I ran mythTV for about 8 months and there were things that I really liked about it (powerful integrated ripping tools, no DRM to be found, completely extensible) and things I really hated about it (inconsistant UI, occasional crashes, having to tweak the hell out of vid drivers to get decent PQ).
In the end I got fed up after being called into the living room to "fix the TV" one too many times by my gf after X crashed out on my myth box.
I'm now on MCE 2005 and I love it. It's certainly not without it's faults (DRM being a huge huge one) but for my usage patterns it's something I'm willing to live with. Ultimately it does the job, it's extremely slick, and it takes zero fiddling to make it work for me.
To me the PS3 looks like yet another console with prettier graphics.
The stuff that is exciting about XBox 360 is not the fancy graphics but the "network awareness" of the machine and the potential to really change the way we look at console gaming. I see a lot of characteristics of their media centre making their way onto this new xbox and I think that's a very good thing.
One of my knocks against sony is they make nice gaming systems but they haven't shown a whole lot of initiative when it comes to online content and the backend infrastructure that supports it.
The PSP is a great example of this. Fantastic little piece of hardware but my god they missed the mark when it came to leveraging the wireless connectivity of this thing. Also the memory card / media file setup is a complete fiasco. They should have had a slick, easy to use media manager app packaged in the box right off the bat. But no, instead I am using kludgy japanese utils to get my movies on to my memory stick.
Of course having said all this like any longtime gaming addict I will probably just buy them both.;)
I have a Hauppauge PVR250 (non MCE) and a Sapphire Theatrix 550 (new ATI chipset).
I've tried both MythTV and MCE2005.
Frankly I think the IQ on both of these cards is quite poor. If you fiddle with various settings/parameters you can achieve a "passable" picture quality at best.
I was really hyped when I heard about the ATI 550 chipset thinking finally I would get some decent IQ but alas, more of the same mushy looking crap.
As it stands now I'm just making due until something truly worthwhile finally comes out.
"VDU WORK AND THE HAZARDS TO HEALTH" is pretty funny but if you want real comedy gold get ahold of some WHMIS documentation. Just remember to bring a change of pants because you will piss yourself laughing at these hilarious docs.
" The 60Hz refresh rate only corresponds to how often the pixel "might" get told to change, there is no pulsing."
See:
"Since LCD monitors do not employ phosphors, refresh rate is not a concern. Basically, the transistors in the LCD remain open or closed as needed until the image changes. This can be a point of confusion for some consumers, however, since most graphics cards still "ask for" a refresh rate setting. This is due to the analog nature of existing graphic cards (see "Inputs" section) and their support for CRT displays. While refresh rates do not apply to LCD monitors, most LCDs are set up to accept any settings from 60Hz and above."
That number of "60hz" you see is fake, presumably for the benefit of the OS or vid driver but it has no actual bearing on the performance of the LCD itself.
The power button on the PSP puts it into sleep mode which has negligible impact on battery life and allows you to "turn on" your psp and return to playing pretty much instantaneously.
"I thought the writer made an interesting point about women digging the Nintendo DS. I've found that women generally seem to like the things Nintendo has to offer, and not just with the DS. When my wife and I have our couple friends over, it's funny to see the women in the group actually WANT to play video games because they want to play things like Mario Party and Donkey Konga. And my wife loves her Nintendo DS with Wario Ware (although she is wanting another game at this point). I think there is a real opportunity for Nintendo to capture a large number of non-traditional gamers with its products. Unfortunately, it can be a difficult proposition because it seems that most women get their video game experiences through more hardcore gamers, so unless Nintendo can get a foothold in with the hardcore gamers, they may not be able to capture anthing."
"2.5 hours of gameplay? You have to be kidding me. As a person who flys a lot I find the fact that this thing won't make a typical flight greatly disturbing. I don't need 20 hours like the SP gives me, but less than 8 or 9 and I get uncomfortable. less than 3 is simply unacceptable."
Where the hell did you get the number 2.5 from?
It's easily 5+. I know this because I've had a PSP for months now, I own both japanese and US games and there is no way in hell the battery runs out in 2.5 hours. Another case of message board rumor mongering... "ya well my friends friends second cousin told me his PSP runs out of juice in ONE HOUR!!!1!!!11one!1"
"Face it, most of these purely psychological "addictions" that plague modern society can be corrected with a little behavior modification and a little willpower."
Errr what exactly do you think a psychological addiction is?
It's a behavious pattern that often has detrimental impact on other areas of your life. No shit it can be corrected with behaviour modification.
The square button placement is a design consolation or design tradeoff not "an intentional feature" as you call it.
It was _designed_ to be different than the other buttons to allow them to to fit it all within that form factor and still manage to get the LCD in there. If they had expanded the button area so the square button was built the same way the others were, either the overall PSP size would have to be bigger or the LCD screen would have to be smaller to accomodate. This was the tradeoff and yes it was intentional not by accident like some people like to think. You think they were placing the square button in CAD and their mouse slipped and that's why the button placement exists as it does today?
I am a PSP owner too and I've never had the square button stick or misbehave. It does feel different than the others and I can certainly tell the physical difference but it hand't been an issue for me.
Because that is contrary to the entire shuttle philosophy.
They aren't trying to make the smallest systems possible they are making small systems that use off the shelf no-compromise components such as HDDs and vid cards.
If that's what passes for a decent news article these days, add me to your friends list. I will provide you with a steady stream of "content" for your "news stories".
You make it sound like aussie was a longshot to win, he cleaned up last olympics so I don't see how anyone could possibly be suprised he would be successful again.
Who said living below the poverty line is a prerequisite for ahdering to socialist doctrine? A socialist by definition is a miserable poor wretch according to you?
1. Radeon 9200 is not a gaming card in any way, shape, or form. You can ignore the rest of your system specs, all you have to say is "radeon 9200" and terrible performance is a given.
2. There is gamma correction in game.
3. Buggy ATI drivers???? You don't say!
4. Turn off AA and turn up the resolution. If you expect to run AA you need a current gen GPU (read: radeon x800 or geforce 6800).
5. Guess where half life lifted its plot/atmosphere from?
Slashdot Mirror
Actually I came to the same conclusion you did.
I ran mythTV for about 8 months and there were things that I really liked about it (powerful integrated ripping tools, no DRM to be found, completely extensible) and things I really hated about it (inconsistant UI, occasional crashes, having to tweak the hell out of vid drivers to get decent PQ).
In the end I got fed up after being called into the living room to "fix the TV" one too many times by my gf after X crashed out on my myth box.
I'm now on MCE 2005 and I love it. It's certainly not without it's faults (DRM being a huge huge one) but for my usage patterns it's something I'm willing to live with. Ultimately it does the job, it's extremely slick, and it takes zero fiddling to make it work for me.
To me the PS3 looks like yet another console with prettier graphics.
;)
The stuff that is exciting about XBox 360 is not the fancy graphics but the "network awareness" of the machine and the potential to really change the way we look at console gaming. I see a lot of characteristics of their media centre making their way onto this new xbox and I think that's a very good thing.
One of my knocks against sony is they make nice gaming systems but they haven't shown a whole lot of initiative when it comes to online content and the backend infrastructure that supports it.
The PSP is a great example of this. Fantastic little piece of hardware but my god they missed the mark when it came to leveraging the wireless connectivity of this thing. Also the memory card / media file setup is a complete fiasco. They should have had a slick, easy to use media manager app packaged in the box right off the bat. But no, instead I am using kludgy japanese utils to get my movies on to my memory stick.
Of course having said all this like any longtime gaming addict I will probably just buy them both.
It's not just you... they are terrible. It's not just the jpg compression either.
The people who claim the IQ on these cards is good need to clean their glasses.
I have a Hauppauge PVR250 (non MCE) and a Sapphire Theatrix 550 (new ATI chipset).
I've tried both MythTV and MCE2005.
Frankly I think the IQ on both of these cards is quite poor. If you fiddle with various settings/parameters you can achieve a "passable" picture quality at best.
I was really hyped when I heard about the ATI 550 chipset thinking finally I would get some decent IQ but alas, more of the same mushy looking crap.
As it stands now I'm just making due until something truly worthwhile finally comes out.
"VDU WORK AND THE HAZARDS TO HEALTH" is pretty funny but if you want real comedy gold get ahold of some WHMIS documentation. Just remember to bring a change of pants because you will piss yourself laughing at these hilarious docs.
Check it out at:
http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/hecs-sesc/whmis/
You are partly correct but this is wrong:
g uide/index04.htm
" The 60Hz refresh rate only corresponds to how often the pixel "might" get told to change, there is no pulsing."
See:
"Since LCD monitors do not employ phosphors, refresh rate is not a concern. Basically, the transistors in the LCD remain open or closed as needed until the image changes. This can be a point of confusion for some consumers, however, since most graphics cards still "ask for" a refresh rate setting. This is due to the analog nature of existing graphic cards (see "Inputs" section) and their support for CRT displays. While refresh rates do not apply to LCD monitors, most LCDs are set up to accept any settings from 60Hz and above."
Source: http://www.necdisplay.com/support/css/monitortech
There is no such thing as refresh rate on an LCD.
That number of "60hz" you see is fake, presumably for the benefit of the OS or vid driver but it has no actual bearing on the performance of the LCD itself.
"my wife loves her Nintendo DS with Wario Ware"
my gf loves her Sony PSP with Lumines
Right back at you cowboy.
The power button on the PSP puts it into sleep mode which has negligible impact on battery life and allows you to "turn on" your psp and return to playing pretty much instantaneously.
ridge racers,
minna no golf,
darkstalkers chronicle,
THUG2,
world tour soccer,
lumines
I must have a magical PSP manufactured by wood elves under a full moon then because my battery lasts longer than five hours playing games
"I thought the writer made an interesting point about women digging the Nintendo DS. I've found that women generally seem to like the things Nintendo has to offer, and not just with the DS. When my wife and I have our couple friends over, it's funny to see the women in the group actually WANT to play video games because they want to play things like Mario Party and Donkey Konga. And my wife loves her Nintendo DS with Wario Ware (although she is wanting another game at this point). I think there is a real opportunity for Nintendo to capture a large number of non-traditional gamers with its products. Unfortunately, it can be a difficult proposition because it seems that most women get their video game experiences through more hardcore gamers, so unless Nintendo can get a foothold in with the hardcore gamers, they may not be able to capture anthing."
I take it you haven't played Lumines yet?
"2.5 hours of gameplay? You have to be kidding me. As a person who flys a lot I find the fact that this thing won't make a typical flight greatly disturbing. I don't need 20 hours like the SP gives me, but less than 8 or 9 and I get uncomfortable. less than 3 is simply unacceptable."
Where the hell did you get the number 2.5 from?
It's easily 5+. I know this because I've had a PSP for months now, I own both japanese and US games and there is no way in hell the battery runs out in 2.5 hours. Another case of message board rumor mongering... "ya well my friends friends second cousin told me his PSP runs out of juice in ONE HOUR!!!1!!!11one!1"
"Face it, most of these purely psychological "addictions" that plague modern society can be corrected with a little behavior modification and a little willpower."
Errr what exactly do you think a psychological addiction is?
It's a behavious pattern that often has detrimental impact on other areas of your life. No shit it can be corrected with behaviour modification.
o.0
The square button placement is a design consolation or design tradeoff not "an intentional feature" as you call it.
It was _designed_ to be different than the other buttons to allow them to to fit it all within that form factor and still manage to get the LCD in there. If they had expanded the button area so the square button was built the same way the others were, either the overall PSP size would have to be bigger or the LCD screen would have to be smaller to accomodate. This was the tradeoff and yes it was intentional not by accident like some people like to think. You think they were placing the square button in CAD and their mouse slipped and that's why the button placement exists as it does today?
I am a PSP owner too and I've never had the square button stick or misbehave. It does feel different than the others and I can certainly tell the physical difference but it hand't been an issue for me.
Because that is contrary to the entire shuttle philosophy.
They aren't trying to make the smallest systems possible they are making small systems that use off the shelf no-compromise components such as HDDs and vid cards.
I take it you never played lineage 2?
That's why they call it MacCheap right?
dumbass.
It's panty _waisted_ as in your waist showing the evidence of someone who wears panties.
Do you bring a flashlight to a horror movie so you can "get your money's worth" you stupid cunt?
"Apple's success is based in their loyal, vocal, energetic community.
The linux community and the apple communities are a lot alike in this manner."
I think the term you are looking for here is "fanboyism".
If that's what passes for a decent news article these days, add me to your friends list. I will provide you with a steady stream of "content" for your "news stories".
You make it sound like aussie was a longshot to win, he cleaned up last olympics so I don't see how anyone could possibly be suprised he would be successful again.
Who said living below the poverty line is a prerequisite for ahdering to socialist doctrine? A socialist by definition is a miserable poor wretch according to you?
1. Radeon 9200 is not a gaming card in any way, shape, or form. You can ignore the rest of your system specs, all you have to say is "radeon 9200" and terrible performance is a given.
2. There is gamma correction in game.
3. Buggy ATI drivers???? You don't say!
4. Turn off AA and turn up the resolution. If you expect to run AA you need a current gen GPU (read: radeon x800 or geforce 6800).
5. Guess where half life lifted its plot/atmosphere from?