# I pit Apple Computer...... **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [October 17, 2005, 11:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-apple-computer/326671 "2005-10-17T23:03:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![treis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bc79bd/32.png) [@treis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/treis)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2005, 6:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-apple-computer/326671/21 "2005-10-18T06:23:04Z")
> [@galt](#): > > You are quite mistaken. Look at any modern PC’s BIOS settings. USB is almost always a boot option nowadays. Checking my extra desktop machine here, I see that the default boot order is 1) IDE CD-ROM Drive, 2) USB device, 3) Hard drive, 4) Ethernet. This is a Compaq, in case it matters. Further, my Gateway TabletPC is one of those ultra-compact things that doesn’t even have a CDROM drive built in, and the only way to boot it from anything other than the HD is to boot from USB. Yeah I probably should have realised this becuase I am in fact in the same situation that you are except my tablet is a TC1100. [hijack] Which Gateway model do you have and how do you like it? I got my TC1100 a month or so ago and I am absolutely in love with it. [/hijack] ---
**Author:** ![Fredescu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/73ab20/32.png) [@Fredescu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fredescu)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2005, 6:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-apple-computer/326671/22 "2005-10-18T06:41:48Z")
> [@galt](#): > > It seems like the complaint here should be “Apple sucks for not allowing you to boot from USB.” I was suprised to learn this. A bit of Googling suggests that “Macs” can boot from USB, just not from OS X. OS 9 can boot from USB. ---
**Author:** ![Shalmanese](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shalmanese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shalmanese)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2005, 8:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-apple-computer/326671/23 "2005-10-18T08:21:51Z")
> [@MacTech](#): > > c’mon Apple, get with the program, keep the FW functionality, sell the FW dock cable as an accesory if you must (i have 2 FW Dock cables so i’m all set for now), but _DON’T_ remove a feature that’s been on the iPod since it’s creation, when you compare FW to USB 2.0 side-by-side, USB 2.0 has _NO_ advantages over FireWire, the _theoretical_ “higher speed” transfers of USB 2.0 are _PEAK_ transfer rates, assuming there are _no other devices connected_, wheras FW’s bandwidth rates are guaranteed no matter _how many_ devices are connected Excuse me? I didn’t know apple managed to change the laws of physics overnight. Are you telling me that firewire can support 63 simultaneous 400Mbit connections over a single bus? The reason why firewire is so great is also the reason why it wasn’t included. Firewire offloads a significant amount of processing of the CPU and onto dedicated controller chips. This is great for performance, but it means you need to cram a whole lot more electronics for a firewire interface than a USB one. I don’t have current figures but I believe that it used to cost over an order of magnitude more for a firewire controller compared with a USB2 one. Given that nearly all people with firewire will also have USB2 but many will not have the opposite, the economics of it simply don’t work out. ---
**Author:** ![Dynation](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de0a6/32.png) [@Dynation](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dynation)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2005, 9:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-apple-computer/326671/24 "2005-10-18T09:26:32Z")
First of all, the iPod photos, are NOT 5th gen ipods, they were iPod photos that merged with the 4th gen line. The video ipod is a 5th gen ipod. ---
**Author:** ![mks57](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b9bd4f/32.png) [@mks57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mks57)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2005, 9:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-apple-computer/326671/25 "2005-10-18T09:38:01Z")
> [@Shalmanese](#): > > Given that nearly all people with firewire will also have USB2 but many will not have the opposite, the economics of it simply don’t work out. There are a huge number of Macs out there, and many PCs, with USB 1.1 (12 Mbps) and Firewire (400 Mbps). ---
**Author:** ![galt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/35a633/32.png) [@galt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/galt)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2005, 10:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-apple-computer/326671/26 "2005-10-18T10:14:20Z")
> [@treis](#): > > [hijack] > Which Gateway model do you have and how do you like it? I got my TC1100 a month or so ago and I am absolutely in love with it. > [/hijack] I don’t actually know what my model number is, but I hate the thing. Luckily, I didn’t actually shell out my own money for it (it belongs to my employer). It’s not a “convertible” TabletPC that can act like a laptop **or** a tablet – it’s got no built-in keyboard. So it came with this ridiculous USB keyboard that you can plug into it with a 1-foot wire. Have you ever tried to balance a flat screen and a keyboard on your lap at the same time? It just doesn’t work. It’s impossible to get the screen angle right so you can actually read the thing, and you’re practically guaranteed to drop either the tablet or the keyboard or both. So that computer basically doesn’t get used for anything you can’t do easily with just a stylus. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2005, 10:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-apple-computer/326671/27 "2005-10-18T10:18:30Z")
> [@MacTech](#): > > 2.0 Drawbacks… > … > supplies only 5.0 volts to external devices, not enough power to power an external “pocketdrive” > … This bit is not actually true either; sure, the USB standard is not particularly geared towards delivering power, but there are any number of bus-powered external USB hard drives out there; I have two of them - Fujitsu HandyDrive and FreeCom FHD-Pro. Not sensing an overload of fact or rationality in this thread. ---
**Author:** ![treis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bc79bd/32.png) [@treis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/treis)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2005, 11:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-apple-computer/326671/28 "2005-10-18T11:36:24Z")
> [@galt](#): > > I don’t actually know what my model number is, but I hate the thing. Luckily, I didn’t actually shell out my own money for it (it belongs to my employer). It’s not a “convertible” TabletPC that can act like a laptop **or** a tablet – it’s got no built-in keyboard. So it came with this ridiculous USB keyboard that you can plug into it with a 1-foot wire. Have you ever tried to balance a flat screen and a keyboard on your lap at the same time? It just doesn’t work. It’s impossible to get the screen angle right so you can actually read the thing, and you’re practically guaranteed to drop either the tablet or the keyboard or both. So that computer basically doesn’t get used for anything you can’t do easily with just a stylus. I almost ended up getting one like that but I am very happy I went with the TC1100. It combines everything a slate has to offer with everything a convertable has to offer becuase I can detach the screen from the keyboard when I want to. ---
**Author:** ![Go\_You\_Big\_Red\_Fire\_Engine](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/eada6e/32.png) [@Go\_You\_Big\_Red\_Fire\_Engine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Go_You_Big_Red_Fire_Engine)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2005, 1:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-apple-computer/326671/29 "2005-10-18T13:16:20Z")
Since you are so fond of using caps, I will use them too to illustrate my obvious point: USB IS BOOTABLE. So why aren’t you bitching that Mac’s don’t boot off USB? PC’s can. ---
**Author:** ![MacTech](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c0e974/32.png) [@MacTech](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MacTech)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2005, 2:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-apple-computer/326671/30 "2005-10-18T14:09:45Z")
> [@Go You Big Red Fire Engine](#): > > Since you are so fond of using caps, I will use them too to illustrate my obvious point: USB IS BOOTABLE. > So why aren’t you bitching that Mac’s don’t boot off USB? PC’s can. okay then, bit of ignorance fought, i wasn’t aware that PC’s could boot off USB, so yes, then i will complain that Apple didn’t implement USB bootability, if USB _can_ be set as a bootable bus, it _should be_ i still like FireWire better, and multiple FireWire devices are quite common on Macs, especially on the older and/or consumer market machines with no internal expandability, like the iMacs and the laptops, my current record was having 4 FireWire external drives connected to my Mirror Door G4 tower, in addition to my iPod (total of 5 external devices), all with no drop in speed… and counting my two internal drives as well, at that point i had _six_ hard drives connected to the machine, why did i do it, well, because i had them laying around and it could be done, good enough reason for me 😉 (in other words “because they were there…”) ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2005, 2:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-apple-computer/326671/31 "2005-10-18T14:33:33Z")
Firewire probably _is_ better (I mean, even the inferior limit on the number of devices per bus isn’t really something that any ordinary mortal is going to run up against), but that’s no reason to actually _hate_ USB. ---
**Author:** ![slaphead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9bcb4/32.png) [@slaphead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slaphead)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2005, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-apple-computer/326671/32 "2005-10-18T14:44:12Z")
> [@mks57](#): > > No, it isn’t. USB 2.0 is a kludge designed by Intel to sell Intel CPUs, and to avoid licensing the technology for Firewire, an IEEE standard. Oh yes, and who created the wonderful technology which became IEEE 1394? Apple. Who charged an excessively high licence fee for IEEE 1394, ensuring that it never achieved widespread use and lost the standards war to the much more affordable USB? Apple. Who are the only major players to support Firewire? Apple (because they are paying themselves licencing fees) and Sony (for some unknown reason). Firewire is a niche technology because it is over-engineered for most uses, and because Apple got too greedy for licencing money. End result is that 100% of modern pcs have USB ports, whereas very few indeed have Firewire. “WAAAAAH! My MP3 player can’t be used to boot a computer via an interface the average consumer has never heard of. WAAAAH!” - pretty lame pitting. Are you planning to write to the folks who make the iRiver telling them that if they build a SCSI interface into the next version you’ll give them your custom in future? I’m sure they’ll be eager to accommodate you… ---
**Author:** ![Amazon\_Floozy\_Goddess](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/779978/32.png) [@Amazon\_Floozy\_Goddess](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amazon_Floozy_Goddess)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2005, 3:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-apple-computer/326671/33 "2005-10-18T15:19:16Z")
I’m also pissed that Apple keeps shitting out a new version of the iPod every few weeks. I got a 20G (firewire compatible) B&W screen iPod about 3 months ago, when it was still the new hotness. Now, two more incarnations later (the fullsize colour screen and the Nano), my model is considered old & busted. Screw that shit. I’m not going to trade it in for a Nano because you know something “new & improved” is going to come out a month from now anyway. Other than that, I’m really happy with my iPod. ---
**Author:** ![Shalmanese](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shalmanese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shalmanese)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2005, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-apple-computer/326671/34 "2005-10-18T16:02:20Z")
> [@mks57](#): > > There are a huge number of Macs out there, and many PCs, with USB 1.1 (12 Mbps) and Firewire (400 Mbps). Can you show me one PC motherboard that comes with onboard firewire but not USB2? I don’t recall ever seeing one. Even if they exist, a USB addon card can be had for less than $20 these days. Putting a $3 controller on every ipod just so a very few people can avoid spending $20 doesn’t make much economic sense. ---
**Author:** ![mks57](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b9bd4f/32.png) [@mks57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mks57)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2005, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-apple-computer/326671/35 "2005-10-18T16:21:06Z")
> [@Shalmanese](#): > > Can you show me one PC motherboard that comes with onboard firewire but not USB2? I don’t recall ever seeing one. I have several PCs with USB 1.1 (on the motherboard) and Firewire (PCI card). Why should I buy another I/O card for USB 2? ---
**Author:** ![slaphead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9bcb4/32.png) [@slaphead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slaphead)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2005, 4:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-apple-computer/326671/36 "2005-10-18T16:36:05Z")
> [@mks57](#): > > I have several PCs with USB 1.1 (on the motherboard) and Firewire (PCI card). Why should I buy another I/O card for USB 2? Because you were dumb enough to invest in the wrong type of I/O card. You picked the losing side in the standards war. :smack: Should have got a 5-port USB2 card with a couple of Firewire ports on it as well like me 😃 > [@Shalmanese](#): > > Putting a $3 controller on every ipod just so a very few people can avoid spending $20 doesn’t make much economic sense. But these very few people are hardcore Apple Kool-Aid drinkers and Steve Jobs OWES THEM!! But instead of delivering on his debts he is embracing the evil of PC HARDWARE! OMGWTFPDQBBQ!!!11!!One!!!1! :rolleyes: Anyhow, whatever. I’m still happy with my 3-gen iPod (apart from it being too small :mad: ) and my girlfriend will hopefully be happy with her Nano she is getting. And when I’ve finished pouring some more money into my gaming PC I might treat myself to a Mini to add to our collection of PCs. And along the line I can guarantee that I will be annoyed by Apple, Intel, IBM, Creative, Hitachi, Microsoft, EA Games and every other company involved. It’s what these companies DO - create and sell desireable hardware and software which still PISSES US OFF :mad: in ridiculous ways. I’ve just had to get used to it and I think **MacTech** will have to as well. If you want something that performs its designed function perfectly, never fails and doesn’t have stupid design flaws, buy a hammer. Anything to do with computers will always be shit in _some_ way, it’s the law of the universe. ---
**Author:** ![mks57](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b9bd4f/32.png) [@mks57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mks57)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2005, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-apple-computer/326671/37 "2005-10-18T16:45:02Z")
> [@Mangetout](#): > > Firewire probably _is_ better (I mean, even the inferior limit on the number of devices per bus isn’t really something that any ordinary mortal is going to run up against), but that’s no reason to actually _hate_ USB. USB is fine for what it was originally designed for, a replacement for low and medium speed I/O interfaces. USB 2 was designed to meet the strategic interests of Intel, not the interests of engineers or end users. It’s an example of how a square peg will fit in a round hole, if you have a big enough hammer. A design approach that Intel is very familiar with. ---
**Author:** ![Merneith](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/57b2e6/32.png) [@Merneith](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merneith)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2005, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-apple-computer/326671/38 "2005-10-18T18:21:27Z")
> [@treis](#): > > I almost ended up getting one like that but I am very happy I went with the TC1100. It combines everything a slate has to offer with everything a convertable has to offer becuase I can detach the screen from the keyboard when I want to. The Gateway Tablets are re-branded Motion Tablets. I bought one last year and used it for about 3 days before I sent it back and bought the tc1100. The screen on the tc1100 is superior to the Gateway and I like the flexibilty of the convertible. I’m crazy about tc1100 but it needs more USB ports. I wanted to add a usb hub connecting it to a usb mouse, usb hard drvie, usb printer & usb sound card & usb speakers. Ok that’s a crazy amount of usb things but I hate having to cary the hub around with me. The thing I really like about Firewire is the daisychaining. My laptop needs would be met much better if I could hook the speakers to the printer to the soundcard and so on without needing to hit a hub. ---
**Author:** ![Dog80](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/6bbea6/32.png) [@Dog80](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dog80)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2005, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-apple-computer/326671/39 "2005-10-18T19:06:43Z")
Hey, I want to access my i-pad though command line, which is impossible with those fancy USB and Firewire interfaces. They should include a [25 pin RS232 interface](http://www.ba-electronics.com/images/pp67d.jpg) on their next generation i-pad. ---
**Author:** ![treis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bc79bd/32.png) [@treis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/treis)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2005, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-apple-computer/326671/40 "2005-10-18T19:39:20Z")
> [@Nithotep](#): > > The Gateway Tablets are re-branded Motion Tablets. I bought one last year and used it for about 3 days before I sent it back and bought the tc1100. The screen on the tc1100 is superior to the Gateway and I like the flexibilty of the convertible. > > I’m crazy about tc1100 but it needs more USB ports. I wanted to add a usb hub connecting it to a usb mouse, usb hard drvie, usb printer & usb sound card & usb speakers. Ok that’s a crazy amount of usb things but I hate having to cary the hub around with me. I too am crazy about my TC1100 and sure it probably could use some more USB and/or firewire ports but where the heck are you gonna put them? The only really available real estate on the outside of the computer is on the top right in laptop mode and I am pretty sure thats where the wireless is. Why do you hate carrying around the usb hub? The one I have is like 1"x2" and compared with a printer, mouse and a hard drive its tiny. Also, why do you have an external sound card? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-apple-computer/326671.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-apple-computer/326671.md?page=3)