The Halo 3 beta will be running with mostly Halo 2 assets, at least at first. Saves download bandwidth. I sure hope they release some larger textures to at least test the engine with later, though.
People are expecting the Core to cease to exist. I'll allow MS+Rockstar this particular excluding move, since the choice will be between Premium and Elite for new customers anyway.
Bash has fancy completion like that, too. I've used it for years. 'make ' to see what buildtargets there are, 'less --' if you forgot the spelling of the colour options, or 'ncftp ' to see your saved FTP sites.
The most annoying re-used sound effect must be the metal door. It's being used for damn near every door opening AND closing in games and movies, whether appropriate or not.
I don't think MS can stop moddable games being released. At worst, only non-GFW labelled games will have mods in the future. If they start locking down Windows Vista so that only MS-approved games are released, Windows won't be viable for gaming anymore.
There can't be one less layer of middleware, can there? The Quicktime player is a player using the same libraries that iTunes would use to play. Exactly the same number of steps, I would presume, unless the library (DLL/.so etc.) magically plays files dropped on it.
Java isn't all that slow, but the bad rep is because of its startup time and a really unoptimised GUI. It's fine for all sorts of things while running, but the two apps I use it for aren't exactly impressive. If I leave Azureus up for a while, it's eating 400 megs of memory. It also takes 10+ seconds to show its window. The other thing I regularly use Java for is my bank, which insists on using a friggin' control in its window. It takes about a minute to show up, even with other Java apps running. It seems the startup time is a per-process thing, not the entire loading of libraries and stuff.
I recently installed Eclipse, and it's a world apart from the slowness of the bank webapp and Azureus. Starts up immediately, ready to rock. I may start using it once I figure out how:P
I personally weigh the obnoxiousness of ads against the quality of a site. Too much crap, like flash-ads with noise/ huge waste of space, and I block it. If they're friendly little links and actually interesting stuff, I let them be. Few sites survive the crap-test, since I'm an intolerant asshole:/
But oh, so nice it is once the ads are gone - you can actually see content then:)
They wouldn't have to mimic the entire user interface of whatever the current Windows is, only the APIs so the latest software will run. It doesn't matter if MS don't support XP, because they don't support ReactOS either. At least ReactOS will have source code;)
I dunno if they'll ever reach their target. They seem dedicated, so it may happen eventually. But I still think ReactOS is pure madness, in a cool sort of way.
>What is SMART monitoring really good for? Not one drive I've had it enabled has given me a "warning, this drive is about to fail" alert.
SMART itself keeps failures transparent to you, by locking out definitely broken sectors on the drive. This is at a level outside the OS, so in theory a write to a bad block should just be a little slower, but not freeze the system. I guess the monitoring tools are just useful to tell you when a drive is starting to fail. Once you have a few bad blocks, disaster is never far away, in my experience.
Yeah, don't knock 35mm. It's a very, very high-definition format. I did some calculations based on what I could find (sorry, you lazy gits will have to use the Wikipedia yourselves) about HD formats and analog film resolutions. I came up with somewhat short of two terabytes to hold a typical feature film, with one soundtrack at 48-96kHz with six channels. My calculations could be off, but it's basically out of reach of current CPUs and graphics hardware to decode something equivalent to REAL film in anything approaching realtime.
It may be a while before we get there, too, as movie formats have been the slowest moving tech. At least it took us many years to go from DVD to HD DVD (six times as many pixels on screen at a time). The next leap may be around the same increase, and still would be far behind 35mm.
Slashdot Mirror
Yeah, Gears of War is prettier :/
One of the xbox.com guys thinks the graphics will improve before release. We'll see..
Here are two screenshots, one from Halo 2, one from Halo 3:6 .jpg. jpg
http://media.teamxbox.com/games/ss/1353/117891277
http://media.teamxbox.com/games/ss/472/1085785669
It certainly looks like they've improved the graphics since H2.
More environmental detail, less blocky characters, more vibrant colours.
So I guess the complainers must have seen an overcompressed YouTube
variant only.
The Halo 3 beta will be running with mostly Halo 2 assets, at least at first. Saves download bandwidth.
I sure hope they release some larger textures to at least test the engine with later, though.
People are expecting the Core to cease to exist. I'll allow MS+Rockstar this particular excluding move,
since the choice will be between Premium and Elite for new customers anyway.
How is this new, anyway? I was stepping through the Amiga ROM in the late eighties
with just the SEKA (or whatever) assembler's debugger.
Bash has fancy completion like that, too. I've used it for years. 'make ' to see what buildtargets there are,
'less --' if you forgot the spelling of the colour options, or 'ncftp ' to see your saved FTP sites.
Two thirds of the cost of a car in Norway IS tax.
Yeah, I think the ISPs would lose a lot of customers - not in protest, but simply because their
traffic looked like or really was pirated material.
Guitar Hero tracks also include data about the on-screen guitarist's finger movements.
I'm sure pirates will find a way to strip discs of keys to revoke, anyway.
The most annoying re-used sound effect must be the metal door.
It's being used for damn near every door opening AND closing in
games and movies, whether appropriate or not.
I don't think MS can stop moddable games being released. At worst, only non-GFW labelled games will have mods in the future.
If they start locking down Windows Vista so that only MS-approved games are released, Windows won't be viable for gaming anymore.
There can't be one less layer of middleware, can there? The Quicktime player is a player using the same
libraries that iTunes would use to play. Exactly the same number of steps, I would presume, unless the
library (DLL/.so etc.) magically plays files dropped on it.
Flight sims are the only games that should get away with it, since they are simulating reality.
I doubt speeding blue hedgehogs cn fool anyone.
> drives for your PC are insane priced right now
:)
But the Xbox 360 drives also work. Much cheaper
Java isn't all that slow, but the bad rep is because of its startup time and a really unoptimised GUI.
:P
It's fine for all sorts of things while running, but the two apps I use it for aren't exactly impressive.
If I leave Azureus up for a while, it's eating 400 megs of memory. It also takes 10+ seconds to show
its window. The other thing I regularly use Java for is my bank, which insists on using a friggin'
control in its window. It takes about a minute to show up, even with other Java apps running. It seems
the startup time is a per-process thing, not the entire loading of libraries and stuff.
I recently installed Eclipse, and it's a world apart from the slowness of the bank webapp and Azureus.
Starts up immediately, ready to rock. I may start using it once I figure out how
>Vista more than just a pretty face, it's a GIANT pain in the A$$ as well.
So Vista is like a very convincing transvestite?
I personally weigh the obnoxiousness of ads against the quality of a site. Too much crap, like flash-ads with noise/ :/
:)
huge waste of space, and I block it. If they're friendly little links and actually interesting stuff, I let them be.
Few sites survive the crap-test, since I'm an intolerant asshole
But oh, so nice it is once the ads are gone - you can actually see content then
So FunCom are going to retrofit some lame online component to all their games now,
or are they simply becoming a boring old MMO company?
FFXI is not an FPS.
They wouldn't have to mimic the entire user interface of whatever the current Windows is, ;)
only the APIs so the latest software will run. It doesn't matter if MS don't support XP, because
they don't support ReactOS either. At least ReactOS will have source code
I dunno if they'll ever reach their target. They seem dedicated, so it may happen eventually.
But I still think ReactOS is pure madness, in a cool sort of way.
I'm a nihilist, and I use Linux. And Windows. Plus a gaming device from each major company.
Doesn't New Zealand also have some unusually strict laws against certain types of horror movies?
>What is SMART monitoring really good for? Not one drive I've had it enabled has given me a "warning, this drive is about to fail" alert.
SMART itself keeps failures transparent to you, by locking out definitely broken sectors on the drive.
This is at a level outside the OS, so in theory a write to a bad block should just be a little slower,
but not freeze the system. I guess the monitoring tools are just useful to tell you when a drive
is starting to fail. Once you have a few bad blocks, disaster is never far away, in my experience.
Yeah, don't knock 35mm. It's a very, very high-definition format. I did some calculations based on what I could find
(sorry, you lazy gits will have to use the Wikipedia yourselves) about HD formats and analog film resolutions.
I came up with somewhat short of two terabytes to hold a typical feature film, with one soundtrack at 48-96kHz with
six channels. My calculations could be off, but it's basically out of reach of current CPUs and graphics hardware to
decode something equivalent to REAL film in anything approaching realtime.
It may be a while before we get there, too, as movie formats have been the slowest moving tech. At least it took us many
years to go from DVD to HD DVD (six times as many pixels on screen at a time). The next leap may be around the
same increase, and still would be far behind 35mm.