TMO at CES - Bill Gates Experiences Three Windows Crashes During CES Keynote
by , 3:45 PM EST, January 6th, 2005
During his keynote address for the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, NV, Bill Gates experienced not one, not two, but three Windows crashes and glitches while showing off new products.
The Las Vegas Sunreported that Mr. Gates first ran intro trouble when trying to connect a new Nikon digital SLR camera to a Windows Media Center Edition PC through a WiFi connection. The result, however, was a frozen computer that wouldn't respond. Two attempts later, however, the demonstration went off without a hitch.
The next one came during a demonstration of a new game called Forza Motor Sport, when the PC the game was being run on actually went directly to the famed Blue Screen of Death.
The third problem occurred when Mr. Gates was unable to get a Tablet PC to connect to the Internet.
All of the problems were met with good natured laughter from Mr. Gates and the audience, and Conan O'Brien, who was co-hosting the event, even quipped "OK, and right now nine people are being fired," during one of the crashes.
Earlier in the presentation, Mr. O'Brien also joked: "I got too drunk, I woke up with a hooker. Bill got too drunk, he woke up with an Apple computer."
His Windows troubles hearkened back to the days of Windows 98, when Bill Gates experienced a Blue Screen of Death during the Chicago Comdex keynote in 1998. That crash made headlines around the geek world, but did not slow the adoption of Windows in the market place.
Even Apple CEO Steve Jobs has had his share of trouble during a keynote presentation at Macworld Tokyo in 1999. Mr. Jobs was attempting to demonstrate the ability to network boot 50 iMacs from a central server, but the units simply didn't work.
More recently, an effort to connect a camera to a Mac on stage resulted in a similar failure during a Macworld keynote.
CloseViewName:macalexPosts: 4Joined: 23 Dec 2004 Thu Jan 06, 2005 5:28 pmSubject:
Even Apple CEO Steve Jobs has had his share of trouble during a keynote presentation at Macworld Tokyo in 1998. Mr. Jobs was attempting to demonstrate the ability to network boot 50 iMacs from a central server, but the units simply didn't work.
--
That's not true, I have a live recording of this presentation.
CloseViewName:Guest Thu Jan 06, 2005 5:43 pmSubject:
Quote
macalex wrote: Even Apple CEO Steve Jobs has had his share of trouble during a keynote presentation at Macworld Tokyo in 1998. Mr. Jobs was attempting to demonstrate the ability to network boot 50 iMacs from a central server, but the units simply didn't work.
I remember that and agree both (Steve & Bill) have had problems, but hooking up 50 iMacs is a little different then hooking up a digital camera. Give me mac problems any day of the week.
Aaahhhhhh...... a moment that will live in my memory for a long while. I shall and will humilate Windows drones with this highly amusing and all too factual and true article.
I have spent about 15 years working with IBM Compatable PC`s With both success and falure, I have recently moved to a Mac for the simple reason It works for me!! I do Video rendering and production and the Mac System works better for Me.......End of story
CloseViewName:Guest Thu Jan 06, 2005 10:18 pmSubject:
Quote
macalex wrote: Even Apple CEO Steve Jobs has had his share of trouble during a keynote presentation at Macworld Tokyo in 1998. Mr. Jobs was attempting to demonstrate the ability to network boot 50 iMacs from a central server, but the units simply didn't work.
--
That's not true, I have a live recording of this presentation.
That was in *1998*. This is *2005*. Even ignoring that, Gates' demo crash was in the course of a normal situation (playing the game, connecting to the internet), whereas have 50 computers running off the same server is not something most of us have ever or will ever do.
/shrug. Either way it sucks to have your big demo crash and have the mistake broadcasted over the net.
That was in *1998*. This is *2005*. Even ignoring that, Gates' demo crash was in the course of a normal situation (playing the game, connecting to the internet), whereas have 50 computers running off the same server is not something most of us have ever or will ever do.
I do it every single (week)day here at school and it works flawlessly. And that's on one 100Mb/s connection to the server, I can't wait to see the 1Gb/s arrive next week or so.......
NetBoot allows you to change the way machines start up in seconds, and no more local maintenance. It's just fabulous!
CloseViewName:macalexPosts: 4Joined: 23 Dec 2004 Fri Jan 07, 2005 4:43 amSubject: OS X Server
Let's look on this from the another side, it was 1999 OS X Server running on basicly G3 400Mhz streaming video to 49 iMac's over 100Mbit Ethernet.
I have a video of this presentation and there is no any problems with the server, just it's take a little time to stream video to all puppies. How long have been around Windows XP or whatever they have use in Bill Gates presentation?
The camera problem Steve Jobs had while trying to show off Image Capture was not his fault nor did it crash the Mac. The camera simply would not turn on at all. Jobs' assisant off stage couldn't even turn on the camera (unclear whether it was a simple dead battery situation).
A better example would have been when Jobs tried to demo Mac OS X's instant wake from sleep feature for PowerBooks and the demo one didn't wake up; that's embarassing.
The only sad thing I see in what happened is that no one is screaming loudly that a device we may soon ALL rely on (directly or indirectly) for daily life is that unstable.
If the lights or Cell service had gone down 3 times in the same time period, it would have made headlines.
Like it or not, Windows (even if solely because of the number of machines installed) is important (if not critical) to daily life and we need to put the "I am a nicer person than you are because I own a particular brand of computer" aside.
To me, this is the real Question of The Day:
If you had to try 3 times to get your car to start (even only 1 time a month) or it stopped unexpectedly on you, would you buy another of the same brand?
No need to wrte a reply just to protect your public (or private) ego or your public (or private) source of income, just think about it.
Especially as you load your children into the car; ask yourself what devices or critical public services that my children might require today rely on Windows (even if it is only for data entry). Will it work when their lives depend on it?
Windows is probably not the OS running on the "Main Server", but is it running on the terminals that must work properly to get to that data or to enter an emergency dispacth?
Every time we (as a public who votes with our dollars) just "laughs off" a public Windows failure, we move one step closer to accepting those kinds of failures everywhere, in Business in general and eventually in Medicine.
Has a Windows failure already cost a life? I don't know. If we are not careful, it may.
I recently took a tour of NORAD's NW Air Defense Sector and noticed they were running much of their air defense identification software on WinDells. I wondered if the Air Force would still be thankful they saved all that money when their computers crashed right in the middle of an air defense emergency.
CloseViewName:MacePosts: 9184Joined: 07 Aug 2003 Fri Jan 07, 2005 4:25 pmSubject:
Quote
AFCdtLoeb wrote: I recently took a tour of NORAD's NW Air Defense Sector and noticed they were running much of their air defense identification software on WinDells. I wondered if the Air Force would still be thankful they saved all that money when their computers crashed right in the middle of an air defense emergency.
Cadet AFCdtLoeb, listen up. Most big projects in a big organization fail because of the complexity of the organization but big projects will not fail publicly.
According to Charles Jade over at Ars Technica, who reported on the expo, Jobs got a system crash while using spotlight to do an images search for "love." I use OS X and XP Pro, and both are usually very stable. I use XP the most because my mac is really old. Now that I can get one for 500 bucks I'll be able to upgrade.
Anonymous wrote: According to Charles Jade over at Ars Technica, who reported on the expo, Jobs got a system crash while using spotlight to do an images search for "love." I use OS X and XP Pro, and both are usually very stable. I use XP the most because my mac is really old. Now that I can get one for 500 bucks I'll be able to upgrade.
Yep, I'm watching it on Quicktime, and around minute 12 or 13 or so, he's using spotlight and something freezes "it seems i have a little bug here" and he clicks a lot, nothing happens, but then he gets a series of beeps right on top of each other. Then he says "that's why we have backups" and switches computers (monitor the same, but probably just a different input), and the audience laughs. Sorry Steve, it still froze! (hehe, but I still hate Gates)
CloseViewName:otaojonesPosts: 158Joined: 07 Aug 2001 Wed Jan 12, 2005 1:22 amSubject: Oh well !!
hey it was an honest demo of the windows experience
my mac works flawlessly for months untill i try to show off a feature to a buddy then the weirdest stuff can happen (i think mac hates crowds)
I have never had a crash with my new PC, with Windows XP. It works fine, and I haven't seen a BSOD in years. On the other hand, at my work, we have iMacs, half of them running OS 9, and half running OS X. OS X works fine, for a Mac, most of the time. But, OS 9 is a mess. It takes forever to load up, and then it'll crash or say that it's not connected to the network, and blah blah blah. That only happens on this one OS 9 computer, that I happen to use from time to time. And OS X isn't perfect either. I would take a PC anyday, because all the Macs that I have worked with are unstable, and, excuse me for saying, pieces of crap. That's why they have a handle on top of iMacs, so you can easily throw them off of the roof. Thanks for reading!
TO ALL,
Listen, hear me, Feel Me.
Mac or Windows Gates or the other guy...WHo cares, they are making money, WE ARE NOT. So, for your information.
Systems crash all the time, and who cares, peple suck, and who cares. No one cares about your comments. I dont care about your comments. I dont care about Billy, or the other guy. I am writing this message from a PC and I dont care. In my Big university. Theres a small room for Mac's but A VERY BIG room for PC's. UHmmmm. I wonder WHY. Maybe MAC is to expensive, or maybe They sucka little, just a little more than PC's, BUt. Heres the twist to it, They dont care. If you go to a creative department PC's are not allowed. But Who cares.
The man WITH the BIG WORD
My pc will sometime be a little cranky but im not justganna go say boo Microsoft sucks (even though they do) because my pc is having a little problem instead go at fixing it. I also have mac problems likt the damn rosetta on the new intel macs mine will some times #@!$ up for no reason
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