Discussions

Hi this is Moshe
Pleas look at my post.
Comments will be appreciated.
http://www.wepc.com/vote/view/dream/7362/William_Gibson_Cyberspace_Machine

Wow. The first post I read on this site, and... gah. People wonder why there are so few women in IT? I can't imagine why...

Have fun in your sandpit boys.

I don't latch on to a pc or laptop like suckling nectar-- I prefer to bleed it dry until it has nothing more to give. That makes it easier to let go. However, there are certain gadgets out there that I respect as "classics". These are iconic designs that are easily identifiable with the eras in which they dominate: the MacBook Air, the iPod, the first Palm and Pocket PC Handhelds, the first smartphones, heck, even amber radios and color TV. The tall order I have is for ASUS to build a new icon that will set new trends-- one that won't follow current standards but will establish new ones that, by the merit of its design, will compel others to adopt or embrace it. In the world of personal computers performance is king to a certain extent but design ingenuity is its queen and bedmaker. Make the two sleep together and let's see what we get...

Lol at Bindi...

So true.

My first computer was XT 8086 with DOS appealed, then came the 486 with Windows 3.1 (if i'm not mistaken)... well they both were very helpful, saved fingers from the agony of typing typewriter.
My first 'advance' computer was IP-III with W'98 OS, back when i started to study Industrial Design in college..
I'd also tried a Mac G3 and G4.
And i'm now stuck with my IP4, dreaming to have a brand new 24" iMAC. But come to think of it, the computer technology changes almost every second, and i don't have enough energy, so maybe i'll wait another year to replace my IP4. So i think my IP4 with NVIDIA 512 and 4 gbs memory is my favorite for now.

"YOU BUY A MAC."

Technically, your wife bought it for you I heard.

So you'd be still a journo at heart then: never buying your own stuff, merely breaking a back to get it off another?

... ;)

I can reminisce about old computers, but I'm not sure I'd ever get nostalgic about them. Fundamentally, what we have now does its job better than what we had ten years ago - that isn't true of say, a period in time of music, or cinema, or even cars. Perhaps, in that way, a comparison with an old relationship is valid for a computer - unless you're still in the 'pining' stage, people don't look back on past relationships with all that much fondness. Specific moments of happiness get recalled - but the overall affair likely finished for a reason.

As for your upgrade story, you're presenting it slightly disingenuously - you have, in fact, upgraded the Mac several times, going (AFAIK) from Macbook to MBP to MBAir. Clearly, the lust for an upgrade is still there, it's just finding a different expression - it's not shaders and GHz, it's the thinness of Cupertino's cut!

That said, you make good points and I think a lot of people will sympathise - the move away from gaming/performance PCs happened because Apple finally realised PPC was wank, Vista turned out to be crap, and the Xbox 360 was fine. It became easy to walk away from the PC - especially when you think that the rise of web-apps made the OS less important.

I think one thing I will be nostalgic about are the days when I built my own PC - when it was possible to buy the bits, plug them together, install your own software and get going. 20 years down the line, we're all going to be locked down with DRM, accounts, sign-in, data in the cloud etc...

Hmm.
Psion Series 3
or
Palm III?

The Pam III's tetris game, along with Mame on my old Vaio N505 got me through a boring 3 months in Luxembourgh.
But the Series 3 was the dogs - especially for the fact that it came with OPL so you could write your own software onboard too. Great wee machine.

My life is a very similar tale Wil, although with considerably less fame and glorey.

I used to build PC's as a hobby. I Built them as gaming rigs, Overclocking, cooling and trying to edge every last frame rate out of an unreal tournament game.

But then I won and Xbox 360, if I hadn't have won it, I would never have tried it. But it did the trick of turning me from a PC gamer to a console gamer.

The weight had been lifted from my shoulders. Everyone had the same system to game with, it was no longer about edging out another megahertz to get the kill, it was all about (and sometimes sadly) personal skill.

With the need to tweek the hardware endlessly gone it gave me a chance to examine other varibles on my computer, like the OS, which lead me briefly to an afair with Ubuntu, although we are still on speaking terms. But ultimatly to the golden fruit of Apple.

I currently use a two year old MacBook Pro. She is a cougar to the svelte barely legal super model you are sporting (she isn't even core 2 duo), but after a beer or two you really can't tell them apart. She is has been there for me longer than any other system, and I rely on her for 8 to 12 hours of work and hobbies nearly every day.

Do I drool over the latest debutantes coming out of Cupertino? Well of course, but, every night it's my beloved Core Duo MBP that I return too, for one simple reason. She get's the job done, better than any other machine I have ever used.

Great stuff will. Never read your work before though am a fan via podcasts. The current Toshiba Satellite that I'm pounding away on has become the trusted ally for too many adventures. My desktop sits around awaiting the day a game I want won't run -- then it's out.