MaximumPC 2004 11

(Dariusz) #1

You write,


In/Out we respond

WHEN WILL YOU
JUMP TO WINDOWS
LONGHORN?
At the end of our October
cover story (“Everything
we know about Windows
Longhorn”), we asked for
your thoughts on Microsoft’s
next-gen Windows OS.
Here’s what you said:

Before I even got into
the article, I wanted to
e-mail ya’ll to say I will
gladly make the leap
to Longhorn in 2006.
I love the latest and
greatest of anything for
my PC and I can’t wait
for a new OS to try.
—BRAD

In the article, the edi-
tors gave their feedback
as to what they would
like to see in the next
version of Windows.
However, no one men-
tioned the complete
uninstallation of appli-
cations. I couldn’t pos-
sibly be the only one
who has this concern.
There are so many pro-
grams out there that
make a half-hearted
attempt at properly
uninstalling apps that

you would think this
would be number one
on everyone’s list. All
you should have to do
is drop an icon into the
Recycle Bin to com-
pletely remove the asso-
ciated program.
—FRANK SUMMARIA JR.

After I read your article,
I immediately changed
my XP desktop into a
Longhorn modification
thanks to your provided
links. From what you
said, I’m not too excited
about Longhorn. I love
my PC, but it took a
long time (by power user
standards) to upgrade
to XP. In fact, I bought
Win2K after XP was
released. I truly intend to
wait and see more of what
Longhorn has to offer.
The DRM technology
really has me running
the other way. While I’m
not a freeloading thief,
I’m not a digital rights
activist either. I hate
Microsoft, the RIAA, and
others treating everyone
as if we’re all thieves and
need to be monitored like
ex-cons.
—BOB COYNE

08 MA XIMUMPC NOVEMBER 2004


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UH, WHAT’S WRONG WITH
TWO GIRLS KISSING?
You just had to go and include
a review of a piece of trash—
Singles: Flirt Up Your Life —in
the October issue, and then
to make matters worse, you
included a screenshot of two
women kissing. This stunt just
goes to show me (and I’m sure
a lot of other subscribers) that
most, if not all, of the people
at Maximum PC are a bunch
of horny kids pretending to
be mature adults. I won’t go
as far as to ask you to stop my
subscription, but I won’t be
renewing either.
—CLINT GUILLORY

SHORTEST. QUESTION. EVER.
Just a simple question: What 24-
bit/96kHz reference material do
you listen to?
—MARTY

GORDON MAH UNG RESPONDS: AIX
Records (www.aixrecords.com) has
a nice sampling of high-resolution
audio formats. The sampler disc that
we use has DVD Audio on one side
and 24/96kHz on the flip side.

FUD FOR THOUGHT
I was thumbing through my
October issue and I saw the
letter from Jake Campbell about
the Centrino platform. First of
all, Jake needs to lay off the
espresso. As you guys replied,
it’s all semantics. But once I read
your reply, it made me stop and
think: not even Intel is immune
to its own FUD (fear, uncertainty
and doubt). AMD, ATI, nVidia—
they all use it too. What makes
this interesting is that Intel
is the first company I’ve ever
known to have shot themselves
in the foot with the FUD bullet.
I bet that stings. With this said,
even as an avid AMD fan, I
would be proud to own a laptop
with the Pentium-M processor.
It’s one hell of a CPU.
—BEN PEARMAN

EDITOR IN CHIEF GEORGE JONES
RESPONDS: You’re right about the
P4M being a hell of a CPU, Ben. By
way of further explanation, FUD
is a powerful and controversial
marketing concept that rarely gets
attention at the consumer level.
Wikipedia.org gives a great defini-
tion: FUD was first defined by Gene
Amdahl after he left IBM to found
his own company, Amdahl, as the
fear, uncertainty, and doubt that IBM
sales people instill in the minds of
potential customers who might be
considering Amdahl products.
The FUD entry goes on to say
that the premise was to persuade
buyers to go with “safe” IBM gear
rather than with competitors’ equip-
ment. This implicit coercion was
traditionally accomplished by prom-
ising that Good Things would hap-
pen to people who stuck with IBM,
and that Dark Shadows loomed over
the future of competitors’ equipment
or software.
You could (and did) argue that
Centrino embraces FUD tactics. Its
message—that only the combina-
tion of the Pentium-M CPU, the 855
chipset, and Intel’s own wireless
chipset (despite the fact that we’ve
heard OEM chipsets are no differ-
ent) will provide what you’re look-
ing for—would seem to fall into the
FUD category, given the implicit
threat than non-Intel wireless chip-
sets are less reliable. Fair or not,
I would argue that this has helped
Intel more than hurt it. While some
people have been confused by what
Centrino is, lots and lots of main-
stream consumers won’t settle for
anything else these days.

RECOVERING AMERICAN IDOL
CD: PRICELESS
I recently lost most of my
MP3 files and was trying to
“re-rip” them from CD. I
could only find one horribly
scratched copy of Kelly
Clarkson’s performances on
American Idol —which I recorded
manually from the show. I was
at a loss. But thanks to your
suggestion in the August issue,
Free download pdf