Girlfriend, It makes no difference to me if you or your boyfriend use pc's or macs, however you may want to see a counselor about your relationship (there was a witty mac commercial with the mac guy and the pc guy and a counselor. If you watch that you might feel better). You may have fallen victim to hp/dell marketing about how "cheap" pc's are. If you spec out a mac (laptop or desktop) to an equivalent piece of their hardware they are pretty close (I'm talking +- 10-15%) - NOT considering software, quality, useable life, etc. I've done it will laptops and "all-in-ones" and it is pretty close. You may be complaining that you can't get a cheap, bare bones, piece of garbage from apple (like you can from dell), but you know what, most people "customize" those bare bones dell machines when they order them and pay way too much for too little. Many could have bought an apple by the time they are done adding on the "necessities." I've been using macs for 20 years. If you're boyfriend is complaining about compatibility, he doesn't have one of the recent intel macs, which boot up in windows if you want them too. For the record I have never booted a mac into windows and I have no real issues with compatibility. I suspect you are exaggerating here, cause he sounds like the type that buys new hardware frequently. Or, you might be thinking of 1992 macs. Of course there are mac viruses. In twenty years of using macs, I've never had a mac virus. I don't use antivirus software, and I sleep just fine. I don't use antivirus software on my linux machines either. I do however keep my OS software up to date. You do have some good points though and for the record...macs crash, macs break, macs require repairs (heck just search this site for cracked screen and you'll hear plenty of horror stories), just like everything humans make. I say that as a regular, and long time, mac user and I have no problem saying it. Girlfriend, you sound like a lifetime pc girl. You don't have to feel bad about it. If it works for you, great. Like the (highly successful and well respected) recent commercials from Microsoft proclaim, "I'm a PC." Say it with pride, cause you are. Don't be ashamed of it. Buy that no name mp3 player, get yourself a google phone, heck try linux while you're at it. You might fine out your a not really a PC girl on the inside. But don't let all that Mac vs PC stuff ruin your relationship.

I understand it must have been embarrassing and inappropriate for a two year old to be seeing porn at the Apple store (or anywhere). I like being able to go into the Apple store and browse the machines. I guess they could activate the parental filters, but that might not sell too many machines. I'm sure Apple doesn't condone or encourage this sort of thing. It was probably somebody "playing a prank" and you just happened to walk up. Nevertheless, perhaps there is something they can do to block those sites and still allow potential customers to experience web browsing on their machines.

I'm certainly not a linux guru, but I do have experience with Fedora, Centos, and Ubuntu. One of the nice things about linux is that you can try different distributions (on different partitions or drives if you want) at no cost (except your time). I must sat that Ubuntu is pretty straight forward for the average person. Maybe you should give it a shot. I like it, and have used it as a server for several years and been quite happy with it. I'm sure other people will chime in with their favs.

It sounds like you guys are getting awesome deals on firewire cables. Good for you. Which begs a couple of questions. Apple would pay probably in the neighborhood of 1-3 dollars (OR LESS) for the cable in question (based on a street price of $10, or $3, or $1). Why don't the just put it in the box? Which begs more questions... Apparently it is a cable that people need regularly for things on their mac like external drives (as one poster pointed out). Why isn't it included? Why should somebody who is upgrading from another mac product - that of course didn't have a firewire cable included - be rewarded for their loyalty to apple by having to go out and buy, or order, a firewire cable? The last thing I want to hear when I shell out top dollar for an APPLE product is that I have to go purchase a cable that to use software which is "awesome" (another posters words) and is a selling-point for Apple. Nope, I want to set up my new mac and start using it. Instead, Apple, the master of making everything easy, doesn't think it is necessary to include the cable. Which begs my last question (and solution). Why not make migration assistant work with usb 2.0? I REALIZE IT IS FAR INFERIOR TO FIREWIRE and would take much longer. But nearly everybody has that cable. Or, Apple could include a firewire cable in the box with every mac.

Then that sure is a lot of complaining about the excuse a company gives for an outage. We can line them up with the cable company, cell phone companies, itunes, my hosting company, and on-and-on, and flog them in unison if you want. Chewie. in a previous post, you've been struggling with this issue of getting rid of your own landline. Complain about a technicality all you want, but there seems to be more to it than that. Perhaps you're projecting? In case you've forgotten this. Seriously, live on the edge, dump your landline.

I have to say that Skype has been extremely reliable, and for the most part it is free - if you want to talk to other Skype users - and the U.S. long distance unlimited calling plan is pretty cheap. Granted, Skype-in, where you get a landline phone number is more expensive, but overall it's still a great deal. So you use it for free and they had an outage? What do you want? Do you have a cell phone? You probably do (if not you should get one). Between Skype and a cell phone, I'm not sure why you would keep you landline phone. I guess some people just can't get rid of that antiquated technology, but blaming skype for it (due to one outage) is blame shifting I'm afraid. Oh, try video chatting on your telephone at home. If you press it really hard into your face, people will be able to see you. :-)

Multiple times I have connected. It connects fine to a bunch of different networks, but then it just throws that error on others. In which case, people with windows machines have no trouble connecting. The problem is well documented on the Apple discussion forums. Granted, it may be a problem with the routers or other items, but like I said, my windows buddies have no trouble. It just refused to connect under such circumstances. I have been traveling and using many different networks. 9 out of 10 times it works fine and then when it starts acting up when I need it the most.

I actually think she's an idiot and I'm often embarassed for her. There are people who I don't agree with politically, whom I can still understand and accept. Often I respect them, the way they present arguments, and thier intelligence. That's what being different is all about. Ann just comes off as an uninformed bimbo that makes crap up for attention. She's sort of like the political side-kick of Paris Hilton. Why doesn't the "right," whatever that is, chose a better spokesperson?

You may be attending the wrong college (for you). It sounds like what you want is a technical college, where you learn how to do one thing - program computers. Universities are more than just places for job training. I'm sure the course requirements were well documented on the college's website before you matriculated. Regardless, you may want to pay attention in those things "you don't want to learn about," because you never know when they'll come in handy in the future.

[quote comment="262"]OK, This is the most stupid thing i've ever heard![/quote] Any comments as to why you think it's stupid? Do you not agree with Migration Assistant, how it works, or the fact that it requires an expensive cable (not included with the macbook) to get it to work?

antispam said: [quote]"macaddict, thanks! You have a point. Spamming could indeed be sending to millions of people; however, are you saying that sending any e-mail [not the e-mail we are discussing, since admin above responded about it already], sent in batches of 5-10, or even 20, can never or not be considered spam?"[/quote] A hard core spammer would get carpel tunnel syndrome sending out spam in waves of 10 emails. I usually think of spammers as people who won't respond to your inquiries about why they mailed you, people who won't take you off their mailing lists when you ask, people who are trying to sell something. They are basically computer driven mass emailing businesses. I guess some people could look at an invitation to visit a site as spam, but I really don't see it that way. I bet they wouldn't email you back if you asked them not to. I should say that if you are going to have a form where people can contact you about things on your blog, you probably don't have much grounds to stand on when they do. Especially if it's a real person and not a computer spam bot thing.

From admin's comments it doesn't really sound like their actions were spamming. I would say that spamming is sending thousands, perhaps miliions, of random people advertisements for products. When somebody invites you to help review their site, because they believe you have valuable knowledge (not just because they want you to buy something), that's sounds more like them asking for your expertise. But let's say that, hypothetically, they did spam you. Your post is proof that spam works! Seriously, it doesn't sound like spam to me, but if you think it is, that's what matters. I've got to go buy me a supply of C. I. A. L. I. S now.....

Kapusta, Amen. Perfectly stated. It even gets worse when people add the "home entertainment center" to the mix. Last year I was babysitting for my brother-in-laws kids. He had three remotes there: one for the cable box, one for the tv, and one for the stereo amplification system. I touched one wrong button, and after about 30 minutes of fiddling with it (making it worse actually), i never got to watch tv or listen to the stereo again. You can't babysit without TV, you just can't. Then he comes home and says.... dude, it's easy all you have to do is hit this {insert special button}, and go to this menu and choose {kill me}, then on the sony remote hit {somebody get me a beer}.....