Well, yes the 5200 is 2 generations ahead of the GeForce3 - but the GeForce3 was the top of the line whereas the 5200 is the bottom of the FX series. Keep in mind also that the FX series is last years line. Even the high end 5950FX is getting spanked by the newer 6800s. So basically you get last years lowest end model in the iMac. For Doom 3 - if PC framerates are any indication, you will be getting FPS in the 20s at low quality in 800x600. You might as well have a GeForce 3 in there. The 5200s performance is going to be closer to the GeForce 3 than to the higher end cards. In comparison with a 6800GT you can do 1600x1200 with antialiasing at high quality and get about 40 fps average. 1280x1024 will be completely smooth.
That's odd. While I do have to drop my particle count a little to prevent jerkiness when fighting with a large group (plenty of powers/buffs going off) I haven't had a major problem like you are describing. On my older P4 2.4GHz with 5600 Ultra it ran fine in 1024x768. On my upgraded p4 3.2GHz with 6800GT it runs great at 1280x1024 with 4x aa 4x aniso. I agree with your comment about showing server pings and locations though. I think there are west coast servers, at least some people in game were surprised to see me (Hawaii player) playing on Pinnacle which is East coast. Since my gaming experience isn't bad I haven't bothered investigating. You might want to make sure you dont have other weird net traffic going on. I have found spyware infestations can cause all kinds of problems with general network speed and QOS.
I happened to notice that if you zoom in very close to the textures on one of the magazines sitting on a table in mission - the cover features the BSD daemon! This got me to wondering - do you use FreeBSD on any of your servers? What platforms are you running on and what kinds of challenges has the scale of an MMORPG presented to that system?
Actually if you go the PowerMac route you CAN get a high end GPU from day one. Just buy build to order. You can add in a 9800XT 256 for $350, a 6800GT for $400 or 6800 Ultra for $500. Which is actually a slight price premium over the PC because you have to figure this cost as being extra on top of whatever the $5200 is worth. Now if you have an eMac, iMac, Powerbook, iBook - too bad! No upgrade options for you! But this is also true on the PC side for many all in one units or most laptops.
The first month is included in the game box, so I guess you could call it $38 or $35 or what for the game and $13-$15 for the first months service. Or if you don't buy right away you can get the cost of entry down - I think I spend $40 on City of Heroes. I really wish they would let me just download the isos and play - but I guess thats not going to happen. I think some of the struggling mmos do this already. The weird thing is that since I started playing a MMORPG, my monthly gaming habit expenses have actually gone done. I've bought 3 games since I started playing City of Heroes in June rather than my usual 2 or 3 a month. And yeah you could say well that I've just missed other great games being stuck on the treadmill. Which is true, but the real appeal of the MMORPG is adventuring with other people. When you get a good group going you get enjoyment out of their company and watching your characters progress. Logging into a pickup game of an FPS feels oddly lonely afterwards. Of course if you clan in online FPS then the same thing applies.
"There's no market for a low-quality digital camera add-on, I think."
I completely disagree. I know plenty of people who have paid more to get a camera phone of dubious quality with low resolution. They just use it for quick pics typically at unplanned times when noone has a camera around.
Sure it is impressive but the article was commenting on the fact that the what was deficient were the elements of the "new doctrine" (network centric warfare) on the frontlines. Basically winning the battle did not rely on anything to do with this new doctrine. Their situational awareness was terrible inspite of all of the satellites and high tech network equipment. What saved them was the good old fashioned strength of superior armor, firepower and tactics. The overall tone of the article was that the new network doctrine has a long way to go - especiallly when it comes to translating commands from the high level commanders watching their plasma screens down to the front line combat troops. Of course this has been the case since man first fought war. A man stationed up on a hill can see the overall picture, but how do you get that information to those in the engaged in that combat? One comment I found interesting at the end of the article was:
Sitting in an office at Rand, Gordon puts things bluntly: "If the army had had Strykers at the front of the column, lots of guys would have been killed."
The Stryker is a new personnel carrier which has received a lot of flack for being under armored. It is part of the new doctrine of a small aware and quickly responsive army. And in the case of Objective Peach, probably would have been ripped to shreds.
Apple users are less likely to pirate their OS (most are too loyal too Apple, the rest have too much money for it to matter or they just didn't know it was even possible),
That is a complete generalization and one that in my experience hasn't been true. I actually haven't seen very many Apple users who purchase the OS upgrades. The ones I've known tend to either stay at the previous version or grab a copy off a friend. Mac piracy is pretty rampant at least in the industry niches where Mac's predominate. Perhaps this is why Quark Xpress has switched over to an activation scheme.
The episode is "A Taste of Armageddon". Definately one of the best of old Trek. Two planets basically have their war controlled by computers. The attacks are simulated, but casualties are calculated. If the computer says you died in the attack you walk over to the disintegration booth. Kirk has a great rant at the end telling them that war is meant to be horrible to prevent it from existing perpetually.
That would be episode 23 "A Taste of Armageddon". One of the best Star Trek episodes of all time in my opinion. The computers simulated the attacks and calculated the casualties. When you number was called up you headed over to the handy dandy vaporization chamber. Of course the girl Kirk is hot for gets her number called up and well lets just say there is a great speech about how war is meant to be ugly and brutal. The sanitized, computer controlled war was indefinate with no end in sight.
While I thought the posts were suspect myself - I'm not sure what you are talking about in regards to his location. Hawaii is in the middle of the pacific. Also over here in Hawaii it is common to replace "the" with "da" because in the local pidgin dialect that is how it is pronounced.
I'm not interested in a laptop. I really don't have use for the portability and prefer a larger (19" or so) screen. In regards to your comment on building your own system. That is understandable and I myself have moved away from full system building. The nice thing is that the enthusiast market has resulted in many companies (Alienware and Falcon being the granddaddies) which cater towards custom pc building. Nowdays when its time for the full overhaul on the base system I order a prebuilt case, mobo, processor, ram. Then I just transfer my old drives/video card into the system and am good to go. The other nice thing is that my older components don't go to waste. When I upgrade my last model bumps down to mom and the kids. Each of them have their own PC. Helps justify the upgrade too - when I upgrade everyone upgrades.:)
No, Macs aren't overpriced against other name-brand manufacturers. They are price competitive. (I'll grant you that if you build your own and zealously look for bargains you can build a slightly cheaper PC.)
Well I wouldn't mind having a Mac at home as a second machine - but the limited choices really suck. I like the expandability and choice that the PC gives me. With a desktoo Mac I basically get a choice between a reasonably price but totally non-upgradeable iMac or a very expensive PowerMac G5. Is there no middle ground? How about a $1500ish desktop Mac with a single G5 with no built in monitor? I hate all in one designs and I really hate that Apple went with the useless 5200 graphics card on the iMac. Sure the G5s are great but I cannot afford to drop $3000 at a time for a new computer. With a PC I can upgrade a bit at a time - and only need to drop about $800 once every few years for a new motherboard, cpu and ram.
My interest in Fable went straight to nil when I heard that there would be no PC version. I think in a sense Molyneux probably also wasn't thinking in console mode when dreaming up Fable. A lot of the features that were supposed to be included wouldn't have been a problem for a PC release where you are much less limited in terms of hard drive, processor, ram etc.
I believe the explanation for Black and White's suckage was that they were working on the creature control aspect for so long that they forgot they needed an actual game. So when deadline time reared its ugly head they just threw in some Populous 3 style gameplay. The twist being that now you had to take care of your villagers while your ape throws poop at them. The creature was kind of neat but utterly out of place with the rather conventional game play. I mean he was mostly a detriment not a help. Hell, most of the time my ape would just be pissed because I was trying to help the stupid villagers fornicate. Damn those villagers were stupid.
It would be a little odd if the system has LAUNCHED as the Retrocade. Although if anyone wanted to sell a version of it today - that would certainly be an appropriate name.
I miss the blue screen of death game too. It was really fun. Too bad I haven't seem it even once on this system. Oh Bill why have you forsaken us? Seriously, I've seen OS X systems that crap out a lot and I've seen Windows systems that crap out a lot - I've seen misconfigured UNIX and Linux systems that blow up too. There isn't a perfect OS out there and what's even worse there sure aren't any perfect users. Call me platform agnostic - I work with Mac OS 9, OS X, Windows 98-XP, Red Hat Linux and FreeBSD on a daily basis. They each have their merits. Well except Mac OS 9 and Windows 98 that is.
Well it beats the crap outta my meager pc: 3.2GHz P4 Gig of DDR 400.5 terabyte internal storage CDR and 8xDVDR overclocked 6800 GT Audigy 2 ZS Some of those firewire things and a few USB thingees which I guess are supposed to "mate" with stuff
all that and I still can't play the Apple logo slider puzzle. I mean I beat it once, but its still a fun game.
Guess I'll just have to settle with Doom 3, City of Heroes, Call of Duty expansion, Rise of Nations, Star Wars Battlefront, Battlefield Vietnam...
Damn. I've never felt so dirty reading someone describe their computer before. You don't by any chance were a black beret, have a goatee and show up on Penny Arcade from time to time do you?
Well I don't know what type of retailer you have. Here at the local CompUSA they typically stock both DVD ROMs under $50 and DVD-Rs at about $50. Obviously if you buy online you will get a better price on a name brand piece of equipment but they are dropping even in retial stores. Keep in mind that $80 DVD-R was $200 a year ago.
There are two main reasons for the recovery disk both aimed at newbies:
1. To have a custom installer to guide the newbie through the OS install 2. To pre bundle all appropriate hardware drivers on the restore CD so that all hardware works properly post install.
Oh yeah there is one other bonus - all that bullshit software (AOL etc.) get reinstalled as well!
Well unless you were using the volume licensing stuff - the standard MSDN Universal license is for ONE developer. It also costs $2500 and the licenses are to be used for development and testing purposes. So technically taking a MSDN XP key home and installing it on your home computer may invalidate the license. Not exactly a great way to avoid paying $150 for Windows. Since you are using it in a way that the license didn't intend I guess you might as well just pirate it.
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Well, yes the 5200 is 2 generations ahead of the GeForce3 - but the GeForce3 was the top of the line whereas the 5200 is the bottom of the FX series. Keep in mind also that the FX series is last years line. Even the high end 5950FX is getting spanked by the newer 6800s.
So basically you get last years lowest end model in the iMac. For Doom 3 - if PC framerates are any indication, you will be getting FPS in the 20s at low quality in 800x600. You might as well have a GeForce 3 in there. The 5200s performance is going to be closer to the GeForce 3 than to the higher end cards.
In comparison with a 6800GT you can do 1600x1200 with antialiasing at high quality and get about 40 fps average. 1280x1024 will be completely smooth.
That's odd. While I do have to drop my particle count a little to prevent jerkiness when fighting with a large group (plenty of powers/buffs going off) I haven't had a major problem like you are describing.
On my older P4 2.4GHz with 5600 Ultra it ran fine in 1024x768. On my upgraded p4 3.2GHz with 6800GT it runs great at 1280x1024 with 4x aa 4x aniso.
I agree with your comment about showing server pings and locations though. I think there are west coast servers, at least some people in game were surprised to see me (Hawaii player) playing on Pinnacle which is East coast.
Since my gaming experience isn't bad I haven't bothered investigating.
You might want to make sure you dont have other weird net traffic going on. I have found spyware infestations can cause all kinds of problems with general network speed and QOS.
I happened to notice that if you zoom in very close to the textures on one of the magazines sitting on a table in mission - the cover features the BSD daemon! This got me to wondering - do you use FreeBSD on any of your servers? What platforms are you running on and what kinds of challenges has the scale of an MMORPG presented to that system?
Actually if you go the PowerMac route you CAN get a high end GPU from day one. Just buy build to order. You can add in a 9800XT 256 for $350, a 6800GT for $400 or 6800 Ultra for $500. Which is actually a slight price premium over the PC because you have to figure this cost as being extra on top of whatever the $5200 is worth.
Now if you have an eMac, iMac, Powerbook, iBook - too bad! No upgrade options for you! But this is also true on the PC side for many all in one units or most laptops.
Which makes it particularly amusing that all of our in house color is calibrated both to proofer and press through 3rd party calibration software.
I guess Apple's isn't that great huh?
Yeah it sucks but...
The first month is included in the game box, so I guess you could call it $38 or $35 or what for the game and $13-$15 for the first months service. Or if you don't buy right away you can get the cost of entry down - I think I spend $40 on City of Heroes.
I really wish they would let me just download the isos and play - but I guess thats not going to happen. I think some of the struggling mmos do this already.
The weird thing is that since I started playing a MMORPG, my monthly gaming habit expenses have actually gone done. I've bought 3 games since I started playing City of Heroes in June rather than my usual 2 or 3 a month.
And yeah you could say well that I've just missed other great games being stuck on the treadmill. Which is true, but the real appeal of the MMORPG is adventuring with other people. When you get a good group going you get enjoyment out of their company and watching your characters progress.
Logging into a pickup game of an FPS feels oddly lonely afterwards. Of course if you clan in online FPS then the same thing applies.
"There's no market for a low-quality digital camera add-on, I think."
I completely disagree. I know plenty of people who have paid more to get a camera phone of dubious quality with low resolution. They just use it for quick pics typically at unplanned times when noone has a camera around.
Sure it is impressive but the article was commenting on the fact that the what was deficient were the elements of the "new doctrine" (network centric warfare) on the frontlines. Basically winning the battle did not rely on anything to do with this new doctrine. Their situational awareness was terrible inspite of all of the satellites and high tech network equipment. What saved them was the good old fashioned strength of superior armor, firepower and tactics.
The overall tone of the article was that the new network doctrine has a long way to go - especiallly when it comes to translating commands from the high level commanders watching their plasma screens down to the front line combat troops. Of course this has been the case since man first fought war. A man stationed up on a hill can see the overall picture, but how do you get that information to those in the engaged in that combat?
One comment I found interesting at the end of the article was:
Sitting in an office at Rand, Gordon puts things bluntly: "If the army had had Strykers at the front of the column, lots of guys would have been killed."
The Stryker is a new personnel carrier which has received a lot of flack for being under armored. It is part of the new doctrine of a small aware and quickly responsive army. And in the case of Objective Peach, probably would have been ripped to shreds.
Check out this bit torrent tracker for comics:
Z Cult FM Comic Tracker
You should be able to find all the Jean Grey you need over there.
Apple users are less likely to pirate their OS (most are too loyal too Apple, the rest have too much money for it to matter or they just didn't know it was even possible),
That is a complete generalization and one that in my experience hasn't been true. I actually haven't seen very many Apple users who purchase the OS upgrades. The ones I've known tend to either stay at the previous version or grab a copy off a friend.
Mac piracy is pretty rampant at least in the industry niches where Mac's predominate. Perhaps this is why Quark Xpress has switched over to an activation scheme.
The episode is "A Taste of Armageddon". Definately one of the best of old Trek. Two planets basically have their war controlled by computers. The attacks are simulated, but casualties are calculated. If the computer says you died in the attack you walk over to the disintegration booth.
Kirk has a great rant at the end telling them that war is meant to be horrible to prevent it from existing perpetually.
That would be episode 23 "A Taste of Armageddon". One of the best Star Trek episodes of all time in my opinion.
The computers simulated the attacks and calculated the casualties. When you number was called up you headed over to the handy dandy vaporization chamber. Of course the girl Kirk is hot for gets her number called up and well lets just say there is a great speech about how war is meant to be ugly and brutal. The sanitized, computer controlled war was indefinate with no end in sight.
While I thought the posts were suspect myself - I'm not sure what you are talking about in regards to his location. Hawaii is in the middle of the pacific. Also over here in Hawaii it is common to replace "the" with "da" because in the local pidgin dialect that is how it is pronounced.
I'm not interested in a laptop. I really don't have use for the portability and prefer a larger (19" or so) screen. :)
In regards to your comment on building your own system. That is understandable and I myself have moved away from full system building. The nice thing is that the enthusiast market has resulted in many companies (Alienware and Falcon being the granddaddies) which cater towards custom pc building. Nowdays when its time for the full overhaul on the base system I order a prebuilt case, mobo, processor, ram. Then I just transfer my old drives/video card into the system and am good to go.
The other nice thing is that my older components don't go to waste. When I upgrade my last model bumps down to mom and the kids. Each of them have their own PC. Helps justify the upgrade too - when I upgrade everyone upgrades.
No, Macs aren't overpriced against other name-brand manufacturers. They are price competitive. (I'll grant you that if you build your own and zealously look for bargains you can build a slightly cheaper PC.)
Well I wouldn't mind having a Mac at home as a second machine - but the limited choices really suck. I like the expandability and choice that the PC gives me. With a desktoo Mac I basically get a choice between a reasonably price but totally non-upgradeable iMac or a very expensive PowerMac G5. Is there no middle ground? How about a $1500ish desktop Mac with a single G5 with no built in monitor? I hate all in one designs and I really hate that Apple went with the useless 5200 graphics card on the iMac.
Sure the G5s are great but I cannot afford to drop $3000 at a time for a new computer. With a PC I can upgrade a bit at a time - and only need to drop about $800 once every few years for a new motherboard, cpu and ram.
My interest in Fable went straight to nil when I heard that there would be no PC version. I think in a sense Molyneux probably also wasn't thinking in console mode when dreaming up Fable. A lot of the features that were supposed to be included wouldn't have been a problem for a PC release where you are much less limited in terms of hard drive, processor, ram etc.
I believe the explanation for Black and White's suckage was that they were working on the creature control aspect for so long that they forgot they needed an actual game. So when deadline time reared its ugly head they just threw in some Populous 3 style gameplay. The twist being that now you had to take care of your villagers while your ape throws poop at them.
The creature was kind of neat but utterly out of place with the rather conventional game play. I mean he was mostly a detriment not a help. Hell, most of the time my ape would just be pissed because I was trying to help the stupid villagers fornicate. Damn those villagers were stupid.
It would be a little odd if the system has LAUNCHED as the Retrocade. Although if anyone wanted to sell a version of it today - that would certainly be an appropriate name.
I miss the blue screen of death game too. It was really fun. Too bad I haven't seem it even once on this system. Oh Bill why have you forsaken us?
Seriously, I've seen OS X systems that crap out a lot and I've seen Windows systems that crap out a lot - I've seen misconfigured UNIX and Linux systems that blow up too. There isn't a perfect OS out there and what's even worse there sure aren't any perfect users.
Call me platform agnostic - I work with Mac OS 9, OS X, Windows 98-XP, Red Hat Linux and FreeBSD on a daily basis. They each have their merits. Well except Mac OS 9 and Windows 98 that is.
Well it beats the crap outta my meager pc: .5 terabyte internal storage
3.2GHz P4
Gig of DDR 400
CDR and 8xDVDR
overclocked 6800 GT
Audigy 2 ZS
Some of those firewire things and a few USB thingees which I guess are supposed to "mate" with stuff
all that and I still can't play the Apple logo slider puzzle. I mean I beat it once, but its still a fun game.
Guess I'll just have to settle with Doom 3, City of Heroes, Call of Duty expansion, Rise of Nations, Star Wars Battlefront, Battlefield Vietnam...
*sigh*
Damn. I've never felt so dirty reading someone describe their computer before.
You don't by any chance were a black beret, have a goatee and show up on Penny Arcade from time to time do you?
Well I don't know what type of retailer you have. Here at the local CompUSA they typically stock both DVD ROMs under $50 and DVD-Rs at about $50. Obviously if you buy online you will get a better price on a name brand piece of equipment but they are dropping even in retial stores.
Keep in mind that $80 DVD-R was $200 a year ago.
Pirates! Pirates! Pirates! Pirates! Pirates! YEEEESSSS!!!!!!!!
Thank you Mr. Ballmer now please go change your shirt.
There are two main reasons for the recovery disk both aimed at newbies:
1. To have a custom installer to guide the newbie through the OS install
2. To pre bundle all appropriate hardware drivers on the restore CD so that all hardware works properly post install.
Oh yeah there is one other bonus - all that bullshit software (AOL etc.) get reinstalled as well!
Well unless you were using the volume licensing stuff - the standard MSDN Universal license is for ONE developer.
It also costs $2500 and the licenses are to be used for development and testing purposes. So technically taking a MSDN XP key home and installing it on your home computer may invalidate the license. Not exactly a great way to avoid paying $150 for Windows. Since you are using it in a way that the license didn't intend I guess you might as well just pirate it.