mcrain
Mar 16, 12:35 PM
Also, for the record, just because we could do it, doesn't necessarily mean we should. The free market should determine this. IF we're willing to pay more for American fuel, then so be it. If not, we'll continue buying from others... but don't let the government manipulate the markets and destroy common sense capitalism.
The free market is the part where your point goes off track. (edit - I reread what I posted and laughed coffee out of my nose... actually, to be honest, your point went off track before that, but for my purposes, I'm going to just address this one issue). If the free market were free, the decision would be made by the consumer and the consumer's money. Right?
Then, can you explain why there are multi-national oil. gas and coal companies that are responsible for almost 100% of our energy supply? Where is the "choice" for consumers? Where there is choice, we consumers choose by price, and we have shown we are willing to pay a premium for investment in renewable and/or less polluting energy. Where we don't have a choice, you find oil/gas/coal forced on us by big-oil (aka Republican) policies.
Personally, I'd love energy that was renewable, reliable and clean. I don't have the financial resources or education to develop that myself, so I and other consumers turn to our government to do things that benefit our society.
Why on earth do you support the big-oil (Republican) policies that stifle competition in the free market and prevent the development of types of energy that would beat big oil/coal/gas in a competitive free market?
Seems anti-free-market... doesn't it?
The free market is the part where your point goes off track. (edit - I reread what I posted and laughed coffee out of my nose... actually, to be honest, your point went off track before that, but for my purposes, I'm going to just address this one issue). If the free market were free, the decision would be made by the consumer and the consumer's money. Right?
Then, can you explain why there are multi-national oil. gas and coal companies that are responsible for almost 100% of our energy supply? Where is the "choice" for consumers? Where there is choice, we consumers choose by price, and we have shown we are willing to pay a premium for investment in renewable and/or less polluting energy. Where we don't have a choice, you find oil/gas/coal forced on us by big-oil (aka Republican) policies.
Personally, I'd love energy that was renewable, reliable and clean. I don't have the financial resources or education to develop that myself, so I and other consumers turn to our government to do things that benefit our society.
Why on earth do you support the big-oil (Republican) policies that stifle competition in the free market and prevent the development of types of energy that would beat big oil/coal/gas in a competitive free market?
Seems anti-free-market... doesn't it?
greenstork
Sep 20, 05:49 PM
Just thought I'd add some tidbits to the DVR discussion. As a few others have pointed out, El Gato and others don't do digital cable content. Digital cable is encoded and the only way to decode it currently is with a cable company set-top box or a CableCARD.
Any device that is capable of accepting a CableCARD must be certified by CableLabs, which is setup and run by all of the cable companies.
CableLabs certified CableCARD devices go through a rigorous certification process. There are a handful of televisions certified and only one DVR, the TiVo Series 3. Windows Media Centers have been waiting for CableCARDs for years but CableLabs won't certify Media Center PCs until Vista comes out, with it's much stronger DRM. Because OS X's/Quicktime's DRM just isn't that difficult to hack, it's going to be a long time before we see a CableCARD capable device working in or alongside a Mac. In other words, Macs won't be recording a digital TV stream for a couple of years at least.
Sure, you could hook up a set-top box to your Mac but then the signal has been converted from digital to analog, back to digital again. Also, you have no control over the channel unless you implement some IR blaster device or something. And that solution is far from easy to use, I'll stick with my TiVo for high definition dual channel recording.
Any device that is capable of accepting a CableCARD must be certified by CableLabs, which is setup and run by all of the cable companies.
CableLabs certified CableCARD devices go through a rigorous certification process. There are a handful of televisions certified and only one DVR, the TiVo Series 3. Windows Media Centers have been waiting for CableCARDs for years but CableLabs won't certify Media Center PCs until Vista comes out, with it's much stronger DRM. Because OS X's/Quicktime's DRM just isn't that difficult to hack, it's going to be a long time before we see a CableCARD capable device working in or alongside a Mac. In other words, Macs won't be recording a digital TV stream for a couple of years at least.
Sure, you could hook up a set-top box to your Mac but then the signal has been converted from digital to analog, back to digital again. Also, you have no control over the channel unless you implement some IR blaster device or something. And that solution is far from easy to use, I'll stick with my TiVo for high definition dual channel recording.
shamino
Mar 18, 03:50 PM
The interesting thing here is that this hack doesn't violate the DMCA. It violates the iTunes shrink-wrap license, but that's only enforceable in VA and MD.
The DMCA doesn't allow breaking encryption. So saving a data stream that is sent unencrypted from a legal distributor doesn't violate this law.
Apple's "fix" for this is fairly simple. Send the files in an ecrypted form. In order to maximize caching, use a common key that all iTunes clients have built-in, sort of like DVDs and CES. The client can then decrypt with the common key and re-encrypt with the DRM key.
This doesn't make it any more difficult for a creating programmer to capture the stream and remove the common encryption without applying DRM, but it does mean that he has to decrypt something in the process. Which makes it into a DMCA violation.
Of course, a new iTunes update will be required to make this happen, but this wouldn't be the first time Apple made a change to ITMS requiring an iTunes upgrade.
The DMCA doesn't allow breaking encryption. So saving a data stream that is sent unencrypted from a legal distributor doesn't violate this law.
Apple's "fix" for this is fairly simple. Send the files in an ecrypted form. In order to maximize caching, use a common key that all iTunes clients have built-in, sort of like DVDs and CES. The client can then decrypt with the common key and re-encrypt with the DRM key.
This doesn't make it any more difficult for a creating programmer to capture the stream and remove the common encryption without applying DRM, but it does mean that he has to decrypt something in the process. Which makes it into a DMCA violation.
Of course, a new iTunes update will be required to make this happen, but this wouldn't be the first time Apple made a change to ITMS requiring an iTunes upgrade.
adamfilip
Sep 26, 07:37 AM
im hoping that apple has optimized leopard to be able to assign certain applications to certain cores. just like what some of the other posters have said
4 cores for Cinema 4D
1 core for internet and mail
2 cores for photoshop
1 core for quicktime dvd playback
4 cores for Cinema 4D
1 core for internet and mail
2 cores for photoshop
1 core for quicktime dvd playback
rdowns
Apr 15, 10:49 AM
Snip a bunch of made up crap from a made up book supposedly written by a made up guy.
More hate from the god squad. :rolleyes:
More hate from the god squad. :rolleyes:
skunk
Apr 24, 10:50 AM
I'm just entertaining the notion of agnosticism as a kind of nod to the great debt we owe Judaism and Christianity. If it wasn't for those two faiths which allowed for reformations (such a thing would be impossible under, say, Islam) then secular Western democracies would be vastly different.What do you mean by "allowed for"? Do you mean that they could have slaughtered more people in the wars of religion? As for Islam, we probably would not have had a Renaissance without Islam.
If Europe had succumbed to the advance of Islam, if Vienna had fallen in the 17th century things likely would be very different today. Europe would have produced as many Nobel Prize winners as the entire Islamic WorldWe would all be speaking German I expect.
If Europe had succumbed to the advance of Islam, if Vienna had fallen in the 17th century things likely would be very different today. Europe would have produced as many Nobel Prize winners as the entire Islamic WorldWe would all be speaking German I expect.
Apple OC
Apr 24, 06:15 PM
just what we need in the world ... a McPeace treaty:cool:
AJsAWiz
Jun 13, 06:17 PM
I loved the iPhone, but the AT&T service is crap! It drops calls with 5 Bars and 3G, so the Towers are not the issue. If Steve Jobs would wake F&*$ up and get with Verizon then AT&T would go out of Business. I am now with Verizon which is where I came from to get the iPhone and I have not dropped a call yet?
C'Mon Steve get the iPhone to Verizon.
I've had the iPhone since it first came out ( currently have 3GS) and have just started having signal strength problems and dropped calls in the past year. This problem was far worse when I was with Verizon. It was so bad that Verizon, after seeing the history of calls to customer service, finally let me out of my contract without having to pay a termination fee. Then I went to AT&T.
C'Mon Steve get the iPhone to Verizon.
I've had the iPhone since it first came out ( currently have 3GS) and have just started having signal strength problems and dropped calls in the past year. This problem was far worse when I was with Verizon. It was so bad that Verizon, after seeing the history of calls to customer service, finally let me out of my contract without having to pay a termination fee. Then I went to AT&T.
drapacioli
Sep 2, 10:45 AM
Is it just certain phones that get dropped calls? I have AT&T and when I demoed the iPhone in store the only phone call I tried to make with it was a dropped call. But my current phone, the Samsung Captivate, I have never even had a low signal, let alone a dropped call.
entatlrg
Mar 13, 02:35 PM
Yea, this is one of the few controversial posts I've made here, I expected some criticism, and likely deserve it as I definitely don't get the whole picture, then again who does.
I'm not saying oil isn't a HUGE problem, or rebutting some of the good points here.
When a nuclear disaster happens hundreds of thousands of people can die, if unleashed in war it could be the end of the world, plus accidents, human error, countries letting power plants age and neglect updates not because they can't afford it but instead because they want the incredible profits from it.
It's not good, I'll never be convinced otherwise. Look at countries like Denmark and the rest of Scandinavia how well they manage their power, the research, alternative (green) energy sources in play and working NOW ... it's incredible and goes unnoticed.
There is better ways.
NO nuclear.
I'm not saying oil isn't a HUGE problem, or rebutting some of the good points here.
When a nuclear disaster happens hundreds of thousands of people can die, if unleashed in war it could be the end of the world, plus accidents, human error, countries letting power plants age and neglect updates not because they can't afford it but instead because they want the incredible profits from it.
It's not good, I'll never be convinced otherwise. Look at countries like Denmark and the rest of Scandinavia how well they manage their power, the research, alternative (green) energy sources in play and working NOW ... it's incredible and goes unnoticed.
There is better ways.
NO nuclear.
blueflame
Aug 29, 10:52 AM
Boo hoo. its a business, waht do they realistically expect?
iJohnHenry
Mar 11, 07:20 PM
I pray that this will not turn into another Chernobyl situation.
ct2k7
Apr 24, 04:29 PM
no, i've not posted these before...
Not you - someone presented these to me before. They have been heavily edited to suit a point. In some cases, what's being said contradicts an earlier sentence.
the point of
is that if he says whoever guards his chastity is guaranteed paradise then the opposite is true.
Yes. However, remaining in chastity is a real gem. I don't think anyone, till date has ever achieved that.
Most honour killings occur in muslim majority countries, or are perpetrated by muslims.
Correlation does not mean causation. (This phrase is hardwired into my head - it was the only mark I lost in a Biology A Level paper).
and also:
A manual of Islamic law certified as a reliable guide to Sunni orthodoxy by Al-Azhar University, the most respected authority in Sunni Islam, says that "retaliation is obligatory against anyone who kills a human being purely intentionally and without right." However, "not subject to retaliation" is "a father or mother (or their fathers or mothers) for killing their offspring, or offspring's offspring." ('Umdat al-Salik o1.1-2).
I guess Islamic clerics are also misinterpreting Islam's message of peace and inclusion? A person might kill his offspring or offsprings offspring for dishonouring the family.
The thing with that, and I remember someone talking about it, is that there had to be certain conditions which were met before honour killing was even an option.
In the cases I've seen, it is murder without trial. Now Islam upholds the sanctity of life, and the Quran declares that killing one innocent human being is akin to killing the entire human race.
Now, the problem of �honour killings� is not a problem of morality or of ensuring that women maintain their own personal virtue; rather, it is a problem of domination, power and hatred of women who, in these instances, are viewed as nothing more than servants to the family, both physically and symbolically.
Islamic Scholars have continuously condemned honour killings. It is not for us to judge, that is for Allah to decide.
in your refutations of my point you don't seem to find any problem with women being beaten for being unchaste lol.
[quote]
You didn't bring it to my attention ;)
[quote]
my point in mentioning Bukhari: Volume 7, Book 63, Number 196: and the other one which deals with testifying against oneself four times is that it shows that counts as four witnesses for the purposes of someone being found guilty of adultery.
Yes. Whilst this may seem weird, the person giving the witness, if indeed four times, must be trustworthy. In this case she was. She wanted to repent, knowing the proceeds that would occur.
Not you - someone presented these to me before. They have been heavily edited to suit a point. In some cases, what's being said contradicts an earlier sentence.
the point of
is that if he says whoever guards his chastity is guaranteed paradise then the opposite is true.
Yes. However, remaining in chastity is a real gem. I don't think anyone, till date has ever achieved that.
Most honour killings occur in muslim majority countries, or are perpetrated by muslims.
Correlation does not mean causation. (This phrase is hardwired into my head - it was the only mark I lost in a Biology A Level paper).
and also:
A manual of Islamic law certified as a reliable guide to Sunni orthodoxy by Al-Azhar University, the most respected authority in Sunni Islam, says that "retaliation is obligatory against anyone who kills a human being purely intentionally and without right." However, "not subject to retaliation" is "a father or mother (or their fathers or mothers) for killing their offspring, or offspring's offspring." ('Umdat al-Salik o1.1-2).
I guess Islamic clerics are also misinterpreting Islam's message of peace and inclusion? A person might kill his offspring or offsprings offspring for dishonouring the family.
The thing with that, and I remember someone talking about it, is that there had to be certain conditions which were met before honour killing was even an option.
In the cases I've seen, it is murder without trial. Now Islam upholds the sanctity of life, and the Quran declares that killing one innocent human being is akin to killing the entire human race.
Now, the problem of �honour killings� is not a problem of morality or of ensuring that women maintain their own personal virtue; rather, it is a problem of domination, power and hatred of women who, in these instances, are viewed as nothing more than servants to the family, both physically and symbolically.
Islamic Scholars have continuously condemned honour killings. It is not for us to judge, that is for Allah to decide.
in your refutations of my point you don't seem to find any problem with women being beaten for being unchaste lol.
[quote]
You didn't bring it to my attention ;)
[quote]
my point in mentioning Bukhari: Volume 7, Book 63, Number 196: and the other one which deals with testifying against oneself four times is that it shows that counts as four witnesses for the purposes of someone being found guilty of adultery.
Yes. Whilst this may seem weird, the person giving the witness, if indeed four times, must be trustworthy. In this case she was. She wanted to repent, knowing the proceeds that would occur.
kdarling
Jun 14, 02:31 PM
If you want to program for the iPhone without buying a Mac or learning Objective-C, you can use DragonFire:
http://www.dragonfiresdk.com
It's a very (very) abbreviated C++ like API with screen and button and image suppoert, that you can use to program under free Visual Studio on a PC. Even has an iPhone emulator.
Then you click a button and it apparently sends a internally translated C to Objective-C source up to their Mac servers, which compile it for the iPhone and sends it back signed with their developer tag.
The SDK itself is something like $50 for a local-test-only version, and $100 for the full compile-for-the-real-device version.
For a small price you can submit it under their name to the App Store. Or something like that. Haven't tried it yet.
http://www.dragonfiresdk.com
It's a very (very) abbreviated C++ like API with screen and button and image suppoert, that you can use to program under free Visual Studio on a PC. Even has an iPhone emulator.
Then you click a button and it apparently sends a internally translated C to Objective-C source up to their Mac servers, which compile it for the iPhone and sends it back signed with their developer tag.
The SDK itself is something like $50 for a local-test-only version, and $100 for the full compile-for-the-real-device version.
For a small price you can submit it under their name to the App Store. Or something like that. Haven't tried it yet.
Pants
Oct 9, 04:18 AM
Ive been using xp pro for 3 months here at work, and I have to say I'm quietly impressed. Its never crashed, nothing has unepectedly quit (and its running a bunch of custom pci cards, so if ever it was flakey, id have expected it to be so with this rig...). My only complaint is the 'look' of it - osX does look nicer, but then osX is a lot less snappy.
So where does my money go to with Apple? I posses a bunch of apples, and each time I buy a new one i feel a little less 'happy' and a little more like a regular consumer. After all, the days of non proprietory hardware being used in apples are gone - its all usb and firewire (and not even cutting edge usb at that). Some of my reasons for disliking M$ are also beginning to surface with appl� - .mac for a start. What osX has done is open my eyes to using linux at home (or maybe x86 solaris) ...switching? hmmm....
oh, and did anyone mention that apples floating point performance was good? no - its awful!
So where does my money go to with Apple? I posses a bunch of apples, and each time I buy a new one i feel a little less 'happy' and a little more like a regular consumer. After all, the days of non proprietory hardware being used in apples are gone - its all usb and firewire (and not even cutting edge usb at that). Some of my reasons for disliking M$ are also beginning to surface with appl� - .mac for a start. What osX has done is open my eyes to using linux at home (or maybe x86 solaris) ...switching? hmmm....
oh, and did anyone mention that apples floating point performance was good? no - its awful!
stompy
Apr 14, 03:36 PM
, are you sure? free, (almost) trouble free,
Agreed. All the little things add up quickly.
I like to do is to come in here and be reminded of some of the misconceptions I had when I first started switching over 5 years ago.
Yep. People often confuse bias with knowledge. I'm guilty as well.
We all know how Macs look nowadays (iMac, Mini, Macbooks, etc) and with the possible exception of the Mac Pro, none of them look much like the 1990s era Mac Quadra 800. Meanwhile, if you want to see something that looks like this today, it's readily available from Dell, HP, and half a dozen other "mini tower" PC makers. Wow.
My company just replaced a co-worker dead desktop with this:
http://i.dell.com/das/dih.ashx/232x232/das/xa_____/global-site-design%20WEB/a9c356c6-fafb-1634-c73b-34d50ab45516/1/OriginalJPG?id=Dell/Product_Images/Dell_Client_Products/Workstations/Fixed_Workstations/Precision/Precision_T3500/right_facing/us-11-22-shipsfast-500x500-t3500.jpg
Well, it's utilitarian. Some would argue that they want a computer, not a sculpture. Ok, but there are reasons behind every object designed. This object says "cheap. cheap. cheap."
That ancient form factor is one thing I don't miss after switching. It's like somebody on the PC side hit the "pause" button when they got their 1994 mini tower PC design completed and all these years later still I see more mini towers than any other PC form factor but I see very few Macs with this ancient form factor.
At the end of your post, you mention needs and tastes and I must admit that industrial design figures prominently in my tastes since switching to Apple gear. Even if the OS were equal (which they are not), I want stuff that doesn't take up more room than necessary, isn't noisier or hotter than necessary and looks good.
On a checklist, those things don't seem like much, but I agree: when you put it on your desk, it all matters (some things, obviously, more than others).
Agreed. All the little things add up quickly.
I like to do is to come in here and be reminded of some of the misconceptions I had when I first started switching over 5 years ago.
Yep. People often confuse bias with knowledge. I'm guilty as well.
We all know how Macs look nowadays (iMac, Mini, Macbooks, etc) and with the possible exception of the Mac Pro, none of them look much like the 1990s era Mac Quadra 800. Meanwhile, if you want to see something that looks like this today, it's readily available from Dell, HP, and half a dozen other "mini tower" PC makers. Wow.
My company just replaced a co-worker dead desktop with this:
http://i.dell.com/das/dih.ashx/232x232/das/xa_____/global-site-design%20WEB/a9c356c6-fafb-1634-c73b-34d50ab45516/1/OriginalJPG?id=Dell/Product_Images/Dell_Client_Products/Workstations/Fixed_Workstations/Precision/Precision_T3500/right_facing/us-11-22-shipsfast-500x500-t3500.jpg
Well, it's utilitarian. Some would argue that they want a computer, not a sculpture. Ok, but there are reasons behind every object designed. This object says "cheap. cheap. cheap."
That ancient form factor is one thing I don't miss after switching. It's like somebody on the PC side hit the "pause" button when they got their 1994 mini tower PC design completed and all these years later still I see more mini towers than any other PC form factor but I see very few Macs with this ancient form factor.
At the end of your post, you mention needs and tastes and I must admit that industrial design figures prominently in my tastes since switching to Apple gear. Even if the OS were equal (which they are not), I want stuff that doesn't take up more room than necessary, isn't noisier or hotter than necessary and looks good.
On a checklist, those things don't seem like much, but I agree: when you put it on your desk, it all matters (some things, obviously, more than others).
JackAxe
Sep 26, 05:31 PM
I didn't know the Renderman Maya plug-in was not mult-threaded. I was thinking of getting it, are you saying it's only a one cpu renderer?
Yep. :( I know of a peep on the OS X Maya forum that ended up buying the full version. I don't have the money for that sort of thing, so I'm not going to buy until the RenderMan Plug-in supports whatever 64-bit version of Maya is released in the future. Then I'll also be upgrading Maya. :)
***
You can download the eval copy to try it out.
<]=)
Yep. :( I know of a peep on the OS X Maya forum that ended up buying the full version. I don't have the money for that sort of thing, so I'm not going to buy until the RenderMan Plug-in supports whatever 64-bit version of Maya is released in the future. Then I'll also be upgrading Maya. :)
***
You can download the eval copy to try it out.
<]=)
Abulia
Sep 26, 06:41 PM
I think beyond a certain level all these Cores are only going to be good for building up your ePeen, speaking of which where can I get one? :D
Nevermind they are only 1.66Ghz each, there are 8 of them!
It's not the speed of your cores that makes you a man, it's how many you have! :D
Nevermind they are only 1.66Ghz each, there are 8 of them!
It's not the speed of your cores that makes you a man, it's how many you have! :D
aswitcher
Jul 12, 03:46 PM
Smallish mid-tower case
Intel Core 2 Duo @ 2.8Ghz or better
1GB RAM
250GB SATA 3.0 HD
1-PCIe x16 Slot
1-Standard PCI Slot
6-USB 2.0 ports (One in front)
1- Firewire 800 port (in front)
Dual Layer DVD
Onboard 10/100/1000 (I don't care if its wireless, but a wireless opition would be nice but not necessary)
Graphics Card should be x1600XT or better with 256mb RAM
I want it at or less than $1199.00
4 ram slots so I can get 2 gig cheap or 4 gig if I want it.
2 x FW 400s well.
BT/AX standard of course.
Frontrow IR port.
Optical audio in/out.
User replacable Ram, HDD, Graphics card(?).
Intel Core 2 Duo @ 2.8Ghz or better
1GB RAM
250GB SATA 3.0 HD
1-PCIe x16 Slot
1-Standard PCI Slot
6-USB 2.0 ports (One in front)
1- Firewire 800 port (in front)
Dual Layer DVD
Onboard 10/100/1000 (I don't care if its wireless, but a wireless opition would be nice but not necessary)
Graphics Card should be x1600XT or better with 256mb RAM
I want it at or less than $1199.00
4 ram slots so I can get 2 gig cheap or 4 gig if I want it.
2 x FW 400s well.
BT/AX standard of course.
Frontrow IR port.
Optical audio in/out.
User replacable Ram, HDD, Graphics card(?).
zero2dash
Jul 13, 10:47 AM
Apple needs to keep the prices and the configurations real now more than ever. I'm not saying PAR but but they can't get crazy.
Amen to that.
Look, I was looking forward to probably getting a Mac Pro later this year/early next year (more towards the time that all the "initial adopters" have reported all their bugs and CS3/Adobe goes Universal) but then I realized that I'd most likely be paying at least $2,000 for a BASE Mac Pro and that's disgusting. I'd like a Mac Pro with a decent amount of bells and whistles, not a base model...so then I'm probably paying $2,500+ (closer to $3,000) and that's ridiculous.
I love OSX as much as the next guy, but $3,000 is a large sum to pay for a computer. $3,000 could pay off about half of my remaining car loan balance...so if I have $3,000 dispensable income, sorry - I'd rather get the car paid off.
If Apple said "we realize the market prices and we're going to be competitive" then I'd be all ears. But we all know that isn't going to happen; no matter who makes Apple's innards or how non-unique it is, Apple will still charge an arm and a leg over street prices and quote it as being "the price to pay for the Apple experience". Like sbarton said, you can build a Core 2 Duo system for cheaper than $1,200 and I guarantee you that it'll come with a whole lot more than a Mac Pro costing twice the amount. If you're so hung up on running Windows and you hate it that bad, then by all means find a *nix distro that you like or attempt to run OSX86 on it. (I'm not encouraging software piracy nor am I discussing it further - I'm just saying "it's an option".)
I really want to buy an Apple again after using a G5 for the last year + at work, and I'm having a crippled experience on an outdated/slow machine running old versions of the programs I use. (G5 1.8, 1256mb RAM, OSX 10.39 Panther, Adobe CS Suite 1) It's high time though that I've come to realize that I'll never get a Mac for what I'm willing to pay for one, and I'm not accepting crippled hardware just to get OSX (ie buying a Mini or even an iMac both of which will undoubtedly be cheaper than a Mac Pro). Dell's get cheaper by the day...heck Dell's nowadays in most cases are actually cheaper than building your own (and you get a lot of freebie bonuses including monitors and the Windows License/install discs that you normally pay for). I thought about buying a refurb G5 DP (prob a 2.3) but for what I'd pay for that, it's still several hundred dollars over the same Core 2 system with better hardware, so I'm stuck no matter what I do. I'm not looking for pity or trying to incite a flame war, I'm just saying.
Meanwhile Apple apparently hasn't gotten the memo about PC price inflation being dead as of 6+ years ago. /shrug
Enjoy your new computers folks...wish I had the money to join you. Guess I'll stick with my P4 desktop and A2200+ laptop for now and maybe build a Core 2 system next year instead and take some of that extra money and put it towards the car loan. :( Guess I'll be sticking with CS2 in Windows for the time being...
Amen to that.
Look, I was looking forward to probably getting a Mac Pro later this year/early next year (more towards the time that all the "initial adopters" have reported all their bugs and CS3/Adobe goes Universal) but then I realized that I'd most likely be paying at least $2,000 for a BASE Mac Pro and that's disgusting. I'd like a Mac Pro with a decent amount of bells and whistles, not a base model...so then I'm probably paying $2,500+ (closer to $3,000) and that's ridiculous.
I love OSX as much as the next guy, but $3,000 is a large sum to pay for a computer. $3,000 could pay off about half of my remaining car loan balance...so if I have $3,000 dispensable income, sorry - I'd rather get the car paid off.
If Apple said "we realize the market prices and we're going to be competitive" then I'd be all ears. But we all know that isn't going to happen; no matter who makes Apple's innards or how non-unique it is, Apple will still charge an arm and a leg over street prices and quote it as being "the price to pay for the Apple experience". Like sbarton said, you can build a Core 2 Duo system for cheaper than $1,200 and I guarantee you that it'll come with a whole lot more than a Mac Pro costing twice the amount. If you're so hung up on running Windows and you hate it that bad, then by all means find a *nix distro that you like or attempt to run OSX86 on it. (I'm not encouraging software piracy nor am I discussing it further - I'm just saying "it's an option".)
I really want to buy an Apple again after using a G5 for the last year + at work, and I'm having a crippled experience on an outdated/slow machine running old versions of the programs I use. (G5 1.8, 1256mb RAM, OSX 10.39 Panther, Adobe CS Suite 1) It's high time though that I've come to realize that I'll never get a Mac for what I'm willing to pay for one, and I'm not accepting crippled hardware just to get OSX (ie buying a Mini or even an iMac both of which will undoubtedly be cheaper than a Mac Pro). Dell's get cheaper by the day...heck Dell's nowadays in most cases are actually cheaper than building your own (and you get a lot of freebie bonuses including monitors and the Windows License/install discs that you normally pay for). I thought about buying a refurb G5 DP (prob a 2.3) but for what I'd pay for that, it's still several hundred dollars over the same Core 2 system with better hardware, so I'm stuck no matter what I do. I'm not looking for pity or trying to incite a flame war, I'm just saying.
Meanwhile Apple apparently hasn't gotten the memo about PC price inflation being dead as of 6+ years ago. /shrug
Enjoy your new computers folks...wish I had the money to join you. Guess I'll stick with my P4 desktop and A2200+ laptop for now and maybe build a Core 2 system next year instead and take some of that extra money and put it towards the car loan. :( Guess I'll be sticking with CS2 in Windows for the time being...
dethmaShine
Apr 20, 05:30 PM
Android is to Windows, as iOS is to Mac OS.
The similarities are astounding � Google is doing the same thing Microsoft did back in the day.
As much as Apple cares about marketshare, the experience is more important to them then the product itself. That's really something.
And there's one more thing. Back then, it was Mac and only mac.
Today, its an ecosystem. Hard to beat.
The similarities are astounding � Google is doing the same thing Microsoft did back in the day.
As much as Apple cares about marketshare, the experience is more important to them then the product itself. That's really something.
And there's one more thing. Back then, it was Mac and only mac.
Today, its an ecosystem. Hard to beat.
pdjudd
Oct 8, 09:19 AM
...but who has the market share?
In smart phones? I believe Nokia and RIM are the big ones - and they are both vendors that have a high degree of control over the software and hardware. On the desktop market it clearly is MS, but it's not really accurate to say that they got that way due to availability on every hardware system under the sun. Microsoft's successes are due to bulding up from prior successes. No surprise their biggest success was practically given to them by a bone headed decision by IBM.
RIM is one proof that you can get tons of market share even when you control the whole widget to a high degree. The second component is having enough SKU's to accommodate different needs. Of course it can become very unwieldy very quickly.
Google's biggest problem is avoiding the pitfalls that Microsoft fell into - trying to have a product that does everything in a market that tends to have difficulty in making choices. Either you get it right and maintain it with a focused plan, or you just release a new product every few months and see if it sticks somewhere.
We cannot say that Google will succeed with this strategy simply because we have a hard time predicting how it will happen - there are too many players vigorously competing. We don;t have an situation like the desktop market where an IBM mentality of thinking can just hand over the market to Google. Just because you attach "Google" and "Open" to something doesn't mean that it's going to succeed. And even if it does, succeed, it could be for a different reason altogether.
If I was a gambling person, I would say that ranking isn't going to be the factor to look at since all the contenders are going to be really close to each other - its not going to matter if "Google is in Second" because they will have to contend with a market where they can go to third in 6 months. In other workds - its who can do the best at leveraging one success into another - and in a market such as this - anybody can do that.
In smart phones? I believe Nokia and RIM are the big ones - and they are both vendors that have a high degree of control over the software and hardware. On the desktop market it clearly is MS, but it's not really accurate to say that they got that way due to availability on every hardware system under the sun. Microsoft's successes are due to bulding up from prior successes. No surprise their biggest success was practically given to them by a bone headed decision by IBM.
RIM is one proof that you can get tons of market share even when you control the whole widget to a high degree. The second component is having enough SKU's to accommodate different needs. Of course it can become very unwieldy very quickly.
Google's biggest problem is avoiding the pitfalls that Microsoft fell into - trying to have a product that does everything in a market that tends to have difficulty in making choices. Either you get it right and maintain it with a focused plan, or you just release a new product every few months and see if it sticks somewhere.
We cannot say that Google will succeed with this strategy simply because we have a hard time predicting how it will happen - there are too many players vigorously competing. We don;t have an situation like the desktop market where an IBM mentality of thinking can just hand over the market to Google. Just because you attach "Google" and "Open" to something doesn't mean that it's going to succeed. And even if it does, succeed, it could be for a different reason altogether.
If I was a gambling person, I would say that ranking isn't going to be the factor to look at since all the contenders are going to be really close to each other - its not going to matter if "Google is in Second" because they will have to contend with a market where they can go to third in 6 months. In other workds - its who can do the best at leveraging one success into another - and in a market such as this - anybody can do that.
flopticalcube
Apr 22, 08:09 PM
I consider myself an atheist who tries to back up my points with facts. I've seen most other posters who are atheists do the same. I hope you are wrong about it being a "trendy" thing to do but I do hope more people see the reasoning behind atheism and join us for the correct reasons. As far as agnostics go, I know the difference between us and I couldn't care less....close enough in my eyes!!!! An atheist and an agnostic arguing to me is like hearing a Catholic and a Protestant argue....such a small difference in something so important.
To be fair there are both agnostic atheists and agnostic theists. I would assume most atheists fall in the former category.
To be fair there are both agnostic atheists and agnostic theists. I would assume most atheists fall in the former category.
Project
Sep 20, 01:55 AM
I hate to be the first to post a negative but here it is. I don't think this will be overly expensive, but I also think we will be underwhelmed with it's features. Wireless is not that important to me. There are many wires back there already. It sounds like it will not have HDMI or TiVo features, and it will play movies out of iTunes, which screams to me that it will only play .mp4 and .m4v files much like my 5G iPod. If it cannot browse my my mac or firedrive, cannot stream from them, cannot play .avi, .wmw, .rm or VCD, then it will not replace my 4 year old xbox. Which itself has a 120Gig drive and a remote. Unless we are all sorely mistaken about what iTV will end up being, and it ends up adding these features (as someone above me noted, hoping Apple would read this forum) I will wait. Honestly, I am far more excited over the prospect of the MacBook Pros hopefully switching to Core 2 Duos before year end. Then I will have a much more powerful machine slung to my firedrive, router, xbox and tv. :)
Its Front Row. Which can play whatever Quicktime can play. Which means it can play avi, wmv etc. Just install the codecs.
Its Front Row. Which can play whatever Quicktime can play. Which means it can play avi, wmv etc. Just install the codecs.
No comments:
Post a Comment