Well, many malware apps still spread simply because users will click on anything and also try to click away checkboxes as fast as possible.

The problem is the user, not the os. It doesn't matter how secure your system is.

So this comment is actually very insightful. Replace "malware" with any app that the certain user REALLY wants to have (like Facebook-Hack-And-See-Pictures-Marked-Private-In-Profiles-Application) and they WILL install it. Even if the procedure is complicated.

I still wonder why they didn't build the first XO on the ARM architecture. I only researched via Wikipedia. What I found out was that the processor they used was based on the an old line of AMD (before the Athlon came out) x86 processors. AFAIR AMD x86 processors were inferior to Intel 486 processors.
So why use such an ancient design instead of a modern day ARM. It would have extended the battery life.

I think they now changed it to the ARM.

Is there anyone here on /. that can explain why they used the x86 on the first version? While I certainly am not qualified to say wether that desing decision was good or bad I can definitely say that the XO fell way short of their goal to become a widely used education tool in many countries. Which is sad, because I think it was a great idea and in many ways a very good design.

I am also not qualified to say why the XO failed in that respect, but I believe it was more politics than either good or bad design that was the major factor behind that failure. And including a major company (like AMD) could be good politics sometimes...

This Mac mini has more power than most servers had a couple years ago. Is a HTPC serving all your multimedia needs in your home (mp3s, videos, pictures) a server, or do you also need to use it as a file server? Microsoft has been advertising the concept of a home server for a couple years. What is blurred here?
I got a 10 year old dsl router from ebay for 5 bucks to use as a print server. 10 of those things would have less computing power than my last cellphone (my current one actually has the same computing power as my last computer). And I call it a server.

Has the guy who wrote this ever typed anything into a command line?

However, with the robust capabilities of my butt I will surely find a niche on my couch...

This was on Slashdot a couple times before. Accenture and Microsoft obviously botched the application developement. I wouldn't blame the tools or the platform if something goes wrong. Maybe they chose the wrong tools and platforms. Maybe not. Difficult to say.

I never knew Accenture was a software developement company. I thought they were in labor leasing. Then again, I can't help wondering. Usually when I hear of stuff that isn't allowed to go down it is some expensive Unix contract with HP (HP-UX), IBM (Aix) or SUN (Solaris). With a lot of redundancy built in. Red Hat thrives in that market, because Linux runs good on comparibly cheap x86 hardware, whereas the other three mentioned have their own fairly expensive hardware.

And then there is always the big iron. Really expensive (I only heard about it). But then again, shouldn't a stock exchange be able to afford that?

You can work with any Apple product perfectly, because they come with Steve Jobs magic, that will make any of their products perfect in every way no matter what. It could reboot every 2 min, but still never crash. It could be doa, but still be the nicest thing to have on a rack ever. It is just soooooooo (mhmhm) perfect.

Have you ever thought how you make the PERFECT Apple fanboy? Glossy screens are so bad, and Apple is a really stupid company for putting them in (like everyone else, but I have seen Apple put them in desktop lcds, and I have yet to see Apple even offer the option of non glare). But if glossy is fine, Apple is not stupid. So glossy must be fine.

Don't forget to get one without a glossy screen. It will limit your choices, but you can't work with a glossy screen. Trust me. These days the only models where they offer the option to get non-glossy will be business models. They are slightly more expensive, but also usually more durable.

Second, you should stop the dual-booting and start virtualization. VirtualBox or VMWare or whatever. I don't use VMWare, because they didn't have a deb package last time I tried and the rpm installation was pretty ugly.

For virtualization the best idea is to get virtualization support in the processor. AMD-VT or Intel-V. The cheaper Intel models dont have it. Which I think is very disapointing. I don't know why Intel does this and I don't like it at all. Because virtualization gets more and more important. Maybe they think they can sell new processors later, when people will need that feature. Because these days most people don't need new computers any more. Whatever it is: I usually would opt for AMD, but that REALLY litmits your choices, because business machines with AMD are hard to find. The only model for a good price I could find was the HP Compaq 615. It comes with glossy and non-glossy screens.

I also like the Latitude 2100 netbook:
No drive bay at all, no CD. If you need stuff, get them USB. Much cheaper than proprietary drive bay drives and features.

Obviously you will need to use VirtualBox (or whatever you prefer) to use other operating systems. And the Atom processor is not very fast. So maybe you won't take that one after all.

But netbooks are very nice, because they run very long and are very portable. The Latitude 2100 is the only netbook that comes with non-glossy screen.

Brother has a whole bunch of different models. Even one with a scanner on top that does copying, faxing and scanning. They don't have chip protected toners, so you can get toners from anyone that builts them. Completely legal.
They have network, no network, wireless ...

Over here in Germany you can get the best deals on the standard network model, because they sell large volumes. So it is 20% cheaper than the sticker price.

On pricing you have to check what they have in the US.

Nowdays the hardware is all the same. All smartphones have 3G, Wifi, GPS and Bluetooth, some have FM receivers. The difference now is all in the software. As much as I dislike the IPhone I guess it still has an edge over other models in that area.

Anyways, less and less power consumption in different parts of the phone could be new way for the hardware makers to differentiate themselves.

Samsung for example makes phones with Windows Mobile, Symbian, Android and their own Smartphone OS. HTC competes with them with their Windows Mobile and Android phones.

A friend of mine recently got a Mac. He is a longtime Palm user and has a Palm Treo 680. I assumed that iSync would support the Hotsync and thus all devices powered by Palm OS.

I was wrong. If you take a look at this:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2824
You will see that the Tungston and Zire family of phones is supported. No Treo at all. According to him (I only had him on the phone) iSync didn't sync to his phone. He has a roommate who is a Mac fanboy (main reason for the Mac, because he is not a computer geek and onsite support at home is pretty cool) who initially set up everything so I suppose he would have set up iSync if it had worked. So Apple support for Palm seems to be rather spotty at best. No Centro or Treo Pro like the website/blog that Slashdot links to were supported anyways. How can Apple drop support for something they never supported in the first place?

Palm has a very good PIM (actually used to have unfortunately, since developement seems to have stopped). So good that I used to give it to people looking for a simple PIM for their computers who never heard of Palm. They also have a version for the Mac:
http://www.palm.com/europe/en/support/palmdt4_mac.html

Hopefully this will run under Snow Leopard, or maybe Palm will put another revision out if it doesn't.

Anyone here who got his Palm Treo or Centro to run with iSync? And if so, how?

I read a report by a Chinese doctor who fled the country and said some donors were still alive when they started removing the organs. The donors were killed by a shooting squad and some weren't hit properly. The doctors were ordered to remove the organs anyways ASAP.

For the previous versions of Quake binary blob drivers were always required AFAIK. And the state of free 3D drivers has never been better. It used to be that the only free Linux 3D drivers were for Intel. Back in 2005 Doom 3 was playable in Intel?

Maybe he is raising the issue, because kernel developers threatened to pull the plug on binary blobs. Other than that I see no reason why he should be complaining now.

They already divided everyone up into two groups: Male and female. Because they decided that males do have an unfair advantage over females in sports and thus should not compete against each other. If someone is found to be male they are not banned, they are simply asked to compete against males.

I suppose the summary is a bit off. They don't really want to find out if she has an advantage, but rather if she still fully qualifies for having the distinct disadavantage of being genetically female.

Lots of cheap Intel processors don't even have Intel VT, while most of the AMD processors in the same price range have it enabled. While I like the fact that some of the new Pentium processors run really cool, I would never consider buying a new processor without virtualization support. Yet most of the current cheap machines (laptops and boxen) that come with Intel use processors without virtualization. Kinda limits your choices. But then again I always liked AMD better.

If he goes as far as deleting that stuff maybe this is about software patents. If he didn't like your suggestions he probabely would just ignore them.

And some Linux musicians told me Reaper is currently the only viable music production software for Linux. Rosegarden and Ardour being the two open source contenders not quite there yet.