[ale] Using OS X as a thin client

John Wells jb at sourceillustrated.com
Mon Jul 30 12:55:34 EDT 2007


----- "Jerald Sheets" <questy at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Jul 28, 2007, at 2:07 PM, John Wells wrote:
> > I made the serious, grave mistake of paying $1300 for a miserably  
> > crappy eMac about 2 years ago. We've had problems with it since we 
> > bought it...in particular monitor whine which lasted for the first 
> > year or so (and which Apple refused to acknowledge as a problem).
> >
> As the undisputed king of starting up rabble-rousing on this list, I 
> just can't let this statement go without more information.
> Specs?
> Processor, ram, disk space?

1.2 Ghz Processor, 512 MB ram, 80 GB harddrive

> Trying to run significant applications on shoestring specs?

Nope, unless you consider iPhoto significant. And, btw, F-Spot and Digikam blow it away so far on the same hardware under Ubuntu.

> > It's my wife's computer, and I was suckered into buying it with the 
> > promise of it being a great media computer. hah! iPhoto is by far  
> > the slowest imaging program I have ever used. It was "ok" when we  
> > were taking 3.2 megapixels shots but still noticeably slow. Now  
> > we're taking 5 mp shots and it's absolutely unusable.
> >
> 
> My experience is absolutely converse to yours.  It was suggested that 
> as a career UNIX admin and a semi=professional musician that I might 
> like a mac because of it's UNIX underpinnings and it's penchant for  
> doing multimedia right.  I do both 3.2 and 5 Megapixel pics and  
> digital video, handle them all in iPhoto, and it's just butter.   
> iPhoto is still amazingly fast and responsive, regardless of the  
> source material.

Perhaps you're on the later version of iPhoto...we were stuck in 10.3.9 and refused to upgrade. I've heard it's better in later versions. 

But, I can assure you it's not just butter on our machine. And my wife, who really wanted to love the Apple, can confirm this and her frustration.

> > I should've known better. Apple is crap as a computer  
> > company...they make decent music devices, but that's it. And  
> > they've pulled the wool over a whole crowd of otherwise intelligent 
> > people and made them think OS X and Apple machinery is "it". I beg 
> > to differ.

> So let me get this straight...  A company is crap because you either 
> don't have the coin for the right specs or because you haven't  
> figured out how to get the system to do what you want it to do?
> As a 17 year UNIX admin, I find my Macbook Pro (formerly my Powerbook 
> G4) both to have been by far and away the absolute *BEST* computers I 
> have ever owned.  They are the fastest, easiest to work with, easiest 
> to upgrade,cheapest commercial OS, best and most stable framework,  
> nicest development tools, wonderful Open Source community surrounding 
> the platform, the "it just works" mantra is still true today.  THe  
> BSD Ports collection has been ported, I use XWindows and my favorite 
> X apps, and can do absolutely everything I need to AS WELL AS run my 
> commercial music applications for notation, recording, and drill
> design.

Yes, IMO. The hardware *in the eMac* is cheap and just CRAP. No offense to you...that's why we're allowed to have opinions. And coin? Well, for the $1300 I dropped on this machine, I could've built my own powerhouse or bought one very easily. Overpriced crap.

Course, I haven't had my coffee today, so forgive the lack of kind and gentle.

> I do it all on my laptop, and it's the first platform I've ever been 
> able to do this with as a professional Sysadmin.

I've been doing Linux on a laptop for years now at both home and work, and I do it all *except* the music stuff. Perhaps this is where OS X has the advantage, although I'd be surprised given a lot of the Linux music apps I've seen recently.
 
> In contrast to Sysadmin work,  as a musician, it outperforms every  
> iteration of Windows I tried for recording, hands down.  It runs Pro 
> Tools like butter.  It runs my parts extraction in Finale with no  
> trouble.  It uses limited resources and is snappy as can be on my  
> drill design software and I can run all three at once!  On Windows, I  
> can only run one at a time, as it begins to bog down and eventually  
> requires a reboot.

Ok...can't argue with you there.

> I was so confident in it's abilities in both usability and technology 
> that when my mother started looking for a new machine, I pointed her 
> to a powerbook.  I used to receive weekly to twice weekly calls from 
> her regarding her system beforehand, but now she never calls for  
> problems.  Her mac just plain works, it works the way she wants it  
> to, and it's as fast as can be for her.  I didn't train her on  
> anything... not once.  That sixty year-old lady is rocking the house 
> on a Mac with no help. 
> My kids use the mac ALL the time.  They do homework, make movies, run 
> iPhoto, and just plain beat the thing to death with no issues.

Very glad to hear your experience has been a good one.

> Instead of an emotional response to issues you are currently  
> experiencing, how about joining the local MUG, coming to a meeting,  
> or getting with some experts to work through issues you are having.  

Sorry...no. I've had it. I'm done. Keep in mind, I've been working through these issues for a few YEARS now. And I've conferred with experts. I work and am friends with two of the deepest Mac guys I know, and neither were able to do anything for iPhoto on the machine. Nor were they able to do anything when Safari started segfaulting, except to say time for an upgrade. 

And emotional response. Well, given the history with this machine, I am emotional about it, and deservedly so. 

We bought the machine...monitor whine at 3.5 months. Ice pick piercing into your brain monitor whine.

Call Apple..and...oh, wait, I didn't buy the three year support. Even though the eMac is still very new, Apple won't talk to me. I have to go the their authorized support center (a la CompUSA) to get support.

Package up eMac...go to CompUSA...get there, and they run their diagnostic CD on the machine. Guess what? Diagnostic CD says everything is perfect. "What about that loud, ear piercing whine we're hearing currently?" says me? "Sorry sir, Apple will not accept repairs if the diagnostic cd passes...no questions asked. We can do nothing to help you. You should have bought the Complete Care plan, so that you could call them" says the tech.

Research in online support forums and community forums. Find out that I'm one of MANY with the same problem with the eMac and that Apple refuses to acknowlege a problem. Cry.

Go home, live with the whine for another 9 months by switching between 800x600 and 1024x768, because it'll change the whine's pitch and at least keep it interesting. My wife learns to hate the eMac and begins to take her frustration out on me.

Month 12...I have less that 10 days to buy the Complete Choice care plan or be stuck forever. Cough up $160 for the plan.

A week later...while waiting for my plan documentation, whine goes away. Begin to suspect sinister Apple support revenue plot.

> It seems to work for you on Linux, eh?

Except flash on PPC and the broadcom driver, then yes...so far everything has just worked.

> Just "FYI":
> The kids' machine isn't as nice as your eMac.  It's an old 867MHz  
> Power Mac G4 with 4G ram and a ton of space.  The Powerbook is  
> repurposed for my oldest son, 2G ram, 1.67GHz.
> My Macbook is the Core 2 Duo, 2G Ram, 120G HDD.
> All factory, all as a result of observing just how darned good they  
> are to work with, how fast they run my apps, and how strong/firm a  
> UNIX underpinning they have.  I pop open a shell and start working in 
> perl right away...what could be better?
> I got this while on the road with my Drum Corps, so I couldn't get to 
> you before the reload.  I'll bet we could've saved you a lot of pain 
> by just answering your questions, making suggestions, and I even have 
> some hardware I could've given you to help out your experience.

Very kind offer of you...seriously. Sorry I'm so negative about it, but I don't hold you responsible for Apple's shortcomings and appreciate your willingness to help very much.

> We may be a linux community here, but there's no reason why you can't 
> ask these questions and get help before freaking out.  You may have  
> had a ton of help from the list you didn't expect, or didn't know  
> existed if you'd have just asked.

See:

http://www.ale.org/archive/ale/ale-2005-03/msg00346.html
http://www.ale.org/archive/ale/ale-2004-10/msg00097.html
http://www.google.com/search?q=eMac+%22John+Wells%22+site:ale.org&hl=en&start=20&sa=N

Bottom line, and it's just preference, but I do believe Apples to be overpriced. In particular, I think the eMac is, hardware wise, on par with the $300 Dells. You pay for aesthetics, I suppose.

Now, regarding OS X...well, I never had a problem with the underlying OS, only the sluggishness of the apps on that run on top of it. 

For my buck, I would prefer to spend $500 on a decent machine with a nice flat panel, and install Ubuntu. There's no vendor lock-in, the hardware is likely to reliable, and if not, expendable, and the choice you get on Ubuntu (and linux in general) just completely blows the total Apple package away. This is my opinion, nothing more.

Thanks for your offer for help...but I'll only go back to Apple if I'm forced.

John



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