Yet another Apple downgrade.
I bought QuickTime Pro, for the first time ever, for version 6.0. Thirty bucks, and I enjoyed some of the extra features. Evidently, I have accidentally upgraded to version 7.0 using Software Update, and now my QuickTime Pro features are all gone. They want me to pay to upgrade again. THIS IS NOT AN UPGRADE. This is a ripoff. It is inexcusable that there was not a clear message that I would be losing features by selecting their "upgrade."
The same thing happens to iTunes all the time. Some clever programmer makes an add-on with a new feature, and then Apple makes sure the new "upgrade" to iTunes disallows that feature. It's not an upgrade when my program loses functionality as a result. At the very least, there should be a clear message from the manufacturer that says, "If you do this, you won't be able to do that anymore."
Amazingly, all the sites like download.com also direct you to version 7.0, whether you want it or not. It's not only a ripoff, it's a conspiracy too. I remember when you only had to pay for system software when the big number changed. System 6.0 cost some money, but not 6.1. Now they want me to buy 10.4. Which I haven't done, and I won't until I have to.
UPDATE (irony there): I did find an official Apple "downgrader," that uninstalls 7.0 and reinstalls 6.5.2. (I guess I'm not the only user with this problem.) Then I had to go to the Apple Store to get my Pro key, but now it's installed and fixed. I still think they should have told me up front.
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9 comments:
Why would they do that when a lot of people will just frown, shrug, and then pay the money?
It's the same reason that spam works even though every reasonable person most of us knows would never buy anything from spam.
Enough people are lazy and uninformed (I initially typed "uniformed", which isn't at all what I meant...I'm sure many uniformed people are hale, hearty, and on the ball, intelligence-wise) to make the system worthwhile.
The iTunes upgrades really make my blood boil. It currently won't let Tom burn any of his legally purchased iTunes songs to a CD, which is one of the fair uses you should have when you pay roughly the same amount per song on iTunes as you would if you bought the real physical CD from a store.
I guess people other than WoW hunters get nerfed.
My fault really, for not being a diligent consumer. Always read the fine print. It was awfully fine, though.
I've never bought a song from the iTunes Music Store. The DRM they use was never a good idea, and it just keeps getting worse. What do you think will happen with the next upgrade? Will they: (a) Relent and let everyone own the music they buy, or (b) make it even harder for you to use your purchase?
DRM punishes the innocent and has no effect on the guilty. Much like the TSA.
Speaking of downgrades, by the way, Apple is moving from the IBM/Motorola chipsets to Intel chips. They also admitted to having a version of OS X already ready for x86 architecture. All versions of Microsoft Office X to this point will be compatible with the new OS. No guarantees on anything else.
Heck, if it'll let me play games in OS X, I'll buy OS X for my PC in a heartbeat.
You're confusing hardware architecture and operating systems. x86 is a decent architecture and stuff that's optimized for SSE2 and other extensions is great. I wouldn't count on your games working; now you're getting into APIs like DirectX being implemented into the x86 version of OS/X.
And yeah, Chuck, I've been hosed on plenty of software. Sometimes it's irreversible too without starting from scratch. DRM is a poorly executed idea. Anyone have the T2 Extreme Edition DVD? There's a hi-def version for PCs on disc 2; like 1920x1080 encoded in Windows Media Format. Running it requires it to go out to the Internet and get the license file. You have to install the software on the disc, you also need to PATCH it, you have to be identified (by IP) as coming from U.S. or Canada. After an hour of Googling and hassle, I got it to work. Yuck.
And WMV-HDs are about the only HD available right now.
Bishop
Right, but the inhibition of Virtual PC as a gaming enabler on Macs is due to the fact that the emulator has to emulate architecture as well as operating system. Were OS X to become a viable x86 OS, it would not be (as) difficult for them to introduce an emulator that will be suitable for gaming.
Virtual PC, even with a high end G5 processor, can't even come close to running the games coming out now, but I have heard reports from several sources that Wine runs WoW with very little lag (Wine being the Windows emulator for Linux.)
Porting Wine to OS X wouldn't be that difficult, I imagine. Might even be possible to run it now, with some effort.
Or you could just buy a PC and avoid all of this nonsense.
*ducks*
Ooh yeah, I'd avoid all this nonsense and get SOME OTHER NEW NONSENSE!
New nonsense like not lagging every time you go to Ironforge? :P
Anyway, Apple's good people, but they've got an outdated outlook. Rather than trying to lure people who don't own computers at all, a dwindling and almost non-existent market (most people now who don't own computers don't want one), they need to focus on luring people away from PC's.
Apple's being reactive instead of proactive. They're just now getting around to correcting the advantages that PC's have over them, and still have not defined a reason for anyone outside of their niche market to buy a new Mac instead of a new PC when they decide to upgrade.
Spend 3-5 grand on a machine that can do the same thing as a 1200 dollar machine out of a Dell catalog can do? That's a hard pill to swallow. Spend 2 grand instead, and get a machine that can do something PC's can't, as well as everything PC's can? Now you're talking.
What that "thing" is, I don't know. I can think of some ideas, some things Bill Gates has already thought of. The concept of a single multimedia center is very appealing to me, but it's only being very slowly integrated, through peripherals. What needs to happen next is a machine which literally does everything.
Imagine, if you will, a machine which has a coaxial input as well as digital receiver for cable, perhaps compatible with multiple satellite networks as well. That machine has the capacity to record, a la Tivo as well. It also has several additional AV inputs in order to accomodate other peripherals, such as XBoxes and such.
Give it a solid sound setup, the capacity to run surround sound, a DVD-ROM and CD-R, and a good Plasma HD monitor/TV to go along with it, and boom, you have one hub for everything. Is it expensive? Yeah, but it could also work, I think, if people would start looking at computers as more than something you put under a desk.
That sounds an awful lot like the setup I have here...:) And it's not terribly expensive; I built this computer for $1400 two years ago (including a monitor). A TV capture card for TV/recording, a sound card that passes digital output off to a receiver, a 50" DLP TV for a monitor, and some filtering software to use the video card to upscale/sharpen/denoise/etc. multimedia playback.
With a remote control solution and a better PVR package, it'd be nearly seamless intergreation and more TiVo-like functionality.
The kicker is, most of the stuff can be had for free. I paid $30 for a TV capture card and $25 for the sound card...it's already a reality, Microsoft is just striving to make it a bundled standard solution.
Can't do consoles yet; there isn't a capture card out there that doesn't introduce some kind of delay through deinterlacing, filtering, going across the bus, and back out the video card. Makes games with any kind of timing impossible to play.
Bishop
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