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Court
| | Posted on Monday, January 14, 2008 - 09:48 pm: | 
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I popped for Windows MS Office 2007. . . . don't. . . stick with the 2004.
You'll note that many large corps (we have >10,000) and HD used to use them (although I see the Buell guys now using Dell) use ThinkPads. |
Naustin
| | Posted on Monday, January 14, 2008 - 10:31 pm: |
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Jack - Yeah, actually I tried Linux (Suse 7.3) for awhile back in college, but I went back to Windows after 6 months. Back then, there were far fewer apps and plugins and it seemed like it was an uphill battle to do anything. I ran StarOffice back then though, and it was a nice program. I noticed too when I was setting up the new Dell that Google now offers OpenOffice as part of its Google Desktop options. I may yet go to that. The Dell came with Works (which I reinstalled after I did a clean format to get rid of Dell's preloaded crap), and like I said, I use Word and Excel so little at home that it hasn't been an issue yet. When it does, I probably will go to Open Office. Whatever I do has to work for my wife too, so I have to be a little careful. 
(Message edited by naustin on January 14, 2008)
(Message edited by naustin on January 14, 2008) |
Pwnzor
| | Posted on Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - 05:10 am: |
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MS-DOS 3.3 is still the best operating system ever devised by Bill Gates.
I would dump Winblows for a Mac or Linux any day except for one thing: Those operating systems have sh1t for video games, and I'm a junkie.
So there you have it, I'm stuck with Winblows. My preferred version is 2000 Pro for my single-core processor machines and XP Pro for my dual-core and Hyper Threading machines. Vista can take a hike. |
Captpete
| | Posted on Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - 06:50 am: |
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How much longer will MS 2k Pro last? This dog's gettin' too old to learn new tricks. |
Lost_in_ohio
| | Posted on Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - 08:00 am: |
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I bought an acer for $350 and it runs vista just fine. Also can't justify the cost of Mac or High end windows machine. Electronics are disposable, no sense sinking big money in something that if broken will cost more to repair than replace.
I also have a Asus EEE machine. It is one of the ultra portable pc Really neat. 4 gig solid state hard drive, Wireless network connection built in, I have gotten 4 hours on the battery, comes with linux, I loaded xp on mine. Great for checking email or doin a tps reset. |
Jackbequick
| | Posted on Tuesday, January 15, 2008 - 09:41 pm: |
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"..MS-DOS 3.3 is still the best operating system ever devised by Bill Gates..."
Bill Gate never devised anything, did he? He and some buddies hacked CPM-86, renamed it to MS-DOS, and then his Mommy, who was a wheel at IBM, made sure that IBM bought the rights to use that licensed as PC-DOS 1.0. Or something like that. There were snippets of code all over MS-DOS that clearly identified themselves as direct lifts from CPM-86. I don't know if they ever got rid of them all. CPM-86 was in the public domain so there was no one to cry theft. But deep in there hearts they knew it was wrong...
But DOS 3.3 *was* good. Remember X-Tree Gold? That was my all time favorite DOS utility. I think I still have a copy of DOS 6.0 or 6.1.
And WordStar, now there was a word processor! All ASCII based graphic displays. It was beautiful!
Jack |
Lost_in_ohio
| | Posted on Wednesday, January 16, 2008 - 08:31 am: |
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xtree now that brings back memorys. |
Pwnzor
| | Posted on Wednesday, January 16, 2008 - 08:56 am: |
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I still use XTG on my Compaq Armada 1560dm.
Like it or not, Bill Gates did what needed to be done, at the right time and the right place. The facts are as follows:
"In 1980, IBM first approached Bill Gates and Microsoft, to discuss the state of home computers and Microsoft products. Gates gave IBM a few ideas on what would make a great home computer, among them to have Basic written into the ROM chip. Microsoft had already produced several versions of Basic for different computer system beginning with the Altair, so Gates was more than happy to write a version for IBM.
As for an operating system (OS) for the new computers, since Microsoft had never written an operating system before, Gates had suggested that IBM investigate an OS called CP/M (Control Program for Microcomputers), written by Gary Kildall of Digital Research. Kindall had his Ph.D. in computers and had written the most successful operating system of the time, selling over 600,000 copies of CP/M, his OS set the standard at that time.
IBM tried to contact Kildall for a meeting, executives met with Mrs. Kildall who refused to sign a non-disclosure agreement. IBM soon returned to Bill Gates and gave Microsoft the contract to write the new operating system, one that would eventually wipe Kildall's CP/M out of common use.
The "Microsoft Disk Operating System" or MS-DOS was based on QDOS, the "Quick and Dirty Operating System" written by Tim Paterson of Seattle Computer Products, for their prototype Intel 8086 based computer.
QDOS was based on Gary Kildall's CP/M, Paterson had bought a CP/M manual and used it as the basis to write his operating system in six weeks, QDOS was different enough from CP/M to be considered legal.
Microsoft bought the rights to QDOS for $50,000, keeping the IBM deal a secret from Seattle Computer Products.
Gates then talked IBM into letting Microsoft retain the rights, to market MS DOS separate from the IBM PC project, Gates proceeded to make a fortune from the licensing of MS-DOS.
In 1981, Tim Paterson quit Seattle Computer Products and found employment at Microsoft. "
From ABOUT.COM |
Pwnzor
| | Posted on Wednesday, January 16, 2008 - 08:59 am: |
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On the subject of Dos 6.x:
Xtree was always better than that wacky pseudo-graphic shell they tried to integrate into DOS. I mean, it worked... but it just wasn't as good. |
Court
| | Posted on Wednesday, January 16, 2008 - 09:09 am: |
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I've got one thing to say . . . .
A I R
SSD is FINALLY here! |
Nautique4life
| | Posted on Wednesday, January 16, 2008 - 11:30 am: |
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By Courts' statement I assume is he referring to Apples latest technological wonder, The Macbook Air. This thing is 3/4 of an inch thick CLOSED. Less than a centimeter at its thinnest. It is sure to wow, but the first thing I "wowed" about was the price, 1800...and I'm not talking about the Tequila. Tack on another $100 for a 64GB solid state HD.
That's a bit too much for a 13in. screen. |
Court
| | Posted on Wednesday, January 16, 2008 - 12:49 pm: |
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The SSHD is a $999 option.
I've been watching this stuff develop for the last year. Samsung has been leading the technology and it's been a struggle getting the capacity up. The 64GB is . . . well good enough for the time. Expect rapid advancement.
One of the limiting things in a laptop is the spinning, moving, heat makin' mechanical hard drive (with all respect to Aaron W. Wilson and the patents he holds for hard drive stuff) and the new SSHD is going to change laptops.
It, just like other Apple stuff, is a tad pricier. But, having snagged my first Apple just 2 weeks ago . . I must say the thing is absolutely amazing.
I wanted to be able to do websites without having to learn C++, ForTran IV, Dreamweaver and stuff that to me is a pure waste of time. I grew up using an IBM 360/50 and sitting in Cardswell Engineering Center punching frickin' paper cards all night . . . other than the logic. . all I have to show for my classes in ForTran, COBOL and Basic are a bunch of old text books. I want to create, gather and communicate information. The PC format is akin to me, rather than buying a car, buy a "how to build a car" from Ford.
Let's see how the AIR sells. . . .
I'm not giving up my Top Rated T61 at this point . . . but, like I've said. . . when I walk through the X. Fu building and see almost ALL Apple . . . well, I have to ask more questions.
I'm still waiting to discover the long fabled . . "but you can't run it on a Mac". To date, everything I've ask the Mac to do was nearly done by the time I figured it out.
World's changing fast . . . particularly for construction workers. |
Naustin
| | Posted on Wednesday, January 16, 2008 - 07:01 pm: |
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You don't have to convince me, I beleive that Apple is better in every respect, and I want one really bad!
Unfortunatly, that doesn't change the fact that I can't afford one. |
Pwnzor
| | Posted on Wednesday, January 16, 2008 - 07:30 pm: |
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Apples have come WAY down in price in recent years, and Jobs is finally taking the hardware in the right direction.
If Atari had taken the bull by the horns back in the late 80's it could have been them not just rising to the top, but already dominating the PC world, beginning with the Mega ST 4. A machine way ahead of its time, it ran PC, Mac, and yes, Atari software with a slick gui background called the Gem Desktop.
But alas, they are relegated to the history books.
I was a big Apple nut in the beginning, but when all the software was IBM PC-oriented, I had to go that way. I'm a gamer and I like to play NEW games, not warmed over ported versions five years later.
But the new Macs are looking sweeter every day.
As for SSD's you can already order them in most new laptops for a premium, and there are 128GB versions out there.
Solid state is the future, Optical discs are on the way out and we are on the edge of some really huge advances. I'm glad I'll live to see most of it. |
Court
| | Posted on Thursday, January 17, 2008 - 06:36 am: |
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>>>we are on the edge of some really huge advances.
That's an accurate statement and I am loving it. We are living in one of the coolest times in history.
I've always said that the solution to traffic problems would be going "3-D" and last week . . . guess what . . . . some outfit is experimenting wit the "Jetson car".
I can see it now. . . . local traffic at 20' AGL . . commuters at 25'AGL and all commercial traffic at 45' AGL. |
Froggy
| | Posted on Thursday, January 17, 2008 - 01:36 pm: |
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I have been using Vista since the alpha stage and I love it. These days compatibility issues are next to none. Even with my computer with its funky configuration, windows found and installed all my hardware automatically with the exception of my sound, I had to run windows update and it found it.
The speed is faster than XP, and lots of little things nobody else mention make a difference. Some of the things I like:
DirectX 10
Handles multiple cores better
Automatic load balancing on multiple network cards
Better memory management
Much more secure, in fact vista saved me from a keygen that tried to infect me with spyware, and I still got to get the key 
The search is awesome, in fact I don’t even bother looking for programs any more, if I want to start a program or run something that is normally in the control panel, I just start typing it in the search. By time I finish typing “sou”, it displays sound recorder and sound properties.
Dreamscene is great, I love having HD car videos as my wallpaper
Integrated windows update is nice; it makes it possible to totally do away with IE if you’re one of those Firefox people.
There is a ton more, but I don’t think you want to read a 20 page post |
Toona
| | Posted on Thursday, January 17, 2008 - 06:47 pm: |
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Thanks to all for the responses.
I looked into a Mac, but entry level is at $1100 at the local Best Buy. I can get a comparable PC laptop in the +/- $700 range. I can't justify the extra $400 for the same processor speed/HDD/ram. My only other concern is I do a lot of computer prep work at my house that I use at church, a PC system. So I'm not sure if there would be any kind of conflict, prepped on a Mac, used on a PC.
It eases my mind that I won't be spending hundreds of dollars and finding out afterward that all Vista has done was give me headaches.
Once again, BadWeB'rs Rock! |
Froggy
| | Posted on Thursday, January 17, 2008 - 07:27 pm: |
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What do you mean prep work? Most stuff today is compatible cross platform without any issue, but there are a few things that if done on a Mac won’t work on a pc or vice versa. I can't think of any off the top my head though. |
Patrickmitchell
| | Posted on Thursday, January 17, 2008 - 08:17 pm: |
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I just switched to a mac book... It is amazing. I can't believe I didn't dump windows earlier. The nightmare reports on vista finally pushed me over the edge. Macs now run all windows software seamlessly. I couldn't find a good reason to buy another windows base system. |
Alchemy
| | Posted on Thursday, January 17, 2008 - 09:10 pm: |
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Hi Patrick,
I was given a Mac Mini for Christmas. It has been 25 years since I last used an Apple computer and I am really liking it. The Mini is smaller than the O'Reilly Manual I bought for OS X. I plugged in a monitor, speakers and keyboard and have not looked back. It has no fan and I really like the solitude. It set up nicely and "Just Worked".
There are a few things I don't quite get yet but it sure is a relatively painless transition for me. The lack of viruses and general lack of foolishness is greatly appreciated. |
Froggy
| | Posted on Thursday, January 17, 2008 - 10:18 pm: |
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I can't even consider a Mac for me yet, as they still fail to even hold a candle to what a PC does best, and that is gaming. Game support is next to none on OSX, and if I use boot camp that defeats the point of a Mac. To top it off I would have to play on “odd” hardware. I used to call the hardware inferior, but in the last year or 2 they have made great strides and have made much better and with more PC parts. The Mac Pro is a workstation based setup geared more like a diesel pickup than a corvette. That makes it the wrong tool for the job for me.
Xeons are too expensive for a gaming rig, so that puts me at an iMac, but they lack the rest of the hardware needed for gaming. Also with the iMac, you are forced to use the screen that’s conveniently built into the unit, so I either waste cash by not using the built in monitor, or I waste cash trying to use a better monitor that I already own. More down points of not being able to shove multiple hard drives in it force me back to the uber expensive Mac Pro. Hell what chipset does the Mac Pro use anyway? Apples current lineup is like a car maker with only 3 models. They got the cheap subcompact (Mini), a normal sedan (iMac), and then the diesel pickup (Pro). Perhaps one day Steve will change his focus from Jesus Phones and overpriced overhyped thin laptops to make the sports car that can steal me away from Microsoft.
It was once suggested to me that I try the Mac Mini as it would let me use all my hardware, but that ended up being not true. Took about 10 minutes worth of investigating to find out the $600 paperweight with yesterdays hardware is not compatible with my monitor (Dell 3007WFPHC 30”) and my keyboard (Logitech G15). Not supporting my surround sound is another major strike, but it’s not like I would want to do anything that would involve 5.1 on a Mac mini anyway.
Sorry for that guys, I just had to get that off my chest. It’s mainly from the Mac fan boys that try and force me to convert while not providing a proper substitute for my needs. Enjoy your Macs guys, I know I won’t. |
Pwnzor
| | Posted on Friday, January 18, 2008 - 09:22 am: |
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makes it possible to totally do away with IE if you’re one of those Firefox people.
I got rid of Internet Exploder way back when I was still running windows 98.
You simply go to Microsoft's downloads section and get what you need for manual installation.
Besides that, XP Pro does all the other things you mentioned, and while my DX is still technically 9.0c, it is possible to tweak it with the SDK to make it DX10 compliant. There's really no major advantage to Vista, period. I guess if you like to hog memory by running videos on your desktop, that's cool, but I like my ram to be available for it's intended purpose.
To each his own, but I see Vista at this stage as just being bulky and intrusive for the sake of being.... bulky and intrusive.
Not impressed. |
Pwnzor
| | Posted on Friday, January 18, 2008 - 09:25 am: |
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I can't even consider a Mac for me yet, as they still fail to even hold a candle to what a PC does best, and that is gaming.
Testify, brother! |
Staindus
| | Posted on Friday, January 18, 2008 - 09:59 am: |
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Consoles are getting to be more an more like computers. The new consoles can browse the web, play music, stream videos among other things. I still prefer some games like FPS's to use a keyboard and a trackball though.
Rant ON.
The one thing that kills me with Vista is the fact that its the same old operating system with more crap thrown into it. Its more bulkier, uses more resources. Why cant they redesign the OS? I am not saying the need to use Linux like apple did, but refine your OS, make it faster not slower.
RANT OFF |
Pwnzor
| | Posted on Friday, January 18, 2008 - 11:32 pm: |
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Consoles are getting to be more an more like computers.
Their problem, as you have alluded to, is the controllers. I have yet to see a satisfactory keyboard and mouse setup on the consoles. My sons have PS3, Xbox 360 and Wii, and with all those USB ports you'd think you could plug in some good gear, but you can't.
The games are mostly twitch-reaction based, and I personally like to aim at my targets instead of just twitch at them.
/emote WTF |
Swordsman
| | Posted on Monday, January 21, 2008 - 03:48 pm: |
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Great reasons to avoid Vista. I'll go Linux before I go Vista.
http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/vista_c ost.html
~SM |
Stretchman
| | Posted on Wednesday, January 23, 2008 - 07:48 pm: |
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http://www.liveleak.com/player2.swf?token=ee1_1195 791770
BTW. I use VIsta, and love it. But I think this is funny nonetheless. |
Cereal
| | Posted on Thursday, January 24, 2008 - 09:34 am: |
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Come on Sword, do your due diligence! I read that report when it first popped up over a year ago. It was a load of crap then, and it's a load of crap now.
I don’t have time to explain all the reasons why, so just read this: http://windowsvistablog.com/blogs/windowsvista/arc hive/2007/01/20/windows-vista-content-protection-t wenty-questions-and-answers.aspx
I am a computer nerd and use every OS I can get my hands on. They all have their ups and downs. And for the record, Linux is no more secure out of the box than any other OS out there. It is an open source OS. That means any hacker worth a damn can learn the ins and outs of every process. If you know your stuff, then you can secure it like Fort Knox. Problem is 99% of users don't have that knowledge. |
Pwnzor
| | Posted on Thursday, January 24, 2008 - 07:24 pm: |
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The REASON that people believe Linux is so secure, is the same REASON that people believe Macs are secure...
Between them, they have less than a 10% market share. (being very generous with that number)
Put yourself in the hacker's shoes. You'd want your work to go as far as possible and do the most possible damage, right? You're looking for your virus to make headlines. So you're going to target the three most widely used software titles. #1 Microsoft Windows (NT Kernel based), #2 Microsoft Internet Explorer, #3 Microsoft Outlook
That is you hardly ever hear about those other OS's being compromised, because the hackers, like anyone else, don't want to WASTE THEIR TIME. |
Reepicheep
| | Posted on Thursday, January 24, 2008 - 08:10 pm: |
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There is an element of truth to that, but Unix is fundamentally different then DOS.
Unix has a clear and concise concept of what constitutes a "system" operation, and what constitutes a "user" operation. So a user should be able to execute a binary program that will give a listing of a directory, but should not be able to replace that program. A user can install their own binaries in their own directory, but those binaries will never be able to corrupt the operating system components. So you can always trust the OS core... Even if a user is as stupid as can be, the "root" user can trust the OS tools to clean it up. And user A can't easily infect user B.
(at least thats the plan... there are security holes in all software, Linux binaries included).
Windows does not enforce these boundaries well, or is not very usable when you do enforce them. So everyone ends up being an administrator. So when things go wrong, things are totally wrong, and you have to scrap the whole OS and start over. And user A is pretty much guaranteed to infect user B.
In short, windows was made to be easy and successful, and it was. Unix was made to be secure and reliable, and it is. Pay your money and take your chances.
Mac is an interesting hybrid... a really consumer centric user layer on top of a solid Unix core. I expect security is somewhat compromised, so joe mac user can install I-tunes without calling a sysadmin, but in terms of tools in the tool box, Mac will have twice as many and twice as good as Windows.
If I watch the firewall and server logs on my Unix box, I see just as many or more Unix targeted attacks (ssh and apache) as I see Windows targeted attacks. |
Froggy
| | Posted on Thursday, January 24, 2008 - 08:38 pm: |
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quote:Windows does not enforce these boundaries well, or is not very usable when you do enforce them. So everyone ends up being an administrator. So when things go wrong, things are totally wrong, and you have to scrap the whole OS and start over. And user A is pretty much guaranteed to infect user B.
Vista does this alot better than previous Windows. Its not perfect, but its a huge leap forward. |
Cereal
| | Posted on Friday, January 25, 2008 - 07:26 am: |
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+1 to Pwnzor, Reep, and Froggy.
Vista was built from the ground up. In other words, it's not just a tweaked XP.
Vista isolates session 0, which is where the 'system' processes take place. Each subsequent user would be on session 1, session 2...
Also, Vista changed the log-on architecture to a credential system. In other words, even if you are the admin, you will need to pass your credentials every time you want to do an admin process. This is why you get so many "Are you sure you want to do this" pop-ups. The scree
Remember, you have to balance security with convenience. Airports didn't use to be such a pain in the ass, but they were much easier to get bad sh!t by security. You can look at a Mac as a pre 9/11 airport and Windows as a post 9/11 airport. Take your pic. |
Reepicheep
| | Posted on Friday, January 25, 2008 - 09:30 am: |
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Agreed... the issues with Vista now are that it is the victim of it's own success. It can be made very secure, but when you do so, people that have been indoctrinated into great convenience and awful security for the last 10 years will throw a fit...
The enforced DRM (digital rights management) still goes down sideways for me, and is probably the biggest thing that keeps me from upgrading. I'm not really interested in going out of my way to install and maintain something that was built around selling out all of my rights in the interest of all the producers rights. If content producers want me to use a crippled appliance, then *they* can pay for it and maintain it.
Note to content producer cabals, and now Microsoft who is in collusion... what part of "I am the customer" has you confused? Content providers can offer Microsoft the moon, but without the customer, both you and they will wither together.
My second beef is price. Vista is not that much better, even for a consumer, then Linux or XP. Microsoft will sell Vista to Dell for $20 per machine, but they want me to pay $120 for it?
Yes Vista was a massive engineering effort, but Vista also has a staggeringly large number of seats to offset the cost. Microsoft is free to try and make it a cash cow if they wish, but I am free to choose not to be milked.
I'm a little bitter at the moment because I finally took the plunge and bought a portable DVR / Video player. It has been a huge PITA ever since. None of the controls put in place stopped me from exercising my fair use rights to take content I legally purchased and put it on an appropriate playback media for my particular needs.
The controls would have done even *less* were I a thief intent on stealing content I did not purchase. That path would have been far easier then what I had to do.
The controls did, however, throughly &%$$ me off as a consumer... I am angry at the maker of my DVR (Archos) the producer of the content (mainly Sony and Disney), and at the maker of my desktop OS (Microsoft). Nobody is winning here. |
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