Crysis is for DirectX 10. By getting my head around vista NOW i'll be ahead of the masses when people start using it.
If you think that in 12 months time there will still be nobody using vista, you're deluded. I already know how to, and do make use of Linux/FreeBSD, so it's not like i'm going to be unprepared for them taking hold either. It's called keeping your (employment) options open.
Do you know anyone who owns a *home* PC, who has no games installed? That segment of the market is pretty small methinks.
Besides, I already have business users who could do with more than 4 gigs of RAM. They're attempting to manipulate 2+gb (file size, no idea how big they would be uncompressed) 3d models (they're mine geologists). Currently, if they're running processing on their machine they can't do anything else with it.
Virtualisation/sandboxing will be a "killer app" for more memory as well - i could sure do with about 8-12 gigs of ram and a few more CPUs myself for virtualisation to use as a "test" environment.
Manipulating uncompressed HD quality video?
There's plenty of uses for it... just because you don't use it, doesn't mean there aren't plenty of legitimate uses either out there or on the horizon within 12-18 months or so...
Dude, this story was posted on april fools day, to fool those who think it was an april fools into posting crap like "april fools" and "slashdot is so not worth reading until monday", etc..
It's the thinking man's april fools story of the day:D
Have you actually used vista much yet? On semi-decent hardware?
Yet, that is principally what Vista offers: more bling. It does not deliver on any of its meritous promises. It does not improve the underlying operating system to any significant degree.
That's a little shortsighted. Large portions have been re-written as managed code, the network stack has been re-written, the security model is different, the audio subsystem is completely new, etc. Time will tell if the re-writing will actually be of any serious improvement, but to pass the whole thing off as mere "bling" is being a little hasty.
After using vista for a couple of weeks, i can think of a number of improvements in the interface that I really miss when going back to XP - the new start menu you can easily scroll through, flip3d (yes, it's kinda lame, but I do miss it, i'm an alt+tab freak, windows+tab makes it easier to find which window you want), the new address bar, etc.
The user interface changes are not massive - they're minor tweaks which do make a difference.
No, they're not killer features, but I'm a lot more happy with the interface changes in vista compared to the changes that happened between Win2k and XP.
But I disagree with your point anyway - the interface is not what has sold windows and kept it there, it's the applications. The Windows interface has been copied plenty by Linux distros and it hasn't helped them at all.
Irrespective of all this, Vista will take off within 18 months as people start requiring more than 4 gigs of RAM. XP doesn't support more than 4gig unless you go to XP 64 bit, which is a dead end product if you ask me...
Tip: you do not want RAID0 for business use. If you want more speed, buy more ram and make use of disk cache. If that's not an option, buy quicker disks.
Trust me, eventually you'll have a disk failure on your RAID0 array, and you'll be facing downtime, usually when it's most inconvenient:)
Unless you're using the PC for some very specific tasks, there's no need for RAID0.
At the very minimum, make your system/boot partition RAID1 (mirror) so you can at least boot to be able to restore files to another disk if you get errors in one of the disks:) It's a lot more convenient to be able to pop in a new disk, boot up as normal from your RAID1 partition and restore your RAID0 partition than reinstall from scratch:)
A few reasons I can think of the lack of queues off the top of my head...
Well, in 1995 you had dos or Windows 3.x (which was shit).
Windows 3.1 was totlly useless for gaming, so basically if you ran games, you used DOS. Windows 95 was a *major* technology leap. Irrespective of how crusty and dodgy the kernel was, it brought in DirectX - which meant that there was finally a reliable way to support video for gaming at higher than 320x240 res without needing to re-write large parts of your game for every sound/video card and game controller on the market. Not to mention a reliable memory configuration to write your game (no more worrying about extended vs expanded, conventional memory limits, etc).
It also brought in long file names, which was a major plus for business use.
Vista makes several technology leaps as well, but they're not as "visible" or impacting on the immediate effect to the user. The fact is, that Windows XP is "good enough" for most people to not bother upgrading until it's convenient, rather than the day of release.
Also, keep in mind that back in 1995 there was very little in the way of ordering software on-line, which i'm quite sure a lot of people buying vista would be doing. Why queue in 2007?
Oh yes, I agree 100%, some of Linux's problems are driver development.
The difference is, however is that because Microsoft put out Vista, the drivers *will* get fixed, one way or another, and in pretty short order.
Will that happen with Linux? Eventually, yes maybe. The situation is definitely a hell of a lot better than it was 11 years ago when i started using Linux, but it's a long way behind.
Is it fair that virtually all the Linux drivers are written by volunteers, often without hardware specs? No, of course not - but in the real world, "but that's not fair?!" won't cut it. Results are what people are concerned about.
Linux really is *almost there* and once the hardware devs jump on board in a big way, it will get critical mass and start becoming more competitive. Unfortunately at the moment it's on the edge of that "chicken and eg" scenario where hardware (and commercial software) devs won't justify linux driver development for a small market, and the market is small because of driver/commercial software development.
Check the number of vulnerabilities that affected XP and compare to Win2k. Compare RAM usage to Win2k. Turn off the fisher price UI, and you have Win2k + insecurity + bloat + product activation. How is that an "upgrade" again?
That's why i think it's a steaming pile of shit - it was a definite step backwards for my purposes:)
Vista on the other hand, at least brings a few things to the table - UI that is much more capable (sure, at the moment the use of 3d is pretty lame, but the framework is there), new (albeit flawed) security model, etc.
I'm not saying it's perfect by any stretch, but there is at least some benefit for me in it.
Well, to clarify. New apps will eventually require vista. DirectX10 is vista only. I use my PC for games. DirectX10 games will require vista.
What I'm saying is that unless you have a specific reason for upgrading, there's little incentive. My "specific reasons" are DirectX10, and because I'd like to know the issues I'm dealing with before I have to fix them in the field...
On a more sober note. Maybe this is a testament to the quality of XP. Up until win2000 windows sucked. With win2000 the interface still sucked. XP made big strides in making the interface less sucky.
Err....
WinXP = Win2k + overly large and garish buttons that consume vastly more resources? As to a killer-app for Vista, my current thought on that is "Crysis".
As someone who's currently got a dodgy copy of Vista running at home (30 day grace period... yeah, yeah, i'm going to buy it when i get home this week), i can see why it's not *currently* selling well for most people (this will change of course when you can no longer buy XP easily).
No, it's nothing to do with the DRM, which the average user is totally oblivious to.
It's the fact that there is currently no compelling reason to upgrade, from a "general use" perspective. Really - other than flip3d (and very few "normal users" i know even use alt-tab) and the new start menu, it's the same old shit, only with more irritating user access control. The fact that for most people's current PCs, performance will be significantly worse, and driver support just isn't there yet doesn't help.
As an aside - a major issue at the moment is the changes to DirectSound. Unless you've got an X-fi soundblaster and run creative's "Alchemy" software which translates Directsound into OpenAL, you're not going to get any EAX support in any games, and the sound support you do get is often scratchy and clicky (eg, neverwinter nights 2)
That said, I'm buying Vista - which is a drastic change in my attitude from 3 months ago. Why? Becuase Win2k is no longer supported, XP *really* is a steaming pile of shit, and Linux just isn't there yet for me to run exclusively (though i've been a user since 1996). I spend all day at work doing admin stuff - on my home pc all i want to do is run some games (and Falcon4: Allied Force, for example, will not run under Cedega), browse the net and media related stuff. From my testing this week, Vista is "good enough" for the tasks I ask of it (nwn2 had minor issues, F4:AF runs fine), and it's a currently supported product.
Also, it's inevitable that I'll have to support it at work sooner or later, so I may as well get a head start on the issues it has.
Oh i forgot... what happens when you need to do concurrent inputs, such as feathering the throttle whilst trying to decide whether 25 or 23.5 degrees steering input is best and then entering it?:D
As far as driving a car goes, until we get a direct brain interface worth anything, the current steering wheel + pedals is about the most usable interface for a car:)
If you want something like that, what you really is a computer controlled voice or telepathy activated car. Just use public transport, or work on solving public transport problems...
For those of us who want to *drive* your idea of "r 15" (you overloaded r to control both right and the radio btw) followed by say, "l 25" within 1/2 sec to correct oversteer (implemented in the real world by simply letting go of the wheel until it self-corrects into counter-steer at approximately the right angle and then adjusting) is not going to be practical.
I fix my "high tech' car myself. It has a lot less on it go wrong than with a 1970s car. I have no points, no need to rebuild carbs, no need to constantly mess with the idle/mixture screws, etc.
I turn the key, it goes. If it doesn't go, I look up the error code on the engine management computer (has flashing diagnostic led) and replace the broken sensor. *If* i have a problem with it.
Other than performance modification, its done 60,000km in 4 years (now has 122,000km on it) with no more than oil/filter changes and a new clutch. Oh, and it's done all that for about 40,000km making double the standard output, on standard engine internals with no need for lumpy street-unfriendly cams, etc:)
If you are in any way interested in performance, it would be worth learning for at least one platform (80x86) - if for no other reason than to get a feel for how your algorithms can be implemented on the hardware you're using, and how new CPU developments can be taken advantage of, etc.
I'm not saying you need to code entire applications in it, but knowledge of it will perhaps give you a bit of an edge.
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Yeah, i just put in my pin number...
If you think that in 12 months time there will still be nobody using vista, you're deluded. I already know how to, and do make use of Linux/FreeBSD, so it's not like i'm going to be unprepared for them taking hold either. It's called keeping your (employment) options open.
Difference between moving from 2k to XP and from 2k/XP to vista is huge, for those reasons.
Do you know anyone who owns a *home* PC, who has no games installed? That segment of the market is pretty small methinks.
Besides, I already have business users who could do with more than 4 gigs of RAM. They're attempting to manipulate 2+gb (file size, no idea how big they would be uncompressed) 3d models (they're mine geologists). Currently, if they're running processing on their machine they can't do anything else with it.
Virtualisation/sandboxing will be a "killer app" for more memory as well - i could sure do with about 8-12 gigs of ram and a few more CPUs myself for virtualisation to use as a "test" environment.
Manipulating uncompressed HD quality video?
There's plenty of uses for it... just because you don't use it, doesn't mean there aren't plenty of legitimate uses either out there or on the horizon within 12-18 months or so...
It's the thinking man's april fools story of the day :D
Later Nvidia detonator drivers do similar stuff in XP. The font rendering seemed much improved when i switched back to 2k from XP anyway...
$5/month is too much for you? Seriously...
That's a little shortsighted. Large portions have been re-written as managed code, the network stack has been re-written, the security model is different, the audio subsystem is completely new, etc. Time will tell if the re-writing will actually be of any serious improvement, but to pass the whole thing off as mere "bling" is being a little hasty.
After using vista for a couple of weeks, i can think of a number of improvements in the interface that I really miss when going back to XP - the new start menu you can easily scroll through, flip3d (yes, it's kinda lame, but I do miss it, i'm an alt+tab freak, windows+tab makes it easier to find which window you want), the new address bar, etc.
The user interface changes are not massive - they're minor tweaks which do make a difference.
No, they're not killer features, but I'm a lot more happy with the interface changes in vista compared to the changes that happened between Win2k and XP.
But I disagree with your point anyway - the interface is not what has sold windows and kept it there, it's the applications. The Windows interface has been copied plenty by Linux distros and it hasn't helped them at all.
Irrespective of all this, Vista will take off within 18 months as people start requiring more than 4 gigs of RAM. XP doesn't support more than 4gig unless you go to XP 64 bit, which is a dead end product if you ask me...
Tesla did this sort of thing prior to 1900...
Ahaha... maybe it was 45... was so long ago, only ever installed it once :)
Care to enlighten me? I used Win2k between 2000 and 2006 and never had any problems with USB support?
The last version of office before office 97 (4.2?) came on about 25 floppy disks from memory :D
Trust me, eventually you'll have a disk failure on your RAID0 array, and you'll be facing downtime, usually when it's most inconvenient :)
Unless you're using the PC for some very specific tasks, there's no need for RAID0.
At the very minimum, make your system/boot partition RAID1 (mirror) so you can at least boot to be able to restore files to another disk if you get errors in one of the disks :) It's a lot more convenient to be able to pop in a new disk, boot up as normal from your RAID1 partition and restore your RAID0 partition than reinstall from scratch :)
If you're really concerned about performance, you go one step further than that, and disable the windows theme service...
Well, in 1995 you had dos or Windows 3.x (which was shit).
Windows 3.1 was totlly useless for gaming, so basically if you ran games, you used DOS. Windows 95 was a *major* technology leap. Irrespective of how crusty and dodgy the kernel was, it brought in DirectX - which meant that there was finally a reliable way to support video for gaming at higher than 320x240 res without needing to re-write large parts of your game for every sound/video card and game controller on the market. Not to mention a reliable memory configuration to write your game (no more worrying about extended vs expanded, conventional memory limits, etc).
It also brought in long file names, which was a major plus for business use.
Vista makes several technology leaps as well, but they're not as "visible" or impacting on the immediate effect to the user. The fact is, that Windows XP is "good enough" for most people to not bother upgrading until it's convenient, rather than the day of release.
Also, keep in mind that back in 1995 there was very little in the way of ordering software on-line, which i'm quite sure a lot of people buying vista would be doing. Why queue in 2007?
The difference is, however is that because Microsoft put out Vista, the drivers *will* get fixed, one way or another, and in pretty short order.
Will that happen with Linux? Eventually, yes maybe. The situation is definitely a hell of a lot better than it was 11 years ago when i started using Linux, but it's a long way behind.
Is it fair that virtually all the Linux drivers are written by volunteers, often without hardware specs? No, of course not - but in the real world, "but that's not fair?!" won't cut it. Results are what people are concerned about.
Linux really is *almost there* and once the hardware devs jump on board in a big way, it will get critical mass and start becoming more competitive. Unfortunately at the moment it's on the edge of that "chicken and eg" scenario where hardware (and commercial software) devs won't justify linux driver development for a small market, and the market is small because of driver/commercial software development.
Exactly. As is and has been the case with every form of copy-protection ever devised. You pay to be disadvantaged.
That's why i think it's a steaming pile of shit - it was a definite step backwards for my purposes :)
Vista on the other hand, at least brings a few things to the table - UI that is much more capable (sure, at the moment the use of 3d is pretty lame, but the framework is there), new (albeit flawed) security model, etc.
I'm not saying it's perfect by any stretch, but there is at least some benefit for me in it.
What I'm saying is that unless you have a specific reason for upgrading, there's little incentive. My "specific reasons" are DirectX10, and because I'd like to know the issues I'm dealing with before I have to fix them in the field...
Err....
WinXP = Win2k + overly large and garish buttons that consume vastly more resources? As to a killer-app for Vista, my current thought on that is "Crysis".
No, it's nothing to do with the DRM, which the average user is totally oblivious to.
It's the fact that there is currently no compelling reason to upgrade, from a "general use" perspective. Really - other than flip3d (and very few "normal users" i know even use alt-tab) and the new start menu, it's the same old shit, only with more irritating user access control. The fact that for most people's current PCs, performance will be significantly worse, and driver support just isn't there yet doesn't help.
As an aside - a major issue at the moment is the changes to DirectSound. Unless you've got an X-fi soundblaster and run creative's "Alchemy" software which translates Directsound into OpenAL, you're not going to get any EAX support in any games, and the sound support you do get is often scratchy and clicky (eg, neverwinter nights 2)
That said, I'm buying Vista - which is a drastic change in my attitude from 3 months ago. Why? Becuase Win2k is no longer supported, XP *really* is a steaming pile of shit, and Linux just isn't there yet for me to run exclusively (though i've been a user since 1996). I spend all day at work doing admin stuff - on my home pc all i want to do is run some games (and Falcon4: Allied Force, for example, will not run under Cedega), browse the net and media related stuff. From my testing this week, Vista is "good enough" for the tasks I ask of it (nwn2 had minor issues, F4:AF runs fine), and it's a currently supported product.
Also, it's inevitable that I'll have to support it at work sooner or later, so I may as well get a head start on the issues it has.
As far as driving a car goes, until we get a direct brain interface worth anything, the current steering wheel + pedals is about the most usable interface for a car :)
For those of us who want to *drive* your idea of "r 15" (you overloaded r to control both right and the radio btw) followed by say, "l 25" within 1/2 sec to correct oversteer (implemented in the real world by simply letting go of the wheel until it self-corrects into counter-steer at approximately the right angle and then adjusting) is not going to be practical.
I turn the key, it goes. If it doesn't go, I look up the error code on the engine management computer (has flashing diagnostic led) and replace the broken sensor. *If* i have a problem with it.
Other than performance modification, its done 60,000km in 4 years (now has 122,000km on it) with no more than oil/filter changes and a new clutch. Oh, and it's done all that for about 40,000km making double the standard output, on standard engine internals with no need for lumpy street-unfriendly cams, etc :)
I'm not saying you need to code entire applications in it, but knowledge of it will perhaps give you a bit of an edge.