Comment On Your Computer Fails

Wow, even the Vista logo needs more RAM...

Anon:

Wow, even the Vista logo needs more RAM...

Of course it does, it's XML-based

Error!
(No problems detected)

The RealWTF is that up until recently, Yahoo Launch only DID work in Internet Explorer (evidently it's been fixed finally, as I just tried with Firefox and it worked).

That Vista label thing may not actually be an error. It wouldn't surprise me at all if MS had a minimum RAM requirement for an OEM to be allowed to put an official Vista logo on the computer. That 1 DIMM option (that doesn't say anything about the actual amount of RAM) may have been too small.

I think I'm not vista compatible either

Can we stop it with the integer overflows? Yes, it's absolutely hilarious when someone is told to install 16PB worth of storage to play WoW, but it's an integer overflow...get over yourselves.

In other news, the "This computer does not support this operating system" message is quite amusing. Where did you get that gem from?

[...and finally, could you please use PNGs or something? the JPG artifacts are so ugly -_-]

Oh my gosh... Microsoft can't produce a shitty tiny little piece of sticker without fucking it up? Not that I'd wanna have a Vista sticker littering MY computer. Altought it'd serve well as a warning label. Kinda like the biohazard symbol...

Whow, i did not know that World of Warcraft needed
EXACTLY 0x1000000 GB = 1 PentaByte (= 1.125.899.906.842.624 bytes) of harddisk space.

Bluemoon

I mean Petabyte instead of pentabyte.

Bluemoon

Bluemoon:

I mean Petabyte instead of pentabyte.

Bluemoon

Actually, you mean Pebibyte:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pebibyte

Evo:

Bluemoon:

I mean Petabyte instead of pentabyte.

Bluemoon

Actually, you mean Pebibyte:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pebibyte

Please die a slow and horrible death.

"This computer does not support this operating system"
I reckon someone is trying to run a VM?

Or it could be a mythical computer that could run the operation system it couldn't run, and it would subsequently display a dialog that wouldn't display.

Bluemoon:

I mean Petabyte instead of pentabyte.

Bluemoon

The English version: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petabyte

samic:

"This computer does not support this operating system"
I reckon someone is trying to run a VM?

Or it could be a mythical computer that could run the operation system it couldn't run, and it would subsequently display a dialog that wouldn't display.

Or they're running Windows XP x64 Edition. I've gotten similar errors before. Even tho I'm sure most 32 bit apps can run on the 32 bit virtualization built in the OS, some apps will only install on standard XP. I'm thinking it something to do with how they check the OS version.

Evo:

Bluemoon:

I mean Petabyte instead of pentabyte.

Bluemoon

Actually, you mean Pebibyte:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pebibyte

DIAF!

Evo:

Bluemoon:

I mean Petabyte instead of pentabyte.

Bluemoon

Actually, you mean Pebibyte:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pebibyte

Nope, he means Petabyte. The cat food prefixes turn out to be some way off universal adoption.

The main problem with them is - and this is important from a technical perspective - that they are ugly as sin. The original terms were at least derived from the Greek, and are unique in all but one letter, the final 'a'; these ghastly replacements in favour of making their utterer appear to stammer in their only conceivable application. If they were intended to be aurally distinctive, they fail at that too.

And they're completely unnecessary too, from any technical perspective. Let's face it - they will only ever be used to describe multiples of bytes. And were it not for the greed of hard disk marketing teams, only they would ever have been used, at least in this day and age where all computers use binary natively. There is simply no confusion; when memory is addressed in a binary form, where the size of a memory map is always a power of two, where decimal computers (and even their holdover, BCD maths) long ago withered on history's vine... SI units make no sense. Whether they make sense elsewhere is also open to interpretation, at least amongst the English-speaking world - otherwise we'd all have been quaffing 500 milliletre glasses of beer and measuring petrol consumption in kilometres per litre way before laws started telling us to - but base-10 oriented units are singularly useless when measuring base-2 aligned storage quantities. So useless that the prefixes are less ambiguous when recycled.

The only thing in the way of that plan is the avarice of an industry which realises that when you're making 144Gb drives, being able to call them 160Gb drives sounds a heck of a lot better. I guess being able to force an entire industry to do things your way would make you jump for joy. Worth blowing the little horn for, I'd say.

Jam:

it's an integer overflow...get over yourselves.

Oh c'mon. It's errored. It's funny. Ha ha. If you don't like overflows, just scroooooool on past.

I would write more here, and end with what the CAPTCHA says, but it says I have only 16.777.216 more characters before it fills. I don't know if I can fit this explanation in the space prov

Nomen Nescio:

Jam:

it's an integer overflow...get over yourselves.

Oh c'mon. It's errored. It's funny. Ha ha. If you don't like overflows, just scroooooool on past.

I would write more here, and end with what the CAPTCHA says, but it says I have only 16.777.216 more characters before it fills. I don't know if I can fit this explanation in the space prov

Classic! Don't you love limiting inputs when you have no idea when you actually reach the max length. Why just the other day I ha&*(#%#%&*(LOST CARRIER)

gwenhwyfaer:

Evo:

Bluemoon:

I mean Petabyte instead of pentabyte.

Bluemoon

Actually, you mean Pebibyte:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pebibyte

Nope, he means Petabyte. The cat food prefixes turn out to be some way off universal adoption.

The main problem with them is - and this is important from a technical perspective - that they are ugly as sin. The original terms were at least derived from the Greek, and are unique in all but one letter, the final 'a'; these ghastly replacements in favour of making their utterer appear to stammer in their only conceivable application. If they were intended to be aurally distinctive, they fail at that too.

And they're completely unnecessary too, from any technical perspective. Let's face it - they will only ever be used to describe multiples of bytes. And <snip/>

After your rant about multiple of bytes, I don't understand why you suddenly start describing drive sizes in bits...

The only thing in the way of that plan is the avarice of an industry which realises that when you're making 18GB drives, being able to call them 20GB drives sounds a heck of a lot better. I guess being able to force an entire industry to do things your way would make you jump for joy. Worth blowing the little horn for, I'd say.

Here, fixed that for ya ;)

Atrophy:

Evo:

Actually, you mean Pebibyte:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pebibyte

Please die a slow and horrible death.

Seconded.

(I know why I don't buy Blizzard games.)

Jam:

[...and finally, could you please use PNGs or something? the JPG artifacts are so ugly -_-]

Fussy much?

The last two images are PNGs--which makes them hard to view with IE (ducks rotten tomatoes).
As for weir, I think the upgrade problem was mostly due to using HP.

gwenhwyfaer:

/.../ otherwise we'd all have been quaffing 500 milliletre glasses of beer and measuring petrol consumption in kilometres per litre way before laws started telling us to /.../

Actually, we measure it in "liters per 10 (or 100) kilometers", not the other way around ;-)

Drifting off-topic, but the benefit of SI units is that conversion between the normal length, weight, volume etc. units can be done easily and accurately without a calculator. Just move the decimal point to the left or right the correct amount of places. Now try that with miles->yards->feet :-)
So in that sense, it absolutely makes more sense in day-to-day life.

Anyway - I agree with your main point... there would be no confusion if disk manufacturers would've gone with the binary units instead. Unless everyone is using the same language everywhere, there will be confusion. And introducing MiB and friends only adds to that confusion! Until the day when everyone agrees on the terminology.. as if that's gonna happen anytime soon

Besides - nobody outside the computer world really cares if 1 MB is 1000 or 1024 KB.. People rather tend to think in number of mp3's or number of documents.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA the logo is not compatible hahahahahahaha *DIES*

I'm gratified to see that the derisive response to "pebibyte" and its equivalents is nigh-universal, rather than Just Me.

Bluemoon:

I mean Petabyte instead of pentabyte.

Bluemoon

I think you mean Penisbite instead of petabyte.

Personally, though I think it sounds a bit stupid, I'm willing to use them, because I hate the term confusion even more. Someone used to the metric system, for example, sees "Kilo" and goes, "Oh, 1000 bytes".. which it isn't in binary terms. The "Kibi" prefix at least distinguishes the two... despite, again, the silly sound. I can see where the 'bi' came from, but it's still not something all that nice to say... would have thought they'd come up with something a little better.
Just my two cents.

Actually, I bet the Vista Logo one is "legitimate" (please notice the quotes, it's still a WTF, just in a different location than intended, I think). In order for your computer to be "Vista Certified" (get the logo aka stamp-of-approval) it needs X amount of memory, Y mhz CPU, N megaflops of video-churning, etc.

In Soviet Russia, Operating Systems support comput... no wait...

John Doe:

gwenhwyfaer:

The only thing in the way of that plan is the avarice of an industry which realises that when you're making 18GB drives, being able to call them 20GB drives sounds a heck of a lot better. I guess being able to force an entire industry to do things your way would make you jump for joy. Worth blowing the little horn for, I'd say.

Here, fixed that for ya ;)

Yes, yes you did. In much the same way that people "fix" their pet cats. You clearly have a promising veterinary career ahead of you.

samic:

"This computer does not support this operating system"
I reckon someone is trying to run a VM?

Or it could be a mythical computer that could run the operation system it couldn't run, and it would subsequently display a dialog that wouldn't display.

Actually, I'd guess that it's from an OS installer.

Woot!
16777216 == 2 ^ 24

Even sticker labels have hardware requirements, how could you not have known this fact?

isaks:

gwenhwyfaer:

/.../ otherwise we'd all have been quaffing 500 milliletre glasses of beer and measuring petrol consumption in kilometres per litre way before laws started telling us to /.../

Anyway - I agree with your main point... there would be no confusion if disk manufacturers would've gone with the binary units instead. Unless everyone is using the same language everywhere, there will be confusion. And introducing MiB and friends only adds to that confusion! Until the day when everyone agrees on the terminology.. as if that's gonna happen anytime soon

Let's get this straight:
- The term HAS been created
- It add's to the confusion until everyone agrees on it/uses it
--> Best solution: let everybody agree and use it
This is what you basically stated.

Now, not everybody agrees on it, so you don't care about it either?


But to be honest, I don't think it does add to the confusion. *B still has the same meaning as it used to have. It can be *either* the 1000^k or 1024^k. However, if you see *iB, you know immediately it's 1024^k.
In fact, gparted uses it. And I was really glad with that; many other partition managers will simply ask you: "how many GB?". THAT could mean two things.

So why NOT use it? Because it sounds awfully? Well, luckily, that's a matter of opinion.
I simply don't see a reason why not to use it. Why use it? Because it does nothing but ADD information.

Reminds me of two sentences I've seen:
1. i helped my uncle jack off a horse. [Capital(s) conviniently stripped away]
2. I broke my G-string while I was fingering a minor

But if you guys only want to add to the confusion, be my guest...

Evo:

isaks:

gwenhwyfaer:

/.../ otherwise we'd all have been quaffing 500 milliletre glasses of beer and measuring petrol consumption in kilometres per litre way before laws started telling us to /.../

Anyway - I agree with your main point... there would be no confusion if disk manufacturers would've gone with the binary units instead. Unless everyone is using the same language everywhere, there will be confusion. And introducing MiB and friends only adds to that confusion! Until the day when everyone agrees on the terminology.. as if that's gonna happen anytime soon

Let's get this straight:
- The term HAS been created
- It add's to the confusion until everyone agrees on it/uses it
--> Best solution: let everybody agree and use it
This is what you basically stated.

Now, not everybody agrees on it, so you don't care about it either?


But to be honest, I don't think it does add to the confusion. *B still has the same meaning as it used to have. It can be *either* the 1000^k or 1024^k. However, if you see *iB, you know immediately it's 1024^k.
In fact, gparted uses it. And I was really glad with that; many other partition managers will simply ask you: "how many GB?". THAT could mean two things.

So why NOT use it? Because it sounds awfully? Well, luckily, that's a matter of opinion.
I simply don't see a reason why not to use it. Why use it? Because it does nothing but ADD information.

Reminds me of two sentences I've seen:
1. i helped my uncle jack off a horse. [Capital(s) conviniently stripped away]
2. I broke my G-string while I was fingering a minor

But if you guys only want to add to the confusion, be my guest...

And this is why I generally use "GBytes", "MBytes", "KBytes" and such.

Forum software screwed up, I have to double post:

To add to my previous post:

And NOT anything that is invented part way to "Make up for" some manufacturer's laziness.

The "Genuine Windows Vista" Logo (ie, certification that the system meets the requirements for putting the logo on) requires a dual-channel RAM setup. This means paired DIMMs here.

They probably should have a slightly smarter rejection macro than "[feature] is not compatible with [other feature] [error code]", mind you.

TheRubyWarlock:

The RealWTF is that up until recently, Yahoo Launch only DID work in Internet Explorer (evidently it's been fixed finally, as I just tried with Firefox and it worked).

I just tried it and it still gave me that "We only support Internet 6.0" message. Ah LaunchCast, it was so great until Yahoo bought them out...

Sigivald:

I'm gratified to see that the derisive response to "pebibyte" and its equivalents is nigh-universal, rather than Just Me.

Why's that? Does a meaningful system of measurement offend you?

Must be American..

fuzz:

Sigivald:

I'm gratified to see that the derisive response to "pebibyte" and its equivalents is nigh-universal, rather than Just Me.

Why's that? Does a meaningful system of measurement offend you?

Must be American..

FOAD!

I am English and have been using giga,kilo,mega,etc... from before a byte was 8 bits (seriously). I have always understood them, have never been confused by them, and I don't need another set of words to describe storage space. If it's storage it's base 2. If you cant work that out you are too stupid to operate a keyboard, let alone write software.

[Not that I mind a bit of American bashing, but at least be fair and bash them for stuff they do wrong, there is enough of it.]

[Define]
K([^B]) = 1000\1
KB = 1024B
G(.) = K\1 * K\1
etc.
[/Define]

The fact that marketing people ruined the world (again) doesn't mean that what we used to do is wrong, and does not warrant insectoid extensions to terms that were/are common use.

Who ever says 'I have 2Gibibytes of RAM!'??? People say 'I have 2 Gigs of RAM' and everyone with an inkling of what it means knows that you are saying 2 x 1024 x 1024 x 1024 bytes of RAM, without you having to state 'bytes' or 'Gibi'...

[Gibi gibi gibi a man after midnight???]

DigitalXeron:

And this is why I generally use "GBytes", "MBytes", "KBytes" and such.

And that compensates for the fact that the G prefix denotes 10^9, M = 10^6, and K = 10^3 how?

I look at your versions, and I can't work out which version you meant! I suppose that from the fact that the unit is "Byte", I should assume that the scalar is not what it appears?

Drak:

[Define]
K([^B]) = 1000\1
KB = 1024B
G(.) = K\1 * K\1
etc.
[/Define]

The fact that marketing people ruined the world (again) doesn't mean that what we used to do is wrong, and does not warrant insectoid extensions to terms that were/are common use.

Who ever says 'I have 2Gibibytes of RAM!'??? People say 'I have 2 Gigs of RAM' and everyone with an inkling of what it means knows that you are saying 2 x 1024 x 1024 x 1024 bytes of RAM, without you having to state 'bytes' or 'Gibi'...

[Gibi gibi gibi a man after midnight???]

Yep. Because having the definition of a scalar prefix be dependent on context is *so awesome*.

Like, say, ounces. Troy ounces or avoirdupois ounces? Why, the *context* can be expected to make that completely clear, and any confusion must be due entirely to ignorant people!

Gedoon:

Oh my gosh... Microsoft can't produce a shitty tiny little piece of sticker without fucking it up? Not that I'd wanna have a Vista sticker littering MY computer. Altought it'd serve well as a warning label. Kinda like the biohazard symbol...

Well, Vista sticker is overrated. I have one computer here (Pentium III 600MHz) that has even more magical sticker - it says "Hardware NSTL Tested Year 2000 Compliant". I haven't seen one of those in newer computers! Modern operating system support? Yeah, well, it runs Ubuntu 7.04 just fine.

Don't believe me? My main computer doesn't have any stickers - you clearly can't call this AthlonXP 3000+ a modern computer, because it's running Debian, originally installed (two systems and several hard drives ago) in 1997...

SW:

Drak:

[Define]
K([^B]) = 1000\1
KB = 1024B
G(.) = K\1 * K\1
etc.
[/Define]

The fact that marketing people ruined the world (again) doesn't mean that what we used to do is wrong, and does not warrant insectoid extensions to terms that were/are common use.

Who ever says 'I have 2Gibibytes of RAM!'??? People say 'I have 2 Gigs of RAM' and everyone with an inkling of what it means knows that you are saying 2 x 1024 x 1024 x 1024 bytes of RAM, without you having to state 'bytes' or 'Gibi'...

[Gibi gibi gibi a man after midnight???]

Yep. Because having the definition of a scalar prefix be dependent on context is *so awesome*.

Like, say, ounces. Troy ounces or avoirdupois ounces? Why, the *context* can be expected to make that completely clear, and any confusion must be due entirely to ignorant people!

But it ALWAYS WILL be dependent on context. No matter what, "Kilobyte" will still mean both 1024 and 1000 bytes, because the new standard will never achieve 100% adoption.

In the olden days, when memory was a huge thing you sat on the floor, a practical kilobyte was 1028 bytes. Yes, 1028. Because individual bytes would stop working, so you had a bit more than you needed. Like a baker's dozen.

At least the scientists understand when it's too late to change a standard. You never see them complain about the fact that conventional current is actually marked backwards on their diagrams. Sometimes it's worth using the system that works (however awkwardly) rather than introducing a second system saying "This will solve all our problems!" Did Esperanto solve any problems with language? No, it just made another language that most people don't speak.

There isn't any practical use for 1000 bytes, or 1000000 of them. 1024 and 1048576 are numbers which have an important meaning in the actual physical devices -- but better than that -- people have learnt the rule now. 1KB = 1024. Let's not change our minds and confuse them all over again.

vertagano:

The last two images are PNGs--which makes them hard to view with IE (ducks rotten tomatoes).

Liar! It works fine with Internet 6.0 or higher.

fuzz:

Why's that? Does a meaningful system of measurement offend you?

Must be American..

"Kilo", "Mega", "Giga" meaning 1000, 1000000 etc. are AFAIK used only in conjunction with SI units. Talking about SI units - I think it's a good system, but, for once, it is not entirely consistent. Why the F is kilogram considered the base unit of mass instead of gram? Anyway, SI units are for science. Information theory is not science. So there is no difficulty discerning the two as long as you know that "bit" is not a scientific unit. It is also interesting to note that the only SI prefix that has actually meant in ancient times what it means today is "kilo" which is Greek for thousand (but I don't think the ancient Greeks used it as a prefix). "Mega", "giga" etc. have not meant 1 million, 1 billion etc. before the introduction of SI units, but were simply understood as "very large" and "very very large".

I know that there is some confusion regarding the use of "megabyte", "gigabyte" etc. especially regarding the capacity of hard disks and optical storage media. Do you know why? Well, kilobyte, megabyte et al have meant "2^10 byte", "2^20 byte" etc. since the very beginning, and were unambiguous until some m*****f***ing marketroids came along and wanted to sell off their disk drives as having a higher capacity than they actually have.

Not only was the usage of the prefixes to mean powers of 2^10 universal when it comes to RAM and ROM, it was also almost universal for disk drives for a very long time. The original sin (at least the one involving a widespread medium) was when they called the 3.5" high-density disks "1.44 megabyte" although having only 1440KB (or "KiB" as you would say). This, of course, is total insanity - "megabyte" here means 1000*1024 byte. Quickly did the marketroids then notice that they could further reduce the megabyte down to 1000*1000 byte, and later the gigabyte (a unit that wasn't yet in widespread use) would thus be reduced to 1000^3 bytes, shaving almost 7% off the 2^30 bytes and thus nowadays allowing companies to declare 465 GiB hard drives as "500 gigabytes".

The confusion is thus not the fault of us Real Techies (as I consider myself to be one), it is imposed by the professional marketing liars that infiltrate every field of interest that has the remotest chance of being profitable, and subvert it with their evil mockery. A quote from the opening sequence of the musical Chess fits nicely:

(The merchandisers)
We've a franchise worth exploiting
And we will
When it comes to merchandising
We could kill
When you get up in the morning
Till you crash at night
You will have to live your life
With bishop, rook and knight
Clean your teeth with chequered toothpaste
Wear our vests
Our kings and queens on bouncing breasts
You could even buy a set
And learn to play
We don't mind, we'll sell you something
Anyway

And now the same non-techies (or brainwashed techies) want to make a mockery of the binary prefixes and have them replaced with terms that make you sound like you're using baby language or are simply a stammering fool, to clean up the "confusion" that their own kind has created for fun of profit. These prefixes even have the impressive property of making you sound equally idiotic in English and German. I wouldn't actually mind using "KiB", "MiB" etc. in writing, but as long as I have a modicum of self-respect left in my body, I will NOT use these ridiculous words when talking. The people suggesting this can just die, as other users has commented. Maybe when reasonable prefixes are created, I will consider switching. But this moron talk? No, thanks, morons.

I'm superior to everyone because I know it's a buffer overflow, and all you unevolved weenies are laughing at it like a fart joke.

And why are you still using JPG images? Lossy is sooo 00000101 minutes ago.

[...and finally, SQUARE BRACKETS!]

AdT:

vertagano:

The last two images are PNGs--which makes them hard to view with IE (ducks rotten tomatoes).

Liar! It works fine with Internet 6.0 or higher.

Liar? My IE 5 Macintosh Edition asks me for a plugin--which it can't find. So, I had to save them to disk and use Photoshop to look at them. Sadly, they weren't quite worth all the effort.