Are you an operating system agnostic? (Hint: I bet you are)

By Zack Whittaker | July 24, 2011, 5:12pm PDT

Summary

Only a week after buying my first ever MacBook, it hasn’t changed my opinion of Windows. It has though made me realise I am OS agnostic.

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Considering I have not spent more than an hour of my life using Mac OS X, jumping about the cultural shift train when my new MacBook Air arrived on Friday should have come as a shock — considering my own personal admission to an increasingly dependent reliance on Windows.

Truthfully, the transition from Windows to Mac has been relatively easy — with only a few quirks to learn along the way.

But the one thing — only half a week later from the arrival of my new beast of a note-slash-netbook, is that I am and always have been agnostic to operating systems. I just never knew it until I forced a change of hand, and I suspect you — the reader — may be the same.

(Image via Flickr)

In reality, I have not transitioned at all. I have learned, and subconsciously compared and contrasted, but I have not actively switched from one to the other.

With Windows, one has to be aware of ‘Windows rot’, database files, caches and the build up of disk space over time, taken over by temporary files and updates that slowly wear away at the system.

Whether or not this truly exists in the Mac world, I have used up only 13% of my 128GB solid state drive, and it has remained as such since the day it arrived, and installed the junk I need to keep my productive life going.

It’s a shift I have never taken before. Being used to something old and decrepit, that works but sometimes breaks, and often needs a kick up the backside to get going again was fine, truth be known.

With my Mac, I have to leave many preconceptions and worries at the door. It seems that I do not need to clear my cache files that often, or need to wipe my Internet history or temporary files each week to remove the constant clog of files on my system.

This, as you may have guessed, is the ramblings of someone very much in the ‘honeymoon’ period; yet to work out the difficulties and set backs that Mac has yet to show, over the Windows operating system that I am so used to.

And on the subject of honesty — I have not switched on my Windows-running desktop upstairs since my MacBook Air arrived. I simply have had no need to.

Despite the closed ‘app-store only’ nature of iOS, for newcomers, Mac OS X is not. It doesn’t need jail-breaking, nor does it require hacking to get the applications you want to work on it.

For that reason alone, again despite the Windows versus Mac divide, so far all but one application is available on Mac OS X as it is on Windows. The one that isn’t, is Paint.NET — an old version of the popular image editing software, for which I use instead of the overbearing clutter that PhotoShop has to offer.

But already, I feel as though I am cheating on my new MacBook purchase by running virtualisation software, to emulate my Boot Camp partition to run Windows applications within the Mac OS X interface.

While I have my Mac OS X Lion based MacBook running multi-platform software — like Chrome, Microsoft Office, Skype and Dropbox, there is still a need to at least have the opportunity more than anything to run Windows applications directly from one’s MacBook.

Simply having the option there is enough to make me feel all-rounded more comfortable; knowing I have a fall back option ready on my MacBook wherever I am in the world. As a netbook-like solution, my MacBook Air will replace my current netbook and travel the world with me when I next travel.

And this sets me to my point. I am operating system agnostic. It doesn’t matter what I use, when it is or how I use it — whether it is a strand of Linux I have never used, Mac OS X or Windows 3.1 through to Windows 7 — I’ll use it regardless.

I suspect that actually, while most will have their own personal preference, I believe many follow this pattern too. It does not matter which browser, operating system, program or service you use — it falls down to whether the job can be done or not. If it can, then continue. If not, by all means move on.

No doubt most will agree: video editing software is better on a Mac, whereas productivity and office documents are better for Windows. The Mac vs. PC adverts on the television do highlight a point, and though jocular and with a staunch anti-PC bias, many prefer to be productive to editing videos.

At the end of the day, productivity in itself is relative. Video editing may well be someone’s job; what right do we have to disparage? We pick the devices for what we feel is best.

Perhaps I would have woken up to Mac OS X if I were able to run it alongside Windows on a PC. The fact that you can run Windows on a Mac shows more about Apple than it does about Microsoft; yet equally negates the positivity by restricting Mac OS X to a Mac computer.

It’s like a Venn diagram out of control; emulating the London 2012 Olympic logo; with jagged edges and overly highlighted spewed-up collage pieces.

Though I am now a proud Mac owner, and still a productive soldier with my desktop and office-based Windows PC sitting in the desktop — with a brand new desktop PC on its way to replace the ailing model I have — I am proud to say I am OS agnostic.

It just took a lot of fear, uncertainty and doubt — and a risky credit card payment to prove it to myself — even if it was by force.

Now, who’s up for a crack at Ubuntu?

http://www.zdnet.com/blog/igeneration/are-you-an-operating-system-agnostic-hint-i-bet-you-are/11684

How Microsoft plans to sell a 'couple hundred million' more Windows 7 PCs before Windows 8

By Mary Jo Foley | July 22, 2011, 7:35am PDT

Summary

Given there’s still a year (give or take) until Windows 8 launches, what is Microsoft’s game plan to keep the bottom from dropping out of the Windows PC market?

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As Microsoft’s fourth-quarter fiscal 2011 earnings made clear, Windows 7 sales — with the glaring exception of netbooks — are good, but not as good as they used to be. Given there’s still a year (give or take) s until Windows 8 launches, what is Microsoft’s game plan to keep the bottom from dropping out of the Windows PC market?

The enterprise market will likely keep Windows 7 sales chugging, as many larger businesses are only now finally deploying Windows 7, after months of planning and testing. And, as Microsoft execs said during yesterday’s earnings call, the emerging market countries are snapping up a lot of Windows 7, though at lower prices — and with substantially higher piracy rates — than the “developed” nations.

It’s probably safe to assume Microsoft will launch another upgrade-guarantee program, as it traditionally does a few months before a new operating system launch, allowing those purchasing current Windows-model PCs to get a free upgrade to the next Windows release once it’s out.

But Microsoft needs to keep consumer demand coming in for Windows 7 if the company plans to sell “those couple of hundred million PCs between now and ‘Windows 8′” that Microsoft expects to move, according to OEM Chief Steve Guggenheimer, who spoke at Microsoft’s recent Worldwide Partner Conference. (Note: Microsoft officials said that the company has sold 400 million Windows 7 licenses since the product was introduced in 2009.)

Even though Microsoft doesn’t make Microsoft-branded PCs, increasingly it is positioning itself as selling Windows PCs (no doubt thanks to a little lot of pressure from archrival Apple). This is one of the slides Microsoft General Manager of Worldwide OEM Distribution, Terry Hagerty, showed during her session on “OEM Through Distribution” (slide deck available to registered partner show attendees only) at the Worldwide Partner conference in Los Angeles on July 11.

(click on the image above to enlarge)

Microsoft has begun making available a “Windows 7 Featured PCs” list to distributors to try to get more information out about the breadth and depth of Windows 7 PCs available to consumers and businesses, Hagerty told her Partner Conference audience. This is a “best in class” list for sales, marketing and technical teams that Microsoft is hoping they use to “create excitement and demand for Windows 7 PCs.”

There are a number of Windows PC form factors and models that many current and potential users — who don’t go to trade shows where they can see lots of different Windows PC models from different vendors side-by-side — have no idea even exist. Retail chains usually only stock a few Windows PCs, and Microsoft brick-and-mortar stores, for now, are very few and far between. (Microsoft officials have said they plan to open 75 more MIcrosoft retail stores in the next two to three years, and will expand the stores internationally.)

(click on the image above to enlarge)

Here’s a sample of the July Windows 7 Featured PC list for consumers from Hagery’s slide deck:

(click on the image to enlarge)

Here’s a sample of the Windows 7 Featured PC list for businesses:

(click on the image to enlarge)

One observation: Microsoft isn’t touting any of the available Windows 7 PCs as “tablets” in these materials. It uses the word “companion” to describe slates/tablets in its two Featured PC sample pages. And the PC matrix slide above doesn’t use the “tablet” designation at all, either. Instead, it describes Windows “slates” as “PCs with no built-in keyboard or mouse and which use touch and/or pen for input.” Maybe Microsoft is trying to distance itself from its less-than-successful tablet past (and not-so-plucky tablet present)?

In any case, it will be interesting to see what happens with Windows and Windows 7 PC demand in the coming few months, as Microsoft finally begins sharing more specifics about Windows 8….

http://www.zdnet.com/blog/microsoft/how-microsoft-plans-to-sell-a-couple-hundred-million-more-windows-7-pcs-before-windows-8/10147

New Mac mini loses optical drive, gains Bluetooth 4.0

By Jason D. O'Grady | July 20, 2011, 9:00am PDT

Summary

Apple today announced a new Mac mini with a Sandy Bridge processor, Thunderbolt high-speed I/O port (like the MacBook Air) and no optical drive (like the MacBook Air).

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Apple today announced a new Mac mini alongside new MacBook Airs and Mac OS 10.7 Lion.

Like the 3G MacBook Air, the updated Mac mini ships with Intel’s Sandy Bridge processor and a Thunderbolt high-speed I/O port. According to Apple’s press release the new Mac mini delivers up to twice the processor and graphics performance of the previous generation.

The new Mac mini comes in two desktop configurations and one server configuration:

Desktop configurations

• 2.3GHz Intel Core i5, 500GB hard drive, 2GB RAM - $599
• 2.5GHz Intel Core i5, 500GB hard drive, 4GB RAM - $799

Server configuration

• 2.0GHz, dual 500GB hard drives, 4GB RAM - $999

Perhaps the most interesting development is that Apple has dropped the optical drive completely from the new mini. (Something I recommended two years ago.)

…if an app you need isn’t available from the Mac App Store, you can use DVD or CD Sharing. This convenient feature of OS X lets you wirelessly “borrow” the optical drive of a nearby Mac or PC. So you can install applications from a DVD or CD and have full access to an optical drive without having to carry one around.

The other option is to purchase Apple’s external SuperDrive ($79) which works with both the Mac mini and the MacBook Air.

The new Mac mini server configuration includes a 2.0GHz quad-core Intel Core i7 processor, Lion Server, 4GB RAM and dual 500GB hard drives for $999 (US). Configure-to-order options include adding up to 8GB RAM, two 750GB hard drives, or up to two 256GB solid state drives.

Update: MacRumors notes that the new Mac mini and MacBook Air support Bluetooth 4.0 and Bluetooth low energy:

…a new specification that offers ultra low-power data transfer and has been touted as opening the door to a host of new wireless peripheral devices.

The new Mac mini is the first to support discrete graphics:

The new Mac mini also makes a transition to discrete graphics on the high-end model, utilizing the AMD Radeon HD 6630M and offering up to twice the graphics performance of the previous generation. The low-end and server Mac mini models continue to utilize integrated graphics in the form of Intel HD Graphics 3000.

What do you like/dislike about the new Mac mini?

http://www.zdnet.com/blog/apple/new-mac-mini-loses-optical-drive-gains-bluetooth-40-updated/10604?alertspromo=&tag=nl.rSINGLE

‘We view a tablet as a PC’: Microsoft chooses to repeat history

By James Kendrick | July 13, 2011, 5:36am PDT

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It is beginning to look like Microsoft is about to repeat the Tablet PC history with Windows 8, and that is not a good thing.

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Microsoft is trying to excite the tech crowd with Windows 8, the next version of the platform that the company is pushing for computers of all types, including tablets to compete with Apple’s iPad. The folks from Redmond have been showing early prototypes of Windows 8 that look a lot like the Windows Phone 7 interface, with live tiles sliding around the screen. It is obvious the attempt is to keep the Windows platform as the dominant line for Microsoft, while the rest of the mobile world has realized that full-blown computers are not what tablet customers want. It is beginning to look like Microsoft is about to repeat the Tablet PC history, and that is not a good thing.

“We view a tablet as a PC”.

This statement given yesterday by Windows Phone president Andy Lees at the Worldwide Partners Conference as reported by Electronista was directed at putting to bed any ideas that outsiders have for a tablet OS based on Windows Phone.

According to Microsoft’s transcript of Lees’ talk the PC theme remained, but had a few caveats (emphasis mine).

One of the key important things here, though, is the change that’s yet to happen, but it’s about to happen, and that is the bringing together of these devices into a unified ecosystem, because at the core of the device itself it’s possible to be common across phones, PCs, and TVs, and even other things, because the price drops dramatically. Then it will be a single ecosystem. We won’t have an ecosystem for PCs, and an ecosystem for phones, one for tablets. They’ll all come together. And just look at the opportunity here.

In 2010, if you count all of these things, there’s just under 700 million units sold in that year. And yet if you look at the predictions from IDC and add them up, that will increase to over a billion units that are sold in 2012. And notice how it’s additive; it’s not that this is about replacing the PC. And that’s why our strategy is that these new form factors are within a single ecosystem and not new ecosystems themselves. Windows has always spanned different PC form factors. And with Windows 8 we’re going to take this to a whole new level including tablets.

Now, a lot of people have asked me, are we going to produce a phone that is a tablet? You know, are we going to use Windows Phone 7 to produce tablets? Well, that is in conflict with this strategy. We view a tablet as a sort of PC. We want people to be able to do the sorts of things that they expect on a PC on a tablet, things like networking to be able to connect to networks, and utilize networking tools, to get USB drives and plot them into the tablet. To be able to do things like printing, all of the things using Office, using all of the things you would expect from a PC and provide a hybrid about how you can do that with the tablet, as well.

The comments shined a light on Microsoft’s view of the tablet market that is not accurate. It keeps alive the mistaken view that drove Microsoft’s Tablet PCs, that full-blown computers are what consumers want in a tablet. That didn’t work with the original Tablet PC, and that is not going to work for today’s consumer tablets. It’s looking like Microsoft is determined to repeat history, and a failed one at that.

Apple set the consumer space on its ear with the release of the iPad, the first tablet that breached the mainstream market in numbers. The iPad defined an entire market that has companies scrambling to penetrate, and none have done so successfully to date. What caught consumer’s eyes in the iPad was the fact that it wasn’t a full PC with all of the complexities those bring. No, the iPad was a pure mobile OS that focused on bringing a touch tablet experience that was simple yet full-featured enough to let users do the things that matter. Getting on the web, playing games and consuming media were the focus of the iPad with iOS, and consumers bought into the system by the millions.

The original Tablet PC designed by Microsoft is a full PC that nobody bought in significant numbers, and it has been around for a decade. The iPad sold more tablets in the first nine months than all of the Tablet PCs bought combined over a decade. That is a significant indicator of what consumers want, a simple mobile tablet and not a full-blown PC.

Microsoft seems to be pushing the ‘tablet as a PC’ philosophy in a desperate attempt to keep the Windows line driving everything it does outside the smartphone space. The choice to repeat history will likely have the same results as the first time; nice products that nobody buys because they are too complex to operate, maintain and develop apps for. Consumers don’t want tablets that are PCs, they want them to just work.

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http://www.zdnet.com/blog/mobile-news/-8216we-view-a-tablet-as-a-pc-microsoft-chooses-to-repeat-history/3267