21 posts tagged “windows”

 The last few days have been very interesting. I've been getting some things worked out in Vista. Yesterday, Joost 0.9.2 was released which doesn't studder as much. Only problem was, that when I went to open the client, it said it couldn't connect to the network. So after hunting around for a solution,  I reinstalled it and it worked fine. Better than before as a matter of fact. Then something strange happened. I was trying to buy a song off of the iTunes store when it wouldn't connect. Even Apple.com wasn't working right. I un-installed, restarted and then reinstalled iTunes and it worked fine, but it's just another example of how iTunes isn't exactly ready for Prime time on Vista. Democracy doesn't work right without turing off Aero, which is a minor pain, but I live with it. I've been looking at the price of some parts lately. Things have dropped dramatically. The cheapest AMD Processor (3600+, 1.9 Ghz, 2 x512 KM L2) is only $95. The 4200 + (2.2 Ghz 2x 512 KB L2) is only $133. The X1650, the ATI midrange GPU, is only $148. 2 GB of Kingston Valuram is only $156. Mind you all these prices come with 0.14% tax tacked onto them, so it's not as great a deal as it appears. But it's still a good deal. I think once I pay for education and my trip to Germany, I'll go get me some upgrades.
Off to Youth Exec. I'll post more in the next few days.

    So I got Windows Vista running today. And thanks to a hack from good 'ol BitTorrent, I don't have to drop over $150 for a copy of Home Premium. But don't tell Microsoft that. I'm enjoying it so far. I mean besides the improved UI, it's the small things like the Instant Search and the improved Window Management. The Iive Tabs feature is also nice. For all the bashing I've done to Vista, I still like it. I don't expect to bumb into the DRM wall yet, as I'm not planning on playing an HD content. With all that said, there are some things that I don't like. It takes forever to both Shut Down and start up as well as the fact that certain app's don't behave well. iTunes is the major culprit here. It works well enough, but it has it's glitches. Logitech Setpoint was another sticking point, but I managed to get it to work after a while. Driver support is pretty good. Considering the disk includes over 15,000 device drivers, it'd better be! My flash drive works fine. I've yet to test my iPod though, though I think it should work fine. I'll give you guys an update in a few days.  

 

    If we look back 10 years ago in 1997 it was the beging in of the Rivival of Apple, the introduction of the Pentium II, the release of Windows 98.... Fast forward 10 years, you have Steve Jobs having begun the second golden age of Apple, Linux is more prominent then ever, and the Pentium architecture has been superseded by the new Core Architecture. Windows 98 has been surpassed by Windows ME, 2000 and XP and now where on to Vista. Chips are smaller and faster, computers are prettier (no longer Biege Boxes) etc.
    But my question is this: What will the the world be like in 10 years? Intel promises to have an 80 cores on a chip by 2011, but will the keyboard and mouse survive that long? As we see in the books that predict the future, voice recognition is the medium of choice for the future. But what about going farther? Computers are getting smaller and smaller and biotech is getting more and more advanced? Can you imagine cybernetics? Without any sensory input you can control a computer with your brain. Can you imagine that? You go your giant computer screen and think "Turn On". The computer turns on. You think "Let's check Email" The email client pop's up. Can you imagine that? It's like the Borg. Except not. Now we have computers that go up to a maximim of 3 Ghz. What in 10 years? 20 Ghz? 40 Ghz? A Teraflop? I can see the monikor now "A supercomputer in every home". Robots have become a commodity. They shop for you, clean for you, do all the nasty stuff you don't want to do. Artificial intelligence is now a reality. And that's just in 10 years. What about in 20,30, 40 even 50 years?
    Just my thoughts on the future?

 Windows Vista was released 4 weeks ago. It was Microsoft's major release in 5 years. Needless to say, it's packed full of features. With the shiny Aero glass, Bitlocker drive encryption, a redesigned media center, there is definitely some incentive to upgrade. But is it worth it? Let's take a look at this?
 4. Hardware Unless you have a machine that's been made in the last year, to year in a half, your going to need a hardware upgrade of some kind. And even if you have a new system, your going to need a hardware upg

rade of some kind. I have 1 GB of RAM in this new system, but in order to get decent performance out of any app (like Audition, Photoshop, etc.) you need 2 GB of RAM. And on top of this, if you invested in a new shiny DX 10 graphics card, you have to wait for Nvidia to get off it's but and write proper drivers.
    In comparrison, Mac OS X can run on a G3 (366 Mhz) 128 of RAM and a Radeon 7xxx to 9xxx  with most of the shiny Aqua based effects. What does that tel you? Mac. If your just a casual computer user,  go to your friendly Apple Store or Authorized Apple Reseller and get yourself a Mac Mini or iMac. Considering the amount you have to spend on hardware, plus a copy of Vista, a new mac is looking pretty good.
3. Software: Currently there are around 900 "Vista Certified" applications which is just a fancy of saying that the companies that make the software payed Microsoft a few thousand bucks to say "Yep, we'll make sure it works with Vista". Many of the apps that previously worked with XP no longer work Vista. It's only a matter of time, but it's still a pain in the butt. Adding to the misery, to get apps like Photoshop and Audition to perform decently you need 2+ GB of Memory. In contrast you can run most apps on Mac OS X with 1 GB of memory. Some apps require a bit more, but in the grand scheme of things, you don't need much memory
2.Virtulization: Here's where Microsoft screws you over big time.If anyone likes to use virtualization, stick with your copy of XP Pro. If you like to virtualize Linux or any other operating system, you need to go out and buy a copy of Vista Bussiness or Ultimate. Guess what? You can get Parrallel's for Mac to virtualize Windows, Linux, OS/2 (why?) and other opearating system. And it only costs you $79 and an Intel based Mac.
1. Next Release: Windows Vista is the lastest release and matches the features of OS X Tiger. But Tiger is reaching new of Life and the next release is on the way. OS X 10.5 Leopard promises to have updated Spolight, Dashboard, and new features included Spaces,Time Machine, iCal, iChat and many others. Apple will probably release Leopard in the next few months with 10.6 coming in early or late 2008. So once again, Microsoft is going to go play catch up.
    That's my take on Vista vs. OS X. What you buy is your business, but I urge casual computer users and non-gamers to swtich to Mac to avoid the deathtrap that is Vista.

     Today was the first day of the Consumer Electronics show in (VIVA!) Las Vegas. Needless to say, there is some pretty cool stuff. Having watch both the DL.tv and Lab Rats podcasts, it's clear that on day one,there was tonnes of stuff announced, with tonnes more to come in the next few days. Last night, Bill Gates gave a keynote and demo'd some really cool, never before seen features in Vista. One of these features is the ability of use the Windows Search to search not only the PC you are currently using, but also all of the PC's on your network that are using Vista. But wait there More! You can even use an Xbox 360 controller to play games on your PC. And the final feature demo'd at Bill Gates' keynote? Full HD motion desktop in Vista. I can't recall the name right now but it looks awsome.
    Final thing. Tomorrow is the Stevenote at Macworld Expo. It's sure to be a great time and as I have last period off, I'll be home early and blogging about it as developments roll in. It's sure to be a blast
This is just the beginging, it'll be fun to see what the rest of the week brings.

     Before I left for school this morning, I caught something on Neowin.net. The french parliment, acting on a study conducted by a research firm has decided to switch from Windows XP to Linux in June of next year. Woot! Score one for the open source movement! I think the move is for the better as Linux is much more secure and can be customized to the needs of the individual organization or user. Whereas with Windows you have only a set amount of options that you can use for certain things. And there are only 2 editions, Home and Professional. With Linux there are litterally hundreds if not thousands of versions of Linux, each of them unique. It's like a person. You could attribute a Linux distro to a person because it one is unique in at least one way, much like every person on the earth. I know I'm getting a bit philosophical but eh, if it works.
    Second and last thing: This was mentioned on TWiT today. It's a spec commerical for the iPhone. And unless they guy said it was a fake, you wouldn't know. For those of you who don't know this entire iPhone goes back quite a while to before the turn of the century when Steve Jobs came back to Apple. It's only gained this much attention due to the sucess of both the iPod and the Mac.  Personally, I don't have any real interest in the iPhone, but it looks like a sleek device. Being Canadian, I personally like the Blackberry, but the iPhone does look appealing to me.This is assuming I have money for a Cell phone. I'll try and post later when I get back from play practice.  

    You know who really ticks me off? Steve Balmer!  I like Bill, the guy is generous with his vast fortune, but Balmer pisses me off. Why? Read on.
    Recently Microsoft and Novell announced that they where partnering to develop software for the Linux platform. Just as general information, Novell develops of the most popular Linux distributions, SUSE Linux. So I guess Microsoft wants to

develop stuff like Office for Linux. So the entire Open Source community is going "huh?" and scratching there heads. Why? Because Microsoft is traditionally an enemy of Linux and everything it stands for. (Closed Source vs. Open Source) So while the OSS community is scratching it's head, CEO of Microsoft Steve "Monkey Boy" Balmer said that "Linux stole our intellectual property." Uh huh. Right Steve. Suuure. Guess what? I bet ya the Linus came up with most of the Kernel himself? And how does it "infringe on intellectual property"? I mean, the code is open source. Unless you develop the actual language yourself, you cannot patent code. You can't patent Perl, Python or any other code. I mean, how hindering would it be if someone patented HTML  and demanded that someone pay every time they used it? Can you imagine what the internet would be like? My whole point in this, Linux is not Microsoft's Property and never will be. Linux is the property of people not some coperate bozo like Bill Gates or Steve Balmer. It should be interesting to see how this relationship develops over the next little while and if Microsoft makes a version of Office for Linux and even better, to see if they make that version Free.   

     Argh. So the days are getting shorter and the nights longer. Where getting less daylight now. Damn, I hate HATE Canadian Winters. Why do you ask? Well let me count the ways. For one thing, the lack of daylight. You get up in the morning, go to school, don't get to see much daylight (and the gray walls of my school don't help.) walk home. By this time, it's alreay gettin

g dark. Then it's dark until that time the next day. Second thing, weather here sucks. And the scho ol board doesn't really realize that. They cancel all of the schools except for ours. This is when the sidewalks have yet to be plowed and it takes me twice to three times as long to make it to school. That's walking downhill. And after the whole "Christmas! Yey! Joy! Lights!" everyone goes through "Seaonal affective disorder" otherwise known as "The Winter Blues" Second thing, the lack of a holiday between Exam Time and March does not help either. So le'ts recap, you've got the lack of a break from your studies for about 3 months, and the lack of sunlight. That in combination with the gray walls and a substational workload makes school from the months of January to March suck. I mean, up until Christmas, things are good and pretty much stress free, but once you get beyond Christmas, it's like "Wow, you've got another 3 months to go before we see the sun.
    ooooh. So as I have mentioned before, Ubuntu 6.10 wasn't so great. However the next version, 7.04 "Fiesty Fawn" looks to be cool. And the one feature I'm looking forward to in this next release is that Composite desktops are enabled by default. No some of my readership are going "Cut the Geek speak! English Please!". Well you see there is this lovely eye candy called XGL/Compiz which makes awsome eye candy. And another thing that Linux has that Windows doesn't is something called "Workspaces" which allows you to have many things running on multiple desktops. So you could have Firefox running in Workspace 1 and Open Office running over in Workspace 4. (This handy when parents look over your shoulder to see what you're doing.) This is handy even without XGL/Compiz. Now with it you can spin it like a Cube or a hexagon, or an oxtagon or as many faces as you like. There are also rain effects little tweaks that make Windows streach like elastics. Some people are not really happy with the fact that XGL/Compiz might use non-free drivers, which is against the whole Ubuntu Philosophy. But we'll see, *waits impatenially for April 17th*  

Windows, Mac, Linux - What's your preference and why?
Submitted by ramblingsbymark.

    hmmm. This is a bit odd on my part. I love the Macintosh, I used to hate it before the release of OS X. See in Grade 7 and 8 we where forced to use it with OS 9 installed. And it was torture. This was before the days of shiny-happy red and gr

een and yellow buttons to close Windows and such. Plus the teachers really didn't help in that they thought we could do everything ourselves without help. But with the release of OS X I'm now in Love with the Mac. I can't wait for 10.5 Loepoard to be released next year and am hoping to get a Macbook for Post Secondary work.
    I currnently use Windows for most of my work, however, if you have read my blog in the past few days, you know that I recently installed Ubuntu Linux 6.06 Dapper Drake on a partition. Although it was a bit frustrating, I'm cool with it know and I only intend to use Windows to play some of my games. Why do I use Linux? Because it's open source. What's that? It means that you can go into the Terminal (like C Prompt in Windows) and add and take away stuff at your lesiure. Furthurmore, it alllows people to create programs and tweak Linux instead of having to rely on the company that created the program, the community can kind fixes for things without having to wait for the next release.  Since I am still at home  most of my family the rest of my family still uses Windows. However when I live on my own, all of my computers will run either OS X or Linux. Unless Ray Ozzie makes an awsome next version of Windows that will follow Vista (codenamed "Vienna") I will switch to Apple. Windows has been nothing but a pain in the butt since day 1. Sure at one point in my life, I hate Apple and Linux but that was when I was a tech N00b. Now I know better.

So last night, just for the heck of it, I downloaded Windows Media Player 11. Back when this thing called iTunes wasn't around I used to use it extensively. However, now I use iTunes for my Audio and Democracy for my Video, let me tell you, this release of Windows Media isn't a huge improvement. Sure they've made it look all nice and pretty like with nice new buttons, but for someone who wants ease of use, it's the same old confusing file system for all of your media, besides the fact that's all DRM'd under the Windows Media file type. Yes there's plenty of Eye Candy, and it looks all very pretty, but I like things that work as well. That's why I use iTunes 7, granted it wasn't the greatest thing to work right off the bat, it's working now and the only things that are DRM'd is my music from the iTunes Store, and I have to give credit where credit is due, Apple's DRM is probably the most un obtrusive on the market today, much better than any Real Networks or Microsoft DRM. Granted it's still DRM but it's very flexible DRM. Really, unless you have more than 5 computers, your not going to notice it. It allows you to burn disks of all your music, as many as you want, as many times as you want. I personally hate DRM, but I think that flexible DRM is better than the oh-my-god-your-burning-a-disk-break-your-music-files Microsoft DRM. But back to Windows Media Player. Whereas Windows Media Player has a million menu's in the options section iTunes only has 5 or so. I mean for the Microsoft fanboy those options probably make sense, but more me, an open source supporter I just scratch my head and go "huh"? But anyway, if you get a prompt on your Windows Box to Upgrade to Windows Media Player 11, don't do it, in fact go to Apple and download iTunes or if your feeling really adventurous, google Fobar 2000 and try that out.
Anyway, off to school now,
I'll post tonight