There is a study in contrasts between a consumer focused company (Apple), and a business focused company (Microsoft). While Apple does offer some business friendly features in iCloud (autobackup for iOS and Document sync for iWork), the data services are primarily personal in nature (e.g. Photo Stream), mobile device focused (iOS), and free. Only the iTunes Match feature is going to cost money - and it is going to be killer for many people. All your music (no matter where you got it!) synced to 10 devices (iOS, PC and Mac) from the cloud for $25 per year.
Apple's services are easy to understand, and there is just one fee-based service. In contrast, Microsoft fails to communicate that their mail service is still free; instead focusing entirely on business, and uses complex product offerings that are anything but simple. ZDnet's Mary Jo Foley produced a guide of the plans and price points for Office 365, Microsoft's hosted server application bundle that is launching shortly.
Then there is Google that is trying to do the consumer and the business and the social thing, and getting none of it as right as the competition. Google Apps and Gmail (and as much as I like Gmail) can't hold a corporate candle to Office 365. And Google's still beta music locker is no where near as compelling as iTunes Match. And Google Buzz and Google Wave were a social bust. I feel bad for Google as they can't seem to figure out how to compete with Apple's consumer services, with Microsoft's business services or with Facebook when it comes to social. Seems like they are the big loser here . . . and the odd man out.
The latest installment of Windows Weekly is up, and it is worth a watch for its Windows 8 commentary. After one of the commercial breaks, Leo showed a site that tracks the upcoming, new and (more significantly!) the soon to depart shows or movies that are available for streaming on Netflix. The site is FeedFlicks, and it looks really handy. No more excuses for missing that cable tv series that I meant to catch when it hit Netflix!
Explorations in Space and Time is available from HDtracks and includes both binaural (for headphone users!) as well as "soundfield" (conventional stereo) versions of the album's main tracks (bonus tracks are binaural only).
While classified as Jazz, this all percussion album should appeal to a much broader audience. A "must buy" for headphone enthusiasts.
Fair warning: the album is encoded in FLAC at 176kHz/24bit - so a converter will be necessary for iTunes or Windows Media Player users (Google for FLAC AAC MP3).
I picked this album up earlier this year, and have been enjoying it with headphones and speakers. Those of you that follow my blog know that I like HDtracks; and ,seeing as Head-Fi is enthusiastic about the album, I thought I would add what attention I can to this project from Chesky Records. Perhaps we can encourage the release of more binaural recordings.
In any event, there is a limited time 20% off promotional code on Head-Fi if you are interested!
Stop by the new gdgt home page for a video tour. As posted to my blog:
This is a super short post about the newly revised gdgt (pronounced, "gadget") - a site that features user submitted reviews of electronic gadgets. However, the redesign appears to be intended to foster more discussion and to make the site a better place to ask questions and respond in kind.
One point that may confuse old timers. You can no longer directly add gear to the site. Instead, you have to ask a question about it, and the moderators will add it to the site's database; or at least that is how they are handling new gear requests right now.
If you thought the old design was too cumbersome, come back and have a look at the streamlined interface. If you have never been to the site, now is a great time to join. Recommended.
You probably know about Microsoft's rolling deadline for stopping the sale of Windows XP. Unless you are an enterprise customer, you have probably noticed that, in North America, new PCs no longer ship with Windows XP, even as an option. So. What are the "end of" dates for the various versions of Windows?
Windows XP will receive security fixes until April 8, 2014. After that, you had better plan on migrating that old PC to linux or scrapping it. However, you are probably already noticing that some newer software is for Windows Vista or Windows 7 only; and this trend will only be getting worse as time passes.
Not that many care, but Windows Vista has already been pulled from the retail sales channel. It will no longer be an option for that new PC come October 22, 2011; and Microsoft will stop providing security fixes on April 11, 2017. While I am not aware of any applications that don't support Vista if they also support Windows 7, I suspect that hardware support may be a little trickier. Most peripherals will work with Vista if they also work with Windows 7, but you may be on your own if you run into trouble. An example is the now discontinued Dell XPS M1730 gaming notebook. While you can install Windows 7 on it, Dell will not lift a finger to help you. Keep that in mind before buying that next Dell or Alienware computer . . .
Microsoft has not released end of sale or end of support end dates for Windows 7; but, in general, we can get an idea from Microsoft's Support Lifecycle Policy FAQ:
Microsoft will offer Mainstream Support for either a minimum of 5 years from the date of a product’s general availability, or for 2 years after the successor product (N+1) is released, whichever is longer.
Microsoft will also provide Extended Support for the 5 years following Mainstream support or for 2 years after the second successor product (N+2) is released, whichever is longer.
The general availabity date for Windows 7 was October 22, 2009. So home users will no longer be able to get support from Microsoft for Windows 7 by either October 22, 2014 or two years after the release of Windows 8. Given that Windows 8 is due sometime next year, we can plan on end of technical support being no earlier than October 22, 2014 and probably no later than December 31, 2014. Security patches will flow at least through October 22, 2019. Since most of us will never ask Microsoft for support with Windows, I'm not sure that the end of technical support date means all that much, but the security patches are naturally of great importance.
It may not be flashy, but the information at Vincent Kar's The Well-Tempered Computer should be costing Google money due to lost searches. Start with Vincent's site, and you only need Google to verify the information that Vincent has already assembled for you. For example, I often hear complaints that USB can't handle high resolution (better than CD) audio due to bandwidth limitations. This is largely bunk, and Vincent concisely clears this up as well as providing useful information related to the topic:
Resolution
A lot of people think USB audio is limited to 16 bits / 48 kHz max.
A lot of (cheap and sometimes not so cheap) USB DACs are indeed limited to this resolution.This is because the manufacturer decided to use a simple and cheap of[f] the shelf hardware solution.
Another common misunderstanding is the specification of the bus (USB 1,2 or 3) and the USB audio standard (1 or 2).
USB Audio Class 1 standard (1998)
This standard allows for 24 bits / 96 kHz max. [that is potentially more than twice the resolution of CD audio]
The standard itself doesn't impose any limitation on sample rate.
Class 1 is tied to USB 1 Full Speed = 12 MHzEvery millisecond a package is send.
Maximum package size is 1024 bytes.2 channel * 24 bit * 96000 Hz sample rate= 4608000 bits/s or 576 Byte/ms
This fits in the 1024 byte limit.
Any higher sample rate e.g. 172 kHz needs 1056 bytes so in excess of the maximum package size.All operating systems (Win, OSX, and Linux) support USB Audio Class 1 natively.
This means you don’t need to install drivers, it is plug&play.
All support 2 channel audio with 24 bit words and 96 kHz sample rateUSB Audio Class 2 standard (2009)
It is downwards compatible with class 1.
USB Audio Class 2 additionally supports 24 and 32 bit and all common sample rates.
Class 2 uses High Speed (480 MHz). This requires USB 2 or 3.
As the data rate of High Speed is 40 X Full speed, recording a 60 channel using 24 bits at 96 kHz (132 Mbit/s) is not a problem.Drivers
From mid-2010 on USB audio class 2 drivers are available in OSX 10.6.4 and Linux.
Both support sample rates up to 384 kHz.
It is unclear if Microsoft is going to support USB Audio 2.
You need a third party USB class 2 driver on Windows.
Vincent also does a more than adequate job of covering USB digital-to-analog converters (USB DACs). However, between the above quoted text and this last link, he stops just short of saying what should now be obvious: there is nothing special about USB DACs. There are only a few manufacturers of audio DACs; and, since the vast majority of these chips are sold for use in stereo and AV receivers and pre-amps, it should surprise no one that the same chips are used in USB DACs. In order for the USB DAC to do its thing, the music player on your PC or Mac is converting audio files (MP3, AAC, FLAC, etc.) into the exact same digital audio data streams that come out of the digital connectors on the backs of CD, DVD or Blu-ray players.
In case we need to be reminded why OBL had to be taken down. Jeff Jarvis is a journalist and professor of journalism at the State University of New York. He is an eye witness to the events at the WTC . . .
Here is the text of the story he wrote on 9/1/1, and here is his audio recollection of the day.
You can follow Jeff on Twitter @jeffjarvis
As you can see below, more pedestrian entries come out just fine.
A useful article, High-Res Music Download Sites, by Currawong of Head-Fi.org.
High-Res is typically defined two or more times the "resolution" of CD audio. Much of the material is stereo only, but some is either from a purposeful surround recording (somewhat rare) or remastered and remixed for surround (often not so great in my opinion). At least some of the stores sell DRM free.