René Rebe

Just a quick note: The affordable, and color accurate 24″ 4K display from Dell (UP2414Q) does work on recent Macs. Even my not so recent mid-2012 Retina MacBook Pro. However, on these, and even the later Retina MacBook Pro it only runs the full 4k resolution at 30 Hz. On the newer it should work with 60Hz, but this currently looks to be a Mac driver limitation.

Switching to HiDPI mode requires some hackery, as Mac does neither do this automatically according to the DPI that could be derived from the DDC EDID data, nor does it offer a UI option to do so, … :-/
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Some posts scattered on the web claimed a Intel Harpertown Xeon, like the X5470 could work in a MacPro 2,1 (or eve 1,1 - they are hardware identical, just different firmware) given they still use the same LGA 771 socket. There even is a post where someone claims that he got a voice message from Apple confirming Harpertown support for his MacPro 2,1.

However, yesterday I tried that (Mac Pro 2,1 with the newer firmware) and I can assure you they do not work. The main logic board led indicator CPUB failure would light but nothing much else would happen.

Another note: Before you pull like crazy on the front fan assembly: mine were fixed with a second screw, the disassembly guides I found only mentioned one at the main logic board, however I had a second screw holding it in place just at the bottom side, where the CPU heat sinks end.

PS: It was actually still quite good that I disassembled the beast. With the original Xeon’s it still works (puh!), and considering that after some 6 years of 24/7 server load it was full of dust and so an internal cleanup was more than overdue ;-)

Usually I’m not in this “unboxing” and “hands-on” business. But as the Microsoft Surface Pro 2 arrived early, this morning, here go some public service unboxing shoots:

In generally a quite good first impression, especially as I’m getting so tired of the scratchy and hard edged aluminum cases in Apple’s PowerBooks MacBooks, iPhones and iPads, …

Some first notes: Given the two kickstand positions, I wonder how the 1st, old snap-in position ever could be useful, … For me the 1st position is not even a good match on an office desk, … And why (the heck) is the BIOS/EFI (hold volume [rocker] up button while powering up to get into the EFI BIOS) startup background so ugly red when SecureBoot is disabled (to install Linux and such)?!?!

Update: If the original Surface Pro battery life was short, the v2 definitely is well an improvement for that. 7h battery life for normal office, developer tasks are quite possible. Your milage may vary. However as non-Windows users I’m a bit irritated that still some old fashioned dialogs are not resolution aware, and thus scaled-up blurry. For example System Control ones, like detailed network settings, e.g. static IP config and such, … One should think a huge company like Microsoft gets all such system-wide details covered over the years, …

Update 2: The machine feels pretty solid, in ways quite outstanding engineering, … I just can not get so warm with the Touch and Type covers. The Touch Cover does not really register every key touch, leading to re-typing some words again, and the Type cover too does not feel too solid, with the fabric edges looking like they may peel off as known from the first try already, …

Update 3: Looks like the Surface Pros will only boot thru EFI, that is no legacy BIOS compatibility “layer” in the EFI firmware (BIOS). So you need a “bleeding-edge” Linux distributions and can not boot older versions, nor Windows XP or such, …

I tweeted it already the other week:

now I admit something “embarrassing”: I might get myself an #Surface Pro 2, …

— René Rebe (@renebln) September 25, 2013

The number one reason for that is plain simple: Productivity for content creation. While I had most iPhones and iPads (like every other generation) I use my iPhone most of the time, but the iPad is mostly just sitting on my desk or bag waiting for the next software test. For occasional reading in public transport it feels too big and heavy, I use the iPhone for that. And for real office productivity the iPad just does not work for more than basic email response. Of course my situation as computer scientist is a bit special. I simply can not do (any serious) programming directly on the iPad. So during the commute, airplane taxi, or on a passenger seat I can not do much with the iPad except consuming something (like news, or a book) answering an email or so. I can not work on an algorithm, fix some bug, or things like that.

Of course with the Surface RT it is even worse: you get the system restrictions with even less apps. The only improvement over that is the Surface Pro. I think it is the biggest mistake from Microsoft to limit the RT’s classic, desktop apps like that. Without that arbitrary restriction (again copying Apple) even Windows RT could be more popular, e.g. for classic, legacy business workflows. Basically the classic Windows customers, maybe the only marked Microsoft Windows is still strong.

While I already considered the first Surface Pro I mostly did not get it due the abysmal battery life. Two to three hours of “normal, real use” (in contrast to the just on, dimmed display, not touched setup used for this longer, official rating) is just not good these days. Of course I knew the Intel “Haswell” CPU Core generation was just around the corner, so I was awaiting this update.

Now the Surface Pro 2 is announced and it delivers just that: A 75% improvement in battery life they promise (and [graphic] performance) due Intel Haswell generation CPUs. Along with some minor improvements left and right (display, touch cover backlit keyboard, dock and such, …). Remaining drawbacks? 40% more weight (900g vs. 652g) and thickness, and probably about half the iPad’s battery life, …

Of course the biggest hurdle still is the Windows OS. As engineer, and spending more than a decade in the open source, Linux side of the world I do not have the highest words for the mess that is Win32 API, kernel and UI design with decade old DOS and 16 bit legacy cruft built-in. Of course the latest NSA scandal does not contribute to the faith in their security and possible crypto or real backdoors to the system.

However, it should be possible (at least there are reports it works with the 1st gen Surface Pro) to also run Linux on it (after disabling SecureBoot that is). This is also something not (easily) possible with the iPad (or the Surface RT). And it should (theoretically) be possible to even run Mac OS X on it, …

So the new, Surface Pro 2 should theoretically vastly boost my productivity while on-the-go: More than answering emails or plain “media” consumption: Aside from real emails, with different attachments, spread sheets, PDF invoices, spec sheets, etc. to real work: code, design. And this likewise applies to others, too. Think photographers, graphic designers working with some Gimp-like program (Photoshop et al.), real office spreadsheets and documents, presentations, etc. Also a plus, and a must: An usable USB port - where I can plug in some USB device to work with, such as a document scanner. And when you come to work you can plug in your desktop class display, keyboard and mouse and work on.

Yes, there are apps for many things on iOS. But let’s face it: aside some awesome games, and social apps most things are toys. Next to no real (that is more than basic features) word, spread, photo or graphic editing. And given the extreme iOS (and Windows RT) restrictions next to no computer science programming. Aside graphical calculators, BASIC, and a Lua shell, or two.

I know, I do not like Windows, the Win32 Api is disgusting, it is full of security issues, the old apps are not touch optimized, … But at the end of the day being able to write some code and send out some more complex email (with more than one kind of attachment) and with a real keyboard, is what counts to get work done.

There could be a point, even in the near future, where productivity on iOS gets better: If Apple continues to push it’s own 64-bit ARM CPUs to the MacBook Air (as they already announced is as “desktop class” performance), there could be an quad-core A8 MacBook Air in one or two years. If iOS and Mac OS X further merge there could be similar, full-blown graphical, office, and science apps for that.

However, to be really useful for the growing class of programmers: Some of the restrictions need to be lifted: be able to generate and run code (for programming, think Xcode), allow to fork of new processes (for anything, from helper programs in scientific apps, to scripting, Xcode, compiler, converter, anything beyond simple apps. And of course the USB port should be fully usable for custom drivers and apps, …

Some of the iOS restrictions are really silly, and what starts to drive some people away from it :-/

I updated my ExactImage-based QuickLook plugin to also support camera RAW images.

Just some week ago I got myself a Sony Nex 5 camera, and used to shooting RAW images for the superior post-production quality with my former, aging Canon EOS 350 I had to notice Mac OS X (10.7) does not support the Sony Nex RAW images by default. There is a camera raw update, but it apparently only installs with iPhoto or Aperture installed, which I do not plan to purchase.

So I finally updated the dcraw support in ExactImage and rebuild the QuickLook plugin with the new support for RAW files, enjoy: 1.8 update w/ camera raw support

If you have another image format you like to preview on the Mac just let me know! Especially if you have camera RAW images that you would like to preview, I likely have to add the file UTI for other files to load, too.

For some excessive amount of time -as I do not find the last half decade MacBooks perfect- I am looking for a PC laptop. The Samsung Series 9 came pretty close, just that the max 4GB RAM of the 13″ is a little little for a software engineer, …

Yesterday Sammy announced the Haswell based, latest Intel Core generation refresh, and I unfortunately have to say: What the heck?

They managed to ruin the machine for the most part: Gorilla glass touch panel!?!?! Thanks, but no thanks! Most of all I do not want to look in a mirror the whole day. This just hurts the eyes, seriously. Not to mention office lights or sunlight. Thank you very much. Of course the touch panel can mostly be ignored. I mean: Who would want to raise the arm the whole day, and even smearing the screen with natural skin oil??? Definitely not me. I could ignore the touch panel - if there would not be this glossy gorilla glass cover, ieek. And then the screen resolution. Yeah, Retina sounds awesome in product advertisements. But fact is, only Mac OS X scales the UI reliably. Such a display is no fun on Windows, nor Linux. All non-top notch Windows Apps will have scaling issues. Sometimes even the top notch ones, … :-/ And obviously all the added mega pixels just burn vital battery life away, …

So then let’s come to the ATIV Book 9 Lite (why continue to use an established, simple brand name like Series 9, when you can ruin it with something like ATIV -what the heck?- Book, yeah, well, ok …). Finally a nice and light AMD Ultrathin. Awesome! We need more of that!! I would get it immediately, if not, … 1366×768 resolution seriously? Come on, after 3200×1800 at the premium, you want to sell us last millennium 1366×768? How crazy is that? One excessive high-res, the other below the bare minimum. And of course only 4GB of RAM, … when you cripple it, make sure you cripple it for real, … The brave new world of soldered on the board, no user swaps SO-DIMM, …

What are those product managers thinking? Really??

PS: And btw. classic: Other companies (like Apple) would have pretty product pages available on their website at launch time, … Samsung? Nada. Not listed yet (on the US, or German) website; at the time of writing. Yeah, why list the just announced flagship product so people can take a look, and order, …?

These days you really wonder, …

For some time I was wondering how suspend time on my iPhone 5 can be so low. Having owned the very first gen iPhone, the 3G, the 4 and now the 5 the current suspend and talk time did not really feel like progress. Au contraire: It felt short :-/

Historically I never had much Apps. After all the initial iPhone was about doing mobile web right, it even did not allow third party Apps. Even when third party Apps where allowed, and appear I did not have many of them. After all I wanted mobile Web, email, and such, …

However over time some Apps accumulated, and of course nowadays people continuously ask to like some Facebook upload and the like. So I had this infamous Facebook.app opened every other day. What I did not realize was, how much hiccup it is doing in the background! After quitting it completely, via the taskbar the battery life actually went up from barely 24h standby and a little use over the day to nearly 48h standby with occasional regular office day use.

If that is not an improvement! Of course it is still fare away from regular, old fashioned mobile’s - but those also did less, had less fancy, smaller screens, etc. Most of all it shows how bad some mobile Apps are written!

Since the MacBook Air more and more Macs, Ultrabooks, and regular, old fashioned laptops (not to mention smartphones, …) come without user serviceable battery, storage, memory, etc. Most people argue: “It is not that bad, when do you ever change the battery? And changing memory and storage? Thats for geeks only anyway, …”

More real life examples why this really sucks:

Of course the biggest reason is the battery. If you gonna use your laptop a serious amount of time (2-3 years++) you definitely need to have the battery replaced at least once. Unless –of course– you just keep your laptop on a desk, always connected to a power source. Likewise, previously I always had another battery for my cellphone when traveling abroad. Now with the iPhone I often find myself in a situation where it emergency powers down approaching the end of longer travels. Yes, one could carry those external charging battery packs. But first of all they are usually bigger, can not instantly be exchanged into the phone, and last but not least: in that case I could carry the matching battery to swap in the first place.

But today came an even bigger point in case: I got one of those faulty Retina MacBooks that have this image retaining LG panels, ieek! After some months with this annoyance I finally wanted Apple to replace it. Turns out they will repair it instead of just swapping the machine, and this may take up to 2 weeks++ (here in Germany, at least, …). Now I have of course many personal files, source, images, documents, on it, … With those nice black polycarbonate MacBooks I could just remove the hard disk without opening the case at all. And leave all my source code and documents here at home while the machine is in service.

Now? I have to make sure I have a perfect, recent backup. Then zero out the flash storage, just to replay the backup when I finally get the machine back.

What a really major waste of time (and flash write cycles).

And it is of course a scandal that Apple sold such faulty display on such a high-end machine in the first place :-/ !1!

Brave new world :-/

So the latest Microsoft Windows PC and Nokia phone sales do not look particularly well.

My too cent?

After decades of Microsoft quality (dysfunctional at best, often crashing at worst – yes it got better with NT, …) and surrounding consumer (dis-) satisfaction - customers are more than happy to finally have the possibility to choose something else! With pleasure! Apple iOS, Android for smartphones and tables that can do a lot what previously was done on a PC, and even turning to the exclusive Mac OS, and associated Macintosh hardware. Of course many will not get a Mac, nor the more experimental (and limited) Google Chromebooks. But investing in an not-too-cheap smartphone, whether it is an iOS or Android, draws away enough money, that in the end a few year old PC is just kept to do the heavier content creation and such. It is plenty fast for that anyway.

Is that bad? For Microsoft, Nokia, and classic PC vendors certainly. Maybe using old PCs even saves the environment a bit, even more so the less energy hungry phones and tablets for email, surfing and video.

For Nokia it certainly was not the smartest move. Even by improving Symbian they may have been more successful. It at least was selling well and had plenty of fans, … They already had their own Linux phones going they could have further build upon.

And for the rest of us? I think the current trend to more diversity (although currently mostly limited to iOS and Android, but thru Android at least also several different manufactures) will be good for all of us. In the future a more diverse landscape will make it easier for entirely new systems, whether based on Linux, BSD, QNX, or entirely new -from scratch- to gain some attention and market share. I personally remember how hard it was to convince someone to switch from Windows to Linux in the beginning of this millennium when Microsoft had a quasi monopoly with somewhere around 90% market share, …

For some years now, I can not find the perfect laptop. The issue with most Apple MacBooks is the way too glossy screens, a sharp aluminum case border that presses into the wrist, an enormous screen bezel, often no Ethernet anymore. Of course most PCs are so ridiculously ugly plastic crap I would not even bother to look at all day. The Lenovo X230 comes quite close, but the display resolution, … so low it really hurts. The mid-2012 Samsung Series 9 (900X3 or so for 13″) is quite nice:

It does so many things better than the MacBook Air it inspires from: Outstanding display (Full HD: 1920 x 1080, the Air only has 1440 x 900) and even mate! Much smaller screen bezel, looks gorgeous, wastes less space. Even optional in black anodized aluminum: yummy!

The drawbacks? Well beside Windows (one would use Linux anyway, maybe Hackintosh would do, too), RAM! How can they ship the 13 inch version with just 4GB max? With this plenty of screen real estate, mate display it would make such an excellent developer machine. But some more than 4GB of RAM would be highly appreciated (even Apple’s MacBook Air allows up to 8 GB) for this and future proof (Hello planned obsolescence at it’s best?).

But worst of it all? The 3mm power plug! Are they kidding? Such an “not so cheap” (not to call it expensive) machine and then a jack that not only pulls the laptop from the table if someone trips on the cable, but even likely breaks and leaves the tiny metal pin stuck inside? Seldom saw such a nonsense. Mag Safe like connector anyone?