Mac hater! (spoken in Dutch accent) (1 Viewer)

[Wayne Bundrick]

Are you just re-stating this or are you trying to tell us that you think that is expensive? Or inexpensive?

Expensive or inexpensive isn't the issue, it's bang for the buck. Comparisons of the G5's performance are relevant only against similarly priced PC hardware, and three large can also buy a whole lot of PC.

 

[Jeff Kleist]

Wayne is correct. For 3K I can set up 3 3GHZ machines and do distributed processing, which will blow your render times out of the water even with a dual G5

 

[Joseph S]

And you still can't do anything with OS X until they remove the 70,000 roadblocks in your way and kill the cute

The Finder is perfectly happy to use 0.00% of my CPUs. If you are paranoid about "the cute" you can always just quit it. If you have physical roadblocks, then just use Speakable Items to launch the terminal.app or get a trackball.

 

[Scott H]

Expensive or inexpensive isn't the issue, it's bang for the buck. Comparisons of the G5's performance are relevant only against similarly priced PC hardware, and three large can also buy a whole lot of PC.

If cost isn't an issue then why have you been making posts regarding it's cost? Seems it is to you.

Regarding what PC you can buy for $3K, again, show me any 64-bit multi-processor processor workstation similarly configured from another manufacturer for less. You're paying for a lot of things here, including IBM processor technology that is new. It's new at AMD too.

 

[Scott H]

And you still can't do anything with OS X until they remove the 70,000 roadblocks in your way and kill the cute

This is Jeff's routine of throwing rocks and running away. Super35 sucks. Mac sucks. No expressed understanding of the topics. It seems logical to conclude from your brash comments, without any technical explanation, that you understand little about OS X. Several of us have dismissed your "cute" comment with facts about our use of X, but you just repeat yourself.

I muddled through Mac OS Classic's aging and weaknesses in the late 90s, discovering Linux... Then OS X arrived on the scene. There is no comparing these two Unix alternatives to Windows OS's. What OS do you use?

 

[Jeff Kleist]

This is Jeff throwing rocks and running away, per the norm. Super35 sucks. Mac sucks. No expressed understanding of the topics. It is very obvious from your comments about OS X that you understand little about it.

Apple goes out of their way to "make their computers easier to use". They deliberately bury the guts of the system in the OS to keep Gramma from screwing up her computer. They assign cutesy names and unneccessary cutesy graphics and animation to their system tools. The software support is nil outside of graphics and related packages. It costs at least half again that of a similarly powered PC.

These are undeniable facts about Apple. Who cares if they're getting some token game ports these days. If you want to "think different" and waste an extra grand, that's your perogative. I'll buy 3 2GHZ+ computers and out render you for less money.

Apple has always been a great hardware designer, but their prices are outrageous, and their UI is the worst I have ever used. I was never an AppleII fan either, the GS felt confused, the original Mac was barely useable, everything up to the performa line I found intolerable, and once they hit PowerPC, they finally didn't snail their way through basic tasks but were still painfully slow

I supported Macs for close to 6 years (middle through HS), and I learned heck of a lot about them because our teacher was incompetant. Some math guy who liked computers they put in charge. He knew nothing about anything, and he was also the reason why the school district held onto Mac exclusivity for so long, when every other school district had switched to PC. Why? Because he didn't know how to use a PC. like it or not, schools should be teaching on PCs because unless you're an artist, that's what you're going to be using. I personally helped expand the school's network with an ex-Commodore guy. Old Keck didn't have anything to do with it, and without Gordon the entire school network would have continued to crawwwwwwlllllllllllll along on ancient outmoded technology that was pokey by Apple standards.

When I say Mac's UI is crap this is from long personal experience. I'm glad they realized how badly their kernel stunk and got UNIX, but until they write a real UI for it, it's just UNIX with training wheels and an invisible dog fence

As for Alias' tests currently, it's quite possible that they've written new versions since I last actively looked at it around a year ago. To the best of my knowlege, my information was correct.

 

[Wayne Bundrick]

$2846.58 sure as hell looks like $3000 to me, especially if I have to pay sales tax.

If cost isn't an issue then why have you been making posts regarding it's cost? Seems it is to you.

I said bang for the buck. That means getting $3000 or more worth of performance, for $3000 or less. It also means getting $1000 or more worth of performance for $1000 or less. Expensive or inexpensive doesn't matter, it's getting the level of performance you need at an appropriate price. That's what I said.

If I were to spend 3 grand in need of pure CPU horsepower, I'd have a rack full of slower, less expensive CPUs. The work that I would need them to do is easily subdivided into smaller tasks, and their total CPU horsepower would outperform a pair of top dollar CPUs.

 

[Walter Kittel]

When I say Mac's UI is crap this is from long personal experience.

Personal preference. :p)

- Walter.

 

[Kelley_B]

Jeff you will be eating your words with Longhorn, trust me. Microsoft is again taking the good from Apple and trying to duplicate it in Windows, but as always fails to even come close to the quality of the Apple counterpart.

 

[Scott H]

Jeff, you didn't answer my question. What OS do you use?

 

[Jeff Kleist]

Right now I use Win98SE, I have several expensive devices that companies have decided not to write XP drivers for. I run my intensive apps in WinNT 4.0

Kelly- I hate every single thing MS tries to take from Apple except the Trash can. I hate Apple's OS, and will always hate it. MS' taskbar and system tray were good additons, and no one appriciates a good keyboard shortcut more than I do. I have my DOS prompt on a hotkey as well as regedit and the other tools that let me get to the heart fast

I still find an elegance in the DOS prompt that lacks in any GUI, I don't know offhand if OSX features a UNIX command line or not.

 

[Scott H]

I have several expensive devices that companies have decided not to write XP drivers for.

I had no such problems migrating from OS 9.x to 10.x.x. All devices that I already owned were recognized immediately and without any driver software, and of the devices acquired since upgrading only a new laser printer from Samsung required downloading their OS X driver. Though being Unix I can run CUPS and Gimp-Print with just about any printer hardware. Plus ESP Ghostscript. And there are open-source drivers available like HPIJS and pnm2ppa and so on.

 

[Scott H]

I have my DOS prompt on a hotkey as well as regedit and the other tools that let me get to the heart fast

I already posted part of this earlier, but again quoting Richard Kerris, Director of Maya Technologies:

"the ability to open up a [terminal] window and drive the computer directly with commands — that’s going to be awesome. One thing that’s held the Mac back in a lot of professional worlds is that those guys who are the rocket scientists, who want to have a system that they can both interface with as well as drive directly — they haven’t been able to do that on the Mac. You either drive it through the interface or not at all. With Mac OS X now, you have the ability to cut right into the core and do something with it."

 

[Rob Gardiner]

Hmmm.. *thinking* I'm not sure this is true. All HDTVs have internal line doublers preventing combing artifacts. VHS is very interlaced but I'm sure people can still watch their tapes on their HD sets without seeing excessive combing. The same goes for DVD players that are not progressive.

Scott L,

I should have been more clear, my deinterlacing manifesto was in regards to hybrid material, that which is a mix of 24fps 3:2 pulldown film, and 30fps interlaced video, such as TV shows like Star Trek TNG or DS9. I understand Babylon 5 and Andromeda also exhibit this property. Or for another example, most supplements on DVD are hybrid: telecined film clips mixed with interlaced video interviews of Robert Wise and Rita Moreno. (Also much news, sports, and as I mentioned earlier, Anime material is like this too.) Interlaced frames sometimes get through the real-time deinterlacers that are built into prog displays. I know for certain this happens on my PC monitor, despite the deinterlacing capabilities of the MPEG decoder. I had assumed HDTV deinterlacing worked the same way: virtually 100% accurate for pure interlaced material, but not quite so good for hybrid signals. For example, in the TNG pilot, when Will Riker visits Groppler Zorn in his office early in the episode and leaves with an apple, there are about 6 combed frames in the minute-long scene. Also any time special effects (video) are combined with filmed live-action, you have a hybrid frame with interlaced and non-interlaced areas. The reason why pre-deinterlaced materials have always looked soft to you, is quite possibly because you have never seen the results of AviSynth using Donald Graft's DECOMB filter. To my knowldge, this is the only technology of its kind, anywhere. This is the only means, that I know of, to properly deinterlace this hybrid material. It has a smart field matching algorithm that can reconstruct pulldown, a post processor that deinterlaces the interlaced portions of any frames that get through the field-matching, and a decimater that can restore the original 24fps (or even strange, silent-era framerates such as 17fps if necessary) frame rate. There are threshholds to control the sensitivity of all these processes. There may be other gadgets elsewhere in the digital video world that can do this, but I have not been able to find them. Of course, there are hardware only video consoles that cost seven figures; I'm sure they can do all this without breaking a sweat but that's not what I had in mind. I am still only a novice but I will post some screen caps from a (sanitized) police video and from "Encounter at Farpoint" this evening to give you folks an idea what this wonderful program can do.

 

[Jeff Kleist]

It's one thing to express a personal preference for one OS over another, but comparing WIndows 98SE to OS X is hardly fair to your OS of choice. From a technical standpoint they aren't on the same playing field. Though over two years old and based on 10.0.0 beta, there is a good primer over at ArsTechnica.

I didn't say I was using 98SE because of choice. I'm using it because it runs what I need. If anything, I used to love AmigaOS

And sure my card is RECOGNIZED by XP, it just doesn't function properly. It's a high-end firewire card created before OHCI standards and does not run on XP. I don't have the money to upgrade it right now.

 

[JoshF]

I still find an elegance in the DOS prompt that lacks in any GUI, I don't know offhand if OSX features a UNIX command line or not.

Dude. It's time to step away from the conversation. You clearly know nothing about OSX.

 

[Jeff Kleist]

I've barely used OSX as previously stated

I maintain that the UI is crap. I can't stand the Mac UI. It doesn't matter that they finally woke up after 15 years and realized that a command line is a good thing. I think it's cloying, I find it pandering, and I feel my IQ drops every time I touch the thing.

Remove the cute, Rewrite your UI to something decent,and drop the hardware price 40% and I might change my mind. Just because Apple gets to the party a decade too late (how long did it take them to get pre-emptive multitasking? Something AmigaOS had in 1990?) doesn't mean they should be heralded as the greatest ever. Instead it should be hordes of angry customers going "why the f**k didn't you do this 10 years ago?"

 

[JoshF]

I'm sorry, but until you understand what you're criticisizing, your comments will come off as those of a circa-1983 BBS Mac vs. PC vs. Amiga rant.

 

[Scott H]

I've barely used OSX as previously stated

I maintain that the UI is crap. I can't stand the Mac UI.

Do you not realize how you come across to objective people? Bashing something while simultaneously conveying that you don't know what you are talking about obviously totally discredits your opinion. Again.

If you've barely used it, then even your cursory criticisms, which so far are invalid as has been addressed, are nothing more than anti-Mac sophism.

Basically, you don't know anything about the Mac OS X GUI or it's underpinnings. You are not privy to it's almost unified industrywide praise (yes, even from the PC camp), and the technological reasons for it. But you hate it.

If you don't have an informed opinion, only a baseless aversion, then why cast stones in the threads?


And BTW, since you turned to semantics as a diversion, in caps nonetheless, when I indicated that every one of my old peripherals were recognized under OS X without any driver installations, that means recognized and fully operational.

 

[Scott H]

Btw, my apologies to Scott L for participating in the hijacking of this thread