I am in the same boat. I won't buy a device until I research its support by Lineage.
Anything other than unlocked is a dead end. I refuse to struggle to deal with artificial barriers on a product I ostensibly own.
If I can't block ads and restrict what any given application can access, then I don't trust the device. All of my devices are rooted and customized by me.
I no longer answer the phone, ever, unless I know who is calling.
It really works.
I also add any "unknown number" to a new contact that I call e.g. Detroit Blocked, or NYC Blocked, or Louisiana Blocked (whatever google says is the caller), then "route to voicemail" all calls from that number. Plus I disabled voicemail, so it's really just a new version of the old killfile.:-)
1) Samsung Galaxy S4 2) Ginormous battery from ZeroLemon or equivalent
Cost: $300 for phone, $40 for the battery (current Amazon prices) so total is modest at $340
Great phone, lasts me for 3-5 days with moderate to heavy use, and will run any Android stuff I can think of. I use Cyanogenmod on mine, you might choose stock or some other variant, but this thing is quite durable and lasts forever.
I was getting so pissed with my Acer Aspire netbook I was going to buy a new ultrabook, mostly because I would hit rlslog and the browser (Chrome) would hang for about 3-4 seconds before I could start to scroll down the page. I assumed this was because the processor was underpowered. It's a 64 bit AMD chip running at 1.3 GHz, though, and I have it upgraded to its maximum capacity of 8 GB of RAM and I'm running with an SSD.
This was making me crazy--no other pages were causing issues as routinely. I did some investigating and figured out the problem was some advertising javascript, and I could not find a good way to restrict Chrome from running it.
But since switching to Pale Moon 64 bit and disallowing javascript on rlslog, the little machine is truly as fast as any other computer I've ever used. I run ublock and NoScript on Pale Moon 64 and this thing FLIES, even with 30 tabs open.
This simple change of browsers has literally saved me $1000 in upgrade costs.
I had an iPad 2, enjoyed lots about it, but the whole browser issue killed my enjoyment of the device. "Legitimate" sites like NBC and the New York Times had pop-up tabs and I couldn't control the browser to the degree necessary to stop them.
Although I had rooted the iPad, I could not find a decent way to deal with ad blocking on iOS. I sold the device and have gone to Android stuff for my mobile solutions.
Here's my recipe for, if not happiness, at least much less pop-up and advertisement induced rage:
--rooted Android device --installed AdAway (from f-droid) --use Naked Browser, with javascript off, and then I whitelist only the sites that need it
Google will become another also-ran, in the end, because they set up Google in the United States.
All the useful stuff on the net is going to end up being hosted from non-US areas because of the legal system abuses that are manifest in the USA.
The first Google-like search engine that works well and doesn't deal with DMCA and other abusive legislation will get my search business, and everything else, eventually. I don't give two shits about Google except so far as it satisfies my desire for a good search engine. Once it quits working in that regard, it's dead to me, just as it killed off my use of Altavista.
I am using a Galaxy S3, 16 GB built-in, and then I added a 64 GB SD card to it. I refuse to downgrade my storage capacity on a new phone. The amazing capacity of this thing is simply a killer feature.
I'm running Cyanogenmod on this thing and it flies, is stable, and has no shitware installed.
These two things have become my new standard for what I want:
1) Is it open enough to get a fully functioning Cyanogenmod update? 2) Does it have SD expansion?
That's it. All the hyper-resolution stuff is meaningless for a four or five inch display. Just give me that badass storage capacity and an uncluttered OS!
I have an iPad 2 and an HTC Evo 4G LTE (Android phone).
I would, sadly, rather browse the web on my cell phone than on the iPad 2. Why? Ad blocking.
This is trivial on my Android system, relatively speaking. I rooted it and installed AdAway, and then I'm done. No significant advertising in any app or when I browse the web. Problem solved! Amazing speed, no popups, life is beautiful.
The iPad, despite a great interface, is horribly crippled in that I can't control what it does when I browse the web. It grabs every ad, talking ones, animated ones, popup ones, hijacking ones, you name it, my tablet is the advertisers' whore. I only use the iPad for games anymore. And I rooted the iPad and STILL can't stop this crap. Chrome for iPad has no adblock. Neither does Safari.
If there were a way to do the hosts file trick on the iPad, I would love to use it more, but as it is that thing makes me angry every time I pick it up.
For those of you who enjoyed/enjoy Monopoly or other financial-type games, give this one a look: Cashflow. My wife and I have loved playing it. It's expensive, but you can consider it to be an education in a box. It can carry some real-world lessons on finances.
We got ours through eBay, not the link I provided, and it was cheaper. It was this game that got us started in real investing, not just 401(k) stuff.
...we'll have very powerful computers that come to a screeching halt everytime they have to retrieve data from the 'net.
Exactly like today.
Face it, things are never going to get better (relatively speaking) as far as wide network speed and latency goes. No matter how fast things are on the network, it's always going to suck compared to our desktop/laptop/palmtop/whatever machines' internal workings.
Sneakemail is my method of choice. Generate a custom address (e.g. eh37fh@sneakemail.com) for every transaction you do, along with one for your web pages. Mail sent to these addresses gets forwarded to your real address, which no one gets (except Sneakemail).
Dispose of them if you ever get junk mail, and you will know exactly which companies not to trust or which web page got spidered.
I get no spam and haven't for several years now. I have had to generate a total of 5 or 6 new addresses for my own vanity page since that one does get spidered from time to time. People can still simply click and mail me.
The downside is that the address that someone uses today to mail me may not exist 6 months from now, and unless he checks my page for an updated address, he may think I don't exist any longer either. But that's okay, I think.
Speaking as an MD, let me just say (in response to the idea of taking your lawyer with you to all doctor's visits):
You are crazy.
I think it is completely reasonable to ask for copies of all the notes that we generate for any visit (which are typically 1 typewritten page in my office) but if you are bringing a lawyer along, I hope that your primary care physician is a psychiatrist.
My Sony writer has also died on me, but only once so far. Slow progression of read errors, then write errors, then inability to recognize any discs (blank or pre-recorded, CD or DVD). Sony was fairly easy to deal with, but it took 2 weeks to get the unit back.
I don't know what they did, but it's clearly the same unit (same stickers, serial number, etc.) and it's working again. The warranty is for a year and I've already burned >150 DVDs, so it has easily paid for itself!
Dude, I don't want to see another comment from you unless it's along the lines of "New version of Alien vs. Child Predator now up at the reopened OMM." I mean, seriously, where can I find some of the quality work that you chuckleheads used to turn out? Old Man Murray ripped me a new one, to quote the Duke.
Damn I miss that stuff. Start to crate ratings...the Deus Ex walkthrough...
Bring it back, man. Unless you're an imposter, in which case bite me.
No way will I get a box with that kind of "fiddle-ability" by the remote powers, enableable and disableable features controlled AFTER my purchase decision is made, and whose data pipe (on which the entire kick-assness of the service depends) exists solely at the discretion of the providers who aren't terribly keen on the whole matter in the first place.
I have a decent hi-fi VCR, works just fine in stereo, has a very, very effective 30 sec. skip button (hit multiple times for longer skips), and for which I have no worries about studios shutting me down remotely or giving me a bunch of shit on my tapes that I never programmed it to tape.
I'll stick with my old analog tech, thank you very much.
Jesus, what a bunch of mean comments. Ugly--too big--not as capable as a VAIO--too limited in too many ways--
Well, I disagree. I'm a happy user of a Handspring Visor for the last year or so, and it's been a wonderful tool as an organizer, news reader (via Avantgo daily updates), entertainment package (with a nice Freecell version and Mille Bournes clone), and document reader (I keep the NCI Cancernet PDQ database on it, and I've also read a few novels on it using iSilo).
These are great little devices but I've been waiting for internet connectivity before getting a new one. I would have gotten a Treo 180 but I figure that if I'm going to have to recharge anyhow (for any wireless device) I might as well wait for color. This new model fits the bill perfectly.
Additionally, I really like the enhanced calculator that Handspring has in their devices as well as the Citytime application for resetting times when traveling. I am among the few people out here who still don't have a cell phone, and this will even let me join the 1990s with a handy device.
Size? My Visor Platinum is significantly larger than the 270 and it is invisible and unnoticed in my pocket when I carry it. I don't go to work without it.
Capability? The 270 should be able to satisfy every use I have found for the Visor, but it has twice the memory and a nicer display. Those card games and documents will be easier to see on a good display.
You want to edit Word documents, write up your departmental expenditures with Excel, watch videos, listen to MP3s--forget it with a device like this. But I challenge anyone to produce any device with a form factor as friendly as my Visor or a Pocket PC that won't drive you nuts while doing those things. You want those capabilities--you must get a laptop. No pocket device form factor will make such jobs possible, without something crazy like accurate speech recognition or a virtual keyboard interface.
For guys like me, this Treo 270 is exactly what we want. The only real gripe I have is that I would like a nice telnet/ssh client built-in so that I could do my remote administration.
Re:Problem with the Netwinder
on
Netwinder is Back
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· Score: 2, Interesting
For less than industrial-strength work, don't neglect the simplicity and incredibly low cost of these old boxes. This thing is a workhorse, made out of free (old) parts.
The best part? I can sleep with my head a few feet from this thing and never hear it. Period. And with a hard drive, you still get niceties like ftp service and email.
Just make Cringely a Slashbox, for Christ's Sake
on
Cringely: OS X on Intel
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· Score: 3, Interesting
It's an option-- go to your preferences page and check the box (under "I, Cringely", maybe 20% of the way into the links). Then you won't have to wait for some karma-whore to get his weekly column submitted to be reminded to check his PBS column.
For what it's worth (to be just a little bit on topic), I've been using Win2K and Linux at home and OS X on a G3 Mac at work. The 10.1 update to OS X along with the Omniweb browser has made that my favorite platform, bar none, to surf the web. For games, it sucks.
It has been fairly stable--I get a hard crash (locked up) about once a month now. The machine is also running Apache, ftpd, and telnetd, and for all intents and purposes I treat it just like my Linux box except that the browser is nicer...
Honestly, I would rather not have OS X on Intel hardware--it is dog slow even on this 400 MHz G3 after all the updates/patches have been applied. What I would like is just a browser as nice as Omniweb.
I have to say that your summary here about computer ownership (in a de facto sense) is the most cogent argument I have read in a long, long time for running open source stuff.
I plan to copy your comment and put it in my quotes file. Thanks, and I mean it.
I am going to replace an aged Pentium 200 MMX Linux box with a much faster Linux box in the next few months. Via's C3, running at 933 MHz, doesn't even require a fan; heatsink alone is sufficient.
I have a silent drive sleeve for my 20 GB 5400 RPM drive, and with a fanless power supply (see the links from http://home.swipnet.se/tr/silence.html), this thing will only have moving parts in the drive and should register less noise than my breathing.
For Quake 3, Wolfenstein, and others, I have a GeForce3 card and an Athlon 1600+ (which also runs fairly quietly, with a Silencer fan replacing the original noisy one on my Volcano cooler), but for thoughtful tasks you can't get better than blissful silence.
Slashdot Mirror
I am in the same boat. I won't buy a device until I research its support by Lineage.
Anything other than unlocked is a dead end. I refuse to struggle to deal with artificial barriers on a product I ostensibly own.
If I can't block ads and restrict what any given application can access, then I don't trust the device. All of my devices are rooted and customized by me.
I no longer answer the phone, ever, unless I know who is calling.
It really works.
I also add any "unknown number" to a new contact that I call e.g. Detroit Blocked, or NYC Blocked, or Louisiana Blocked (whatever google says is the caller), then "route to voicemail" all calls from that number. Plus I disabled voicemail, so it's really just a new version of the old killfile. :-)
I love this phone combination:
1) Samsung Galaxy S4
2) Ginormous battery from ZeroLemon or equivalent
Cost: $300 for phone, $40 for the battery (current Amazon prices) so total is modest at $340
Great phone, lasts me for 3-5 days with moderate to heavy use, and will run any Android stuff I can think of. I use Cyanogenmod on mine, you might choose stock or some other variant, but this thing is quite durable and lasts forever.
I was getting so pissed with my Acer Aspire netbook I was going to buy a new ultrabook, mostly because I would hit rlslog and the browser (Chrome) would hang for about 3-4 seconds before I could start to scroll down the page. I assumed this was because the processor was underpowered. It's a 64 bit AMD chip running at 1.3 GHz, though, and I have it upgraded to its maximum capacity of 8 GB of RAM and I'm running with an SSD.
This was making me crazy--no other pages were causing issues as routinely. I did some investigating and figured out the problem was some advertising javascript, and I could not find a good way to restrict Chrome from running it.
But since switching to Pale Moon 64 bit and disallowing javascript on rlslog, the little machine is truly as fast as any other computer I've ever used. I run ublock and NoScript on Pale Moon 64 and this thing FLIES, even with 30 tabs open.
This simple change of browsers has literally saved me $1000 in upgrade costs.
I had an iPad 2, enjoyed lots about it, but the whole browser issue killed my enjoyment of the device. "Legitimate" sites like NBC and the New York Times had pop-up tabs and I couldn't control the browser to the degree necessary to stop them.
Although I had rooted the iPad, I could not find a decent way to deal with ad blocking on iOS. I sold the device and have gone to Android stuff for my mobile solutions.
Here's my recipe for, if not happiness, at least much less pop-up and advertisement induced rage:
--rooted Android device
--installed AdAway (from f-droid)
--use Naked Browser, with javascript off, and then I whitelist only the sites that need it
No pop-ups, no worries, no ads.
This is exactly right.
Google will become another also-ran, in the end, because they set up Google in the United States.
All the useful stuff on the net is going to end up being hosted from non-US areas because of the legal system abuses that are manifest in the USA.
The first Google-like search engine that works well and doesn't deal with DMCA and other abusive legislation will get my search business, and everything else, eventually. I don't give two shits about Google except so far as it satisfies my desire for a good search engine. Once it quits working in that regard, it's dead to me, just as it killed off my use of Altavista.
Agreed.
I am using a Galaxy S3, 16 GB built-in, and then I added a 64 GB SD card to it. I refuse to downgrade my storage capacity on a new phone. The amazing capacity of this thing is simply a killer feature.
I'm running Cyanogenmod on this thing and it flies, is stable, and has no shitware installed.
These two things have become my new standard for what I want:
1) Is it open enough to get a fully functioning Cyanogenmod update?
2) Does it have SD expansion?
That's it. All the hyper-resolution stuff is meaningless for a four or five inch display. Just give me that badass storage capacity and an uncluttered OS!
In my idealistic youth, I thought of him as a programming God.
As I grew older, I began regarding him as more of a cranky old, "get off my lawn", impractical hard liner.
Now, with the whole NSA/Snowden revelations, I realize I was wrong to be complacent. He has reverted to deity status for me.
I have an iPad 2 and an HTC Evo 4G LTE (Android phone).
I would, sadly, rather browse the web on my cell phone than on the iPad 2. Why? Ad blocking.
This is trivial on my Android system, relatively speaking. I rooted it and installed AdAway, and then I'm done. No significant advertising in any app or when I browse the web. Problem solved! Amazing speed, no popups, life is beautiful.
The iPad, despite a great interface, is horribly crippled in that I can't control what it does when I browse the web. It grabs every ad, talking ones, animated ones, popup ones, hijacking ones, you name it, my tablet is the advertisers' whore. I only use the iPad for games anymore. And I rooted the iPad and STILL can't stop this crap. Chrome for iPad has no adblock. Neither does Safari.
If there were a way to do the hosts file trick on the iPad, I would love to use it more, but as it is that thing makes me angry every time I pick it up.
We got ours through eBay, not the link I provided, and it was cheaper. It was this game that got us started in real investing, not just 401(k) stuff.
Exactly like today.
Face it, things are never going to get better (relatively speaking) as far as wide network speed and latency goes. No matter how fast things are on the network, it's always going to suck compared to our desktop/laptop/palmtop/whatever machines' internal workings.
In English, I believe we call it a "Clockwork Orange."
-h
Dispose of them if you ever get junk mail, and you will know exactly which companies not to trust or which web page got spidered.
I get no spam and haven't for several years now. I have had to generate a total of 5 or 6 new addresses for my own vanity page since that one does get spidered from time to time. People can still simply click and mail me.
The downside is that the address that someone uses today to mail me may not exist 6 months from now, and unless he checks my page for an updated address, he may think I don't exist any longer either. But that's okay, I think.
-h
Speaking as an MD, let me just say (in response to the idea of taking your lawyer with you to all doctor's visits):
You are crazy.
I think it is completely reasonable to ask for copies of all the notes that we generate for any visit (which are typically 1 typewritten page in my office) but if you are bringing a lawyer along, I hope that your primary care physician is a psychiatrist.
-h
My Sony writer has also died on me, but only once so far. Slow progression of read errors, then write errors, then inability to recognize any discs (blank or pre-recorded, CD or DVD). Sony was fairly easy to deal with, but it took 2 weeks to get the unit back.
I don't know what they did, but it's clearly the same unit (same stickers, serial number, etc.) and it's working again. The warranty is for a year and I've already burned >150 DVDs, so it has easily paid for itself!
-h
Dude, you *cannot* request a "mod parent up" on your own post. Geez. Have a little etiquette.
-h
No shit! I am 100% in agreement.
Everyone who asks me, "Which computer should I buy?" I ask one question: "Are you going to play 3-D games?"
If yes--> Most expensive, fastest machine you can afford.
If no--> Pick up the cheapest, lousiest, ratty looking new model you can find (such as a Wal-Mart $300), as it is 10x too powerful for your tasks.
And my server is even slower than yours, but works like an enslaved genie to do my bidding. Here's my specs:
Silent server
-h
Dude, I don't want to see another comment from you unless it's along the lines of "New version of Alien vs. Child Predator now up at the reopened OMM." I mean, seriously, where can I find some of the quality work that you chuckleheads used to turn out? Old Man Murray ripped me a new one, to quote the Duke.
Damn I miss that stuff. Start to crate ratings...the Deus Ex walkthrough...
Bring it back, man. Unless you're an imposter, in which case bite me.
Why, yes, I do have some solid facts about who supports the terrorists. But it's not CD pirates.
It's smokers.
Read this Guardian article to see just how REAL money is made. Hint: they don't waste time on warez.
...until this news came to light.
No way will I get a box with that kind of "fiddle-ability" by the remote powers, enableable and disableable features controlled AFTER my purchase decision is made, and whose data pipe (on which the entire kick-assness of the service depends) exists solely at the discretion of the providers who aren't terribly keen on the whole matter in the first place.
I have a decent hi-fi VCR, works just fine in stereo, has a very, very effective 30 sec. skip button (hit multiple times for longer skips), and for which I have no worries about studios shutting me down remotely or giving me a bunch of shit on my tapes that I never programmed it to tape.
I'll stick with my old analog tech, thank you very much.
Jesus, what a bunch of mean comments. Ugly--too big--not as capable as a VAIO--too limited in too many ways--
Well, I disagree. I'm a happy user of a Handspring Visor for the last year or so, and it's been a wonderful tool as an organizer, news reader (via Avantgo daily updates), entertainment package (with a nice Freecell version and Mille Bournes clone), and document reader (I keep the NCI Cancernet PDQ database on it, and I've also read a few novels on it using iSilo).
These are great little devices but I've been waiting for internet connectivity before getting a new one. I would have gotten a Treo 180 but I figure that if I'm going to have to recharge anyhow (for any wireless device) I might as well wait for color. This new model fits the bill perfectly.
Additionally, I really like the enhanced calculator that Handspring has in their devices as well as the Citytime application for resetting times when traveling. I am among the few people out here who still don't have a cell phone, and this will even let me join the 1990s with a handy device.
Size? My Visor Platinum is significantly larger than the 270 and it is invisible and unnoticed in my pocket when I carry it. I don't go to work without it.
Capability? The 270 should be able to satisfy every use I have found for the Visor, but it has twice the memory and a nicer display. Those card games and documents will be easier to see on a good display.
You want to edit Word documents, write up your departmental expenditures with Excel, watch videos, listen to MP3s--forget it with a device like this. But I challenge anyone to produce any device with a form factor as friendly as my Visor or a Pocket PC that won't drive you nuts while doing those things. You want those capabilities--you must get a laptop. No pocket device form factor will make such jobs possible, without something crazy like accurate speech recognition or a virtual keyboard interface.
For guys like me, this Treo 270 is exactly what we want. The only real gripe I have is that I would like a nice telnet/ssh client built-in so that I could do my remote administration.
Bah. You like low power? Cheap? Quiet?
Check out my budget server! Cost: $0
http://medmeta.dyndns.org/silent_server.html
For less than industrial-strength work, don't neglect the simplicity and incredibly low cost of these old boxes. This thing is a workhorse, made out of free (old) parts.
The best part? I can sleep with my head a few feet from this thing and never hear it. Period. And with a hard drive, you still get niceties like ftp service and email.
It's an option-- go to your preferences page and check the box (under "I, Cringely", maybe 20% of the way into the links). Then you won't have to wait for some karma-whore to get his weekly column submitted to be reminded to check his PBS column.
For what it's worth (to be just a little bit on topic), I've been using Win2K and Linux at home and OS X on a G3 Mac at work. The 10.1 update to OS X along with the Omniweb browser has made that my favorite platform, bar none, to surf the web. For games, it sucks.
It has been fairly stable--I get a hard crash (locked up) about once a month now. The machine is also running Apache, ftpd, and telnetd, and for all intents and purposes I treat it just like my Linux box except that the browser is nicer...
Honestly, I would rather not have OS X on Intel hardware--it is dog slow even on this 400 MHz G3 after all the updates/patches have been applied. What I would like is just a browser as nice as Omniweb.
I have to say that your summary here about computer ownership (in a de facto sense) is the most cogent argument I have read in a long, long time for running open source stuff.
I plan to copy your comment and put it in my quotes file. Thanks, and I mean it.
I am going to replace an aged Pentium 200 MMX Linux box with a much faster Linux box in the next few months. Via's C3, running at 933 MHz, doesn't even require a fan; heatsink alone is sufficient.
w ww.via.com.tw/jsp/en/products/C3/c3reviews.jsp+c3+ reviews+and+awards&hl=en).
I have a silent drive sleeve for my 20 GB 5400 RPM drive, and with a fanless power supply (see the links from http://home.swipnet.se/tr/silence.html), this thing will only have moving parts in the drive and should register less noise than my breathing.
Surprisingly, it will also perform fairly well--those C3 processors are not dogs, as you can see from the reviews linked to on Via's page (cached at http://www.google.com/search?q=cache:PMSJrxoMUV4:
For Quake 3, Wolfenstein, and others, I have a GeForce3 card and an Athlon 1600+ (which also runs fairly quietly, with a Silencer fan replacing the original noisy one on my Volcano cooler), but for thoughtful tasks you can't get better than blissful silence.