[ale] RE: New Apple chip

[Sean Kilpatrick]

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On Tuesday 24 June 2003 09:17 am, Christopher Fowler wrote:
> Rebuttle:
> 
> http://www.haxial.com/spls-soapbox/apple-powermac-G5/

 
The article referenced above rebuts Apple's claims to
a gain in chip/bus speed over Intel and other PC chip
makers.

Processor speed is certainly _one_ benchmark of a computer
system. But I would argue that when we are talking about
desktop systems, speed today is almost irrelevant.

Speaking as a PC user who finds the "cute" factor of Macs
distasteful at best, the Apple products do have some things
going for them way ahead of what is available to me with
Linux.

The new Apple G5, according to Jobs, will have built in fax
capabilities. Also built in will be the new Firewire standard,
gigabit Ethernet, USB 2.0, and other more Apple-centric goodies.


Are most of these features available to me. Yes, I suppose they
are; but not without a _lot_ of hassle. By way of example, I have
yet to get a memory card reader to work correctly on this box --
RH 9.0 -- and it will take me hours of frustration to get the
scanner working again. No such frustration with the Mac.

On the down side, although OSX is apparently based on BSD and
has a terminal program, it is _not_ trivial to become root on
this operating system and actually change some of the niddling
aggravations. Also not trivial is Apple's continued insistence
on a one-button mouse.
When, not if, Linux surpasses Apple in the number of installed
desktops, manufacturers will begin developing Linux drivers
for their products and adding them to the boxed package. With
any luck that point will be reached in the next 24-36 months.

If HP were to offer a scanner with included Linux drivers today,
I'd buy it tomorrow. Regardless of price. Same goes for a memory
card reader.

Sean

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