Robert Aitchison

NEW! The early feedback is in, and the consensus seems to be that I am a pessimistic complainer :-). Based on user feedback I have added a couple of positive opinions (and a new negative one).

I have also heard that my punctuation and grammar are terrible, I made some changes to this page and the Politics page to try to help that.

It's been rumored that I have an opinion on everything, some have even said that I am opinionated. All I have to say is that in my opinion they are right.

Below are some of my opinions on different, unrelated issues and subjects. Look for this page to grow as I add items to the list (adding to the top).

First I'd like to say that the following are my opinions and most likely don't represent the opinions of anyone else or any other organization, if any of these statements offend or annoy you then feel free to E-Mail me with your comments.

AMD is a big ripoff, you pay the same for no more performance with less reliability

It seems that many people, have bought hook line and sinker the propaganda put out by AMD and other people who have a very transparent anti Intel agenda.

Only when the P4 came out is when you finally started to hear about how the AMDs were supposedly faster, thats because the P3s were faster than the AMDs and before the P4 AMD couldn't say anything except they were cheaper (even though they are not really cheaper) and you could overclock them (which results in frying them).

The reason the P4 was created is because AMD finally got close to getting their act together in emulating the P3, so they released the P4 with a whole boatload of new extensions setting the reverse engineers at AMD back to square one in how to make a chip that works like a P4 but is different enough architecturally that AMD won't get sued.

Of course all these extensions, of which almost no programs use and few probably ever will, served to make the P4 slower then the P3, of course the only way the P4 can overcome this by turning up the clock speed.

For their part, Intel wants everyone to switch to the P4, so they stopped developing faster P3s, a 2Ghz P3 (which Intel could easily make) would send any P4 or AMD crying home to it's mommy, but for political reasons it will never be made, another example of Intel screwing over the consumer to protect it's near monopoly (does anybody remember the Pentium Pro).

Getting back to AMD, like I said, AMD chips are designed to work exactly (or as close as they can get) like an Intel chip but be different enough architecturally that Intel can't sue AMD.

The result is that AMD uses bass ackwards circuits and instruction sets, reducing the efficiency of the chip and making it run (clock for clock) probably 40% slower than the P3.

AMD then compensates for this deficit by cranking up the bus speed, adding cache and other "bleeding edge" techniques that make as an end result an AMD chip that runs ~5% slower than a P3 but ~5% faster than a P4.

The downside is all these bleeding edge techniques is they make the processors more buggy, run hotter and in general have more problems, that is why AMD chips have a failure rate SEVERAL HUNDRED TIMES greater than Intel chips. (partially because a lot of AMD chips are overclocked)

This can be absolutely proven when you look at the makeup of system and what processors they use. The only systems you see AMD chips in are the VERY LOWEST END "Consumer" PCs where quality is optional, the buyer is typically ignorant and price is the only important factor.

Just look at "Business Class" PCs, 99.999% of the time they will have an Intel processor, look at "Server Class" systems, there the rate is 100%.

If AMD were really all that great at a lower price, the bottom line conscious businesses would be using them like crazy, but they don't, because they AMD chips aren't really any faster, aren't really any cheaper and are most definitely a lot less reliable.

I think that Metallica and the RIAA are a bunch of losers for going after Napster

Metallica and the RIAA are too lazyto go after the Napster users who are the ones doing the pirating so they are going to try to go after the easier target, Napster, even though napster isn't doing anything illegal.

Metallica is just greedy, the ironic and hillarious thing is that I am sure that all of this BS is in fact hurting Metallica CD sales while at the same time providing a lot of free publicity for Napster. I know that I was going to buy a Metallica CD before this whole thing erupted and I changed my mind based solely on Metallica being punks.

The RIAA are one of the most evil and sneaky organizations on the planet, they rape the record consumer and the artists. They are trying to stop Napster and other technologies that could have the potential to cut them out of the loop where they take their hefty profit. They are going to lose, Digital media is here, and a lot of people are going to make a lot of money off of it, but I don't think it will be the people behind the RIAA who just want to keep thing the way they were since the 80s.

I think the TV ratings system is a good idea

What this policy does is tells parents what their kids will be watching, so they can make a choice with actual information.

The advantage for adults is that you are seeing better (more believable) TV shows being shown.

The Internet is the coolest thing since sliced bread

This will likely fall in the DUH category, but it really is amazing when you think about it, anyone in the world can communicate with anyone else in the world with great speed and efficiency.

People are waiting too long to get married and have children

It used to be that people got married in their late teens or early twenties and started their family shortly after that.

Now people wait until their late twenties to get married and often wait until their late thirties or even forties to start a family.

People are way too preoccupied with their careers or having fun to be concerned about having children, the country would be better off if we rolled back that clock about 40-50 years.

I think that Bill Clinton will go down in history as one of the - if not the worst presidents in history.

• Every original idea he has ever had has been a bad one (i.e. Socialized Health Care)
• He is a liar, a cheat and a crook
• He loves to take credit for things he had no effect on (like the economy) or things he actively fought against (like the balanced budget)

I think that there are WAY too many SUVs on the road:

People who bash Microsoft are a bunch of crybabies with "Bill Envy"

The reason that Microsoft is so successful is because they have excellent marketing (even when they products suck) plus their competitors are way too preoccupied with "beating Microsoft" to be effective (As Ray Noorda could no doubt testify).

Lets look at two of the high profile people complaining about Microsoft and Bill Gates:

• Scott McNealy who sells overpriced computer hardware that most people have no idea how to use.
• Larry Ellison who sells overpriced database software.

People don't know how to drive, or worse intentionally drive badly

Living in the Los Angeles area, I certainly have a lot of experience with bad traffic.

Almost the entire reason we have traffic is because of rude or stupid drivers. Between the jerks passing on the shoulder or waiting until the last second to force their way in before an interchange or the idiots slowing down to see a minor accident on the other side of the freeway there is no way traffic can move.

It is my belief that if you remove the worst %1 of the drivers on the road it would make far more of a difference on traffic than eliminating an average %10 of drivers.

People need to learn how to park

there are TONS of people who effectively block two spots because they can't park between the lines, add to this the people who park suburbans in compact spots or the jerks who deliberately park across two spots because they don't want their car scratched.

I drive a Geo Metro and it totally makes my day when I get to park so close to some idiot or jerk by parking 2 inches off their drivers door (by simply parking in my spot).

Another problem is on street parking where people park 3/4 of a car length from a driveway or red zone, effectively wasting a spot, I have seen it many times where three cars are parked where five would fit.