Windows - and bugs - everywhere

[david4121]

Windows - and bugs - everywhere

 

PC users have come to take hardware and software problems in stride, and the problems will only grow in number as PCs find new homes in homes and automobiles. Windows 95 is the best example of a buggy computer product, and Internet Explorer 4.0 is the buggiest product of 1997, followed closely by Netscape Communicator. We put up with shoddy computer products when we would never accept such a low level of quality in other products we buy.

 

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Rather than computers becoming more like our reliable phones and televisions, our phones, televisions, automobiles and other consumer devices will become more like our unreliable computers. Once PCs find their way into automobiles our already-high insurance rates will skyrocket as drivers distracted by e-mail carom off each other at 65 mph. Do you think someday we will stop being suckered into buying computers that do not work as advertised and that we do not need in the first place? Nah.

 

 

A Collective Howl went up from most people I know who bought a PC or software

 

this past holiday season. One person reported that to get his kids' games

 

running on his Gateway PC, he had to reinstall Windows 95, and to do that, he

 

had to reformat the hard disk. Another poor fool spent two precious vacation

 

days getting a new SCSI-based scanner up and running. Myself? I drummed my

 

fingers impatiently as I installed solitaire and baseball games on a couple of

 

family members' machines, awed once more at the complexity and time an

 

installation takes even when nothing catastrophic goes wrong.

 

PC hardware and software problems are so common that we've come to accept them

 

as normal. Windows 95 is the single biggest culprit. Internet Explorer 4.0

 

gets the nod as Buggiest Product of the Year, with Netscape Communicator

 

running a close second. Last year's batch of major office application suites

 

was crawling with bugs. Even the latest version (3.0) of Norton Utilities,

 

which is supposed to prevent and fix problems, trashed Zip disks.

 

Short of refusing to buy buggy products and loudly registering complaints, we

 

often have little choice but to put up with shoddiness in PC products. Who in

 

their right mind would tolerate these sorts of problems with cars, TVs, or

 

telephones? Yet that may be exactly what's in store for us as hardware and

 

software companies look for new markets.

 

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"Get Smart" Revisited

 

It has already started. Companies are now selling little gizmos that attach to

 

your phone, not to your PC, and switch calls from the phone network to the

 

Internet to save you money. Sounds straightforward, right? It took our testers

 

6 to 12 tries before they made successful cross-country connections (see Top

 

of the News). When they finally did connect, the voice quality was appalling.

 

What's worse, they could call only each other because these devices don't work

 

with regular phones. This is progress?

 

And there's more to come. In early January Tele-Communications Inc. signed

 

deals with both Microsoft and Sun Microsystems for software that will run on

 

millions of digital set-top boxes for interactive TV. Expected to be available

 

early next year (we PC users know what that really means), these boxes will

 

run Windows CE and PersonalJava. They'll deliver more channels than you could

 

ever watch, high-speed Internet access, Web content for TV shows, interactive

 

advertising, programming guides, and other new services. Sounds great, right?

 

Probably, if you like futzing with your TV more than watching it. And you

 

think your cable company is unresponsive and overcharges you now? Just wait

 

until you try reaching tech support because your Windows CE box crashed in the

 

middle of Monday Night Football.

 

Comedy of Errors

 

It gets worse. In early January both Microsoft and Intel unveiled grand plans

 

to put PCs in our cars. Microsoft's AutoPC, a small, voice-activated computer

 

running Windows CE, will attach to a dashboard and talk back to you. This

 

scaled-down PC will give you directions, let you access e-mail, play the radio

 

and music CDs (what? no Mortal Kombat as you battle traffic?), and store

 

addresses and phone numbers, but it won't let you browse the Web. Clarion, a

 

car audio manufacturer, says it will ship its version of the AutoPC by June

 

for about $1300.

 

 

Not to be outdone, Intel announced its Connected Car PC. The dashboard unit of

 

this PC will talk to you too, issuing directions, traffic reports, news, and

 

stock quotes and giving you voice access to e-mail. A second unit will let

 

passengers browse the Web, play games, watch videos, and dash off memos.

 

Slated to be out next year, Connected Car PCs will cost between $1000 and

 

$2500, depending on options.

 

Combine vehicles moving at 65 miles an hour with drivers sending and receiving

 

e-mail, and we're talking about a whole new scale of crashing. No thanks--not

 

until PC problems are the exception rather than the rule.

 

Cathryn Baskin is editor in chief of PC World.

 

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[garthman]

Hello and welcome to the forum. Sorry, but I don't understand your question. Please could you be more specific - perhaps a description or photograph?

[Freeman Keller]

Welcome David, we are here to help.

[Grant Harding]

I recommend you buy a new one and get a salesperson to help you out.

[daddymack]

David, your post kind of makes no sense...so could we define some normal terms for you? [because "non-acoustic" doesn't mean much around here]

We look at guitars in very specific ways.

Acoustic, which could have either nylon or steel strings. It can have a round, oval or 'D' shaped sound hole, or f-holes, or with some newer builders, holes where you would not expect holes to be. It should have 6 strings, but could have 12, or 4...

Acoustic/Electric, which is similar to an acoustic in all ways, but will have some form of electronic pickup so it can be plugged into an amp or console.

Electric, which can be solid body, semi-hollow, or hollow body, typically having pickups, knobs, switches, and is designed to be plugged into an amplifier or console. It should have 6 strings, but could have 12, or 4...or 7, or 8...

 

So which type is it you are planning to purchase?

 

Next. one should never buy an instrument if one knows absolutely nothing about the instrument. That really goes for pretty much anything, but guitars especially for our discussion here. Also, music store salespeople are not always the best arbiters of truth when it comes to making a sale...I'm jus'sayin'...

 

Some direct questions you should answer in order for us to assist you:

When you say "buying an old one", do you mean used, antique, decrepit?

When you say "is it real?", are you asking if it exists, or if it is a cheap copy...?

Do you know the name of the manufacturer?

Do you know the model name/number?

Do you have a picture of it?

Are you buying from a private party, online, in a music store, out of the back of a van belonging to someone who may not have bathed in recent history?

 

[Idunno]

I think the whole of the acoustic thing has been meddled with by ignorance over the gestation period of forums to date, and remains that way.

 

Believe it or not, many are of the opinion that a classical is a nylon string guitar and a steel string guitar is an acoustic. I read this frequently. Evidently, because the forum think-tanks in their respective front offices decided to make separate Classical and Acoustic guitar forums, as if Classicals are not acoustic guitars, people have been brainwashed to believe this is the case. People, otherwise commanding a respectable grasp on intellect, come to the various forums with this distinction in discussion. It's a facepalm moment but that kind of forum entertainment is why I return.

 

Anyway, we have an inquiry about what an acoustic guitar is and I doubt he or she lacks understanding of what an electric guitar is.

[daddymack]

hmmm, well a classical is a nylon string [and of course was once a 'gut' string] guitar, but it is an acoustic guitar, no matter how one slices it, and of course there are acoustic electric classicals as well, hence I did not make any specific distinction under the a/e section...the old school jargon was that a steel string acoustic guitar was a 'folk' guitar...thus establishing an easily accepted differentiation.

[DeepEnd]

I'm not sure I understand your question but I'm going to assume you know an electric guitar when you see one. If you're asking whether an acoustic guitar can be plugged into an amplifier look for a jack like one of these:

 

[ATTACH=JSON]{"data-align":"none","data-size":"full","title":"51qEnysXG5L.jpg","data-attachmentid":32339036}[/ATTACH]

 

[ATTACH=JSON]{"data-align":"none","data-size":"full","title":"endpin_jack.jpg","data-attachmentid":32339037}[/ATTACH]

 

If there's no jack the guitar can't be plugged into an amplifier and it's strictly an "acoustic guitar."

[Delmont]

Radio silence. I doubt we'll ever hear from David again.

[Delmont]

Please anybody help me because i am buying an old one and want to know is it real ?

Yes. It's real.

 

[daddymack]

actually, not necessarily...I have soundhole p-ups [DeArmond and Bill Lawrence] with their own cable and plug that go out through the end pin...I'm jus'sayin'...it ain't always black and white...

[DeepEnd]

Presumably the OP knows a pickup when he sees one. Even if he doesn't, if the guitar has a cable hanging out he should be able to figure out what it's for. This is a case where he's not sure, which indicates there's no recognizable pickup and no visible cable. A guitar that's made to be plugged in may not have a recognizable pickup but it will have a built in jack, a guitar that isn't won't.