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Geez........Sony has a VAIO w/dvd burner for $1199.99!

post #1 of 23
11/16/01 at 7:57pm
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<a href="http://r4.us.rmi.yahoo.com/rmi/http://www.sonystyle.com/vaio/digitalstudio/hot_dvdrw.shtml/rmivars%3ftarget=_top" target="_blank">http://r4.us.rmi.yahoo.com/rmi/http://www.sonystyle.com/vaio/digitalstudio/hot_dvdrw.shtml/rmivars%3ftarget=_top</a>

That's pretty damn good if you ask me. Just a short while ago dvd burners were $900. Now they are in $1200 PCs......
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post #2 of 23
11/16/01 at 8:31pm
gotta be honest. that is a pretty damn nice computer for that price.

Sony has been impressing me lately with their desktop systems.
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post #3 of 23
11/16/01 at 8:49pm
<a href="http://www.sonystyle.com/vaio/storage/dru_110ac1.shtml" target="_blank">http://www.sonystyle.com/vaio/storage/dru_110ac1.shtml</a>

My poor credit card.
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post #4 of 23
11/16/01 at 9:03pm
Damn... I wish Apple had a G4 with a Superdrive for that price. Maybe possible in three or four years.
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post #5 of 23
11/16/01 at 9:09pm
How does this Sony drive compare to the Pioneer drive Apple is using? It's certainly nice to see these advanced optical drives fall so rapidly in prices.
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post #6 of 23
11/16/01 at 9:38pm
Anybody notice how Sony uses DVD-RW drives in its VAIOs but it sells the DVD+RW standalone? Sony should eat its own dog food and put DVD+RW drives in its machines.

Personally, as Sony isn't even using its own technolody in its VAIOs, I think it would be a dumb idea to buy a DVD+RW drive.
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post #7 of 23
11/16/01 at 10:05pm
Sony's are cool. Too bad you have to run Windows on it.
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post #8 of 23
11/17/01 at 7:39am
GD!

You could buy a display equivalent in price to the cinema display with this comp and still come in under the loaded G4's price WITHOUT a monitor. WTF?
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To save time, assume I know everything.
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post #9 of 23
11/17/01 at 11:44am
[quote]Originally posted by SDW2001:
<strong>GD!

You could buy a display equivalent in price to the cinema display with this comp and still come in under the loaded G4's price WITHOUT a monitor. WTF?</strong><hr></blockquote>

That's one of the big reasons Apple only has the marketshare it does.
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post #10 of 23
11/17/01 at 12:15pm
Kinda a weird pickle to be in. I love the Mac OS (especially X...it's gotten me excited and "into it" all over again), but you routinely see Wintel machines with better specs and doo-dads like the one above FOR SUCH A BETTER PRICE!!!

Dream scenario?

Mac OS X on some of these nicer, well-designed and feature-laden PC boxes if Apple is going to continue to be behind the curve in certain areas.

That whole "missed the boat on CD-R" thing should've tipped us off quite loudly that Apple, cool as they can be, don't always have both hands on the wheel and have LOTS of room for improvement/act-getting-together.
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post #11 of 23
11/17/01 at 12:28pm
This is one area Apple should really be winning. Because they do offer, as Phil Schiller mentions every five minutes, the complete package of hardware and software, Apple should be trying to get these cool technologies into the hands of users at the earliest possible opportunity.

It was great that they got DVD-R in before anyone else (Well, they managed to ship just before Compaq, who announced the day before Apple), but they're not running with the ball and making it available to as many users as possible.
Chicanery.
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Chicanery.
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post #12 of 23
11/17/01 at 12:47pm
But you still have to run Windows on the Sony
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The crucial memorandum will be snared in the out-basket by
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post #13 of 23
11/17/01 at 1:03pm
[quote]Originally posted by Sinewave:
<strong>But you still have to run Windows on the Sony </strong><hr></blockquote>

That's the only reason why it sucks. Otherwise it seems like the perfect computer.
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post #14 of 23
11/17/01 at 2:05pm
Doesn't the encoding of DVDs on PC's take an extraordingary amount of time? Anyone have any comparisons of G4 vs PC encoding times? I was under that impression that the altivec enhancement in idvd and dvd studio pro were the reasons that dvd burning was viable. Someone correct me if I'm wrong...
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for sale. or rent
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post #15 of 23
11/17/01 at 6:25pm
[quote]Originally posted by torifile:
<strong>Doesn't the encoding of DVDs on PC's take an extraordingary amount of time? Anyone have any comparisons of G4 vs PC encoding times? I was under that impression that the altivec enhancement in idvd and dvd studio pro were the reasons that dvd burning was viable. Someone correct me if I'm wrong...</strong><hr></blockquote>

what Apple apple didn't tell you at first was that they used the lowest compression possible. hence the 1 hour max on iDVD and the fast encoding time


current PCs probably do it about as fast, maybe a bit slower but it really depends on the software
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post #16 of 23
11/20/01 at 7:13pm
What is funny is on the "Where will Apple be in a year?" thread I was getting my butt chomped for suggesting that Apple is losing marketshare and market opportunities to PC's like these. For the price of this machine you can't even buy a Mac that will burn DVD's. You can't even get a G4. You have to settle for a 15in iMac without even the possibility of a combo drive.

I want Apple to sell tons of machines but as is obvious in this and other threads, you can be a Mac fan without drinking the kool-aid. Apple needs to stop ripping us off and offer some competitive desktops. NOW!!

Nick

"During times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act." -George Orwell

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"During times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act." -George Orwell

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post #17 of 23
11/22/01 at 7:48am
Apple has, is, and always will be a premium brand. You have to expect their stuff to cost more. I have several friends with VAIOs and they curse them daily. It's a nice specsheet, but what about reliablity? That P4 1.5ghz is NOT as fast as it sounds, I'd compare it to a 733 G4, if even that, most likely a 667 G4.

That also isn't a superdrive, either, it's just a straight out DVD burner from what I can see. DVDs only, and then it has a CDROM b/c that drive can't even read CDs.

The video card is also a piece of crap--I have one in the machine I'm on right now--it's great if you're looking for something that is as cheap as it gets, but come on? Would a GeForee2MX have killed Sony?

It's a nice computer, I'll give it that, but you have to run Windows on it, you get less expansion than on a G4, and the hell you're probably going to experience with those drivers and burning DVDs on a PC will make the Mac worth the extra cash.

I saw a guy on TechTV try to burn a DVD on a PC last night. I was nearly in tears I was laughing so hard. It was pathetic. This isn't a machine that normal people will be able to figure out.
David Egger
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First Year Student DePauw University
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David Egger
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First Year Student DePauw University
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post #18 of 23
11/22/01 at 12:08pm
You have to remember that while it's still old technology for a video card, I bet the TNT2 32MB can perform quite a bit better than the 16MB Rage 128 Ultra we get in the iMacs in that price range.
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*Registered March 1, 1999*
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post #19 of 23
11/22/01 at 12:59pm
[quote]Originally posted by MacAddict:
<strong>You have to remember that while it's still old technology for a video card, I bet the TNT2 32MB can perform quite a bit better than the 16MB Rage 128 Ultra we get in the iMacs in that price range.</strong><hr></blockquote>

Exactly, that's one of the reasons why I think overall the Sony is a pretty good deal.
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post #20 of 23
11/22/01 at 5:01pm
Actually, no, I would not bet on the Riva TNT2 having better performance than a Rage 128 Ultra.

I'd put the TNT 2 in the same league as the Voodoo 3.
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post #21 of 23
11/22/01 at 5:19pm
riva = sucks

rage = not bad, on the way out

by springtime, gf2mx will be what the rage 128 varieties were/are...

gf2mx 32mb in iMac... radeons probably still in the portables, but 16 on iBook, 32 on PB
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post #22 of 23
11/22/01 at 7:48pm
Sony computers suck. Trust me, I work on computers 6 days a week. While Sony's other products kick ass, their computers are expensive and simply not reliable over the long term.
-TheRoadWarrior
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-TheRoadWarrior
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post #23 of 23
11/22/01 at 9:06pm
[quote]Originally posted by TheRoadWarrior:
<strong>Sony computers suck. Trust me, I work on computers 6 days a week. While Sony's other products kick ass, their computers are expensive and simply not reliable over the long term.</strong><hr></blockquote>

They are better than companies like Dell and Gateway right?
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