Billium said: quote: OS X seals the issue for the long-term future, as far as I'm concerned, since it equals or beats NT at the things NT currently does better-stability, mostly Aren't we, uhhh, counting a few chickens here? Even if MacOS X is delivered as promised, there's a lot that NT/2K does in fields where MacOS X doesn't even compete. What are the MacOS X equivalents of COM+, MSMQ, Index Server, Terminal Services, Active Directory, Kerberos, or IIS?

(Not to mention the software and hardware support gulf.). Weird, photoshop on my NT machine creates photoshop files that open in photoshop when double clicked.

Yes they're.psd files. Like windows it's so hard to go to START, PROGRAMS, ADOBE, PHOTOSHOP and load a file.

I get sick of downloading a jpeg that's linked to photoshop on my mac because just to see it I have to load up photoshop. I'd rather just use Picture viewer or something. On windows you can just use ACSee to view files by double clicking them and it loads it as fast as the file can be loaded.

If photoshop is already opened, just use that if you want. Yeah ocasionally. Mac OS has it's share of glitches too. Quicktime 4 doesn't draw itself right when you get a window or pop up dialog box in front of it then close or move it. My mac has dual monitors. Many times when I double click a photoshop file, I lose my window pallet placements - my pallets are on the other monitor normally. I can't comment on the million fonts in windows thing though because I don't have many windows fonts (have a lot of mac ones though).

Was it NT or 95/98? The QExpress thing might also be a video card/driver issue, or old app version, not NT's problem. I don't know though because I haven't used Xpress on NT yet. I'm sure there are workarounds that can be found if a little effort was made to correct it. Postscript may very well have more of it's strength on the mac OS than NT, but that's a font/software issue is it not? I don't usually work enough with postscript to comment, so yes you possibly may be right.

BeOS does the realtime vector graphics scaling/anti-aliasing too. Quartz is much more powerful though from what we all know though. How is all the eye candy stuff useful anyway?

OSX is not out yet either. I do believe it has the potential to be better than NT performance-wise, but still not as flexible as what NT offers - as the counter thread called 'What can NT do that Mac OS cannot?' Has clearly pointed out. Ok, so a recap. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt. The reasons I would have for buying a mac are: 1. Final Cut Pro 2.

Troubleshooting 3. Postscript printing/fonts Reasons for using NT: Everything else.

Well, happy, I didn't make that decision. If it'd been my decision they'd all be using NT boxes right now and this whole point would be moot. The IDE RAIDs were the inital response to the problem.

The 'serious' machines use a big, fat, external SCSI raid - but they're still macs. I just find it ironic that they wouldn't shell out the bucks for a decent NT machine because they fell for that line 'Macs do it better. And cheaper.' For what they spent on that one workstation, they could have had an SGI. I'm suprised nobody's mentioned Firewire devices yet. Although I'd say Firewire is not an essential upgrade over SCSI, it's incredibly convenient.

I've had the pleasure of using a VST external Firewire drive to use for work. At 3400 RPM's these things are relatively slow and expensive, but it's plug-and-play at its best. Plug in one cable from the Mac to the drive and it spins up, powered by the Firewire port.

No need to turn the computer off or check with ID's. It's also very tolerant of problems. During a file copy, I unplugged the drive and it brought up an error window asking me to plug the drive back in. I plugged it back in and the file copy resumed. You can even do this with Quicktime movies. Unplug the drive while the movie's playing, plug it back in and it resumes playback. If you're looking for more performance, VST also makes full-size drives that run fast, but require a separate power cable.

VST's also just come out with a portable Firewire RAID that can be powered by a laptop battery. There's a bunch of other things such as hubs, repeaters, scanners, printers, Zips, DATs, Orb drives, CDRW's, SCSI-to-Firewire adapters, DVD changers, etc. Video editing over Firewire on the Mac is also an absolute pleasure, and programs other than Final Cut Pro support MiniDV. Now, I know that Firewire exists on Compaq and Sony computers and is available for PC's through PCI cards, but developer support is definitely oriented towards the Mac in this field. What M100 are using? Either way, NT or Mac, if you don't set up the computer correctly the things is going to fall over.

NT is not the solution for everything. In Australia, I know alot of the Media 100 reps choose mac over pc.

The reason is that they make the sale, set the system up and then 3 years later sell them the new one. Ie there is very little support required.

I really believe the days of the big ass analoge systems is really quite limited. Once the DV cameras get up there, we won't see the $30000AUS boards(2 cards for the XR???) being that popular. Well, sitting here on my dual-boot Pentium box I can name one very obvious point, just that. If I want to play DVDs, or access my USB scanner/printer I switch to 98, then its back to NT to run SoftImage, Maya etc. Needless to say my partitions look like hell, and the whole rig is somewhat less stable than an NT only setup. I know this is an issue shortly to dissapear with Win2k, but somebody did say NT, and I've suffered for a looong time now As for the earlier posts about EI and C4D, haven't looked at either for about a year, but the one to watch is Lightwave 6. I've been playing with the final beta and I like it.

This is the one that will overtake 3DSMAX in having a charge at the big boys. All platforms, even Alpha. IMarshall: I said 'as far as I'm concerned,' and the only thing you mentioned that concerns me is IIS, to which I say Apache, and every other Unix tool that's related to such stuff. The history of NT Server 4 is not especially good based on what I've lived with as a client and what I've read. Sentry: 'weird, photoshop on my NT machine creates photoshop files that open in photoshop when double clicked.

Yes they're.psd files. Like windows it's so hard to go to START, PROGRAMS, ADOBE, PHOTOSHOP and load a file.' Yes they open, but ONLY PSD files. I need to edit TIF and EPS and JPG and GIF. I need to not think about GIFs I've made with Photoshop and GIFs I've made with WebPainter.

I'm a designer. 'Computer Operator' isn't a profession. And no, it isn't hard to do it the long way, but it's annoying. It's actually much easier to drag them to the taskbar.

It's even easier still to just open everything and anything in one way-just open it. It'll open in the program that created it, regardless of file type. As I said, it's a little thing, but over the course of a day it adds up.

'I get sick of downloading a jpeg that's linked to photoshop on my mac' So use File Exchange to change the way your Mac handles generic JPGs. The point is that a Mac can tell a Photoshop JPEG from any other. Yer complaining about a Windows problem; files downloaded from the net don't have meta info, so the Mac has to deal with them like Win would. Let whatever utility you like handle generic JPGs and let all native Mac files open with their creator app regardless of type. 'On windows you can just use ACSee' Which is to say, give up on detailed file association and throw everything at one good utility, then decide what other program to use.

You can always do this with a Mac if you like. As I said, for my work it's a pain. ' Many times when I double click a photoshop file, I lose my window pallet placements - my pallets are on the other monitor normally.' If you ever got two monitors working on a PC this would be the least of your complaints. 'Postscript may very well have more of it's strength on the mac OS than NT, but that's a font/software issue is it not?' And the OS and printing APIs are not a software issue? This stuff is largely handled at the system level.

There's a very good reason that service bureus still charge more for PC output after many, many years of trying. And cost is a consideration, too. BTW: XPress had its various problems with W95. I understand from talking to a few people that it's worse with NT.

I assume the Registry is pretty much the same thing, and that was the problem with fonts. Don't assume that I brought everything up, though. XPress 4.x is junk on any platform, but the Win version has a habit of eating documents-just permanently destroying them. 'How is all the eye candy stuff useful anyway?' It's usefull because I spend the majority of my life at work, and I'd like to enjoy it. You can switch it off, though.

And this is an interesting comment in light of all the 'I can get better skins than that' stuff I've heard. Especially when has the skin (scheme) collection to beat all.

'as the counter thread called 'What can NT do that Mac OS cannot?' Has clearly pointed out.' I haven't seen this thread. It isn't news to anybody that the 'classic' Mac OS is architecturally deficient. It hasn't even been news to Apple for many years now. On the other hand, that OS gave the world desktops and APIs and folders and drag-n-drop as well as almost all of the important apps used. I'll wager that most of what NT can do that OS X can not is proprietary MS stuff that exists despite existing standards.

My fav is networking. How many 'standards' has MS tried to establish over the years?

Apple has used exactly two networking protocols: AppleTalk and TCP/IP, and AT was created when nobody thought a personal computer could network, nevermind bullet-proof plug-n-play. In the Net age, it doesn't get more standard than BSD. To be a little more blunt about platforms: Apple never bastardized Java. They never sabotaged Real. They never threatened to deprive MS of something to get MS to kill MediaPlayer. Monopolies aren't illegal. Abusing a monopoly through extortion is.

My final argument in all platform wars is this: PC folks are as tied to MS and Intel as I am to Apple for the design of the machine. I'm stuck with Apple's machines and they're more expensive-a little-but they have the best quality around, too, historically.

And Apple's intentions are better. Apple machines are where almost everything a personal computer can do was invented, so to a hobbyist interested in the possibilities of a computer, that makes them the cool place to hang out, IMO.

Other folks may well find greater rewards elsewhere. This message has been edited by Billium (edited January 17, 2000). I know Cinema is dual platform, I've stated that earlier in my second or 3rd post to this thread. I was sure it wasn't network aware because EI users would always say EI was the fastest mac renderer because of it's networking, but i could be wrong. Version 6 will be better, but also go up against maya 3.0, Sumatra, Lightwave 6, etc too. The NT counter thread is here: Yeah I respect what you're saying Billium, but I still think it's a navigation preference towards how you work.

I don't work the same way. Yeah I could change the data fork on mac files, but it's not worth the effort. I don't know how many times I and other people have stated this. In response to you're NT's advantages are all MS apps or features, how about these reasons: games - too many to even start listing 3d software -ex houdini, maya, softimage, 3d studio, etc numerous networking software (not MS) hardware- graphic cards, capture cards, networking specialty cards, etc webslacker, about the firewire HD's. They're great and all, but they're a far cry from video. I question even if the new RAID firewire HD (was it VST?) released can capture raw analog video. Sentry, when I meant that it was cross platform, I meant the network render, such that you can have Mac been the render box or the pc for that matter.

We have a client that uses Archicad, and Renders in C4D. Archicad(the bomb software for architects ) runs on the Macs and he uses the PC as rendering boxs.nothing else. The reason he uses archicad apparently is that it's flythoughs are quick and quite good looking. He mention something about it also allowing for QTVR panoramas. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that 4d is even in the same ball park as maya or SI.

But it's really starting to encrouch on 3ds max, They appparently r also porting it to BeOS. In terms of what you can do on NT as opposed to what you could do on NT even 2 years ago, the mac is just really struggling to keep up. Lets talk about Digital Video. The only thing that matters is throughput.

Datarate is king. I dont care where i get my 30MB/s, as long as i got it. You can get raids platform independant so the issue here is what hardware you capture and output with. I run a Matrox Digisuite LE, with a 70GB MedeaRaid, Premiere RT and Aftereffects 4.1 on my NT and I can do everything and more then a $100,000 avid on mac(or nt now). Dual stream 720X486 Realtime editing, realtime colorcorrection, a load of other crap and broadcast quality at datarates over 5MB/s. That is not that far from miniDV's 3.5Mb/s. Broadcast quality for under 4 grand.

Reasons NT is useful: Workflow is fast(taskbar is great for having 10+ windows open) Great software. 2d/3d, internet progs, you name it. Windows got it. MultiProcessor support Multitasking, very nice. More options. Ability to control everydamn little thing if you know what youre doing.

Reasons MACS are useful: Lots of designers use them. Marathon infinity. Still has some good adobe software and lightwave/electricimage/cinema4d. Mac gamma is a little brighter. Designers claim this is really important.

Lots of programs. Dual monitor support By the way, the idea that macs have the monopoly on dual monitors doesnt hold true these days. WIN98 is multimonitor native and WINNT is if your graphics card drivers take advantage of it. Ive got a matrox g400 dualhead graphics card which powers realtime overlays on my DSLE and also powers 2 monitors from the same card. I think the mac is still great. My sound designer buddy advises me that MIDI stuff is still far better on mac then on pc. I think their claims of the g3 and g4's speeds are a little over-optimistic but still solid.

Unfortunately, mac doesnt have as many options, and when you have voodoo3 pc cards going for $100, then having the same cards with mac drivers being sold for more then twice that price- i think youll see that Mac maybe doesnt have the upperhand. I think what you have is a lot of people with a lot of emotional attachments to macintoshes and looking for reasons to justify it. I dont like microsoft, and they sure as hell dont innovate much without being forced too, but the fact is NT has evolved into a respectable os with a lot of options. Also, all computers are a pain in the ass unless theyre set up right. Quote: Which is to say, give up on detailed file association and throw everything at one good utility, then decide what other program to use. You can always do this with a Mac if you like. As I said, for my work it's a pain.

You can just do 'Open With.' On Windows 2000, thank heavens. Quote: If you ever got two monitors working on a PC this would be the least of your complaints. On Windows 2000 it's quite easy, thank heavens. Quote: much the same thing, and that was the problem with fonts. Don't assume Only on Windows 98, because of it's stupid 64K limit on virtually anything.

Windows NT/2000, you can throw fonts in the font folder all day long. I like that 'Font Mover' thing in Mac OS though. Quote: many years now. On the other hand, that OS gave the world desktops and APIs and folders and drag-n-drop as well as almost all of the important apps used. Wasn't this the Xerox Star?

I'm confused. Quote: So, OS X. I'll wager that most of what NT can do that OS X can not is proprietary MS stuff that exists despite existing standards.

My fav is networking. How many 'standards' has MS tried to establish over the years? Apple has used exactly two networking protocols: AppleTalk and TCP/IP This is a good thing? MS have supported exactly two standards: NETBIOS and Active Directory, and AD is based on IETF standards anyway. They've supported loads of protocols over NETBIOS though, which is good. Anyone who has tried to connect Macintoshes to NetWare will be familiar with this phrase: 'Why don't you fucking Work! Fucking peice of SHIT!

Quote: Apple never bastardized Java. If you mean 'Tried to get it to the stage you could write things in it', you're right. Quote: They never sabotaged Real. Oh now come ON.

This is the 'giveaway phrase' of a Macintosh Zealot. RealPlayer G2 was a buggy peice of buggy crap. Blaming MS for it was a low blow.

Quote: They never threatened to deprive MS of something to get MS to kill MediaPlayer. Didn't they take Microsoft to court for designing something that looked like the Macintosh desktop (a bit), despite John Sculley signing a document saying that they could? Besides, any attempt to kill QuickTime is welcomed by me. Quote: My final argument in all platform wars is this: PC folks are as tied to MS and Intel as I am to Apple for the design of the machine.

I'm stuck with Apple's machines and they're more expensive-a little-but they have the best quality around, too, historically. QUOTE Actually, PC folks can go to AMD, or Be (Apple people could until apple kicked Be in the face), or that penguin thing, should they so wish. Apple machines cost a fortune compared to PCs, and smell funny when you get them, should they work at all. QUOTE And Apple's intentions are better. Apple machines are where almost everything a personal computer can do was invented, so to a hobbyist interested in the possibilities of a computer, that makes them the cool place to hang out, IMO. Other folks may well find greater rewards elsewhere. Apple want your money, same as Microsoft.

And Apple systems have been on a sliding scale of 'fun' to 'elitist snobbery' ever since the original brilliance of the Apple II. IMarshall, You do realize that probably almost nobody on here as any clue as to what COM+, MSMQ, and MTS are/do? The response you got was that he 'didn't care' about that stuff.

That's because he doesn't know what they are. Oh well, just let the software shops decide what platform to support. That will decide it for everyone else. I can't think of any real advantage that a Mac has over a Windows NT PC. I think it really boils down to emotional preference. The reality of the situation is that people will buy what runs the software they want.

They can bitch all day, rant, and rave, but in the end they buys what runs the stuff they want to use. PeterB: You're right! Now, can we find a way to commercialize that program? Maybe we can get an Every article to evangelize it?

Billium: quote: the only thing you mentioned that concerns me is IIS, to which I say Apache, and every other Unix tool that's related to such stuff. Personally, I think IIS is a lot better than Apache. The disadvantages are that you're limited to NT and Microsoft's programming model, but you'd be amazed at the functionality you get out of the box with IIS/COM+/MSMQ. (And yes, Lord Midnight, I know people don't know about these things. But education is good.) quote: The history of NT Server 4 is not especially good based on what I've lived with as a client and what I've read. How is this relevant to this thread? The Macintosh has never been within a thousand miles of being capable of acting as a server OS (even with OS X Server, which no one in the world actually uses, not even Apple).

To be fair, Microsoft have learned a lot from the problems of NT4 and have fixed some of the major problems in W2K. Quote: XPress had its various problems with W95. I understand from talking to a few people that it's worse with NT. I assume the Registry is pretty much the same thing, and that was the problem with fonts. Kindly explain what the registry does to handle fonts on NT, and how it becomes a problem. I think you've been called on this before.

Quote: Don't assume that I brought everything up, though. XPress 4.x is junk on any platform, but the Win version has a habit of eating documents-just permanently destroying them. So there's a software package that's was ported to Windows and is even worse than on the Macintosh. There are dozens of software packages that are in the inverse position, including the big one: MS Office. Quote: I'll wager that most of what NT can do that OS X can not is proprietary MS stuff that exists despite existing standards. Typical Apple-fan bigotry.

What does OS X have for a component model? What does it have for a transaction monitor?

What does it have for distributed objects? Quote: To be a little more blunt about platforms: Apple never bastardized Java. They never sabotaged Real. They never threatened to deprive MS of something to get MS to kill MediaPlayer. Monopolies aren't illegal.

Abusing a monopoly through extortion is. Actually, Apple flirted with doing the exact same thing that Microsoft did to Java: extend the language to support their OS features. It never happened, though, probably because Apple could never get their own VM working quite right.

As for Real, you should really get a clue. Fighting for file extensions isn't sabotage. Does ACDSee sabotage Photoshop? As for harming other companies, Apple has more lawsuit blood on their hands than any other company in the industry. Don't give me this self-righteous garbage. Quote: PC folks are as tied to MS and Intel as I am to Apple for the design of the machine.

I suppose an Athlons with Via chipsets running Linux don't exist? How interesting. Quote: I'm stuck with Apple's machines and they're more expensive-a little-but they have the best quality around, too, historically. And Apple's intentions are better. Apple machines are where almost everything a personal computer can do was invented, so to a hobbyist interested in the possibilities of a computer I roll on the floor laughing.

Apple has the best quality machines, better intentions, invented almost everything a personal computer can do? Give me a break, what a con job you've swallowed! Are you sure you're not RiscRocket in disguise? Quote: that makes them the cool place to hang out Apple hasn't been the cool place to hang out for a decade. Quote: (even with OS X Server, which no one in the world actually uses, not even Apple). Apple uses OSX to run the Apple Store, which gets a bunch of hits and a does a bunch of business. Quote: So there's a software package that's was ported to Windows and is even worse than on the Macintosh.

There are dozens of software packages that are in the inverse position, including the big one: MS Office. Why do you think Office is junk on a Mac? It is actually a pretty good program. It is subject to the normal MS problems. (Installing tons of stuff everywhere, resource hog, etc.) But otherwise it seems to be pretty solid. Quote: Actually, Apple flirted with doing the exact same thing that Microsoft did to Java: extend the language to support their OS features.

It never happened, though, probably because Apple could never get their own VM working quite right. Actually, IIRC, Apple was not doing the same thing. MS was 'breaking' JAVA so that (roughly speaking) MS java would not run on other machines, and other javas would not run on Windows.

Apple was working on adding functionality to Java so that it would do.extra. things on Macs, but would still run on any machine, and Mac would still run any Java app.

There is a difference. Resteves: quote: Apple uses OSX to run the Apple Store, which gets a bunch of hits and a does a bunch of business.

According to Netcraft, 'store.apple.com is running Netscape-Enterprise/3.6 SP3 on Solaris'. Is there another Apple store that I'm not aware of?

Quote: Why do you think Office is junk on a Mac? It is actually a pretty good program. It is subject to the normal MS problems. (Installing tons of stuff everywhere, resource hog, etc.) But otherwise it seems to be pretty solid. I just meant that Office was better on Windows (which I doubt you'll deny, although I know Microsoft generally does pretty good jobs with their Mac ports). The overall point was that the quality of XPress running on NT says little about the OS. Quote: Actually, IIRC, Apple was not doing the same thing.

MS was 'breaking' JAVA so that (roughly speaking) MS java would not run on other machines, and other javas would not run on Windows. Apple was working on adding functionality to Java so that it would do.extra. things on Macs, but would still run on any machine, and Mac would still run any Java app. There is a difference.

Resteves, this is a textbook example of someone believing the hype and not thinking for themselves. What you call 'MS Java' is a set of extensions to Java that only work on Windows and are implemented in Microsoft's VM. This means COM and Win32 support, among other things.

On the other hand, Microsoft's VM will run Java bytecodes written to the standard VM jjst fine. With some exceptions, 'MS Java' is a superset of 'pure' Java. Or how else do you think IE on Windows runs Java applets? In other words, there is absolutely no difference between what Microsoft has done with Java and what Apple tried to do.

Where do you see a difference? Edit: Having read your last paragraph more carefully, I was wondering if you really meant 'it would do.extra. things on Macs, but would still run on any machine'.

This may be the source of your confusion: you can add extra functions that only run on the MacOS, but how will they work elsewhere? And if you modify existing Java functions, you're breaking Sun's spec. I think you need to think about this a little more and check your sources. This message has been edited by IMarshal (edited January 17, 2000).

ISTR that Sun's JVM does things that no other JVM does. I also STR that MS' JVM doesn't/didn't break a single Java feature, and was purely a superset of Java. Quote: Apple uses OSX to run the Apple Store, which gets a bunch of hits and a does a bunch of business. (inkvine) telnet store.apple.com 80 Trying 17.254.3.41.

Connected to store.apple.com. Escape character is '^'. GET / HTTP/1.1 400 Bad Request Server: Netscape-Enterprise/3.6 SP3 Your browser sent a message this server could not understand. Connection closed by foreign host. You might be interested to know that WebObjects hasn't yet been ported to OS X, according to Apple, who, frankly, ought to know.

So, resteves, on what basis do you claim that the Apple Store is running on OS X? Now, I know that Netcraft isn't perfect, that's why I tested it by hand. I also know that Apple deny the availability of WebObjects on OS X anyway. So, the two things together - the fact that the headers really do claim to be generated by NS Enterprise Server, and the fact that the site uses WebObjects - indicate that you're full of shit. Edit: Sorry if anyone got fucked by the auto-refresh that I put in. IE, for me, honours it in spite of its placement.

I've fixed it. This message has been edited by PeterB (edited January 18, 2000). Quote: Originally posted by PeterB: You might be interested to know that WebObjects hasn't yet been ported to OS X, according to Apple, who, frankly, ought to know. I also know that Apple deny the availability of WebObjects on OS X anyway. So, the two things together - the fact that the headers really do claim to be generated by NS Enterprise Server, and the fact that the site uses WebObjects - indicate that you're full of shit. Edit: Sorry if anyone got fucked by the auto-refresh that I put in.

IE, for me, honours it in spite of its placement. I've fixed it. This message has been edited by PeterB (edited January 18, 2000). If anyone is full of sh.t it is you PeterB. Please point out to me where Apple denies the existence of WebObjects for OS X?

(Let me help you out.you will not find anything anywhere.) The WebObjects 4.0.1 Developer CD is included (and has been since the day it shipped) with Mac OS X Server. Quote: Not to mention the fact that IEEE 1394 is hot swappable, Just like SCSI. Quote: plug and play, Just like SCSI.

Quote: transfers data at 400 Mbps NOW Which is, uh, slower than fucking ATA-66, let alone U2W SCSI, let alone Ultra160/m SCSI. Quote: with 800 Which is, uh, slower than Ultra160/m SCSI. Which is available.now. Quote: and 1600 Mbps speeds not far behind. Quote: If anyone is full of sh.t it is you PeterB. Please point out to me where Apple denies the existence of WebObjects for OS X? (Let me help you out.you will not find anything anywhere.) The WebObjects 4.0.1 Developer CD is included (and has been since the day it shipped) with Mac OS X Server.

How The Hell Am I Suppose To Categorize That For Macros

I misinterpreted what Apple wrote on their web site: I interpreted the 'will' as a future tense (as in, it doesn't do it at the moment, but 'will'). I find it somewhat curious, since HP-UX is UNIX. By 'UNIX', they appear to mean 'Solaris'. Also, I would be inclined to consider OS X Server as a different beast from OS X, and as yet there is no version that'll run on OS X, but there's no OS X, either. But that still misses the bigger picture - Apple don't use OS X for their Store. Quote: Originally posted by PeterB: Not to mention the fact that IEEE 1394 is hot swappable, Just like SCSI. Plug and play, Just like SCSI.

You are telling me that your computer just gracefully quits doing whatever it was doing with SCSI device (hard drive, scanner, etc.) when you pull the power/cable, and gives you a message saying 'please plug the device back in?' With no damage done to the integrity of the data (if were talking about a hard drive)? Quote: transfers data at 400 Mbps NOW Which is, uh, slower than fucking ATA-66, let alone U2W SCSI, let alone Ultra160/m SCSI. With 800 Which is, uh, slower than Ultra160/m SCSI. Which is available.now.

And 1600 Mbps speeds not far behind. Your right, but I never said that Firewire is faster than U2W SCSI, I am just pointing out that it has several features that are far superior to SCSI when it comes to 'ease of use', and it is fast enough right now to handle digital video. (IEEE 1394 was designed for digital appliances, not analog) For more info on IEEE 1394 (including future designs) you can start quote: Also, I would be inclined to consider OS X Server as a different beast from OS X, and as yet there is no version that'll run on OS X, but there's no OS X, either. OS X Server has the same core OS (Mach 3 & BSD 4.4) as OS X Client. The WebObject IDE is ready to go.

Quote: But that still misses the bigger picture - Apple don't use OS X for their Store. You are right, Apple does not use OS X Server for their store. The fact of the matter is, that Apple does want to 'eat their own dog food' (software), but right now they do not have a big enough bowl (hardware). You would have to be a fool to think that they could handle the traffic that site generates with the current Mac boxen shipping. They need to produce some serious hardware if they want OS X to scale to that level. Will Apple every ship enterprise level servers? Only they know.

BTW Portions of the apple.com site use Mac OS X Server, but all of the heavy lifting is done by Solaris. Even having underpowered hardware isn't a good excuse, IMO. It's not like MS use a single box to run is it. WebObjects supports load-balancing and clustering (AFAIK), which can offset the limited capabilities of each individual box, can't it? Yes, Apple might use OS X Server for little bits of the site, presumably tucked away out of sight, but it doesn't exacltly inspire confidence, does it? Quote: Your right, but I never said that Firewire is faster than U2W SCSI, I am just pointing out that it has several features that are far superior to SCSI when it comes to 'ease of use', But the reason that most people use SCSI (in the PC world, at any rate) is for its speed. Thus, FireWire isn't a reasonable upgrade.

Quote: Really? You are telling me that your computer just gracefully quits doing whatever it was doing with SCSI device (hard drive, scanner, etc.) when you pull the power/cable, and gives you a message saying 'please plug the device back in?'

With no damage done to the integrity of the data (if were talking about a hard drive)? Our RAID doesn't object too much if we yank a drive. It happens that hot-plug SCSI doesn't seem to be implemented for other devices, but that's not the same as saying that it can't be. I find it amusing - the first FireWire hard drives (don't know about the current generation products) didn't support hot-swapping for that very reason. Well, you could do it, but they recommended that one shut down one's computer before attempting such a manoeuvre, to prevent data corruption.

DV ain't VIDEO. Understand this.

You can't go comparing a Firewire drive to a real drive just because it'll do 'digital video.' Digital video is great, but it's useless when you need to make a studio beta transfer, or when your source is film, or when you actually need to capture from a broadcast source.

The reason DV seems so fast is because the video is already compressed before you transfer it to the PC. Well, hell, if that's the game then my old home PC would do 'digital video' right over the modem - but that don't mean much in the real world.

If you had to transfer MJPEG video (as in 'video capture') Firewire wouldn't seem fast at all, believe me. Firewire is a nice toy. It'll be great when I can connect all my stereo equipment with it (well, IF I ever have to - that is if Bluetooth or something else don't make it moot). At any rate, don't confuse Firewire with SCSI. And don't confuse DV with real video work.

This, I love: You are right, Apple does not use OS X Server for their store. The fact of the matter is, that Apple does want to 'eat their own dog food' (software), but right now they do not have a big enough bowl (hardware). I have never heard this complaint in the wintel camp. I know dozens of companies serving tens of thousands of hits per day with wintel boxes bought right off the shelf from Dell, Compaq, and others. Maybe if Apple gets hungry enough they'll figure out what it takes to 'eat' in the real world. This message has been edited by poptones (edited January 18, 2000).

Quote: Yes, Apple might use OS X Server for little bits of the site, presumably tucked away out of sight, but it doesn't exacltly inspire confidence, does it? Well, if you go to and take a look at the front page, you will see a few little tabs at the top. ITools(the mail, online disk space, etc.) runs on OSX Server (AFAIK, you can't do AppleShare over TCP/IP with anything but OS 9 and OSX Server), and suspect that iReview and iCards do too, but I have no information on those last two. Granted, the web site reviews and greeting cards aren't exactly the bread-and-butter of Apple's site traffic, but they are right on the main page, and probably get quite a few hits. The simple fact is that Apple doesn't make enterprise-level server hardware or software, and Sun does. That's why Apple.com is run on a Solaris machine.

NT-based-machines, even expensive high-end ones, simply aren't even close to high-end Sun servers, which is why few sites that get a lot of traffic run NT. NT is suited far better for small to mid-level sites that receive less traffic, and can't afford a more expensive Sun box. You wouldn't use a $500 Win98 machine as a web server, the same way that you wouldn't use a $100,000 Sun machine to surf the web and play Tribes. Well, maybe some people would, but only if they could afford it. Venture I don't know who told you that some FW drive aren't Hot Pluggable. I watched as a now defunct company Mactell repeatedly unhooked an external FW drive while playing a Quicktime movie. The Movie simply paused and then restarted playback once the drive was plugged back in.

I won't vouch for ALL drive but I saw that with my own eyes. Sure SCSI is Hot Pluggable if you have an expensive RAID system.

Let's be honest folks there is much more excitement in the Consumer channel right now about Firewire. SCSI is priced outside of the consumer channel meaning the Firewire should be the next 'Standard' As far as speed Firewire has plenty and I can't wait to see AV equipment with Firewire hookups.

Will save us $100's in overpriced 'Monster Cable' add on etc. SCSI is still going to be great for ultimate speed but ultimate flexibility will be had with Firewire.

Tens of thousands?? Wow, pretty impressive. Apple.com, unfortunately, gets about 1.5 million people a day. That is why it takes more than an 'off the shelf' box to handle it. Yes - and if 'Apple.com' would support their systems with an open standard, the people who run those servers might actually be able to run the 'Apple.com' OS.

They could scale those 'off the shelf' boxes the same way that Sun, Compaq and Dell are able to scale 'off the shelf' boxes to support tens of Millions of users. That is, if 'Apple.com' made an OS that was as powerful as that CPU made for them by Motorola. Just another fine example of Apple crippling itself with paranoid business practices. This message has been edited by poptones (edited January 19, 2000). Christ don't bump old threads.

I thought Poptones had been unbanned. Anyway this is funny: quote: All I have to do is use the standard UNIX-style commands and I can compile and run the latest LAME, or EMACS or nmap or whatever.

LAME is so horrible for Mac its not even funny. Nothing like barely realtime audio encoding Check out the windows version sometime (plus no 'futz' to get it to work with iTunes like on Mac). Quote: I also like the fact that I don't have to worry about the latest virus, editing my Registry, and rebooting.twice. to install programs. What needs to be rebooted to install? Quote: LAME is so horrible for Mac its not even funny.

Nothing like barely realtime audio encoding Big Grin The encoding time is pretty slow, but I always use q=0, V=0 and VBR, so I didn't expect it to be a speed deamon on a 500Mhz G3. Quote: Check out the windows version sometime So you can compile the new version without waiting for 'the Windows binary?' That's news to me. Quote: (plus no 'futz' to get it to work with iTunes like on Mac).

Installing an Applescript is tuff: quote: What needs to be rebooted to install? XP did last time I checked.