The only review that matters - as detailed and in-depth as ever. "I'm giving the MacBook Pro with Retina Display our bronze Editor's Choice award. Making it the first Mac to ever receive one. It would have been a silver had the software story been even stronger (iWork, Mountain Lion, Office and Photoshop being ready at launch would have been a feat worth rewarding). And it would have been a gold had Apple been able to deliver all of that but without sacrificing end-user upgradability." The device has performance issues which Mountain Lion will address (to a degree), but for the rest, AnandTech's review details - without being pro or anti-anything - just how good this new MBP really is. As a sidenote, Windows 8 on the retina display further confirms the classic desktop is dead to Microsoft: it still can't handle high-DPI displays properly. With the desktop going the way of the dodo, why would the company make it so?
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Member since:2010-03-08
1. I agree with that line of thought, to a degree. I do not think that all users should know how to service their hardware, but I also think that being tied to the manufacturer of a device for servicing is a bad idea.
To go back to vehicle analogies, I know tons of people who are happy owners of cars and bikes which have not been produced for years, and in some case whose manufacturer does not exist anymore. If these had been produced as a soldered black box, forbidding them to request help from a local mechanic, they would probably have had to throw them away as soon as something minor would break down inside after the end of the manufacturer support period, which is a waste of money and natural resources.
If Apple had their say, I bet I wouldn't have been able to fix that iMac G4 which I have ended up working on for the past few months while my team was waiting for funding to buy new computers 
2. It depends on the damage done or the complexity of the modification. I agree that you will always need manufacturer help to fix major problems (like a motherboard breakage for example). But for small issues, such as a dirty fan or a lack of ram, I honestly think that unless your hardware is still under warranty, asking the manufacturer is a waste of time and money and shouldn't be needed.
Most of the time, I don't ask a local computer shops for these small repairs either because I know how to do it myself anyway. But few people have this knowledge. And even for me, there is stuff which I don't know how to do and am not eager to learn, but which the guy next door can do for a very attractive price, such as replacing a laptop hinge or finding where the CMOS battery is located and changing it. What's more, these shops are also a good place to buy hardware such as mice or RAM, since you have someone near you to yell at if it breaks after a few days.
Edited 2012-06-25 06:38 UTC
The third and final WWDC product I want to talk about is - of course - OS X 10.9 Mavericks. While iOS 7 was clearly the focus of this year's WWDC, its venerable desktop counterpart certainly wasn't left behind. Apple announced OS X 10.9 Mavericks, the first OS X release not to carry the name of a big cat.We already talked about iOS 7 yesterday (after a night of sleep, it's only looking worse and worse - look at this, for Fiona's sake!), so now it's time to talk about the downright stunning and belly flutters-inducing new Mac Pro. As former owner and huge, huge, huge fan of the PowerMac G4 Cube - I haven't been this excited about an Apple product since, well, I would say the iMac G4. This is the Apple I used to love.
Apple held its big keynote event thing at WWDC earlier this evening, but since I was away with friends I've had to read up on it later in the evening. The company announced iOS 7, OS X 10.9 Mavericks, and they gave a preview of the new Mac Pro. Especially the Mac Pro impressed me, and while iOS 7's new Holo/Metro-inspired theme looks messy and garish to me, I do commend Apple for finally breaking the mold. This news item will focus on iOS 7 - I'll dive into the Mac Pro and OS X 10.9 tomorrow (it's late here now).
And yes, the PRISM scandal is far, far from over. More and more information keeps leaking out, and the more gets out, the worse it gets. The companies involved have sent out official statements - often by mouth of their CEOs - and what's interesting is that not only are these official statements eerily similar to each other, using the same terms clearly designed by lawyers, they also directly contradict new reports from The New York Times. So, who is lying?This story is getting bigger and bigger. Even though most Americans probably already knew, it is now official: the United States government, through its National Security Agency, is collecting the communications and data of all American citizens, and of non-Americans using American services, through a wide collaboration with the large companies in technology, like Apple, Google, Microsoft, Facebook, and so on. Interestingly enough, the NSA itself, as well as the US government, have repeatedly and firmly denied this massive spying on Americans and non-Americans took place at all.Ah, patents - the never-ending scourge of the technology industry. Whether wielded by companies who don't actually make any products, or large corporations who abuse them because they can't compete in the market place or because they're simply jerks, they do the industry a huge disservice and are simply plain dangerous. According to The Wall Street Journal (circumvention link), president Obama is about to take several executive actions to address patent trolls - which may seem like a good idea, but I am very worried that all this will do is strengthen the positions of notorious patent system abusers such as Apple and Microsoft.
With version 13.05, the developers of the Genode OS Framework take measures to ensure that Genode continues to scale well with a growing number of users and the steadily broadening platform coverage. Further highlights are the improved SoC support for Exynos 5, OMAP4, Raspberry Pi, i.MX, and new components for realizing headless systems.At the D11 conference, Apple CEO Tim Cook once again took the stage to be interviewed by Walt Mossberg and Kara Swisher. While most of the interview can be replicated by picking and reading 10 random Apple fanblog stories - there were still a number of very interesting things that warrant some closer scrutiny.
So, the Xbox One disaster continues. Microsoft's policy for dealing with the used games market has reportedly leaked - and it's a clear and direct attack to destroy the used games market. Prices for used games will be set at the retail value of a new game, and retailers have to hook into Microsoft's computer systems and comply with Microsoft's terms and conditions.At an event earlier today, Microsoft unveiled the next Xbox - the third model, but confusingly named Xbox One. The big focus was TV, integrated Kinect, and all the other stuff we all expected to be forced down our throats. I think it took them 25 minutes to actually come to what should be the core of the story: gaming. Nothing groundbreaking in the gaming department, except for how Microsoft intends to handle the used games market and borrowing games from friends: pay up, buddy!
Member since:
2006-01-01
1. Operating a car is not the same as modifying or otherwise fixing the car. Tire pressure (much like charing a laptop) is operating the car. Modifying some facet of the car to change it's performance characteristics is beyond the vast majority of car users. The same applies to cell phones, refrigerators, toasters, microwave ovens, and virtually all other appliances. Why are computers in a separate category? The reality is their not, not to most people anyway, just those of us who can do such things.
2. I'll certainly accept your point on this. If your away from an Apple store then your service experience is much weaker. In fairness though, if your talking about fixing the device, then most manufacturers - certainly Dell and IBM which I have used for years - will either require you to send in the device or (given the right warranty) send people out to you. I've not gone to 'local shop' to service a computer for decades. (Though I do appreciate the experience might differ in other countries it was much the same when I lived in London and Brussels.)
I do think that, as inevitable as this may be, we are heading towards a PC market where consumer devices will be essentially disposable (refurbishable) rather than maintainable.
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