price for these was like $400. I have no idea why, because it's a very simple gadget.
I have owned three of those from Seiko, Citizen, and Pulsar (a Seiko subsidiary). I gave the Seiko away because it was huge and bulky. I like both the Pulsar and the Citizen. The bands are in no way cheap: stainless steel on both the Seiko and Pulsar, and titanium on the Citizen.
The thing that is "exactly like a slide rule" is a slide rule, and is intended to be used as a slide rule to figure out glide distance, remaining flight time based on remaining fuel (and often include a "lbs" label on one dial as well as some conversion ratios such as lbs:gallon and other helpful values), and so on, and can also be used as a tachymeter, which is a scale calibrated for measuring average speed over a measured mile. The movements are accurate enough to be marketed as "Chronometers" or "Chronographs" and they generally support multiple time zones, multiple alarms, countdown timers, and the manual usually includes info on how to use the analog dial as a compass (any analog watch can be used as a compass!) in the manual.
I'm partial to flight computer watches and usually avoid "dressy" watches because they're boring, or far too small to be usable if they do include additional functions. I also dislike Casio offerings; they look horrible, are made cheaply, and even their better digital watches are ugly as hell, with more focus on flashing LED segments than actual functionality (much like the "light show" head units in all too many modern aftermarket car stereos)
My favorite watch is my Citizen Skyhawk Eco-Drive (now discontinued, a victim of the economy I guess); it is a flight computer but is a nice subdued titanium finish, not the hugely bulky polished stainless steel, blue, and yellow finish on the "Blue Angels" edition. Solar powered, slide rule, stopwatch, countdown timer, as many time zones as I wish to configure, three alarms, and of course excellent luminescent markers. The only things I don't like about this edition are: 1) lack of backlight for the LCD screens and 2) it comes with a mineral crystal, not sapphire (but Citizen does offer a crystal upgrade program)
My second favorite watch is the Pulsar Hyperflight Tech Gear: another great flight watch killed off by the economy. Two alarms, IIRC, stopwatchm, slide rule, countdown timer, EL backlight, pretty good luminescent markers, dual negative LCD screens (so they are grey-on-black), and the really neat thing is that you can turn off one or both of the LCDs so it looks like a purely analog watch. I like it a lot, but it is bulkier than the Citizen, and is a polished stainless steel feel, and I had to remove all of the wristband inserts to get it to fight right. I scratched it up so I took some buffing wheels to it and made it look like new again, except for the crystal, which like the Citizen is "hardlex" (mineral glass) not sapphire. What I do not like about it: 1) the crystal is not sapphire 2) finding a "new old stock" replacement is near impossible and 3) the manual describes an LCD contrast adjustment/setting, but the feature never made it into the watch. The crystal and slide rule bezel are both scratched up so I need to eventually send it to an authorized dealer to have it restored,, and hopefully find a sapphire crystal that will fit it.
Other than that, for formal occasions if the Citizen is inappropriate, I have a couple of slim watches from TJ Max that look nice, but they are dreadfully boring. In fact I don't even know where those watches are.
Interesting thing: I've been asked if the Pulsar is solar powered because the displays look like solar cells on old solar watches when they're turned off, but no one EVER asks me if the Citizen is solar powered even though the solar cell covers the entire face.
Fox News is neither conservative nor liberal; they are all about ratings and will say damn near anything or support any position that is controversial and draws viewers to increase advertising revenue. They're not above even fabricating stories (see the moniker Faux News) or wiretapping in order to increase viewership.
I don't trust any of the news channels, really, except CSPAN (which really isn't news, per se, but public affairs coverage so bias is less likely). I'll view multiple sources, consider the sources and the intent, and arrive at my own conclusions. The truth usually lies somewhere between Faux News' spin and MSNBC's and CNN's. The unfortunate thing is that journalistic integrity ceased to exist long before most of us were born.
That's what happens when you spring for a high end body (to keep up with the Joneses) and then cheap out on crap lenses - and then don't bother creating a lens profile in Lightroom to correct CA in post.;)
No links - Just dealt with having a microdermal removed back in February when I had my nose done. The anesthesiologists required that all piercings be removed.:-(
Or any kind of surgery (including oral or nasal) where the anesthesiologist will flat-out refuse to admit you until the microdermals are gone, leaving behind scars.
Well, the value of the hole itself would be decreased as any compost comprised of politicians would most certainly be toxic, but the return on investment would certainly be immense, with the economy likely reaping the benefits almost immediately, along with the elimination of war. Well, peace would last at least until we stupidly promote more narcissistic assholes into power - unfortunately very likely a phenomena doomed to repeat itself. Let's refer to Douglas Adams' work for an insight into this stupidity:
The major problem - one of the major problems, for there are several - one of the many major problems with governing people is that of whom you get to do it; or rather of who manages to get people to let them do it to them.
To summarize: it is a well known fact, that those people who most want to rule people are, ipso facto, those least suited to do it. To summarize the summary: anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job. To summarize the summary of the summary: people are a problem.
Sure, when Photoshop, Lightroom, Illustrator, Canon's DPP, and embroidery design and machine control apps get ported to Linux, and Linux gets F/OSS Blu-Ray support, I'll dump Windows permanently.
. . . nor does anyone else who goes out of their way to install Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, Safari, or Opera. People who install those browsers quite simply DO NOT WANT INTERNET EXPLORER.
I don't want to use MSIE even if MSIE had a plugin that will build me an island and then fucking transform into a jet and fly me there. If I don't need to access an ActiveX app, I simply do not want to use MSIE!!
I believe you fail to understand RAM's purpose: to store data. Your disk check probably did not require 11 GB, but since it was available, it chose to use it to improve its performance.
I understand the purpose of RAM. However, I also understand that the reason my applications were terminating without warning was that Windows was killing the apps in the foreground to give the background scan more RAM. With 12GB of RAM I've seen little to no need to run a swap file. To complete that scan while getting work done I had to allocate swap so I could run my apps without Windows terminating them with no warning.
. . . and you think Obamney's policy of extending the nanny state, increasing taxes, increasing deficit spending, and systematically eradicating personal liberties to be a better policy?
People should be able to hop on a plane as easily as they hop in the car and drive to work or hop on the subway, a bus, or any other form of public transport ion which has no screening and lots of people.
The TSA wants it to be equally easy as well, which is why they are trying to work their way into harassing citizens ("Papiere bitte") on every mode of transportation.
No, because I do not wish to exchange freedom for apparent security. I want it to be like it was up through the mid-90s: loved ones and friends being able to meet you or see you off right at the gate, children being able to be escorted directly to the gate by their parents, etc.
You know, LIBERTY.
I know, only the radical fringe lunatics believe in actual freedom nowadays.
Vote for Ron Paul - one of his first actions will be using executive order privilege to cancel out all of Duhbya's and Obama's unconstitutional ones, then cancelling out the executive order privilege altogether to restore due process as defined in the Constitution.
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See: natural ice age cycles. We're still coming out of an ice age right now. It's going to get a lot warmer regardless of human activities. Then, it will become cold again eventually, repeating the cycle.
Isn't that reason enough? What happened to ambition, curiosity, and doing things "because it's there?"
Free Waterfall Junior: "You can't own property, man."
Farnsworth: "I can. But that's because I'm not a penniless hippie."
what the subject says
A few things:
Better firewalls, including even the lowly dd-wrt and the now-defunct Snapgear, support syslog so you can capture and create your own custom reports, and dd-wrt reports total bandwidth usage on a daily, monthly and and annual basis and will retain that info until you do a reset (or until it runs out of NVRAM). It can come in very handy if your ISP claims you hit your bandwidth cap.
Another thing you might want to try is IMFIREWALL/WFilter in monitoring mode to see which users are doing what on your network. What is required is to either put a port on your switch (connected to your gateway/firewall) in either promiscuous mode or a two-way mirror to the port that connects to the firewall.
http://www.imfirewall.us/WFilter.htm
It will report the number of hits to instant messaging, streaming, social networking, porn, gambling, stock trading, and any other criteria you can think of configuring. You can also put it in filter mode so it will basically kill any requests that you disapprove of, but in monitoring mode you can create custom reports of who is doing what.
Other firewalls will include these features as integrated, but some vendors (Cisco, Sonicwall) won't sell you the complete feature set for a flat price; they nickle and dime you because it's more profitable, and when the unit dies, good luck transferring those purchases.
You might want to check out m0n0wall as well, and get a good syslog app so you can capture detailed logs and create your own detailed status reports.
Those $599 notebooks often cost more than the high end ones because they fall apart and need replacement far sooner. My M6400 is obsolete but thanks to the easy service and upgradability (hybrid hard drives, 12GB RAM, Quadro video card) it still feels plenty fast.
I'd like to second the Dell Precision Mobile Workstation recommendation. In fact I just posted about it elsewhere today:
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2861395&cid=40051999
It has a full numeric keyboard and I actually prefer it over a lot of the cheap full keyboards that are out on the market now.
"at least twice as much" is a bit of an exaggeration, don't you think?
Sure, you can buy an i7 PC a bit cheaper than the cheapest i7 equipped Mac, but the case will be louder, more flimsy, probably more gaudy. and won't have bluetooth and wifi integrated out of the box. Is it cheaper? Yes, depending on your perspective. Add in a good case, good keyboard and mouse, WiFi, equivalent interfaces (DisplayPort/Mini-DisplayPort/HDMI) then you've surpassed the price of the Mac.
Notebooks: Yes, you can get cheaper notebooks, but they will be flimsy pieces of crap than a Macbook, with a higher failure rate. My notebook (a 17" Dell Precision Mobile Workstation) with a full desktop chipset, Core 2 Quad Extreme, WUXGA+ (1920x1200) display with RGB-LED backlighting covering the full Adobe color gamut, internal RAID support (dual hard drives - newer ones support THREE hard drives!), and a THREE-button trackpointer AND touchpad, is actually more solidly built than my Macbook Pro (which I also have but never use; it's a Core Duo) but costs far more. I've dropped it from a 4' high ledge onto a tiled concrete floor with the screen open, and it never stopped running and the screen and everything else is fine. Very solid, but definitely cheap, either. I could buy a much cheaper PC notebook, but it will not have the fast desktop chipset, won't have an NVIDIA Quadro video card, won't have DisplayPort, and will have fewer USB ports than I have, and likely won't have ESATA and definitely won't have multiple hard drive bays. So, will it (a cheap notebook) save money? It depends on your needs.
I needed desktop/workstation performance on the go and that's what I have. You can't even get a desktop chipset in an Apple notebook. The great thing about PCs is there is a huge expanse of options ranging from ultra-cheap notebooks with integrated graphics and mobile chipsets, but flimsy cases. Decent notebooks with mobile chipsets but will last longer. Mobile chipsets in solid cases (equivalent to the Macbook Pro) but will have a low failure rate of only 2%-4%, and then you have the true mobile Desktop/Workstation offerings from Dell and Lenovo that are built like tanks, include desktop chipsets and workstation graphics cards and multiple hard drive support, and are priced accordingly. And, that selection works. The ironic thing is the more expensive notebooks (Latitude, Precision, Thinkpad, Toughbook) are cheaper for some people who are on the go a lot and work in both professional and industrial environments; the notebooks can take a real beating, and if you do break something, every individual part can be ordered, be it a screen hinge, a bezel, motherboard, hard drive sled/tray/bracket, or the entire chassis. The cheaper notebooks are disposable. Macbook Pro? Built like a tank but still has the retarded one-button mouse (yes yes I know about the "virtual" second button, but try using middle-button functionality in X in Linux!!), and when you do need a part, good luck ordering it, You have to deal with the "not"-genius bar who will only want to sell you on a new Macbook, or you need to go to feeBay or to a few other sites that offer the parts. Oh, and you can't get a Macbook with a desktop chipset.
Why is the desktop chipset a big deal? Faster throughput, better performance, and yes, there is a tradeoff of battery life, but IMHO it is worth it. Even with an outdated CPU and video card, my notebook still feels plenty fast, especially since I upgraded it with "hybrid" hard drives.
Conclusion: comparing apples to apples (no pun intended), a Macintosh notebook, iMac or Mac Mini is not really more expensive than the equivalent PC. The Mac Pro is a different story, though - but honestly if you go with something like a Supermicro workstation (which will have far faster throughput and more PCI-E x16 slots) it will be MUCH louder, unless you buy just the board and install your EATX board into a third-party chassis.
I have owned three of those from Seiko, Citizen, and Pulsar (a Seiko subsidiary). I gave the Seiko away because it was huge and bulky. I like both the Pulsar and the Citizen. The bands are in no way cheap: stainless steel on both the Seiko and Pulsar, and titanium on the Citizen.
The thing that is "exactly like a slide rule" is a slide rule, and is intended to be used as a slide rule to figure out glide distance, remaining flight time based on remaining fuel (and often include a "lbs" label on one dial as well as some conversion ratios such as lbs:gallon and other helpful values), and so on, and can also be used as a tachymeter, which is a scale calibrated for measuring average speed over a measured mile. The movements are accurate enough to be marketed as "Chronometers" or "Chronographs" and they generally support multiple time zones, multiple alarms, countdown timers, and the manual usually includes info on how to use the analog dial as a compass (any analog watch can be used as a compass!) in the manual.
I'm partial to flight computer watches and usually avoid "dressy" watches because they're boring, or far too small to be usable if they do include additional functions. I also dislike Casio offerings; they look horrible, are made cheaply, and even their better digital watches are ugly as hell, with more focus on flashing LED segments than actual functionality (much like the "light show" head units in all too many modern aftermarket car stereos)
My favorite watch is my Citizen Skyhawk Eco-Drive (now discontinued, a victim of the economy I guess); it is a flight computer but is a nice subdued titanium finish, not the hugely bulky polished stainless steel, blue, and yellow finish on the "Blue Angels" edition. Solar powered, slide rule, stopwatch, countdown timer, as many time zones as I wish to configure, three alarms, and of course excellent luminescent markers. The only things I don't like about this edition are: 1) lack of backlight for the LCD screens and 2) it comes with a mineral crystal, not sapphire (but Citizen does offer a crystal upgrade program)
My second favorite watch is the Pulsar Hyperflight Tech Gear: another great flight watch killed off by the economy. Two alarms, IIRC, stopwatchm, slide rule, countdown timer, EL backlight, pretty good luminescent markers, dual negative LCD screens (so they are grey-on-black), and the really neat thing is that you can turn off one or both of the LCDs so it looks like a purely analog watch. I like it a lot, but it is bulkier than the Citizen, and is a polished stainless steel feel, and I had to remove all of the wristband inserts to get it to fight right. I scratched it up so I took some buffing wheels to it and made it look like new again, except for the crystal, which like the Citizen is "hardlex" (mineral glass) not sapphire. What I do not like about it: 1) the crystal is not sapphire 2) finding a "new old stock" replacement is near impossible and 3) the manual describes an LCD contrast adjustment/setting, but the feature never made it into the watch. The crystal and slide rule bezel are both scratched up so I need to eventually send it to an authorized dealer to have it restored,, and hopefully find a sapphire crystal that will fit it.
Other than that, for formal occasions if the Citizen is inappropriate, I have a couple of slim watches from TJ Max that look nice, but they are dreadfully boring. In fact I don't even know where those watches are.
Interesting thing: I've been asked if the Pulsar is solar powered because the displays look like solar cells on old solar watches when they're turned off, but no one EVER asks me if the Citizen is solar powered even though the solar cell covers the entire face.
Fox News is neither conservative nor liberal; they are all about ratings and will say damn near anything or support any position that is controversial and draws viewers to increase advertising revenue. They're not above even fabricating stories (see the moniker Faux News) or wiretapping in order to increase viewership.
I don't trust any of the news channels, really, except CSPAN (which really isn't news, per se, but public affairs coverage so bias is less likely). I'll view multiple sources, consider the sources and the intent, and arrive at my own conclusions. The truth usually lies somewhere between Faux News' spin and MSNBC's and CNN's. The unfortunate thing is that journalistic integrity ceased to exist long before most of us were born.
That's what happens when you spring for a high end body (to keep up with the Joneses) and then cheap out on crap lenses - and then don't bother creating a lens profile in Lightroom to correct CA in post. ;)
No links - Just dealt with having a microdermal removed back in February when I had my nose done. The anesthesiologists required that all piercings be removed. :-(
Or any kind of surgery (including oral or nasal) where the anesthesiologist will flat-out refuse to admit you until the microdermals are gone, leaving behind scars.
Too late; Microsoft already hired him for Ribbon and Metro UI design.
Well, the value of the hole itself would be decreased as any compost comprised of politicians would most certainly be toxic, but the return on investment would certainly be immense, with the economy likely reaping the benefits almost immediately, along with the elimination of war. Well, peace would last at least until we stupidly promote more narcissistic assholes into power - unfortunately very likely a phenomena doomed to repeat itself. Let's refer to Douglas Adams' work for an insight into this stupidity:
Sure, when Photoshop, Lightroom, Illustrator, Canon's DPP, and embroidery design and machine control apps get ported to Linux, and Linux gets F/OSS Blu-Ray support, I'll dump Windows permanently.
. . . nor does anyone else who goes out of their way to install Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, Safari, or Opera. People who install those browsers quite simply DO NOT WANT INTERNET EXPLORER.
I don't want to use MSIE even if MSIE had a plugin that will build me an island and then fucking transform into a jet and fly me there. If I don't need to access an ActiveX app, I simply do not want to use MSIE!!
Got that, Microsoft?
Didn't you read any of the thread? If CHKDSK = crap antivirus/antimalware software in your book, then I guess I have crappy antivirus software.
I understand the purpose of RAM. However, I also understand that the reason my applications were terminating without warning was that Windows was killing the apps in the foreground to give the background scan more RAM. With 12GB of RAM I've seen little to no need to run a swap file. To complete that scan while getting work done I had to allocate swap so I could run my apps without Windows terminating them with no warning.
. . . and you think Obamney's policy of extending the nanny state, increasing taxes, increasing deficit spending, and systematically eradicating personal liberties to be a better policy?
More like the needs of earmarked pork-barrel spending benefiting pockets of the few outweigh inalienable rights of the many.
The TSA wants it to be equally easy as well, which is why they are trying to work their way into harassing citizens ("Papiere bitte") on every mode of transportation.
No, because I do not wish to exchange freedom for apparent security. I want it to be like it was up through the mid-90s: loved ones and friends being able to meet you or see you off right at the gate, children being able to be escorted directly to the gate by their parents, etc.
You know, LIBERTY.
I know, only the radical fringe lunatics believe in actual freedom nowadays.
Vote for Ron Paul - one of his first actions will be using executive order privilege to cancel out all of Duhbya's and Obama's unconstitutional ones, then cancelling out the executive order privilege altogether to restore due process as defined in the Constitution.