I've been using a Surface Book for my digital sketching since the device launched, back in 2015/2016, and it's served me well. For a first-generation device, it's a great machine. Were it not for its waning battery life and increasingly slow feel, I'd probably keep using it.
So I've been eyeing an upgrade for a while now, following the release of the Surface Book 2 and then the Surface Book 3, but noting several issues with each iteration of the hardware: pen input jitter, battery volatility, specs that aren't even close to cutting edge, etc. It's been disappointing watching the Book line be relegated to the back of the pack.
I'd hoped this year we'd see a refresh that made an upgrade worth it - even at a premium cost - but I don't see any updates on the horizon, especially with the global chip shortage looking like it'll continue on into next year.
Where does that put me? Well, if you remember some of my really old blog posts, I'm eating crow. I'm trying out an iPad Pro as a replacement.
It's Microsoft's loss, honestly. I've been an evangelist for the Surface Book since I've owned one, and I still like the device. But it just doesn't make sense for me to wait another 6-12 months for a half-step upgrade. Especially when it might still have the same issues people are facing now. Especially with the less accurate pen input. Especially when it will likely cost more.
I might come back to the Surface Book in the future, but for now, I'm going with an iPad Pro for digital drawing. Let's see where that takes me.
Recently, a few of my friends have made comments to me about how I "hate Apple". I just wanted to take a moment here and clear the air on the subject.
I do not, in fact, hate Apple.
Am I critical of some of the stupid things they do? Sure. But I am that way for many things, including things that I really enjoy using / being a part of.
I do, however, hate Apple's throng of fanboys; that loud, angry minority of Apple users who will argue how great their new iDevice is while they're lugging it through the mall to their local Apple Store to get it repaired. But instead of going on and on about why I hate Apple zealots, here's a good real-world example (the first comment on this article from 9to5mac.com):
I'll stay with my two-year-old opinion. iOS and Mac OS X will never merge, but they will continue to complement in feature set (Mac to iPhone to iPad to Mac, and so on) and connectivity (iCloud, etc.). One day, iOS and Mac OS X will get canceled after Apple creates a new OS that reinvents computing. When they find a way that's got the precision and speed of the mouse and keyboard and the ease-of-use and mobility of the touch screen, they'll implement that input method into the new OS. I give it 5 years (up to 10) - otherwise, another company (I'm not betting for Microsoft - they never did anything extremely innovative, IMO) may become the new Apple.
I've bolded the worst part. The whole comment is bad, but the ignorance, arrogance, and stupidity that went into drafting that single bolded sentence is mind-blowing to me. It's like reading the words of a religious zealot. Totally ridiculous.
So long story short, I don't hate Apple; I hate its pretentious, die-hard fans. And just to keep things fun, here's a short list of other fanboys I can't stand, in no particular order:
PlayStation/Sony fanboys
Dallas Cowboys fanboys
Halo fanboys
Anyway, that felt good to get off my chest. Feel free to leave me a love letter in the comments about it.
The other day at work, I wanted to move around some of the items we have sitting on a table at the back of the room I work in. This included a monitor, a small printer, and a large flatbed scanner. The monitor and the printer were easy to move, but the scanner had run out of USB cord length, so I couldn't move it any farther away from the computer it was attached to. Thinking I had remembered seeing a USB extension cord floating around the office somewhere, I got out our box of random computer parts and started digging through it in hopes of finding something useful.
After only a minute or two, I came up victorious: one of our Macs had come with a USB extension cord for the keyboard that was about two feet long; perfect for moving the scanner. I put the box of junk away and dove under the table to add the extension cord to the mix of wires coming out of the back of the computer.
The male end of the extension plugged into the back of the computer alright, but then when I tried to attach the female end to the scanner's USB cable, I found that they wouldn't connect to each other.
I checked to make sure the connectors were the same size; they were. I flipped one end of the cable around, thinking I might have just made the mistake of trying to plug them in upside-down, but this didn't work either. Slightly frustrated, I pulled the cable out of the computer and brought it back into the light where I could examine it more closely.
And that's when I saw it. The female end of this otherwise normal USB cord had a small raised notch right down the center of one end.
This slight change to the connector does not exist for any functional reason – it was placed there solely to prevent the end user from using the cable for anything other than what Apple had intended it for. I unplugged the keyboard from my computer and checked the male end of its USB connector, and sure enough, there was the matching groove for the extension cord's notch.
What utter horse shit.
Forget, if you will, that Macs typically cost hundreds (if not thousands) of dollars more than their PC counterparts. Forget that none of my games will run in Mac OS. Forget that Macs have a somewhat limited library of software compared to Windows. Forget the throngs of imbeciles known as Mac fanboys. And, if possible, try to forget all those annoying and factually deficient Jason Long commercials.
This is why I will never get a Mac.
You'd think that a company who charges such a ridiculous premium for their computers would have the common courtesy to at least include a USB extension that follows industry standards and works with other devices, but no. After all is said and done, Apple sticks to its guns, follows the same path it always has, and makes a no-stop trip straight into proprietary hell. At this point, I'm honestly surprised that they haven't started releasing their keyboard/mouse with custom triangular USB plugs, to prevent people from using them on non-Apple computers.
This is the kind of bogus practice that will eventually hurt Apple's reputation with consumers, and they deserve every bit of criticism for it.
As you probably heard, Apple recently announced a new version of iTunes, iTunes 8. The new version adds a feature called "Genius," which is sort of a Pandora's Box/Last.fm rip-off that recommends more iTunes purchases based on your past iTunes purchases. The new update also serves to further bloat the iTunes + QuickTime package, to the tune of about 4mb, though I'll admit I don't quite remember how big prior iTunes + QuickTime downloads have been. 75mb seems excessive for a music player and a media format I care nothing about, though.
Oh, and don't forget about the pre-checked Safari in the "New Software" box. Nice try (again) Apple.
But wait, there's more! After my install, Apple Software Update re-checked for updates, and now it wants to add further garbage to my computer:
MobileMe Control Panel? What?
I don't own an iPhone or an iPod Touch. Why would I want (or need) a MobileMe control panel on my computer?
This is even further baffling because after the last iTunes update, I had MobileMe Control Panel installed in my Windows Control Panel, and I had not been informed or let alone, agreed to, any sort of MobileMe software installation. Now it has been covertly removed from my computer, and then added to the Apple Software Update utility.
Maybe other people share my feelings and don't like Apple sneaking their software onto my computer? Is Apple trying to assimilate my computer by adding small bits of it's software here and there, until one day I turn on my computer and I find I'm running Mac OS?
Either way, Apple is quickly overstaying its welcome on my computer, and I don't appreciate it. The next time I find random Apple software floating running in and out of my computer all willy-nilly, I'm uninstalling iTunes and using WinAmp.
Oh, and when I closed Apple Software Update, I we met with this gem:
I've mentioned this in a few other places around the internet, but up until tonight, I've gone mostly unaffected by it. I made every attempt to avoid it, and it was all in vain. Tonight, I was attacked by the Trojan browser, and I am angry about it.
It all started with a simple software update I've been putting off. About a week ago, iTunes complained about updating - but since I don't use it all that often, and I don't have or want an iPhone, I had no reason to update. I also hate it when Quicktime installs with iTunes, and I have to go into the settings and disable the tray icon. So, I ignored the update, and the reminder didn't come back up for me until this afternoon.
I was in the middle of some gameage when it popped up, so I continued to play, ALT+TAB-ing back to Windows when I needed to. iTunes loaded, and told me I needed an upgrade. I clicked Okay, signalling my willingness to download said upgrade, and got back to my game. A second later, the Apple Software Update utility pops up, does a quick check, and informs me that it needs to be upgraded before my iTunes upgrade can go through. I probably should have just stopped here.
Instead of stopping though, I allowed the program to update, and after it got done, it told me I needed to restart my computer. I usually ignore these messages, because half the time they are complete lies, and continued on to check for updates to the software on my computer with it. It returned with two items on the software update list, Safari and iTunes/Quicktime. Oddly, both were defaulted to being checked for update. The problem? I don't have Safari installed on my computer, and I don't want it installed on my computer. But there it was, bold as brass, and ready to try to install itself on my computer.
I unchecked the box next to Safari and went ahead with the upgrade. 10 minutes later the package had finished downloading and began installing, and I was taken out of my game again for a warning from the Apple Software Update utility: the upgrade experienced some errors and could not continue. It needed to be performed again. I set it to do the upgrade dance again, got back to my game. A few minutes later, the same warning sound played, and I jumped back into windows. Sure enough, the same error message had appeared above the Apple Software Update utility. I took a brief moment to look at the program window more thoroughly; there didn't seem to be any way to find out more about what was causing this error. Typical Apple.
I told the update program to try again, went back to my game again, and got the same error again. Frustrated, I closed the Apple Software Update utility, re-opened it, and tried again. I made sure to uncheck the Safari install again. The program went about on its fourth attempt at downloading the update, and I got back to my gaming.
10 muntes later, some frantic hard drive activity cued to me that the upgrade had actually worked this time, and I ALT+TAB-ed back to Windows just to make sure. Everything appeared fine, iTunes was updating. Back to gaming for me.
An hour later I stopped playing games and finally closed out to inspect my newly upgraded iTunes installation, and clean up the usual mess that an Apple software upgrade makes on my machine. Imagine my surprise when I not only found three unwelcome icons on my desktop, but when one of them was a shiny little compass icon...
The Safari icon.
I know I unchecked it. I did it every time I attempted to install the iTunes upgrade. And yet there it was, laying right there on my desktop, taunting me in all its smug insolence.
I popped open the Control Panel and as quickly as possible, uninstalled that piece of crap.
Seriously - this is bullshit. A software updater should not sneak in an unwanted browser masquerading as a software upgrade. You should not have to "opt-out" of the Safari browser by unchecking the box for it. If the only Apple software I have installed on my computer is iTunes and Quicktime, then those are the only programs that should even have the possibility of appearing in the Apple Software Updater's list.
This is a sneaky, deceitful practice on Apple's behalf. It's a cheap way to try to shore up market share for an unnecessary piece of software, and it insults my intelligence that Apple would assume that I am too stupid to look over a list of software before installing it on my computer.
I've sung praise for Apple before, most notably for their excellent handling of a bad PR move involving South Park and iTunes, but this makes me regret that. It's pathetic to me that Apple acts so smug about how great their products are, all while trying to sneak some of them onto your computer through a Trojan Horse of their very own design. If your stuff is so great, you shouldn't need to silently drop it into a software update and hope nobody notices.
Driving to work today, I only passed by one Cingular store, but I could see a small throng of people standing outside of it, waiting for it to open. Listening to the radio, I heard that the frenzy had reached a higher pitch in the bay area, where some people have been waiting outside of Apple stores since Wednesday, and lines have extended to span almost a block of city streets.
What earth-shattering, ground-breaking, head-exploding new product are all these sad souls waking up early for?
The iPhone 3G, of course. A slight upgrade to the iPhone.
As a somewhat frequent visitor of Digg during the work week, I'm actually quite sick of hearing about it, if you want to know the truth. Almost every other story submitted has been about the iPhone 3G, and each one seems to try to make something as mundane into something interesting more so than the last, and not coincidentally, insult my intelligence more.
Want to watch someone activate their iPhone?
Or navigate an application store?
Or take it out of the bloody box, and handle it?
All covered, courtesy of fanboys, Engadget, and the piece of trash that is Gizmodo. And it makes me sick. How pathetic has our society become that we waste minutes and hours of our lives standing in line for an upgraded telephone?
It's gotten to the point where I feel like I'm about the only man in his mid 20's in California who doesn't shit himself every time someone mentions the iPhone - a sad reality. I even had the displeasure of listening to KGO interview a guy who was first in line at one of the Apple stores in San Francisco, who admitted he already had an iPhone, but wanted a second version phone as well.
Yes, in this time of economic downturn, people are buying a second version of the same phone they already own because it has a few more features than the last. At the time of this writing, Apple's stock is down 1.9% - on a big product launch day, no less - and people are still casting away their barely-year-old old iPhones so they can browse the internet on it slightly faster. And people wonder why our economy is tanking.
This foolishness must stop. Currently, I'm using an LG Chocolate 2, and I really like it - it's easily the best phone I've ever owned. It does everything I need it to do, and it looks cool. But I am not going to rush out and buy the LG Chocolate 3 when they release it, especially not if my current phone is working fine. In fact, the next time I buy a phone will likely be when this one stops working. And I'm not going to participate in the ridiculous douchebaggery that permeates the iPhone crowd, and take videos of myself opening the box, using the phone, or buying applications. I'm a tech guy, and even I find this crap completely neurotic, obsessive, and just plain disgusting.
