@ Sirius: " (imagine how must software there is in a BMW or Merc)."
Modern vehicles indeed do have a lot of software. The communications buses in these multiplex electronic CAN (Controller Area Network) systems is immense, as each system such as engine, ABS and auto transmissions have their own ECU (Electronic Control Unit) with software. Most CAN systems are made by Bosch so they own the patents, not the manufacturers unless they help develop the systems, but this varies.
The same systems are used by Volvo in trucks and buses such as FH12 and B7RLE as well as other car manufacturers like Ford, Vauxhall and VAG (Volkswagen Audi Group). I work in a bus repair shop and am a time served mechanic, this stuff is even better geekery than standard computers!
The author sounds like a typical Mac fanboi, whinging when things don't go their way. Instead of bitching, why not use iCloud? It's a beloved Apple service, I'm sure they'd love another of their drone zombies signing up :)
Seriously I wish Google would come up with something of their own rather than following others. I have my own cloud drive! It's called my webserver with 6 TERABYTES of cloud space, you can all keep your pathetic 3 and 5 'gigabytes' ;) All this cloud hype is just a fad, it's all FTP that's been around for years, I write cloud frontends for MegaCloud.
Jeez, Zuckerberg now has his hands on yet another established product, to save himself the time and effort of actually having to code it from the ground up. This will probably now end up like Facebook, its iPhone app, and the horrid timeline. Bloated, useless, horrible crashy junk.
Zuckerberg probably DID steal or buy Facebook from somewhere, because in the last few years his clueless company have turned it into bloatware worse than buying a Toshiba laptop! he is clueless, ugly, and stoopid to boot. Instagram is pretty pointless and overcrowded anyway, once the novelty wears off it'll be just another forgotten one hit wonder.
Companies these days have no drive! They simply buy out existing technology and call it their own (looking at you Facebook, Google, Microsoft et al), in my eyes it is cowardly and lazy.
My girlfriend and I have been a member of MSDN & TechNet for a good few years for our programming and computer repair firms. Microsoft are claiming “Over the past few months, pirates have exploited these programs and systems to obtain free or lower cost genuine product and have then resold at significant profit margins"
That's funny, I've been seeing people selling Windows TN keys on eBay for at least four years! I even caught my co director doing it last year on the Digital Spy forums with one of our other company accounts and warned him about it, as we were both paying together for it until I caught him again and made him do it alone.
They reduced the number of keys a year ago to just 5 from 10 because of piracy, so this latest news is old and irrelevant. They need to start linking keys to accounts so when they get blocked MS know who is responsible, because people will sell the same key two or more times as they can be used several times on different machines.
Apple, quit crying wolf you publicity hungry cowards! If it means so much to you, why didn't you hire security when you "lost" your iPhone 4 proto to Gizmodo in a cafe?
When they're not suing iPad/iPhone component makers Samsung, or whoever they feel like at the time, they're leaving iPhone prototypes in bars "accidentally" on "purpose" so that guys from Gizmodo and others can get their hands on it and start freaking out over the next piece of Apple locked in junk.
They'll then sue whoever finds the bait, and it'll be classed as theft. How predictable. It can't be a coincidence that the same thing happened with the iPhone 4?
Apple need to get out more, or start tracking prototype stuff!
Paris, because even she knows a marketing scam when she sees one!
If Windows 8 is going to be used on fondleslabs (layman's term tablet), as much as I feel, the ribbon may be useful due to the big button style, but bad due to the clutter and screen space. We need a solution between ease of use and tidiness, I don't feel the ribbon is it.
Stop it with all the dead puppy stuff! I love cats and dogs, any animal in fact. He said it to stop his kids using Google because you know what kids and fluffy puppies bring out, lots of "Awwww, poor pup!" so if he made them think one dies every time Google is used, they won't use it. A bit of a cruel analogy though.
Kids love animals. I've just seen my 3rd dead bunny by the side of the road, and it hurts, even as a 26 year old animal lover. Maybe they were run over by the GOOGLE CARS!!!!!! BUNNY KILLERRRSSS!!!
The bag of hammers would have enough sense to see IE for the slow, bloated, dumbed-down basic UI piece of crap it is and whip into a rage induced sick-of-IE frenzy smashing it to pieces, switching to Firefox!
Paris, because even she's sexy and smart enough to NOT use IE!
I absolutely detest DSG and all they stand for. I'm an independent computer repairer and here at my firm Kitamura Computers I get so many customers with shock stories. We do computers, consumer/domestic goods and security systems, so get a lot of tales from the crap TechGuys (now KnowHow) scam they have going. PC World charged one guy £229 just to reseat a stick of memory in a laptop, all because they had to remove the keyboard (they probably can't even figure it out so it takes them hours!) I do little jobs like that for nothing, they cost nothing but a smile to do and my customers keep coming back!.
PC World staff are clueless (you've all heard the stories of their zombie staff going into the backroom to find out if the product you want will work, when all they need to do is check the box, they then never re-appear!), they don't know their own products, they kiss Symantec's ass by reselling their Norton crap, and they're generally very poor.
Their TechGuys (now Knowhow! snigger snigger!) we-do-it-all marketing scam is the biggest con I've ever seen. You phone them up to fix your washing machine. You know the bearings have gone, they then tell you the motor and/or control board is knackered. Add to that they charge extortionate prices to mount TV's on the wall, set Freeview and FreeSat up (they charge 320 more to do the HD + version even though it's the same setup routine!)
Us guys at Kitamura have been doing computers and electronics repairs for years, I laugh every time DSG have to re-brand one of their subsidiaries (TechGuys to KnowHow, for example!) to throw off all the negative publicity!
I'll tell you a true story. When I set my firm up I decided to test them and went in to PC World to buy a nice laptop I'd seen, on credit. They were just that day starting to use a new infrastructure for the sales system. I was kept waiting 4 hours because of bugs and issues with the system to be told they couldn't do the credit agreement on my finances, our credit record wasn't good enough as we'd only just started.
So they don't even roadtest software before rolling it out in the company, either, and waste customer's time! I have never been so annoyed, and never ever set foot in their stores ever again! And that was 4 years ago.
Add to that Apple only switched to Intel so dumb Mac fanboys would pay thousands more for a Mac that will run Windows when a standard more upgradeable PC cost three quarters less!
They then turned round and said us standard PC users couldn't run OS X. Arrogant greedy bastards, trying to steal PC market! The OS X86 Project soon stuck a 4 finger salute up to that crap! Mac OS is basic compared to Windows anyway. Compare the Control Panel to System Preferences to see!
Ahhh, this is getting old, and annoying. Apple brand locking worsens, yet again! I've been fixing Apple hardware for years, and have seen gradually how things have got smaller. More components are soldered in (CPU on all their notebooks and iMacs, and on the Air everything is! RAM, SSD, CPU)
The shit gets thinner, more non-standard and more overpriced every year. I prefer a standard form factor machine I can upgrade completely, not some proprietary built-around-itself shit like the iMac. The only good thing about Apple crap is me and my job, I'm a vacuum rework specialist, so when all the Airs and iMacs come in for repairs and upgrades with soldered in components, I'm quids in because I'm cheaper than Apple and have all the reflow equipment under the sun!
The only fully upgradeable machine in Apple's line up is the Mac Pro, but probably not for long. The fannybois will still be ripped off by His Arrogant Sweary Jobsness, but then complain when their machine is dog slow 3 years later because the HDD and CPU is non-upgradeable!
All this trouble for "single sheet aluminium"? Sacrificing upgradeability and repairability for looks is a stupid mugs game, a game I've never been stupid enough to play because I have sense as well as experience in the computer repair industry!
So Steve Jobs IS as arrogant as he looks? Exactly the reason I won't buy Apple stuff and be brand locked. And the reason Apple just made the HDD connectors on the new iMacs proprietary so you have to go to them for parts. Yup, more outrageous overpriced hardware. And brand locking!
I'm an Apple repairer, and have been for 13 years, I've seen them go downhill, all thanks to that ugly arrogant prick Jobsworth who has fanbois wanting to suck his tiny dick around every corner who will buy his steaming shit if he sold it! Repairing the stuff brings me good money but I'll NEVER buy it personally! And no, I'm not a troll, I speak my mind.
Neither do 2G or 1G users get the update either if I'm correct? I have a 3G but am in no rush to upgrade because Apple needs to release new phones just to add new features which should have been there from the start. They did it with the iPad. The features in the iPad 2 were deliberately left out of the iPad 1 because Apple like to keep the fanboys buying the new gear for new features to screw money out of them.
Sly marketing that should be classed as rip off fraud in my book. My 3G is a phone and a high tech PDA, no need for me to upgrade, except to a HTC when the time is right. I hate sly brand locking, and snobbish companies like Apple. Exactly the reason I like that jailbreaking is legal, I'll do what I want with my device that I paid for, thanks. And that includes being able to go where I want without being tracked too clearly.
And as another note Andy, yes I do have 3D, I have a 60" Samsung 3D TV that my Japanese girlfriend imported from her hometown of Tokyo.
I'm not a pathetic troll either but a time served electronics and computer professional so I tell it as it is. And I have a joband gorgeous girlfriend. Nor am I an idiot, and because I know more facts than you, turns out you're the idiot instead because you're a blind Sony fanboy still blissfully ignorant of the faults that the crap that your Holy Grail Sony call revolutionary, has and always will have.
Sony couldn't organise a piss up in a brewery, that's why 15 years later their shitty laser diodes are still failing.
PSN is also crap and laggy, but then it's free and currently hacked to pieces and unavailable, so you get what you pay for. Microsoft have XNA for amateur programmers, the subscription costs a lot less than the development stuff for the PS3, that's why nobody likes programming for Sony anymore.
Something else. Do you ACTUALLY KNOW what caused the RRoD and YLoD? It isn't "crap hardware", it's called RoHS, lead free solder and BGA solder technology. Before RoHS (Reduction of Hazardous Substances) we used LEAD in solder, which made joints strong enough to withstand high chip operating techniques. Ever since RoHS legislation, us engineers have had to use lead free solder balls in BGA (Ball Grid Array), which is softer, and gradually fractures due to cooling and heating of chips because the solder reaches melting point under normal use. The solder balls fracture past an acceptable amount (the chips include sets of redundant stress resisting balls) thus causing intermittent contact, and the YLoD/RRoD happens.
It happens in laptops too, and is partly the reason the nVidia defect is so severe.
There's the facts from a software and computer/console hardware engineer. Beats a bedroom expert fanboy opinion anyday, Andy. You might wanna do your research and use the hardware rather than spouting nonsense how Microsoft are crap. And actually get a job.
@Andy Jones: Well, it's obvious to me you're a PS3 fanboy.
1. Where's your card reader?
2. Where's your Other OS?
3. Where did all your 4 USB ports go?
4. Why have Sony released firmware that breaks stuff like stopping the Blu-Ray drive working?
5. Why do the lasers and drives keep failing?
6. Why can you STILL not FULLY install games to your PS3 HDD without jailbreaking it? Even then all games don't work, I've done it, I have a Slim as an unwanted present.
7. Why do 99% of games that say 1080p on the box only do 720p? On a Sony TV as well as others?
8. Where's your PS1/PS2 Backwards compatibility gone with physical discs? They charge a fortune for ANCIENT PS1/2 games on PSN to screw yet more money out of you!
9. The build quality of the Slim is utter shit. The cooling fan itself is a tiny cheap plastic one as opposed to the massive metal one of the FAT, but then you wouldn't know that, you're a user fanboy and not a technician.
I can go on, I repair these things on an intimate board level. The 3D is a load of shit. The firmware that was released to make the PS3 magically 3D when the FAT was still in production is bollocks. It was jittery and didn't have the proper hardware 3D support until the Slim. And the Slims are still failing today due to heat and dodgy blu-ray lasers and control boards, whereas Microsoft learned their lesson. Installing the FULL game to my 360 HDD so the drive doesn't need to be used, and full 1080p res in dash and game was enough of a selling point to upgrade from Premium to S for me when they added it in with bigger HDD and Wireless N. The console got better and better over the years once MS realised, I can't say the same for PS3. Sony just shrunk the case, whereas Microsoft shrunk chip die sizes, combined CPU & GPU, add to that improved the cooling.
The PS3 is alsodifficult to program for,and I quote Gabe Newell of Valve, "The PS3 is a total disaster on so many levels, I think it's really clear that Sony lost track of what customers and what developers wanted". He continued "I'd say, even at this late date, they should just cancel it and do a do over. Just say, 'This was a horrible disaster and we're sorry and we're going to stop selling this and stop trying to convince people to develop for it'"
Blu Ray is OK. It's slow for games, they take AGES loading because of the too-high density so the PS3 IS NOT good for gaming unless you have a sleeping bag handy waiting for loading. But then if you'd actually USED a PS3 and 360 side by side rather than being a forum know-it-all you'd know, wouldn't you? Blu-Ray is good for movies and backups, that's it. I'd rather use DVD and have quick loading times. Microsoft did make mistakes, I never said they didn't, but they learnt their lesson in the end, we are HUMAN, the console has never been fully hacked unlike the PS3 so it goes to show security.
And finally. The 360 still has ALL IT'S ORIGINAL FEATURES! What does your PS3 still have after all these years? The only reason Blu-Ray won the format war was because Sony backhanded everyone with money and threatened court action to jump ship from HD-DVD!
In the email detailing the breach they sent out, they simply said:
"We thank you for your patience as we complete our investigation of this incident, and we regret any inconvenience."
Not even an apology from them, like, "We are deeply sorry!" so Sony obviously don't care. Good job the PS3 I registered my PSN account on was an eBay repair job and did the YLoD once too many times, and went straight under my sledgehammer. I'm sick of crap quality PS hardware with crappy lasers & ball bearing disc spindles (PS1), chips that get too hot and need reballing, add to that the features that keep disappearing. Hell, games don't even run at 1080p when the box says they should! The shit quality has been there since the PS1, I'm a console repairer and done it many times at work, and home before I got sick of their crap consoles. I used to be a PS guy until Xbox saved my headaches.
My Xbox 1 NEVER needed any replaced parts, and still goes strong with my Elite cool running 360, and new S. Add to that the 360 and Xbox 1 never had features gradually taken away over the years. THAT was another nail in the Sony coffin for me (the FAT PS3 LOOKS like a coffin lid!), it's like giving a child loads of presents one year for Xmas, and slowly taking one away every year after that, downright cruel.
After the way Sony have treated me as an ex customer, I'm loyal to Microsoft, at least they own up to mistakes and don't take stuff away from me that I paid hard earned cash for! They repaired and replaced RRoD consoles for me in great time and customer focused fashion, for both me personally and my customers at work. THAT is SERVICE.
It's my job to clean computers, and this doesn't shock me!
This is what I actually love about my job. People bring me their computers in, saying they're crashing and freezing, beeping, etc, and all I have to do is spend 1 - 2 hours dismantling everything (completely), cleaning it, renewing thermal grease, (and sometimes the fans if they're burnt out because of the dust) put everything back together, and that's £22 - £44 (£22ph) worth of food on my table, and the customer's machine is spotless. I keep the pile of dust, and cam pics for them, to shock them!
I do this about 7 - 8 times a day, and just the computer cleaning side of my company repair skills earns me a lot on really good weeks, before the actual repairs come in! I've seen spiders, dead hedgehogs, ants, bluebottles, centipedes, woodlice, you name it. It is well worth it, I love my job as a self employed repairer, and despite not liking spiders, wouldn't swap it for the world. I'm a big softie too, and like animals, so seeing dead creatures like hedgehogs (how they got there is another story) inside PC's saddens me, but that's life.
Luckily it's only ever dust, and the occasional insect inside consoles and laptops I do. FAT PS3's get the biggest insects in, having a lot more vents than 360's. Ants seem to think PS3's are fairgrounds, and like having rides on the blades of fans, so much it kills the little blighters, good riddance! It's quite hilarious imagining their little faces as they whizz round and round, their bug eyes popping out!!
Acer want to follow Apple? Acer are cheaply built, just like Apple. I know because I repair them, on a daily basis at my firm Kitamura Computers, as I do Apple equipment. They're built to look nice on the outside, like Apple like to use their "single sheet of aluminum", but inside, are shoddy and cheaply built. On Acers, case parts break more than usual, mouse buttons (the microswitches, not the plastic your finger touches) are soldered direct to the motherboard rather than being part of the palmrest trackpad assembly, needing to be desoldered and soldered to be replaced, and the machines generally fail prematurely.
Take the latest MackBook Air. 3 year old Core2Duo processor (My 3 year old Clevo has a faster C2D CPU). Everything is soldered to the motherboard. CPU, Flash and RAM. And how often do us techies have to replace RAM sticks in PC's and standard laptops because they've gone bad? Very Often. Meaning the board in the 2009/2010 Airs has to either have the Flash and RAM replaced/reballed, or the whole board scrapped. After paying $800+ in the first place to buy the crap? No thanks, pal!
So, if Sony and Acer/Asus want to copy Apple, go to it. Puts my food on the table in my chip reballing sector of my company, along with all the failing PS3 FAT consoles (and now Slims that are emerging with no video or power!) I've seen a massive drop in failing RRoD 360 consoles, the newest Elites and Slims are staying really strong!
I prefer SUBSTANCE over STYLE. Otherwise the iPad and MB Airs are the nasty disposable results you get if you favour style, and listen to fanbois! I'd rather be able to upgrade the RAM and CPU in my systems, thankyou. Mac CPU's have always been soldered in their laptops, and they should be done for the amount of their disposable crap that ends up in landfill because it's either A) The device is obsolete and can't be upgraded, or B) The owner can't afford my reballing and vacuum rework costs, they've blown it on the device itself and haven't finished paying it off!! Their excuse is always, "Ooh, it looks nice!" Wow. Not.
I seriously don't like the way Google are going. The modifications they're making to their web and image search are tacky, and take up too many resources. My CPU fan on my notebook (A 1.86GHz C2D with 1GB RAM) kicks right up to full and Firefox slows right down, until I close the tab down.
Trying to show pages and pages of results on one virtual sheet of paper is a no-no. Rather like Google's pie-in-the-sky idea that everyone will be using cloud computing within 3-4 years. Trusting your data to other people's hard drives and servers, with all the hacking, Internet banking fraud and stuff going on? Sorry, I'm keeping my data close to me, on my HDD. I know it's safe, as I'm a qualified IT engineer and have my security set up as it should be.
Off back to Yahoo..... Bye bye, Google! Yet again another company (like Tesco) that are trying to get too many fingers in too many pies, not knowing what they're doing. Are we going to see Google Car Insurance anytime soon? I sure hope to hell we're not.
This isn't the first time, nor will it be the last time Dell withholds info from staff. I used to work for them in Limerick a few years ago, and the amount of stuff I heard from other staff rather than management themselves was atrocious.
This, and their crappy marketing & manufacturing procedures (non standard hardware, locking customers into the brand for parts etc) made me quit working for them, and go with Tiny and Evesham. Getting parts for Dells back then wasn't as easy as eBay, not many people sold them on a third party basis. Since then I've done freelance for various companies, and none have been as bad as Dell. Industry standardization is the key, including staff motivation and information.
This is just typical of Sony. Crap overpriced hardware that fails, and doesn't do what it's supposed to, or what you paid for it to do.
PS1 = Fail, laser and spindle cheapness
PS2 = Even bigger fail with the same laser problems as the original, that looks like a heatsink out of an industrial machine!
PS3 = Same issues as the above two, shaped like a casket, and slow.
Vaio = Crap Mac lookalike that fails unexpectedly (I know, I'm a PC technician). The only good thing is the DC Jack is on a plug for replacement.
Sony Batteries = Junk that explodes
The only thing going for Sony with me is some of their audio products. Sound quality and battery life (provided you're not using THEIR batteries)
Sony seems to have a lot of worshippers, like Apple. Why, is beyond me. In fact the two companies are becoming similar, style over substance. I'd rather have substance over style, something that isn't wafter thin, but still does what I want it to, and doesn't explode.
This is interesting...now I get the chance to test Hitachi's 2TB offering over my first fave Western Digital. The WD seems to vibrate a little in my test case, but that's without vibration damping grommets.
Let's hope WD and Hitachi drive Seagate out...I hate them, and their Maxtor buddies! Their drives have been nothing but problematic for me and my customers, never again will I buy an SG/Maxtor.
Quote Dunncha, "Considering that nobody uses eBay anymore.
Fail! Because eBay used to be fun!"
Nobody uses it really? I think you better open your eyes, if you have any! There's several billion, if not trillion users. In the words of Niko Bellic, GTA IV, Liberty City's famous Serbian terrorist, "Open your stupid eyes!"
I use it, and have never had any problems with either eBay or Paypal, other than fees. System outages happen, why people like the Reg like to make a song and dance is beyond me.
Quote from Anonymous Coward (I wish they had a [quote][/quote] system like phpBB!)
"If you needed to keep defragging and reinstalling windows "very often," then you're doing it wrong. If you learn even the most basic things about running a windows machine, you can keep it running like a new install for years, so I suggest you guys go back to school before preaching more bs."
Exactly, AC. I've had my Windows Vista & XP dual boot for well over a year now, and it runs perfect. I regularly defrag, move downloaded files to a storage drive, do antispyware & AV scan/update, registry optimise and junk cleaning. I also keep the inside clean, dust free, and change my thermal paste regularly.
My system is like factory new, except it doesn't have factory bloat on it. No blue screens, slowdown, lockups or "[Program name] has stopped working" errors. It's like housekeeping. You wouldn't have piles of dirty dishes/clothes everywhere at home, or bugs and mites everywhere, would you? Some might, but I don't. I keep my computer organised, like my home.
The analogy is the same across all OS'es, they all gather clutter of some kind, and need maintenance, just not all are prone to spyware & viruses, and that is because of popularity. Windows is used by the majority, so is more profitable (so to speak) to hackers.
It's people's laziness, ignorance, and the expectation of it to "just work" that causes most software & hardware issues. I know, I've been doing computers for well over 12 years, and it's taught me the differences between all OS flavours, plus how to keep them running like new, instead of crying on a forum, "It's slow, it crashes, Microsoft is crap!". Look at yourself first, and think, "What if I took the time to find out WHY it's slow/crashy, and put it right?"
Mac OS isn't "perfect" it's just that it's engineered to work on a certain combination of hardware, thus avoiding compatibility issues, even with Windows. I like the customisability of a PC, and have the knowledge and experience to set it up and keep it running right.
I've never liked Seagate, due to high failure rates, and even more so since they took over Maxtor. I've NEVER had a Western Digital hard drive fail, compared to about 25 Seagate/Maxtor ones, and that's NOT including customer ones. The Maxtor 2F0L0 20GB drives were known to be crap, I had bucketloads of them die, either electronically, or because of bearing failure. They only had 2 platters, were thin and quiet, but failure prone.
As far as I'm concerned, from my experience (I'm a repair company owner), Western Digital and Hitachi are my top two, and the only ones that go in any of my machines or company servers. When I stick a WD in a computer, I am assured that it isn't going to come back for HD replacement, only maintenance and regular backup, as my customers entrust me to do backups for them on site.
If WD start to sell SSD's mainstream, and eventually as cheaply as their mechanical drives, I won't hesitate to use them. Their recent pricing of their new 1TB 2.5" drive at around $179 has surprised me, too.
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29 posts • joined Friday 31st July 2009 12:38 GMT
Re: Software patents in the EU?
@ Sirius: " (imagine how must software there is in a BMW or Merc)."
Modern vehicles indeed do have a lot of software. The communications buses in these multiplex electronic CAN (Controller Area Network) systems is immense, as each system such as engine, ABS and auto transmissions have their own ECU (Electronic Control Unit) with software. Most CAN systems are made by Bosch so they own the patents, not the manufacturers unless they help develop the systems, but this varies.
The same systems are used by Volvo in trucks and buses such as FH12 and B7RLE as well as other car manufacturers like Ford, Vauxhall and VAG (Volkswagen Audi Group). I work in a bus repair shop and am a time served mechanic, this stuff is even better geekery than standard computers!
Why the whinging?
The author sounds like a typical Mac fanboi, whinging when things don't go their way. Instead of bitching, why not use iCloud? It's a beloved Apple service, I'm sure they'd love another of their drone zombies signing up :)
Seriously I wish Google would come up with something of their own rather than following others. I have my own cloud drive! It's called my webserver with 6 TERABYTES of cloud space, you can all keep your pathetic 3 and 5 'gigabytes' ;) All this cloud hype is just a fad, it's all FTP that's been around for years, I write cloud frontends for MegaCloud.
Going down the Instapan!
Jeez, Zuckerberg now has his hands on yet another established product, to save himself the time and effort of actually having to code it from the ground up. This will probably now end up like Facebook, its iPhone app, and the horrid timeline. Bloated, useless, horrible crashy junk.
Zuckerberg probably DID steal or buy Facebook from somewhere, because in the last few years his clueless company have turned it into bloatware worse than buying a Toshiba laptop! he is clueless, ugly, and stoopid to boot. Instagram is pretty pointless and overcrowded anyway, once the novelty wears off it'll be just another forgotten one hit wonder.
Companies these days have no drive! They simply buy out existing technology and call it their own (looking at you Facebook, Google, Microsoft et al), in my eyes it is cowardly and lazy.
Re: My iPad 3 can't connect to anywhere
Like what you did there! Hope you have fun using your etch a sketch! At least it doesn't crash, eh? :)
Only in the last few MONTHS?
My girlfriend and I have been a member of MSDN & TechNet for a good few years for our programming and computer repair firms. Microsoft are claiming “Over the past few months, pirates have exploited these programs and systems to obtain free or lower cost genuine product and have then resold at significant profit margins"
That's funny, I've been seeing people selling Windows TN keys on eBay for at least four years! I even caught my co director doing it last year on the Digital Spy forums with one of our other company accounts and warned him about it, as we were both paying together for it until I caught him again and made him do it alone.
They reduced the number of keys a year ago to just 5 from 10 because of piracy, so this latest news is old and irrelevant. They need to start linking keys to accounts so when they get blocked MS know who is responsible, because people will sell the same key two or more times as they can be used several times on different machines.
First IP adresses, and now phone numbers
Wow, we're really running out of resources in life! Coal, diesel, petrol, then IPV4 addresses, and now telephone numbers?
What next, oxygen?
Bah!
Apple, quit crying wolf you publicity hungry cowards! If it means so much to you, why didn't you hire security when you "lost" your iPhone 4 proto to Gizmodo in a cafe?
Mine's the one with the open source Android OS...
PUBLICITY!!
When they're not suing iPad/iPhone component makers Samsung, or whoever they feel like at the time, they're leaving iPhone prototypes in bars "accidentally" on "purpose" so that guys from Gizmodo and others can get their hands on it and start freaking out over the next piece of Apple locked in junk.
They'll then sue whoever finds the bait, and it'll be classed as theft. How predictable. It can't be a coincidence that the same thing happened with the iPhone 4?
Apple need to get out more, or start tracking prototype stuff!
Paris, because even she knows a marketing scam when she sees one!
Gonna be issues on tablets!
If Windows 8 is going to be used on fondleslabs (layman's term tablet), as much as I feel, the ribbon may be useful due to the big button style, but bad due to the clutter and screen space. We need a solution between ease of use and tidiness, I don't feel the ribbon is it.
Stop it with puppies, I love them!
Stop it with all the dead puppy stuff! I love cats and dogs, any animal in fact. He said it to stop his kids using Google because you know what kids and fluffy puppies bring out, lots of "Awwww, poor pup!" so if he made them think one dies every time Google is used, they won't use it. A bit of a cruel analogy though.
Kids love animals. I've just seen my 3rd dead bunny by the side of the road, and it hurts, even as a 26 year old animal lover. Maybe they were run over by the GOOGLE CARS!!!!!! BUNNY KILLERRRSSS!!!
An insult to a bag of hammers!
The bag of hammers would have enough sense to see IE for the slow, bloated, dumbed-down basic UI piece of crap it is and whip into a rage induced sick-of-IE frenzy smashing it to pieces, switching to Firefox!
Paris, because even she's sexy and smart enough to NOT use IE!
Crap companies get their comeuppance in the end!
I absolutely detest DSG and all they stand for. I'm an independent computer repairer and here at my firm Kitamura Computers I get so many customers with shock stories. We do computers, consumer/domestic goods and security systems, so get a lot of tales from the crap TechGuys (now KnowHow) scam they have going. PC World charged one guy £229 just to reseat a stick of memory in a laptop, all because they had to remove the keyboard (they probably can't even figure it out so it takes them hours!) I do little jobs like that for nothing, they cost nothing but a smile to do and my customers keep coming back!.
PC World staff are clueless (you've all heard the stories of their zombie staff going into the backroom to find out if the product you want will work, when all they need to do is check the box, they then never re-appear!), they don't know their own products, they kiss Symantec's ass by reselling their Norton crap, and they're generally very poor.
Their TechGuys (now Knowhow! snigger snigger!) we-do-it-all marketing scam is the biggest con I've ever seen. You phone them up to fix your washing machine. You know the bearings have gone, they then tell you the motor and/or control board is knackered. Add to that they charge extortionate prices to mount TV's on the wall, set Freeview and FreeSat up (they charge 320 more to do the HD + version even though it's the same setup routine!)
Us guys at Kitamura have been doing computers and electronics repairs for years, I laugh every time DSG have to re-brand one of their subsidiaries (TechGuys to KnowHow, for example!) to throw off all the negative publicity!
I'll tell you a true story. When I set my firm up I decided to test them and went in to PC World to buy a nice laptop I'd seen, on credit. They were just that day starting to use a new infrastructure for the sales system. I was kept waiting 4 hours because of bugs and issues with the system to be told they couldn't do the credit agreement on my finances, our credit record wasn't good enough as we'd only just started.
So they don't even roadtest software before rolling it out in the company, either, and waste customer's time! I have never been so annoyed, and never ever set foot in their stores ever again! And that was 4 years ago.
Apple users = Mugs
Add to that Apple only switched to Intel so dumb Mac fanboys would pay thousands more for a Mac that will run Windows when a standard more upgradeable PC cost three quarters less!
They then turned round and said us standard PC users couldn't run OS X. Arrogant greedy bastards, trying to steal PC market! The OS X86 Project soon stuck a 4 finger salute up to that crap! Mac OS is basic compared to Windows anyway. Compare the Control Panel to System Preferences to see!
Yet more brand locking!
Ahhh, this is getting old, and annoying. Apple brand locking worsens, yet again! I've been fixing Apple hardware for years, and have seen gradually how things have got smaller. More components are soldered in (CPU on all their notebooks and iMacs, and on the Air everything is! RAM, SSD, CPU)
The shit gets thinner, more non-standard and more overpriced every year. I prefer a standard form factor machine I can upgrade completely, not some proprietary built-around-itself shit like the iMac. The only good thing about Apple crap is me and my job, I'm a vacuum rework specialist, so when all the Airs and iMacs come in for repairs and upgrades with soldered in components, I'm quids in because I'm cheaper than Apple and have all the reflow equipment under the sun!
The only fully upgradeable machine in Apple's line up is the Mac Pro, but probably not for long. The fannybois will still be ripped off by His Arrogant Sweary Jobsness, but then complain when their machine is dog slow 3 years later because the HDD and CPU is non-upgradeable!
All this trouble for "single sheet aluminium"? Sacrificing upgradeability and repairability for looks is a stupid mugs game, a game I've never been stupid enough to play because I have sense as well as experience in the computer repair industry!
Arrogance is rife @ Apple
So Steve Jobs IS as arrogant as he looks? Exactly the reason I won't buy Apple stuff and be brand locked. And the reason Apple just made the HDD connectors on the new iMacs proprietary so you have to go to them for parts. Yup, more outrageous overpriced hardware. And brand locking!
I'm an Apple repairer, and have been for 13 years, I've seen them go downhill, all thanks to that ugly arrogant prick Jobsworth who has fanbois wanting to suck his tiny dick around every corner who will buy his steaming shit if he sold it! Repairing the stuff brings me good money but I'll NEVER buy it personally! And no, I'm not a troll, I speak my mind.
Re: Still know where you are 3Gers
Neither do 2G or 1G users get the update either if I'm correct? I have a 3G but am in no rush to upgrade because Apple needs to release new phones just to add new features which should have been there from the start. They did it with the iPad. The features in the iPad 2 were deliberately left out of the iPad 1 because Apple like to keep the fanboys buying the new gear for new features to screw money out of them.
Sly marketing that should be classed as rip off fraud in my book. My 3G is a phone and a high tech PDA, no need for me to upgrade, except to a HTC when the time is right. I hate sly brand locking, and snobbish companies like Apple. Exactly the reason I like that jailbreaking is legal, I'll do what I want with my device that I paid for, thanks. And that includes being able to go where I want without being tracked too clearly.
I have 3D too, Andy!
And as another note Andy, yes I do have 3D, I have a 60" Samsung 3D TV that my Japanese girlfriend imported from her hometown of Tokyo.
I'm not a pathetic troll either but a time served electronics and computer professional so I tell it as it is. And I have a joband gorgeous girlfriend. Nor am I an idiot, and because I know more facts than you, turns out you're the idiot instead because you're a blind Sony fanboy still blissfully ignorant of the faults that the crap that your Holy Grail Sony call revolutionary, has and always will have.
Sony couldn't organise a piss up in a brewery, that's why 15 years later their shitty laser diodes are still failing.
Some more Fact for Andy
PSN is also crap and laggy, but then it's free and currently hacked to pieces and unavailable, so you get what you pay for. Microsoft have XNA for amateur programmers, the subscription costs a lot less than the development stuff for the PS3, that's why nobody likes programming for Sony anymore.
Something else. Do you ACTUALLY KNOW what caused the RRoD and YLoD? It isn't "crap hardware", it's called RoHS, lead free solder and BGA solder technology. Before RoHS (Reduction of Hazardous Substances) we used LEAD in solder, which made joints strong enough to withstand high chip operating techniques. Ever since RoHS legislation, us engineers have had to use lead free solder balls in BGA (Ball Grid Array), which is softer, and gradually fractures due to cooling and heating of chips because the solder reaches melting point under normal use. The solder balls fracture past an acceptable amount (the chips include sets of redundant stress resisting balls) thus causing intermittent contact, and the YLoD/RRoD happens.
It happens in laptops too, and is partly the reason the nVidia defect is so severe.
There's the facts from a software and computer/console hardware engineer. Beats a bedroom expert fanboy opinion anyday, Andy. You might wanna do your research and use the hardware rather than spouting nonsense how Microsoft are crap. And actually get a job.
@Andy Jones
@Andy Jones: Well, it's obvious to me you're a PS3 fanboy.
1. Where's your card reader?
2. Where's your Other OS?
3. Where did all your 4 USB ports go?
4. Why have Sony released firmware that breaks stuff like stopping the Blu-Ray drive working?
5. Why do the lasers and drives keep failing?
6. Why can you STILL not FULLY install games to your PS3 HDD without jailbreaking it? Even then all games don't work, I've done it, I have a Slim as an unwanted present.
7. Why do 99% of games that say 1080p on the box only do 720p? On a Sony TV as well as others?
8. Where's your PS1/PS2 Backwards compatibility gone with physical discs? They charge a fortune for ANCIENT PS1/2 games on PSN to screw yet more money out of you!
9. The build quality of the Slim is utter shit. The cooling fan itself is a tiny cheap plastic one as opposed to the massive metal one of the FAT, but then you wouldn't know that, you're a user fanboy and not a technician.
I can go on, I repair these things on an intimate board level. The 3D is a load of shit. The firmware that was released to make the PS3 magically 3D when the FAT was still in production is bollocks. It was jittery and didn't have the proper hardware 3D support until the Slim. And the Slims are still failing today due to heat and dodgy blu-ray lasers and control boards, whereas Microsoft learned their lesson. Installing the FULL game to my 360 HDD so the drive doesn't need to be used, and full 1080p res in dash and game was enough of a selling point to upgrade from Premium to S for me when they added it in with bigger HDD and Wireless N. The console got better and better over the years once MS realised, I can't say the same for PS3. Sony just shrunk the case, whereas Microsoft shrunk chip die sizes, combined CPU & GPU, add to that improved the cooling.
The PS3 is alsodifficult to program for,and I quote Gabe Newell of Valve, "The PS3 is a total disaster on so many levels, I think it's really clear that Sony lost track of what customers and what developers wanted". He continued "I'd say, even at this late date, they should just cancel it and do a do over. Just say, 'This was a horrible disaster and we're sorry and we're going to stop selling this and stop trying to convince people to develop for it'"
Blu Ray is OK. It's slow for games, they take AGES loading because of the too-high density so the PS3 IS NOT good for gaming unless you have a sleeping bag handy waiting for loading. But then if you'd actually USED a PS3 and 360 side by side rather than being a forum know-it-all you'd know, wouldn't you? Blu-Ray is good for movies and backups, that's it. I'd rather use DVD and have quick loading times. Microsoft did make mistakes, I never said they didn't, but they learnt their lesson in the end, we are HUMAN, the console has never been fully hacked unlike the PS3 so it goes to show security.
And finally. The 360 still has ALL IT'S ORIGINAL FEATURES! What does your PS3 still have after all these years? The only reason Blu-Ray won the format war was because Sony backhanded everyone with money and threatened court action to jump ship from HD-DVD!
Case Closed.
Not even an apology from Sony!
In the email detailing the breach they sent out, they simply said:
"We thank you for your patience as we complete our investigation of this incident, and we regret any inconvenience."
Not even an apology from them, like, "We are deeply sorry!" so Sony obviously don't care. Good job the PS3 I registered my PSN account on was an eBay repair job and did the YLoD once too many times, and went straight under my sledgehammer. I'm sick of crap quality PS hardware with crappy lasers & ball bearing disc spindles (PS1), chips that get too hot and need reballing, add to that the features that keep disappearing. Hell, games don't even run at 1080p when the box says they should! The shit quality has been there since the PS1, I'm a console repairer and done it many times at work, and home before I got sick of their crap consoles. I used to be a PS guy until Xbox saved my headaches.
My Xbox 1 NEVER needed any replaced parts, and still goes strong with my Elite cool running 360, and new S. Add to that the 360 and Xbox 1 never had features gradually taken away over the years. THAT was another nail in the Sony coffin for me (the FAT PS3 LOOKS like a coffin lid!), it's like giving a child loads of presents one year for Xmas, and slowly taking one away every year after that, downright cruel.
After the way Sony have treated me as an ex customer, I'm loyal to Microsoft, at least they own up to mistakes and don't take stuff away from me that I paid hard earned cash for! They repaired and replaced RRoD consoles for me in great time and customer focused fashion, for both me personally and my customers at work. THAT is SERVICE.
Mine's the one with the Microsoft logo on!
It's my job to clean computers, and this doesn't shock me!
This is what I actually love about my job. People bring me their computers in, saying they're crashing and freezing, beeping, etc, and all I have to do is spend 1 - 2 hours dismantling everything (completely), cleaning it, renewing thermal grease, (and sometimes the fans if they're burnt out because of the dust) put everything back together, and that's £22 - £44 (£22ph) worth of food on my table, and the customer's machine is spotless. I keep the pile of dust, and cam pics for them, to shock them!
I do this about 7 - 8 times a day, and just the computer cleaning side of my company repair skills earns me a lot on really good weeks, before the actual repairs come in! I've seen spiders, dead hedgehogs, ants, bluebottles, centipedes, woodlice, you name it. It is well worth it, I love my job as a self employed repairer, and despite not liking spiders, wouldn't swap it for the world. I'm a big softie too, and like animals, so seeing dead creatures like hedgehogs (how they got there is another story) inside PC's saddens me, but that's life.
Luckily it's only ever dust, and the occasional insect inside consoles and laptops I do. FAT PS3's get the biggest insects in, having a lot more vents than 360's. Ants seem to think PS3's are fairgrounds, and like having rides on the blades of fans, so much it kills the little blighters, good riddance! It's quite hilarious imagining their little faces as they whizz round and round, their bug eyes popping out!!
Acer = Like Apple, cheap junk sold expensively
Acer want to follow Apple? Acer are cheaply built, just like Apple. I know because I repair them, on a daily basis at my firm Kitamura Computers, as I do Apple equipment. They're built to look nice on the outside, like Apple like to use their "single sheet of aluminum", but inside, are shoddy and cheaply built. On Acers, case parts break more than usual, mouse buttons (the microswitches, not the plastic your finger touches) are soldered direct to the motherboard rather than being part of the palmrest trackpad assembly, needing to be desoldered and soldered to be replaced, and the machines generally fail prematurely.
Take the latest MackBook Air. 3 year old Core2Duo processor (My 3 year old Clevo has a faster C2D CPU). Everything is soldered to the motherboard. CPU, Flash and RAM. And how often do us techies have to replace RAM sticks in PC's and standard laptops because they've gone bad? Very Often. Meaning the board in the 2009/2010 Airs has to either have the Flash and RAM replaced/reballed, or the whole board scrapped. After paying $800+ in the first place to buy the crap? No thanks, pal!
So, if Sony and Acer/Asus want to copy Apple, go to it. Puts my food on the table in my chip reballing sector of my company, along with all the failing PS3 FAT consoles (and now Slims that are emerging with no video or power!) I've seen a massive drop in failing RRoD 360 consoles, the newest Elites and Slims are staying really strong!
I prefer SUBSTANCE over STYLE. Otherwise the iPad and MB Airs are the nasty disposable results you get if you favour style, and listen to fanbois! I'd rather be able to upgrade the RAM and CPU in my systems, thankyou. Mac CPU's have always been soldered in their laptops, and they should be done for the amount of their disposable crap that ends up in landfill because it's either A) The device is obsolete and can't be upgraded, or B) The owner can't afford my reballing and vacuum rework costs, they've blown it on the device itself and haven't finished paying it off!! Their excuse is always, "Ooh, it looks nice!" Wow. Not.
Google too big for its pants
I seriously don't like the way Google are going. The modifications they're making to their web and image search are tacky, and take up too many resources. My CPU fan on my notebook (A 1.86GHz C2D with 1GB RAM) kicks right up to full and Firefox slows right down, until I close the tab down.
Trying to show pages and pages of results on one virtual sheet of paper is a no-no. Rather like Google's pie-in-the-sky idea that everyone will be using cloud computing within 3-4 years. Trusting your data to other people's hard drives and servers, with all the hacking, Internet banking fraud and stuff going on? Sorry, I'm keeping my data close to me, on my HDD. I know it's safe, as I'm a qualified IT engineer and have my security set up as it should be.
Off back to Yahoo..... Bye bye, Google! Yet again another company (like Tesco) that are trying to get too many fingers in too many pies, not knowing what they're doing. Are we going to see Google Car Insurance anytime soon? I sure hope to hell we're not.
Not the first time, Dell!
This isn't the first time, nor will it be the last time Dell withholds info from staff. I used to work for them in Limerick a few years ago, and the amount of stuff I heard from other staff rather than management themselves was atrocious.
This, and their crappy marketing & manufacturing procedures (non standard hardware, locking customers into the brand for parts etc) made me quit working for them, and go with Tiny and Evesham. Getting parts for Dells back then wasn't as easy as eBay, not many people sold them on a third party basis. Since then I've done freelance for various companies, and none have been as bad as Dell. Industry standardization is the key, including staff motivation and information.
Typical Sony, this!
This is just typical of Sony. Crap overpriced hardware that fails, and doesn't do what it's supposed to, or what you paid for it to do.
PS1 = Fail, laser and spindle cheapness
PS2 = Even bigger fail with the same laser problems as the original, that looks like a heatsink out of an industrial machine!
PS3 = Same issues as the above two, shaped like a casket, and slow.
Vaio = Crap Mac lookalike that fails unexpectedly (I know, I'm a PC technician). The only good thing is the DC Jack is on a plug for replacement.
Sony Batteries = Junk that explodes
The only thing going for Sony with me is some of their audio products. Sound quality and battery life (provided you're not using THEIR batteries)
Sony seems to have a lot of worshippers, like Apple. Why, is beyond me. In fact the two companies are becoming similar, style over substance. I'd rather have substance over style, something that isn't wafter thin, but still does what I want it to, and doesn't explode.
My second fave joins the club!
This is interesting...now I get the chance to test Hitachi's 2TB offering over my first fave Western Digital. The WD seems to vibrate a little in my test case, but that's without vibration damping grommets.
Let's hope WD and Hitachi drive Seagate out...I hate them, and their Maxtor buddies! Their drives have been nothing but problematic for me and my customers, never again will I buy an SG/Maxtor.
Exaggerated!
Quote Dunncha, "Considering that nobody uses eBay anymore.
Fail! Because eBay used to be fun!"
Nobody uses it really? I think you better open your eyes, if you have any! There's several billion, if not trillion users. In the words of Niko Bellic, GTA IV, Liberty City's famous Serbian terrorist, "Open your stupid eyes!"
I use it, and have never had any problems with either eBay or Paypal, other than fees. System outages happen, why people like the Reg like to make a song and dance is beyond me.
Typical media.... You're all the same!
@ Anonymous Coward
Quote from Anonymous Coward (I wish they had a [quote][/quote] system like phpBB!)
"If you needed to keep defragging and reinstalling windows "very often," then you're doing it wrong. If you learn even the most basic things about running a windows machine, you can keep it running like a new install for years, so I suggest you guys go back to school before preaching more bs."
Exactly, AC. I've had my Windows Vista & XP dual boot for well over a year now, and it runs perfect. I regularly defrag, move downloaded files to a storage drive, do antispyware & AV scan/update, registry optimise and junk cleaning. I also keep the inside clean, dust free, and change my thermal paste regularly.
My system is like factory new, except it doesn't have factory bloat on it. No blue screens, slowdown, lockups or "[Program name] has stopped working" errors. It's like housekeeping. You wouldn't have piles of dirty dishes/clothes everywhere at home, or bugs and mites everywhere, would you? Some might, but I don't. I keep my computer organised, like my home.
The analogy is the same across all OS'es, they all gather clutter of some kind, and need maintenance, just not all are prone to spyware & viruses, and that is because of popularity. Windows is used by the majority, so is more profitable (so to speak) to hackers.
It's people's laziness, ignorance, and the expectation of it to "just work" that causes most software & hardware issues. I know, I've been doing computers for well over 12 years, and it's taught me the differences between all OS flavours, plus how to keep them running like new, instead of crying on a forum, "It's slow, it crashes, Microsoft is crap!". Look at yourself first, and think, "What if I took the time to find out WHY it's slow/crashy, and put it right?"
Mac OS isn't "perfect" it's just that it's engineered to work on a certain combination of hardware, thus avoiding compatibility issues, even with Windows. I like the customisability of a PC, and have the knowledge and experience to set it up and keep it running right.
WD is No. 1
I've never liked Seagate, due to high failure rates, and even more so since they took over Maxtor. I've NEVER had a Western Digital hard drive fail, compared to about 25 Seagate/Maxtor ones, and that's NOT including customer ones. The Maxtor 2F0L0 20GB drives were known to be crap, I had bucketloads of them die, either electronically, or because of bearing failure. They only had 2 platters, were thin and quiet, but failure prone.
As far as I'm concerned, from my experience (I'm a repair company owner), Western Digital and Hitachi are my top two, and the only ones that go in any of my machines or company servers. When I stick a WD in a computer, I am assured that it isn't going to come back for HD replacement, only maintenance and regular backup, as my customers entrust me to do backups for them on site.
If WD start to sell SSD's mainstream, and eventually as cheaply as their mechanical drives, I won't hesitate to use them. Their recent pricing of their new 1TB 2.5" drive at around $179 has surprised me, too.