IBM and Nintendo Partner on Dolphin

CuriousGeorge113 writes "IBM and Nintendo recently anounced a partnership worth $1Billion where IBM will design a new 400MHZ processor for Nintendo's new Dolphin system acheduled for release by X-Mas 2000. Read more here. " What's really cool is the Dolphin system-they want to make this thing the center of your entertainment unit-DVD, CD, as well as hooking up to the Internet.

Comments

Will Nintendo use discs for games?

[Anonymous Coward]

Is nintendo going to use a disc or a cartridge for their games?

Re:Will Nintendo use discs for games?

[Millennium]

I'd like to see the numbers Square used to figure out that $1000+" bit. I'd imagine they're just plain wrong. Would FF7 be a pricey cartridge? Yeah. But over a thousand? No way.

Here's the thing about carts, and this is why Nintendo has stuck with them until now. CD's hold more (though the gap is closing), and they're dirt cheap. However, they're much easier to pirate than carts, and they're sloooooooooooow, especially when comkpared to carts.
Carts have the advantage in that they're a great deal faster, they're harder to pirate, and they're much more durable (as a kid I did all kinds of things to my carts, including running over then with a bike and sending them through the washing machine, which would have killed a CD).

DVD solves the speed issue; it's really still too slow (at least in my opinion) to make it particularly suitable for any game but an RPG, but it's almost there, and certainly much closer than CD's ever were. Plus, you can start with advanced encryption and other such things, helping to solve the piracy issue. I don't know what Nintendo's going to do about the piracy to make it as piracy-resistant as they claim, though; perhaps it'll start punching holes in the disk in strategic locations which are different for each game?

Not only that, but carts aren't going to catch up to DVDs capacity-wise for a long time to come. That's more than enough to outshine the durability issue.

So then you come to the last issue, and the only other advantage carts still have over DVD's: portability. Yes, I know you can stick a DVD in your pocket (it'd have to be a big pocket, yes, but you can). But just try sticking the DVD player in your pocket. Those would have to be huge pockets to pull that off, especially if you had to add a screen and controller to the mix.

So I think that from this point on, carts will be relegated to the portable systems. However, don't rule them out just yet. Never know when the next huge advance in solid-state technology will come out...

Re:Will Nintendo use discs for games?

[Hermelin]

DVD disc with security by Masushita (sp?)

But you can bet they are trying to figure out some rewritability feature into it. That is the only real thing that could hurt Sony hardware wise.

Think - real life looking Pokemon. God help us all. Psy-duck?

Re:Will Nintendo use discs for games?

[SuperRob]

Nintendo stuck with carts for 3 main reasons. 1) They can control the manufacturing process. 2) They are more kid-friendly. 3) They make massive $$$ off the chip-fabs. But DVD's can store ridiculous amounts of data. It was the only way to go.

Re:Will Nintendo use discs for games?

[tono]

In the press releases they say DVD. Poor Nintendo has always been set on carts. Now they realized the error of their ways when FF7 would have cost over 1000 dollars to put on cartridge. ;)

Re:Will Nintendo use discs for games?

[tono]

They figured it out by using the fact the game encompased three cd's at 650 meg's a pop thats 1950 megabytes. The carts the N64 uses hold roughly 32 Megabytes each and that's the large ones so 1950/32=61 cartridges with each cart priced around 60-70 dollars for list price that makes 4265 dollars by my account.. Square and Sony were being very generous with their understatement. And that, is how they arrived at the cost.

Re:Will Nintendo use discs for games?

[m3000]

Yes, Nintendo will use DVD as a way to get more developers to the system. Many developers cough*square*cough didn't want to develop for the N64 because of the limitations of cartridges. Now they won't have a reason. And as to the post above this, Nintendo still hasn't annonced everything about it, so a hard drive type thing could still be a possibility.

Re:Will Nintendo use discs for games?

[m3000]

There's a flaw in that reasoning though. It wouldn't cost $60 bucks a cart. Probally only $30 or so per cart. The reason it's $60 bucks now is for all the packaging, the product advertising, and the fact your only buying one. That's why FFVII doesn't cost $120. It's only $40. A developer can also put in a bunch of space into one cart, the reason the limit at the moment is at 32 Megs is cost. I'm sure there is a limit somewhere, but it wouldn't take 61 cartridges. So I'm guesstimating about 10. Using the above examples, it would bring a total cost to: $300

So is Sony

[Anonymous Coward]

I was looking through a free local job search mag (unemployment gets boring) and I saw an ad from Sony's Silicon Valley operation. There were a couple listings for embedded systems programmers for set-top boxes, including one listing requiring experience writing 3D libraries. Draw your own conclusions.

Full of it!

[Anonymous Coward]

Speaking as someone who played PS2 proto backstage at E3, you are completely full of it! Yes, its good.. But it's not better then consumer level 3D ards for PC..

To get to Toy story level requires an amount of hand tuning of the scences that isn't possible in a real time video game.

Nuon

[Anonymous Coward]

I hear you. Now that most of the movies I like are on DVD I've been keeping my tape purchases to the $6.99 cheapies in anticipation of going digital, too. I really want a DVD player, but I've been waiting for one with the Nuon chipset by VMLabs to come into production. If Nintendo beats them to market, well then I guess I'll go with Nintendo.

This gets a score of 1???

[Anonymous Coward]

I mean who is moderating this. Threshold at one should eliminate any type of stupid ranting like this. Time for some new moderators.

Re:This gets a score of 1???

[Yarn]

heh, if the other moderators are like me, they've run out of moderation points.

I do agree with you though.

IBM and Video Games

[Anonymous Coward]

BE CAREFULL NINTENDO!
The last time IBM was used to promote/invest in a console system the ATARI JAGUAR was born!

I heard that Magnavox is bringing the CD-I back ;-)

Re:IBM and Video Games

[Anonymous Coward]

My idea of CD-I is the Philips box used to play Digital Music eXpress discs at work. Red book CDs won't play in this machine for some reason.

Re:IBM and Video Games

[Anonymous Coward]

The thing that killed the jaguar was ataria no the fact that ibm was involved i ahve a jag its a nice games sysetm wiht good graphics but it lacked game anda powerfull company behind it if say Sega or NinTendo had luached the jag it would of been a hit with the advertising budget

Re:Sounds like a computer to me

[Anonymous Coward]

Hello! Console games are designed to look and play good on the tv screen.
Would Gran Turismo gain much from an increase in resolution? I think not.

Oh, and the european TV standard PAL is actually better than NTSC, it is slightly higer rez (720by540 or something vs 640by480) and has a higher contrast ratio. Only the refresh rate is worse than NTSC (50 vs 60hz).

Two questions

[Anonymous Coward]

1. What platform will they be developing on?
2. If they want to include Internet access they'll need some kind of OS. What will it be?

Re:Two questions

[Anonymous Coward]

Note the subtle difference between developing FOR Nintendo and devoloping ON some workstation. Or are you trying to suggest that they'll use the game consoles to host a full blown development environment?

Re:Two questions

[m3000]

What do you mean what platform. The topic says it it self. Nintendo?!?! As for the OS, it's undecided, but if someone says Linux again, I think I'll scream. Why in the heck would a console need a full blown OS? It doesn't. It'll probally be something really simple that Nintendo makes themselves.

Re:Two questions

[m3000]

Sorry, I miss understood you. It really is a subtle difference. In that case, I have no idea.

Re:Dolphin?!

[Anonymous Coward]

Seeing as how he added a "{grin}" after his comment on IBM using a Dolphin adapter it's pretty obvious that it was a joke. He was just making fun of some shitty hardware that IBM made.

Um -- Der -- Ar!

[Anonymous Coward]

heh, the last time IBM and a game company combined forces, the Atari Jaguar was produced.. haha

The last time someone left a post like this it was answered to...

I hereby give you a citizen's -1, in case the moderator is too busy reading that spec post a few messages back.

Wow, yesterdays technology tomorrow

[Anonymous Coward]

Hmm. So now we can have the technology of last year just in time for next year's Christmas? Oh, but it will be for a fraction of the cost! So will 400mhz computers by then...

Re:Wow, yesterdays technology tomorrow

[Anonymous Coward]

400 MHz CPU is not the whole story. Current Sony PS only has the CPU equivalent of a 486/33 yet its graphics still rock. Also Nintendo's new 200MHz graphics chip will be clocked faster than the TNT2, Rage128, or Voodoo3.

Re:Wow, yesterdays technology tomorrow

[SuperRob]

Check your facts ... the IBM chip and Sony's Emotion Engine can pull more FLOPS than the Intel processor. It's truly bleeding edge stuff. Also, DVD is NOT mainstream yet, even if you have it. Most consumers have not jumped on the bandwagon. A game console at $200 is the perfect way to do it.

Re:all-in-one won't happen

[Anonymous Coward]

By hardcore gamers I assume you mean those people with no lives. Seriously, when I was in pre teen age I sure did a lot more game playing than I do now. Most of us kind of grow out of it at a certain age. (This however does not mean we give up game playing entirely.)

I do think that in the years to come you will find set top boxes that replace computers for most people. The reason for this will be simple, less money to work with. How many people can really afford to upgrade their computer every six months?

When and if this does happen, and it will. I would look for the downfall of popular Wintel mags that push trash like Maximum PC and PC Accelerator. Let's face it they are basically both gaming mags on steroids.

This however does not mean that some people won't use classic computers. It just more likely that set boxes and palm devices will be more popular.

The Amiga never sold for $300 in its prime.

[Anonymous Coward]

An Amiga was much more than $300 back in the 80s(It was around $800 if I remember correctly). A better analogy would be the the Atari 400/800 and C64 machines. They both sold for around $200 and used a TV for display. The Atari 400 was nothing more than a programmable version of the 5200. The games on those machines kicked the PCs ass up until 1990 or so when VGA and the Ad Lib/Soundblaster appeared(Whatever happened to Ad Lib???). Yes, PCs were hideously expensive back then. I have old magazines listing 10mb hard drives for $3,000 and 486/25 machines for $10,000(circa 1989). The only difference back then is that your purchase didn't go obsolete as quite as fast as it does now. Back to the Amiga thing, when I was first considering upgrading from my C64 in 1990 I looked at both the Amiga and the PC. The Amiga had better games then, but I could see their market was on the decline. The PC on the other hand was rapidly gaining market share and improving technologically. I chose a PC as I thought it was the best in terms of a long term investment. I still am an avid gamer at the age of 29, but haven't owned a console since 1982(An Intellivision, the only console I ever owned). Console games always seemed to lack the depth of the PC games I love(Strategy, RPGs, Simulations, Flight Sims, etc). That and I hate playing games on a TV set. PCs were always much more versatile as a tool, as well as a lifestyle. I can play games, but I can also do 3D graphics/animation, write papers, send e-mail, surf the web, play MP3s, etc, etc, etc..

demoroniser

[Anonymous Coward]

Check http://www.fourmilab.ch/webtools/demoroniser/ . It explains the problem and gives a script that fixes it.

Basically, these pages do not use the standard latin-1 encoding. They use a proprietary M$ "addition" to latin-1. But the pages say they use latin-1, and so Netscape tries to use a latin-1 font, which on Windows has their propietary extra characters but on UNIX have nothing. So, Netscape puts the question marks to show that it has found an invalid character (which is right according to the standards).

Even if the pages specified the right character set, it wouldn't show "correctly". What you're complaining about is the "smart quotes", and they don't exist on latin-1 fonts. If they existed in Unicode, it would be possible to translate. I do not know much about this part of the issue, but xfree86 fonts seem to be mainly latin-1 only.

So this is a "Set-Top-Box"?

[gavinhall]

Posted by d106ene5:

Wow, after hearing so much about them, and how everyone who's anyone is building or providing parts for them, its nice to hear about one eactually existing. The term "set-top-box" has been bandied about by (up to this point), mostly flailing/failing companies looking for a yet-to-exist market that they can claim leadership in, in order to appease shareholders shortly before delivering a disastrous quarterly report.

Reminds me of previous Netscape press releases -

"We're a browser company"
(Netscape loses browser war)
"We're a server company"
(Netscape loses server war)
"We're an enterprise software company"
(Netscape never actually enters enterprise war)
"We're a portal"
(Netscape tries but never seriously challenges Yahoo)
"We're being acquired by AOL!"

Cool.APPLE are you listening?

[Sleepy]

I've been waiting for a DVD application that makes me really go out and buy one. I've been holding off on buying any movies on tape for 18 months in anticipation of going digital.

The problem with the current line of DVD players is they don't add anything to distinguish one from the other - just an extra output or something trivial like that. I want something like a reasonably priced set-top box but also runs software. I'd been hoping Apple would do something like this - a computer like the iMac but without a monitor... just plug it into the TV like an old Atari computer. Looks like Nintendo will get my dollar first..

What I really would like tho is an open, programmable system - a semi-real computer but plays movies and music with the same push-button real-world interface everybody knows. I'm sure one could get the Nintendo SDK - but really that's not open enough for me.To illustrate why, I ALMOST bought a Playstation when the PSXAmp guys announced they were developing an MP3 player for the Playstation. Sure, I have MP3 on my Mac and Linux, but a "real world" interface is something most hardware manufacturers have lost sight of. I don't consider dropping a DVD decoder in a Gateway PC with a whirring fan to be "convergence" -- the implimentation is as important as the technology.

Re:Cool.APPLE are you listening?

[grossdog]

Why not try a Powerbook G3 with a DVD drive and decoder and a remote control app. I've used mine to play movies (on the lcd screen) and have hooked it up to my TV. A friend has a remote control that works with his. DVD player is scriptable. Sure, it's a damn expensive DVD player but, oh yeah, you get a computer too.

Oh, it also happens to play pretty much any other digital media you can throw at it. But, the cool thing is, all the executives with their toshibas and tiny lcds at airports who look at this thing with green envy. I digress, but it funny.

--Andrew Grossman
grossdog@dartmouth.edu

Re:Sounds like a computer to me

[A Life in Hell]

It's like the old amiga was in the 1980's.... you could buy an IBM PC for $5000, or you could buy an amiga for $300, which would kick it's ass for playing games on (lets face it, thats why we buy pent-ii's), and yet you can still do a bit of wordprocessing/web surfing on it.
Now, i'm a coder, I need a real computer (Okay, the amiga was/is, but it's an analogy guys :). But my cousin who just plays quake and web browses would be much better served by this, at about 1/10 of the price.

Nintendo Dolphin == IBM Blue Logic + iMac

[Douglas]

First posted on www.xlr8yourmac.com:

IBM recently has entered the custom CPU business with it's Blue Logic
library of CPU cores and peripherals. The following is a possible
combination of IBM's currently available cores that would be perfect
for Apple to use in a low cost portable.

This chip would allow a 3 chip motherboard with more features than the
current G3 350/DVD/MPEG Tower systems.

Note: even though the CPU is only running at 200mhz the integrated
peripherals would probably yeild performance better than a 266mhz
PowerBook G3. For maximum performance, the PPC 405 core can be replaced
by an external 333-466mhz Copper G3 CPU attached to the 60x bus/memory
controller.


PPC 405 CPU core (equivalent to an EC603E CPU)
66mhz 60x CPU bus/memory controller interface
2 independant on chip 64bit/66mhz I/O busses with crossbar switch
2 independant 64bit/66mhz memory controllers
1 32bit/33mhz Onchip Peripheral Bus
1.2 Gigabyte/sec internal I/O data transfer rate (2x 528Mb/sec + 133Mb/sec)

4 to 6 DIMM slots:
2 SDRAM DIMMs up to 256meg main memory
1-2 SGRAM DIMMs up to 32meg video texture and MPEG memory
1-2 SGRAM DIMMs (on ATI RAGE 128 LC) up to 32meg video memory

64bit/33mhz PCI bus
AGP 2x Graphics bus


Bus 1 PLB:
200mhz PPC 405 CPU
32k ICache/32k DCache
66mhz 60x bus interface
66mhz SDRAM controller
8 channel DMA controller
PLB/PLB crossbar switch
PLB/OPB bridge
PLB Arbiter
64bit/33mhz PCI bridge

Bus 2 OPB:
Timers
MPIC
GPIO
I2C
100baseT Ethernet
OPB Arbiter

Bus 3 PLB:
66mhz SGRAM controller
8 channel DMA controller
PLB/PLB crossbar switch
C54X DSP coprocessor
400Mbps Firewire
MPEG
MPEG AC-3 Audio
PLB Arbiter
AGP 2x bridge


Note: the following diagram displays correctly in a fixed width font like courrer.

66mhz
60xbus66mhz
SDRAMSGRAM
||
+==============|================================ |==========================+
|PPC60xbusmemory|
|Memorycontlercontler|
||||
|PPC405CPU--+----------PLB/Crossbar----------+-- C54xDSP-------{Serialout-
|200mhz||16kdataram/64kcoderam|
|32kICache|||
|32kDCache|32/33OPB+--400MbpsFirewire{1394i/o-
|+----PLB/OPB--+--EthernetSCP||
||||+--MPEGVideoDecoder|
||Timers--+--EthernetMAL||
||||+--MPEGAC-3Audio-{Audioout-
||GPIO----+--EthernetMAC||
|8channelDMA-+|||+--8channelDMAcontroller|
|||I2C--+--EthernetPHY||
|PLBArbiter--+||||+--PLBArbiter|
||||MPIC|||
|PLB/PCI|||100baseTPLB/AGP|
|64/33|||EthernetAGP2x|
|PCIbus||||||
+==============|======|==|===|========+========= |==========================+
||||||
ViaVT82C686ATIRage128LC
SouthbridgeAGP2xVideo
SuperI/O




The PPC 405 CPU core is equivalent to the PPC EC603E (no FP unit).
The FP unit core is not yet available in the Blue Logic library.

PLB: Processor Local Bus, 64bit, 66mhz split transaction on chip CPU bus.
OPB: On Chip Peripheral Bus, 32bit, 33mhz peripheral attachment bus
(similar to a PCI bus).
DMA: 2 - 8 channel intelligent DMA controllers with chained discriptors.
Timers: 5 multi purpose counter/timers.
GPIO: 32 General Purpose I/O lines.
I2C: I2C serial port for sensing SDRAM confifguration and/or
configuring peripheral chips.
MPIC: Imbedded Programmable Interrupt Controller (OpenPIC compliant)
with 32 interrupt inputs and 4 interrupt outputs.
SCP: Serial Communications Processor (subset of the 68302 SCP).
MAL: Memory Access Layer (Logical Level API for serial communications).
MAC: 100baseT Ethernet Media Access Controller.
PHY: 100baseT Physical Media Controller.
C54X: C54x Digital Signal Processor, binary compatible with TI C54x
(16k data ram, 64k code ram).
Firewire: 400Mbps Fire Wire plus MPEG sequencer
(allows playing MPEG encoded video streams from a Firewire DVCam).
MPEG: MPEG video decoder, MPEG audio layer 3 and Dolby AC-3 audio.
AGP 2x: AGP 2x port for video controller.
PCI64: 64bit, 66/33mhz PCI controller (PCI 2.2 compatible)

VIA: Via technologies VT82C686 Super South Bridge
SoundBlaster Pro Hardware and Direct Sound Ready
Integrated AC-97 2.0 (meets PC98 (TM) Basic Audio spec.)
- Dual full-duplex Direct Sound channels between system memory
and AC97 link
- PCI master interface with scatter / gather and bursting capability
- 32 byte FIFO of each direct sound channel
- Host based sample rate converter and mixer
- Standard v1.0 or v2.0 AC97 Codec interface for single or
cascaded AC97 Codec's from multiple vendors
- Loopback capability for re-directing mixed audio streams into
USB and 1394 speakers
- Hardware assisted FM synthesis for legacy compatibility
- Direct two game ports and one MIDI port interface
Integrated Super I/O:
FDC,
ECP/EPP parallel port,
2 serial ports,
IRDA port with seperate 3rd serial port
Voltage, temperature, and fan speed hardware monitoring
UDMA/33 / ATA-66
Advanced mobile PC power management
Supports ATAPI compliant devices including DVD devices
USB
ACPI

ATI Rage: ATI Rage 128 LC (for Digital LCD screens)

Re:Dolphin?! Nintendwave 2000! "Error dialing out.

[Drakino]

Bye bye SGI? The makers of the graphics system in the N64 left SGI, but yet again are making the system for the N2000... The CPU isn't as central as it is in a PC. Remember the Amiga archetecture? Thats what consoles are like. And for those who don't remember, Amigas used a few processors on the mainboard, all with specific tasks like graphics.

-----

Something new already?

[dwlemon]

The N64 has only been around for a little while.

Does anybody remember the NES? It had an 8 bit
processor that ran at about 1.7 MHz. At first they developed games like Mario Bros. and Donkey Kong. But after years of innovation on the platform, the NES, in it's old age, is running colorful, beautiful games such as Solstice, and the Kirby games which push the system to it's utmost limit.

Also there are the classics like Blaster Master and Metroid which have playability which shines even today, and they were created in the NES's earlier years. (I'm only listing a fraction of the quality games on the NES.)

Maybe this sounds extremely nerdy: but I think the time I spent playing through games for weeks on end -- keeping passwords and making maps.. of a personal journey through worlds where the focus was on perseverance and skill, rather than 5 minutes of cheap graphical thrills (like all these sports or rocket-blasting racing games today) -- was an important thing for building character.

Yet since Zelda: The Ocarina of Time is finished, serious development for the N64 must come to a grinding halt. Innovation in video game programming and playability is dead, and so the only solution for these people is new hardware.

So.. thanks and no thanks, Nintendo.

Re:Something new already?

[SuperRob]

"The N64 has only been around for a little while." Check your facts. The N64 was released in the US September of 94 ... five years ago. The standard life span of a console is about 5 years. Which means that N64 has about 2 years left before Dolphin supplants it. That's a longer lifespan than even the SNES had. Third Parties don't even have dev kits yet, btw. Also, your comments are clearly colored by the fact that you were still an unjaded child when you played on your NES. Times have changed, and while there isn't a lot of originality left, there is some. Many original ideas have come and gone, but the classics still shine, only because they were the first. Some great stuff was shown at E3 ... you'll see.

Re:Something new already?

[SuperRob]

Whoops ... You're right ... I meant 96. My bad. I was in a hurry typing. Anyway, I've had three different jobs in the N64's life span, covering 4 years. It will be five years (probably 6) before the N64 is replaced. That's still an excellent life span, and I have to add ... better than most PC's these days.

Re:Something new already?

[m3000]

Your mistaken. The release date of the N64 in the US was September 29, 1996. The N64 has had a short life, but I don't think they should delay the Dolphin because of it. Part of the reason they didn't do so well was because it came so late after the PSX. They can't afford to be the last one to a new console again.

Re:Something new already?

[m3000]

Hahaha, that's a good point. PC's are always improving, and it gets expensive after a while. Or I can buy a N64 and use it for a couple of years, with game graphics constantly improving as techniques get better. BTW, do you work for Boss? I'm REALLY looking forward to WDC and I loved TGR so keep up the good work! : )

Other links about Dolphin

[Grenamier]

This story has been out a couple of days at NGO.

Nintendo has Dolphin Running at E3
Ten Things You Must Know About Dolphin
Next Generation Nintendo System Announced

Re:Other links about Dolphin

[SuperRob]

Don't forget Operation N2000

Re:Other links about Dolphin

[m3000]

And another one that tells the whole transcript Howard Lincoln's Press Transcript IGN64

Re:Other links about Dolphin

[m3000]

Some more links to various other sources
IGN64
Nintendojo
More Nintendojo
Nintendo

Dolphin?!

[jerodd]

I sure hope this doesn't mean IBM is going to use their accursed Dolphin multimedia adapter. {grin} The Mwave 2780DSP is the worse curse that satan has yet sent to us. ``Lord, save us from the Mwave, and lead us not near Dolphin adapters.'' (The Dolphin is what comes with the Aptiva, and makes its modem and audio subsystem malfunction).

Cheers, as always,
Joshua.

Re:Dolphin?!

[m3000]

I have no idea what the heck a Dolphin adapter is, but I can tell you, no, it's probally not going to use it. It's just a code name, not anything official. Like Project Reality was to the N64.

Re:Name

[grossdog]

nice enough?

It might be more appropriate to say that Intel chips aren't _completely_ horrible. IBM knows what's up with chip design and fab. Unfortunately, their consumer marketing and resistance (in the past) to enter/leverage partnerships sorta torpedoed the ppc (as far as market dominance goes).
why not "IBM makes nice enough commercials too."

--Andrew Grossman
grossdog@dartmouth.edu

Re:Sounds like a computer to me

[Anonymous Female]

Oh yeah? What about the Intellivision keyboard? :)

DVD

[IceFox]

Well it isn't just going to be a gaming system. They are hoping to make it a lot more. This means that Sony might make the PS2 be able to play DVD's out of the box if Nintendo is going to have a system 8 months down the line that does. This I hope is what will happen.

hehe

[lord_dArk]

heh, the last time IBM and a game company combined forces, the Atari Jaguar was produced.. haha

Re:ZDNet Questionable Reporting

[norn]

FWIW, I looked on my FreeBSD machine with netscape 4.6 and it showed ?Dolphin?, but if I use my Windows machine it's "Dolphin". I've seen this before, and i think you're right. It's something to do with the font.

Name

[Jonas �berg]

Gekko? Well, they certainly decided on a good name anyway :)
Seriously though, I expect this was great for IBM. Anyone know how their stock-prices went? I would have guessed Nintendo would team up with Intel, but I suppose IBM makes nice enough chips too.

Re:Name

[Jonas �berg]

Yes, you might be right. Personally I've always been a sucker for CISCs, but I'd have to agree on that RISCs can be kind of cute too.

Re:Name

[tono]

Intel makes CISC architecture chips which run too hot to put in a gaming platform, the only logical thing to do is run an Altivec RISC chip to power the Dolphin. I'm assuming the chip will be based on the G4 PowerPC instead of the G3. Beside's the G3 is faster than an equal megahertz P3 it would make no sense to use Intel.

Just my 2 cents

Duplicate story

[nd]

This story was already posted a few days ago here.

Re:Duplicate story

[SuperRob]

A lot of us were at E3 at the time, and didn't see it.

IBM's stock price

[beamin]

As an IBMer, I was very pleased to see the stock price up by $20 per share following this announcement.

Re:all-in-one won't happen

[Freon]

PSX is not considered a hardcore gamer's system because Sony itself makes great games (although SCEA has produced respectable basketball, football and hockey games) but because they were able to promote their system well enough to get a large 3rd party base which DOES produce great games, i.e. Square (final fantasy), Namco (tekken, ridge racer), Eidos (tomb raider), and Capcom (resident evil, street fighter).

The problem with Nintendo is that they have 2 things: Shigeru Miyamoto, responsible for Zelda and Mario (both of which i loved), and Rare with Goldeneye. This, coupled with Nintendo's reluctance to put their little golden star on anything even remotely offensive, and their minimum order of 1 million carts (at $35 a pop) per publisher, results in a serious lack of 3rd party titles that break any real ground.

Finally, remember that people shared the same enthusiasm for Matsushita's (well, 3DO's, but thats another story) M2, Atari's 'its 64bit, really!' Jaguar, etc... My point is, we have to remember that when you try to juggle too many balls, you're eventually gonna drop one. I wouldn't want to wake up and find that the only software titles i can get for my 128bit, 8 million bilinear phong shaded reflective mapped triple z-buffered mipmapped triangles per second machine is 'Look At Johnny Add!' and MSIE4.

all-in-one won't happen

[Freon]

Yamauchi may be a stubborn, crotchety old man, but he will not let his company release a product that has had THIS poor of a response in the past, even if his company is nintendo. CD-i: dead. 3DO: dead. NetLink: dead. X-Band: dead. While Nintendo attacked the grade-schooler and preteen with N64, Sony attacked hardcore gamers, and guess what, Sony has some 65% of the market share, compared with Nintendo's 30%, and Sega's 5% (that's is what happens when you jam an extra processor in the chipset and forget to write any good libraries). So Sony has shown us that the hardcore gamers rule the market. And what do hardcore gamers want? Not edutainment, net access through an analog controller, and Titanic on DVD. They want a company they know is committed to games. While the Sony and Nintendo have not completely shown their respective hands, right now the only company that i have seen that seems to have it right is Sega: impressive hardware, good libraries, good 3rd party titles, and as always their phenomenal arcade division (I love you AM3). Now if only they can release Sony's grip on Squaresoft...

Re:all-in-one won't happen

[m3000]

I find it funny you mention the PSX is for hard core gamers. I find the N64 more to that tune. PSX had great marketing. They made it seem "cool" to have a Playstation. That's why they are ahead. Of course, Nintendo made the mistake of having mostly games that would be called "kiddie" by the average public. This gave them a bad image and made them seem "uncool", another thing in Sony's favor. Real gamers don't care if a game is kiddie or not. They play a game for what it is. And hardcore gamers do not make up the market. They are a very small percentage. That's why Southpark 64 (which I've heard sucks from just about every website) is selling so well, because the general public thinks: Southpark, it must be good. And they think it's good, because it's Southpark and it's cool.

Also interesting to note that you say gamers want a company interested in games. Is Sony a good game maker? No, Nintendo is one of the best game developers there is. Coupled with Rare, I think you get a great system that is for the games. And I'm sorry if you think gamers don't net access or DVD, because I guess you won't be buying a next-generation system. All of them will have those features, they are coming.

Oh, and one final thought. You state the Dolphin had a poor response. I don't know your definition of poor, but I think it's had a great reception. Everyone seems to love this machine. It has everything the PSX2 has, and more.

Re:ZDNet Questionable Reporting

[SEWilco]

No, it is not the question mark (Information) icon. In this article it is nonstandard characters which my browser shows as question marks around those words. Obviously quotation marks are intended, but quotation mark characters or encoding were not used.

These pages explain this MS problem:

• On the use of some MS Windows characters in HTML
• demoroniser - correct moronic and gratuitously incompatible Microsoft HTML

ZDNet Questionable Reporting

[SEWilco]

I see again the moronized character set has ZDNet questioning its facts. Its saying "?Dolphin.?" and "?Gecko?" makes it hard to read and to identify whether they are not sure of their facts, whether there is a question being asked, or whether they are using a nonstandard character set.

Re:ZDNet Questionable Reporting

[SuperRob]

The Question marks supposedly link you to definitions of the term in question. Lots of sites use this.

Re:Dolphin?! Nintendwave 2000! "Error dialing out.

[goomba]

heheh.. The MWave is truely the crappiest piece
of hardware ever created. Thats pretty much well
know for everyone who has done anything with computers. If they dont try integrating all this
crap into one chip, we'll be okay, otherwise, byebye Nintendo. Again.

BTW, N2000 better be faster than the PSX2, which
is doing realtime BETTER than Toy Story quality
3D (seen it in action, trust me, it gives ANYONE
a huge woody. They could make movies with this engine! Byebye SGI!)

Netscape lost the browser war?

[tono]

This is certainly news to me. What with Gecko on the horizon and all. I should keep up with the times I suppose.

Scary thoughts

[tono]

The Sega Dreamcast has Windows CE as its core OS.

So what?

[First Post]

It's a good article anyways, with more info.

Sounds like a computer to me

[JimDabell]

"...they want to make this thing the center of your entertainment unit-DVD, CD, as well as hooking up to the Internet."

Oh, you mean like a computer does? Let's face it, with all the console makers out to add more and more functionality to their consoles, they are aspiring to what computer-owners have had for ages. Nintendo wants to break into the computer market with a dumbed-down PC.

If I want to buy something to write an email on, I'll buy a computer.
If I want to buy something to play games on, I'll buy a computer.

Sounds like Nintendo have finally noticed what's happening with the computer games industry. What's the point of having hi-res 3d games, if they are only going to be displayed on a TV?

Jim, who's seen this coming since the MarioPaint Mouse was released.

Re:Sounds like a computer to me

[JimDabell]

OK, I'll agree, computers are more expensive, and yeah, like I said, what they are aiming for would be "dumbed down" compared with computers. But I don't agree with you when you say that consoles are better for games. Not at all.

At the end of the day, whatever the console does has to be piped through a TV. And for many countries (like the UK, where I live), the standard TV is awful quality for anything other than watching TV.
And when it comes to crashing, blame Microsoft. I really ought to make that my sig sometime. COMPUTERS DON'T CRASH. The software does.

It would be better for them if they ported an already available OS, such as Linux or *BSD, removed half the code, such as that relating to filesystems and hardware, wrote their own drivers, and bundled it as firmware.

Obviously, you wouldn't have to install anything, because it would all come on dvd or whatever. They would already have the code base necessary to offer internet connection, sound, etc. And it would be simple enough for a five year old to pop the cd in and switch on. Half the problems associated with computers is their versatility, which Nintendo and Sony are adding to every day.

So what happens when they add internet connectivity. Where do I store my bookmarks? What happens when I want a different browser? Not everyone will be happy with the one that comes with the console. Sooner or later someone else will come out with a rival, and there will be all sorts of incompatabilities, etc.

A little setting up is the price people have to pay for versatility. If they keep adding to their products at this rate, in five years time, a five year old kid WON'T be able to use it.


Blame Microsoft :)

Re:Sounds like a computer to me

[m3000]

I'm sorta scared of the thought of a OS on a console. Like you said, it's the software that causes the crashes, and I don't want my Dolphin to crash. That's probally the main reason I like consoles better than PC's, ease of use. As for the bookmark problems, either Nintendo has a hard drive (or ZIP drive) type thing added on to the console, or it's like the controller pak (or memory card to you PSXers) where it's just something that's big enough to store something small like that. Actually, I don't even know if it'll have a browser per se, the modem will probally be just for multiplayer gaming. Or another idea is having a DVD that ships with the system where it has the browser and stuff in it. So it loads just like a game, except it isnt' a game. You could check e-mail with that too. (Rereading your post, I relize that you said some of those points I just mentioned, but I'll mention them again anyway : ) ) It'll be a sad day when a 5 year old can't use a console, they will be losing out on a huge audience.

Re:Sounds like a computer to me

[m3000]

Yes, I guess it does sound like a computer, only better (at least for games). You see, it's a heck of a lot cheaper. You can't buy a $250 computer and play great games with great graphics on it. It's also a heck of a lot easier to use. I'd like to see a 5 year old install a program, and then figure out how to fix it when it crashes. No problems with that on a console. Nintendo's aim isn't the computer market. They don't want you to program or run a server off the Dolphin, but it is just natural progression that some aspects of computers and consoles eventually become integrated together.

Just saw that Sony is using Linux...

[LordRathma]

...for their development platform for the Playstation II!

Though with the hardware and special "emotion" chip the system will cost $20,000 for developers.

Anyone have any other info on this? Looks like someone is doing something right, right out of the gate!

Isn't competition great?

[joeler]

It has been a long time since the computer software induistry saw competition like this.
With computers, the Microsoft monopoly tells us when we are ready for somthing really new.
The new home entertainment (game)systems from Sony and now Nintendo really sound good.
I will hold off buying a dvd player until I see what these new game units can do.

Exactly, who cares?

[CuriousGeorge113]

It's still a good story, right. Seemed pretty interesting to me anyway.

This is Nintendo, Not Atari

[CuriousGeorge113]

Considering the history of both companies, I don't think this will be a problem. Nintendo is a much stronger comany then atari and shoulnd't have as much problems releasing a new system to the market.

Playstation, Nintendo 64, Dreamcast, Playstation 2

[Contramac]

It's good that Nintendo is going to jump in the game again after Nintendo 64. I think why that didn't pick up is that they waited too long and PSX just filled up the market too much. The same may happen now but I'm not all that sure Nintendo will let the same thing happen again. Since PSX 2 will be multiprocessor (just like Sega Saturn), it is difficult to make games for it because you constantly have to synchronize the processors. Thats why Sega Saturn didn't run that much, so they have redesigned it and came up with the Dreamcast which I've played and is pretty good. This shows that Sega has learned, now it'll be Nintendo's turn. Since PSX 2 will come out at the end of next year. Thats taking into account the gaming industry isn't on time. The Dreamcast will do the same thing the Playstation did, it'll fill up the market before the second one had a chance to come out, despite the power the later system shows.

I already have a nice Sony DVD player, I'll never get a game system/disc player because I think each component has a purpose and thats it so I can change around the configuration of all the components to my wishes.

But things and people change.

all-in-one "must" happen

[Aruges]

Given the fact that all three Next-Gen systems will eventually have the ability to play DVD movies (it's a planned add on to Dreamcast), to hook up to the internet, and be capable gaming platforms...it's no longer a question. It's going to happen by default.

Innovation and Playability dead?

[Aruges]

Funny.... Super Smash Bros. came out after Zelda... it's innovative and insanely playable. Perfect Dark (psudo sequel to GoldenEye) will have real time ray tracing for lighting effects on a machine about as powerful as a p100 with a Voodoo1 and it will come out after Zelda... Heck, Capcom (actually Angel Studios) figured out how to squeeze RE2 onto a cart improve the visuals and still keep the cinemas! (but then Capcom isn't known for innovation... renovation yes, but not innovation..)