22july2013

crowley said:

22july2013 said:

Will the underlying Android OS on Sony Smart TVs be able to inform Sony's HQ on the Internet what users are watching inside the Apple TV app? I really don't know.

Of course it will be able to, just like iOS is able to inform Apple HQ what users are watching in Netflix.  Whether it actually will is a different question.

That's a good response. I guess the difference is I trust Apple a fair bit. I haven't established any trust in Sony yet.

I see Apple is moving up, from doing business with a country that gets 2.26 (out of 10) on the democracy index (China) to a country that gets 3.06 (Viet Nam). I would much rather see Apple do its business in a higher scoring country, perhaps India (6.90) or Brazil (6.86.) I guess Apple's core values don't include freedom or democracy or human rights. Well, at least they aren't doing business with North Korea (1.08), or Saudi Arabia (1.93). I guess Apple wouldn't do business with Saudi Arabia because Apple has strong LGBTQ values.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy_Index <--

By the way, on environmental indexes, Viet Nam is near the bottom. Although India is even closer to the bottom.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_Performance_Index <--

If you liked season one, make sure you go back and watch the last episode now, because you may have missed the post-credit scene which gives a big hint/teaser for season two. I missed it myself and caught it only accidentally after the second watching. I won't spoil it here.

The upcoming season will probably be a little more "Flash Gordon" and less "The Right Stuff."

If I was writing this show, I would add an Easter Egg for Foundation. Technically these two shows are in the same "universe" and it's possible to add something that could be spotted in both shows, since a small part of Foundation Series happens on Earth's Moon. Uh-oh, I hope I didn't spoil anything.

Upon reflection, I think it's obvious to me that the writers of "For All Mankind" need to make the show "compatible" with "Foundation" which could result in some plot lines in this series that lead to the plot lines in Foundation. Season 2 appears to begin in 1983. However in the Foundation Universe, one of the first characters to appear on earth occurs in the 1990s, so we may not see signs of Foundation until Season 3. In the 2004 Will Smith movie, "I Robot," there was a character named Lawrence Robertson who is part of the general Foundation universe. But Apple doesn't own that movie so it's likely to be unreferenced. But I'm predicting that we will see a character named Lawrence Robertson either in Season 2 or Season 3, if the writers have half a brain.

I just installed WoW on my new 16GB Mac Mini M1, and tested a range of FPS rates. I took my test character into a crowded city with about 100 characters to display. At the lowest quality settings and resolution the FPS was capped at 60.0 FPS for the default resolution 1680x1050. When you raise either the quality settings or the resolution, the FPS rate drops. So for example, if you raise the quality to maximum and the resolution to 3360x2100 (which looks to me to be a little under 4K) then the FPS drops to 22. But if you keep either the resolution at a modest size or the quality settings at moderate values while keeping the other value at max, then you get numbers around 40 FPS. I recommend that you tinker with raising and lower the quality and resolution until you find a value that suits you best. If you value high FPS then start with the highest settings and then lower the quality or resolution settings, either one at a time or all at once. In my case, I prefer image quality so I think I'm going to go buy a higher quality monitor than my 20 year old 1080P monitor whose screen is fairly poor.

Some people insist that only 60 FPS is good enough for them. You can get close to that in a variety of settings on M1 Macs, but it won't be using all the highest quality settings. If you want the best of everything, then an M1 Mac isn't your best choice. Maybe the M2 next year will be more to your liking, but maybe not. It's possible that Apple will sell M2 Macs with discrete graphics next year, or maybe Apple will simply catch up to discrete performance with their GPUs instead. My wild guess is that M2 iMac Pro and M2 Mac Pro will support discrete graphics in 2021 or in early 2022.

djfriar said:

Damnit Damnit Damnit. I have been waiting for these M1 computers since the transition was announced, money set aside and everything, but as I also invested in dual LG Thunderbolt 4K displays (which are bomb I may add), there is no way I'm buying another non-matching display just to use the Mac mini.

Seriously, seriously disappointed. Apple absolutely dropped the ball here; there is literally no excuse to not support dual 4K over TB3. It was already frustrating that they dropped form 4 TB3 ports to 2 (I have zero use for USB-A now having already fully converted over due to the 13" MBP).

Seriously Apple, WTF!?!?

The fact that you're "accustomed to two monitors" and the fact that you opened with those three words forced me to think of the closing song from my favourite movie:



On a technical point, it was for this very movie they invented the wireless mic, for Rex Harrison.