August 2, 2007 by Jen Stolzer.

SIGGRAPHIANS!

I have done some research and there is a Bus service from the airport to our Comfort Inn (at Sea World and the Zoo). It is called Cloud Nine and it is $7.50 one way 11.50 round trip per person. Considering taxi services and the cost of gas in California, I personally think this is a pretty good deal. I think we should all go for it.

Jen

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August 2, 2007 by joeljohnson66.

Autodesk — User Group Monday 6:30-8:45
After Party 9:00-1:00 OVER 21 ONLY

Adobe-Maxon After Party Tuesday 6:30-XXX NOT AGE LIMITED Registration is closed I am going to try to get an invite at the booth

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August 2, 2007 by joeljohnson66.

A couple of things to be aware of:
–Remove all the parts from a Mac and a similar PC and you would find that they are using almost completely identical parts
–The biggest difference between the current generation Macs and PCs is the operating system OSX (Mac) vs XP/Vista
–Always try to get an educational price, it should reduce the base hardware costs by about 5% and software costs by 50%
–Never add-on to base price Macs. Mac is reasonably priced for their base machines and they make a killing on the upgrades. Be brave adding memory, hard drives and DVD drives is very very simple and will save you a ton of $$$
–Mac users are fanatics, they are largely blind to the pros and cons because of this
–Parallel processing is the future of computers. Core-Duo processors (2 processors on 1 chip) are the norm and quad-processors (4 processors on 1 chip) are quickly moving into the market
–Always try to purchase the most processor you can, it it the brains of the system and it is the most expensive and difficult to upgrade part 3-4 years later. If you can afford it move into a quad-core system
–Never purchase the very best parts if you can help it. The best parts come with a huge premium for bragging rights and will lose that cost within 90 days of purchase
–You can get by on almost any non-budget computer, spending more gets everything done faster runs more advanced software much more smoothly and will allow you to have a viable machine (able to run the software you need) longer
–Computer prices fluctuate dramatically, purchasing during the back-to-school time or X-mas will typically save you 10-20%
–Fair market value for anything new and really fantastic will plummet, less exotic machines and parts will drop in fair-market value slower but they will also drop precipitously
–If you have nothing a used PC can be a great way to get by on a budget, last years $1500 PC is on Ebay for $500, Last seasons $5000 machine is on sale through outlets for $3000
–A cheap mac is not typically a good idea unless you are willing to pay a huge premium for style you get a lot more for your money in a PC if you can’t afford a Mac Pro
–Laptops are inherently weaker, more expensive, and less upgradable than their desktop counterparts–but if you need portability they may be your only choice–just remember some high-end applications such as Maya, AfterEffects, Premier, FinalCut are significantly easier to run on a desktop because of their demands on the system
–Do your homework–there are hundreds of Web sites and magazines and enthusiasts out there–get yourself educated before you spend that much money

Mac (Pros)

–No viruses–none
–Well built–no one but Mac makes Macs and so there tends to be less confusion about specifically what you get and they are usually quite thoughtful in their design
–High-end Macs are workstations (good for 3D, CAD, high-end video) in all but name and are priced similarly
–Designers like them a lot
–Good support
–You don’t give Bill Gates any $$$ and you encourage competition

Mac (cons)
–$$$$ you will pay a premium for every component in a Mac–I this quantify this at roughly 10-20%
–Despite the claims to the contrary Macs are significantly less compatible with hardware, software and Web pages. Running Windows as well as OSX on them helps only marginally and is a costly solution
–Parts and upgrades can be expensive and fewer people are qualified to give advice
–They crash just like PCs
–Apple upgrades tend to be revolutionary big change can lead to big headaches OS 9 to OS X was a major headache and required all software to be upgraded to make the move. Apples recent revolution to Intel-based processors is similar. They will tell you that it is seamless, but this is hardly the case.
–iMacs are intentionally difficult for users to repair and upgrade

PC (pros)
–Less expensive
–Many distributers creates a great deal of choice in price and features that doesn’t really exist on the Mac platform
–Stuff will run on them–no one ignores the 85% majority when making hardware or software
–Support can be very good and many people know how to repair them, parts and upgrades are cheap and common
–With paid virus scanner, spyware blocker and Windows auto-update running viruses and spyware are uncommon. It is peoples ignorance of security (and nefarious personal practices) that gets them into trouble. Once these things are set up they can be largely ignored as they will automatically run
–PCs tend to upgrade through an evolutionary process and you will find almost anything that you were running under Windows 98 will run in the current environment.

PC (cons)
–Many options includes many poor ones as well as good options
–If you are not dilligent about security and updates or if you engage in risky online behaviors (piracy, porn, nigerian schemes) you will be crippled by your viruses and spyware
–You are giving money to Bill and without Apple there would be less innovation
–There are a lot of stupid people selling PCs through retail outlets — this can make buying retail very confusing

Cost Breakdown (prices as of 8/1/2007)

Apple’s Mac Pro has a base price of $2500 without a monitor and with Apple Care ($200). For this you get a workstation-class system with 2 — Dual-Core 2.66 GHz processors (retail $720/per), 1GB RAM (retail $60), 250GB Hard Drive (retail $65), GeForce 7300 Video Card (retail $70), 16X double-layer DVD Burner “Super Drive” (retail $30). Beyond this you have a motherboard capable of using a Xeon processor (apr. $450), a Power Supply capable of supplying a power-hungry machine (apr. $100), a quality case (apr. $150), keyboard mouse (apr. $75) Total Apr. $2440

That should give you a good breakdown of what you are paying for in the base Mac Pro system. As you can see the base model is reasonably priced for the components you get, but you are paying a steep price for rather exotic and very powerful processors. Also note that to add 1GB RAM (from base to 2GB) you pay an extra $270 instead of the $60 it would cost to add yourself. Apple charges $296 for an additional 500GB hard drive that you could purchase for $120. Lastly Apple’s 20″ monitor at $550 is very nice but for that I could purchase TWO to THREE high quality 20″ monitors at $175-250.

For comparison I priced out a Dell Precision 490 (Workstation Class Dell) with the same processor, same RAM, same Hard Drive, and DVD burner, but with a better video card (Dell doesn’t sell this workstation without a better video cards) for $2600. The difference here is in the video card which is worth at least the $100 variation. This PC is much more configurable (has more potential options) than the apple but…

Apples to Apples (Dell workstations) high-end machines have almost identical costs.

It is however easier to find a PC workstation that does not have a base price of $2500. You can reduce the processor speed from 2.66 to 2.33 on the dell and start with a base of $2300 because of the premium on the slightly faster 2.66 processor, or put a single quad-core 2.33 Xeon processor (still 4–2.33 GHz processors) at a base of $2250. This reduces your base costs by $250 and allows and additional processor to be added at a later date (when it is much cheaper) moving the system up to 8–2.33 GHz processors. The PC is significantly more flexible in pricing and upgrading.

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August 1, 2007 by joeljohnson66.

Hey all!!

We will be getting into San Diego about 12.  I would like to meet at the convention center about 2pm if everyone is in by then. They will have a message board somewhere for people to leave notes. If we don’t end up coming together (most of you probably will) we can meet at the message board when we get to the convention center. We are going to to dinner someplace within walking distance of the convention center after we register and anyone who wants to is welcome to come along. We will want to find some good places to eat near the convention center so we don’t have to eat overpriced and mediocre at the center (they will have food).

It will be about 5 our time by the time we all get together and registered.  There are almost 300 restaurants within 1 mile of the convention center and the Gaslight District is right next to us (as is the harbor).

 If you don’t get together with us on the first night make sure you get up in time for the earliest shuttle. The shuttles come very often, but if you hotel is the last on the route the prime times may fill up before they get to your stop. You won’t know of course until the first day, so to be safe catch a very early shuttle.

 See you all Saturday!!

Joel

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August 1, 2007 by sanjin2.

labs are closed this week, after 5 for maintenance….i think they’re putting new tables in 202, and every other room got new stations….so if theres still a meeting, is there a different place?  or are we just seeing each other saturday?

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