3DGalaxy

So Windows Vista is finally released to way too much hype. As much as I appreciate Bill Gates and his charity work, I just don’t feel the same way about what Microsoft have done with Vista.

It’s just so over hyped for a product that takes almost everything tiger does and just adds in a glass effect. Mac fans are annoyingly stereotypically known to bash microsoft non-stop and stick up for their OS. I’m not doing that, or at least not without good reason in my mind. This is my opinion on Vista trying to be as unbiased as I can. I just can’t help looking at Windows Photo Gallery and seing iPhoto.

One of the things really pisses me off about Vista is how bad the sidebar is and how useless the Flip 3D tool is. So firstly it wastes system recources just like everything else Vista does (aka pointless animated desktops). Plus Expose on tiger is so much more useful. I imagine using flip 3d you could miss the window you want and end up going through twice or even three times before you find it. I know this is what I would do. It doesn’t look very good for speed or accuracy, nor I’m guessing for moving files from one window or app to another. Expose on the other hand is easy because you don’t have to keep flipping through the windows, they’re just all there at once. You can find the one you want quickly and if you’re currently dragging a file you can hold the mouse over the window and wait a second for it to scale back to it, then drop the file into that window. Of course if you’re not dropping a file you can just click the window which is super easy and has a pretty nice look to it too.

It’s really just depressing to see Apple work so hard on their hardware and software, push them out at lower prices to compete better and then have Microsoft come along with the same technology, but not as well implemented and almost certainly retain the same status and share that XP has currently. Plus Apple still can’t seem to shift the feeling among long time haters of being overpriced and under-compatibe. If you want to see what people are saying about the macs, take a look at CNET.com reviews. I’m pretty sure every mac model is at the top of their category. MacBook / Pro, iMac, Mac Mini and the Mac Pro.

The work Apple does should be getting them to a place around 25% market share globally or at least in the US with the worldwide figures around 20%. When you consider that Apple is a hardware company and not a software one I think it’s a good idea to compare them instead of Microsoft to companies more along the lines of Dell or HP who are both around 30% market share. One of the problems Apple has always faced is that as they make their own hardware, they are limited in their marketshare because everyone else who makes hardware sells it bundled with windows. Therefore they will never beat microsoft as long as they are a pure hardware company. That’s fine though and simply means that they should instead be turning their attention to capturing the title as the top hardware company which Dell and HP are fighting for at the moment.

Another of the problems is that Mac is seen more as a cult which definitely holds the platform down. Admittedly I am a fan but I try to not go over the top and remember that the reason I buy their stuff is because they really do make the best hardware and software available. If people just start to treat mac as just a platform like windows and not jump down the throats of anyone who slightly criticises it then it will gather more and more mainstream popularity. Steve Wozniak has mentioned in an interview that he dislikes the cult of mac, so everyone should start to listen to him.

I was thinking of upgrading to Vista about a year ago before it got pushed back another 7 months but that was before Apple brought out the MacBook and I decided to finally take the plunge and buy a Mac, the best move I could have made. At this point however I’m not planning on buying Vista for the reasons above, plus I’m not even sure if my PC of less than 2 years with 2 gigs of ram and athlon 64 chip is good enough to run it, mainly because of the graphics card I have in it which I’m not really interested in upgrading. I know our family PC isn’t good enough because it’s 3 years old and has 512 of ram and a similar 128mb geforce 4 card inside.

Anyway, all Apple need to do is allow the running of windows apps in leopard without bootcamp or parrallels (for windows games) and I’m sold on Leopard. I’m not sure if I’ll buy Leopard if it doesn’t have that yet. I’m just waiting to see if there’s anything new and exciting we havn’t been told about yet. If nothing major I’ll probably wait until I buy a new mac to get the new version. better yet though as far as windows games go, why don’t more developers do what Blizzard does and provide mac and pc versions in the box like they do with WOW.

Wow is all I can say really. I mean I knew £425 was going to be the price for the premium system which is about $200 more than the US price. What I didn’t know however was that they wouldn’t even release the 20gb system here at launch. They also announced today that it will in fact be coming out in March, not April, on the 23rd of the month. It’s not April but it’s not exactly far away from it.

So for people who want a PS3 on launch, they’re going to have to somehow deal with the following difficult to digest facts.

1. It’s coming out 4 months later than in the US and Japan
2. We pay more for the system despite it’s lateness
3. There will only be 1 million systems for the entire continent
4. The 20gb base version won’t be out for a while
5. There aren’t any real must have games yet (resistance isn’t as good as gears)

Before all that annoyed me about the PS3 was the price, blu-ray, not having wi-fi or a card reader in the basic version (the wii has both and it costs half the price) but now I’ve got a few more reasons not to go for one. I honestly don’t have a hatred for Sony. I think sony TVs are the best, I’ve had a PS1 and 2, plus a walkman, portable CD player and a Hi-Fi. However, I think maybe the rootkits, their poor MP3 players, not that great online music store, blu-ray and all the PS3 stuff has just combined to give me an overall negative feeling towards them. I’d still buy a Sony TV though.

Back to gaming. Recently I’ve really been getting interested in the 360. I totally agree with how Microsoft has approached it and dealt with the PS3. I think providing HD DVD as an added option is brilliant and gives real piece of mind if you want to game but don’t want to commit to an HD format at this stage, or aren’t interested at all.

Then there are some really great games out now and on their way. These include Gears of War, Rainbow 6 Vegas, Mass Effect not forgetting Halo 3. With a price drop surely in the near future to bring the total cost of the system and HD DVD drive to a more competitive level with the PS3, (when you add in the wi-fi adapter and xbox live subscription it does get a little more expensive than the PS3) I can definintely see myself purchasing one. I might not because I’m really a Nintendo fan and I’m loving the Wii, but if I was thinking of getting into HD gaming I know where my money would be going at this point.

There’s been talk about the iPhone being exactly the same as the LG KE850. I like the LG phone and I can understand why people think they’re the same. I don’t doubt it looks pretty similar to the iPhone because it clearly is. However, if I was going to buy one I wouldn’t even think twice before going for the iPhone if someone offered me either one.

The reasoning behind that decision is pretty simple. I’ll start with the fact that it’s an Apple phone, therefore it’s finally a device with absolutely seamless integration with OSX which I’m sure the LG won’t do, or at least no where near as well. The LG comes with a pitiful amount of memory and I don’t really want to mess around with mini or micro sd cards if I can avoid it. Obviously if the iPhone was expandable that would be great but it’s not a huge problem that the first gen version doesn’t.

I would assume that despite how good LG can make an mp3 or video player, I’m almost certain that it simply won’t match up to the full video iPod that the iPhone integrates as part of it’s package. I just don’t see the interface or the features really coming together in this device in the same way as the iPhone.

The look of the phones also goes in favour of the iPhone for me. The Prada looks nice but for me I just like the look of the iPhone more. I feel like if you’re going to make a touchscreen phone, why put the talk and end keys as actual keys rather than just integrating them into the touch screen like the iPhone. It just ruins the whole simple look of the phone in my view.

Finally, the names. How can you argue with the name iPhone, I mean it’s apple we’re talking about here. iPhone just fits and sounds right, unless you’re cisco. The Prada on the other hand. Well I’ll start by saying I really don’t like fashion. It’s just not my thing, so for them to call this the Prada and team up with them on the project really doesn’t interest me in the slightest. It actually puts me off it big time. Even if they did call it the KE850 I still wouldn’t be interested but it’s not cool that one of my favourite manufacturers are teaming up with a fashion label to probably over charge for the device because people who like prada will buy it.

Probably not.

Now I’m not in favour of illigal downloading via whatever p2p networks people use now. I’m personally a big itunes and sometimes emusic customer and I don’t buy CDs anymore and I like it. Everything except DRM that is. I hate it and despite rumours apple will start licencing the fairplay drm (to made for iPod partners) I have no faith in itunes music being synched to your iriver clix or sansa connect anytime soon. I’m not saying this because I don’t like iPods because I have two and want a third. I’m saying that Apple definitely overestimate how many people buy iPods because of the iTunes store. It’s already been said that most people just dabble with iTunes and get the rest of their content from ripped CDs from their collection and other more shady sources (which like I said I don’t support). The point is even if they opened itunes to work with any MP3 player they would still sell the same amount of iPods or maybe just less. However the sales of iTunes music and other content would increase by a substantial amount to counter any lack in sales.

I’m not sure why I brought up emusic because it doesn’t have DRM so lets concentrate on DRMd music from major labels. Going back to the question in the title of this post, no they can’t be more annoying or clueless. It’s been announced that legal downloads of music have doubled and the same day they start threatening ISPs with legal action if they don’t stop illegal filesharing.

You want to know why suing everyone doesn’t help and why people pirate music in the firstplace? You’re all obsessed with locking down content and you’re not treating it in the same way you used to treat CDs. I don’t remeber ever being told I couldn’t play a CD on more than one computer, Hi-Fi or walkman so why should things change now when things were like that for so long? People don’t want to get used to buying music online and being thought of as potential criminals.

If you were more trusting of people then the piracy issue probably wouldn’t be anywhere near as bad. It’s not people pirating just for the sake of it, its mostly people just demonstrating against DRM.

It’s really just the greedyness of the labels that I hate, combined with the people in power who thought that ripping a CD to your computer to play on your own personal iPod or other player wasn’t fair use.

Now although we won’t see itunes music being DRM free by the end of 07 (because they have no need to if they are selling music so well), I hope some big online service takes the initiative and delivers DRM free music from major labels.

I guess a slightly more faesable hope for the following year is Apple to at least offer double the number of authorised computers to 10 or something or even abolish the limit. Even though there is a chance people will download loads of music using donated money and give people access to the username and password of the itunes account (after putting in a fake credit card number after purchasing) I doubt this would really happen. I mean I doubt that many people really think about it like that and just want to preserve all the authorisations they can as a precaution, plus it’s already possible to do that a couple of times and although it’s probably been done it won’t be widespread. I’ve already lost one of my authorised computers permenantly due to a windows reinstall I had to do where I couldn’t unauthorise it before I wiped the drive with the new install because it was in such bad shape.

Anyway, for the music industry to really move forward, they have to fully embrace digital in a more open way and stop DRM. They really need to start to see the correlation between decreased CD sales, DRM and pirating music and go back to the days of no restrictions and no one knew what DRM was.

“In a new edition of “Windows Weekly”, Paul Thurrott says that a new version of the Xbox 360 will be coming in late 2007 and that only the new 360 will have the ability to use IPTV. In addition to a new Xbox, Paul states a larger hardrive is in the works (28:00)” - submitter on digg.

What can I say about this, We all expected to hear something at some point soon about the xbox upgrade with iptv, larger hd and an hdmi port but it’s definitely a big blow to current owners of the system if this proves to be true and you will need a new xbox to use the tv function rather than just downloading a firmware update.

The fact that it is likely to come out in late 07 is an indication to me at least that microsoft are planning a price drop for the system soon. This would probably be a better way of doing the upgrade because then when they do introduce the new version, they won’t be able to go back up to a higher price due to the fact that people will oppose it and maybe just buy a PS3.

I guess it’s still possible that they won’t lower the price of the current hardware at all so they can release the new version at the same price point. Seing as the console is already competitive with the PS3’s price point and also considering that fact that sony won’t be able to lower their price for a long time I could understand if they feel they are selling well enough to avoid a price drop at this time.

What they do will probably affect when a lot of people buy the machine, inlcuding me, if I ever get into it enough, (aka when halo 3 comes out and they start bundling the machine with it and gears of war). I think if the price stays the same until the new one is launched then they will keep selling steadily or possibly lose sales depending on how many people know about the new version and are waiting for it. However if the price does drop in the next couple of months I think that they will get a good number of customers buying the system. I could understand this because I personally don’t care about iptv and as much as I’d really like hdmi it’s not essential for me. Even the bigger hdd isn’t something I’d really care about because I probably wouldn’t even be able to fill the 20gb because I have no use for it really.

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