Knuckledragger

I am by no means a network geek, and I have had no trouble getting my MacBook to talk to any Wintel that comes into the house. When my old PC died, I successfully backed up 850GB of files vial ethernet from the semi-functional WinXP box to my Mac to an external LaCie drive. The value of a Mac Pro is not just its power, but its expandability and lifespan. It's easy to get 5+ years of service out of a Mac Pro, even if you run demanding tasks on it every day. Obviously, a Mac Pro isn't going to be a help when you're mobile. See if you can run the apps you want on your MacBook, and replace it with an MBP when you need/can afford to.

KR Audio : Kronzilla DM : tubeAudioPRODUCTS.com Available for the "introductory price" of $20K. Also:

I generally avoid posting political stuff here, but this cartoon elicited a genuine chuckle from me.

Well, shit. Looks like I just bought myself a pair of these: In the age of LED blinkenlights, I'm much less of a fan of Chauvet than American DJ. That said, these things are really cool and ADJ doesn't make anything equivalent. I put what I thought was a seriously lowball bit on a pair of these (20% below list) on an eBay Buy It Now/Best Offer auction and ended up winning the damn things. Good thing I have a slew of lighting gigs coming up. I just managed to pay myself back for the last round of lights I bought. I'm really going to have to sell off some of my less-used headphones, Real Soon Now.

At least once a day I have to talk myself out of buying VPI's 5D.

It used to be the case that Apple's panels were the best binned that Samsung had to offer. I do not know if that is still true.

I should point out that there's a reason some people pay a premium for Apple displays, and it's not so the little logos match. For video and still frame editors, proper gamma and color accuracy are essential. Even with the user of a monitor sucker fish, it can be difficult or impossible to get many LCD panels to behave properly. Of course what srs bsns pros (and amateurs with srsly deep pockets) use isn't AAPL, it's Eizo.

I have two different sized monitors, and they're vertically stacked: (Old pic is old. I really need to take a new one.) That said, they're much smaller than what Dusty is using. Sometime Real Soon Now I'm buying a Mac desktop, and will then be tasked with buying a new monitor. I do like the two-smaller-monitors paradigm vs. one big one. I find the Apple 30" difficult to use. It's so damn big I have to sit farther away than normal, which means jacking up the font sizes. I also lose track of the pointer sometimes.

^^ Congratulations. If you don't, I suggest you avail yourself of a battery pack for your camera*, the 85L's AF (and in fact, MF) motor sucks juice like there's no tomorrow as it moves around 2 1/2 lbs of glass. *That is, unless you have a 1 series body, which I suspect is not the case.

What is going on with Apple's line of displays? Currently the entire selection is the lone 27" LED-lit panel. That's a very nice monitor (technically superior to the now-discontinued 30" in many ways) but it's $1000 and bigger than many people want. I can't imagine they sell too many 27"s with Minis. Apple often has a late-January launch for new products (or at least they did when Macworld was still around.) I hope they have some new monitors pretty damn soon. Says the guy who's in the market for a new %$ display.)

The App Store App is very nice, but the one-click purchasing is a bit disconcerting. I'd hate to accidentally click on purchase button (which is right next to the "share link" button) while and look at Aperture and be out $80 just like that. I spent most of the holidays binging on the Steam sale, so the pay-for-download model is now well familiar to me. I do wish Apple used a cart/final purchase paradigm. Not everything needs to be a one click operation. It's a bloody good thing AAPL isn't a military contractor. Click here to launch warheads!