crumshot - Slashdot User

Users Rage Over Missing FireWire On New MacBooks 820

Posted by kdawson on Friday October 17, 2008 @10:58AM from the liar-liar-pants-not-wired dept.

CWmike writes "Apple customers, unhappy that the company dropped FireWire from its new MacBook (not the Pro), are venting their frustrations on the company's support forum in hundreds of messages. Within minutes of Apple CEO Steve Jobs wrapping up a launch event in Cupertino, Calif., users started several threads to vent over the omission. 'Apple really screwed up with no FireWire port,' said Russ Tolman, who inaugurated a thread that by Thursday has collected more than 300 messages and been viewed over 8,000 times. 'No MacBook with [FireWire] — no new MacBook for me,' added Simon Meyer in a message posted yesterday. Several mentioned that FireWire's disappearance means that the new MacBooks could not be connected to other Macs using Target Disk Mode, and one noted that iMovie will have no way to connect to new MacBooks. Others pointed out that the previous-generation MacBook, which Apple is still selling at a reduced price of $999, includes a FireWire port. Apple introduced FireWire into its product lines in 1999 and championed the standard."

Police Objecting to Tickets From Red-Light Cameras 807

Posted by Zonk on Thursday April 12, 2007 @07:28PM from the a-little-hair-of-the-irony-dontcha-think dept.

caffiend666 writes "According to a Dallas Morning News article, any 'Dallas police officer in a marked squad car who is captured on the city's cameras running a red light will have to pay the $75 fine if the incident doesn't comply with state law ... Many police officers are angry about the proposed policy. The prevailing belief among officers has been that they can run red lights as they see fit.' Is this a case for or against governments relying on un-biased automated systems? Or, should anyone be able to control who is recorded on camera and who is held accountable?"

A Bit About Making Maniac Mansion 34

Posted by Zonk on Thursday April 12, 2007 @06:19PM from the oh-the-memories dept.

Over at the Grumpy Gamer site, Rob Gilbert is reminiscing a bit about the making of Maniac Mansion, prompted by a YouTube video depicting a 9 minute speed run for the game. "I found it fascinating to watch this video. It's was like thumbing through an old family album of childhood photos. Memories long forgotten are jarred to the surface by the smallest of details. An old and forgotten toy. The front grill of your fathers car. Things you could never have remembered if you tried become so clear they could have happened yesterday. I'd see little things like Dave hitting the edge of the porch, turning around, then walking forward and then continuing on his way. I remember this from development. It was a weird bug having to do with the walk-boxes that told the character where they could walk. I knew how to fix it, but it would have broken oh-so-many of other things. It always drove me crazy that he did that." Many thanks to Mr. Gilbert for his work on the game; Bernard's Theme still pops into my head every once in a while for no particular reason.

Comment fairly widespread problem? (Score 1) 153

by crumshot on Wednesday February 28, 2007 @03:15PM (#18184596) Attached to: For Unlucky 360 Owner Seventh Time's the Charm

At first, I thought that people were completely exaggerating the failure rate just to make MS look bad, etc, whatever reason. I bought my 360 in March 2006, and in Jan 2007, I got the dreaded red ring of death. I called MS up and got mine repaired for free. It's pretty funny that they actually have a menu option for if you're seeing the red ring of death. This kind of suggested this problem was slightly more widespread than I previously thought. All said and done, I was without a working Xbox for ~3 weeks, including all shipping delays.

Approx a year after I purchased my 360, everyone else who I know (5 or 6 people) have all gotten the red ring of death and had to replace theirs. And no, none of them are sitting in an enclosed entertainment center, etc. The power brick is properly placed and has plenty of buffer space around it and whatnot. I'd really love if MS would actually say what the problem is that causes this red ring.

Bionic Eye Could Restore Vision 167

Posted by Zonk on Friday February 16, 2007 @07:15PM from the we-have-the-technology dept.

MattSparkes writes "A new bionic eye could restore vision to the profoundly blind. A prototype was tested on six patients and 'within a few weeks all could detect light, identify objects and even perceive motion again. For one patient, this was the first time he had seen anything in half a century.' The user wears a pair of glasses that contain a miniature camera and that wirelessly transmits video to a cellphone-sized computer in the wearer's pocket. This computer processes the image information and wirelessly transmits it to a tiny electronic receiver implanted in the wearer's head."

Printers Vulnerable To Security Threats 173

Posted by kdawson on Thursday January 18, 2007 @12:18PM from the infected-my-what? dept.

jcatcw writes "Networked printers are more vulnerable to attack than many organizations realize. Symantec has logged vulnerabilities in five brands of network printers. Printers outside firewalls, for ease of remote printing, may also be open to easy remote code execution. They can be possible launching pads for attacks on the rest of the network. Disabling services that aren't needed and keeping up with patches are first steps to securing them." From the article: "Security experts say that printers are loaded with more complex applications than ever, running every vulnerable service imaginable, with little or no risk management or oversight.... [N]etworked printers need to be treated like servers or workstations for security purposes — not like dumb peripherals."

Sony BMG Settles Over CD DRM 225

Posted by samzenpus on Wednesday December 20, 2006 @07:31PM from the sorry-about-that dept.

aurispector writes "Sony BMG Music Entertainment will pay $1.5 million and kick in thousands more in customer refunds to settle lawsuits brought by California and Texas over music CDs that installed a hidden anti-piracy program on consumers' computers. The settlements, announced Tuesday, cover lawsuits over CDs loaded with one of two types of copy-protection software — known as MediaMax or XCP. Although it's great to see this as a victory for consumers, I can't help but wonder about the next wave of DRM schemes."

The 'EA Image' Tarnished 134

Posted by Zonk on Friday December 01, 2006 @01:43PM from the it-was-really-great-to-begin-with dept.

Gamespot reports that Pacific Crest Securities analyst Evan Wilson has gone on record saying that EA is wrecking its good name, with questionable business decisions and dropping game quality. From the article: "'Reviews of all of EA's annualized titles, its primary source of profit, have declined over the past two years,' Wilson noted. 'Although market share has not declined dramatically to date, in years such as 2007, which promises to have tremendous competition, it seems likely if quality does not improve. EA's aggregate review has also declined significantly in the past two years.'" 1up has the word that, in support of this, EA is still very proud of their 'paying for cheat codes' policy with Need for Speed.

Sony Probably Going To Do PlayStation 4 149

Posted by Zonk on Friday December 01, 2006 @12:22PM from the stop-the-presses dept.

Nomura Securities' Yuta Sakurai has been quoted as saying that 'he cannot imagine a PlayStation 4' because of Kaz Hirai's promotion. He sees it as a move (eventually) towards Sega-like software focus. Sony has, of course, immediately denied this because ... they (understandably) like money. From the article: "Following the launch of the PlayStation 3 just a few weeks ago, and witnessing the huge consumer demand for the product, I think it would be rather short-sighted for anyone to predict there might not be a next generation of PlayStation product."

Halo 3 Beta Sign Up Starts Dec. 4th 36

Posted by Zonk on Friday December 01, 2006 @10:48AM from the better-than-a-kick-in-the-pants dept.

aplusjimages writes "1up.com is reporting that Dec. 4th, will be when Bungie will start taking registrations for the Halo 3 Beta test. This is also the date that the new 60 second commercial will air on ESPN's Monday Night Football. There have already been sightings of gamertags playing Halo 3 Beta online." From the article: "'There will be multiple ways to get involved with Halo 3's public beta and next week's online registration is just the first way.' The registration program will be set up at Halo3.com and will give players a chance to be one of the 'select members to join the unprecedented Halo 3 public beta program.' If you don't get in to the beta via this method, relax, there will be numerous other opportunities to participate in the beta."

Get on the 'Gates for President' Bandwagon 654

Posted by Zonk on Thursday November 30, 2006 @05:24PM from the jobs-for-vice-president dept.

netbuzz writes "Dilbert's Scott Adams kicked off the idea in his November 19th blog post, saying there isn't anything wrong with this country that President Bill Gates couldn't cure in less time than it takes to get a new operating system out the door. Today, the idea is moving forward with a brand-new 'Bill Gates for President' Web site. Adams is also back on the campaign trail, flogging the site and Gates' candidacy." A blog post at Network World includes a lot of eye-rolling about this idea, but neither Adams nor the folks at the 'Gates for President' website seem to be taking this lightly.

Sony, Analysts React To PS3 Launch 247

Posted by Zonk on Thursday November 30, 2006 @04:36PM from the settling-down dept.

cdneng2 writes "Sony may be aware that something is just not right. There's a reshuffling of management occurring within Sony. Kazuo Hirai is set to head their videogame unit, as Ken Kutaragi has been bumped to the Sony board. Jack Tretton, former COO for SCEA, is now the president and CEO of that arm of the company. There's no word on the reasoning behind these position shifts. On the same day, Namco announced that they must sell 500,000 games to begin making profit on PS3 games. A Financial Times article confirms speculation on how hard it will be for Sony to make money, as analysts with UBS predict that 30 games must be sold per PS3 for them to break even." To add insult to injury, EA CEO Larry Probst has said PS3 numbers were lower than expected. Current thinking is that Sony managed to ship roughly half of the 400,000 units they were promising.

Iraq Study Group Reaches Concensus 621

Posted by kdawson on Thursday November 30, 2006 @09:20AM from the bring-them-home-but-when? dept.

reporter writes to point us to a story in the Washington Post reporting that the Iraq Study Group has reached consensus and will issue its 100-page report on December 6: 'The Iraq Study Group, which wrapped up eight months of deliberations yesterday, has reached a consensus and will call for a major withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq, shifting the U.S. role from combat to support and advising, according to a source familiar with the deliberations.' The Post mentions that first word of the panel's conclusions came from the New York Times yesterday. The Times points out that it is not clear how many U.S. troops would come home; some brigades might be withdrawn to Iraqi bases out of the line of fire from which they could provide protection for remaining U.S. operations.

RIAA Subpoenas Neighbor's Son, Calls His Employer 593

Posted by Zonk on Tuesday November 28, 2006 @12:43PM from the kicks-his-puppy-puts-suger-in-his-gas-tank dept.

NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "To those who might think that I might be exaggerating when I describe the RIAA's litigation campaign as a 'reign of terror', how's this one: in UMG v. Lindor, the RIAA not only subpoenaed the computer of Ms. Lindor's son, who lives 4 miles away, but had their lawyer telephone the son's employer. See page 2, footnote 1." From Ray's comments: "You have a multi-billion dollar cartel suing unemployed people, disabled people, housewives, single mothers, home healthcare aids, all kinds of people who have no resources whatsoever to withstand these litigations. And due to the adversary system of justice the RIAA will be successful in rewriting copyright law, if the world at large, and the technological community in particular, don't fight back and help these people fighting these fights."

Why Vista Took So Long 761

Posted by kdawson on Monday November 27, 2006 @01:31PM from the changing-lightbulbs dept.

twofish writes, "Following on from Joel Spolsky's blog on the Windows Vista shutdown menu, Moishe Lettvin, a former member of the Windows Vista team (now at Google) who spent a year working on the menu, gives an insight into the process, and some indication as to what the approximately 24 people who worked on the shutdown menu actually did. Joel has responded in typically forthright fashion." From the last posting: "Every piece of evidence I've heard from developers inside Microsoft supports my theory that the company has become completely tangled up in bureaucracy, layers of management, meetings ad infinitum, and overstaffing. The only way Microsoft has managed to hire so many people has been by lowering their hiring standards significantly. In the early nineties Microsoft looked at IBM, especially the bloated OS/2 team, as a case study of what not to do; somehow in the fifteen year period from 1991–2006 they became the bloated monster that takes five years to ship an incoherent upgrade to their flagship product."

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