pecosbill's Profile

  • May 28, 2008
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Latest comments made by: pecosbill

  • Hmm. My MacBook has had only one problem. No Safari freezes. If you have anything in /Library/Input Managers, remove it (SafariBlock 2.1 works fine for me, FYI). You should also check /Library/Internet Plug-ins (name?) to ensure you don't have any junk in there. I had a helper file in there for Flash and it was confusing the newest version. You might want to move all the plug-ins out and add them back one file at a time. DVD sharing probably only works well on 802.11n networks and wired GigE. The one time I had wake from sleep problems LONG ago, I had to do an Archive and Install(preserving settings). Worked fine after that as there was some software not behaving with the latest OS. I don't recall what it was. As for the window closing on volume eject, OS 9 did that. Is OS X supposed to randomly pick a location? Seems like a convenience to me but I like things tidy. My one problem stems from my WPA security, I guess. The network "hangs" until I turn AirPort off and back on. Many others have it too. I did an Archive and Install with settings preservation. I think I have to kill all the related support files and start over.
    pecosbill had this to say on Mar 25, 2008 Posts: 12
    Leopard: Not Quite Right
  • Makes you wonder if smackdown even read the article & comments. S/he is also as bad as any Mac zealot. So, with the following terms on the iPhone (probably new with the 1.1.1 update), I cannot understand why anyone would agree to them. Quite evil. Effectively, Apple states: "If we break your iPhone, you pay to fix it." Uppercase theirs. "6. Disclaimer of Warranties YOU EXPRESSLY ACKNOWLEDGE AND AGREE THAT USE OF THE iPHONE SOFTWARE AND iPHONE SOFTWARE UPDATES IS AT YOUR SOLE RISK AND THAT THE ENTIRE RISK AS TO SATISFACTORY QUALITY, PERFORMANCE, ACCURACY AND EFFORT IS WITH YOU. INSTALLATION OF THIS SOFTWARE MAY AFFECT THE USABILITY OF THIRD PARTY SOFTWARE. EXCEPT TO THE MAXIMUM EXTENT PERMITTED BY APPLICABLE LAW, THE iPHONE SOFTWARE AND iPHONE SOFTWARE UPDATES, AND ANY SERVICES PERFORMED BY THE IPHONE SOFTWARE AND IPHONE SOFTWARE UPDATES, ARE PROVIDED "AS IS", WITH ALL FAULTS AND WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, AND APPLE AND APPLE'S LICENSORS (COLLECTIVELY REFERRED TO AS "APPLE" FOR THE PURPOSES OF SECTIONS 6 AND 7) HEREBY DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES AND CONDITIONS WITH RESPECT TO THE iPHONE SOFTWARE AND iPHONE SOFTWARE UPDATES, EITHER EXPRESS, IMPLIED OR STATUTORY, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES AND/OR CONDITIONS OF MERCHANTABILITY, OF SATISFACTORY QUALITY, OF FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, OF ACCURACY, OF QUIET ENJOYMENT, AND NON-INFRINGEMENT OF THIRD PARTY RIGHTS. APPLE DOES NOT WARRANT AGAINST INTERFERENCE WITH YOUR ENJOYMENT OF THE iPHONE SOFTWARE AND iPHONE SOFTWARE UPDATES, THAT THE FUNCTIONS CONTAINED IN OR SERVICES PERFORMED BY THE iPHONE SOFTWARE AND iPHONE SOFTWARE UPDATES WILL MEET YOUR REQUIREMENTS, THAT THE OPERATION OF THE iPHONE SOFTWARE AND iPHONE SOFTWARE UPDATES WILL BE UNINTERRUPTED OR ERROR-FREE, OR THAT DEFECTS IN THE iPHONE SOFTWARE AND iPHONE SOFTWARE UPDATES WILL BE CORRECTED. NO ORAL OR WRITTEN INFORMATION OR ADVICE GIVEN BY APPLE OR AN APPLE AUTHORIZED REPRESENTATIVE SHALL CREATE A WARRANTY. SHOULD THE iPHONE SOFTWARE OR iPHONE SOFTWARE UPDATES PROVE DEFECTIVE, YOU ASSUME THE ENTIRE COST OF ALL NECESSARY SERVICING, REPAIR OR CORRECTION. SOME JURISDICTIONS DO NOT ALLOW THE EXCLUSION OF IMPLIED WARRANTIES OR LIMITATIONS ON APPLICABLE STATUTORY RIGHTS OF A CONSUMER, SO THE ABOVE EXCLUSION AND LIMITATIONS MAY NOT APPLY TO YOU."
    pecosbill had this to say on Oct 10, 2007 Posts: 12
    8 Reasons Windows Users Don’t Switch
  • Beeblebrox said "And digging themselves right into another one by bricking iPhones when customers exercise their right to open the phone to other carriers." Any iPhone owner specifically agreed via ToS to not modify their phones to "open to ... other carriers." They had zero right to do that. They knew the risks and APPLE STATED their phone might be damaged if they applied the latest firmware. Come on! What's Apple supposed to do, physically hold their hands? In case you didn't know, the iPhone is believed to be partially subsidized by the monthly fees via commission from AT&T. This bricking argument is getting tired and has always been ignorant. I liked Steven's article because it's honest and accurate. You're like the anti-zealot spewing unsubstantiated claims. For example, when did Jobs demand that DRM be removed? He suggested it, but I have seen no account of a demand. Yes, EMI was thinking of doing it before Jobs announced it and may have even given Jobs the idea. Demanded? Maybe all this zealot labeling comes from people vigorously defending falsehoods. Ignorance cannot remain unchecked! Sheesh. I hate having to correct Mac users. Apple does lock OS disks to the computer model they ship with. My G5 disk would not install on my iBook (but the OS would copy). You will hear Apple say they don't support third party applications and hardware. Most geniuses will give it a try though. I would definitely agree that Apple has taken many pages from Microsoft's playbook. I think it's too early to call them a monopoly and can cite your citation of Amazon's mp3 store as an example. Plus, the Sansa is reportedly gaining market share. My $350 laptop does NOT run Vista like a champ. It's slower than it should be for a 1.2G Celeron. We certainly don't know what negotiations exactly transpired between Apple and the music trolls. There's nothing preventing Universal from trying to undercut iTunes to cause damage/prop-up the new AmZtore. Welcome to business. My point is you cannot draw a conclusion when the underlying rules change. Think "Introductory (predatory) Pricing." And, if you recall, it wasn't until Jobs talked them into it that you could actually own your purchases for life. Up until then, it was subscription only. There's NO WAY you could have talked the trolls into DRM free music back when the store started. AND, Jobs had to talk them down to 99c. What Apple could do, now that the Store is making Apple tons of money, is reduce some of their take but I'd bet that won't happen without a concession from the trolls. The iPhone subsidy is the same as other phones. Theoretically, the initial price is discounted due to the monthly cost built in for any phone. Why do you think Apple dropped the price? It just means that once the phone subsidy is paid (whenever that is), AT&T doesn't get the gravy, Apple does. (You don't think you can get a high-end smartphone for zero initial cost, do you?) I think most large corporations are greedy and, unlike Apple these days, inept. Apple just makes great products. Yes, repair prices are obscene which is why my new rule is to always get AppleCare. And speaking of shit don't stink, I don't think there's as many people as you do who believe that Apple can do no wrong. Most of us are pissed that Jobs didn't fight back more on ringtones. Lots of theories as to why but nothing concrete. Bluegirl, why is M$ to blame if your CM system crashes? BBrox, why didn't you take your numbers file into the store with you and open it on any of many Macs that have iWork and save it out as Excel or any other supported format? BTW, *IIRC*, the format is an XML package so you should be able to extract the parts and recreate if you were in a hurry. I don't have iWork 08. And, while you're at it, let's see the laundry list of money spent on your cheap PC. Don't forget the software you must have to support it. I suspect you'll still be below the iMac. Oh, be sure to factor in your time to build it. Apple does not have a stranglehold over me. The DRM lock is due to the music trolls (RIAA) and not Apple's fault. I can get my computers repaired by third parties using hardware that they refurbished. And I can even dump OS X in favor of anything that runs on Intel. Though I wouldn't call it a stranglehold, I do think Apple needs to offer more variety of hardware. We need a mini tower that runs Core Duos with reasonable memory costs. FB-DIMMs are expensive. I'm reaaaaaally tired of people demanding that Apple open the hardware platform. Go get the cracked OS X 10.4.4 that has to be floating somewhere in the Net and have fun. Apple is a hardware company first. Their gross profits primarily come from hardware (though Leo WILL give them a nice boost). They are never going to cede that money. M$ has huge costs and lack of reliability due to their "open" hardware standards (If it was truly open, Apple wouldn't have had to hack in a BIOS layer inside EFI to boot XP). Even if/when Jobs leaves, his successor knows why open hardware will not work for Apple. It's been tried and it failed, or did you forget that? Anyone blaming a user for an OS crash should have their head examined. Unfortunately, many don't know a true OS crash/lockup or don't wait when a mounted volume abnormally drops. A kernel panic IS possible when hardware is bad (and roughly is equal to a BSOD these days). Bad power can wreak havoc too. Bad kernel extensions (kexts) will cause problems also but there are far fewer third party kexts than drivers for windows so the risk is greater for the latter. Bad kexts is also not Apple's fault though anyone installing risky code (kexts or Unsanity's APE) may need a tongue lashing (though isn't it better to go at it from a helpful side which would involve asking questions about what the user was doing?). It is Microsoft's as all different types of drivers (in XP at least) all run in the same space. Print drivers and disk drivers whereas OS X segregates them. To my knowledge, Apple also strongly discourages the kext code path.
    pecosbill had this to say on Oct 10, 2007 Posts: 12
    8 Reasons Windows Users Don’t Switch
  • Oh, forgot to add: I love honest, accurate discussions. What annoys me is when people use FUD or outright falsehoods to blast anything.
    pecosbill had this to say on Oct 09, 2007 Posts: 12
    8 Reasons Windows Users DO Switch to Mac
  • 3, Gear lust: that only became true when Jobs returned as he got the engineers to focus. They really have that nailed which is why they're doing so well currently. Maybe it's 7: Design, but I would have thought more of a comment on OS usability would be in order. I'm surprised that you said Vista is missing drivers from 3rd parties. I read elsewhere that at this point they're mostly there. Some (most?) of the delay can be firmly planted on the horrid DRM. From my Vista Home Basic experience, I found the following: veeeery buggy; the cancel/allow authorization thingie is horribly annoying; the number of times the entire display went black then blinked back on was pathetic; it's SLOW to resume from hibernate or suspend though hibernate might be faster than XP. Actually, the login seems the slowest part. Having 15(?) versions of an OS is a joke. Just seems a way to gouge users. We bought VHB on a $350 Toshiba to get the absolute cheapest thing possible. It's function is to record and play square dances (using a Mac would be a tragic waste) and nothing else. It only has a "Celery" processor at 1.2G and 512M ram w/ 80G HD. (Can't remember much else.) I'm an immense fan of the Macintosh though I could write a (somewhat short) list of things that still bug me. The list for XP is MUCH larger. Enormous and still growing. Haven't used VHB enough to make a real list.
    pecosbill had this to say on Oct 09, 2007 Posts: 12
    8 Reasons Windows Users DO Switch to Mac
  • OOOoooooooo. I love an honest discussion. Thanks. Point 5: Lies, is really interesting. I never considered the obvious game angle as I don't have time to play them. 4: Price is exceedingly frustrating these days. Though likely not true now, when the Mac Pro came out, it was cheaper than a Dell. Macs don't get viruses NOW but that could change. It's not like there haven't been security patches. Apple is very careful to not say Macs cannot get viruses but that there aren't any (except Proofs of Concept). 6: Bashing Windows started when W95 was released. Think about it, both are GUI based OSes (now) with command lines. What makes a Mac different is it's easier/more enjoyable to use than Windows. That's bashing Windows. Maybe Jobs does so because that's what people want to hear. As a Mac fan since 84/5, I was dismayed that people would pick W95 over a Mac when the experience was clearly better. (The Mac did get on shaky ground when NT 4 was released.) That experience came at a price because Mac hardware was higher quality (and Apple's profit margins were higher). That reaction lead to zealotry. 7: Really! I wasn't impressed when I set up Basic. Cancel/Allow got old FAST despite me turning it off during the main setup of a new laptop. Your pitying W users is what leads to zealotry, BTW. 8: I find that interesting. Most long term Mac users I know have a love/hate with Apple. Love the products, hate the company for whatever reason. Please smack the lecturer(s).
    pecosbill had this to say on Oct 09, 2007 Posts: 12
    8 Reasons Windows Users Don’t Switch
  • I've always thought of it as "disk wrist."
    pecosbill had this to say on May 04, 2006 Posts: 12
    May 3, 1984: Mac System 1.1 Released
  • The Finder never had cut except for the file name — in a public release that I saw. The only reason why cut/copy are useful for files in Windows is they have a single window mode by default, no spring loaded folders, and no column view. Without painful navigation, there is NO WAY to make a new folder on the desktop in windows without right-click. Another peeve: I hate having to search for things in the task bar. The dock keeps apps in the same place vs the task bar putting doc/app mix in almost haphazardly (certainly no muscle memory there and yes I know the logic it uses.) I could go on for ages. Had I the time, I'd write an article.
    pecosbill had this to say on Aug 21, 2005 Posts: 12
    What OS X Could Learn From Windows
  • Windows help is definitely better than Apples which sux royally. Windows just has more content though. I really miss the coachmarks from 8/9.
    pecosbill had this to say on Aug 19, 2005 Posts: 12
    What OS X Could Learn From Windows
  • Bryan, I don't think you get what Apple did with the home keys. You can navigate without moving your right hand. Use the arrows to move around or if you want to move further, hold down a modifier. Command <- & ->to the start/end of line or option up/dn to move paragraphs (some developers don't follow this). Command up/dn to move to start/end of document. I find it really annoying that I have to use the home/end keys to move around like that on windows as it is right next to the delete key, a distructive key. I don't use home/end on the Mac all that often so when I do I don't often hit delete. i'm not aware of standard keys on XP that do the same as home/end/pgup/dn on the Mac. (Another "trick" that works most of the time on the Mac (formerly always) is you can use the up/dn arrows in single line fields to go to the st/end. That was handy. Usually works now. In full text boxes, it never beeps at you unlike windows but takes you to the document st/end.) Speaking of keys, I do NOT like how OS X doesn't have keyboarding for buttons (except esc & enter and enter doesn't work in every case even when it's throbbing blue!) unless you turn on the whole we-dont-need-mice options. We need a means to target them. (Probably time for me to revisit that.) XP is a hopeless mishmash of modifier keys. Too much to go into now (should be finishing configuration of my w03 servers :-\ for work) The whole Start menu All Programs thing is a kludge from Win3 days. They need to move on and get their developers to follow. DOH! As for what the anonymous author asked at the end, Apple needs to "borrow" NXhosting from...... itself. Nextstep used to have this feature (so I've read) whereby all the GUI commands (Postscript, mainly I expect) were sent to a remote device for remote control. Windoze has that which they got from Citrix which is how I'm setting up my boxen that I've never laid eyes on. (Terminal Services/Remote Desktop) This is NOT timbuktu or VNC but is much cooler as it gives you (optionally) your own remote session. Those actually copy the bitmap of the screen (though I really think TB2 was trapping some calls and saving the rendering for the client side UNTIL they went cross-platform.) Having the work split among the two boxes makes much more sense instead of sending a keyframe then updating like TB2 does now (but does well!). I don't think Apple can do this until post-Intel switch as they can't split the processing like that with Classic in the mix. I also wonder how things would work now that they have Quartz Extreme.
    pecosbill had this to say on Aug 19, 2005 Posts: 12
    What OS X Could Learn From Windows
  • Surprising the comments are few thus far. They are right on though. I'm not sure I follow the whole windows lining up thing but my guess is you like that windows makes maximized documents appear as though they are part of the app. I think that's a matter of taste and I do like the more 3d effect that OS X has. Well, I am dismayed at the entire metaphor they've picked. It's far from consistent. Try opening two Excel Documents & two Word Docs. Click the app close button bigger red X on Word & it closes one doc. Do that on Excel. It closes both. Inconsistencies like that abound. I also find their "properties pane" tiny size maddening. Try setting preferences in Outlook. It's a wild goose chase (use help!) resulting in layers on layers of those idiotic things. As for Word on the Mac, I refuse to give M$ one cent so I would not know how zoom works. I imagine the heritage of X and XP play in this a lot. For zoom, it's likely a Carbon vs Cocoa thing (Carbon: programmer do it all -- nearly -- it's changing; Cocoa: Apple handles things for you due to Object Oriented Programming). In XP, they have legacy issues as well though I don't understand the Word vs Excel close nor the itty bitty panes. I do feel that OS X has a much less cluttered feel than 9. I have lots of rants for both platforms (well, all three: 9, X, XP). My list for Windows is MUCH longer. One also needs to keep in mind that Apple is coding at a furious (insane?) pace. Issues like this are a result. I'm in awe at what they can turn out. The days of a solid x.0 release are long gone. I'm a power user of 9 (fading fast though it fit like a glove as it was my only for so many years), X, and XP (shudder, but I had to in order to make it more tolerable).
  • Oh MY GAWD! (though kudos for the courage and cojones to bring it up) I use Windows at work and have used Macs (not counting the test drive of the first) since 85. I admin/set up several Windows servers (since NT 4) & code for them using cross platform Omnis (started on Macs but company forced me to Windows & Windows forced me to become a power user). 1. My left hand always hurts thanks to the contol key being so hard to reach. The location for the command (and winalt) is much easier on me. As someone else said, 10.4 makes this moot. 2. Don't see why not though I think windows has toolbar-its. Damn things are everywhere. Ironic too as when PC zealots were saying GUIs were horrid, they said keyboards are better (faster, etc) but yet all these button bars make hand movement to the mouse far more required. For stuff like that, I stick to the keyboard. Don't even get me started on screen real estate (though today's monitors make that less of an issue, I have seen people cramped by them on notebooks even today) 3. Mighty Mouse. (love the track-pea but not the raised finger) I agree so I bought a logitech ages ago. The dock begs for it. Don't use it for much else I used to hate them but they are an acquired taste like beer. 4. Um, no. This goes back to elegance. Don't hide things from users to make them wonder where they are or if they are in the correct location. Familiarity breeds confidence. 5. DON'T you DARE. There's this wonderful thing called the keyboard (see 2). Use the tab key to jump into that listing box and TYPE. Windows behaves very erratically when you try to do that (try targeting a file when folders are in the list). OS X (type the first few letters) jumps right to whatever it is you want. 6. Ambivilent on his one. Apple started this with their balloon help which was rather annoying. On windows and Mac it can be very annoying as it somehow manages to cover up what you really want to see. Just because my pointer is where it is does not mean that I want some ji-normous help box covering what I do want to see. While I'm at it, I hate the help button on Mac keyboards. I wish, ages ago, that Apple had used that button as a help balloon toggle instead of lauching some app (slowly) when you accidentally typed it. (For grins: My insert key on my windreck has been REMOVED :-) While I'm at it, Windows could REALLY learn how to HIDE a mouse pointer when typing! The option exists but does NOT work as I set on my windreck at work typing (into firefox) with the pointer BLOCKING my text! Apple has borrowed. 'Bout time, too. I wish they had borrowed one thing with command-tab: ignore the mouse. on the mac only, it can be used to pick an item when you don't realize/want it (my trackball seems to exacerbate this due to its speed and possible proximity). If I were doing drag-drop then I would want the mouse to work.
    pecosbill had this to say on Aug 19, 2005 Posts: 12
    What OS X Could Learn From Windows