USB drives don't support the data rates yet. Burning blu ray to play in regular players (play stations, set tops, et al) is the preferred delivery for right now. I agree that someday, optical will be dead; but not today. At least one or two more Mac generations, and LOTS of internet speed upgrades.
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New Mac Pros and Mac Minis Launching in August
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USB drives don't support the data rates yet. Burning blu ray to play in regular players (play stations, set tops, et al) is the preferred delivery for right now. I agree that someday, optical will be dead; but not today. At least one or two more Mac generations, and LOTS of internet speed upgrades.
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Great work Tong, although, has anyone else realized that the white MacBook hasn't received an update for over 12 months??? Is it being discontinued for the MacBook pro?????
Great work Tong, although, has anyone else realized that the white MacBook hasn't received an update for over 12 months??? Is it being discontinued for the MacBook pro?????
Maybe in the US. In the Netherlands 10MBit internet is entry-level stuff. We get unlimited 20MB(megabyte)/second for EUR 25 per month. EUR 45 gets you 40MB/s. 1080p movies need about 10 seconds of buffering but then they run without a hiccup.
I hear internet is even faster in South Korea.
I see. That is a very good point actually. But does TB support the right kinds of rates?
3D will happen, but that's a different point.
In terms of ppi, we aren't there yet, but the ppi limit of a regular 27" monitor will be attained before we reach 2K. People usually sit at 60cm = 23inch. It's twice the amount of iPhone's viewing distance for retina limit to reach. So you'd need half the resolution of iPhone from 23inch to be at limit, which is around 150ppi.
iMac is already at 110 ppi, so 150ppi will give you around 1.9K vertical resolution. So short of 2K, Retina limit is reached.
Sorry, slip of the tongue, so to say. Yes I meant 10Mbit.
Agreed 100%, I never said otherwise. Also I never said the current streaming videos look anything like Blu Ray. But a 10Mbit downloadable content will look very close to Blu Ray and on a small screen it probably wouldn't look any different than actual Blu Ray.
Unfortunately there aren't any 10Mbit downloadable 1080p content out there, for now.
NBT: 1080p60 in the short term; 1080p60 (3D) soon as well (120HZ for flicker minimizing); 4K is already here for Red type cams, and there are a few 4K projectors; those will be after we use up 1080P capabilities. Notice that all of these keep increasing the data rates and speeds necessary. I think it will stay ahead of the internet speeds people actually have in their homes or space to store stuff long term on hard drives or USB drives. 4K will need 100GB or more and double or more datarates. Not everyone will want it, but those that do, will insist on it.
1080P60 cams are here now and priced reasonably giving 1000 lines or more resolution for CONSUMER use (TM700 et al). If Red Scarlet ever shows up, we'll get 3K for reasonable costs as well.
My belief is that for videophiles and high end consumers, optical will be around for some time.
TB is 10 Gbit/sec. It's basically 500 times more than a Blu Ray bitrate, which is around 20Mbits. But TB is not the speed of internet infrastructure. Except in Japan. Japan is installing 10Gbit internet as we speak, those crazy nutjobs.
For the Blu-Ray talk....
It really bothers me why Apple doesn't include a Blu-Ray drive in any Mac that has disc support. How can one sell a $1000+ machine with a DVD drive is beyond weird.
We all know why Apple doesn't support it. iTunes. Think what you want but Apple is associated with quality and not using BRD (those Macs with disc trays) is flat out embarrassing and an insult to their customers.
Say what you want about Blu-Ray dying, but if you believe this, then why is Apple shipping a DVD drive?
iTunes does not offer any movie that comes close to the picture and audio quality that Blu-Ray offers.
It really bothers me why Apple doesn't include a Blu-Ray drive in any Mac that has disc support. How can one sell a $1000+ machine with a DVD drive is beyond weird.
We all know why Apple doesn't support it. iTunes. Think what you want but Apple is associated with quality and not using BRD (those Macs with disc trays) is flat out embarrassing and an insult to their customers.
Say what you want about Blu-Ray dying, but if you believe this, then why is Apple shipping a DVD drive?
iTunes does not offer any movie that comes close to the picture and audio quality that Blu-Ray offers.
You're still not using "post-PC" correctly.
And I roll my eyes at your attempt at cracking wise. You claim so much you've already lost track. You claim cell phones are post PC devices. Yet we've not been living in Post PC world for a decade? At the same time you claim iPods are Post PC devices, because people put mp3s on them, yet I got my first mp3 player a decade ago. Oh so I was right after all.
You are basically claiming that Apple started the Post PC era (which incidentally does not exist) with the iPod, iPhone and iPad, yet note that this term was coined way before Apple ever entered into the "post-PC" bandwagon, with Steve Jobs on some expo.
Post PC means "After PC" as in "when PCs are gone". That's what it means, though in marketing-speak you're probably right it means something else. Who am I to divine what marketing means.
It's not a trademark like Power PC. That can mean whatever you'd like. I wouldn't think that means that those PCs are particularly powerful. But "post-PC" is a term that has a meaning in the english language. So save your breath, it isn't what you think it is.
As for Apple dropping Mac support, there's plenty of evidence. XServe killed, iOS like Mac OS, 511 days between Mac Pro upgrades, iMac form factor still the same since 2005 (longest ever), lackluster pro-updates by Apple, no BD support, gesture based features in the new Mac iOS (oops did I write that) etc. etc.
Perhaps you don't want there to be any signs, for whatever reason. There are. Plenty.
Sadly.
It was a precision 3500 if I recall. I promise you the specs were the same and it as 1,350. Low end yes. When you start getting two CPUS then Apple's prices look better against the competitors. Again it was on sale for 1350, Apple is above sales. Steve said so in one of his LCD induced visions.
Yeah smartypants, they've had a 24" display since 2005 and have been used by designers as a cheap alternative to a Mac Pro since that very day they were released, which was my point. How could you misunderstand such a simple thing?
Again: the reason people used Power Macs before for design and illustration was because there was no other alternative to use a Mac with a big monitor. Since the 24" iMac there has been. It has never been because suddenly the iMacs are really powerful (they're average home computer powerful, now as ever) - in fact the iMacs have *always* been able to run the basic illustration and photo editing programs pretty decently (though nowhere near the performance of the PowerMacs/Mac Pros) they just didn't have the monitor.
Did you think it's just recently that designers started using iMacs for their work? Oh wow.
That's the current track record, Macs on maintenance upgrades (i.e. uninspired and minimal), but I for one always live in the hope that Apple wakes up from this iOS disaster (from the POV of a Mac user) and start treating the Macintosh like a tier one platform, worthy of all their attention.
Actually I'm just expecting minis and Mac Pros with T-bolts, and that's it. Nothing interesting, just maintenance.
iOS 'disaster'? Yeah, what a disaster, that has propelled Apple into the stratosphere, benefitting Apple itself, shareholders, developers, and most importantly, customers- while enabling it to enter and dominate the smartphone and tablet industries. You seen their quarterly profits lately? Are you aware they're now the most valuable tech company on the planet- primarily because of iOS? But yeah, what were they thinking- they pissed off a few fansite messageboard users in going this direction, I guess they're doing it all wrong then.
http://www.apple.com/macosx/whats-new/features.html
Have you seen this? That's a pretty massive list of changes for an OS they apparently 'dont care about'. I've been using the Lion beta for a while, and in my opinion its the biggest OSX leap in a very long time.
Could you tell me, because I'm honestly curious, what Apple needs to do with OSX and the mac so that you may consider them 'serious'? Their notebooks are the best selling and most critically acclaimed in the industry, as is the iMac, widely considered the overall best all-in-one, critically acclaimed and loved by most. The Macbook Air is breaking new ground in terms of ultra-portables, and the competition has been unable to release a viable, comparable alternative. Macs are flying off shelves at a faster rate each subsequent quarter- sales are drastically increasing, while the rest of the PC industry is decreasing.
So please, enlighten us about what specifically Apple needs to do with OSX and Macs to make it seem like they give a **** to you. It's not the 1st time I hear the sentiment, and its always backed by absolutely nothing, beyond whining that iOS is so successful.
TB is 10 Gbit/sec. It's basically 500 times more than a Blu Ray bitrate, which is around 20Mbits. But TB is not the speed of internet infrastructure. Except in Japan. Japan is installing 10Gbit internet as we speak, those crazy nutjobs.
Jesus! They are really preparing for the futre now aren't they?
Meh you can remove the file system of OS X without any problems, just Spotlight everything. It can be done easily enough, so why then iOS? Why then OS X? It's basically the same system.
Yeah I applaud your open mindedness by calling people lazy and backwards, because they don't subscribe to Apple's idiocy.
(golfclap)
At what point does all this quality no longer become visible to the human eye? If there are retina displays for the iphone, presumably there is a treshold beyond which detail is no perceivable. If our internet can get up to that speed with the help of a little bit of buffering, that would effectively kill off optical media right? How close are THunderbolt, lightpeak, and fiber optics for home internet to meeting that treshold?
Just one more little step and you're there: being able to criticize Apple for doing something bone-headed. So close, I gave that post a thumbs up!
Lossless CD quality is not dead among those with actual sound systems. iPods with ear buds need not apply.
Mp3 sucks really bad; mp4 is better, and and 320KB is close. But with a decent sound system, what you lose with even MP4 is depth and presense. Phase relationships get shifted, so "distance" cues become smeared. That may not make a difference with much music that is recorded a track at a time and pro-tooled to death with a bunch of effects, then compressed so there is no life left.
But carefully created music, even rock, metal, and pop, (especially well recorded drums) just seem veiled when played back on good systems with compressed formats as the source.
But for much mainstream stuff, yes, online, digital delivery in compressed formats seems to be the future, especially for indy bands. I released my EP that way because it's so much cheaper than pressing a bunch of CD's for CD Baby or some such and hoping I sell enough. It's only $49 to get an album on iTunes and others. If I have a lot of demand, I'll do a CD release, likely on Amazon CD on Demand.
Eddie O
First, I never claimed Apple started this Post PC era. Post PC era started when other devices than computers started to emerge, which partially did what computers did.
Second, none of the stuff I typed is my opinion. It's only stuff I heard from Silicon Valley execs, in interviews, broadcasts, articles.
I never called an iPod a post PC device. Silicon Valley did.
I never called a smartphone a post PC device, Silicon Valley did.
Am I clear on that?
Next.
Post PC does not mean the PC is dead. And it's meaning in the english language is defined as what people understand from it. Again, nobody in their right mind can claim that PC is dead. Not Steve Jobs, not Bill Gates, nobody. When you hear someone mention that term, you can be sure that they don't mean the PC is dead.
Ok, here I have to play the ignorant card.
XServe killed. XServe was released in 2002. So if XServe is an indication of Apple's Mac support, then Apple had poor support before 2002 to begin with.
Do you understand what a rack mountable server unit is? XServe isn't a Mac. XServe is a rack unit. It was not being sold, so it was discontinued. Simple as that. That means Apple dropped out of the rack mountable server market, which they haven't entered for a long time to begin with. It doesn't mean they are dropping out of the Mac market, which is still a 6 billion dollar revenue a year for them.
Second, 511 days between Mac Pro updates HAPPENED ONCE. And it was about Intel not releasing any Xeon updates. Also Apple's iMac updates, Laptop updates, happen more frequently. And those are macs as well, I wonder why you don't mention them but only Mac Pro.
iMac form factor not changing does not mean squad. Dell's workstations have been the same since forever. Do you complain about that as well? Does that also mean Dell dropping out of the PC market?
Lackluster Pro updates? Apple just completed one of the biggest rewrites in editing industry with Final Cut Pro X. No other software house actually attempted to do something like that. Avid, the leading software manufacturer on non linear editing, is still using decade old code and can't put down the resources to do a major rewrite like Apple did. The rest of the Pro apps have been regularly updated (2 year cycles in average, which is standard for those apps), and some have been dropped due to low sales, or better alternatives emerging in the market. Which happens with all software, not just Apple software.
And gestures on Mac OS X is an indication that Mac is dying? Windows 8 is bringing gestures all over the UI. Does that mean PC is dying as well?
Give me a break and get real.
Yeah it depends on where you live. Really, you get 160 megabit connection for 25euro a month w/unlimited download? Must be nice.
But then again, can you buy movies from iTunes in the Netherlands? If not, what good is that 10Mbit connection (or 160 megabit in your case) - and in reality to support a 10Mbit stream, you'd need a 15+Mbit connection and nobody else could use the internet in your home while you're watching that movie.
So perhaps a 30Mbit connection is more realistic. Then one has to wonder, how stable is that connection? Can you always get 1.25 mega BYTES per second from your internet? If it is cable or DSL, then it matters how many are using the internet in your street at any given time.
Or just pop in a BD and it will work. Always and immensely better quality than anything available through streaming. You'd even be able to choose subtitles and spoken languages (perhaps not useful in the Netherlands, but there are places, quite many places where that's pretty nifty)
The bride doesn't want to give an URL to her guests, etc. to see the event movie; she want to hand out a physical thing. USB sticks don't cut it, and to view them means tranferring the content to a computer, then watching it there. Aunt Emma (whatever) can stick her DVD or BR into a player next to her TV and press PLAY. Done. Not everyone (actually, almost NO ONE) is a techie. Why do you think most old VCRs are still flashing 12:00?