illa romza

This is the lowest end machine Apple makes. Let's be realistic. This is a reasonable update for the base model. And it's probably being done in advance of a Core 2 Duo update to the iMac.

Yonah doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Merom is pin-compatible and costs exactly the same amount. Besides, it would be a PR boost for Apple to have the entire lineup 64-bit and "Leopard ready". The Mac Mini is going to use the 5000 series Meroms and the iMac is going to use the 7000s.

I had, or rather still have in a closet, a powerbook 100. It had an external floppy drive and I did carry it around with me, kind of defeating the purpose of the smaller form factor in the first place, so I bought my wife the powerbook 145 which had the floppy onboard. I guess we're now beyond wondering how to get things on the computer without the drive, but it would make sense for a driveless mac to have some super wireless connectivity options? Perhaps connectivity with the home mac in a "go to my pc" kind of way. Apple does own the "go to my mac" domain name. Just a thought.

Marketing geniuses :)

Hmmm... not really. I hate marketing. Nothing they say will change that. They also need to stop calling the iPad "magical". It really isn't. It's very nice, but not magical.

http://img.shoppingnexus.com/products/hamilton-beach-hot-oil-popcorn-popper.jpg

I don't have a microwave anymore but like the occasional bowl of popcorn. :)

I like that concept... not owning a microwave. Encourages you to eat fresh and reheat things the proper way. :)

I guess I'm number 1 on the team now :cool:

congrats! keep it up!

I have used Linux before, admit that I gave up with linux with Suse 9. The point I was trying to make with the package manager is that its not easy to go out and find something, every time you either have to find a package for your specific distribution or have it "built" for your distro. If you look at the way the mac works now I can drag the aduim icon to a remote drive, and from almost any machine that meets the basic specs I can then double click that app, even if its on a network drive, it will run, can you say the same for Linux?

Yes I can. Like I said, I just fire up the package-manager, find the app in question and click "Install". That really is all there is to it. No need to browse the web, looking for installers to download.

By unification I meant giving a constant user experience with singal points of administration, management ect. Some of my previous sessions with linux the applications did not always fully adhere to guidelines that were set out by KDE, whatever theme i choose, it didnt adapt to it for example.

Things are different these days. You are basing your judgement on SUSE9, which was released three years ago. During that three years, Linux has made HUGE progress. Things are chaning for the better, and they are changing FAST. I would say that Linux has changed more during the last three years than it did during the five years before 2003.

Note: that is NOT a bad thing for Apple. I bet that Apple would much rather co-exists with Linux than with Windows. There could never be a monopoly Linux could exploit to harm competitors, Microsoft could do that, and they have done it. Linux is open and follows established standards, Microsoft does not, if they can get away with it. Linux has no interest in destroying competitors, Microsoft does.

I fully admit im not a linux guru, and that things very likely have changed, but my perception is that every distro comes with a boat load of software on the DVD or via download, if you want to get something thats not listed it becomes a bit more difficult.

Well, SUSE does ship with tons of apps on the DVD (mainly so that it could be used wby people without broadband). But if you look at Ubuntu for example, it ships with relatively few apps. In a way, they have selected "best of breed"-apps for their distro. But if the user wants to have some additional piece of software, he can just fire up the package-manager, where he can choose from 16.000 pieces of software. The app the user is looking for is most likely listed there. If he's installing a piece of commercial software, they usually ship with nice installers that are not one bit harder to use than the ones in OS X or Windows.

There is the issue of building your own kernel

You have no need to do that. Seriously. I haven't built my own kernels in years. And when I did, it was because I wanted to do it, not because I had to do it.

Just because you CAN compile your own kernel does not mean that you are required to do so. The possibility is there for power-users.

The mac advantage is that its a bit easier to get, install and run applications than windows, and IMO linux as well.

I disagree. In Linux all the apps I could even want were just few mouse-clicks away. On OS X (and on Windows) I have to hunt for those apps in internet, only to find out that I'm expected to pay for them. I had none of those problems in Linux.

why is there a few big distros out there after years of linux development, why are there so many niche ones, and why do linux users argue with others over their favorite distro?

There are several distros, because one distro can't do it all. Want an OS that can be tweaked and customized to your exact needs and for your specific hardware? Obviously Ubuntu is not ideal then, but Gentoo is. Want a distro that "just works"? Ubuntu would be a good choice then. Want a distro with rock-solid reliablity? Try Debian. Want to run Red Hat servers, but don't want to pay for support? Use CentOS.

All those distros exist because there are users who find them to be better for their needs than the other distros are. And there's nothing wrong with that, since one size does not fit all. No-one could tell the users that "from now on, there will be just one distro". And even if someone could say that, the users who were unhappy with the "one true distro" could start their own distro if they wanted to.

Why do users argue which distro is best? For the same reason why Mac-users tell Linux and Windows-users that OS X is the best? For the same reason why BMW-drivers tell others that BMW is better than Merc is? People like to rationalise their choice of OS.

Diversity and flexability is one of the strenghts of Linux, its users know that, and having a single distro that does everything will counter that strength, they also know that.

They know that there can't be one distro that "does everything". Ubuntu wants to be easy to use OS that just works. Gentoo wnts to be as customizable, flexible and powerful as possible. It would be very, very hard for single OS to offer both of those ideoogies in one package. It would en up being "jack of all trades, master of none".

Take Mandrake (Mandiva these days) and Red Hat for example. Years ago Red Hat decided to use GNOME as their default desktop. There were bunch of Red Hat users who liked the distro, but liked KDE more than GNOME. So they took Red Hat, replaced GNOME with KDE and voila: Mandrake was born. From that point te two started to diverge. as independted OS'es.

6950 6950 6950 6950 6950 6950 6950 6950 6950!

For heavens sake give it a nice GPU!!!!!!!!:eek:

Ah.... this speculation really brings back the memories of PowerPC rumors. Like when everyone was speculating if we see 3 Ghz G5's. I thought the feeling would be gone now we have intel (and its roadmaps), but debating on wether we might see a Core 2 Duo line-up soon brings the excitement right back. Hope this time the rumors do come true. This eventhough I am completely not in the market for a new Mac (neither was I for a 3 Ghz PowerMac :p)

Exactly so. For everyone's reference, here's a current Intel price chart (per CPU in lots of 1000): http://spamreaper.org/frankie/macintel.html

It makes certain options quite clear. For example:

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