All those blockbuster/action films are great to watch, but there are also crazy people that get the wrong idea... Real or not though, they should've transported it more discretely as any responsible gun owner would. There's no need to draw attention. No one likes to hear someone shout "FIRE" in a crowded building.

Take your hand and feel it up to see if its a Sheila

The problem with most netbooks is the low resolution 1024x600. If you're reading short e-mail/web pages and viewing youtube video, then this is adequate. I owned a MSI Wind, but the poorly built cramped keyboard causes strain after long use. If you're a touch typist, it will cause you to mistype when you switch back to a full sized keyboard due to muscle memory. In addition, the touchpad on the MSI Wind is unusable. It's best to use an external mouse. It made for a horrible user experience that I ended up replacing it. This is basically what the Apple folks concluded when asked about netbooks.

I replaced the MSI Wind with a HP Mini 2140 with HD (1366x768). This has an almost full sized keyboard which is quite comfortable to use. The HD display is absolutely gorgeous and has enough resolution to view large documents. Programmers will love the display as one can see more lines of code. The only problem is the higher resolution results in the pixel being smaller. People that have bad eyes are going to have a hard time with the smaller 10" display and is going to cause eye strain. The trackpad button placement is also a bit awkward and the touchpad itself could use more vertical space. These are minor problems that I could live with though. If the display were 11", then I think we have the sweet spot. If they built this, I imagine more people would replace their existing laptops with netbooks. Of course, that would cut in on the manufacturer's laptop sales. I don't think that will happen.

Agree with everything you say. Plus, Apple provide a rich set of documentations. This is often the problem with open source. The standard "RTFM" attitude or "read the source" is not acceptable for the general public. I've switched to Macs when they came out with the cheaper Minis. I use it as my desktop and media center. They work great and have lots of nice multimedia applications to go along with it. If I wanted to get down to Unix, I can still do that. On my server, I still use PC hardware running Linux as it does everything I need although any free Unix variant would work.

Just Bing it! Thank God I'm on a Unix box.

Well, everyone is entitled to their own opinion. I, for one, prefer it to be a hardware function. That could be from previous bad experience with software based wear leveling back in the old days.

The other issue I have with software doing wear leveling is the added processor overhead incurred. This may not matter for modern day desktop systems, but it still a burden for embedded devices.

I thought wear leveling was already being done by the SSD hardware? It is for Compact Flash. There is a little controller inside the CF that manages the NAND flash chip(s) and handles the wear leveling transparently. SSDs will put all those disk repair software out of business. ;-)

Just to be clear, Sen. Orrin does not represent every republican's view on this.

Snow Leopard is about performance and optimization. A new file system would fall under new features.

I would have to agree. I'm still on my original 1st gen phone. I resisted the urge to upgrade due to the increase in monthly (recurring) fees for the 3G phone. When the iPhone 3G came out, a lot of the users who upgraded didn't seem to mind the added service charge for the new 3G phone. With the economy downturn, I imagine a lot of them feeling the hurt and this added upgrade restriction for the latest model just makes it even worse for them.

I use my phone for making calls when I don't have access to a real phone line. Being able to access the net is a convenience, but I can't justify paying the added service charge. Furthermore, since I barely use the cell phone as it is, I end up rolling over my unused minutes. I have a bunch of accumulated minutes that basically expire. So, I'm certainly not getting my money's worth paying the lower EDGE monthly plan as it is. Most of the time I have access to a wifi network so I can access the net without using ATT's data network.

Although I qualify for the discount upgrade, that's not enough for me to upgrade the phone. I'm still looking for a lower cost plan. I imagine a lot of iPhone users that are feeling the hurt of the recurring cost will finally realize this.

It's time for cable services to change. Even the Comcast digital starter package is $59.95/month. I only watch about 5 channels out of the list they provide where 1/3 of which are infomercials anyway. The only reason I subscribe to it is because I like to watch Discovery, History, and FOOD channels. The other thing is local news which I can get off the air. I welcome IPTV and anything that allows me to select what I want instead of stuffing everything in a bundle. Send those programs over IP multicast and I'll drop my cable service in a heartbeat.

I don't think we'll see this in US. I work for a network equipment provider and we do xDSL and FTTH. Even when our customers deploy fiber technology, they still limit the pipe. With video becoming more prominent, they'll have to increase the bandwidth. However, the only advancement we'll see is if there were more players as opposed to only one or two choices.

Things are tough already and there are signs all over that shows consumer spending cut backs. Now, they want to tax us for online purchases? I guess everyone skipped that part when they filed their taxes, huh?.

The common citizens can play their game, too. If the law makers want more tax revenues from people, just avoid spending. Here in California, they raised our sales tax so they can continue with their over budget spending. Talk about kicking you when you're down...

Buy all your toys online now kiddies before they jack us. That Apple netbook/tablet better ship soon! ;-)

Nah. Specific was right. Don't bite the hand that feeds you.

The Mac Mini hardware is worth $99, but the $500 premium brings the total cost to $599. This box comes with hardware and ready to use software.

With a PC, you have to buy all the other apps to have an equivalent of what OS X + iLife. How much are you willing to pay for the other apps? Unless, of course, you don't count the cost because they get the software from torrent sites.

Hey Microsoft, how about charging a reasonable price for your Vista Ultimate? $300 is too expensive in this economy.