Re: The Windows XP Pro experience ....

On Tue, 24 Jan 2006 18:53:07 +0000, not_in_use@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx (Peter
Hayes) chose to bless us with the following wisdom:

>Mayor of R'lyeh <mayor.of.rlyeh@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
>> On Tue, 24 Jan 2006 13:33:32 +0000, not_in_use@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx (Peter
>> Hayes) chose to bless us with the following wisdom:
>>
>> >Mayor of R'lyeh <mayor.of.rlyeh@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
><snippage throughout for brevity>
>
>> >> • Plug the USB hub into the computer. The telescope is connected to
>> >> the hub via a Keyspan Serial Adapter.
>> >> • "New Hardware has been found. Please choose an installation..."
>> >> Click.
>> >>
>> >> The new HW notification is only given the first time a device is
>> >> plugged in.
>> >
>> >To that USB port. Plug it into another port and it goes through the
>> >installation rigmarole all over again. Dumb, or what...
>>
>> That's not how it works here. It only does it once per machine.
>
>My Dell laptop with XP SP2 and all updates behaves as I described.

I've tried it on fifteen different machines over the course of the
evening. All behaved the way I described. You seem to be the odd man
out.

>
>> >> • "This device would work faster if you connected it to a high-speed
>> >> USB Port." Click.
>> >> • "Aha, gotcha! You don't have any high-speed USB ports!" Click. (Only
>> >> fell for that one once.)
>> >>
>> >> Yeah that one is annoying.
>> >
>> >There must be a registry hack to shut it up.
>>
>> It only comes up for me on one machine at one place I only
>> occasionally do any work at so its not a big deal in my world.
>
>I have only one XP machine and it behaves as I described.
>
>> >> • "Your anti-virus software is now up to date ..." Click.
>> >>
>> >> Nothing wrong with telling you that.
>> >
>> >Except the OS is so flawed that it needs anti-virus software in the
>> >first place.
>>
>> I almost wish MacOS X would get to 90% marketshare just to watch the
>> Maccies spin and dance in an attempt to explain away the way it became
>> a piece of Swiss cheese overnight after declaring it 'invulnerable'
>> for so long.
>
>I wish MacOS X would get to 90% marketshare just to watch the
>Wintrolls spin and dance in an attempt to explain away the fact that it
>hadn't become a piece of Swiss cheese overnight despite their promising
>otherwise.

You keep forgetting that his argument is over. There have been proof
of concept codes released to exploit holes in MacOS X. No one cared
enough to bother. Its clear that Mac's 'security' is through obscurity
and nothing else. Also most alerts are issued for Unix.

>
>> >> • Connect software to telescope.
>> >> • "Cannot connect to Meade LX200... LPT4 not found..." Click.
>> >> • Manually configure serial port. Click.
>> >>
>> >> LPT4 is not a serial port.
>> >
>> >I guess he meant COM4 but in his excitement he got it wrong...
>>
>> Or, more likely, he's another Maccie spinning a tale that doesn't know
>> enough about PCs to get the details right. Its a long standing
>> tradition in Macdom. If he were telling the truth why would he
>> embarrass himself by complaining about a bunch of things that he had
>> to have set up to work that way?
>
>Why should anyone wanting to control their telescope need a degree in
>computer science just to set up their machine?

Nothing in his description rises anywhere near the level of needing a
degree in computer science. Remember 90% weren't even the default
behavior so someone knows enough to change them.
I still think his story is 100% bull***. I think he's just reporting
things that he saw happen on other's machines whd had them set up that
way because that's how they wanted them to be. He just assumed that
they were they default behaviors and wrote his little tirade that
makes him look like an utter idiot if you know up from down about XP
accordingly.

>
>> It used to be common to see some Maccie complain that a PC wouldn't
>> boot because its motherboard battery had died. Of course it was always
>> either a brand new or nearly new PC. The only problem is that PCs will
>> boot just fine with a dead battery.
>
>It'll boot with default BIOS settings, which may or may not work
>properly, especially with specialities like RAID. It'll likely come up
>with a date of 1st January 1970,

Every PC I ever booted up with a dead battery booted up to the date of
their BIOS. My P166, for instance, boots up to some day in 1996.

> which could send some apps into a tailspin.

But it does boot, which is the point. Its Macs that weren't able to
boot at all with a dead battery. Its not an attack on Macs. I'm just
pointing out that Maccies making up stories tend to forget the little
differences between Macs and PCs.

>> It was Macs that wouldn't.
>> In here its George and Sandman that keep the tradition alive. They
>> both have many tales describing PCs that behave strangely in ways that
>> PCs simply don't work. Frequently the behavior they describe sounds
>> more like how a Mac works than a PC. Neither one of them know enough
>> about how PCs actually work to get the details right.
>
>I couldn't possibly comment.

Sandman recently told a story about his PC laptop that was plugged in
for a week but not being used. He complained that when he woke it up
it took a long time to get up to speed while his Mac came on
instantly. Earlier in his tale we had gotten out of him that he had
not altered the power settings. The problem with his story is that at
sometime the PC would have gone into hibernate and it wouldn't wake up
from tapping on the keyboard like he was claiming it did. He would
have needed to hit the power button.




--
"A president who breaks the law is a threat to the
very structure of our government."
Al Gore

Bill Clinton became eligible for reinstatement to the
bar on January 19,2006 after losing his law license
in 2001 for comitting perjury.
.