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Aayush Arya on a faulty Dell monitor that he has had replaced several times: Outrageously enough, this guy also had the audacity to suggest to me that since it seemed damn near impossible for the company to properly produce one Dell UltraSharp 3008WFP, perhaps I would like a downgrade to a cheaper monitor in the…
Aayush Arya on a faulty Dell monitor that he has had replaced several times:
Outrageously enough, this guy also had the audacity to suggest to me that since it seemed damn near impossible for the company to properly produce one Dell UltraSharp 3008WFP, perhaps I would like a downgrade to a cheaper monitor in the interest of at least getting one without any flaws.
Be sure to click through and read his last paragraph. I have had similar bad experiences with Dell support.
In case your interested I have a completely different setup at home now, so I figured I would snap a pic.
In case your interested I have a completely different setup at home now, so I figured I would snap a pic.
One thing that I forgot to mention earlier when I posted about the new Microsoft store in Bellevue is the interesting problem that the location poses to Microsoft. As I said the store is about 3-4 spaces down from the Apple store, which I can only assume was intentional on Microsofts part. On the other…
One thing that I forgot to mention earlier when I posted about the new Microsoft store in Bellevue is the interesting problem that the location poses to Microsoft. As I said the store is about 3-4 spaces down from the Apple store, which I can only assume was intentional on Microsofts part.
On the other side of the Apple store (the non-Microsoft side) is two doors and then Nordstrom. I can tell you from first hand experience just what that means on an iPhone launch day – it means the iPhone line snakes down and will go directly in front of the Microsoft store.
How awkward is that?
Not for the people waiting for the iPhone, but for everyone in the Microsoft store including the employees. Think about it, to my knowledge there has been no line where people have waited hours and hours in 300+ people lines to get a Windows Phone 7.
So that means come another iPhone/iPad launch everyone in the Microsoft store will have to stare at the droves of people lining up to buy one thing from their competition. I don’t know if this is bad or good, Microsoft could use it to their advantage and try to woo people with their competing products (walking through the line showing off a slate or Windows Phone 7 perhaps) or it could prove to be completely demoralizing for Microsoft.
Either way it should be interesting to see.
I just got a review unit of the Samsung Galaxy Tab from Verizon, I will be working on a review of it over the next week. Please email me if there is a specific something you want me to address in my review and I will do my best.
I just got a review unit of the Samsung Galaxy Tab from Verizon, I will be working on a review of it over the next week. Please email me if there is a specific something you want me to address in my review and I will do my best.
I just returned from my first trip to the newly opened Microsoft Store at Bellevue Square – the store itself sits just a few doors down from the Apple Store, but is vastly different. I have read in many places that the store is much like an Apple store and yadda yadda yadda – this…
I just returned from my first trip to the newly opened Microsoft Store at Bellevue Square – the store itself sits just a few doors down from the Apple Store, but is vastly different. I have read in many places that the store is much like an Apple store and yadda yadda yadda – this could not be further from the truth.
The only way this store is like the Apple store is in how the employees dress, how nice they are, that it sells consumer electronics and that it offers similar services as the Apple Store. Everything else is vastly different.
I was really happy that I got to spend some time with two models of Windows Phone 7 devices. Some HTC jobber and a Samsung Focus. Overall Windows Phone 7 impressed the hell out of me, it may be the best piece of software I have seen Microsoft make in the last decade. The UI was impressive and responsive. The keyboard was comfortable, but both devices had a large screen than the iPhone so typing was hard for me – though I guess with a short amount of time you would have no problems typing on the device.
The browser was slow to load this site, but I don’t know if that was the network (the store was packed with people using the Internet) or the browser itself. I liked everything about the phone except the home screen. That home screen is nothing but ADD, I couldn’t find any logic to how it was laid out. What a joke.
Overall though I really was impressed with my short time playing with the phone, more impressed than I ever have been with an Android phone.
Sorry for the crap pictures BTW – I had not planned on taking any and apparently there was a lot less light in the store than I previously thought.
Kristin Jackson reporting for the Seattle Times: The airline said Friday there would be no charge for in-flight Internet through Dec. 9 (courtesy of the Honda corporation). Awesome, who’s going to pick up the tab for me when I fly over New Years week? I vote the TSA pays for it.
Kristin Jackson reporting for the Seattle Times:
The airline said Friday there would be no charge for in-flight Internet through Dec. 9 (courtesy of the Honda corporation).
Awesome, who’s going to pick up the tab for me when I fly over New Years week? I vote the TSA pays for it.
I would be remiss not to reuse such a compelling headline, Kiro TV in Seattle reports: “I didn’t really expect her to touch my vagina through my pants,” said Kaya McLaren, an elementary schoolteacher, of an airport screener. Come on already. In other news: Erick Erickson (what a name) of Red State reports: This is…
I would be remiss not to reuse such a compelling headline, Kiro TV in Seattle reports:
“I didn’t really expect her to touch my vagina through my pants,” said Kaya McLaren, an elementary schoolteacher, of an airport screener.
Come on already.
Erick Erickson (what a name) of Red State reports:
This is probably another good time to remind you all that all of us were carrying actual assault rifles, and some of us were also carrying pistols.
So we’re in line, going through one at a time. One of our Soldiers had his Gerber multi-tool. TSA confiscated it. Kind of ridiculous, but it gets better. A few minutes later, a guy empties his pockets and has a pair of nail clippers. Nail clippers. TSA informs the Soldier that they’re going to confiscate his nail clippers.
And Gruber linked to this gem from Molly Grantham reporting for WBTV:
“She put her full hand on my breast and said, ‘What is this?’. And I said, ‘It’s my prosthesis because I’ve had breast cancer.’ And she said, ‘Well, you’ll need to show me that’.”
Cathy was asked to show her prosthetic breast, removing it from her bra.
It appears that the TSA wants you to be safe and humiliated before you fly – ass wipes.
Lastly here is something interesting that happened to my Wife when she got to TSA yesterday in SEATAC. She got in line a noticed that she was in the porno-scanner line. She lane jumped to a metal detector and did so a couple of times to make sure she got through TSA fast enough to not be re-routed to the short porno-scanner line. Upon clearing the metal detector an agent that had been watching her pulled her aside and search her stuff, telling her that she had too many liquids.
This ass of a TSA agent claimed that she could only have 3oz of liquids TOTAL in her bag. WTF. Here is TSA’s official policy:
What my Wife was told was clearly a lie, eventually they let her through. I have no doubt that this was in response to her jumping lines and probably looking freaked out that she may have to be groped instead of being given cancer with the porno-scanner. If that was the case though TSA should have asked her about it instead of passive aggressively making shit up.
Today I spent the morning updating all of my external backups and making sure everything was in good order. Next week is Thanksgiving here in the U.S. which means a short work week and loads of travel. I love it, but it is also a peak time for data loss so I wanted to make…
Today I spent the morning updating all of my external backups and making sure everything was in good order. Next week is Thanksgiving here in the U.S. which means a short work week and loads of travel. I love it, but it is also a peak time for data loss so I wanted to make sure everything was properly backed up. The annoyance though quickly set in as external USB HDs are slow, and I began to wonder what it would be like to have external SSDs instead.
Here are the options that I have found, none of which I have tried.
It appears that you could put SSDs in a Drobo, you would just have to find a way to mount them in the 3.5” bay that Drobos use. If you were to buy the base model Drobo that has 4 bays that would cost you $399 and it appears that for only a twenty dollars for each drive you could get the needed adapter, though I have never seen the inside of a Drobo so I can’t say for sure that this adapter would work.
You could then fill the drive with Intel X25-M Gen2 80GB SSDs at a price of $250 a pop – not cheap. But in the end you would have a 320GB Drobo that is all SSDs for an everyday low price of $1,479.00.
Which is massively expensive for what you get.
[Updated: 11/19/10 at 10:21 AM] Drobo says it does not support SSDs – that saves me 1,479 dollars.
Since the Drobo is out of my price range here are some other options that I found:
Ok so far I am striking out to find anything useful. I would need to replace 1 mobile 250GB HD, 2 1TB desktop HDs, and 2 500GB desktop HDs so that my backups would remain solid. None of the above options do that in a way that I could remotely afford.
It appears that in order to get all external drives to SSD you need to be rich, very rich. I am not, so for now I will stick with my lovely 7200rpm records. I would suspect though that we are very close to seeing these drives at affordable prices.
What really intrigues me is what form factor SSD external drives may take – they wouldn’t need the same cooling fans, the same power requirements, nor would they need to be in a box shape.
It is distributed via Steam and costs $4.99. I have it on my iPad only and love the game. Not sure about how it plays on the Mac, but it has to be better than it would be on the iPhone (iPad is awesome). [via TUAW]
It is distributed via Steam and costs $4.99. I have it on my iPad only and love the game. Not sure about how it plays on the Mac, but it has to be better than it would be on the iPhone (iPad is awesome).
If you read this site in RSS or Instapaper be sure to re-read the updated post from today about Minimal Computer Geeks. I posted an important update at the bottom.
If you read this site in RSS or Instapaper be sure to re-read the updated post from today about Minimal Computer Geeks. I posted an important update at the bottom.
TJ-Maxx is selling the iPad (16GB Wi-Fi only flavor) for $399, which is $100 off the ‘normal’ price. It is not at every store and they won’t tell you which, it’s like hide and seek. If you want one, but money has been an issue this is probably as good a deal you will find…
TJ-Maxx is selling the iPad (16GB Wi-Fi only flavor) for $399, which is $100 off the ‘normal’ price. It is not at every store and they won’t tell you which, it’s like hide and seek.
If you want one, but money has been an issue this is probably as good a deal you will find before Christmas.
If you are wondering how they can do this – I am guessing that they are eating the $100 and calling it a marketing expense, otherwise they would be at every store. This is a great idea if I am right.
[Updated: 11/19/10 at 7:58 AM] MacRumors (via Gruber) reports that Marshalls has them too and are getting 100 day over a 3-day period.
I, like so many others, was inspired by Patrick Rhone when he started Minimal Mac – I wanted to make my Mac experience less cluttered and more focused. As it turns out Patrick and I are not alone, judging by the popularity of his site there exists quite a large group of Mac users who…
I, like so many others, was inspired by Patrick Rhone when he started Minimal Mac – I wanted to make my Mac experience less cluttered and more focused. As it turns out Patrick and I are not alone, judging by the popularity of his site there exists quite a large group of Mac users who feel this way. This essay is for those people.
Ian Hines recently launched a new interview blog, and one of the first interviews was with Patrick Rhone, in this interview he stated:
Sometimes I use TextEdit. If it requires a lot of formatting (which I do with Markdown), I use TextMate.
This statement seemed innocent enough, and I do believe it is, but it got me to thinking: what does minimalistic computing really mean? Does it mean that we use as few applications as possible, or mean that we use our computers as little as possible? Then again does minimalistic computing mean that we have a lot of apps that are themselves very minimal in what they do?
So many questions, none of which I know the answer to. Thinking about it another way:
If everything Patrick does in TextEdit can be done in TextMate, but not the other way around, would the minimal thing not be, to use only TextMate? I am guessing he uses TextMate (like I do) to convert Markdown formatted text into HTML markup for posting. ((Using the great MultiMarkdown Bundle.)) If that is the case then why use TextEdit?
Ah yes, but TextEdit can do somethings that TextMate can’t – like say, open a Word document. So would the minimalist approach to computing then be: that you use many single focused (do one thing well) apps, such as Patrick is doing, or be to have one app that can do all of these things?
That is an honest question, what is the answer? Better yet, does the answer even matter?
I don’t mean to pick on Patrick, so let’s look at my computing setup instead. I use two web browsers every day. Every day. Two browsers.
I use Safari and Chrome. I use Safari as my primary browser and Chrome as a backup when I need to get some Flash going. I could easily accomplish everything in one or the other, but I choose not to have Flash installed in Safari to speed up my web browsing and increase battery life – the downside being that I have one more app I must run. Right or wrong it is a choice that I have consciously made, does it go against minimalistic computing though? On the one hand I eliminate Flash, however in doing so I created a need for a second web browser. I could easily have just one web browser, but that would mean having to keep Flash installed…and so on. Which solution is more minimal?
Same can be said with Photoshop and Pixelmator. Photoshop is more powerful, but Pixelmator is my go to, and then I inevitably make the switch back to Photoshop because I can’t easily do something I want to do in Pixelmator. Look at this tracking chart of my Photoshop vs Pixelmator usage for 2010 (thanks to Daytum):
As you can see I use Photoshop overwhelmingly more than Pixelmator, and the fact is that I can do everything in Photoshop that I could in Pixelmator, but not the other way around. So why keep Pixelmator?
For starters it is faster and lighter to use on my Mac, so it makes good sense when I want to run a bunch of apps at once. It is also much, much, cheaper to purchase. It is more stable. However, wouldn’t the minimal thing be to get rid of Pixelmator and go all Photoshop? Or would it be to stick with the more minimal Pixelmator and ditch Photoshop? Or keep them both using them for different things – as I currently do?
Isn’t what really matters the things that work for us the best? If I want to keep using multiple photo editing apps and that workflow makes sense for me then would that not be the best workflow solution for me? I think so.
There are more questions here than answers and I think most are rhetorical to be honest. I do think though that there is a difference between these three concepts:
That is, minimal computing seems to be a concept around which a certain group of us strive towards – minimizing and simplifying certain aspects of our computing lives. Productive computing is another facet – something that we all want to obtain, so that we can stop wasting time. This concept is centered on focus based tools like: OmniFocus, alarms, WriteRoom. Best solutions though are the things that work best for us and only us – like Patrick using both TextEdit and TextMate, or how I use two web browsers.
I think a lot of times we get these concepts confused because they so closely relate to one another. All to often I tend to blur the line between the three and it usually results in a compromise to the most important of the three: best solutions.
For instance let’s look at our menubars shall we…
There are nine icons in my menubar right now: Transmit, Dropbox, Bluetooth, Battery, Keychain, AirPort, Clock, Sound, Spotlight. A minimal approach would be to get rid of as many of these icons as possible. A productive approach might be to add as many as possible, to get the most information you can, or to get rid of as many as possible in order to decrease distractions. The best solution though is more vague, the best solution for me is to have nine.
I used to pride myself on the fact that I only had a handful of icons in the menubar, I removed the clock, sound, battery, wifi, bluetooth and Transmit. All to what end though? I ended up adding most back in Dashboard in one form or another and just ended up hitting F4 a lot more during the day. Likewise I used to have the icons stretch until they hit the other side with all sorts of things that monitored: temperature, fan speed, RAM usage and so on – that just resulted in ugliness. So I did a minimal and practical thing, I removed everything and added back what I missed. That’s how I ended up with nine – that’s how I found my best solution to the problem.
I know that sometimes I get caught up on trying to make my computer as productive as possible, or as minimal as can be – it occurred to me though that while that is all well and good, the best thing I could do would be to setup up my computer so that it works best for me, and only me.
I encourage you to do the same. ((That does not mean that you should stop reading sites like Minimal Mac, just that you don’t have to do everything posted on the site, or use every tool talked about – not that anyone said you ever did.))
[Updated: 11/19/10 at 8:03 AM] Patrick Rhone on Twitter reminds me that he too feels the same way, and that we really should read the About page on Minimal Mac (which I did read before posting this) where Patrick states:
I believe the most minimal computer is the one that is optimized for you. How you work. The menubar items you need. The dock items you need. The applications you need. The system you need. The peripherals you need. The tools you need to get the job done.
I believe most of us do not take the time to evaluate what that need is. The entire mission of this site is to help you ask those questions and find the answer that is right. The only answer that is right. The one that constitutes what is enough for you and only you.
Again I didn’t mean to sound like I was attacking Patrick Rhone, what he has done for my computing life and for the Mac community at large is wonderful. I was simply meaning to pose some questions that had been rattling around in my head, and some things that I see others not paying attention too.
It seems that I was not clear in my writing here today and for that I apologize. At the end of the quote from the Minimal Mac about page Patrick states the sites mission, which is to get people to think and ask questions about what they need. I had wanted to ask the specific questions that were in my head out loud and try to offer a look at how I answer those questions.
I was also pointed to these great posts on Minimal Mac: Computing Simplicity and Minimalism: More Than Just a Desktop ‘Theme’.
Tiffany Hsu: The “Broadcast Message Center” would allow government agencies to zap alerts to phones in the geographic area affected, whether across a few blocks or nationwide. Sounds cool.
Tiffany Hsu:
The “Broadcast Message Center” would allow government agencies to zap alerts to phones in the geographic area affected, whether across a few blocks or nationwide.
Sounds cool.
Brett Kelly: Reason being, if you don’t give enough of a crap to try to rectify your own situation, then neither does he. Effort shows that you’re (albeit clumsily) committed to getting the problem sorted out and have only come to him out of necessity, not laziness. So true, also try Googling for your answer…
Brett Kelly:
Reason being, if you don’t give enough of a crap to try to rectify your own situation, then neither does he. Effort shows that you’re (albeit clumsily) committed to getting the problem sorted out and have only come to him out of necessity, not laziness.
So true, also try Googling for your answer first.
This is not good, Ken Tyndall reports: The TSA points out that even if an airport decides to use a private firm for security, the screeners still must follow TSA guidelines. That would include using the full body scanners if they are installed at the airport.
This is not good, Ken Tyndall reports:
The TSA points out that even if an airport decides to use a private firm for security, the screeners still must follow TSA guidelines. That would include using the full body scanners if they are installed at the airport.
Mike Lee: As an airline employee, I gave up a lot of rights, because airlines are considered a necessary part of the country’s basic infrastructure. That’s why we bail out the airlines when privatization fails. It’s mighty disingenuous, then, to now claim that airline travel is some kind of luxury reserved for those willing to…
Mike Lee:
As an airline employee, I gave up a lot of rights, because airlines are considered a necessary part of the country’s basic infrastructure. That’s why we bail out the airlines when privatization fails.
It’s mighty disingenuous, then, to now claim that airline travel is some kind of luxury reserved for those willing to submit to humiliation by the TSA.
Congressman Ron Paul: In one recent well-publicized case, a TSA official is recorded during an attempted body search saying, “By buying your ticket you gave up a lot of rights.” I strongly disagree and am sure I am not alone in believing that we Americans should never give up our rights in order to travel.…
Congressman Ron Paul:
In one recent well-publicized case, a TSA official is recorded during an attempted body search saying, “By buying your ticket you gave up a lot of rights.” I strongly disagree and am sure I am not alone in believing that we Americans should never give up our rights in order to travel. As our Declaration of Independence states, our rights are inalienable.
and:
My legislation is simple. It establishes that airport security screeners are not immune from any US law regarding physical contact with another person, making images of another person, or causing physical harm through the use of radiation-emitting machinery on another person. It means they are subject to the same laws as the rest of us.
Those are my favorite parts, but the whole article is excellent and well thought out. This transcends political parties and Congressman Paul makes an excellent point that if “political elites” were subject to this type of screening it would never have gotten this far.
I had to wait until after the epically over-hyped Beatles announcement was made to make sure that iTunes wasn’t suddenly dead – since iTunes remains I thought we should talk about why I think it is the biggest piece of crap software that Apple ships. More accurately iTunes is what I call ‘bloatware’ – a…
I had to wait until after the epically over-hyped Beatles announcement was made to make sure that iTunes wasn’t suddenly dead – since iTunes remains I thought we should talk about why I think it is the biggest piece of crap software that Apple ships. More accurately iTunes is what I call ‘bloatware’ – a piece of software that has taken on the characteristics of a hoarder and a ball hog all at once, software that wants to be everything to everyone.
In the beginning iTunes was great, but that was back when all it did was allow you to deal with music only – now days it tries to be so much more. Certainly you can still handle music in iTunes, but iTunes feels lost to me – like it has forgotten its roots. For instance have you ever tried to manage duplicated songs in iTunes? Holy crap is that a pain in the ass. I recently merged my library with my Wife’s, and with our media center. I have over 4,800 duplicate tracks in iTunes and the only way to get rid of duplicates is to manually select which one I want. It is 2010 and I have to make over 2,400 clicks to get rid of duplicates? Give me a break.
We haven’t even gotten to the fact that iTunes is now: a video store, app store, bookstore, social network, syncing engine, and more. I am not saying that each of these should be their own apps, but certainly some of them should be. Ping should be browser based and stay out of iTunes aside from being integrated with the playlist so a user can ‘like’ something without leaving the app. Video can stay. Apps and books should be in their own app, I don’t know about you but when I think iTunes I don’t think: games.
Why was syncing ever made apart of iTunes – for the longest time Apple had been using iSync to handle this, but iPods slowly killed it off (though it is still alive on Macs). Interestingly it is where you control these options for MobileMe:
The whole thing makes no sense, my iPhone and iPad are not media devices they are computers, so why should I sync them with iTunes?
There is only one culprit to blame: Windows. ((IMHO))
Think about it, Apple must ship iTunes to Windows users in order to keep iPod/iPhone/iPad customers happy. Apple needs to ship all the features and additives in iTunes to Windows users as well to support these devices. So what is easier for Apple? Creating separate apps for both Windows and Mac users for each of these services and then having to tie them together on Windows? Or just cramming all the crap they can into iTunes?
Obviously putting it all in iTunes is the most economical solution – but good God y’all it is the most un-Apple solution possible.
Think about it another way, if we take the iLife suite and iTunes-ify it you get one app that does: Video editing, photo editing and management, music studio creation software, web development, DVD authoring. Perhaps iWeb gets left out to be fair, but the rest would all be one app aptly named iLife and it would suck a lot. That is how I feel about iTunes.
Again you can do this with iWork: word processing, page layout, presentation, spreadsheets all in one app. Wouldn’t that be a real gem to use?
Nobody wants the iWork and iLife suite to become one app – not even Apple. We don’t want that to happen because we all know that it will just look and feel like iTunes, introducing a completely new level of suckage that would only rival Microsoft Office.
I am of course leaving out all the strange UI conventions that Apple uses in iTunes, but no where else. Never mind this for now.
Every time I spend more than a few minutes in iTunes I have to cringe – the way that it handles most everything is painful.
For example:
I could keep going, but I started to get too depressed about the whole thing.
Dear Apple, you can do better and we both know it. Please do better.
Ian Hines messaged me on Twitter last night to ask if I knew that you could export your Facebook data. It was the first I heard of it, but it turns out that indeed you can export your messages and wall posts among other things. Here’s a video from Facebook explaining it all. If you…
Ian Hines messaged me on Twitter last night to ask if I knew that you could export your Facebook data. It was the first I heard of it, but it turns out that indeed you can export your messages and wall posts among other things.
Here’s a video from Facebook explaining it all.
If you are thinking about leaving (and I think you should) then this looks like a smart thing to get before you say goodbye.
Let’s hope U.S. politicians still ignore other countries, because as Alan Purkiss reports: In a speech at a London telecommunications conference organized by the newspaper, the minister will say the market should decide the extent to which service providers can charge for preferential content delivery and slow down other traffic.
Let’s hope U.S. politicians still ignore other countries, because as Alan Purkiss reports:
In a speech at a London telecommunications conference organized by the newspaper, the minister will say the market should decide the extent to which service providers can charge for preferential content delivery and slow down other traffic.