Lol nevermind

Well, I don't have any friends that wear watches. Maybe one or two. I personally think the phone is a good form factor. I can check it easily for notifications, for the time, for directions, for anything. And when I don't want it, it's out the way.

I'm very skeptical of wearables at this point. If they all need phones, what's the point? If I have something in my pocket that does what I want 100x better than this thing on my wrist or face, why am I going to bother? I just can't find the point of it at all. My phone lives with me - it takes good pictures, it notifies me of everything that I want, and I -need- it. Why should I add another device that just duplicates it in an inferior way?

I feel naked without my watch.

As for Apple, they have themselves in a bit of a mess. It's not that they make bad phones, it's just that they don't set themselves apart anymore. It's becoming very hard to be innovative in the smart phone market. But that's what investors demand from Apple.

Google has it easier, because they don't have that obligation. They release the software and the OEMs define the market. Want a bigger phone? A bigger battery? Anything else? Fine, someone will make it and bring it to market. And if the consumers like it (like with screen size), everyone else will follow and Google gets the credit.

I wouldn't say Apple is in massive trouble though. On the train every day, I still see mostly iPhones, especially with women. The question is more five years from now, after people go through a few phone contracts. How does Apple keep its position as the innovator if people see it surrounded by phones doing much more?

iPhone is getting stagnant. Apple is stagnant. New Mac Pro? LOL.. OS X Mavericks is ho hum. iOS7.. meh, OK. They are definitely slipping.

I like the *idea* of a smart watch, but it's got to have more functionality than they currently have. I'm in the camp with Wood that says "My phone does this better and it isn't any more inconvenient." The only reason I even wear a watch is because it's basically the only acceptable jewelry for a man to wear.

Like I alluded to, I like the idea of watches that are a smart phone ACCESSORY, but not that are essentially a full-blown Android device on their own. The ability to control your phone's functions (music control, stopwatch control, etc.) while being active, for example, is a decent feature of having a watch. But I'm with you - no need to add another Android device to my life that doesn't work with my phone.

We need the girl from 4E

Agreed. The problem Apple is running into is that it's increasingly seen as competing with other PHONES rather than competing with other OPERATING SYSTEMS. Even in this thread, the discussion has largely centered around specifications and features rather than the user experience. When that happens, it's no longer iOS vs. Android and instead is about iPhone vs. Samsung S4 vs. HTC One vs. LG G2 vs. a million others.

It's much tougher to compete when you're one option of hundreds than it is when you're one option of two.

They had people lining up for iPhones yesterday at stores and getting up at 4 am to buy online. They sold out of many models really quickly. They make a profit on each of those phones.

Can any of those be said for one of the individual phones you list?

I don't think you can hate on the new Mac Pro yet. My initial reaction was kind of negative because I was envisioning having an internal RAID in one. Now I think it's going to be a solid option for me because it's small enough I can take it wherever I need it to be.

EVERY person I know in the film industry is pissed about it. It's a pretty big **** up according to them. The lack of expansion cards is a deal breaker.

The new Mac Pro is a huge huge ****up. I support a large number of people that have the actual need for the hardware that the previous Mac Pro provided. This Mac Pro does not meet their standards at all. It's a joke. Everyone that actually does intensive graphic design type work necessitating a machine like a Mac Pro is beyond disappointed. Apple sat pat on the Mac Pro line for many years, and to see this little food processor looking piece of shit as the result is a straight slap in the face from Apple. They ****ed up hard.

Exactly what I've been hearing as well.

Just one example.... I support a professor who currently has a Mac Pro, with 4 X 2TB SATA drives in it, along with 16GB of RAM, 1GB Radeon graphics card. Pretty standard for a most graphics designers. One of hundreds of similar setups I support.

Absolutely non of that is compatible with the new model. Upgrading will likely cost him ~$3K just for the new unit, at least 2 external HD enclosures for his current SATA drives, Thunderbolt dongles, HDMI to DVI dongle, external optical drive, etc.

And I know many people in that same boat. What's going to happen, is that current Mac Pro owners are going to hang on to their old tower units absolutely as long as possible, because the new system means starting over from scratch. Which is exactly Apple's intent. It's ****ing horseshit and it's going to create serious animosity toward Apple above and beyond what's already there.

Couple that with Adobe's new "Rental" licensing model, and you have yourself an entire industry of graphics folks that are ****ing pissed off at the world with no clue on how to pay for their next generation of hardware and software.

*shrug*

Guess we'll see what happens when it's actually released with specs and benchmarks. I'll be purchasing one for sure. Most of the working copies of images that I've got can live on a USB3 or Thunderbolt drive with a separate Thunderbolt RAID to hold my postgres database. Going to put in for two 27" displays and plan on getting one of them.

I will say that I'm not excited about having that huge mess of wires around my lab, but my lab is already that way due to all the stuff I've got plugged in already.

And like I said...the ability to take everything local and toss this little thing into a duffel bag to take home for the weekend or an all night session beats the living shit out of lugging home a 9 pound laptop plus all the other crap just to have an underpowered machine.

My current Mac Pro falls into that weird gap where you can't upgrade it beyond Snow Leopard. I'm hoping that it falls from my employer as surplus soon. The combination of that hardware and Snow Leopard (which is still getting updates) makes it the most stable machine I've ever used on any platform.