5 ms·

> Decent software companies terrible at making hardware Not sure if one wants to count them as a decent software company, but Microsoft is quite good at buildi

by krylon 9y ago

> Decent software companies terrible at making hardware Not sure if one wants to count them as a decent software company, but Microsoft is quite good at building keyboards, IMHO.

frik 9y ago
Old 1990s hardware from them was awesome. IntelliMouse, Joysticks, keyboards, etc very good devices. Even the Comfort Mouse 6000 was still great (though the die too fast, and have a hardware bug - middle click is delayed) But nowadays it's all cheap plastic and cheap mechanics, made to last 2 years. There are alternatives for good keyboards, but I have yet to find a good mouse. (a business mouse, not a rainbow colored funky gamer mouse)
oblio 9y ago
Their internal divisions might be all over the place regarding company policies (see: Windows 10 as spyware :) ) and their insistence on keeping strict backwards compatibility with sub-par products (DOS, basically) might be debatable. But their engineering these days is top notch. They might not be the best but they're probably in the top 10% sofware companies regarding engineering practices, IMO. If not higher.
- wolfgke 9y ago
  > and their insistence on keeping strict backwards compatibility with sub-par products (DOS, basically) might be debatable. All 64 bit versions of Windows can neither run DOS applications nor Win16 applications (I described the technical reason for this at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14246521 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14246521).
  - temac 9y ago
    I'm pretty sure that excuse is random bullshit. First, are handles limited to 16 bits in 32-bits Windows? I'm pretty sure they are not, especially when the 2 lsb are 0 for NT handles... Second, you could cherry-pick other random resource pointer and make up another excuse with the same power: e.g. "32-bits programs can not work under 64-bits Windows because pointers are 64-bits wide with 'all' (at least > 32) their bits used, so they won't fit in 32-bits pointers of 32-bits programs" That's not how retro-compatibility involving virtualization is engineered - that's pretty much the other way around! If MS wanted to make Win16 run on 64-bits Windows, they could have engineered it (without much difficulty). They choose not to (and I don't blame them too much for that) and as a result, maybe some (or a lot) of details that would have been needed to ease that implementation do not exist (maybe SOME handles were limited to 16-bits on 32-bits Windows, all the time or when the program was a 16-bits one - and the provision to limit to 16-bits is not there anymore in 64-bits Windows as a result of the lack of purpose it would have given the general lack of support of win16 on this plateform), which maybe makes it harder to do for a 3rd party now... (and even by MS, given Windows has evolved a lot since introduction of 64-bits)
    - tracker1 9y ago
      If you really have 16-bit windows/dos software, these days dosemu or WINE may be better options under a VM (Not sure if ReactOS would work well enough). DosBox may work as well, depending on specific needs.
  - oblio 9y ago
    While that's strictly true, there's a wider range of backwards compatibility they're keeping. See the whole Rust/Cargo problem on Windows. Windows files can't be named con, aux, etc., because the Windows file systems are backwards compatible, generationally, all the way to DOS, which didn't have subfolders initially and which reserved those keywords for special files. Then as DOS added subfolders it still kept that global restriction, then Windows adopted it... and here we are today. Windows is full of these things, a lot of them coming from DOS and more coming from Win16 or even early Win32. I know they broke backwards compatibility in the strict sense with Win64, but apart from this not many situations where they did it come to mind. And even for that, they only did it because the overall market for DOS/Win16 was tiny at the point when they did it.
    - wolfgke 9y ago
      POSIX and its ecosystem is also full of this backwards compatibility baggage (I for example claim that X11 has a lot more outdated backward compatibility legacy than WinAPI - no surprise since it is much older). Just to give a few basic texts about this: The Unix-Haters Handbook: http://web.mit.edu/~simsong/www/ugh.pdf http://web.mit.edu/~simsong/www/ugh.pdf A Tale of Two Standards: A text by a person (Jeremy Allison) who understands both WinAPI and POSIX: https://www.samba.org/samba/news/articles/low_point/tale_two_stds_os2.html https://www.samba.org/samba/news/articles/low_point/tale_two... The reason why people tell this all the time with respect to Windows, but much more rarely with respect to POSIX and its ecosystem, is in my opinion that much more programmers have inhaled the latter.
    - i336_ 9y ago
      Concurrently occurring Creation -> Obsolescence produces overlap: DOS Win3.1 Win95 Win10 Creat. Obsc. |---------App----------| |---App---| |-----App-----| ~1980=========================================~2020 |-----App-----| |-------App-------| |--------App--------> (Okay, that looked a little better in my text editor.)
      - tracker1 9y ago
- tracker1 9y ago
  Regarding compatibility.. didn't they try to break away with Windows N? Though a commercial flop, only available on ARM and locked down devices... I hd pretty high hopes in that space, higher that they'd take Server in that direction... I'm not sure MS can really dead-end a legacy codebase so easily. They seem to be trying, but hitting resistance at every turn.
DaiPlusPlus 9y ago
I disagree. Every Microsoft Natural keyboard I've used that's more than a few years old has gotten incredibly mushy. I make an exception for the original line of Natural Keyboards in the mid-1990s that had a firmer membrane, but the current range, including the "Ergonomic Keyboard 4000" just feels like I'm typing on kitchen sponges.
- krylon 9y ago
  Sad to hear that. I like the 4000, in fact I am typing on one right now. I vaguely remember Fujitsu had an ergonomic keyboard (one could even adjust the angle between the two halves), but I have never laid hands on it, so I cannot say anything about the quality. All Fujitsu notebooks I have touched had absolutely crappy keyboards, but that might not mean much.
- smacktoward 9y ago
  I've never had a 4000 that survived more than a couple of years. Inevitably one of the keys gives out, and then it's off to Office Depot to buy another one. The main thing it's got going for it is the overall layout, which is fantastic. If someone made a keyboard using mechanical switches with the same layout I'd snap it up in a hot second. But for reasons unknown, while keyboards with mechanical switches have proliferated in recent years, none of them incorporate 4000-style ergonomic features like split keys or a curved key bed.
intoverflow2 9y ago
The driver for my Microsoft Designer Mouse (one of their latest models) stopped working when I updated windows the other day, no word on when a fix will occur.
lmm 9y ago
Microsoft hardware in general has always been very good IME. Their mice were the best around for decades, and I'm loving my Surface Book.
- nailer 9y ago
  Keep in mind Surface Books don't have global support - I bought mind in at a Microsoft Store in the US and Microsoft UK just won't look at it.
LoSboccacc 9y ago
comfort curve 2000/3000 are one of my fav to work on. comfortable without the annoyances of going full mechanical. also their optical mouse is quite good. but the real crown jewel was the xbox steering wheel (the real one not the U stick): solid, precise, feature packed and sold at an incredible price.
cuspycode 9y ago
I agree. My main keyboard is a Microsoft Internet Keyboard that I have been using for many hours daily since 1999, surviving five different computers (all running Linux). It's the most comfortable keyboard I've ever used, and it shows no signs of wear other than having some stains, plus partial fading of a few of the key symbols, and the Ctrl and C keys are beginning to show dents where my nails have been hitting them.
driverdan 9y ago
There are no good standard rubber dome keyboards. Try using a keyboard with real switches or good rubber dome like buckling springs or Topre switches and you'll know what I mean.

by krylon 9y ago

> Decent software companies terrible at making hardware Not sure if one wants to count them as a decent software company, but Microsoft is quite good at building keyboards, IMHO.

frik 9y ago

Old 1990s hardware from them was awesome. IntelliMouse, Joysticks, keyboards, etc very good devices. Even the Comfort Mouse 6000 was still great (though the die too fast, and have a hardware bug - middle click is delayed) But nowadays it's all cheap plastic and cheap mechanics, made to last 2 years. There are alternatives for good keyboards, but I have yet to find a good mouse. (a business mouse, not a rainbow colored funky gamer mouse)

oblio 9y ago

Their internal divisions might be all over the place regarding company policies (see: Windows 10 as spyware :) ) and their insistence on keeping strict backwards compatibility with sub-par products (DOS, basically) might be debatable. But their engineering these days is top notch. They might not be the best but they're probably in the top 10% sofware companies regarding engineering practices, IMO. If not higher.

wolfgke 9y ago
> and their insistence on keeping strict backwards compatibility with sub-par products (DOS, basically) might be debatable. All 64 bit versions of Windows can neither run DOS applications nor Win16 applications (I described the technical reason for this at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14246521 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14246521).
- temac 9y ago
  I'm pretty sure that excuse is random bullshit. First, are handles limited to 16 bits in 32-bits Windows? I'm pretty sure they are not, especially when the 2 lsb are 0 for NT handles... Second, you could cherry-pick other random resource pointer and make up another excuse with the same power: e.g. "32-bits programs can not work under 64-bits Windows because pointers are 64-bits wide with 'all' (at least > 32) their bits used, so they won't fit in 32-bits pointers of 32-bits programs" That's not how retro-compatibility involving virtualization is engineered - that's pretty much the other way around! If MS wanted to make Win16 run on 64-bits Windows, they could have engineered it (without much difficulty). They choose not to (and I don't blame them too much for that) and as a result, maybe some (or a lot) of details that would have been needed to ease that implementation do not exist (maybe SOME handles were limited to 16-bits on 32-bits Windows, all the time or when the program was a 16-bits one - and the provision to limit to 16-bits is not there anymore in 64-bits Windows as a result of the lack of purpose it would have given the general lack of support of win16 on this plateform), which maybe makes it harder to do for a 3rd party now... (and even by MS, given Windows has evolved a lot since introduction of 64-bits)
  - tracker1 9y ago
    If you really have 16-bit windows/dos software, these days dosemu or WINE may be better options under a VM (Not sure if ReactOS would work well enough). DosBox may work as well, depending on specific needs.
- oblio 9y ago
  While that's strictly true, there's a wider range of backwards compatibility they're keeping. See the whole Rust/Cargo problem on Windows. Windows files can't be named con, aux, etc., because the Windows file systems are backwards compatible, generationally, all the way to DOS, which didn't have subfolders initially and which reserved those keywords for special files. Then as DOS added subfolders it still kept that global restriction, then Windows adopted it... and here we are today. Windows is full of these things, a lot of them coming from DOS and more coming from Win16 or even early Win32. I know they broke backwards compatibility in the strict sense with Win64, but apart from this not many situations where they did it come to mind. And even for that, they only did it because the overall market for DOS/Win16 was tiny at the point when they did it.
  - wolfgke 9y ago
    POSIX and its ecosystem is also full of this backwards compatibility baggage (I for example claim that X11 has a lot more outdated backward compatibility legacy than WinAPI - no surprise since it is much older). Just to give a few basic texts about this: The Unix-Haters Handbook: http://web.mit.edu/~simsong/www/ugh.pdf http://web.mit.edu/~simsong/www/ugh.pdf A Tale of Two Standards: A text by a person (Jeremy Allison) who understands both WinAPI and POSIX: https://www.samba.org/samba/news/articles/low_point/tale_two_stds_os2.html https://www.samba.org/samba/news/articles/low_point/tale_two... The reason why people tell this all the time with respect to Windows, but much more rarely with respect to POSIX and its ecosystem, is in my opinion that much more programmers have inhaled the latter.
  - i336_ 9y ago
    Concurrently occurring Creation -> Obsolescence produces overlap: DOS Win3.1 Win95 Win10 Creat. Obsc. |---------App----------| |---App---| |-----App-----| ~1980=========================================~2020 |-----App-----| |-------App-------| |--------App--------> (Okay, that looked a little better in my text editor.)
    - tracker1 9y ago
tracker1 9y ago
Regarding compatibility.. didn't they try to break away with Windows N? Though a commercial flop, only available on ARM and locked down devices... I hd pretty high hopes in that space, higher that they'd take Server in that direction... I'm not sure MS can really dead-end a legacy codebase so easily. They seem to be trying, but hitting resistance at every turn.

DaiPlusPlus 9y ago

I disagree. Every Microsoft Natural keyboard I've used that's more than a few years old has gotten incredibly mushy. I make an exception for the original line of Natural Keyboards in the mid-1990s that had a firmer membrane, but the current range, including the "Ergonomic Keyboard 4000" just feels like I'm typing on kitchen sponges.

krylon 9y ago
Sad to hear that. I like the 4000, in fact I am typing on one right now. I vaguely remember Fujitsu had an ergonomic keyboard (one could even adjust the angle between the two halves), but I have never laid hands on it, so I cannot say anything about the quality. All Fujitsu notebooks I have touched had absolutely crappy keyboards, but that might not mean much.
smacktoward 9y ago
I've never had a 4000 that survived more than a couple of years. Inevitably one of the keys gives out, and then it's off to Office Depot to buy another one. The main thing it's got going for it is the overall layout, which is fantastic. If someone made a keyboard using mechanical switches with the same layout I'd snap it up in a hot second. But for reasons unknown, while keyboards with mechanical switches have proliferated in recent years, none of them incorporate 4000-style ergonomic features like split keys or a curved key bed.

intoverflow2 9y ago

The driver for my Microsoft Designer Mouse (one of their latest models) stopped working when I updated windows the other day, no word on when a fix will occur.

lmm 9y ago

Microsoft hardware in general has always been very good IME. Their mice were the best around for decades, and I'm loving my Surface Book.

nailer 9y ago
Keep in mind Surface Books don't have global support - I bought mind in at a Microsoft Store in the US and Microsoft UK just won't look at it.

LoSboccacc 9y ago

comfort curve 2000/3000 are one of my fav to work on. comfortable without the annoyances of going full mechanical. also their optical mouse is quite good. but the real crown jewel was the xbox steering wheel (the real one not the U stick): solid, precise, feature packed and sold at an incredible price.

cuspycode 9y ago

I agree. My main keyboard is a Microsoft Internet Keyboard that I have been using for many hours daily since 1999, surviving five different computers (all running Linux). It's the most comfortable keyboard I've ever used, and it shows no signs of wear other than having some stains, plus partial fading of a few of the key symbols, and the Ctrl and C keys are beginning to show dents where my nails have been hitting them.

driverdan 9y ago

There are no good standard rubber dome keyboards. Try using a keyboard with real switches or good rubber dome like buckling springs or Topre switches and you'll know what I mean.