Author Topic: Hardware/OS Geek Thread  (Read 53087 times)

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Offline Nathan

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Re: Hardware/OS Geek Thread
« Reply #76: August 28, 2009, 11:18:45 PM »
PS - Nathan...

;)
What? :lol:  What did you bait me on?

Offline The Chief

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Re: Hardware/OS Geek Thread
« Reply #77: August 28, 2009, 11:40:00 PM »
What? :lol:  What did you bait me on?

Not specifically, but the post about 2 whole malwares was tongue-in-cheek :P

Your response time was admirable :lol:

Offline Nathan

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Re: Hardware/OS Geek Thread
« Reply #78: August 28, 2009, 11:41:57 PM »
Not specifically, but the post about 2 whole malwares was tongue-in-cheek :P

Your response time was admirable :lol:
I'm damned good!  And I'm not even on my Mac, or I'd be even quicker! :lol:

Offline The Chief

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Re: Hardware/OS Geek Thread
« Reply #79: August 28, 2009, 11:43:21 PM »
I'm damned good!  And I'm not even on my Mac, or I'd be even quicker! :lol:

You laugh but that'd be the truth for me.  I don't know any damn shortcut keys on a Mac, on Windows I barely need a mouse at all.

Offline Nathan

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Re: Hardware/OS Geek Thread
« Reply #80: August 28, 2009, 11:45:08 PM »
You laugh but that'd be the truth for me.  I don't know any damn shortcut keys on a Mac, on Windows I barely need a mouse at all.
I'm pretty familiar with both.  A lot are similar between the two, substituting the "Command" key (the one with the Apple logo) for Control on the PC.

Offline The Chief

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Re: Hardware/OS Geek Thread
« Reply #81: August 29, 2009, 12:08:28 AM »
I'm pretty familiar with both.  A lot are similar between the two, substituting the "Command" key (the one with the Apple logo) for Control on the PC.

Why doesn't Alt-D go to the address bar in any browser on the Mac?  :evil:

Offline Nathan

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Re: Hardware/OS Geek Thread
« Reply #82: August 29, 2009, 12:53:59 AM »
Why doesn't Alt-D go to the address bar in any browser on the Mac?  :evil:
Because it's Command + L for "Location Bar". What's the "D" for ;)?

Can't use Command + A (or Control + A) for Address bar because it's for Select All.

Offline The Chief

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Re: Hardware/OS Geek Thread
« Reply #83: August 29, 2009, 11:24:51 AM »
Because it's Command + L for "Location Bar". What's the "D" for ;)?

Can't use Command + A (or Control + A) for Address bar because it's for Select All.

aDdress bar.  I never said it made sense.  Why does CTRL-K go to the search bar in Firefox?  Who effing knows.  CTRL-L works in Windows too, btw, but only for FF, not IE (it opens an open file dialog :lol: )

ALT-D is much easier to do one-handed, and therefore makes more sense to me as my left hand usually resides around the left side of the keyboard, while my right hand usually resides on the mouse unless I'm full-on typing.

Offline Ali the Baseball Cat

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Re: Hardware/OS Geek Thread
« Reply #84: August 29, 2009, 11:48:40 AM »
I should write all of this down  :lol:

Offline Nathan

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Re: Hardware/OS Geek Thread
« Reply #85: September 01, 2009, 11:16:19 PM »
I installed Snow Leopard last night.  I don't notice much difference.  I never had any real feeling of slowness on Leopard, so I don't really notice much speed increase at all.  The battery life seems a little bit improved but not any big amount.

BTW Chief, what is up with Tech net?  For the yearly price you get access to all that software for no additional charge?  Might be worth it just for Windows 7 and the Windows version of the office.  Do the apps expire after a certain time or after you end your subscription?

Little clip of the battery meter on the Mac.  Still 7 hours remaining on 74% charge :shock: but it was only light web browsing.  Flash video watching lowers it a lot, about 4-5 hours on a full charge.

Offline The Chief

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Re: Hardware/OS Geek Thread
« Reply #86: September 03, 2009, 12:12:35 PM »
BTW Chief, what is up with Tech net?  For the yearly price you get access to all that software for no additional charge?  Might be worth it just for Windows 7 and the Windows version of the office.  Do the apps expire after a certain time or after you end your subscription?

$349 for a one-year download-only sub, or $549 for a one-year sub where they'll actually send you hard copies.  Either way you get multiple licenses for most things.  10 valid full-version retail keys for W7 Ultimate, 10 more for Enterprise, 10 more for Pro, etc.  Office and other stuff works similarly.  The "catch" is that the software is "not for use in a production or staging environment" and is for "evaluation only." The keys are good forever, though.  You don't have to renew your sub to keep using the products.  There are frequent promos, so it's not too hard to catch a 25% off deal if you're patient.

Offline The Chief

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Re: Hardware/OS Geek Thread
« Reply #87: September 03, 2009, 03:04:00 PM »
Might as well throw some more wood on the fire :stir:

http://blogs.zdnet.com/security/?p=2941

Quote
Why Safari?  Why didn’t you go after IE or [Firefox]?

It’s really simple. Safari on the Mac is easier to exploit.  The things that Windows do to make it harder (for an exploit to work), Macs don’t do.  Hacking into Macs is so much easier. You don’t have to jump through hoops and deal with all the anti-exploit mitigations you’d find in Windows.

It’s more about the operating system than the (target) program.  Firefox on Mac is pretty easy too.  The underlying OS doesn’t have anti-exploit stuff built into it.

Quote
With my Safari exploit, I put the code into a process and I know exactly where it’s going to be.  There’s no randomization. I know when I jump there, the code is there and I can execute it there.  On Windows, the code might show up but I don’t know where it is.  Even if I get to the code, it’s not executable.  Those are two hurdles that Macs don’t have.

It’s clear that all three browsers (Safari, IE and Firefox) have bugs.  Code execution holes everywhere.   But that’s only half the equation.  The other half is exploiting it.  There’s almost no hurdle to jump through on Mac OS X.

Quote
On a scale of 1-10, how impressive was the Nils’ sweep of exploiting all three main browsers?

I was surprised.  For IE 8, I’d give him a 9 out of 10.   For Safari, maybe a 2. It’s just too easy to pop Safari.   For Firefox on Windows, I give him a 10.  That was the most impressive of the three.  It’s really hard to exploit Firefox on Windows.

Really?  What’s the difference between what you can do on IE but can’t do on Firefox?

The technique he used works against IE but not Firefox.  It allows you to place code in a specific spot in memory.  Mark Dowd and Alex Sotirov talked about this at last year’s Black Hat.  You can use a technique to make .net not opt into the mitigations and jump over hurdled easily.  With Firefox, you can’t do that.

For all the browsers on operating systems, the hardest target is Firefox on Windows.  With Firefox on Mac OS X, you can do whatever you want.  There’s nothing in the Mac operating system that will stop you.

:twisted:

Of possible interest to the Google-loving crowd (:jmad batsignal: :lol: )

Quote
Google Chrome was the one target left standing. Surprised?

There are bugs in Chrome but they’re very hard to exploit.  I have a Chrome vulnerability right now but I don’t know how to exploit it.  It’s really hard.  The’ve got that sandbox model that’s hard to get out of.  With Chrome, it’s a combination of things — you can’t execute on the heap, the OS protections in Windows and the Sandbox.

Offline The Chief

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Re: Hardware/OS Geek Thread
« Reply #88: September 03, 2009, 03:06:47 PM »
Oh and just to throw a little humor into the mix:

Apple store robbed in 31 seconds

http://www.neowin.net/news/main/09/09/03/apple-store-robbed-in-31-seconds

Offline Nathan

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Re: Hardware/OS Geek Thread
« Reply #89: September 03, 2009, 06:15:05 PM »
Well, I just threw out my MacBook Pro for a Dell Vostro.  Chief has convinced me that I must be wrong and the Dell is clearly the superior machine.

Offline The Chief

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Re: Hardware/OS Geek Thread
« Reply #90: September 03, 2009, 08:32:59 PM »
Well, I just threw out my MacBook Pro for a Dell Vostro.  Chief has convinced me that I must be wrong and the Dell is clearly the superior machine.

Don't be a spoilsport! :P

How much you want for that MBP? ;)

Offline sportsfan882

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Re: Hardware/OS Geek Thread
« Reply #91: September 03, 2009, 08:42:15 PM »
Dell

Offline Nathan

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Re: Hardware/OS Geek Thread
« Reply #92: September 03, 2009, 08:45:30 PM »
Don't be a spoilsport! :P

How much you want for that MBP? ;)

 ;) :P

Offline The Chief

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Re: Hardware/OS Geek Thread
« Reply #93: September 07, 2009, 12:09:37 PM »
 :icon_mrgreen:

[attachment deleted by admin]

Offline Nathan

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Re: Hardware/OS Geek Thread
« Reply #94: September 07, 2009, 06:20:30 PM »
:icon_mrgreen:
Or there are people who aren't fanbois and can see the virtue in both.  Like a super tricycle with a jet engine attached :lol:

I have noticed with the RTM build of 64 bit windows 7, my MBP gets MOLTEN hot!  I don't know if there is a fan control issue or what.  I did notice that Windows + the boot camp drivers only let you use the discrete nvidia 9600m GT instead of being able to switch to the integrated 9400m for power and heat savings.

Shoddy drivers on the part of Nvidia and Apple on that front.

Offline The Chief

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Re: Hardware/OS Geek Thread
« Reply #95: September 08, 2009, 09:01:12 AM »
Shoddy drivers on the part of Nvidia and Apple on that front.

Based on things I've read elsewhere and personal suspicions, I'm guessing that the shoddy power management under boot camp is at best neglect on Apple's part, at worst, deliberate sabotage for marketing purposes.  All's fair in love and war I suppose, but it still seems crappy of them.

Offline PC

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Re: Hardware/OS Geek Thread
« Reply #96: September 08, 2009, 02:17:19 PM »
Quote
Why Macs Can't Beat PCs with Windows 7

Apple's heyday of picking on Windows is over, and it can no longer claim its OS is better than Windows 7 -- here are 5 reasons why.
   
I regularly use both Windows and Mac PCs, so any comments that I've never used a Mac are bunk. I've been using Windows 7 since before its public beta release at the first of this year. I use my Mac for video editing, iPhone development, etc. I love all of my computers equally -- my Windows PC, my Mac and my Linux servers. They all do what I ask them to do very well, and I have things about each that I like and things I don't.

But frankly, the differences in the Windows 7 and Mac OS X platforms from a usability standpoint are pretty much nil. Windows 7 has simplified much of the complexity introduced in Vista and made Windows a very clean and easy-to-use OS. I would even go so far as to predict that the days of Apple trampling all over Windows in the "I'm a Mac" commercials are pretty much over. Not to say Apple won't go after Windows 7 as soon as Windows 7 has some vulnerability or issue Apple can exploit in a TV commercial. I'll grant, too, that Apple still has its "cool" factor and Windows isn't like to encroach on that. But Windows 7 is not only a "good enough" operating system, it is so much better an OS and user experience that Apple will have to think hard before using the same advertising tactics that worked so well on Vista.

Here are the five reasons Apple fears Windows 7:

Clean and Simple User Experience. There is now very little difference between the easy user experience on Windows 7 and Mac OS X. Gone from Windows 7 are Vista's loads of unnecessary bloatware applications, confusing and poorly designed configuration dialog boxes, and moronic UAC popups that impeded a user's productivity at every turn. The new task bar is more simple and straightforward than Mac OS X's crowded icon bar. Windows also has very good screen configuration settings that make switching between monitor configurations extremely easy. And the Control Panel has been redesigned to the basics of what end users need to manage Windows 7. Like it or not, we're now down to personal preference when it comes to usability and ease of use.

Mac Crashes More. Fact is, my Windows 7 systems don't crash... ever. Those days of frequent Windows Explorer crashes went away when I installed the Windows 7 RC. My Mac now crashes more often (about once a month or so) than Windows 7, and my Mac isn't over laden with junk on it.

Flexibility and Lower Cost. Microsoft has updated its "PC hunter" commercials but they still show how easy it is to find a better value when buying a Windows PC over a Mac. You have to use some pretty convoluted math to come to the conclusion Macs don't cost more than PCs for the equivalent devices. If you buy a Mac it's going to be because you consciously have decided you want a Mac instead of a PC, you hate Microsoft, you prefer the Mac user interface, etc.

Performance. We may not have side-by-side Windows 7 and Mac OS X performance comparisons yet (I'm sure we will soon) but Windows 7 isn't the performance hog Vista was. The experience is great. Windows 7 tools are fast, applications don't freeze up waiting for resources, disk I/O performance is great, memory utilization is much more efficient. Startup, shutdown and sleep are fast. Outlook still has its issues with not responding but overall we're talking a speedy experience on Windows 7. Now add that to the fact that Windows has access to the latest hardware advances -- you can crack the core on the latest Intel i7 or other hardware advances.

Mac Security Is NOT Better Than Windows 7. Many still live with the myth that Mac OS X doesn't have any security issues while Windows does. That myth ignores the facts. For example, Apple just released 18 security patches (the smallest collection of patches this year) for Mac OS X on August 5th. Many try to argue that not all the fixes are for Mac OS X, but rather for other software that might be included with it. To compare apples-to-apples (pun intended) you have to stack up the software each vendor ships with their products, not selective parts of it. While it is true that Windows is still a much larger security target because of it's market share, it isn't true that the Mac doesn't have plenty of security issues of its own.

 :stir:  ...a little more.  :icon_mrgreen:

Offline The Chief

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Re: Hardware/OS Geek Thread
« Reply #97: September 08, 2009, 02:45:32 PM »
#1 - Mac vs PC is a matter of personal preference?  Really?  Thanks for the hot tip.

#2 - while Vista and 7 are vastly more stable than XP ever was, I'm not sure you can say "Mac crashes more" after using a pre-release OS for 1 to 6 months (depending on whether he's counting from RTM or from the public RC)

#3 - PCs are cheaper and offer a great variety of configurations - how is this news?

#4 - they're both running the same hardware underneath, and both are finely tuned proprietary OSes, so performance isn't likely to differ much.  Snore...

#5 - this has been covered ad infinitum in this thread already - if you want security, don't use a computer.

While I agree with most of the points being made, I hate it when fanboy "journalists" regurgitate yet another Mac vs PC article simply for the sake of fanning the flames.

Offline Nathan

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Re: Hardware/OS Geek Thread
« Reply #98: September 08, 2009, 04:47:37 PM »
Macs crash more?  I have never in 4+ years of using a Mac seen a kernel panic (BSOD equivalent).  And to be fair, during my XP days, I only once saw a BSOD which was on a home built PC that I built and had not yet finished installing all the drivers.  Now Windows 98 would give me a BSOD on a regular basis, the switch to the NT kernel with XP pretty much fixed that.

Now I have had *apps* crash all the time on both OS's.  An app crash on 98 would often cause a BSOD but on OS X and XP+, an app crash doesn't bring the whole OS to its knees.

The whole "PC's are cheaper" bit is a little old.  Yes, you can get a cheaper PC than you can get a Mac, but if you go for a comparably spec'd PC with comparable software to what comes on the Mac, you actually come out pretty close.  To be fair, I don't really use stuff like iMovie or iDVD or GarageBand, but they are pretty powerful apps.  On the notebook side of things, I was not able to find a PC notebook with comparable battery life and solid build quality to the MacBook Pro at all.  I was going by what I could actually use and try out at the stores, but I'm sorry, those HPs and Dells just feel flimsy and cheap.  The Vaios are better, but pricier.

I actually agree with most of the points made by that article.  The way Windows 7 is shaping up, it looks to be about equal to OS X in pretty much every area, it is down to preference, or reasonable people who choose both  :icon_mrgreen:

Offline PC

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Re: Hardware/OS Geek Thread
« Reply #99: September 08, 2009, 04:51:24 PM »
While I agree with most of the points being made, I hate it when fanboy "journalists" regurgitate yet another Mac vs PC article simply for the sake of fanning the flames.

#1 - I am unashamedly a Microsoft/Windows fanboy and have been one for 20+ years though Windows ME made being so a whole lot tougher about a decade ago.

#2 - I don't and have never claimed to be a journalist, if that swipe was aimed at me.  I remember after I'd posted this (and when I wasn't near a computer) that I hadn't given the link.  Here it is.

http://www.pcworld.ca/news/column/91dc57e3c0a80006007226e3831bd622/pg0.htm

Now, I don't know if you consider him a "journalist" or a journalist and I'm also not sure if the "regurgitate" remark was aimed at me or him.

And, as is usually the case on internet message boards, I've been the model of restraint.  I'd guess that the plurality of Snow Leopard "reviews" not made by "the Mac Crowd", have been majority negative.  A majority of the reviews have been substantially negative.  If I wasn't restrained, I could post three or four of them a day, whereas, on this fourth page, this is the second that I've posted.  Four pages, filled with people who didn't regurgitate but two posts, regurgitated...  :|