This is a VERY LONG post. Sorry about that. But I felt that each of ZzzKing's points deserved a thoughtful, complete response.
ZzzKing:
And that is why I purchased it, because of the Mac support. Got it a couple of days ago, no Mac support, and I've heard promises before. I've never owned any of your products, though. Maybe your company is different.
We try to be very approachable, responsive (it's 1:46 am as I write this), and honest. And I most certainly think we are "different".
The fact that we actually have Mac software sitting on our web site should at least prove that we are not totally BS-ing you. We began shipping the Sensus Ultra as soon as the Windows software was ready. If we had waited for the Mac software, you wouldn't even have your recorder yet. I think this decision was reasonable, and if anything it puts more pressure on us to get the update finished promptly.
ZzzKing:
And thus I can't use my PDA in the interim.
I'm really sorry about that. You'll just have to wait for word from us on our handheld software roadmap. It will take time.
ZzzKing:
MacOS doesn't now, nor has it ever, included serial devices. Don't believe me, try hooking up a state-of-the-art, Windows 95 compatible mouse to your Powerbook. I can't seem to find a port on mine to do that. Maybe you have a custom built one.
I beg to differ. Macs DID in fact have serial ports in the form of an 8-pin Mini-DIN connector. In true Mac style, it used the RS-422 standard which is more robust than the PC's RS-232. This was a standard feature for a long time.
As an engineer, I think the recent push to kill off the serial port is a major mistake. The serial port does not harm anything, except in the weak sense that it "clutters" the back of someone's PC/Mac. There is NO valid technical reason to remove it and many good ones to keep it.
Technical argument aside...if you do not have a serial port, you simply use a USB-Serial adapter. They work great on PCs and Macs.
ZzzKing:
I haven't bought a periphoral in more than five years that had a driver that was incompatible with my OS. I plug them in and they work. This is definitely NOT the case with my office PC, however.
I've got to disagree with you here too. We used to recommend that users without serial ports go out and buy a USB adapter off the shelf. But it turns out that there are LOTS of such adapters that come with lousy drivers that don't install properly, don't work, or worse...work intermittently.
What will surprise you even more: we had the most driver complaints from OS X users. Each OS X revision tends to break the low-level system drivers and many adapter manufacturers are very slow to update them. It was a nightmare.
The ONLY reason that we sell a USB adapter on our web site ourselves is so that we can guarantee it (and support it) on all of our supported OSes. No problems since then.
ZzzKing:
My Treo 650 must be one of the 1%.
Actually, it's one of the 99%. The Treo 650 has a serial port. But like most PDAs, you need the appropriate serial cable to access it. Lots of companies make them. For instance:
http://www.pcables.com/prod1.html
These cables are painfully expensive and I have not tried them all (hence cannot guarantee that they work), but they are the ONLY OPTION. As I said before, you cannot connect your USB sync cable to a USB device, even if our recorder was USB. Two USB slave devices cannot speak to eachother.
When it comes to PDA support, early models like the Palm m100 are the best. They come with a serial sync cable in the box, and work flawlessly. I have often suggested going to eBay and picking one up for $20 (or less!) just for dive data analysis. At that price, you'll probably feel much safer taking it on a dive boat where it might get trashed.
ZzzKing:
The added speed of Firewire is wasted on everything except audio and video but that doesn't mean it only gets used for those.
I mentioned the speed issue because I am often asked about it. I merely meant that there was no particular incentive to use USB on the basis of speed.
ZzzKing:
I just bought a cheap-*ss USB card reader for less than $15. It must not add a whole lot to the cost or they wouldn't be able to sell it for that.
I have one of those too. So do about 20,000,000 other people.
When you manufacture in that kind of volume, components become dirt cheap. We manufacture in the low 1000's and do not get much of a break at all. The volume pricing difference can be as much as 5:1 on some electronic components. Huge.
It is much more cost-effective for us to resell a prefab USB-Serial adapter then to incorporate similar electronics in our device itself. In the end the user would still have to install a driver, so there is no overhead or added complexity with the separate adapter. In fact, by getting the USB adapter separately, you have a perfectly good serial port at your disposal, not a proprietary download dongle. Proprietary is not our style.
ZzzKing:
There are certain technically oriented groups on here that may dispute your logic on that (they would be the "more points of failure" folks) but all I have to say is, if 9 is better than 4, then why aren't 9 faster than 4?
I think you missed the "
". That line was supposed to be a
joke.
ZzzKing:
Sorry for the rant but I have been excitedly awaiting the arrival for over a month and want to play with my new toy. Technically I have played with it since I have taken it on a couple of dives. PLEASEPLEASEPLEASEPLEASEPLEASE hurry with the updated software so I can see what I did on those dives.
If I were you I'd probably be anxious too. But consider yourself lucky...we had pre-orders dating back to October of 2005, so you are a relative newcomer.
The Mac update is currently our top priority. We are working REALLYREALLYREALLYREALLY quickly to finish it. But we do not rush software development. It will be done soon.
Kris Wilk
ReefNet Inc.
