MegaSack DRAW - This year's winner is user - rgwb
We will be in touch
Only the Raspberry Pi was properly produced in massively insufficient numbers in recent times.
And don't I know about it. Was a right bugger trying to get hold of my one, but it was perfect for a project I was working on at the time so i didn't want to go elsewhere.
DDoS'ed both Farnell and RS Components websites too 🙂 Got mine in batch 2.
Hmm, so 1866mhz memory, 12 logical cores, PCI-E storage, two GPUs, USB3, HDMI 1.4?
Welcome to the 20th century guys!
If you want a quick tech preview you can pick up most of this stuff on a £50 Micro-ATX motherboard.
What happens if the (single) fan fails?
I do hope they sell like hot cakes, I have AAPL stock.
What happens if the (single) fan fails?
Same as in any other over-heating modern system. Thermal-cutout activates.
Did you buy your stock in '99? If not, I bet you wish you did 😉
I have to say - that the machine *looks* ace...
I'm glad these things have got more efficient - my machine at home cranks out 600W of heat, but then that's with 50% overclock on the CPU and 30% on the GPU! Running Folding/SETI it warms the rooms quite nicely...
If you want a quick tech preview you can pick up most of this stuff on a £50 Micro-ATX motherboard.
Mustn't...feed...the....troll.... 😉
...oh go on, I'm a bit bored... £50 mobo that'll take a IVB-E xeon with 12 cores and 1866Mhz ECC ram? Linky? 😉
Very very nice, but it be totally wasted on me. Though the new MacBook air might be a purchase later in the year 🙂
So all the connections and the power lead plug into the front? Or is the power button on the back? Either way it seems a little inconvenient for anyone who wants to use it rather than just look at it!
Mustn't...feed...the....troll.......oh go on, I'm a bit bored... £50 mobo that'll take a IVB-E xeon with 12 cores and 1866Mhz ECC ram? Linky?
Om nom nom nom.
So all the connections and the power lead plug into the front? Or is the power button on the back? Either way it seems a little inconvenient for anyone who wants to use it rather than just look at it!
It's round, it doesn't matter, does it? It'll sit orientated where the wires are best situated for connecting to mains and externals, which could be sideways for some users. It would make a difference if it was a big box like the old Pro Towers, which had optical drive drawers on the front.
And usually sat on the floor, collecting dust and footprints...
...unlikely to happen with one of these!
OI geeks! You are aware that no potential Mac Buyer has the remotest idea what on earth you're talking about. A fact they'll take a great deal of comfort from
I take it that all that shit helps you play World of Warcraft a bit quicker? 😆
Or is the power button on the back?
Of course its on the back. Thats the best place for a mac power button.
Thats what I loved about the intel imacs when the came out - they put the power button round the back where you have to feel for it, back where it belongs.
I remember having a guy come into our office back in the late 90s to network our beige G3s to our new lightning fast ISDN connection. He sat studiously hunched over the computer for 20 minutes before piping up "Excuse me, how do I switch this on?"
Looks alright, I'm sure it'll be just as overpriced as the rest of their lineup and yet the poncey arty farty lot will still shell out for it.
I actually think the older mac pros look better but each to their own.
Or is the power button on the back?
Lets face it, you turn it on once and then the only time it gets turned off is because you're going away for a long period of time, or for a quick reboot.
Looks alright, I'm sure it'll be just as overpriced as the rest of their lineup and yet the poncey arty farty lot will still shell out for it.
Ooh get her! Jealous you can't afford one? 😛
Lets face it, you turn it on once and then the only time it gets turned off is because you're going away for a long period of time, or for a quick reboot.
This. The only times I've restarted either my MacBook Air or MacMini in the recent past are for updates. I'm not even sure where the power button on the MacMini is.
This. The only times I've restarted either my MacBook Air or MacMini in the recent past are for updates. I'm not even sure where the power button on the MacMini is.
I was expecting to get beaten down for saying it 😛
I've had my Mac Mini for six months. One reboot.
I've had my MacBook for 5 years. Could probably count the reboots on my fingers still.
Could probably count the reboots on my fingers still.
But PC users are that bit more evolved than us
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Somebody needs to make one of the flaily arm men for it
like this
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until that happens, am ooot
Ooh get her! Jealous you can't afford one?
Lol I can quite easily afford one, its just that I always try to get the best value for my money. Thus, I dont have any apple products any more, unless a hackintosh counts? I'm planning on getting a nice looking case if that makes it more acceptable? 😛
best value
Ah see this is an interesting thing. Cos it's very personal, and it depends on what [i]you[/i] value for your work/leisure uses.
So the mac pro won't be "bad value" for many of its intended customers.
E.g. if you need the xeons/ECC, that immediately cuts out a lot of "good value" consumer parts from your choices (i7? No good etc. Consumer geforce? no good.). Typing this on a dell precision, which I don't think was any better/worse value (from a pure spec pov) than the equivalent mac pro.
Yeah - Apple products have been competitive on a spec/price for quite a while now.
And yes, I rate the value of the retina display in this MacBook VERY highly. Really weird using a normal laptop now.
Rachel
Ah see this is an interesting thing. Cos it's very personal, and it depends on what you value for your work/leisure uses.So the mac pro won't be "bad value" for many of its intended customers.
This. Also - Macs tend to have much better resale vale than PC equivalents so the total cost of ownership is often not much different. But lets not get into another tedious Mac vs PC debate please.
Oh I don't know it's it the law or something.
Bring back the mad custom machines, I say.
"The Macintosh IIfx was a model of Apple Macintosh computer, introduced in 1990 and discontinued in 1992. At introduction it cost from US $9,000 to US $12,000, depending on configuration, and it was the fastest Mac available at the time. It had many code-names, including Stealth, Blackbird, F-16, F-19, Four Square, IIxi, Zone 5 and Weed-Whacker"
Wikipedia
This. Also - Macs tend to have much better resale vale than PC equivalents so the total cost of ownership is often not much different. But lets not get into another tedious Mac vs PC debate please
Or
[i]Here is my opinion on the matter and it's obviously right so please don't disagree with me as I want to have the last word unchallenged[/i]
If you don't want the "debate" then its probably best not to start it, rather than just implore people to bow to your magnificence.
This. Also - Macs tend to have much better resale vale than PC equivalents so the total cost of ownership is often not much different. But lets not get into another tedious Mac vs PC debate please
The resale is an interesting point, mostly due to the initial sale price I would have to guess, if you want one but can't afford it then the 2nd hand market will be your option. The more who can't afford new the more who will dabble in the second hand market and hence keep prices up.
The lack of upgrade in some of the apple models will lead to people shipping stuff on sooner into a market of people who can't afford to get the new one.
FWIW Win 7 is a very stable OS, it catches program crashes really well and keeps the whole system up. The number of update restarts has dropped a lot and I reckon I turn the machine off once every 2/3 months.
I never understand this. Why would you not turn it off when you're not using it?
Some Linnuxians have this e-peen thing "I've not restarted since 2008"
Seems really weird to me - turn it off, save some power.
Come into office - press 'on' button [s]pick nose[/s] make tea - [s]pretend to[/s] work. Simples.
I think they hibernate it, just not turn it off. Different.
I never understand this. Why would you not turn it off when you're not using it?
PC is workstation, media server, working through the night doing stuff when I'm not there, accessed remotely etc. It's not just there to email and browse singletrack
I never understand this. Why would you not turn it off when you're not using it?
My main computer at the moment in the top-spec MacMini Server. It uses sod-all power to leave on. When it's left on I can sit down in front of it and start working instantly. I can keep my VMs running, keep my backup services for remote machines running, and pickup work where I left off earlier without having to reload everything. To me, thats important.
PC is workstation, media server, working through the night doing stuff when I'm not there, accessed remotely etc. It's not just there to email and browse singletrack
This sums it up well. Those who don't understand why some of us need to leave computers on 24/7 probably don't because they don't have a use case for it. Theres nothing wrong with that. It's just some of us do have a use case for having at least one machine on 24/7.
I have only recently started turning my PC off since A.) buying an iPad, and B.) migrating the bit torrent client to the NAS (which is on 24/7).
The PC has a UPS attached, so uptime between reboots was measured in months.
Now I use the PC* about once a week.
(*PC for me = hackintosh pro 😉 )
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Here is my opinion on the matter and it's obviously right so please don't disagree with me as I want to have the last word unchallengedIf you don't want the "debate" then its probably best not to start it, rather than just implore people to bow to your magnificence.
Oh FFS. Whatever. 🙄
I've got Ubuntu Linux at home, and I regularly have to reboot it when the kernel upgrades.
Funnily enough the last time I had to restart this Win7 machine was when iTunes updated. Most of the time I just hibernate it overnight to save power.
I don't think you can realistically argue about OS stability these days - they're all pretty stable, and have been for a number of years now.
Lol I can quite easily afford one, its just that I always try to get the best value for my money. Thus, I dont have any apple products any more, unless a hackintosh counts? I'm planning on getting a nice looking case if that makes it more acceptable?
In our studio, we have two iMacs, both of which are three or four years old, plus an old G5 which acts as a server/RIP to our imagesetter, plus an old G3, which was previously my Mac in a previous job/life, made in 2001, IIRC and still being used as the email server.
In our IT department, there are currently four dead PC's sitting on the floor, and a matching number of empty boxes, and not so long ago there was a room with over a dozen dead PC's sitting on shelves prior to going in the skip.
None of those PC's could be more than two years old.
Best value for money? A machine that's scrap after two years, or a machine that's still in use twelve years on?
Funnily enough the last time I had to restart this Win7 machine was when iTunes updated.
FAIL.
I don't think I've ever obeyed iTunes' demands for immediate restarts on Mac or PC, and I don't seem to have died yet...
'Zero has got a point. My Dad is still using a G3 iMac.
Oh dear!
And who was it that said high speed memory was out of the question for micro-ATX?
http://www.tomshardware.com/news/Overclock-ASRock-Z87M-OC-Formula-Memrory-RAM,23053.html
A machine that's scrap after two years
Of course, every PC is scrap after two years... 🙄 My i7 work laptop is gonna die in 6 months then apparently... oops... better order another.
Perhaps you just buy crappy PCs?
Actually, how many people have PC laptops that are more than 4 or 5 years old?
I have a 2004 Toshiba, but even that's gone through 2 hard discs and a processor [Celeron P4 was actually unusably slow at 2.6GHz?!!]
I don't know any others that haven't died after 2-4 years. I know of 2 G4 Ti-books still running from 01-04.
OTOH both my G3 iBooks died from logic board failure - but I'd say that's the exception.
Most of my computer equipment is "ancient"...
Main PC = 2008 era kit, running OSX 10.8
Laptop 1 = 2009 Toshiba, running Win 8
Laptop 2 = 2006 Dell Lattitude D530, running OSX 10.7
2008 MacBook is my oldest. Admittedly with a few upgrades. 8GB RAM (Apple say it'll only take 4GB 😀 ), SSD and a 640GB drive where the superdrive once was. Runs like a dream, but has nothing on my MacMini.
I've got a Thinkpad T20 from 2000 ish still in daily use. Have lots of older stuff than that knocking about but none really used any more, I just have a soft spot for the Thinkpad 😀 (and no, that's not a reference to its clit mouse thingy 😛 )
[i]Funnily enough the last time I had to restart this Win7 machine was when iTunes updated.[/i]
FAIL.I don't think I've ever obeyed iTunes' demands for immediate restarts on Mac or PC, and I don't seem to have died yet...
Well, I suppose I could have ignored it, it was probably just so it could restart the iTunes update service or something. Still, wasn't particularly busy at the time, and there's always the risk that the bloody thing's going to be popping up restart messages from here to eternity unless you Obey. So I did.
... and PCs dead at 2 years??? That's some real cheap bargain basement crap that IT department's buying!
last laptop was 6 years old, current desktop is more but an evolution rather than a replace purchase.
Previous workstations in the office were 4+
It's amazing as it's all made from the same stuff inside 🙂
Sold my Sony Laptop aged about 5-6 years.
My MacBook is 6 years old next month, but I gave up on that 2-3 years ago. 2 dead batteries, and really CBA to get yet another (battery or Mac). Otherwise it works just fine.
My Netbook is fractionally younger, and gets used all the time.
So imho, my Mac was closer to scrap and no longer fully supported after 4 years or so than any other PC I've owned.
Had some time so watched the Apple Developer keynote address yesterday - very interesting but be warned its nearly 2 hours including all the demos [url= http://www.apple.com/apple-events/june-2013/ ]link here[/url]
Some great advances (in order of my interest)
Apple TV / latest OS upgrade (Maverick named after a surf spot in California) can drive your tv as a fully functional screen - for me this will be very very useful - I already run my old MacMini connected to tv which is great for movies, bike and ski videos via Vimeo / YouTube and I read my email and browse web that way. I don't see why apple would make a tv when for £100 you just connect up and apple tv to any hdmi tv
Maverick has some very cool new changes to finder with content tagged and searchable over all devices and clue immediately, nice changes to Safari too. Much improved battery life due to OS efficiency - new MacBook Air now all day battery
New phone and iPad OS looks very nice with some very useful improvements in functionality and efficiency plus the usual very cool graphic/interface tweaks
Re kit lifespan discussion above we were a family of windows devices (5 laptops, 2 desktops, Nokia phones) 6 years ago, the windows stuff was always crashing and the hardware used to die after 1-3 years. Now whole family is apple phones, laptops and desktops. All that kit is still running (phones get upgraded as per contracts every 1-2 years) oldest MacBook is 6 years my daughter who has it now is fed up with it and wishes it would die so she can have a new one, my MacMini is 4 years old - I will replace it for a new one soon as 160gb disk and 2gb ram doesn't cut it anymore and I want to run the latest OS - it will be retired / given to one of the kids. iPad 1 still going strong but if I have the money will be upgraded next year when it will be 4 years old (I think)
who was it that said high speed memory was out of the question for micro-ATX?
Nobody did. It was fast ECC memory.
Actually, how many people have PC laptops that are more than 4 or 5 years old?
Yep, mines at least 5 years old on all original hardware still. And my desktop was bought in 2008, runs osx/fcp and other apple programs better than my mates imac as its better specced 😆
Actually, how many people have PC laptops that are more than 4 or 5 years old?
Me!
Best value for money? A machine that's scrap after two years, or a machine that's still in use twelve years on?
Best value for money?
An repairable grey box with PC components in it for £500.
A sealed grey box with identical PC components in it, with a picture of an apple on the front, for £2000?
Never broken a PC here, don't know how you can really, bits break, you fix them for minimal cost. If your chain fell off would it be new bike time? Use Windows 7 at work and home, haven't had a crash for... must be a couple of years now.
Or is the power button on the back?
You teabag the top indentation and it turns on.
😆 sold!