Metal Dad - Hardcore for Life

The Best Technology Doesn't Alway Win

In my opinion, Betamax was actually superior to VHS but VHS cornered the market through ubiquity and cost. I was reminded of this because today is the 40th anniversary of ethernet. It has evolved from its modest beginnings as a 2.94 Mbps CSMA/CD system connecting a hundred or so workstations to higher speeds including gigabit ethernet with hundreds of connections.  It is also my opinion that back in the day token-ring was a superior technology. But IBM, in its infinite wisdom, made it so bloody expensive and difficult to implement that ethernet won by default. Makes me think of OS/2 which was a really good desktop and server OS. They could have given Microsoft a run for the desktop market but failed to do so. I once got OS/2 to run on a 386 laptop with 4Mb of RAM. It ran. Dog slow, but it ran. And I could do things on OS/2 which would routinely cause Windows to crash.

Gone, But Not Forgotten

Interesting article on Computerworld about operating systems from the past. I'm not an OS bigot. I've always believed you should pick the right tool for the job. Some jobs it's Windows and some jobs it's linux.

IBM could have given Microsoft a run for desktop domination with OS/2 if they had only known how to market it. Alas, the best technology does not always win. Witness VHS vs. Betamax or ethernet vs. token-ring. At the time, token-ring was actually a superior technology, in my opinion. However, IBM made it so bloody difficult and expensive to implement that ethernet won by default.

One of the first personal computers we had in our home was a TRS-80 with 32 K of RAM and it used cassette tapes to load programs. Ah, the good, old days.

Now Playing: Bleak - Reflections on Death (demo) - "Reflections on Death"

Technorati Tags: Computerworld, Nostalgia, Operating Systems, Personal Computers, Technology

Too Much Social Networking On the 'Net?

Very interesting take on the boom of social networking online over at Electric Venom. "Thing is, I used to love being online in order to avoid being social."

I know I've opted out of some "social" sites because it became intrusive. Spam, friend requests from people I don't know from Adam, etc.

Technorati Tags: Blogging,Social Networks,Venomous Kate

Looks Like DRM Will Die a Quiet Death

Check out this article over at the Wired blog. Sony BMG is apparently finalizing their plans to abandon digital rights management methods of controlling the distribution of digital media.

"As the major labels abandon DRM, it becomes increasingly likely that new distribution channels will rise up capable of challenging Apple's market-dominating iTunes Store. Amazon's DRM-free store, for instance, offers variable pricing. Social network sites like Facebook and MySpace could also potentially provide outlets for the sale of DRM-free songs as well. The record labels want that type of flexibility, which Apple has been reluctant to provide.

Adjusting the digital music distribution model is becoming more crucial than ever: The Associated Press reported Thursday that album sales fell 9.5 percent in 2007. "

Technorati Tags: DRM, Music, News, Sony BMG

The Kindle

Venomous Kate writes about the Kindle being #1 on her Christmas Wish List. I have to admit that I don't usually lust after tech stuff. I guess I get my fill playing with cool, new tech tools at work. I didn't get an MP3 player until last year.

But this Kindle looks amazingly cool. The idea that I could walk around with this electronic thingy that contains part of my library is quite tempting, although I would miss the tactile thrill that comes from actually holding a book in my hot, little hands. Mrs. Metal Dad often asks when I buy books or balk at giving away any not-read-recently volumes, "What's wrong with taking them out of the library?"

A fair question for which I have no real logical or reasonable answer. I just like the idea of being able to go down to the family room and pull a book off the shelf whenever I want.

 

Technorati Tags: Books,Kindle,Venomous Kate,Christmas Lists

The Outlook is Kind of Grim

  VK writes about her travails with Vista. Apparently corporate IT has the same misgivings. A survey by King Research indicates that a large percentage of IT professionals are worried that migrating to Vista will reduce stability and add too much complexity into their computing environments. 90% of the 961 professionals surveyed said they had concerns about migrating and more than half said they had no plans to deploy Vista at this time. The researchers also found that 44% of those interviewed have considered non-Windows operating systems in order to avoid migrating to Vista.

Now, I am not an OS bigot. I was fortunate to cut my computing/networking teeth with an organization which stressed finding the right tool to get the job done.  Consequently, I've had my hands on any number of technologies. They all  had their strengths and weaknesses.

I absolutely loved OS/2. It's a shame that IBM had no clue how to market it or they could've given Microsoft a run for the desktop. Much in the same way that Novell gave away the network by trying to be all things to all people instead of concentrating what they did best, IBM ceded the corporate desktop to Microsoft.

But then IBM has a history of bungling good technology. Witness the ascendancy of ethernet as the network topology of choice. Truth be told, token-ring was superior to ethernet, but IBM made it so bloody difficult and expensive to implement that ethernet won by default. Sort of like VHS and Betamax  in the early days of VCRs. Betamax was actually superior to VHS but cost and saturation in the marketplace allowed VHS to become the standard.

I ran Vista RC2  on an IBM ThinkPad with 2 GB of RAM and it performed adequately. There were some issues with certain Cisco network appliances which would be a huge problem if my organization deployed Vista now. It's got a pretty user interface but nothing that makes me want to migrate anytime soon.

Technorati Tags: Operating Systems, Vista, Microsoft, IBM, Novell, Venomous Kate

Guitar Hero III Brings In $100 Million In First Week

I've got to be honest, I don't get this game. Is it just air guitar for the wired generation? #1 son went out and bought it, ostensibly as a birthday present for #2 son. I've watched them play it over the past month or so and I just don't get it.

I hear that there are Guitar Hero tournaments and folks are video-taping themselves playing the game and posting it to YouTube. But at least some kids who might never have heard Dead Kennedys will have their musical horizons expanded.

H/T Metal Underground (some music was meant to stay underground)

Technorati Tags: Guitar Hero, Video Games

Net Neutrality Needs Your Help and Support

I think it's common knowledge that anything the federal government manages becomes bloated, dysfunctional, and generally useless, kind of like the Post Office.

From Save The Internet:

"Net Neutrality has been part of the Internet since its inception. Pioneers like Vinton Cerf and Sir Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the World Wide Web, always intended the Internet to be a neutral network. And "non-discrimination" provisions like Net Neutrality have governed the nation's communications networks since the 1930s.

But as a consequence of a 2005 decision by the Federal Communications Commission, Net Neutrality — the foundation of the free and open Internet — was put in jeopardy. Now cable and phone company lobbyists are pushing to block legislation that would reinstate Net Neutrality.

Writing Net Neutrality into law would preserve the freedoms we currently enjoy on the Internet. For all their talk about "deregulation," the cable and telephone giants don't want real competition. They want special rules written in their favor."

Technorati Tags: Net Neutrality, Greedy Telcos

Electric Venom » Blog Archive » Feeling Sluggish?

Electric Venom » Blog Archive » Feeling Sluggish?

VK nails it here. I could make a second career out of rescuing in-laws from their computers. I once had a machine that took three days and at least three different anti-spyware apps to clean.

Technorati Tags: Family, Spyware, Venomous Kate

Tech Trends - More Bandwidth Than You Can Use?

Interesting article and interesting question. How much is enough and can one ever have too much bandwidth? And what kind of caps will the ISPs impose once they can deliver these kinds of speeds?

"The FiOS initiative has given Verizon an imposing lead in how much bandwidth it can deliver to U.S. homes, and yet the cable industry won't be going down without a fight. Comcast CEO Brian Roberts recently demonstrated a new technology called DOCSIS 3.0 that promises to give cable modem users speeds as high as 150 Mbps." 

Tech Trends - More Bandwidth Than You Can Use?

Technorati Tags: FiOS, Broadband, Bandwidth

Windows Live Writer Beta 2

I am not an OS bigot. I believe in using whatever tool works best to get done what needs doing. Sometimes it's Wintel, some times it's a Mac, sometimes it's linux.

Read this over at Everything TypePad. I'm always on the hunt for blogging tools. Since I don't use MS Office for my personal computing I'm not able to take advantage of the blogging capabilities of Office 2007. I've been using the ScribeFire extension for Firefox  and it's more than adequate most of the time but it does hang on occasion, epecially on larger posts with images so I thought I'd give Live Writer a whirl. It's not bad, was easy to install and configure for my TypePad blog. You can find it here if you want to give it a spin.

Technorati Tags: Live Writer, Blogging Tools

Life at Home

I realize that I have not been posting regularly on this here blog. I've been preoccupied a bit with a new toy. My dear wife gave me a Zune at Christmas. The Zune is Microsoft's attempt to make inroads into the media player market which Apple pretty much owns with their iPod.

I've been busy filling up its 30 Gb hard drive with my music collection. This device has some (in my opinion) critical limitations which will prevent it from taking off.

First, it is incompatible with Microsoft's own Media Player software. Music you have ripped with Media Player cannot be synced to the device. The device has its own media player software which you must use to rip CDs and import mp3 files. One is also able to burn CDs with this software.

Second, (And this one boggles my mind)one cannot subscribe to and download podcasts for listening. If you can find the podcast in mp3 format, you could download it and play it. This is a serious oversight on Microsoft's part, in my opinion.

Third, while video playback is quite sharp on its 3" LCD, native support for MPEG-4 and Xvid/Divx are not here yet.

I am enjoying the device in spite of its limitations. One thing I really appreciate is being able to plug it in to the aux port on my car CD/Radio and play music from the device. I like not having to have a boatload of CDs in the car.


Technorati Tags: Zune, mp3 players