Whilst it would be nice to be free of the 8086 legacy... i think you'll find that large portions of the totally CRAP code coming out of microsoft in recent years have nothing to do with legacy code, and lots to do with poor design/implementation of current code.
These same coders starting from scratch? I reckon Windows 2000 would still be far more reliable.
Times have changed. Back then, the commodore C64 was something you bought for the kids - mum (yes, i'm an aussie) and dad had very little to do with it.
Now, a home computer is expected to be able to log into work from home, run office, browse the net, etc (this is the main reason the amiga died, imho - i used to own one, and in the mid 90s things just eventually got to the point where if it wasn't "IBM Compatible" it wasn't even considered).
A sony "computer" may be able to do some of those things, but hell, free *NIX/MacOS is having a hard enough time breaking into the home computer market, and they're both established players.
Well hows this... I have a PC that is now just over 4 years old (pentium4, non-ht 2.4ghz), and runs everything i throw at it well enough to play quite happily.
All i've upgraded is the video card (Geforce 6600GT currently) and disk space (not required really, but I dual boot).
Sure, it's not top of the line any more, but I have yet to try running something that was not playable to force me to upgrade...
From a CPU standpoint, AMD has been in front for a while, however, a CPU does not constitute an entire computer.
Personally I have had all sorts of wierd and wonderful problems with my non-intel x86 machines in the past (a 486DLC, cyrix 686L, K6s, athlons, athlon XP - genuine intel i've had a 486, pentium2, pentium3, pentium4), and what it boils down to, is that the competing chipsets generally suck.
Forget benchmarks - real world stability, compatibility and driver support have been second-rate.
I've been out of the market for a couple of years now (my non-ht pentium 4 2.4 is still going strong:D), so perhaps AMD has a chipset maker who has a clue (I'd put my money with nvidia personally) - but excuse me if I'm cautious, having been burned so many times before:D
Whilst I agree with you that "the" architecture is currently x86, that wasn't my point.
Anyone seriously considering Linux (or ANY O/S for that matter) in a business environment is going to check compatibility with their hardware, or order hardware with Linux compatibility as a requirement.
For people in a home-use environment, is checking for hardware compatibility too much to ask?
I can dig out "problem" hardware with Windows XP as well if you like. Perhaps one of the myriad of SCSI controllers that requires a vendor driver before the system will even install? Perhaps a quad CPU box (which AMD seem to be releasing real soon now)?
Chasing a moving hardware platform for 100% compatibility with zero issues in unrealistic. Hence, bitching about hardware issues that are either easily solved (eg, take *some* of your vista upgrade money and invest in a compatible video card) and/or affect a small number of users is not really something to worry about too much.
I couldn't figure out how to send someone a picture in gAIM because there were no menu options for it, but all you gotta do is drag the file to the chat window and it works.
Ahhh the irony:D
I'm not going to go off on a Gnome bashing spree - but there's so much crap like that, that is just so non-intuitive and awkward to use for someone who has a clue, that I've honestly given up hope.
With KDE, on the other hand, I am continually discovering stuff that makes me go "wow, that's cool", and makes me work more effectively...
Does not stop someone booting from floppy (or even LILO prompt - not sure if GRUB supports options, I hate it and haven't bothered learning it, since i'm more interested in BSD these days) and doing init=/bin/sh
If you want a secure machine, you need to deny users physical access to it, or encrypt the filesystem.
Neither of which is done by any linux distribution yet, to my knowledge...
Note that this isn't a problem simply relegated to Ubuntu, or even just Linux - Windows NT/XP, FreeBSD, etc are all in the same boat here AFAIK...
While it could be seen as a security "issue" - there's nothing to stop someone booting a knoppix CD, linux boot floppy or any other number of options to get root on a Linux machine they have physical access to.
If you're paranoid about your users getting root on the box, physically secure it for a start and deny them shutdown permission (to reboot to the boot menu) you'd be better off...
- document their code properly
- keep the core O/S components seperate from the apps.
those two are the main reasons I like it (and i've been using linux since '96, and BSD since '00... more biased towards BSD since for the reasons listed above).
One option is subscription fees to network services.
Sure, if it's open-source, someone could probably reverse engineer it and build their own server - but still, someone is going to have to pay for the hardware/software to run a big enough game world.
If the choice was between playing a free version on a game world with 20 players, vs a properly maintained cluster that could support thousands, i'm sure a lot of people would be willing to pay for the larger game world...
Just because the game client is open-sourced, it doesn't necessarily mean the network server has to be...:)
Free OS (the BSDs) gets DTrace. If a commercial OS wants to implement it, they get DTrace (easily, as the code is open). Net result = better software in BOTH the free and payware segments.
How is this bad?
One thing the GPL weenies just don't seem to get, is that BSD people *DON'T CARE* if people use their code to make money/sell commercial software, because the aim is to improve the quality of software in general - not to impose some sort of political agenda.
No one is going to FORCE you to BUY Dtrace in a commercial OS when the free version exists - but, if the commercial OS has features that you personally need, the option is there.
The wheel gets reinvented because if every game used the Source engine every game would play exactly like Half Life 2 and CounterStrike Source and DoD Source. If every game used the Doom III engine every game would play exactly like Doom III and Quake IV. Variety is the spice of life, and it's the variety of game engines that make games different from each other. There's already a chorus about how every game is the same, there's no innovation, nothing's original anymore--how much louder would those protests be if engines were more uniform?
Surely you jest? For that to be the case the cs:source engine must have no configurable parameter (even in the source) for tweaking game physics, and the no ability to change weapon damage, viewpoint, etc.
Which i'm quite sure it does. The only excuse for the game playing "exactly like" any other source engine game is developer laziness.
Example: quake3 and urban terror both use the quake 3 engine. They play nothing alike. UT2k3 and Vampire: Bloodlines both use the UT2k3 engine and they play absolutely NOTHING alike. They're not even the same genre of game...
I think it's because most of the current generation of gamers/producers are obsessed with eye candy - there's little in the way of original or in-depth gameplay ideas anymore, just the newest shiny 3d engine and surround sound.
Seriously, when was the latest "new idea" you saw with regards to gameplay?
Tetris? Lemmings? Command and Conquer? Sim City? Wolfenstein 3d? Elite?
Everything I can think of these days is a variation on the same general idea (other than flight/driving "sims" of course). The last truly interesting and original game concept was over 10 years ago...
Given that, the only real way to distinguish yourself as far as marketing goes, when limited to a fixed number of game themes, is by graphical or audio superiority. This costs money.
Sad really... if someone was to come up with an original (or even, not flogged to death in the past 5 years), entertaining gameplay idea, they'd do well...
Me? I'm waiting for a decent new 2d platformer to come out:D
No, i didn't RTFA... as all piracy statistics are made up and biased one way or the other. Still, seems awfully close to the percentage of people who said they'd get Vista illegally:D
I can't find the link but back in the early browser wars days, I'm pretty sure they actually got sprung with a rigged video showing performance that just wasn't there for either IE or Windows 98 (i forget, so long ago).
Besides, with optimisation to the loader, and hardware advances in the next 6 months, it will surely speed up.
Also, the many thousands of people currently using it don't seem to feel that it's "too slow".
History has proved that speed is not the be all and end all of computing - otherwise we'd all still be coding in assembler and writing our documents in plain ASCII text.
The benefits of an open format far outweigh any speed shortcomings I've experienced with it.
We run trend officescan in a ~1000 PC corporate network and have only ever had one problem, with a bung pattern file that chewed up 100% cpu - which was fixed within a day or so (affected people world-wide).
As someone who has witnessed the norton (now symantec) suite go from being a decent bit of software in the DOS days, to the steaming pile of shit that it is now, this does not surprise me in the least:)
Slashdot Mirror
These same coders starting from scratch? I reckon Windows 2000 would still be far more reliable.
There is NO NEED for confidential company data to leave your premises.
Now, a home computer is expected to be able to log into work from home, run office, browse the net, etc (this is the main reason the amiga died, imho - i used to own one, and in the mid 90s things just eventually got to the point where if it wasn't "IBM Compatible" it wasn't even considered).
A sony "computer" may be able to do some of those things, but hell, free *NIX/MacOS is having a hard enough time breaking into the home computer market, and they're both established players.
Does this mean I'll be able to class it as a computer for taxation purposes? :D
All i've upgraded is the video card (Geforce 6600GT currently) and disk space (not required really, but I dual boot).
Sure, it's not top of the line any more, but I have yet to try running something that was not playable to force me to upgrade...
That doesn't make it right.
From a CPU standpoint, AMD has been in front for a while, however, a CPU does not constitute an entire computer.
Personally I have had all sorts of wierd and wonderful problems with my non-intel x86 machines in the past (a 486DLC, cyrix 686L, K6s, athlons, athlon XP - genuine intel i've had a 486, pentium2, pentium3, pentium4), and what it boils down to, is that the competing chipsets generally suck.
Forget benchmarks - real world stability, compatibility and driver support have been second-rate.
I've been out of the market for a couple of years now (my non-ht pentium 4 2.4 is still going strong :D), so perhaps AMD has a chipset maker who has a clue (I'd put my money with nvidia personally) - but excuse me if I'm cautious, having been burned so many times before :D
Anyone seriously considering Linux (or ANY O/S for that matter) in a business environment is going to check compatibility with their hardware, or order hardware with Linux compatibility as a requirement.
For people in a home-use environment, is checking for hardware compatibility too much to ask?
I can dig out "problem" hardware with Windows XP as well if you like. Perhaps one of the myriad of SCSI controllers that requires a vendor driver before the system will even install? Perhaps a quad CPU box (which AMD seem to be releasing real soon now)?
Chasing a moving hardware platform for 100% compatibility with zero issues in unrealistic. Hence, bitching about hardware issues that are either easily solved (eg, take *some* of your vista upgrade money and invest in a compatible video card) and/or affect a small number of users is not really something to worry about too much.
Windows OR Linux.
I can go try install Windows XP on a Sparc, and then bitch that it's 2006 and why doesn't it boot, if you like.
Ahhh the irony :D
I'm not going to go off on a Gnome bashing spree - but there's so much crap like that, that is just so non-intuitive and awkward to use for someone who has a clue, that I've honestly given up hope.
With KDE, on the other hand, I am continually discovering stuff that makes me go "wow, that's cool", and makes me work more effectively...
If you want a secure machine, you need to deny users physical access to it, or encrypt the filesystem.
Neither of which is done by any linux distribution yet, to my knowledge...
Note that this isn't a problem simply relegated to Ubuntu, or even just Linux - Windows NT/XP, FreeBSD, etc are all in the same boat here AFAIK...
If you're paranoid about your users getting root on the box, physically secure it for a start and deny them shutdown permission (to reboot to the boot menu) you'd be better off...
- keep the core O/S components seperate from the apps.
those two are the main reasons I like it (and i've been using linux since '96, and BSD since '00 ... more biased towards BSD since for the reasons listed above).
Much like BSD...
(flamebait, but true... from my experience, having used both since they were both pre-1.0).
Sure, if it's open-source, someone could probably reverse engineer it and build their own server - but still, someone is going to have to pay for the hardware/software to run a big enough game world.
If the choice was between playing a free version on a game world with 20 players, vs a properly maintained cluster that could support thousands, i'm sure a lot of people would be willing to pay for the larger game world...
Just because the game client is open-sourced, it doesn't necessarily mean the network server has to be... :)
Free OS (the BSDs) gets DTrace. If a commercial OS wants to implement it, they get DTrace (easily, as the code is open). Net result = better software in BOTH the free and payware segments.
How is this bad?
One thing the GPL weenies just don't seem to get, is that BSD people *DON'T CARE* if people use their code to make money/sell commercial software, because the aim is to improve the quality of software in general - not to impose some sort of political agenda.
No one is going to FORCE you to BUY Dtrace in a commercial OS when the free version exists - but, if the commercial OS has features that you personally need, the option is there.
My bad actually, you may be correct (i work away, not at home, not 100% sure now you mention it).
However, that only strengthens my point - it doesn't play anything like CS: source either :D
smash.
Surely you jest? For that to be the case the cs:source engine must have no configurable parameter (even in the source) for tweaking game physics, and the no ability to change weapon damage, viewpoint, etc.
Which i'm quite sure it does. The only excuse for the game playing "exactly like" any other source engine game is developer laziness.
Example: quake3 and urban terror both use the quake 3 engine. They play nothing alike. UT2k3 and Vampire: Bloodlines both use the UT2k3 engine and they play absolutely NOTHING alike. They're not even the same genre of game...
smash.
Because it wasn't "why *were* there no indie game hits". Doom was 10 years ago. Thats the whole point... where have the indie game hits *gone*?
If you RTFA, it mentions games like Doom, Ultima, etc by name as being pioneering leaps forward...
smash
Seriously, when was the latest "new idea" you saw with regards to gameplay?
Tetris? Lemmings? Command and Conquer? Sim City? Wolfenstein 3d? Elite?
Everything I can think of these days is a variation on the same general idea (other than flight/driving "sims" of course). The last truly interesting and original game concept was over 10 years ago...
Given that, the only real way to distinguish yourself as far as marketing goes, when limited to a fixed number of game themes, is by graphical or audio superiority. This costs money.
Sad really... if someone was to come up with an original (or even, not flogged to death in the past 5 years), entertaining gameplay idea, they'd do well...
Me? I'm waiting for a decent new 2d platformer to come out :D
smash
No, i didn't RTFA... as all piracy statistics are made up and biased one way or the other. Still, seems awfully close to the percentage of people who said they'd get Vista illegally :D
here: http://www.mackido.com/History/History_DrDos.html here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/600488.stm
and elsewhere.
I can't find the link but back in the early browser wars days, I'm pretty sure they actually got sprung with a rigged video showing performance that just wasn't there for either IE or Windows 98 (i forget, so long ago).
smash.
This coming from the makers of Windows.
Besides, with optimisation to the loader, and hardware advances in the next 6 months, it will surely speed up.
Also, the many thousands of people currently using it don't seem to feel that it's "too slow".
History has proved that speed is not the be all and end all of computing - otherwise we'd all still be coding in assembler and writing our documents in plain ASCII text.
The benefits of an open format far outweigh any speed shortcomings I've experienced with it.
smash.
Fairly happy with it.
smash.
smash.