Why the hell do people yell "OMG it's been done before..." everytime someone comes out with something.
If a company thinks that something is interesting enough that they talk to it before they even have a demonstration working, much less public availability, presumably they think there's something special about it. In the case of [a-zA-Z]drives, it's really, really been done before.
What is with Microsoft and their TERRIBLE, self-destructive habit of talking endlessly about something that might come some time soon? The general public has zero faith in Microsoft anymore, they've seriously tarnished their image, yet still they let these idiots go ranting on about how amazing and awesome the next iteration will be.
Learn, Microsofties. You will be a lot more credible, and your products will be received much better, if the first we ever see the product is a working, kick-ass, released product. Not some low level product wank talking up the best it could possibly be, guaranteeing the market will be underwhelmed when something eventually pops out 5 years later.
One huge difference is that the Microsoft tech support guys are paid to listen to your stupidities. You are a lot more patient and understanding when you're paid.
There's lots of pay support options for Linux, as well. I'm sure they'll happily guide you through long, drawn out support if they're charging by the minute (with something like Ether, anyone can provide that sort of pay service).
What I think they're talking about, however, is the general community. On a Windows-related forum, it is entirely true that there are often armies of individuals dying to help to the best of their capacity, eager to show off what they know. The more simplistic and general your question, the more likely it is to get dozens of answers by eager helpers. Microsoft even anoints some of these as MVPs, a designation that countless microsoft.* newsgroup inhabitants work (for free) towards.
In Linux forums and communities, on the other hand, that sort of, err, benevolence seldom exists. Linux users, as a general rule, don't have the same motiviation to "show their stuff". In fact I'd say that the opposite is true, and in the Linux camp you're more likely to get responses if you ask highly technical, esoteric questions. A simple question is more likely to be ignored, or responded with a hostile RTFM.
This could just relate to level of experience.
When I first got into "computers", I become the family computer guy that everyone came to for help, and in a way it boosted my ego and gave me a way to prove myself valuable. The more this became a career, and as I became more professionally respected and entrenched, the less motivated I was to be "the computer guy". In fact I started to see it is a way that people used me and others like me, soliciting free computer help under the guise of patting my back and telling me how smart and helpful I was.
Nowadays I have little motivation to help when people ask questions, unless there is some monetary reward, and honestly I usually have the same internal reaction (though usually unvoiced) as that indicated in the story: RTFM. Often the questions are usually the result of selfish people who can't waste a moment of their own time actually looking for an answer -- googling, consulting the help or man pages, or trial and error -- and instead immediately fall upon demanding the attention of others.
Philips companies were also instrumental in VCRs that could detect commercials, and automatically skip the commercial on playback (a tape based PVR of sorts). Sounds like Philips is just trying to cover all bases.
Actually no, it never was. It was a two-bit trading company that scammed its way into appearing that it was far bigger than it actually was.
No, it really was. With thousands of employees, and billions of dollars of cash flow, Enron most certainly was a large company. Enron basically single-handedly caused the huge power crunch in California. Hardly a two-bit company.
Microsoft has about as much cash as Apple's entire market capitalization.
SO WHAT? Apart from the fact that this has nothing, whatsoever, to do with Apple, Microsoft's cash hoarde is irrelevant. It has had a massive cash hoarde for over a decade, and strangely it has failed to do much more with it than fun a loss game console. Eventually shareholders decided that they could do better with the cash in their pockets rather than letting it be used by Microsoft, hence the special dividends, which will continue.
Just because you (and others) may not like MS does not mean they dont have tons of ingenious/creative people working for them.
You do realize, don't you, that it's possible for someone to like Microsoft, or to be neutral about them, and still to predict that they have tough times ahead? Building a caricature of everyone disagreeing being a pro-Linux anti-MS nut is both incorrect and offensive. I'm a Microsoft Empower member, my business does consulting largely for Microsoft SQL Server, and I continue to pursue Microsoft certifications, yet there isn't a chance in hell that I'd hold Microsoft stock right now, nor would I recommend that someone accept an employment agreement that relies upon options as the primary draw. Demand cold hard cash or look for work with a competitor.
Another irrelevant case. You're comparing apples to oranges.
No kidding I'm comparing apples to oranges, which would be the case for any comparison of this sort. The pertinent point is that they were large, money rich companies that seemed to be in the seat of power, and now they're either gone, or severely crippled. Pointing out that Microsoft makes lots of profit today doesn't prove much -- they have lots of revenue, but they have enormous expenses as well, not to mention that they're seeing increasing pressure on the revenue side.
It's biggest competitor is Apple.
It's irrelevant who the biggest competitor is. Microsoft has a million little competitors all taking a bite out of it, and it's at the most tenuous position that they've been in for decades. Not to mention that Microsoft's real biggest competitor is itself, with many users (and corporations) feeling absolutely no pressing need to give more money to Microsoft. Microsoft has had to fall to withdrawing support to force upgrades, which leads to resentment and the opening of opportunities for competitors.
MS is huge, they have a HUGE customer base. They are not going out of business anytime soon. They have TONS and TONS of highly qualified techies who are working to make new products that MANY people will buy.
As the old saying goes, the bigger they are, the harder they fall. Enron was once a really big company, with lots and lots of really smart employees. GM was once a really big company, with lots of really smart engineers, and now it's teetering on the edge of bankruptcy. Kodak was once a really big company, with ownership of entire markets.
Of course I don't think Microsoft is going anywhere anytime soon, and they have a lot of superlative products (many of which were released in late 2005. SQL Server 2005, Visual Studio 2005,.NET 2.0, soon Biztalk 2006, and so on. A huge percentage of what Microsoft was working on was recently released, so I think the author of the "article" being discussed just wasn't paying attention), however their dominance is in question, and seems to be a thing of the past.
Not only have they lost almost all technical clout, but there just really isn't much interest in what they're doing anymore. Whether it's because the market has matured enough already, or competitors have taken Microsoft's crown, is debatable. On the revenue side Microsoft has been forced to start squeezing "lost revenue" that it previously overlooked, through mechanisms such as Software Assurance, efforts against professional piracy (investigative teams, rewards, customer snitch lines, and so on) and casual piracy (e.g. activation, genuine advantage), and so on. If Microsoft starts to truly get desparate, expect patent assaults on Linux and other competitors.
But yes, it was likely delayed more than a "few months" at least due to them deciding to throw out the XP kernel and base it on Server 2003's instead.
They didn't "decide" to make the kernel transition. Rather, much like Duke Nukem Forever, technology changed so much while they were in development that they saw now loss in changing the "engine". In the process they dumped much of the work they have completed, and started largely anew.
It was the result of the first iteration being a complete disaster.
When I sample a movie at 720x480, I am not compressing, even though I threw away a few millions pixels that would have been visible on a huge screen.
Off the compression topic (though still on it inadvertently), but the 35mm film used for movies, and then the duplication of the same for projection, really isn't that high of resolution. It could be that one of the reasons the new HD formats don't show the promised advantage is simply because the source material doesn't have much more additional information.
On the topic of analog versus digital, in the film world the analog copy is another huge weakness, particularly in the way the source copy (the film reel) is degraded with each playing. It's too bad they couldn't get the digital distribution initiative going, because it's unsatisfying watching a bouncing image displaying some scratched up film.
You are not nearly as clever as you seem to think you are.
Is this really your baiting technique? The tired old "you're not clever/smart/pretty/strong" chestnut from the junior high days? Wait -- you are in Junior High! Makes sense.
Hopefully you can get your lame jabs in before they update the proxy software to block you from adult sites like Slashdot.
Let's talk video then. I'll take a 1080i/component over a 480i/HDMI any time of the day. Or another one: I'll take a good analog cable service over a HD satellite badly tuned any time of the day. And on, and on...
I'd totally agree with you. However, analog television has a long and storied history of being incredibly prone to defects, and even the best cable providers serve up a palette of overlapped, distorted analog signals. Their digital feeds, on the other hand, tend to either work or not work, and presuming that they aren't overcompressed the picture quality is perfect.
In the context of the discussion, television media feeds, digital is almost always superior to analog.
How do you figure a walmart shopper is going to drop an extra 400 bones just to brag about it? We are not talking about videophiles here.
They won't. The early adopters will buy it early, and soon enough the electronics will be in $50 Apex players, guaranteed. I bought a DVD player for $600 when the only place to rent them was a tiny little corner in an obscure video store in my town (during the whole Divx thing). Many like me supported the format until it entered mass market pricing, and then it exploded. The same thing will happen with high-def DVD.
A 8KHz PCM (no compression) stereo file will sound worse than a LP or a cassette, you can be sure of that.
As an aside, digitizing a full frequency source into 8Khz PCM is compression, done with the knowledge that it is impossible for it to capture the full source range (compressing attributes of the original). I realize from your prior post that you have a problem taking concepts outside of literal singularities, however that is compression is every sense of the word, and if it were used to digitize an orchestral piece for reproduction on a stereo system, it most certainly would quality as overcompression.
I haven't read something that dumb in a while. Digital and Analog are two different ways to store/transmit data, nothing more. The quality of each is bound to be the quality that it was designed to hold, nothing more, nothing less. The ONE property digital data has over analog, is that it _can_ be duplicated without loss.
The only idiocy was your air of superiority, entirely nonsensical reply. You see, we were specifically talking about television, and feeds over satellite/cable, comparing digital picture quality versus analog picture quality. I realize your Aspergers probably kicked in, and you couldn't resolve the comment in the context of the conversation, ridiculously taking a comment out of context, but next time I'd advise that you just save your dispays of ignorance for venues where it can be so easily shot down.
Did you entirely miss the point of my comment? I specifically said that it was an evolution (as opposed to a revolution), which is why it will be a gradual upgrade. Regarding your derisive "Joe 6-pack" comment, even where people don't notice the difference they can still be sold on hypotheticals. Many average consumers like bragging about their hardware, and if they can pick up a new DVD player at a small premium when they were thinking about upgrading anyways, they will. This will be furthered when they go to pick up some DVDs, and realize that they're buying "obsolete" media.
Who wants a EMT64/AMD64 in a mobile processor? it serves no purpose. I think the AMD fanboys are realising that the sleeping giant is waking up...
Given that the article is talking about using the processor on the desktop, it does seem to be an entirely pertinent point. Even in the mobile space, I just ordered a laptop with 2GB - the maximum available in the model. It seems odd that a new chip would come out today that supports close to the average new PC (even bargain PCs come with 1GB+ now) as an upper limit. While I never expect much future proofing in computer hardware, it would be nice if there were some headroom.
I find it more likely than not when I'm at someone's house, they have a first-generation HDTV (720p), and they have it all out of whack in how it's set up.
720p isn't first generation, anymore than 540p or 1080i is. They're all just variants on the spec, and new and old sets have supported a variety of them. Maybe you're new to HDTV, but it's been around for a while and current sets - the overwhelming majority of which are 720p - are hardly first generation.
As for screwing with people's display, of course they don't like it. Many people have their sets set to stretch 4:3 images to fill the screen to avoid uneven burn on their display, something that drives the fiddlers nuts. Colour balance is subjective with the environment, and everyone thinks their particular tweaks are correct. Detail is completely subjective as well, as to what is most asthetically pleasing. Don't screw with people's sets.
And this is all further compounded by the mostly inferior quality of anything claiming to be "high-def" for the sake of selling product, for example, Dish, Echo, Comcast, etc., all boast some flavor of "digital", with hints and sometimes outright bogus claims of HD too.
Huh? Firstly, digital is superior to analog, at least where there isn't overcompression. Secondly, what "bogus claims" of HD? Most of them support REAL HDTV. Most network primetime shows are in high definition, and shows like CSI, Without a Trace, and Survivor look worlds better than SDTV (although they are sometimes in 4:3 for framing reasons, the resolutions is far beyond SDTV).
Something else to consider... if you are disinterested in this new technology because the difference isn't that noticable and from the looks of things you seem to be technically fluent, how is the average joe going to react? I'm talking about those people who watch standard def contents on their HDTV sets without even realizing it/knowing the difference.
The new formats are a simple evolution of DVD, and most users will simply evolve into it over time (I doubt they're going to immediately toss their collection/player), just as people have been buying HDTV sets for several years now (e.g. they're buying a new set, and it is a small premium over an SDTV set so why not), yet most regions have only recently started getting HDTV content.
Regarding quality differences, it should be noted that the first examples on a given format/platform are almost always subpar. Be it the first DVDs, the first CDs, or the first game for a console system. Not only are they usually rushed, the system that led to their generation was often built with a lesser system in mind. E.g. Because of low quality mastering in the early CD days, many CDs were only marginally better than cassette tapes. The low quality mastering was a legacy of studios that only had to worry about targeting a low quality end, so things like high end hiss or harmonic noise really didn't matter. Give it time and the engineering kinks will be worked out.
My ISP had it on their ad, big red letters: "UNLIMITED broadband service starting at $19.99 depending on speed!"
So you can use your connection to send spam, for instance? Can you use it to launch hacking attacks, or to endlessly spread viruses? Both of those should fall under the "unlimited" banner, so clearly the ISP should have no Terms Of Service.
They do? Well that's strange. Maybe they were referring to one aspect of their service, such as connection time. Those ads were usually crafted back when they were competing against AOL and other dial-up services, which due to modem/line oversubscribing limited users to a set number of hours per month under the base account. The "unlimited" means that you can be online throughout the clock with most high speed, even if their intent is that most of the time you have marginal usage tools like email checking and IM clients running.
Every service on the planet is limited, and you shouldn't be naive about it.
Yes, you are wrong. That max speed is burst speed, and was never sold to be saturated constantly. If you want a constant speed, why don't you call up one of your providers and ask for a dedicated 5Mbps line -- compare that price (in the thousands per month) with your $40 cable modem service, and contemplate why they differ.
As far as the *all the time* claims that are constantly used to justify antisocial line saturation -- firstly, only something like one provider ever actually made that claim (I believe Comcast), and even then it was ambiguously used (e.g. you do have unlimited connection time, which was the primary comparison at the time with services like AOL). Other services have always used clear wording, such as "Always On", giving specific monthly limits of throughput, beyond which you should be paying for the thousands of dollars connection, not bogarting your neighbourhoods connectivity around the clock.
Seriously, somebody explain their business plan to me.
Just had to address this, too -- you seem to be under the flawed belief that high speed providers rely upon P2P fanatics for their business, only selling to high-volume torrent users. This is completely untrue, and the overwhelming majority of high speed customers are occasional users, not power users. High speed is quite prevalent you know, and sees a lot of adoption among "mom & pops" and other unlikely-to-torrent users.
I mean, seriously, why did they think customers wanted 5Mb/s? So they could download movie previews from the QT website?
Ummm, yes? Most high speed users are burst high-speed users, who get on their PC and browse around YouTube and other high bandwidth sites, and then "log off" and go about their life. They don't sit sucking 100% of the capacity around the clock, but when they do the high bandwidth is very beneficial.
The reality is that it is grossly economically unsustainable for someone to max out their connection perpetually, which is why many high speed providers have had max throughputs per time period since their inception (cue someone complaining about some provider that never did, yet a lot did. Up here in Canada, the major cable providers that operated under the @Home banner always listed a max throughput, beyond which they can assess additional charges, or disconnect you, or force you to upgrade to a much more expensive service if you want to continue).
My car might have 255HP, and while that helps me pass trucks and merge onto highways better, it doesn't mean that I drive around the clock with the pedal pushed to the floor.
For those reasons alone NTP should also have its relevant patents revoked and RIM shouldn't be paying a dime to them.
NTP is already close to certain to lose their patents. Under the threat of an injunction, RIM was forced to pay $600 million to NTP, nonrefundable. NTP knew that their patents would fall, so they made sure there was no "give it back if your patents are finally declared bogus, with no more appeals" conditions.
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Why the hell do people yell "OMG it's been done before..." everytime someone comes out with something.
If a company thinks that something is interesting enough that they talk to it before they even have a demonstration working, much less public availability, presumably they think there's something special about it. In the case of [a-zA-Z]drives, it's really, really been done before.
What is with Microsoft and their TERRIBLE, self-destructive habit of talking endlessly about something that might come some time soon? The general public has zero faith in Microsoft anymore, they've seriously tarnished their image, yet still they let these idiots go ranting on about how amazing and awesome the next iteration will be.
Learn, Microsofties. You will be a lot more credible, and your products will be received much better, if the first we ever see the product is a working, kick-ass, released product. Not some low level product wank talking up the best it could possibly be, guaranteeing the market will be underwhelmed when something eventually pops out 5 years later.
One huge difference is that the Microsoft tech support guys are paid to listen to your stupidities. You are a lot more patient and understanding when you're paid.
There's lots of pay support options for Linux, as well. I'm sure they'll happily guide you through long, drawn out support if they're charging by the minute (with something like Ether, anyone can provide that sort of pay service).
What I think they're talking about, however, is the general community. On a Windows-related forum, it is entirely true that there are often armies of individuals dying to help to the best of their capacity, eager to show off what they know. The more simplistic and general your question, the more likely it is to get dozens of answers by eager helpers. Microsoft even anoints some of these as MVPs, a designation that countless microsoft.* newsgroup inhabitants work (for free) towards.
In Linux forums and communities, on the other hand, that sort of, err, benevolence seldom exists. Linux users, as a general rule, don't have the same motiviation to "show their stuff". In fact I'd say that the opposite is true, and in the Linux camp you're more likely to get responses if you ask highly technical, esoteric questions. A simple question is more likely to be ignored, or responded with a hostile RTFM.
This could just relate to level of experience.
When I first got into "computers", I become the family computer guy that everyone came to for help, and in a way it boosted my ego and gave me a way to prove myself valuable. The more this became a career, and as I became more professionally respected and entrenched, the less motivated I was to be "the computer guy". In fact I started to see it is a way that people used me and others like me, soliciting free computer help under the guise of patting my back and telling me how smart and helpful I was.
Nowadays I have little motivation to help when people ask questions, unless there is some monetary reward, and honestly I usually have the same internal reaction (though usually unvoiced) as that indicated in the story: RTFM. Often the questions are usually the result of selfish people who can't waste a moment of their own time actually looking for an answer -- googling, consulting the help or man pages, or trial and error -- and instead immediately fall upon demanding the attention of others.
Philips companies were also instrumental in VCRs that could detect commercials, and automatically skip the commercial on playback (a tape based PVR of sorts). Sounds like Philips is just trying to cover all bases.
Actually no, it never was. It was a two-bit trading company that scammed its way into appearing that it was far bigger than it actually was.
No, it really was. With thousands of employees, and billions of dollars of cash flow, Enron most certainly was a large company. Enron basically single-handedly caused the huge power crunch in California. Hardly a two-bit company.
Microsoft has about as much cash as Apple's entire market capitalization.
SO WHAT? Apart from the fact that this has nothing, whatsoever, to do with Apple, Microsoft's cash hoarde is irrelevant. It has had a massive cash hoarde for over a decade, and strangely it has failed to do much more with it than fun a loss game console. Eventually shareholders decided that they could do better with the cash in their pockets rather than letting it be used by Microsoft, hence the special dividends, which will continue.
Just because you (and others) may not like MS does not mean they dont have tons of ingenious/creative people working for them.
You do realize, don't you, that it's possible for someone to like Microsoft, or to be neutral about them, and still to predict that they have tough times ahead? Building a caricature of everyone disagreeing being a pro-Linux anti-MS nut is both incorrect and offensive. I'm a Microsoft Empower member, my business does consulting largely for Microsoft SQL Server, and I continue to pursue Microsoft certifications, yet there isn't a chance in hell that I'd hold Microsoft stock right now, nor would I recommend that someone accept an employment agreement that relies upon options as the primary draw. Demand cold hard cash or look for work with a competitor.
Another irrelevant case. You're comparing apples to oranges.
No kidding I'm comparing apples to oranges, which would be the case for any comparison of this sort. The pertinent point is that they were large, money rich companies that seemed to be in the seat of power, and now they're either gone, or severely crippled. Pointing out that Microsoft makes lots of profit today doesn't prove much -- they have lots of revenue, but they have enormous expenses as well, not to mention that they're seeing increasing pressure on the revenue side.
It's biggest competitor is Apple.
It's irrelevant who the biggest competitor is. Microsoft has a million little competitors all taking a bite out of it, and it's at the most tenuous position that they've been in for decades. Not to mention that Microsoft's real biggest competitor is itself, with many users (and corporations) feeling absolutely no pressing need to give more money to Microsoft. Microsoft has had to fall to withdrawing support to force upgrades, which leads to resentment and the opening of opportunities for competitors.
MS is huge, they have a HUGE customer base. They are not going out of business anytime soon. They have TONS and TONS of highly qualified techies who are working to make new products that MANY people will buy.
.NET 2.0, soon Biztalk 2006, and so on. A huge percentage of what Microsoft was working on was recently released, so I think the author of the "article" being discussed just wasn't paying attention), however their dominance is in question, and seems to be a thing of the past.
As the old saying goes, the bigger they are, the harder they fall. Enron was once a really big company, with lots and lots of really smart employees. GM was once a really big company, with lots of really smart engineers, and now it's teetering on the edge of bankruptcy. Kodak was once a really big company, with ownership of entire markets.
Of course I don't think Microsoft is going anywhere anytime soon, and they have a lot of superlative products (many of which were released in late 2005. SQL Server 2005, Visual Studio 2005,
Not only have they lost almost all technical clout, but there just really isn't much interest in what they're doing anymore. Whether it's because the market has matured enough already, or competitors have taken Microsoft's crown, is debatable. On the revenue side Microsoft has been forced to start squeezing "lost revenue" that it previously overlooked, through mechanisms such as Software Assurance, efforts against professional piracy (investigative teams, rewards, customer snitch lines, and so on) and casual piracy (e.g. activation, genuine advantage), and so on. If Microsoft starts to truly get desparate, expect patent assaults on Linux and other competitors.
But yes, it was likely delayed more than a "few months" at least due to them deciding to throw out the XP kernel and base it on Server 2003's instead.
They didn't "decide" to make the kernel transition. Rather, much like Duke Nukem Forever, technology changed so much while they were in development that they saw now loss in changing the "engine". In the process they dumped much of the work they have completed, and started largely anew.
It was the result of the first iteration being a complete disaster.
I knew it! Thanks for coming clean about all of that.
When I sample a movie at 720x480, I am not compressing, even though I threw away a few millions pixels that would have been visible on a huge screen.
Off the compression topic (though still on it inadvertently), but the 35mm film used for movies, and then the duplication of the same for projection, really isn't that high of resolution. It could be that one of the reasons the new HD formats don't show the promised advantage is simply because the source material doesn't have much more additional information.
On the topic of analog versus digital, in the film world the analog copy is another huge weakness, particularly in the way the source copy (the film reel) is degraded with each playing. It's too bad they couldn't get the digital distribution initiative going, because it's unsatisfying watching a bouncing image displaying some scratched up film.
You are not nearly as clever as you seem to think you are.
Is this really your baiting technique? The tired old "you're not clever/smart/pretty/strong" chestnut from the junior high days? Wait -- you are in Junior High! Makes sense.
Hopefully you can get your lame jabs in before they update the proxy software to block you from adult sites like Slashdot.
You try too hard dennis. Now stop threadcrapping and go kick your dog or whatever else is next on your list of ways to inflict your misery on others.
Says the guy following me around to make comments to my threads. You have so much irony you could be dangerous to children.
Let's talk video then. I'll take a 1080i/component over a 480i/HDMI any time of the day. Or another one: I'll take a good analog cable service over a HD satellite badly tuned any time of the day. And on, and on...
I'd totally agree with you. However, analog television has a long and storied history of being incredibly prone to defects, and even the best cable providers serve up a palette of overlapped, distorted analog signals. Their digital feeds, on the other hand, tend to either work or not work, and presuming that they aren't overcompressed the picture quality is perfect.
In the context of the discussion, television media feeds, digital is almost always superior to analog.
How do you figure a walmart shopper is going to drop an extra 400 bones just to brag about it? We are not talking about videophiles here.
They won't. The early adopters will buy it early, and soon enough the electronics will be in $50 Apex players, guaranteed. I bought a DVD player for $600 when the only place to rent them was a tiny little corner in an obscure video store in my town (during the whole Divx thing). Many like me supported the format until it entered mass market pricing, and then it exploded. The same thing will happen with high-def DVD.
A 8KHz PCM (no compression) stereo file will sound worse than a LP or a cassette, you can be sure of that.
As an aside, digitizing a full frequency source into 8Khz PCM is compression, done with the knowledge that it is impossible for it to capture the full source range (compressing attributes of the original). I realize from your prior post that you have a problem taking concepts outside of literal singularities, however that is compression is every sense of the word, and if it were used to digitize an orchestral piece for reproduction on a stereo system, it most certainly would quality as overcompression.
I haven't read something that dumb in a while. Digital and Analog are two different ways to store/transmit data, nothing more. The quality of each is bound to be the quality that it was designed to hold, nothing more, nothing less. The ONE property digital data has over analog, is that it _can_ be duplicated without loss.
The only idiocy was your air of superiority, entirely nonsensical reply. You see, we were specifically talking about television, and feeds over satellite/cable, comparing digital picture quality versus analog picture quality. I realize your Aspergers probably kicked in, and you couldn't resolve the comment in the context of the conversation, ridiculously taking a comment out of context, but next time I'd advise that you just save your dispays of ignorance for venues where it can be so easily shot down.
Did you entirely miss the point of my comment? I specifically said that it was an evolution (as opposed to a revolution), which is why it will be a gradual upgrade. Regarding your derisive "Joe 6-pack" comment, even where people don't notice the difference they can still be sold on hypotheticals. Many average consumers like bragging about their hardware, and if they can pick up a new DVD player at a small premium when they were thinking about upgrading anyways, they will. This will be furthered when they go to pick up some DVDs, and realize that they're buying "obsolete" media.
Who wants a EMT64/AMD64 in a mobile processor? it serves no purpose. I think the AMD fanboys are realising that the sleeping giant is waking up...
Given that the article is talking about using the processor on the desktop, it does seem to be an entirely pertinent point. Even in the mobile space, I just ordered a laptop with 2GB - the maximum available in the model. It seems odd that a new chip would come out today that supports close to the average new PC (even bargain PCs come with 1GB+ now) as an upper limit. While I never expect much future proofing in computer hardware, it would be nice if there were some headroom.
I find it more likely than not when I'm at someone's house, they have a first-generation HDTV (720p), and they have it all out of whack in how it's set up.
720p isn't first generation, anymore than 540p or 1080i is. They're all just variants on the spec, and new and old sets have supported a variety of them. Maybe you're new to HDTV, but it's been around for a while and current sets - the overwhelming majority of which are 720p - are hardly first generation.
As for screwing with people's display, of course they don't like it. Many people have their sets set to stretch 4:3 images to fill the screen to avoid uneven burn on their display, something that drives the fiddlers nuts. Colour balance is subjective with the environment, and everyone thinks their particular tweaks are correct. Detail is completely subjective as well, as to what is most asthetically pleasing. Don't screw with people's sets.
And this is all further compounded by the mostly inferior quality of anything claiming to be "high-def" for the sake of selling product, for example, Dish, Echo, Comcast, etc., all boast some flavor of "digital", with hints and sometimes outright bogus claims of HD too.
Huh? Firstly, digital is superior to analog, at least where there isn't overcompression. Secondly, what "bogus claims" of HD? Most of them support REAL HDTV. Most network primetime shows are in high definition, and shows like CSI, Without a Trace, and Survivor look worlds better than SDTV (although they are sometimes in 4:3 for framing reasons, the resolutions is far beyond SDTV).
There is nothing at all bogus about it.
Something else to consider... if you are disinterested in this new technology because the difference isn't that noticable and from the looks of things you seem to be technically fluent, how is the average joe going to react? I'm talking about those people who watch standard def contents on their HDTV sets without even realizing it/knowing the difference.
The new formats are a simple evolution of DVD, and most users will simply evolve into it over time (I doubt they're going to immediately toss their collection/player), just as people have been buying HDTV sets for several years now (e.g. they're buying a new set, and it is a small premium over an SDTV set so why not), yet most regions have only recently started getting HDTV content.
Regarding quality differences, it should be noted that the first examples on a given format/platform are almost always subpar. Be it the first DVDs, the first CDs, or the first game for a console system. Not only are they usually rushed, the system that led to their generation was often built with a lesser system in mind. E.g. Because of low quality mastering in the early CD days, many CDs were only marginally better than cassette tapes. The low quality mastering was a legacy of studios that only had to worry about targeting a low quality end, so things like high end hiss or harmonic noise really didn't matter. Give it time and the engineering kinks will be worked out.
My ISP had it on their ad, big red letters: "UNLIMITED broadband service starting at $19.99 depending on speed!"
So you can use your connection to send spam, for instance? Can you use it to launch hacking attacks, or to endlessly spread viruses? Both of those should fall under the "unlimited" banner, so clearly the ISP should have no Terms Of Service.
They do? Well that's strange. Maybe they were referring to one aspect of their service, such as connection time. Those ads were usually crafted back when they were competing against AOL and other dial-up services, which due to modem/line oversubscribing limited users to a set number of hours per month under the base account. The "unlimited" means that you can be online throughout the clock with most high speed, even if their intent is that most of the time you have marginal usage tools like email checking and IM clients running.
Every service on the planet is limited, and you shouldn't be naive about it.
Am I wrong in this?
Yes, you are wrong. That max speed is burst speed, and was never sold to be saturated constantly. If you want a constant speed, why don't you call up one of your providers and ask for a dedicated 5Mbps line -- compare that price (in the thousands per month) with your $40 cable modem service, and contemplate why they differ.
As far as the *all the time* claims that are constantly used to justify antisocial line saturation -- firstly, only something like one provider ever actually made that claim (I believe Comcast), and even then it was ambiguously used (e.g. you do have unlimited connection time, which was the primary comparison at the time with services like AOL). Other services have always used clear wording, such as "Always On", giving specific monthly limits of throughput, beyond which you should be paying for the thousands of dollars connection, not bogarting your neighbourhoods connectivity around the clock.
Seriously, somebody explain their business plan to me.
Just had to address this, too -- you seem to be under the flawed belief that high speed providers rely upon P2P fanatics for their business, only selling to high-volume torrent users. This is completely untrue, and the overwhelming majority of high speed customers are occasional users, not power users. High speed is quite prevalent you know, and sees a lot of adoption among "mom & pops" and other unlikely-to-torrent users.
I mean, seriously, why did they think customers wanted 5Mb/s? So they could download movie previews from the QT website?
Ummm, yes? Most high speed users are burst high-speed users, who get on their PC and browse around YouTube and other high bandwidth sites, and then "log off" and go about their life. They don't sit sucking 100% of the capacity around the clock, but when they do the high bandwidth is very beneficial.
The reality is that it is grossly economically unsustainable for someone to max out their connection perpetually, which is why many high speed providers have had max throughputs per time period since their inception (cue someone complaining about some provider that never did, yet a lot did. Up here in Canada, the major cable providers that operated under the @Home banner always listed a max throughput, beyond which they can assess additional charges, or disconnect you, or force you to upgrade to a much more expensive service if you want to continue).
My car might have 255HP, and while that helps me pass trucks and merge onto highways better, it doesn't mean that I drive around the clock with the pedal pushed to the floor.
For those reasons alone NTP should also have its relevant patents revoked and RIM shouldn't be paying a dime to them.
NTP is already close to certain to lose their patents. Under the threat of an injunction, RIM was forced to pay $600 million to NTP, nonrefundable. NTP knew that their patents would fall, so they made sure there was no "give it back if your patents are finally declared bogus, with no more appeals" conditions.