The 100 Best Tech Products of 2006

prostoalex writes "You've read about the 25 worst tech products, now it's time to check out a list of the 100 best tech products of 2006 from the same publication. PC World named Intel Core Duo, AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual-Core, Craigslist.org, Apple iPod Nano and Seagate 160GB Portable Hard Drive the best tech products of this year."

Thank you for your opinion - now here's mine.

[w33t]

Ever notice how easy it is to say something bad about anything?

I like this new layout - but it seems that people like to post about what they don't like about something more than what they do. This new layout is clean and modern.

if you don't like it then tell us some specifics on why you don't like it!

I admit, it's different, and it's ok to be scared by things that are different. But as times change so must one if one wishes to survive. You cannot grow without change. Growth is change.

Of course, everyone is entittled to his or her own opinion - this one is mine :]
--
Music should be free [w33t.com]

Re:And now it's time... fooor.... completely OT po

[suv4x4]

Not to mention the score is now on the far right from the title of comments.

I also hated that, it makes no sense. On my wide screen, by the time my eye reaches the right side of the monitor I've forgotten which post I'm looking for. Short memory, or wide monitor? Or crappy skin? voting for the latter.

The colors are way too contrasting, the sans-serif fonts make formatting less distinctive (like italics) and it looks really wrong.

Damn it :P

On the other hand, maybe I'll do some work now :)

Re:Thank you for your opinion - now here's mine.

[notque]

if you don't like it then tell us some specifics on why you don't like it!

1. The faded icons on the sidebar look like any html template look you'd find on a website. They don't look nice, just cheesy.
2. It's brighter, which for some reason gets on my nerves. I like being able to fade into the lull of the old colors.
3. It looks like any other blog. I like to pretend that Slashdot isn't just a blog, but a professional website full of incompetent writers.

We will all get used to it, but it sucks. It didn't need to be changed. Weeeee.

I'd love to be able to hide the left-hand nav bar.

[astrosmash]

It seems to take up more screen real estate than the old one, and I never use the damn thing anyway.

I like the design, overall, so I figure it's time to pick nits. And what's with using Tahoma? Not as bad as Verdana, but still, ugh. What's next, .aspx pages served from IIS?

Mostly blank column

[machine of god]

How about letting the comments extend to the left edge of the screen. To be honest, I don't come here for the crap articles. Slashdot's real content is the comments.

The way it is now looks like a xanga page 'customized' by someone with maybe some aesthetic ability. It looks ok, but it's still generic as hell. The front page is pretty good, but the format doesn't support area where the real value of the site is.

Re:New layout?

[Anonymous Coward]

Hm. I don't think anyone's ever accused slashdot of being pretty, but this new layout is somehow even uglier. How do I turn this off?"

I think it looks horrible. Kind of feels like a vague attempt to look "90's future", like a computer screen on Babylon 5 or ST:TNG.

Also, whoever designed it clearly has no experience with fonts. The logo on the top banner is blurry, the Helviticarial all-caps "tagline" is crisper and looks tacked-on at the last minute. The bold-white-on-green headlines are also blurry (and yes, I'm on a nice LCD monitor that's carefully calibrated.) The main body text is in sans seriff which is a difficult to read when the paragraphs get long. The strength of this font in web design is that it's very legible in small sizes, such as on menus on the side (speaking of which, the lines on the menu feel like they're too far apart.)

Of course, this is just an opinion, but I liked the old version-- a bit clunky but it had charm.

another "please consider advertising with us" list

[fermion]

This list reads like the top cars of the year list in an automotive magazine. Enough catagories so that each major mass market automobile manufactur gets one winner for each major automobile they produce. These lists are more like an effort to get more advertising from the manufacturers than editorial content.

So apple gets two listing for the ipod. Both Intel and AMD gets the top two spots. Hey, I wonder who makes chips for most computers? Googles gets a number of spots all the way through, and even Amazon, someone who probably advertises a lot but has done almost nothing interesting, gets an honorable mention for it's lame search facility. Throw in an award for every printer, every camera, and a few nods to popular technology, and can we say suck up.

I know that people like to complain about stealth ads on /. In this case, the complaints are warrented. This has no editorial content, and simply is a way for pcworld to prove to advertisers that pcworld cares about them.

Should have posted a separate story

[Anonymous Coward]

When the css change-over went into effect, it should have been a separate story; "New format in effect!"

Now the poor 100 best product story will be filled with NOTHING but comments on Slashdot itself.

Apple List entries

[Marcion]

The Boot camp is at number 10, while the Mac Mini is down at 35??? Surely they are the wrong way around?

Surely the trip-proof magnetic AC adapter is far more important than Boot camp?

Apple got Windows working on Intel hardware, Big Whoppee, Windows on Intel, like fifty billion other people haven't already?

-----------------------
If this is nuts then excuse me but I having a hyper-fit with this new Slashdot layout. I'll just go lie down in dark room for a bit.

Re:Sad for MS

[toddestan]

On the other hand, a product that enables Macs to boot Windows XP comes in at number 10.

Re:Thank you for your opinion - now here's mine.

[ResidntGeek]

1. The font sucks. It's harder to read.
2. Too much white, like there's too much space in between everything.
3. Posts not indented enough, it's hard to tell what's a reply to what without much pointless scrolling up and down.
4. Accidentally clicking on the "sections" header opens a settings box which won't go away for a minimum of 5 seconds after you click the [x].
5. The "Read More" link is far away from where my eyes and cursor end up after reading the summary.
6. Scores on the wrong side of the comment header.
7. Why the hell isn't the old layout an option? CmdrTaco was explicit in his statements that it was just a superficial redesign with no drastic changes, it can't require much more than an extra variable in the code.

I'm sure I'll keep discovering reasons to hate it as time goes on. If you'd like updates, just say so and I'll post them here.

Re:Slashdot new layout crashes my Opera 9

[DavidWide]

If a browser crashes, it's the browser's fault. No web page can be held responsible for a browser crash, regardless of content. File a bug report with Opera.

Re:Slashdot CSS

[Lord_Dweomer]

Honestly, I think we should have the option of using the old version. But the biggest issue I have with this version is that it COMPLETELY breaks up the flow of how I read comments. I used to be able to skim comments by their mod points. If I wanted to read a bit faster, I wouldn't change my threshold or anything, but I would just kinda skim over the 3s and maybe 4s since I browse at +3. However now that the comment scores are on the FAR RIGHT....completely away from all the rest of the post information, my eyes are jumping all over the screen and it is screwing things up.

Please for the love of god fix that, or give us the option of going back to the old way. If it aint broke, don't fix it.

Re:Slashdot CSS

[Bega]

I dunno, I kind of am longing for the old look. I think the colors are lighter or something. It doesn't feel right anymore.

Sortof, yes, since you've probably gotten used to the old layout. I got used to it after some while, but let's face it, it wasn't the nicest to the eye. I think it's nice that Slashdot finally got a facelift, and a nice one at that too. And Slashdot got finally SPACES between the different parts of the pages.

Flickr

[BandwidthHog]

Flickr is an amazing piece of technology. Not only is it a remarkable demonstration of the much-maligned (in these parts) Web 2.0, but it has without a doubt made me a better photographer. (Well, that and doing enough overtime to afford a dSLR.) And any technology that can improve your skills rather than just compensate for your shortcomings is all-fucking-right in my book.

Re:And now it's time... fooor.... completely OT po

[T.Hobbes]

I like the new look overall, but I have a couple complaints:

- The 'Sections' header in the sidebar should not open up a (kludgy) preferences window. People only change that kind of thing once in a blue moon; there's no need for it to be on the front page. I'd much rather it be a link (like the 'Vendors' header), pointing to the search page or something
- The open/collapsed state of the lefthand sidebar seems to be preseved between browser sessions, but only on the front page: Once you enter a story, it defaults to the open state for all items in the sidebar
- The comment score should not be on the extreme right
- The [blink] tag is used far too sparingly

Re:Slashdot CSS

[biglig2]

Worst thing of all, by not changing it at the same time as posting an announcement story, all the meta-discussion about the new look is stuck here in a story making it impossible to read.

Re:Slashdot CSS

[hereschenes]

One thing with the comments - I don't like it how the moderation score is way over to the right. Would be better right next to the comment title.

I like it

[joel8x]

I've been waiting a long time for Slashdot to upgrade the look, and I welcome the new font (I always disable serif fonts in my browser anyway). The coolest part is the Apple section - go check it out, its very nice!

And to the current mods who are modding down all the comments on the change, maybe you should all chill out and realize that this is a big topic for the loyal Slashdotters and a bit more interesting that the story these comments fall under.

I don't like the font

[JesusPancakes]

I'll be honest - I'm not happy with the default font.

There are two types of fonts. Serif fonts have little squigglies coming off the sides of the letters (like Times New Roman, Courier) whereas sans serif fonts are smooth-edged and end sharply. When you read text, serif fonts tend to slow your eye down whereas sans serif fonts cause your eye to move quickly and smoothly across the text.

When I read comments, I want to be slowed down so I absorb. I want titles to be smooth and continuous while text-heavy content is serif and slows me down to pay attention to detail - I'm getting a headache because my eye moves faster than I want it to across the new font.

I know that smooth fonts are all Web 2.0 and shiny-looking, but they're not pleasant to read a lot of text with.

Re:Slashdot CSS

[sr180]

At first glance, it looks prettier, but its much less functional. I was much more comfortable reading slashdot in the old format.

Re:Thank you for your opinion - now here's mine.

[Anonymous Coward]

> if you don't like it then tell us some specifics on why you don't like it!

It's fucking unreadable due to the micro-sized dot-matrix sans-serif font (or the ridiculously huge sized, equally-ugly font, that you get if you increase the font size with a Ctrl-+).

The 3-4 pixels (or more) between each line of text means a hell of a lot more eyestrain.

> I admit, it's different, and it's ok to be scared by things that are different. But as times change so must one if one wishes to survive. You cannot grow without change. Growth is change.

Ever notice how easy it is to say something that sucks is really wonderful by mouthing a bunch of bullshit about how change is intrinsically good?

> This new layout is clean and modern.
>
>if you don't like it then tell us some specifics on why you don't like it!

If it's so fucking wonderful, why don't you tell us what, specifically, makes it so fucking wonderful.

Aesthetic opinions like "clean" and "modern" and philosophical statements "change is good" don't count.

#1 & #2

[skiflyer]

What gets the Intel Core DUO put at #1 & the AMD 64 X2 and #2?

Seriously? I have an AMD 64X2 system and I love it, so I'm just curious... all the research I did pre-purchase certainly put the AMD way ahead of Intel... true 64bit, shared memory space, better performance, and definitely better performance per purchase dollar as well as performance per electricity dollar.

Is this all the hub-bub I've been hearing about the last couple weeks about the brand new not yet out Intels that're supposed to be better yet?

Looks more like a "Oooo shiny" list ot me

[Sycraft-fu]

They don't seem to be rating the items on there by any useful metric, such as how innovative they are, how much money they've made, how useful they are, it just seem to be a list of what's big buzz. Case in point, the #1 entry the Conroe. Now I fully believe Intel's demos, I believe the Conroe is going to be a great processor. However at this point, it's not a great product because it isn't for sale. It's a tech demo. You show me real systems with real COnroes, then we can start talking about where it should rank on the product list. Until then, it's just hype.

Same thing with boot camp. It's a "Shiny toy" kind of thing. From a technical standpoint, it's nothing special. It emulates old BIOS to allow XP to boot (not hard) and Apple supplies the hardware drivers necessary. Great, nothing any other OEM doesn't do. From an impact standpoint it seems pretty low too. Basically all the Mac users I know (and I know quite a few) are going to put XP on there to noodle around with, but they aren't buying a Mac to run XP, they are buying a Mac to run MacOS. This is no big deal. I also haven't run in to any real converts at this point because of it. After all, if your intent is to run Windows, you'll probably do it on a PC that costs less.

I'm sure it will generate a few crossover sales, but nothing much. All in all, it's likely to be a nice feature for Mac users that need to run a couple apps not on MacOS, but nothing that's going to have any ral big impact.

However the concept of Windows native on a Mac is one that lots of people seem to have trouble wrapping their minds around. Thus it gets a big wow factor from many, despite the fact that it's really pretty minor. The fact that Apple is switching to Intel is the major tech story, not that because they have you can also boot XP.

To me, this looks like most of these lists where it's just a collection of whatever happened to catch the writers' eyes rather than anything based on any kind of useful metric.

Re:Slashdot CSS

[John Nowak]

For the sake of building consensus, I also agree. I like most everything else about the new version, but, especially when you have a wide browser window, the current score location is very spatially jarring.

Why not Gmail?

[slashdotmsiriv]

Any reasons why gmail does not make the list? From all the s/w products of the last 2 years gmail has dramatically changed the way i organize my email. It is a great improvement over previous paleolithic approaches. Every time i check my old hotmail and yahoo account I cannot help but wonder how i manages to live without gmail all these years and then i burst in laughs for all those milions that still use hotmail and keep it in the top of the list of web mail apps.

Re:Thank you for your opinion - now here's mine.

[dcam]

8. The scores are on the right hand side. The score is an important part of deciding whether to read a comment. When it is over the far right hand side you can't read the subject and the score in one quick glance.