What's so fantastic about Apple?

[John Albert]

Sometimes freedom means doing a little extra work.

 

[TheL8Elvis]

Hehe. Yes, actually I have.

Because replacing a tiny surface-mount ROM chip on a cellphone PC board is rather beyond the technical capabilities of nearly all cellphone users. We're not talking about hypothetical users with unlimited technical ability and high-tech equipment at their disposal for modifying their own phones.

What does a 'surface-mount' ROM chip have to do with what I posted ?
Your response gives me zero credibility in your claim.

You ignored the fact that the Nexus One has a micro-SD slot.
So as I said before, no.

You do understand, the nexus, designed by google, manufactured by samsung, has no SD card slot. Do you have a nexus, or do you have a nexus one, or a nexus s ?

And how does apple not including a sd slot limit freedom, but google not including it not limit freedom ?

 

[OCaptain]

What does a 'surface-mount' ROM chip have to do with what I posted ?
Your response gives me zero credibility in your claim.



You do understand, the nexus, designed by google, manufactured by samsung, has no SD card slot. Do you have a nexus, or do you have a nexus one, or a nexus s ?

And how does apple not including a sd slot limit freedom, but google not including it not limit freedom ?

I think you're confusing it with the Sony Ericcson Captivate Slide and the Motorola Amaze Epic 4G+ G1.

Neither of those have SD card slots.

 

[Fast Eddie B]

I'm discussing this issue calmly and rationally and you guys are going all bonkers.

"All the world is mad, save me and thee...

...and sometimes I think thou art a little queer!"

A quote my mom liked.

Seemed appropriate in an odd way.

 

[This is The End]

What does a 'surface-mount' ROM chip have to do with what I posted ?
Your response gives me zero credibility in your claim.



You do understand, the nexus, designed by google, manufactured by samsung, has no SD card slot. Do you have a nexus, or do you have a nexus one, or a nexus s ?

And how does apple not including a sd slot limit freedom, but google not including it not limit freedom ?

I think you're confusing it with the Sony Ericcson Captivate Slide and the Motorola Amaze Epic 4G+ G1.

Neither of those have SD card slots.

No, he's right. The new Nexus does not have an sd card slot.

I believe they are releasing an official SD card slot adapter thingy eventually. That will plug into the micro usb slot. Though, you can already do that right now with a 3rd party cord/reader, but it is not sleek. The official one will probably be sleek.

Is there a similar adapter for the iPhone?

 

[Stray Cat]

Sometimes freedom means doing a little extra work.

Then again whilst you're doing all this:

Several times in recent years I've become disappointed by an upgrade. The first time was when KDE4 originally came out and I hated it. There was no way to back-grade so I ended up reformatting my root partition and reinstalling a new distro from scratch. Then a couple years later I upgraded Ubuntu only to find it had installed a tablet/netbook interface ("Unity") by default. Then there are the persistent problems I always have with Banshee, so I keep having to uninstall that and install Clementine instead...

I'm free to get on with my work and then I'm free to take the rest of the day off.

And then because I don't use a mobile phone, I'm free to do what ever I want without being constantly interrupted by people who think others should be on call 24/7... so I suppose it depends where you see the value of freedom.

 

[megaresp]

I'm not very interested in tablet computers...I'm just as interested in productivity...so I value a machine that provides both functions far more than some overpriced toy...

Do you agree with any of the following statements? And if so, which of the following in particular?

• The iPad as an "overpriced toy"
• All tablets are overpriced toys
• Tablets are not the best solution for work (e.g. an ultrabook is always better in a work situation)

 

[joobie]

Is there a similar adapter for the iPhone?

there is a sd card reader dongle for the iphone/ipad, yes.

 

[Brian-M]

Do you agree with any of the following statements? And if so, which of the following in particular?

• The iPad as an "overpriced toy"
• All tablets are overpriced toys
• Tablets are not the best solution for work (e.g. an ultrabook is always better in a work situation)

You forgot...

• In certain circumstances, a tablet computer can function as an effective work tool, but in most cases they serve as little more than an overpriced toy.

(Just adding this option because that's what I'd answer if you were asking me the question.)

 

[kajata]

Define "toy".

 

[Fast Eddie B]

Is there a similar adapter for the iPhone?

For $30 Apple sells a "Camera Connection Kit". It includes 2 adapters, one for USB and one for SD card.

I bought one but have not yet found a compelling use for them either of them.

 

[Fast Eddie B]

Define "toy".

Something American Airlines pilots are allowed to play with in the cockpit.

http://www.slashgear.com/american-airlines-gets-first-ipad-for-cockpit-approval-by-faa-13202062/

 

[Darat]

Something American Airlines pilots are allowed to play with in the cockpit.

http://www.slashgear.com/american-airlines-gets-first-ipad-for-cockpit-approval-by-faa-13202062/

Could be tricky for some folks when mid flight Apple removes the app from the Apple store.... Also surprised Apple aren't saying they should receive 30% of all passenger revenues collected on flights that use their hardware!

 

[Fast Eddie B]

Could be tricky for some folks when mid flight Apple removes the app from the Apple store....

Some truth in that.

When some people upgraded to iOS5, they were surprised that some or all of their aviation charts were missing. Caused a lot of consternation in the aviation community. Had to do with how programmers had cached some data (I think). I recently was surprised to find the pdf's I had stored in iBooks were missing. That included my plane's POH, which must be carried in flight, and some sectional charts, so I'm glad I caught it.

Also surprised Apple aren't saying they should receive 30% of all passenger revenues collected on flights that use their hardware!

Who says they're not? Maybe that's why the stock price is soaring!

 

[Darat]

Some truth in that.

When some people upgraded to iOS5, they were surprised that some or all of their aviation charts were missing. Caused a lot of consternation in the aviation community. Had to do with how programmers had cached some data (I think). I recently was surprised to find the pdf's I had stored in iBooks were missing. That included my plane's POH, which must be carried in flight, and some sectional charts, so I'm glad I caught it.

...snip...

Slightly off-topic as it's a non-company specific complaint - but that does show the problem with relying on a consumer company for anything critical. (Was really surprised to learn that the iPads used by the airline were standard consumer products.) I can see over the coming years with the ever increasing reliance on private companies' "cloud services" there will be quite a few "disasters". I've seen it with just the use of hosting services.

 

[John Albert]

What does a 'surface-mount' ROM chip have to do with what I posted ?
Your response gives me zero credibility in your claim.

I misunderstood what you meant by the term "cooking ROM." I thought you meant writing information to a standard ROM chip, which I have done. Apparently you were referring specifically to the practice of changing firmware on a mobile phone.

Well, I have never had any reason or occasion to change the firmware on an Android phone, although back in the day, I did flash a few regular old cellphones with modified firmware.

Rooting/jailbreaking is one thing, but those kinds of mods are definitely beyond the capabilities of most cellphone users. They violate warranties, require specialized, highly-technical software and run the risk of bricking the phone if you don't know what you're doing. So I really don't see the relevance of making a general value judgment on one phone over another, based on the practices of hardware hackers.

You do understand, the nexus, designed by google, manufactured by samsung, has no SD card slot. Do you have a nexus, or do you have a nexus one, or a nexus s ?

And how does apple not including a sd slot limit freedom, but google not including it not limit freedom ?

I already told you that my phone has a microSD card slot. I already pointed out that an SD card, or lack thereof, is not the single defining factor in the issue of consumer freedom. Why do you keep on repeating the same questions that I've already answered?

Remember that thing I said, that you mindlessly copy-pasted back at me? The one about not attentively reading what other people say?

 

[John Albert]

Do you agree with any of the following statements? And if so, which of the following in particular?

• The iPad as an "overpriced toy"
• All tablets are overpriced toys
• Tablets are not the best solution for work (e.g. an ultrabook is always better in a work situation)

I feel that the tablet is generally a poorly-conceived form factor for a computer. It lacks the means to prop itself upright at a comfortable viewing angle the way a notebook does, so it must be held in the hand at all times, leaving only one hand free to type or navigate the workspace. If you lay it down flat, then you have to crane your neck over it. Even holding one in the lap while sitting requires one's legs to be propped up to provide a good viewing angle. Then there's the fact that you're sticking your fingers all over the viewing surface. I prefer even a small laptop keyboard over the aggravation of using a touchscreen keypad, getting finger smudges all over the screen. In my view, this combination of inconveniences makes tablets generally unsuitable for most kinds of work, and even annoying for entertainment purposes. I prefer not to have my fingers blocking my view when playing a video game, and I prefer watching a movie on a vertical surface instead of on some dinky little device with rounded edges that I have to worry about finding some way to prop upright.

But hey, I can acknowledge that some people like them. They're a new form for portable computers, and seem all futuristic with their glossy, integrated display/input device. They can't do a heck of a lot, but they're thin and light! You can surf the Web on them, but it's a bit of a pain to enter information or type anything longer than a tweet. They're great for playing all kinds of wacky little games, but they generally don't support Flash.

So, meh.

I can acknowledge they might be useful in some industries, like aviation for example, or inventory taking or parking enforcement where people are used to carrying tablets and notepads anyway. But I generally consider them a pointless fashion accessory. I'll stick with my notebook computer, thank you.

 

[John Albert]

Then again whilst you're doing all this:

I'm free to get on with my work and then I'm free to take the rest of the day off.

And then because I don't use a mobile phone, I'm free to do what ever I want without being constantly interrupted by people who think others should be on call 24/7... so I suppose it depends where you see the value of freedom.

I can choose not to answer my phone if I don't want to. I even have various ring tones to differentiate among callers, so I don't even have to look at the phone if it's somebody I don't want to speak with at the moment.

As for the computer thing, perhaps I exaggerated the issue. Keep in mind that it was an upgrade I did not need to perform. My computer runs fine and does everything I need it to without making OS upgrades. But some Linux users change distros regularly, just to try new things. There are loads of distros out there and you never know which one's the best for you unless you try out a few. So I deliberately chose to do this upgrade on a lark, out of curiosity about what the new version was like, feature-wise. Usually, I'm happy with the new versions, but on two occasions over the past 10 years or so, I was disappointed.

When I found out the new version wasn't for me, I simply reformatted my root partition and reinstalled a different distro without touching any of the user settings or data. That's the advantage of setting your machine up properly in the first place, with your user space on a separate partition from your OS. The whole operation took about an hour and a half. I did the reformat and install before I went to bed, and when I got up in the morning everything was back to normal.

As for uninstalling the Banshee music player and replacing it with Clementine, that involves typing 8 words of code.

So yeah, I was basically kvetching, making a mountain out of a molehill.

 

[Stray Cat]

I can choose not to answer my phone if I don't want to. I even have various ring tones to differentiate among callers, so I don't even have to look at the phone if it's somebody I don't want to speak with at the moment.

As for the computer thing, keep in mind that that was an upgrade I did not need to perform. My computer runs fine and does everything I need it to without making OS upgrades. I deliberately chose to do it, just to check out what the new version was like, feature-wise and such. When I found out it wasn't for me, I simply reformatted my root partition and reinstalled the previous version without touching any of the user settings or data. That's the reason why you set your machine up properly in the first place, with your user space on a separate partition from your OS.

Yes I realise all this. My point was that if you don't allow your technology to drain your time and rule your life, you can just get on with your stuff and then be free to do what you want. It was your comment that "sometimes freedom means doing a little extra work" that seemed a bit self contradictory to me and it's not a concept I have ever had to deal with because I think I have more freedom for doing less work. So I guess it's about what you value as freedom.

 

[John Albert]

I guess maybe "work" was a poor choice of word.

I enjoy trying out new distros, so that aspect is really more like "play" to me. But the main upshot is that there are literally hundreds of different distros. If I choose, I can switch around from one to another to see if I find one that I like better, or I can easily modify the one I have. Sometimes the distro I'm using will introduce changes that I don't like in a newer version, but I don't strictly need to upgrade at all for several years if I don't want to, and there are always plenty of other options to choose from.

And they're all free. I don't have to worry about giving out my credit card number over the Internet. I don't have my computer manufacturer shoving ads for Katy Perry or Toby Keith in my face when I'm trying to purchase software. I don't have to worry about buying some special dongle for USB or paying $35 extra for a special plug to hook my computer up to my TV.