Anyone who can get Joe and Jane Public to pony up billions of dollars to create a particle that lasts for a billionth of a second is God in my books. Let God name his particle.
The Future Of Food covers the Monsanto thing in good detail. Summary: a large company buys up all the seed, genetically modifyies some strains to be Roundup-ready, then sues into submission anyone who ends up with a cross-pollination with Roundup-ready strains, while creating a strain that is _inferior_, requiring increased fertilization and dependence on said company. File under 'Stuff that matters'.
By the time (i.e. concentration level) you can smell H2S, you are in big trouble. Then your sense of smell goes and you think you are alright again, I guess. In short, not the greatest stench compound.
Which is easier, (1) add the functionality you want to a bare-bones system, (2) scratch your head at a unusually-designed system and have to go through a re-learning curve, (3) reconfigure a system that offers multiple ways of doing something by simply stripping away or rearranging what is offered?
Note 1: I'm not taking OS sides here (in fact, I prefer XP [then DOS] to everything I've ever tried).
Note 2: (1), (2) & (3) above are not referring to a particular OS, but could. For example, (1) sounds a bit like the "KISS system design, rather than ease of use" of Slackware. (2) sounds like gnome for sure, but also like Microsoft Office 2007. (3) sounds like KDE in particular and Microsoft Windows in general.
Embrace and extend is actually a good design principle. Marrying it to bad intent is what makes it evil. Microsoft embraced the mouse and used it to extend input options, but Gates insisted on full keyboard equivalence. Score one for the users who benefited from Microsoft's approach. If KDE adds numerous alternative ways of doing something, most of which can be easily changed or removed, I am all for it.
In reading this thread it occurred to me that each Linux application, on first use or when holding down some key while click-launching it, could prompt with "There are other applications that can do a similar job to me, can I show you a few?" This would allow Linux to embrace and extend applications in general. This would reward Linux developers who see things just a little bit different. This would grow the field for all of us.
Ok, I normally use Opera and have avoided Firefox due to the community voice regarding memory use. So I decided to give FF2 & FF3beta4 a try today. Here is my usage stats:
Browsers: Firefox v2.0.0.12 (no plugins), IE v6.0.2900.2180 (I can't stand the look of IEv7), Opera v9.23, Firefox v3Beta4. Caches cleared before test.
Memory used on initial load: FF2 IE O FF3 26 17 45 27
Memory used after loading each of these in a new tab (window for IEv6): FF2 IE O FF3 28 25 58 34 http://www.firefox.com/ 45 46 76 52 http://us.imdb.com/ 68 71 86 74* http://www.espn.com/ 73 80 89 73 http://www.pcmag.com/ 76 82 91 75 http://www.extremetech.com/ 79 86 95 79 http://www.wired.com/ 88 98 104 87 http://www.cnn.com/ 97 116 108 93 http://www.amazon.com/ 99 124 108 95 http://www.slashdot.org/ 104 148 111 101 http://www.google.com/ig * - 74, dropping to 67 after 10 seconds
After closing all tabs: FF2 IE O FF3 66 67 104 58
Amount released when program is shutdown (as shown in Task Manager): FF2 IE O FF3 56 53 100 47
Amount not released (as per TM): FF2 IE O FF3 10 14 4 11
Note: Browsers (espec. IE) don't necessarily show all memory used by their entry in Task Manager so I prefer to know what memory was free before they loaded, and just as importantly after the browser in question is closed.
Comments: Ok, I was surprised how well FF2 & FF3 did in these tests. I also noticed Firefox properly rendering that slideshow-like flash thingy on espn.com (where my Opera setup doesn't show it at all). And that Opera acted pigishly:-{ I think it is time to give Firefox another trial.
I recall Internet Explorer on Windows 95 doing the same thing -- eating all RAM until it started hitting swap. We had to run around editing Internet Options to limit RAM usage on each machine so that it wouldn't suck quite as badly. It is truly amazing that 12 years later it still works the same way. Microsoft will do almost anything -- indexing, "super" fetching, startup helpers, etc. -- to bog down the experience enough that you will want to upgrade to the next trap^H^H^H^Hversion.
Video games have become blood sports. In a society that decries the carnage of a bull ring, the hunting of a whale or the clubbing of a baby seal, children are encouraged to play "Grand Theft Auto", "Super Smash Bros" and some kind of "Brawl". In fact, grown people are told that these titles will be a big force in gaming in 2008 and everyone proceeds to debate not the content, but the relative chance of success of these titles.
It is like we are talking about which grenade or anti-personnel mine will help drive the arms industry, without stopping to consider if we should be talking with such enthusiasm about weapons designed to end lives. What on Earth are we doing, encouraging people to play such games? I don't get, yet I've played all kinds of games for 45+ years of my life.
Answer: "Grand Theft Auto". Question: What are three words to describe a major crime, Alex.
I typed "What is Grand Theft Auto?" into Google and the original meaning of this criminal act was nowhere to be found. But I did learn that there is a video involving both GTA and LEGO that I'm sure parents will be thrilled to watch with their kids.
How did this transference of violence from one unacceptable form to another get legitimized? What happened to hand-eye coordination? Solving a puzzle. Juggling. Dribbling. Passing. It is not that these things can't be achieved in video, console or wii-style games. It is that they aren't encouraged at any level. Why? When did we turn our minds off to video game butchery?
Oh well, at least I can count on the group think to vote as one on my post.
Does this article take into account zip file contents, zips of zips, cabs, zips of cabs, files within.iso etc. -- all the files within files within files? If so, how?
Tom's Hardware has a great web page just for cpu doubters. It allows you to choose the two cpus to compare, the task you are wondering about and then you get an exhaustive list of how fast several dozen processors would be, with your chosen two in red.
I have been using the charts to compare various CPUs that PCClub.com offers across their various families of computers. The Q6600 looks to be, as they themselves said when I visited the store, the sweet spot as of March, 2008.
I think you should realize that quad+ cores are not going to offer as visible a performance increase as you are used to. In other words, unless you dig out three or four stopwatches and run your test tasks on both single and multi-cpu setups, you aren't going to see the differences.
For what it is worth, I think your mistake is when you say you are looking for "*major*" differences. These are not at all necessary for the user experience to be improved. Try typing on a 110cps teletype into a mainframe to see what I mean -- plenty of raw power goes wanting because the PBKAMainframe. Multiple cores reverse the situation -- average core speed is often lower, but the average task no longer pulls down the whole system.
Consider the following trivial test I did at the store. Open a cmd.exe window, change to root directory, type "DIR/S" and press enter. On my 3.2gHz HT Pentium, I get 100% cpu on at least one of the cores (I can't test my own system at the moment, sorry). So, my fan kicks in, my ears get deafened and I don't like it. On the Q6600, two of the cpus get zero load change, and two get a 35-50% increase. So, thermally, there is little to no change (.LT. 25% increase in overall cpu usage) -- half or less of my system -- and so the fan may not even kick in (I didn't hear it in the store, anyway), I don't get my ears blasted, and I am noticeably happier (because I am a simpleton who only types DIR/S all day long).
Yeah, shiny new things are nice and it takes some time for the "new" to wear off. You could argue that it was a gigantic waste of money since it does the *exact* same thing as the TV that it replaced, but then again does your new Maytag do anything different than your old washer/dryer? The answer will depend on your point of view, just don't expect everyone to see things from exactly your point of view, I don't.
Well, this here new Maytag we got does in fact do very much more. Automatic water level means less water u$ed, less waste water (costs even more to discard it than use it, believe it or not). Automatic temperature control means it can heat (or cool) as suited to load. Greater number of cycles (about ten vs two). Half the soap u$e. Better water extraction means fa$ter drying time. In short, it will pay for itself in five years.
HDTV's do cost more but they aren't "required" to be large. However, there is some science to back up why people are buying larger TV's than in the past (other than ego).
The thing is, if you get an HDTV that is say 27" in size (all we have room for in our living room), you are harder pressed to see them extra pixels. I lived with a 13" TV for some time a while back and realized that size definitely does not help TV. Similar to music, it is not the sound/picture quality but what you actually look or listen to. So why would I waste money on a "better look" that ain't even discernible at the diagonal size we trip with.
I'm not 100% sure, but the reason that DVD isn't capable of doing HD has nothing to do with filesize, but the codecs. Most DVDs are "stored at a resolution of 720×480" or 345,600 pixels, whereas 1080p HD is 1920×1080, or 2,073,600 pixels...or 6 times the resolution. So, I think your filesize complaint is also wrong/invalid.
Well, that is the raw theory. The reality, as I mentioned, is that they don't even ship DVDs at the highest quality a DVD can display, yet you don't hear legions of people whining about the lack of quality of DVDs. Even DVDs are good enough when half full, so why would I move to a Blu-Ray disc ever?
Don't know if you are misinformed about the fancy "Digital TV" thing either. If you have cable, then they can track what you are watching whether digital or analog.
How do you figure they can track me on regular cable? We have no Comcast box in the house and 3 TVs sharing the cable. How can they tell what each TV is showing? Think about.
With digital TV you get a box and commands from the remote go to the box (and back to Comcast). That is how they know you want to watch something from Channel 1, for example. You request it, they send it/unlock it/you get it. And then they know you wanted it.
If you were referring to broadcast TV, then they can't track what you are watching whether digital or analog, PLUS analog broadcasts are going away in 2009.
I was not referring to TV via an antenna. Although that would meet my privacy standard, yes.
So your fantasy about watching non-traceable analog TV is about to crumble before your eyes.
I don't think so, scooter. See above.
Bottom line, you sound like you have a chip on your should and are just blabbering away on topics you have little to zero "factual" information about.
I think you have described your "should's" situation.
I enjoy my HDTV and you are scared/angry at it.
Your adjective choices are truly high definition. I suggest you lock out CNN & Fox News, and hold the telephone a foot away from your head when you talk. Oh, and switch from robusta to arabica!
I wash my clothes and put them in the closet or the drawer, you are popping popcorn and watching it as your form of entertainment because big brother can't track you doing that.
We had no popcorn last night:-( but probably will this weekend when we go camping...in HD by the way.
I bought our family of five a new clothes washer two days ago. We went from a worn out 15 year old top-loading Maytag truck to a front-loading top-of-the-line auto-everything "Epic", by Maytag. Yesterday it got installed and last night my wife and I watched $1,100 worth of automation for at least 45 minutes. People like shiny new things. That doesn't mean they will be watching them every night for the foreseeable future.
HDTV costs too much, requires a TV the size of a 4'x8' sheet of plywood (or what is the point?), and offers nothing I want. I'd take an HD movie if only the studios would ship one. Have a look at the file sizes on DVDs -- maybe only half the time do they actually fill a dual-layer. Ironically, Disney is rah rah on Blu-Ray, when their product could ship on a CD, contains the least amount of extras of any studio, and doesn't benefit from extras anyway.
The Corporation shipped with the movie and 6 hours of interviews on the second DVD. I think there is enough room on a DVD for pretty much any video I can think of, and if there isn't, well Lawrence of Arabia had an intermission in the theaters, why not at home?
Personally I will never even have digital TV (again). I don't want someone monitoring what I watch, the digital jaggies happened all to often, and the Outdoor Life Channel is now in the "lower 48" so what is the point?
I think the Discovery/NG channels are cow feed. Compare when the History Channel and Discovery do a subject. History, you get the facts. Discovery, you get the faux drama.
I have a similar approach -- plenty of metamoderating, not so much moderating. But why wait until you are "offered" a chance to metamoderate? You can do this any time you want and there is always a backlog that needs metamodding. In fact there seem to be months of backlogged posts waiting to be metamodded.
On the topic of moderations, the "overrated" mod is ripe for abuse. Even the other negative mods are too easy to use and thus abuse. I suggest that any negative mod cost you 3 mod points -- we are supposed to concentrate on up-modding after all. You could still use it to nuke a post you didn't like, but then you would be unable to go nuke 4 other posts on your personal vendetta list. The core people who run/. still have unlimited mods and can down-mod the trolls any time. Besides, troll/redundant/offtopic stuff is not a problem. It won't get upmodded, so we can set a threshhold to avoid it -- or we can just skip over the reading of it. But deliberately burying posts that hurt you or your company's image -- this sucks and should be stopped/made more difficult.
What I found when I first tried to play MP3s on Media Player was that MP itself was using a gross amount of the cpu by itself (30% to 40% cpu utilization!). This was when CPUs were slower and I couldn't stand the slowdown so I went off and found Ultra Player -- a free, stable, "does one thing well" skinnable player that has continued to meet my audio needs to this day. Currently it is using 1 to 2% of cpu using my motherboard sound chip. I think you wasted your money.
The virtual desktops I tried were third party add-ons to Windows. In general I have scaled back installing extra stuff on my computers over the years. I have no problem with the XP (2000/9x) theme, once I have changed the default window background color to grey instead of white. I don't need Gauntlet.scr. And when I do install my 5 or 10 need-to-have-ems, I often use a vintage version, sometimes as far back as a Windows 3.x version, because of less-is-more benefits, or them being nag/cripple-free.
For as many systems as I have administered, across a LAN, WAN and via the Internet, I am racking my brain to think of a single case where I needed to stay logged in across an extended period of time (let's say more than 24 hours). And the longest cases most likely involved a lengthy file transfer or database process -- not a lot of local things need to be running to make that happen.
Yup, this otherwise doggy 750mHz or so machine had the best graphics card in the house (probably a 64MB nVidia as well) and ran games quite well. The only person who really suffered with this machine was myself when I came along to stop the video game time and then had to wait 2 or 3 minutes for the full RAM swap from video game world to Windows desktop.
We froze the kid's video games at 100 (or whatever it was) titles and haven't let them buy many since about 2004. What they do play are often flash-based online things that are quite lean compared to almost any CD-delivered game.
For me the worst feature of all about that computer, ok two of them, were: (1) a 12GB c: drive & 16GB d: drive (yowzer) and (2) USB 1.0 ports. I think I could have transferred files faster by sucking them up my nose and squirting them out my eye.
But XP systems are easily tuned and balanced. Vista systems get spec'd with maximum, not balanced, components and yet they are still a downgrade from the machine you had before. If you throw everything you have at a problem and it still doesn't yield, time to stick a fork in it.
The extreme developer case I was thinking of was a Clarion developer who would not install *anything* that didn't directly lead to billable product. He wouldn't change his wallpaper, screen saver, add or remove programs, services, and certainly not install something as indulgent as WinAmp, for example.
In defense of this seeming stupidity, he was working on Windows 95 at the time:-)
You're setup sounds entirely reasonable for a developer. Personally I gave up on virtual desktops back in the Windows 3.1 days, but I keep plenty of applications open on my current 1GB main work beast as well. I don't think Linux is the only OS that could load what you have loaded. Besides I've found that efficiency drops as the number of active up-on-the-screen eating-up-real-estate things rises beyond 3 to 5 so I avoid this and don't miss it. I will set things up for a given task, do the task and then shut down what is not needed for the next task group (keeping audio / media / browser / email always open).
As in love as you are with your Linux/Unix things over the years, I could spin similar stories about my Vic20/C64/Trash80/Clone/Kaypro/DOS/Windows PCs. We're both just trying to get work done and so naturally Vista doesn't begin to look interesting.
(1) the whack is implied in that the scenario he talks about it not relevant to most people and 512MB is a "most people" amount of memory, not a professional web site designer amount.
(2) as I corrected when someone else pointed it out, I meant wmplayer.exe.
(3) you skipped part of my scenario, I'm not sure why.
(the rest of your comments) I think that young users are very different from novice users. I was talking about one, you the other. Novice users to me are people who haven't seen a computer before and in general that means older people. Young users could be the next Bill Gates...or Bill Murray. Yes, in general, young users are more empowered (i.e. less fearful), but that was not the scenario I was talking about.
Heh, this whole thing is about "If you only do a + b, 512MB is tons. If you are Johnny Quest or Robert Goddard, buy whatever the heck you need and stay off my lawn."
This is so far out of whack, it's time for whack-a-troll.
(1) You point out that "novice users" (and that would be the vast majority of computer users), are not going to run Photoshop. Yet you mention that 512MB ain't enough to run it. Why did you even mention it then?
(2) You say "or you like to play mp3s while working", implying that this would overload a 512MB XP machine. I have mplayer.exe running with a movie paused -- 17MB of RAM used. 17MB more is going to break the XP camel's back?
(3) "or a number of other situation". You mean like running AutoCAD, a continuous system benchmark, and playing WoW...while downloading pr0n? Man, I see novices doing that all the time.
(4) "but I will be [sic] that they *will* have a large number of applications open at once". Well, in my experience novices tend to have a grand total of one program open at once, and if you try to leave a second one open they will close it, sometimes even when you have carefully minimized it. Many developers are this way as well -- wanting to squeeze an extra 50msec out of that recompile. Oh, and that one program is almost for sure 99% most likely you-can-bet maximized.
Real world situation #1: upgrading the dreaded mother-in-law computer to XP involving a machine with 64MB of RAM. Yup, one-eighth of what you are whining about. EVERYTHING I re-installed worked. MS O2k, CompuServe 2000, graphics editors, alternate browser, etc. Yes, everything ran slowly. Yes, it was slow to boot up (but not as slow as 512MB Vista machines). And when told how cheap RAM was, the m-i-l rushed out and bought 256MB.
Real world situation #2: my wife upgrading her computer while I was away. It went from 98 to XP Pro, with 320MB of RAM. The thing ran hundreds of games and everything else. Nobody ever thought it was slow. I used it myself for some things for a time. It was only replaced a year ago, and died of dust overload, if anything.
And think of how many bugs are created with the reinvent the wheel approach. Hundreds or thousands of times as many bugs as should be "created". Think of the suffering of the end users who get fed dog food that tastes different from the next hospital but is still dog food. Then the pompous twits at the top push for Joe's Custom Oracle Software Emporium to make changes to the crap they are being served. And it almost becomes usable. Until Joe comes out with Dog Crap 2.0. What a nasty cycle. I enjoyed breaking it whenever I had a chance.
And the one of those that jumps out at me is AMD with a market cap 30 times less than intel. 30 times!?11! How has AMD competed with intel with such a shortage of capital? There was a time when they were licensing some part of intel chips (if memory serves) but how can they afford the ongoing R&D costs, and then the sky high costs of new Fabs every few years? Amazing Hertz vs Avis situation there.
Slashdot Mirror
Anyone who can get Joe and Jane Public to pony up billions of dollars to create a particle that lasts for a billionth of a second is God in my books. Let God name his particle.
The Future Of Food covers the Monsanto thing in good detail. Summary: a large company buys up all the seed, genetically modifyies some strains to be Roundup-ready, then sues into submission anyone who ends up with a cross-pollination with Roundup-ready strains, while creating a strain that is _inferior_, requiring increased fertilization and dependence on said company. File under 'Stuff that matters'.
By the time (i.e. concentration level) you can smell H2S, you are in big trouble. Then your sense of smell goes and you think you are alright again, I guess. In short, not the greatest stench compound.
Henceforth, no moderator shall mod up a post ending with the digits "3029442".
How else to explain it?
To the latter bunch I say, go find something you are better at and stop wasting time and resources.
This from "TheLink", who is not content to f*ck with people using a link that people can read and decide to avoid. Now he has TinyURL'd the link.
There are lawyers, d*mn lawyers, and TheLink.
To further Dasher42's point...
Which is easier, (1) add the functionality you want to a bare-bones system, (2) scratch your head at a unusually-designed system and have to go through a re-learning curve, (3) reconfigure a system that offers multiple ways of doing something by simply stripping away or rearranging what is offered?
Note 1: I'm not taking OS sides here (in fact, I prefer XP [then DOS] to everything I've ever tried).
Note 2: (1), (2) & (3) above are not referring to a particular OS, but could. For example, (1) sounds a bit like the "KISS system design, rather than ease of use" of Slackware. (2) sounds like gnome for sure, but also like Microsoft Office 2007. (3) sounds like KDE in particular and Microsoft Windows in general.
Embrace and extend is actually a good design principle. Marrying it to bad intent is what makes it evil. Microsoft embraced the mouse and used it to extend input options, but Gates insisted on full keyboard equivalence. Score one for the users who benefited from Microsoft's approach. If KDE adds numerous alternative ways of doing something, most of which can be easily changed or removed, I am all for it.
In reading this thread it occurred to me that each Linux application, on first use or when holding down some key while click-launching it, could prompt with "There are other applications that can do a similar job to me, can I show you a few?" This would allow Linux to embrace and extend applications in general. This would reward Linux developers who see things just a little bit different. This would grow the field for all of us.
Browsers: Firefox v2.0.0.12 (no plugins), IE v6.0.2900.2180 (I can't stand the look of IEv7), Opera v9.23, Firefox v3Beta4. Caches cleared before test.
Note: Browsers (espec. IE) don't necessarily show all memory used by their entry in Task Manager so I prefer to know what memory was free before they loaded, and just as importantly after the browser in question is closed.
Comments: Ok, I was surprised how well FF2 & FF3 did in these tests. I also noticed Firefox properly rendering that slideshow-like flash thingy on espn.com (where my Opera setup doesn't show it at all). And that Opera acted pigishly
I recall Internet Explorer on Windows 95 doing the same thing -- eating all RAM until it started hitting swap. We had to run around editing Internet Options to limit RAM usage on each machine so that it wouldn't suck quite as badly. It is truly amazing that 12 years later it still works the same way. Microsoft will do almost anything -- indexing, "super" fetching, startup helpers, etc. -- to bog down the experience enough that you will want to upgrade to the next trap^H^H^H^Hversion.
Except the article says:
During intensive browsing with approximately 50 tabs
Video games have become blood sports. In a society that decries the carnage of a bull ring, the hunting of a whale or the clubbing of a baby seal, children are encouraged to play "Grand Theft Auto", "Super Smash Bros" and some kind of "Brawl". In fact, grown people are told that these titles will be a big force in gaming in 2008 and everyone proceeds to debate not the content, but the relative chance of success of these titles.
It is like we are talking about which grenade or anti-personnel mine will help drive the arms industry, without stopping to consider if we should be talking with such enthusiasm about weapons designed to end lives. What on Earth are we doing, encouraging people to play such games? I don't get, yet I've played all kinds of games for 45+ years of my life.
Answer: "Grand Theft Auto".
Question: What are three words to describe a major crime, Alex.
I typed "What is Grand Theft Auto?" into Google and the original meaning of this criminal act was nowhere to be found. But I did learn that there is a video involving both GTA and LEGO that I'm sure parents will be thrilled to watch with their kids.
How did this transference of violence from one unacceptable form to another get legitimized? What happened to hand-eye coordination? Solving a puzzle. Juggling. Dribbling. Passing. It is not that these things can't be achieved in video, console or wii-style games. It is that they aren't encouraged at any level. Why? When did we turn our minds off to video game butchery?
Oh well, at least I can count on the group think to vote as one on my post.
Does this article take into account zip file contents, zips of zips, cabs, zips of cabs, files within .iso etc. -- all the files within files within files? If so, how?
Tom's Hardware has a great web page just for cpu doubters. It allows you to choose the two cpus to compare, the task you are wondering about and then you get an exhaustive list of how fast several dozen processors would be, with your chosen two in red.
/S" and press enter. On my 3.2gHz HT Pentium, I get 100% cpu on at least one of the cores (I can't test my own system at the moment, sorry). So, my fan kicks in, my ears get deafened and I don't like it. On the Q6600, two of the cpus get zero load change, and two get a 35-50% increase. So, thermally, there is little to no change (.LT. 25% increase in overall cpu usage) -- half or less of my system -- and so the fan may not even kick in (I didn't hear it in the store, anyway), I don't get my ears blasted, and I am noticeably happier (because I am a simpleton who only types DIR /S all day long).
I have been using the charts to compare various CPUs that PCClub.com offers across their various families of computers. The Q6600 looks to be, as they themselves said when I visited the store, the sweet spot as of March, 2008.
I think you should realize that quad+ cores are not going to offer as visible a performance increase as you are used to. In other words, unless you dig out three or four stopwatches and run your test tasks on both single and multi-cpu setups, you aren't going to see the differences.
For what it is worth, I think your mistake is when you say you are looking for "*major*" differences. These are not at all necessary for the user experience to be improved. Try typing on a 110cps teletype into a mainframe to see what I mean -- plenty of raw power goes wanting because the PBKAMainframe. Multiple cores reverse the situation -- average core speed is often lower, but the average task no longer pulls down the whole system.
Consider the following trivial test I did at the store. Open a cmd.exe window, change to root directory, type "DIR
I'm not sure I'm following all of your points.
:-( but probably will this weekend when we go camping...in HD by the way.
Yeah, shiny new things are nice and it takes some time for the "new" to wear off. You could argue that it was a gigantic waste of money since it does the *exact* same thing as the TV that it replaced, but then again does your new Maytag do anything different than your old washer/dryer? The answer will depend on your point of view, just don't expect everyone to see things from exactly your point of view, I don't.
Well, this here new Maytag we got does in fact do very much more. Automatic water level means less water u$ed, less waste water (costs even more to discard it than use it, believe it or not). Automatic temperature control means it can heat (or cool) as suited to load. Greater number of cycles (about ten vs two). Half the soap u$e. Better water extraction means fa$ter drying time. In short, it will pay for itself in five years.
HDTV's do cost more but they aren't "required" to be large. However, there is some science to back up why people are buying larger TV's than in the past (other than ego).
The thing is, if you get an HDTV that is say 27" in size (all we have room for in our living room), you are harder pressed to see them extra pixels. I lived with a 13" TV for some time a while back and realized that size definitely does not help TV. Similar to music, it is not the sound/picture quality but what you actually look or listen to. So why would I waste money on a "better look" that ain't even discernible at the diagonal size we trip with.
I'm not 100% sure, but the reason that DVD isn't capable of doing HD has nothing to do with filesize, but the codecs. Most DVDs are "stored at a resolution of 720×480" or 345,600 pixels, whereas 1080p HD is 1920×1080, or 2,073,600 pixels...or 6 times the resolution. So, I think your filesize complaint is also wrong/invalid.
Well, that is the raw theory. The reality, as I mentioned, is that they don't even ship DVDs at the highest quality a DVD can display, yet you don't hear legions of people whining about the lack of quality of DVDs. Even DVDs are good enough when half full, so why would I move to a Blu-Ray disc ever?
Don't know if you are misinformed about the fancy "Digital TV" thing either. If you have cable, then they can track what you are watching whether digital or analog.
How do you figure they can track me on regular cable? We have no Comcast box in the house and 3 TVs sharing the cable. How can they tell what each TV is showing? Think about.
With digital TV you get a box and commands from the remote go to the box (and back to Comcast). That is how they know you want to watch something from Channel 1, for example. You request it, they send it/unlock it/you get it. And then they know you wanted it.
If you were referring to broadcast TV, then they can't track what you are watching whether digital or analog, PLUS analog broadcasts are going away in 2009.
I was not referring to TV via an antenna. Although that would meet my privacy standard, yes.
So your fantasy about watching non-traceable analog TV is about to crumble before your eyes.
I don't think so, scooter. See above.
Bottom line, you sound like you have a chip on your should and are just blabbering away on topics you have little to zero "factual" information about.
I think you have described your "should's" situation.
I enjoy my HDTV and you are scared/angry at it.
Your adjective choices are truly high definition. I suggest you lock out CNN & Fox News, and hold the telephone a foot away from your head when you talk. Oh, and switch from robusta to arabica!
I wash my clothes and put them in the closet or the drawer, you are popping popcorn and watching it as your form of entertainment because big brother can't track you doing that.
We had no popcorn last night
I bought our family of five a new clothes washer two days ago. We went from a worn out 15 year old top-loading Maytag truck to a front-loading top-of-the-line auto-everything "Epic", by Maytag. Yesterday it got installed and last night my wife and I watched $1,100 worth of automation for at least 45 minutes. People like shiny new things. That doesn't mean they will be watching them every night for the foreseeable future.
HDTV costs too much, requires a TV the size of a 4'x8' sheet of plywood (or what is the point?), and offers nothing I want. I'd take an HD movie if only the studios would ship one. Have a look at the file sizes on DVDs -- maybe only half the time do they actually fill a dual-layer. Ironically, Disney is rah rah on Blu-Ray, when their product could ship on a CD, contains the least amount of extras of any studio, and doesn't benefit from extras anyway.
The Corporation shipped with the movie and 6 hours of interviews on the second DVD. I think there is enough room on a DVD for pretty much any video I can think of, and if there isn't, well Lawrence of Arabia had an intermission in the theaters, why not at home?
Personally I will never even have digital TV (again). I don't want someone monitoring what I watch, the digital jaggies happened all to often, and the Outdoor Life Channel is now in the "lower 48" so what is the point?
I think the Discovery/NG channels are cow feed. Compare when the History Channel and Discovery do a subject. History, you get the facts. Discovery, you get the faux drama.
I have a similar approach -- plenty of metamoderating, not so much moderating. But why wait until you are "offered" a chance to metamoderate? You can do this any time you want and there is always a backlog that needs metamodding. In fact there seem to be months of backlogged posts waiting to be metamodded.
/. still have unlimited mods and can down-mod the trolls any time. Besides, troll/redundant/offtopic stuff is not a problem. It won't get upmodded, so we can set a threshhold to avoid it -- or we can just skip over the reading of it. But deliberately burying posts that hurt you or your company's image -- this sucks and should be stopped/made more difficult.
On the topic of moderations, the "overrated" mod is ripe for abuse. Even the other negative mods are too easy to use and thus abuse. I suggest that any negative mod cost you 3 mod points -- we are supposed to concentrate on up-modding after all. You could still use it to nuke a post you didn't like, but then you would be unable to go nuke 4 other posts on your personal vendetta list. The core people who run
Now watch this get modded offtopic...
What I found when I first tried to play MP3s on Media Player was that MP itself was using a gross amount of the cpu by itself (30% to 40% cpu utilization!). This was when CPUs were slower and I couldn't stand the slowdown so I went off and found Ultra Player -- a free, stable, "does one thing well" skinnable player that has continued to meet my audio needs to this day. Currently it is using 1 to 2% of cpu using my motherboard sound chip. I think you wasted your money.
The virtual desktops I tried were third party add-ons to Windows. In general I have scaled back installing extra stuff on my computers over the years. I have no problem with the XP (2000/9x) theme, once I have changed the default window background color to grey instead of white. I don't need Gauntlet.scr. And when I do install my 5 or 10 need-to-have-ems, I often use a vintage version, sometimes as far back as a Windows 3.x version, because of less-is-more benefits, or them being nag/cripple-free.
For as many systems as I have administered, across a LAN, WAN and via the Internet, I am racking my brain to think of a single case where I needed to stay logged in across an extended period of time (let's say more than 24 hours). And the longest cases most likely involved a lengthy file transfer or database process -- not a lot of local things need to be running to make that happen.
Yup, this otherwise doggy 750mHz or so machine had the best graphics card in the house (probably a 64MB nVidia as well) and ran games quite well. The only person who really suffered with this machine was myself when I came along to stop the video game time and then had to wait 2 or 3 minutes for the full RAM swap from video game world to Windows desktop.
We froze the kid's video games at 100 (or whatever it was) titles and haven't let them buy many since about 2004. What they do play are often flash-based online things that are quite lean compared to almost any CD-delivered game.
For me the worst feature of all about that computer, ok two of them, were: (1) a 12GB c: drive & 16GB d: drive (yowzer) and (2) USB 1.0 ports. I think I could have transferred files faster by sucking them up my nose and squirting them out my eye.
But XP systems are easily tuned and balanced. Vista systems get spec'd with maximum, not balanced, components and yet they are still a downgrade from the machine you had before. If you throw everything you have at a problem and it still doesn't yield, time to stick a fork in it.
The extreme developer case I was thinking of was a Clarion developer who would not install *anything* that didn't directly lead to billable product. He wouldn't change his wallpaper, screen saver, add or remove programs, services, and certainly not install something as indulgent as WinAmp, for example.
:-)
In defense of this seeming stupidity, he was working on Windows 95 at the time
You're setup sounds entirely reasonable for a developer. Personally I gave up on virtual desktops back in the Windows 3.1 days, but I keep plenty of applications open on my current 1GB main work beast as well. I don't think Linux is the only OS that could load what you have loaded. Besides I've found that efficiency drops as the number of active up-on-the-screen eating-up-real-estate things rises beyond 3 to 5 so I avoid this and don't miss it. I will set things up for a given task, do the task and then shut down what is not needed for the next task group (keeping audio / media / browser / email always open).
As in love as you are with your Linux/Unix things over the years, I could spin similar stories about my Vic20/C64/Trash80/Clone/Kaypro/DOS/Windows PCs. We're both just trying to get work done and so naturally Vista doesn't begin to look interesting.
(1) the whack is implied in that the scenario he talks about it not relevant to most people and 512MB is a "most people" amount of memory, not a professional web site designer amount.
(2) as I corrected when someone else pointed it out, I meant wmplayer.exe.
(3) you skipped part of my scenario, I'm not sure why.
(the rest of your comments) I think that young users are very different from novice users. I was talking about one, you the other. Novice users to me are people who haven't seen a computer before and in general that means older people. Young users could be the next Bill Gates...or Bill Murray. Yes, in general, young users are more empowered (i.e. less fearful), but that was not the scenario I was talking about.
Heh, this whole thing is about "If you only do a + b, 512MB is tons. If you are Johnny Quest or Robert Goddard, buy whatever the heck you need and stay off my lawn."
I think I mis-typed -- wmplayer.exe. Windows Media Player, v10.0.0
This is so far out of whack, it's time for whack-a-troll.
(1) You point out that "novice users" (and that would be the vast majority of computer users), are not going to run Photoshop. Yet you mention that 512MB ain't enough to run it. Why did you even mention it then?
(2) You say "or you like to play mp3s while working", implying that this would overload a 512MB XP machine. I have mplayer.exe running with a movie paused -- 17MB of RAM used. 17MB more is going to break the XP camel's back?
(3) "or a number of other situation". You mean like running AutoCAD, a continuous system benchmark, and playing WoW...while downloading pr0n? Man, I see novices doing that all the time.
(4) "but I will be [sic] that they *will* have a large number of applications open at once". Well, in my experience novices tend to have a grand total of one program open at once, and if you try to leave a second one open they will close it, sometimes even when you have carefully minimized it. Many developers are this way as well -- wanting to squeeze an extra 50msec out of that recompile. Oh, and that one program is almost for sure 99% most likely you-can-bet maximized.
Real world situation #1: upgrading the dreaded mother-in-law computer to XP involving a machine with 64MB of RAM. Yup, one-eighth of what you are whining about. EVERYTHING I re-installed worked. MS O2k, CompuServe 2000, graphics editors, alternate browser, etc. Yes, everything ran slowly. Yes, it was slow to boot up (but not as slow as 512MB Vista machines). And when told how cheap RAM was, the m-i-l rushed out and bought 256MB.
Real world situation #2: my wife upgrading her computer while I was away. It went from 98 to XP Pro, with 320MB of RAM. The thing ran hundreds of games and everything else. Nobody ever thought it was slow. I used it myself for some things for a time. It was only replaced a year ago, and died of dust overload, if anything.
Somewhere a chair-thrower is rubbing his hands together and saying "Vista is right on target!"
One thousand, one hundred and two tons of debris and dust.
Plus or minus 500 tons.
And think of how many bugs are created with the reinvent the wheel approach. Hundreds or thousands of times as many bugs as should be "created". Think of the suffering of the end users who get fed dog food that tastes different from the next hospital but is still dog food. Then the pompous twits at the top push for Joe's Custom Oracle Software Emporium to make changes to the crap they are being served. And it almost becomes usable. Until Joe comes out with Dog Crap 2.0. What a nasty cycle. I enjoyed breaking it whenever I had a chance.
And the one of those that jumps out at me is AMD with a market cap 30 times less than intel. 30 times!?11! How has AMD competed with intel with such a shortage of capital? There was a time when they were licensing some part of intel chips (if memory serves) but how can they afford the ongoing R&D costs, and then the sky high costs of new Fabs every few years? Amazing Hertz vs Avis situation there.