You control the full source code that runs on your device
No licensing costs
Thousands of applications are only a compile away
Linux is well understood and well supported, it's easy to find employees
In the non-graphical embedded market, Linux is already the de-facto standard for new projects. It is a proven technology.
It's pretty obvious, really. I don't know why so many clueless people always keep asking "why Linux, why Linux?" everytime it is used on an embedded device when it's already not only a proven technology, but *the* de-facto standard.
In 4 years I promise you that there will be only few CPU-using appliances which are not using Linux. There will be a lot of non-Linux PDAs because of backwards application compatibility, but other than that finding a non-Linux system will be the exception.
I don't know where you live, perhaps Zimbabwe or somehting, but around here the PS2 and the XBOX are the same price.
Only because MS pours over 100$/unit into it. MS loses 1 billion/year on it. Who is going to pay all that money when Microsoft finally wants to get something out of XBox? You, the XBox gamer?
So you really think that Sony has completely wasted 2 billion $ into designing a new architecture? You think they did that just for kicks? You know that the PS2 has some DSP (Digital Signal Processing) features like VLIW? No, of course not, you don't know what a DSP is. Anyway, the 128 Bit architecture, the PS2 is using does make sense in what it does and is a lot more efficient than the x86-nVidia design. The PS2 was designed from the ground up to play games, the x86 was extended again and again to make up for it's deficiencies.
For the same performance, the PS2 is over 100$ cheaper/unit and does not suffer from some architectural deficiencies.
Yes, the PS1 compatibility adds some cruft, but at least it makes sense because I can play PS1 games. (You cannot play PC-games on your XBox in case you didn't notice) And it's just one level of backwards-compatibility which is not comparable to the 20 years of x86 compatibility.
You say the Xbox's architechure is "braindead" yet it's based on the same tried and true game platform that is the PC.
Yeah, the PC is a general purpose system that can also play games which often needs also 20 years of backwards compatibility.
Just because the PSX architecture is based on a different set of technologies, does not make it any more "good" of a game system then anything else.
If it weren't better (and about 150$ cheaper/unit) why should have Sony developed it? You really think a 20 year old architecture that has been extended numerous times is the optimal gaming platform?
MS might have a superior console 2 years after the PS3 release, but certainly not at the same time.
Just imagine Microsoft had to put out a console at the PS2-release: A Pentium2-250MHz with a NVidia TNT, or something? Not even remotely comparable to the PS2 - and still more expensive.
So far I've seen only name-calling from XBox-fanboys, no facts.
Why do you guys always try to weasel yourself out?
I clearly said, that upkeep costs (which we are talking about and which are provided by XBL) are clearly seperated from development costs (which are NOT provided by XBL).
So, yes, you need custom coding - well, the whole server software is custom coded, yes it's expensive, but no, it's not an upkeep cost and no, it's not included in XBL
Also remember that when the PS2 was released, developers everywhere raised an uproar about the pathetic libraries and documentation provided, hard to optimize architecture, etc.
Yes, that's the drawback of a truely new architecture.
You have higher initial costs (hw-development and sw-development including possible redesigns), but you save a lot in the long run. The XBox is the contrary: You have barely any development costs, but you pay a lot in the long run (mostly in terms of too expensive hardware).
But I tell you that: By now, Sony already paid all the architectural development already.
XBox is an off-the-shelf design and that is normally used for quick and dirty solutions and low numbers. Just face it: If you want to sell millions of units for half a decade and off-the-shelf design is just wrong and a stupid business decision.
That's all done by the hoster, not the by the user. Gaming does not require any advanced server features or special availability. (If the server is down or crashes, some gamers lose their games, who cares) You don't even need a seperate database system.
If the servers are very CPU-intensive, it might be a little bit more expensive because you need more machines, but in general a few thousand $ is realistic for most games.
Please note that development costs (developping the server software, supporting it, writing upgrades, etc.) is not included in the above and is indeed very expensive.
You are comparing apples to oranges - or a 1-year old product sold at 100$ loss with a 3-year old, profitable product.
While there is no doubt that because of brute force (read: mucho MHz - These clockcycles just weren't possible when the PS2 was put out.) XBox can beat the PS2 at the benchmarks, it has a lot of weaknesses: Skipping, overheating and above all a much higher production price.
I repeat: Just like when the PS2 was released, a comparable x86-based console was unthinkable, when the PS3 will be released, MS will have no comparable console at hand.
Wrong, as a game publisher you completely lose control of your online games.
If you already have a big PC or PS2-community using your game, you are screwed because there will be no cross-platform games on XBL.
You suggest not charging for online play - well, with XBL that's impossible because XBL comes with a monthly fee that is subject to change.
If MS decides to raise prices for XBL, you are screwed and can do nothing against it. Your sales will go down and Microsoft's profit margin will go up.
If MS has technical problems, you are screwed.
If MS decides to not like your company any more and stop offering your product on XBL, you are screwed.
You need a lot of trust in Microsoft to offer XBL games. And because Microsoft doesn't have a long-term strategy (nobody knows what XBL will cost per month next year) and screw over their partners (see Sendo), it's very clear that game publishers won't do it. Especially because XBox is performing rather weak on the market.
As Publishers/Developers they have no upkeep costs on running any of the LIVE services, servers, or systems, how can they be complaining. Companies like Blizzard spend thousands if not millions to keep thier on-line services up and running
Contrary to the average gamers belief, neither bandwidth nor running a server is not expensive. For example at serverbeach they sell 100$/month packages with 400GB bandwidth and hardware included. Now that will probably not be enough to handle an entire continent, but the upkeep costs are maybe a few thousand $/month - neglegtible compared to development, marketing and packaging/sales costs.
With all the optic cables dug in for years, the cost of bandwidth has come down to almost nothing for datacenters. (Of course the last mile is still expensive, but you don't run your gameservers via DSL)
Or to put it in another way: The expensive part about online gaming is making a server and supplying the clients with online capabilities (aka development) and marketing.
my 2 cents but hey i think i have a damn good point !
You have never had anything to do with running servers, that's for sure.
Microsoft is asking the game developers to do more work and don't let them control it. For example, it might be feasible to let gamers use online services for free (see above) to boost sales. Or the game might be so good, that you want to charge much more.On XBox, both is impossible - MS just won't let game-publishers make their business decisions.
XBox' problem is that it can't support itself, that means because of the braindead x86-nVidia architecture, it will die a quick painless death the moment Microsoft stops spending a billion/year on it.
The PS2 architecture is optimized for gaming and much more efficient at it. - And it can also be put on one single chip. On the other side, XBox' architecture might win in terms of raw performance because it's 2 years newer, but a x86-architecture will never be able to put out a competitive console at the same price as a more optimized architecture.
In a few years, Sony will bring out the PS3 and Microsoft will have no chance to put out anything comparable at the same time at a competitive price. Either they wait 2 years again and lose a little, or they put out a x86-monster at the same time and lose a lot.
Re:Apparently...someone is behind the times
on
SuSE 8.2 Announced
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· Score: 0, Flamebait
Actually "it will include KDE" is a big plus.
Just look at RedHat, they will probably cripple the hell out of desktop sharing because they don't want to make Gnome look bad.
So yeah, "it will include KDE" is not a given today.
I'm not the AC you respond to, but I think he meant somebody who always gives up before even trying.
OfficeXP is already 2 years on the market and has only captured about a quarter of the market, most people still use Office97 and Office2K. After a release adoptions slows down, so it will take much longer than 2 years to reach even more than half.
This gives use plenty of time. OpenOffice is available, unlike Office2003 runs on Win9x, Linux, MacOSX and Solaris and is free. There are 200 million Win9x users out there who will happily upgrade to OO when somebody gets off his ass and tell them.
So if somebody is "in the lead" he can do what he wants, not caring about morals and the law?
That means you would find nothing wrong if Bill Gates would hire hitmen to kill off some people that would "threaten his lead", right?
In a democracy (no, I am certainly not talking about the USA) the state is passing laws against anticompetitive behaviour to protect customers and competitors from artificially created barriers of entry and other unfair practices.
Example:
In the EU, printer makers will soon (I don't know the exact date, could be 2005 or 2006) have to stop building anti-copy chips into refill cartridges.
This is good for customers because it brings down prices for refill cartridges, is good for the environment because people will buy less printers and more cartridges and is good for 3rd party competition.
(In the USA, anti-copy chips are not only allowed, the DMCA forbids 3rd parties from creating a market.)
Anyway, returning back to Microsoft: Microsoft of course shall be allowed to do anything to improve their products, but encrypted formats don't improve their products, they just decrease interoperability, which is bad for everybody: The competition, the competition's customers and MS' customer's.
If there is no law against that, well there should be.
Tell that to Wells Fargo or any other big bank running 64 bit versions of NT for years.
There is no such thing as a 64Bit version of NT. Windows/Alpha couldn't adress the full adress space and was essencially a 32-Bit OS that happened to run on a 64-Bit CPU.
So most of your points sound a bit silly to me -- if this is v1.0 quality, then so is Linux for the Opteron.
First of all, you are only attacking one point, not "most" of my points.
But then it sounds even sillier that the great 64-Bit Windows NT couldn't use the full adress space on Alpha. Linux on the other hand is used on production machines and doing real 64-Bit computing for years already. Operon is new of course, but 64-Bit isn't.
Maybe that's the difference between us: You base your opinion on Powerpoint presentations of what Microsoft will do, I base mine on their past track record - which is pretty weak in the 64-Bit area.
And a small point -- there's no *technical* reason NT can't be ported to all sorts of architectures. In fact, given that you basically have to port the HAL (and recompile the rest), new architectures can be added pretty easily.
Oh, no, another victim of Microsoft-marketing.
Hey, can you explain the difference between the "HAL" (wow, that sounds so cool) and just an ordinary API?
(Hint: There is no difference, the HAL is just another API)
When you stop reading Microsoft marketing presentations and start learning computer basics you will realize that there is no technical reason any API can't be ported to any CPU. But it just happens that Win32 was several years late, WinNT4 was several years late and Win2K was several years late. Maybe - just maybe - Win64 will be late, too.
Maybe you will also realize that giving an API a cool name (you know, like "HAL") doesn't automagically make it easily portable and "new architectures can be added pretty easily" is not proven. Given the very poor job MS did at their Windows/Alpha port, it sounds like a pipedream.
You are really trying very hard to miss my points?
All your post still doesn't change even one of the points I made.
For the first time AMD and Intel support Linux from day 1 and Microsoft is no longer their exclusive OS provider. - And Linux can benefit from the extensions much earlier.
You can post Microsoft marketing material all day, but it won't change these facts.
When both AMD and Intel change their policies regarding OS-suppliers, it does have an effect, if you like it or not.
What will make it collapse? [..] A completely new, simpler software design paradigm?
Exactly. OpenSource.
Linux runs on all major and most minor CPU-architectures out there. With Linux rapidly emerging as the standard (just forget about your stupid Winmodem, take a step back, take a deep breath and look at the big picture: *ALL* major chipmakers are supporting Linux from day 1. (IBM, AMD, Intel) Linux runs on everything from mainframes to embedded systems. Microsoft is still dominating the desktop, but on the desktop, there are already several signs of weakness: Linux becoming the standard-OS for 3d-modelling desktops is just one, Linux being adopted by a lot of governements another.), binary-backwards-compatibility will soon become much less important than it used to be and the way will be free for real new, real innovative CPU architectures.
Currently, a lot of organizations are kept away from Linux because of high switching costs - which means that a lot would like to switch but don't do it because they would have to throw out all their software.
Now, if an organization like this switches to 64-Bit, they will want to replace most of their software anyway, so they might as well switch to Linux.
Imagine a simple file/mail/webserver combo which exists in thousands of smaller companies: You have the choice: Either buy an Opteron and buy new software for it (if available at all) and a new Windows operating system at Version1.0 quality, or switch over to Linux and get the speed improvements for free, earlier and more stable (Linux runs on 64-Bits for years already).
Combined with the points in the parent post, there are huge problems ahead for Microsoft.
After all, Microsoft HAS developed a version of Windows XP Professional that works on the Itanium CPU in IA-64 mode, for gosh sakes!
Well, although I have never seen a review about that, never seen a Wintel64 system on sale and don't know what dirty hacks and workarounds are in the package, let's assume that's true.
Now look at my post again: All the points I made are still valid, the most important one being that Linux is being supported right from the start for the first time.
I'm sure that Microsoft is right now working a version of Windows XP Home/Professional that works on the AMD Athlon64/Opteron CPU's in x86-64 native mode
While I'm also sure that they are working on it, I'm not about their ability to ship a working product on time. On the other side, SuSE has already successfully ported Linux to mainframes for IBM (something I don't think MS could do with Windows in a timely manner) and they are now porting Linux to Opteron - or better have already ported it as Beta-systems are already out there. - Where is the Windows-Operon Beta? I don's see it.
In case you forgot, Microsoft was YEARS late in finally adequately supporting 32-Bit (actually, Intel was already quite angry at MS that their chips were still used in 16-Bit mode almost exclusively for so long). Of course by that time, there was no alternative, so Microsoft got away with their incompetence, but now there is not only an alternative, it is also supported officially by AMD and Intel.
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Is a heck easer to do than "just program everything from scratch".
It's pretty obvious, really. I don't know why so many clueless people always keep asking "why Linux, why Linux?" everytime it is used on an embedded device when it's already not only a proven technology, but *the* de-facto standard.
In 4 years I promise you that there will be only few CPU-using appliances which are not using Linux. There will be a lot of non-Linux PDAs because of backwards application compatibility, but other than that finding a non-Linux system will be the exception.
Only because MS pours over 100$/unit into it. MS loses 1 billion/year on it. Who is going to pay all that money when Microsoft finally wants to get something out of XBox? You, the XBox gamer?
So you really think that Sony has completely wasted 2 billion $ into designing a new architecture? You think they did that just for kicks? You know that the PS2 has some DSP (Digital Signal Processing) features like VLIW? No, of course not, you don't know what a DSP is. Anyway, the 128 Bit architecture, the PS2 is using does make sense in what it does and is a lot more efficient than the x86-nVidia design. The PS2 was designed from the ground up to play games, the x86 was extended again and again to make up for it's deficiencies.
For the same performance, the PS2 is over 100$ cheaper/unit and does not suffer from some architectural deficiencies.
Yes, the PS1 compatibility adds some cruft, but at least it makes sense because I can play PS1 games. (You cannot play PC-games on your XBox in case you didn't notice) And it's just one level of backwards-compatibility which is not comparable to the 20 years of x86 compatibility.
Oh yeah and XBL will do the development magically for you, right?
Sometimes I think I talk to morons here.
Yeah, the PC is a general purpose system that can also play games which often needs also 20 years of backwards compatibility.
Just because the PSX architecture is based on a different set of technologies, does not make it any more "good" of a game system then anything else.
If it weren't better (and about 150$ cheaper/unit) why should have Sony developed it? You really think a 20 year old architecture that has been extended numerous times is the optimal gaming platform?
Just imagine Microsoft had to put out a console at the PS2-release: A Pentium2-250MHz with a NVidia TNT, or something? Not even remotely comparable to the PS2 - and still more expensive.
So far I've seen only name-calling from XBox-fanboys, no facts.
Why do you guys always try to weasel yourself out?
I clearly said, that upkeep costs (which we are talking about and which are provided by XBL) are clearly seperated from development costs (which are NOT provided by XBL).
So, yes, you need custom coding - well, the whole server software is custom coded, yes it's expensive, but no, it's not an upkeep cost and no, it's not included in XBL
Yes, that's the drawback of a truely new architecture.
You have higher initial costs (hw-development and sw-development including possible redesigns), but you save a lot in the long run. The XBox is the contrary: You have barely any development costs, but you pay a lot in the long run (mostly in terms of too expensive hardware).
But I tell you that: By now, Sony already paid all the architectural development already.
XBox is an off-the-shelf design and that is normally used for quick and dirty solutions and low numbers. Just face it: If you want to sell millions of units for half a decade and off-the-shelf design is just wrong and a stupid business decision.
And I've never said that Sony was a nice company.
That's all done by the hoster, not the by the user. Gaming does not require any advanced server features or special availability. (If the server is down or crashes, some gamers lose their games, who cares) You don't even need a seperate database system.
If the servers are very CPU-intensive, it might be a little bit more expensive because you need more machines, but in general a few thousand $ is realistic for most games.
Please note that development costs (developping the server software, supporting it, writing upgrades, etc.) is not included in the above and is indeed very expensive.
While there is no doubt that because of brute force (read: mucho MHz - These clockcycles just weren't possible when the PS2 was put out.) XBox can beat the PS2 at the benchmarks, it has a lot of weaknesses: Skipping, overheating and above all a much higher production price.
I repeat: Just like when the PS2 was released, a comparable x86-based console was unthinkable, when the PS3 will be released, MS will have no comparable console at hand.
You need a lot of trust in Microsoft to offer XBL games. And because Microsoft doesn't have a long-term strategy (nobody knows what XBL will cost per month next year) and screw over their partners (see Sendo), it's very clear that game publishers won't do it. Especially because XBox is performing rather weak on the market.
Contrary to the average gamers belief, neither bandwidth nor running a server is not expensive. For example at serverbeach they sell 100$/month packages with 400GB bandwidth and hardware included. Now that will probably not be enough to handle an entire continent, but the upkeep costs are maybe a few thousand $/month - neglegtible compared to development, marketing and packaging/sales costs.
With all the optic cables dug in for years, the cost of bandwidth has come down to almost nothing for datacenters. (Of course the last mile is still expensive, but you don't run your gameservers via DSL)
Or to put it in another way: The expensive part about online gaming is making a server and supplying the clients with online capabilities (aka development) and marketing.
my 2 cents but hey i think i have a damn good point !
You have never had anything to do with running servers, that's for sure.
Microsoft is asking the game developers to do more work and don't let them control it. For example, it might be feasible to let gamers use online services for free (see above) to boost sales. Or the game might be so good, that you want to charge much more.On XBox, both is impossible - MS just won't let game-publishers make their business decisions.
The PS2 architecture is optimized for gaming and much more efficient at it. - And it can also be put on one single chip. On the other side, XBox' architecture might win in terms of raw performance because it's 2 years newer, but a x86-architecture will never be able to put out a competitive console at the same price as a more optimized architecture.
In a few years, Sony will bring out the PS3 and Microsoft will have no chance to put out anything comparable at the same time at a competitive price. Either they wait 2 years again and lose a little, or they put out a x86-monster at the same time and lose a lot.
Just look at RedHat, they will probably cripple the hell out of desktop sharing because they don't want to make Gnome look bad.
So yeah, "it will include KDE" is not a given today.
Or like Microsoft asking all their customers to sign away all their rights and let the MS-police (aka "BSA") search everything in their organization.
I'm not the AC you respond to, but I think he meant somebody who always gives up before even trying.
OfficeXP is already 2 years on the market and has only captured about a quarter of the market, most people still use Office97 and Office2K. After a release adoptions slows down, so it will take much longer than 2 years to reach even more than half.
This gives use plenty of time. OpenOffice is available, unlike Office2003 runs on Win9x, Linux, MacOSX and Solaris and is free. There are 200 million Win9x users out there who will happily upgrade to OO when somebody gets off his ass and tell them.
Wrong.
In the EU, MS was sued because they were using their dominant position on the desktop to push their servers.
antitrust law is a means to uphold a free market, having a monopoly is not a prerequesite.
You don't have to be a mob-boss to get arrested for murder either.
That means you would find nothing wrong if Bill Gates would hire hitmen to kill off some people that would "threaten his lead", right?
In a democracy (no, I am certainly not talking about the USA) the state is passing laws against anticompetitive behaviour to protect customers and competitors from artificially created barriers of entry and other unfair practices.
Example:
In the EU, printer makers will soon (I don't know the exact date, could be 2005 or 2006) have to stop building anti-copy chips into refill cartridges.
This is good for customers because it brings down prices for refill cartridges, is good for the environment because people will buy less printers and more cartridges and is good for 3rd party competition.
(In the USA, anti-copy chips are not only allowed, the DMCA forbids 3rd parties from creating a market.)
Anyway, returning back to Microsoft: Microsoft of course shall be allowed to do anything to improve their products, but encrypted formats don't improve their products, they just decrease interoperability, which is bad for everybody: The competition, the competition's customers and MS' customer's.
If there is no law against that, well there should be.
There is no such thing as a 64Bit version of NT. Windows/Alpha couldn't adress the full adress space and was essencially a 32-Bit OS that happened to run on a 64-Bit CPU.
First of all, you are only attacking one point, not "most" of my points.
But then it sounds even sillier that the great 64-Bit Windows NT couldn't use the full adress space on Alpha. Linux on the other hand is used on production machines and doing real 64-Bit computing for years already. Operon is new of course, but 64-Bit isn't.
Maybe that's the difference between us: You base your opinion on Powerpoint presentations of what Microsoft will do, I base mine on their past track record - which is pretty weak in the 64-Bit area.
And a small point -- there's no *technical* reason NT can't be ported to all sorts of architectures. In fact, given that you basically have to port the HAL (and recompile the rest), new architectures can be added pretty easily.
Oh, no, another victim of Microsoft-marketing.
Hey, can you explain the difference between the "HAL" (wow, that sounds so cool) and just an ordinary API?
(Hint: There is no difference, the HAL is just another API)
When you stop reading Microsoft marketing presentations and start learning computer basics you will realize that there is no technical reason any API can't be ported to any CPU. But it just happens that Win32 was several years late, WinNT4 was several years late and Win2K was several years late. Maybe - just maybe - Win64 will be late, too.
Maybe you will also realize that giving an API a cool name (you know, like "HAL") doesn't automagically make it easily portable and "new architectures can be added pretty easily" is not proven. Given the very poor job MS did at their Windows/Alpha port, it sounds like a pipedream.
All your post still doesn't change even one of the points I made.
For the first time AMD and Intel support Linux from day 1 and Microsoft is no longer their exclusive OS provider. - And Linux can benefit from the extensions much earlier.
You can post Microsoft marketing material all day, but it won't change these facts.
When both AMD and Intel change their policies regarding OS-suppliers, it does have an effect, if you like it or not.
Exactly. OpenSource.
Linux runs on all major and most minor CPU-architectures out there. With Linux rapidly emerging as the standard (just forget about your stupid Winmodem, take a step back, take a deep breath and look at the big picture: *ALL* major chipmakers are supporting Linux from day 1. (IBM, AMD, Intel) Linux runs on everything from mainframes to embedded systems. Microsoft is still dominating the desktop, but on the desktop, there are already several signs of weakness: Linux becoming the standard-OS for 3d-modelling desktops is just one, Linux being adopted by a lot of governements another.), binary-backwards-compatibility will soon become much less important than it used to be and the way will be free for real new, real innovative CPU architectures.
Now, if an organization like this switches to 64-Bit, they will want to replace most of their software anyway, so they might as well switch to Linux.
Imagine a simple file/mail/webserver combo which exists in thousands of smaller companies: You have the choice: Either buy an Opteron and buy new software for it (if available at all) and a new Windows operating system at Version1.0 quality, or switch over to Linux and get the speed improvements for free, earlier and more stable (Linux runs on 64-Bits for years already).
Combined with the points in the parent post, there are huge problems ahead for Microsoft.
Well, although I have never seen a review about that, never seen a Wintel64 system on sale and don't know what dirty hacks and workarounds are in the package, let's assume that's true.
Now look at my post again: All the points I made are still valid, the most important one being that Linux is being supported right from the start for the first time.
I'm sure that Microsoft is right now working a version of Windows XP Home/Professional that works on the AMD Athlon64/Opteron CPU's in x86-64 native mode
While I'm also sure that they are working on it, I'm not about their ability to ship a working product on time. On the other side, SuSE has already successfully ported Linux to mainframes for IBM (something I don't think MS could do with Windows in a timely manner) and they are now porting Linux to Opteron - or better have already ported it as Beta-systems are already out there. - Where is the Windows-Operon Beta? I don's see it.
In case you forgot, Microsoft was YEARS late in finally adequately supporting 32-Bit (actually, Intel was already quite angry at MS that their chips were still used in 16-Bit mode almost exclusively for so long). Of course by that time, there was no alternative, so Microsoft got away with their incompetence, but now there is not only an alternative, it is also supported officially by AMD and Intel.
Neither AMD nor Intel wants to be the first to implement it and there is really no benefit for them.