That's cute.

You like to throw jabs and insults, yet you don't actually back any of it up. I'm impressed by you. Really.

... or I know plenty, and didn't feel the need to wave my nerd around to show you how big it is.

100GBASE-LR4 is still a multiplex. It runs over a single physical fiber pair. That doesn't mean it's a 100Gbps signaling rate.

My comment was to the one above mine, not to the one my magic hat predicted from you in the future. In the comment to which I replied, the poster was grumbling that 100Gbps ethernet is commercially available today in contrast to "something which runs at 25Gb, over 32 fiber pairs."

Was my statement wrong? Or did I just not feel the need to enumerate every single PHY variant to satisfy you?

And 100Gbps ethernet runs over 10 fiber pairs.

Your point?

For many consumer-level printers, it's often cheaper to buy 2 new printers than replace the toner/ink.

Or at least pretty damn close in many cases.

For many consumer-level printers, it's often cheaper to buy a new printer than replace the toner/ink.

Landfills are printer graveyards.

No, what you're describing is virtualization.

Virtualization management tools do exactly what you just said. You add resources to your pool, and your VM management system decides how to utilize the backend resources within the guidelines that you've configured. VMware, as one example, uses what they call DRS ( Distributed Resources Scheduler) to monitor and reallocate VM load across physical hosts.

Managing VMs with abstraction tools is not a "cloud." It's managing your virtualization infrastructure.

This reinforces my earlier point exactly -- the term "cloud" is far too ambiguous. Virtualization management is *part* of what makes a "cloud" but it does not make a cloud on its own (by most definitions).

What you're describing is virtualization.

"Cloud" is a stupid buzzword that quite simply means "resides on someone else's stuff."

Whether it's Amazon's stuff, Rackspace's stuff, or Microsoft's stuff -- it's not your stuff. You don't worry about physical servers, disks, or OS (in many cases.) Take it a level higher and if your cloud service includes databases or middleware, you don't worry about that either. Or even applications. Amazon's Elastic Beanstalk basically lets you publish your website code directly to it and the rest is magic that you don't have to mess with.

Then we turn it all around and create "private clouds" which means "we want to be trendy but don't trust someone else's stuff."

The pundits and pedants will mix in all kinds of semi-fabricated points about things that "must" be true in order for something to qualify as a "cloud," private or not, such as auto-provisioning and/or automated management, etc.

We used to call it "hosted services." Some marketing knob decided that the industry needed a more bandwagonny word for people to latch onto. Thus the term "cloud" was born, and it continues to be confused, misunderstood, and abused in perpetuity -- a condition that illustrates what a huge failure the very forces that coined this nonsense have done in making it clear to the consuming public what it actually is supposed to be about.

If you can disable them, how are you not given a choice?

Your disagreeing with their default state is not equivalent to not having a choice.

My kingdom for some mod points...

Good call.

By your logic, I'm going to cancel my auto insurance, my home insurance, my health insurance, stop seeing the doctor, never get my teeth cleaned, and start crossing the freeway with my eyes closed and ears plugged.

"Chance favors only the prepared mind." - Louis Pasteur

Do you have insurance? That sounds like paranoia. Do you look both ways before crossing the street? Definitely paranoia.

It's not paranoia to simply be prepared for something in the [unlikely] event that it happens. "Paranoia" and "preparedness" are different words for a reason.

What?

Well that's remarkably narrow-minded.

... because home invaders never target people in "nicer" areas due to the higher level of returns on a break-in?

... because nobody in a "nice" area ever had their home burglarized?

... because feeling safe and protected only applies to people in "non-nice" areas?

I don't live in the ghetto, and I keep loaded firearms in my home. Do I fear someone breaking in? No... but that doesn't mean it can't or won't happen. If it does, I'm prepared.

The most dangerous gun in one's home is the unloaded one. That is, of course, assuming education and not ignorance.

I've never, not once, ever, had a receiver quit on me.

I've had Sony, Yamaha, Denon, Onkyo...

A couple things -- the store that I actually bought the Onkyo receiver from (through Amazon) is listed as an Onkyo authorized reseller. No problems there. Also, manufacturer's warranties are essentially useless, they'll find *any* excuse not to honor them, it's just the way it is. And third-party warranties? No thanks. Really, with the money I save by buying smart, if the thing craps out on me, I'll buy another one. I'll still come out ahead in the long run. A calculated risk.

Yes, but not entirely. I still wander through Magnolia when I'm shopping for something. If they have it for me to demo (speakers, TVs, etc.) then I will give them an audition.

Where they are really shooting themselves in the foot is that they won't price match. I gave them numerous opportunities to make a sale, but they wouldn't price match online prices from Frys.com, Amazon, or other online stores. They claim it's because those prices can't be verified or validated. In one case (an Onkyo receiver that BB wanted 899.99 for and I found it on Amazon for 549.99 with free shipping and no tax) they claimed that selling it to me for that price would actually be less than they paid for it, and would violate their contract with Onkyo -- which I doubt in both cases. But they were arrogant, and the manager thought he was going to bully me around and I would do what he said, and he was wrong. He told me I was a fool to trust online markets. So I went and bought the receiver from Amazon, and the next weekend I needed to go to another store in the same center as the BB, so I brought my receipt with me. I asked to speak to the GM of the store, explained what had transpired the week before with the Home Theater dept. manager, and showed him my receipt, and told him that I was glad to be a fool who saved $400. He was fairly irritated with his manager.

THIS is why Best Buy has failed. Not "is failing" -- "has failed." Being the Internet's showroom would be fine if they would price match and keep the people IN THEIR STORE -- that's when the added opportunity for impulse purchases kicks in. If I buy a Blu-ray player in the BB store because they price matched it and I didn't have to wait for shipping, as I'm walking toward the check-out line I'll pass by the Blu-rays and maybe I'll let my judgement lapse for a short time and pick up a couple overpriced titles for the sheer convenience of "I can go watch this RIGHT NOW." Hell, they could even con the masses into upgrading their HDMI cables while they're at it. No, the informed consumer won't bite, but they don't need EVERY ONE to bite, they only need a few of the dumber ones to bite, and that's who their target is anyway.

And price tag.