Comments on: Some Computer Woes http://tadhg.com/wp/2007/12/13/some-computer-woes/ Wherein some things Tadhg are discussed Mon, 06 Sep 2010 23:11:47 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.1 hourly 1 By: kevintel http://tadhg.com/wp/2007/12/13/some-computer-woes/comment-page-1/#comment-6735 kevintel Tue, 18 Dec 2007 13:25:59 +0000 http://tadhg.com/wp/2007/12/13/some-computer-woes/#comment-6735 <p>Seriously, although as a Mac user I'm inclined to look down my nose at Windows XP, in it's Service Pack 2 guise it's not actually a bad operating system. It's truly an Operating System For The Rest of Us; something that by and large works well enough in most situations. Unless you're doing technical computing or pure data work such as programming, computer management, statistics, etc the majority of users are going to be more productive in a GUI environment and they will find that XP does it's job as a GUI-based system well enough. I think most of the problems it does have these days are introduced by a third-party, such as drivers. Such as the problem you faced with your drivers, which looks more like a problem introduced by the driver vendor than by Microsoft, so I couldn't fault them for not catering to a highly specific situation...</p> <p>I know it'll sound like flame-bait to you, but I'm actually serious about it. I get to see Windows XP side by side with my Mac OS 10.4 on the same notebook, and even though it looks cheap and dated, it's also very fast and responsive and flexible, and for better or worse they made it easy to develop for. Mac OS 10.x may be beautiful and polished, but it comes at a cost.</p> <p>As for Linux, as good as it might be, it's just never going to be an Operating System For The Rest of Us like XP is, because XP already has that niche to itself (Hell, Microsoft is even finding that XP is still out-competing Vista in the marketplace. It's here to stay.).</p> Seriously, although as a Mac user I’m inclined to look down my nose at Windows XP, in it’s Service Pack 2 guise it’s not actually a bad operating system. It’s truly an Operating System For The Rest of Us; something that by and large works well enough in most situations. Unless you’re doing technical computing or pure data work such as programming, computer management, statistics, etc the majority of users are going to be more productive in a GUI environment and they will find that XP does it’s job as a GUI-based system well enough. I think most of the problems it does have these days are introduced by a third-party, such as drivers. Such as the problem you faced with your drivers, which looks more like a problem introduced by the driver vendor than by Microsoft, so I couldn’t fault them for not catering to a highly specific situation…

I know it’ll sound like flame-bait to you, but I’m actually serious about it. I get to see Windows XP side by side with my Mac OS 10.4 on the same notebook, and even though it looks cheap and dated, it’s also very fast and responsive and flexible, and for better or worse they made it easy to develop for. Mac OS 10.x may be beautiful and polished, but it comes at a cost.

As for Linux, as good as it might be, it’s just never going to be an Operating System For The Rest of Us like XP is, because XP already has that niche to itself (Hell, Microsoft is even finding that XP is still out-competing Vista in the marketplace. It’s here to stay.).

]]> By: Tadhg http://tadhg.com/wp/2007/12/13/some-computer-woes/comment-page-1/#comment-6684 Tadhg Mon, 17 Dec 2007 20:22:30 +0000 http://tadhg.com/wp/2007/12/13/some-computer-woes/#comment-6684 <p>mollydot: Yes, I should consider Ubuntu, at least trying it out at some point. As Kev knows, an upgrade to Vista is out of the question...</p> <p>It turns out that the crashing problem is due to the death of the fan on my video card and resultant overheating, which is very annoying.</p> mollydot: Yes, I should consider Ubuntu, at least trying it out at some point. As Kev knows, an upgrade to Vista is out of the question…

It turns out that the crashing problem is due to the death of the fan on my video card and resultant overheating, which is very annoying.

]]> By: kevintel http://tadhg.com/wp/2007/12/13/some-computer-woes/comment-page-1/#comment-6466 kevintel Fri, 14 Dec 2007 15:39:43 +0000 http://tadhg.com/wp/2007/12/13/some-computer-woes/#comment-6466 <p>Hey, why don't you upgrade to Vista? It's got lots of cool new features and is much more secure!</p> Hey, why don’t you upgrade to Vista? It’s got lots of cool new features and is much more secure!

]]> By: mollydot http://tadhg.com/wp/2007/12/13/some-computer-woes/comment-page-1/#comment-6457 mollydot Fri, 14 Dec 2007 11:37:07 +0000 http://tadhg.com/wp/2007/12/13/some-computer-woes/#comment-6457 <p>Is it the general Windows keyboard shortcuts you want, or application specific ones? If the former, try Ubuntu - it's Alt+F4 to close an application, Ctrl+C to copy, etc, at least with the default window manager.</p> Is it the general Windows keyboard shortcuts you want, or application specific ones? If the former, try Ubuntu – it’s Alt+F4 to close an application, Ctrl+C to copy, etc, at least with the default window manager.

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