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…however, strangely, my Windows is all doom-and-gloom.

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Yesterday, after realizing I was running out of drive space on my trusty MacBook Pro, and knowing that I’d need a Windows machine for certain upcoming school requirements, I decided to wipe my Windows XP Boot Camp partition from my MBP, and went out and bought an Acer Aspire X1200 desktop PC. I was attracted by its quietness, small form factor, decent specs, and great price.

Now, this computer looks fine on paper. Maybe everyone was right, I overpaid for both Macs that I’ve bought in the past 4 years. Looking at the specs, it’s hard to argue that for $450, this looks like a fantastic deal, and sure beats paying $600 for a new Mac Mini, right?

Wrong.

My short amount of time with this PC has done nothing but remind me why I will pay just a little extra (and sometimes a little less, depending on your research) for a Mac, rather than suffer through a PC hell again.

First off, setup of this little bugger took about 30 minutes. That includes unboxing, plugging everything in, and first boot-up, where Windows Vista ran some sort of “speed test” on the machine to check its performance, and install its bloated mess onto the machine. 30 minutes. I could have been actually USING my computer in 1/6 of the time had I bought an Apple computer. I know from experience.

And that doesn’t include the time I took uninstalling all the crap software that Acer decided to include with the machine.

Oh yeah, this computer didn’t even come with a recovery/restore disc. I had to burn my own.

My old Mac Mini (which I no longer have) took 5 minutes for me to set it up and be up and running. And that was in 2005. I paid about $600 for it.

“Cheap” does not equal “Value”.

Fitting that the embedded ethernet adapter died after only one day. From looking at the customer reviews on BestBuy.com, I’m not the only one that’s had that problem. I’m returning this machine tomorrow for a refund, rather than try to deal with Acer Tech support, who would only tell me to do everything I’ve already tried to troubleshoot the problem.

So, the next time someone tries to say things like “Macs are so expensive, why pay that much for a computer when you can pay so much less for a PC?”, I say again, “Cheap” does not equal “Value”.

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From http://komodomedia.com/blog/index.php/2007/11/05/css-png-image-fix-for-ie/

IE6 is a bag of smashed buttholes.

word to that.

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Microsoft continues to do potentially shady/questionable things, and the world continues to allow it.

From windowssecrets.com:

Microsoft has begun patching files on Windows XP and Vista without users’ knowledge, even when the users have turned off auto-updates.

ugh.

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I’m just going to link to it. what a joke.
I’m almost speechless at the level of misinformation, ignorance and general stupidity the author shows when trying to explain the new features of Apple’s upcoming OS X “Leopard” operating system, and how they relate to Windows Vista. This is unreal. It has to be a joke.

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From Engadget:

While we’re unsure if tricksters have figured out a way to siphon unthinkable quantities of cash from this particular ATM, the owners should be ashamed of themselves for running a (presumably pirated) unactivated copy of Windows on the public banking machine. Of course, there’s quite a few workarounds for this problem if you take the time to look, but seriously, who skimps on a product activation code when running a multi-million (billion?) dollar banking operating?

AAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Product activation RULES!

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My parents think I’m pretty smart, but really I just use this info to fix their computer problems. The secret is out!

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OK, Microsoft, why does it take you so long to patch major holes in your operating systems? I know no software is without bugs, but you’d think a company like Microsoft would be able to fix a widespread vulnerability such as this WMF thing (which was first reported December 27, 2005), before it mutates and screws-up even more people’s and businesses’ computers. And for God’s sake, man, you’d think they would be able to fix it before third parties start making “unofficial” fixes, which are just that - UNOFFICIAL. Microsoft is now reporting they won’t have a patch available until January 10, which is when they were planning on putting out their monthly Windows updates anyway. Way to sense the urgency, Microsoft. UPDATE: On January 5, Microsoft (to their credit) released a patch for Windows Update, available here.

Meanwhile, I’ll continue to watch this disaster from a safe distance, upon my goodship Mac Mini. Ah… these seas are calm…. I bet you anything if such a vulnerabilty were to arise in Mac OS X, Apple would patch that sucker within days, not WEEKS.

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I’m a little late in hearing about this, what with the holiday madness, but as John Battelle reports, according to a recent Infoworld article, Bill Gates has mentioned his company is planning on sharing ad revenue generated from advertising on msn.com with the site’s users. To me, this is an act of desperation. Google has Microsoft by the balls, as I see it, and this is the best they can come up with?
MSN revamped it’s engine a couple years ago, which was great, but they still can’t get a bigger piece of the market share. This is bribery, in my opinion. I mean, hey, I admit, if they do this, I will try and see what kind of $ i can swindle out of M$ generate by scamming creatively using their system. But I still think Google is the king of search. There is none higher. Sucker SE’s, should call them “sire.”

Ok, I know that was a lame RUN-D.M.C. lyrical parody.

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For the past several months, I’ve been using Foldershare, a fine little utility that lets you keep files and folders synchronized between multiple devices. I’ve been using it primarily to keep my documents for my classwork synch’d between my Windows laptop and my Mac. I was using the free version, which allowed me to share up to 500 files in 2 main folders. There were 2 other options, which cost a yearly subscription fee, but allowed quicker syncing of a much greater amount of files and folders, and have web access to said files.

Looks like M$ has bought this company. Apparently it’s all free now. I just hope they don’t ruin it.

Press release: https://www.foldershare.com/info/company/aboutUs.php?

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