Comments on: Apple Chooses Form Over Function; Users and the Press Rebel

By: Create Digital Music » Mac USB Audio: M-Audio Says Avoid the Left-hand USB Port, All Ports Not Equal

Tue, 28 Apr 2009 08:05:53 +0000

[...] have to say, it is possible to get good performance out of USB audio interfaces. On the other hand, removing FireWire from MacBooks seems again like a poor choice. GA_googleFillSlot(”CDMU_interpost_rect”); Ableton Live 8 [...]

By: jsfranco

jsfranco — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 18:28:37 +0000

If the firewire port had to go, so be it.
But for crying out loud, leave “some” option for connectivity! How about an ExpressCard slot? at least people would be able to add firewire, more USBs, eSATA or a you name it – they would have a CHOICE. The alternatives to firewire for real-time transfer gear on USB2 or Wifi or even Ethernet simply DO NOT exist to this day (and will never on USB2 as its just a crappy protocol). Moving out of Firewire should have been AFTER an alternative becomes available.

By: Eloy Garcia

Eloy Garcia — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 09:50:59 +0000

This what I got to say. APPLE FUCKED UP ON ALL OF US! My girl friend has a macbook and wanted the new one untill she looked at the NO FIREWRIE problem she’s not a pro at all. It was so funny last night when I told her there was no Firewire she was so mad. We were in the apple store and she had the cash in her hand then I told her no Firewire she said “NNNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!” cause she just got a new camera that was a $700 and it’s firewire and she was so happy for the new macbook. I wish I had video of this in the store. Then they tryed so hard to sell her the new macbook pro but it’s to big for her.

By: Dri

Dri — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 18:07:47 +0000

“We now return to our regularly scheduled, Theremin-filled music tech news.”

Hahahaha, oh Peter.

By: Claude Ravel

Claude Ravel — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 07:08:15 +0000

Hey Lumma, you are really kind of a creep, but I think you know that already.

By: Jenya

Jenya — Tue, 21 Oct 2008 23:26:33 +0000

If only I was in manufacturing and could build an ethernet/firewire adaptor (theoretically 100Mbit should fit the firewire bandwidht) and also have a a solid driver to make it work for music apps/hw I would probably become a millionaire pretty soon – hopefully someone in taiwan is already thinking about it.

I, just like many others, had my cash ready for the new macbook, but I’ll probably stick to my black ‘07 macbook for a while as size and Duet compatibility are a must for me…

By: 4lefts

4lefts — Tue, 21 Oct 2008 20:39:41 +0000

to re-emphasise what peter said, taking away firewire BUT NOT REPLACING IT WITH SOMETHING IS NOT BETTER. taking away the floppy drive but having a cd-rom and usb? no big deal. taking away a FW but still keeping only two usbs? big deal. that’s not minimalism, that’s being a tight arse. i still need a usb hub to use my printer, mouse, scanner, external HDD, usb stick all at once.

“we hardly need one (connction system) with wireless going the way it is” – yeah, i’ll take two of those new audio interfaces that stream 10 tracks of 24-bit 96kHz audio over wi-fi. oh, wait, yeah, that’s science fiction. it’s like telling a kid “sorry, nothing for christmas this year, cos, yeah, your presents next year are going to be amazing, they just don’t exist yet. there’s some awesome transformers coming out next september though”.

the “what’s in the box” section of the apple store makes no mention of a mini DP connector. on a laptop that costs nearly a thousand pounds???? tight bastards. that means i can’t use it with a whiteboard, and means i’m not going to buy one.

By: Carl Lumma

Carl Lumma — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 21:57:01 +0000

Crap, it hid my disclaimer because I put angle brackets around it. The previous comment was entirely my personal opinion and speculation, and contained no information connected to my job.

By: Carl Lumma

Carl Lumma — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 21:54:22 +0000

It’s got nothing to do with business sense, it’s just SJ doing his minimalist thing, and trying to push the industry in the direction he wants it to go. I think the parallel port comparison is apt precisely because most PC laptops still have them. I just got an expensive new ThinkPad and it has one. I don’t want that damn thing on there! Same thing with floppy drives and the original iMac. It truly was a feature not to have one.

I understand the frustration, and I was being a bit obnoxious on purpose. But one must understand that we don’t need two special-purpose data/power interconnects in the world (USB and FireWire). We hardly need one with wireless going the way it is.

I rolled my eyes when I first heard about the mini DisplayPort connector, too. But it’s an awesome connector — way easier to use than the standard DP connector. And I think we include a mini-standard adapter with every mini-DP product we sell. But don’t quote me on that.

By: Bites from the Apple: MacBook Afterglow (Now LED-Powered) | aStore SEO | aStore Theme | aStore Tips

Mon, 20 Oct 2008 20:44:01 +0000

[...] is functionality that’s rarely needed. The bigger headache (as Peter Kirn documents over at CreateDigitalMusic) comes for those (consumers and professionals) who have FireWire-based peripherals (external hard [...]