evilcat's Profile

I was under the impression that the only thing really moving towards cloud computing were gullible computing journalists and tech bloggers. I've yet to see anyone even using gmail exclusively over here beyond a handful of geeks. Perhaps it's because we, like Australia, are given bad broadband. My 'up to 8 meg' connection debuted at 2.2 meg in January 2007 and now sits between 900k and 1.05 meg as standard. It's very easy to forget there's a world outside of America, isn't it? Regardless, your line of reasoning is interesting, but follows the same patterns as all thinking regarding these ideas. In the 50's the future was robots doing your cooking and washing and cleaning... and they were right in a way, but so, so wrong. Microwaves have chips in them more powerful than a 1983 home computer and can cook a baked potato in 10% of the oven time. Your washing machine can be programmed to wash your clothes and then dry them, automatically. But do we have robots in the kitchen? No, not really.

"But until Apple’s marketshare is something more than a rounding error of Microsoft’s I think direct comparisons and talk of Apple kicking Microsoft’s butt is very premature." - gabriel I seem to recall figures recently which showed that Apple make 25% the amount of profit Microsoft do, with less than 10% of their marketshare. Don't quote me on the exact figures, but it's about right. This means Apple does not need to gain another 65% marketshare to beat Microsoft senseless. “So anyway, Microsoft, boo! You should be scared, because that little company is kicking your butt all over the place.” I'm with Beeb on this one, but, you're missing the point. MS is being beaten senseless by MULTIPLE little and no-so-little companies. With desktop OS, it's Apple. With servers, it's the various *NIXen out there. On the web for search and marketing, Google. But I'm not ready to write them off yet. They followed ME with their best OS, Win2k, which at the time, wiped the floor with OS 9. The late 90's was the perfect time for Linux to emerge to the desktop, back when people were still used to using a command line, yet it failed to do so, and Ubuntu et al have spent years trying to make it friendly enough for people lobotomized by years of Windows usage. Just two examples of how MS can (a) pull something good out of the hat after they screw up, and (b) the ease with which their competitors can make just enough errors to allow MS to gain the advantage.

Well, the big deal has been Bill leaving, and a load of stories going over his achievements over the last few decades. Plus, they're gunning for Google these days, not Apple.

I have not yet upgraded to Leopard. It's my policy to wait till somewhere around the 10.x.4 to 10.x.6 revision before upgrading, since Apple can't get their shit straight any quicker than that (kind of like Microsoft and SP1 or, usually, SP2). Tiger's doing everything I need right now, although the odd little App I use is now Leopard only, like Handbrake, for example. As far as I can tell, Snow Leopard is a Service Pack. It should be free. Also I'm waiting on confirmation from Apple that it's Intel only. I have just finished paying off a two year loan to cover the fortune I paid for my Quad G5. I can't believe it will be officially unsupported by OS X by summer '09. They were still selling them in summer '06! That said, if the upgrades are all optimisations for Intel only, Snow Leopard won't break compatibility with Leopard, and Universal Leopard apps will be compatible with both. That gives my G5 till the end of 2010 as a useable modern machine. And at least CS4 is still PowerPC compatible (I'm running the betas now). Back to the point: FREE service pack upgrade -- cost of disks and postage only.

According to Arstechnica, 10.6 is code named Snow Leopard and will exist solely as an evolutionary upgrade -- it is Leopard, optimised to within an inch of its life for Intel Macs only. There will be no major new features, it's all about speed and stability. http://arstechnica.com/journals/apple.ars/2008/06/04/mac-os-x-10-6-code-named-snow-leopard-may-be-pure-cocoa

No personal offense meant, as the article seemed to be interesting, right up to those benchmarks. Frankly, it's bullshit. My G5 Quad still performs like a champ, just having passed its second birthday. It cost be three grand and I run professional software (Creative Suite, etc). The G4 Mini could not have performed up to snuff (I often tax 3 out of the four processors), or take enough RAM to do this work. Also, I recently used a C2D based MacBook Pro, and found it unable to handle my working habits in a satisfactory manner, as two cores just didn't go far enough. I bought 'more mac than i need' in order to make it last. I can plonk a further 10Gb RAM in here and attach a 30" cinema display before it runs out of usefullness. This should see me through at least CS4 and most likely up to CS5. The only limitations I have noticed is that some software is now Leopard only, which causes me a problem. Your advice, however is correct. If I were to rush out and buy the latest 8 core Mac Pro, I would be buying more Mac than I need, as my current model meets my requirements. And the irony of being able to get a 4 core PC for 1/3 the price I paid is not lost on me either.

Apparently, since the BBC launched their streaming iPlayer onto the web, which shows recent TV shows at a quality somewhere between VHS and DVD, ISP's in the UK have seen a 20% surge in network traffic, and are afraid that they will be put out of business, as they can't afford to maintain that level of constant net traffic without putting up their prices or having the content provider (i.e. the BBC) subsidise their running costs. The BBC have told them where they can stick it. What does this mean? It means that HD streaming/downloading from, say, iTunes store at the quality we'd like will see the end of those £8.99/month allegedly up to 8Mb, allegedly unlimited broadband connections once and for all. In Hong Kong, you can get a 100Mb/s net connection. In the UK, most people get between 1Mb and 4Mb. My American father-in-law lives in the sticks and gets a 22k dial-up. To get anything else he'd need satellite at a cost of $99/month. BluRay will be the equivalent of SACD/DVD-A in the audio market. DVD is so cheap for the quality, and most HDTV owners think they are watching HD because that's what their TV is. If the network bandwidth problems can be solved then Apple will do very well in a few years time. Let them iron out their problems and sort 480p/576p pics at 8mb/s delivery, and people will be happy enough.