It could be argued that the forward viewscreen and top-deck bridge are pointless anachronisms in TNG and later eras, too.

They have cheap non-physical desktop holographics (Data's hologif of Tasha Yar, the holographic display built into the Captain's ready room desk), and the screen is just that, a screen that generates an image based on FTL sensor data synching visual light images to real time. They could just as easily build the bridge in the middle of the saucer section so one lucky shot wouldn't kill the command group, and have a central holographic display that gives the big picture. Tactical and Navigation don't use visual information for their activities, and they could just project a holographic "screen" at the front for communication or on the rare case they need to manually pilot the ship.

The WiFi on the slim isn't integrated. It's a tiny USB adapter plugged into a hidden port on the motherboard. So from an "upgrade" standpoint it's a worse setup than the external model with two full-size antennas.

http://www.10stripe.com/featured/map/semiconductor-fabs.php

I'd say the fabs are pretty evenly distributed between the US, Europe, and Asia.

As long as the really high-end fabs are US-based (Intel, TI, etc.) there will be high-tech clean room work that can't really be built elsewhere. Even Global Foundries is moving INTO the US for chip production.

"Favoring" in procurement just means it gets weighted more than the closed source project. It doesn't automatically mean they'll pick it instead.

I've made dozens of RG-58 wearable antennas while I was active duty army. Very easy and cheap narrowband design.

Or if you want to go expensive: http://wearableantenna.com/tactical_vest_antenna_system/

Who else remembers the short-lived iteration of the iPod Shuffle with only the on-off on the device and the goofy control built into the earbuds?

It was an experiment in eliminating buttons just like this that failed because of multiple reasons.
#1 was that it was no longer compatible with any other headphones, since Apple didn't simultaneously release a controller to plug them into.
#2 was that the controller itself was built around a "count the taps" system you had to memorize.

The reality is that Apple might release this "no home button" concept in real life, but sales will drop so hard they'll be forced to scramble to release a new version so everyone will forget the fuckup.

Cryptography is a long series of people reinventing schemes because A: they didn't know about them (the secrecy of the existence was maintained), and B: it was effective. A great example is the Jefferson disk (1795) and Bazeries Cylinder (US-Army M-94, 1923-1942), which were functionally identical.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jefferson_disk
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M-94

VMWare could handle that. It dynamically assigns resources of the hardware to the the VMs so they are running at maximum efficiency. Unlike with traditional physical servers where the hardware is mostly at idle while the processes take maybe 10% of operating ability, or run up when overtasked and lock up when maxed out.

Wow. Just think how many servers you could run in VMWare on that. A hundred would be a decent functional number.

I don't know about you, but except for a C++ class in my sophmore year every single computer in my school district was an Apple system. And I'm sure quite a large majority of districts use Macs as well.

It was only once I actually had to do things that mattered that I really got into using Windows.

I'm not an average user, have some odd peripherals, and like to play games. Thus, Windows and decent hardware.

And considering you can get a decent PC for 600 or so now WITH Windows...

As to OSX that's because they refuse to sell the entire OS standalone and support the open-hardware environment.

Ubuntu does not do enough to make me happy.

If you want to get technical, Apple-, MS-, and Linux-centric hardware are all PCs. Especially now that Apple runs on x86 and the hardware itself doesn't matter.

Mac/PC ad freezes, nerdy looking guy walks in front.

"And hi!, I'm linux. I'm free, unlike these guys. And I've been configured to run on just about any hardware!

"As long as you don't care about using all the software these guys use, and are willing to deal with no real customer service, I'm a great alternative! I admit that unlike with these guys I don't easily work with the hardware you already have...

"Ummm...I'm really best in a server...en..vironment..." (trails off)

Walks off with head down.