That I'm a mac user? Well, erm yeah it is (sorry no cookies left, but feel free to give yourself a gold star). If you'd prefer me to use a CEX, Prestel or WELL address instead I'd be happy to oblige, if I thought they were still running.
If you'd noticed my UID (which ironically is not only displayed right next to my UID, but actually forms part of the email alias), you'll note that I've been around long before pretty much any 'mac zealots' - or you - had even heard of Slashdot (from a time when pretty much all the readers were Unix users), so the chance of me being a ranging mac zealot still on/. after all that time is pretty low.
"From what I can gather" and "if that's true" parts were fairly clearly disclaimers on my post. What you failed to mention is that the iMac's already use a Memron processor, so the chance of the PowerBook's moving to them in the future is quite high.
The Intel chips are much less sophisticated than offerings from ATI or Nvidia (to the extent that Intel graphics chips are seen as something of a pariah by gamers;-), so there is probably a lot less risk in that they are not doing nearly as much either in the chip or in the drivers. In the case of ATI and Nvidia I think a sufficent amount of code remains in the software due to the constantly-evolving and highly competative nature of consumer graphics card market (where it's common to see driver updates that allow existing cards to support the latest effects). If they crammed as much into hardware as was possible, that would reduce the flexibility of the platform quite a bit.
I forget which but either ATI and Nvidia (possibly both) have said the reason why they haven't open sourced their drivers is because they contain valuable intellectual property that could be to the advantage of a competitor (i.e. each other - I assume), and I'm inclined to belive them to a large extent. If that's the case, I think it's certainly conceivable that if it's possible to determine a bit more about how the system operates, that it would make it easier for those looking for both trivial and non-trivial patent violations to make a case, and that might be part of the reason why neither party has been inclined to released open source drivers despite both being sufficently aware of demand that they've provided binary drivers for Linux on x86.
At the end of the day, you can't effectively boycott a company which takes in so much cash per week as Nike, Sony or so on. You may win morally and feel nice inside but they will never see any impact on their bottom line.
If that were true though, companies like Nike wouldn't have spent so much money trying to repair damage to the brand to get consumers back 'on side' (I remember seeing Nike videos after the details about Nike sweatshops first appearing in the press, that were an attempt to show how Nike had cleaned up their act).
It's also worth bearing in mind consumer confidence impacts the share price too (meaning company executives have significant impetuous to keep it in mind). Consumer awareness of how big business operaters is higher than it's ever been and their is considerable public pressure on companies to be seen to behave ethically and responsibly - think of all the adverts you seen from companies like BP ('Beyond Petroleum' indeed!) and Shell about how 'environmentally friendly' they are.
Big companies devote a significant amount of reasources worrying about their public image and how favourably potential customers view them (apparently either not at Sony, or the people in Sony that are paid to worry about that sort of thing have very little clout).
I think whether or not your Core Duo 2 CPU has 64 bit support or not depends on which core it has - Conroe or Merom (Wikipedia mentions a couple of other types). Nothing on the Apple site seems to talk about the technical specifications on that much detail, sadly.
From what I can gather, the MacBook's are using Conroe's (which would explain why Apple arn't touting '64 bit support' in them), if that's true I would guess we may see Memron ones around MWSF (on Googling, a couple of other sites seem to be thinking that too).
Jack Thompson would be made a hero if he would drop the whole video game issue and took up the Bully issue in our schools today.
This is what I've often though when seeing people rant about how popular media is warping the children.
If people cared even half as much about the REAL violence, bulling and intimidation that we ALL KNOW goes on in schools - and of course the quality of the education on offer - as they apparently do about on-screen or in-game content then the world would be a much better place for all of us. And that's something that applies globally.
Apparently, Jack doesn't care as much about the self-perpetuating and much more destructive real violence, bullying and intimidation that goes on in schools (which has been the norm since long before videogames existed) as he does about seeing the the same thing in videogames. Of course, I'm sure he stands to make much more money through all the free publicity surrounding his demonizing of video games than he would do standing up for the rights of children to be free from violence and harrasment (in a place they are forced to go to).
Given the previous encounters between Jack and Rockstar, I can't help but think Rockstar may have thought more about what they were doing in releasing Bully then might initially be apparent.
Sure, obviously. I think the interesting point for discussion is the systems in place which encourage that behaviour, rather than acting to balance against the natural insticints of people to empire build (something that's rarely in the best interest of the company, who are actually paying for the staff in a managers 'empire').
I think it's unfair for that comment to have been marked Troll.
Many large companies grow staff quickly because 'that's what they are expected to do' and because of a perceived need for them, but few compaines really seem to pay much attention to the 'work smater, not harder' approach. I've seen many departments of 20-30 people, with loads of dead weight, that would be far more efficent and deliver better and quicker results if they were instead just handful of really competent staff.
From my own perspective, I work for a large company and have spent the last 6-12 months writing, on my own, some vital software which has out performed in almost every measurable way nearly identical (but addmitedly slightly more complex) systems symoltaniously developed by other teams for other areas of the business (one of which is about 20-30, another is more like double that in terms of active developers). I know the guys in the the other teams and I know the work they are doing - those teams could have written the same software faster if they'd just left the 5 most competant guys to work on it and ditch the rest (but kept the analysts on board for paperwork and liasing with management and other teams).
Given what Google has been doing (the amount of liasing with other companies in particular) I'm sure they do need a lot more staff than they used to, purely due to demand for technical staff to be avalible to able to consult with staff and customers. While an overzealous efficency drive can certainly hurt output, I think most companies (probably not Google, but most existing large companies certainly) could do with a huge amount of 'optimisation' in their IT departments (something that usally needs to be applied to both management and developers).
Companies seem very reticent to do this though, pehaps it's because there is no incentive in having a 'smaller team', or because if you do elect to trim down, HR/senior management will turn round and say 'if you have too many staff, why are your projects late / why don't you taken on more work' and question your management ability. Many managers evidently don't feel comfortable having difficult, perhaps confrontational conversations with senior management in this regard, certainly 'not rocking the boat' invariably seems to be an overriding concern - even when things are going badly wrong.
I refuse to play a lot of online serivces, including battle.net and Live, in large part due to the score. Not all of us are competitive, and not all of us are competitive all the time.
That's pretty odd you know! You certainly seem to be worried about what other anonymous people on the internet think (people who by all accounts, are jerks).
Anyone who knows the first thing about the score knows it doesn't mean that much (especially when you have people buying titles like King Kong or Fight Night just because it hands out easy points - not that Fight Night isn't superb). More than anything, it's a general reflection of how much someone plays their 360, though I know people in my friends list who share the account with friends and familer members who come round (and of course, they have the highest scores of anyone I know, no ones ever brought it up though).
I'm far more likely to use Sony's system than MSes due to the fact there is no score.
Sorry, but that's weird. I really don't know why you would care. I think you might be looking at games in a way that might prevent you from getting the most out of them.
FWIW, my gamer score sucks, it's about 730 or so (would be about 930 or so, but not all the achivements were unlocked on the same account). That's pretty sucky, especially as I've bought something like 20 titles so far (so in theory, it could be something like 14,000). I play my 360 a fair bit, I play quite a lot of PC games too - I have a great setup for both environments, which I've invested pretty heavily in (AMDFX CPU, SLI graphics cards, 24" TFT for the PC, 50" HD Plasma for gaming, etc - I definately spend most of my disposal income on gaming) I just suck at most games (I'm only noticeably good at team based FPS games).
I can live with that though, because I still have a shitload of fun playing them. Don't get me wrong, I don't like to lose (especially when it's down to being on the Worst. Team. Ever.), but most games these days aren't just 2 player, so as long as I manage not to be last I'm happy. I play games primarily for fun and immersiveness rather than any sort of challenge (for me, something like Ghost Recon on Normal mode is just perfect in terms of gameplay, difficulty and length - plenty of great gameplay and there were no stupidly difficult end levels).
If I unlock an achievement it's because it was really easy to grab with only a little effort, or as is the case 9 times out of 10, it's just part of normal gameplay and it happens without me expecting it. I unlocked the 'kill 30 enemies in one round of multiplayer without dying' award in GRAW this week, that was a nice surprise, but there is no way I'm going to try and do something crazy like try and get the 'kill 1500 people in multiplayer' award just so I can get 25 points or so.
I actually like the Live system, because I can see how much of a game someone has actually played, so I know if they are talking out of their ass or not, though that's a situation that rarely arises because other people know they can see if someone else has actually finished a title or gotten to level X - so smacktalk is cut right down. It's also so nice to be able to see what people in your friends list are playing and how much of it they've played (or, conversly, if they've not played it at all since they first got it). Lastly (and this has been said before regarding Live), the only feature of keep score that is any use, is in knowing that you are "offically better" than your friends, at least one particular game.
I can almost understand where you are coming from, in that if I'm playing BF2 and me or my squad has just spent the last round solo defending vital flags that won the match for the team while other people went on stats padding killing spree's and are score is pretty crummy at the end of it, that's frustrating (especially if you've got a bunch of solo-artists bickering about who is the leetest in chat), but, I've never heard anyone say anything disparaging to anyone on the basis
* Up to 4 GB of DDR2 dual channel2 memory
* 20.1" Widescreen WSXGA+ display
* 256MB ATI® MobilityTM RADEONTM X1800 Graphics Card for multimedia intensive applications.
* Integrated 1.3 megapixel web cam and array microphone
* 8 speakers and subwoofer
* Up to 240GB3 of storage across two hard drives
* Optional RAID 0 - 1
* 8x DVD/CD Burner (DVD+/-RW)4
* IEEE 1394 integrated port (1394 cable and software sold separately)
* 4 USB 2.0 (Universal Serial Bus) compliant 4-pin connectors
* ExpressCard Slot
* RJ45 Ethernet port
* RJ11 Modem port
* Video: Digital Video Interface (DVI)
* S-Video: 7-pin mini-DIN connector
* Component Video, S/PDIF Digital & Analog 7.1/5.1 Audio out
* 13-in-2 removable memory card reader
RAID 1 has data redundancy, but not "automatic backups", with or without quotes. If you lose a file, you lose it from all the mirrors, and can't recover it any more than if it had been on a single drive. It only protects you from drive failure causing data loss. Since there's no hotswapping on this lapstop, you'd still have to stop what you're doing and get a new drive fitted in.
I think we all understand that, and I suspect the OP knows that too.
It only protects you from drive failure causing data loss.
Exactly, it protects you from disk failure, in that sense he was quite correct to refer to it as backup.
Since there's no hotswapping on this lapstop, you'd still have to stop what you're doing and get a new drive fitted in.
That is not correct. Virtually no RAID controllers (except really shitty ancient ADAPTEC PoS's) are so poorly written.
The last time I came across behaviour like that was down to a 3rd party controller in a Compaq Proliant system that was nearly 10 years old.
As for speed, you're wrong there.
I suspect it's you who's mistaken, it seemed to me the parent was suggesting RAID 1 was inferior to RAID 0 from an avid gamers perspective, a statement which is entirely valid.
This is not a tool to help people increase their sites ranking in Google. It's a tool for customers who pay Google for advertising to help those advertisers drive up revenue by converting more visitors (those who notice the advert and click through) into paying customers by making their sited better at driving customers into making a purchase.
It's fanboi comments like this that make the Apple Religious laughing stocks.
Interesting that you should mention stocks.... Despite Dell selling significantly more (cheaper) computers than Apple do, Apple is still worth more (about 15 US Billion more) than Dell, a gap which has been widening all year.
While not the whole story, it's certainly enough to give pause for thought when mulling over whether, compared to Apple, Dell sells 'tat' or not.
AFAIK it's inaccurate for the OP to suggest Dell sells computers that are any less likely to work than Apple's (I don't expect there is much in it either way), but I think it's fair to describe the average quality of a Dell system in other respects (features, design) as being comparatively pretty inferior.
It's no secret that Dell competes almost entirely on price (something they do astoundingly well), only rarely on features and almost never in innovation.
Aaaah, I've just followed the link to your site and realise you almost certianly knew all that already! 8)
The most compelling use for LiveScript at the time was that you could interact with Applets and plugins in the page... Hence the overexcited name change.
I'm not sure I think that was the most compelling use for it (not that I dislike Java), but I can see now why you might see it that way:)
Personally I'd really like to see more use of scripting languages for simple applications, not least because I think some people would othewise not be able or have the time to write applications would be able to knock out some really great tools.
I think something like JavaScript would be excellent as an option in X-Code for example, as I think AppleScript has gotten a bit too klunky (I'm not sure if I'm alone in finding it easier to write Coca apps in Java and Objective C than AppleScript), and there are so many instances where I'd love to do a minor utility with a GUI, but don't have the time to do it properly in Java or ObjC, but I could hack it up quickly enough using a scripting language.
I was just pointing out the absurdity that web content could have had a really solid programming model underpinning it - Java or something like Java.
I'd very much rather JavaScript was class-based based (and that it was more feature rich) but I would respectfully disagree with the view that something like Java would be a better solution for web based software in favour of an updated ECMAScript language (which sadly, is long over due). Anyone would certainly want to keep most of the benifits of Java, so perhaps I think ideal platform would look a lot like a merger of the features of both.
Writing the majority of your average application in a scripting language, with specific tasks being handed over to a library written in another more feature rich / efficent language (I'm thinking the same way HyperTalk could call XCMD's origionally written in C, or that PHP can interact with modules written in C - or Java for that matter) is what'd I'd prefer - of course this is roughly what you can do today, it's just that JavaScript needs to get just a bit more powerful to get the best out of both (IMO).
As for network storage, this seems close enough to be viable, especially with local mirroring.
Actually, with a local mirror that would be a feature I'd really like (that way I could have information stored locally, but "backed up" on a central service, which would only be adventageous).
If it's going to be wireless, we shouldn't have to keep plugging it in. I've switched back to wired controllers for most of my activities simply because the wireless ones always seem to be either plugged in anyway, or out of batteries and in need of plugging in.
Hmm, I really like the 360 system. I've found than even when I'm using a system that is fully charged I can run out of juice - particularly if I'm playing for a long time at the weekends on one particular game. I've always assumed the Wii would work the same way. I used to have a Logitech re-charable wireless mouse and found that if I used it for really long periods (work or gaming) I'd have the same problem of it going flat after sucessive periods of heavy use.
Raises a good point though, will the Wii battery life be more of a problem - given that more games seem likely to depend on it's motion sensing abilities, how much extra power that might require and how much more cumberson having a cable might prove? I guess the inevitable recharge/power cable will need to be a bit longer than the 360's to be comfortable (to give enough room for movement when your using Wii with it plugged in - bearing in mind a lot of us are sitting further back from TV's than we used to now we have larger (increasingly HD) displays).
And yes, of course recording and recompiling are two different things. But do you really want to have to recompile a hundred different times and then manage each of those compilations? You won't even have finished compiling version 1.2.3 on all the phones by the time 1.2.4 is ready, and then you have to start over again.
I for one totally agree writing for phones (either traditional software or WAP/Web content) is a total nightmare.
I've written DHTML/AJAX sites comparible to Google maps (including one that's actually a scrollable map, though it's for a web based game - not a case of wheel re-invention) and have found it surprisingly straight forward to write for MSIE, Firefox and Safari (and Opera, which hasn't been any more difficult than the other three, but given it's market share is less of a priority - or at least it has been for me).
Writing even a simple WAP page that works across all major phones is nightmare though, and normal WWW pages on a phone are worse when it comes to things like consistant form behaviour, CSS and Javascript support. Arguably, writing a Java application is easier, at least it's vaguely consistant, but even then you've got varing screen resolutions, different levels of support for various features (from 'hardware acellerated' to 'not at all'), different input methods and varing number of - and posititions of - buttons to deal with.
Varing screen resolutions/oriantations is the biggest problem I find - when you have so little to work with in terms of screen real estate it can be frustrating trying to build the best possible interface on a system that is limited in it's interactivity/scriptability, in interface reponsiveness and in network speed.
So now we're imitating real applications in a scripting language that was intended to serve as glue for the real language.
Actually, what is known as "JavaScript" was developed at Netscape (in the pre-AOL purchase days) and the language has nothing to do with Java, and the name to "JavaScript" was a late change (and one that has caused a lot of partly-intentional confusion). It's not glue for Java, it's actually an implimentation of ECMAScript - as is the very similar ActionScript (used by Flash) or JScript (used by IE - as IE doesn't technically support 'JavaScript' but instead has it's own implimentation of ECMAScript, which very similar to and largely compatible with JavaScript).
Boy I would like to get my hands on the PHB at Netscape that decided to name it from LiveScript to JavaScript.
As scripting language, it's actually a better choice for most lightweight applications in a number of ways IMO, not least because from a user perspective it's more convinent in many causes, though in the case of software someone is likely to use often - like Google Maps - a downloadable Java application would definately be preferable.
There are very few sites that really make great use of JavaScript, which I think is a shame as it's really easy to learn and use. It's amazing what you can do with it, though typically it's used in gimmicky ways or for relatively mundane form validation.
Hardware HDR. Just give us a really broad palette to work with, and handle the HDR on-chip.
I think that's a reasonable request.
Profile login on a Sim card in the controller. The Xbox 1 had the right idea, but they milked the memory card price too much. Register your controller on the network by popping in a tiny / cheap sim card.
Network Storage. My web host offers 400 GB of storage and a ridiculous amount of bandwidth for not much more than a Live Gold account. Drop the hassle of memory cards, jump to Sim cards, and store the basic game info remotely.
I can't agree with either of those though, I think that's just something that sounds cool but wouldn't be practical.
Having storage online would mean I wouldn't be able to continue saved games when there is a network problem or when X-Box live is down for maintenance (as it was last night, for hours!), which would be too annoying. If you've got a username/password already (and your X-Box can remember that, which it can) their really isn't any need to have a sim card with that information on it.
The only use I can see would be taking it round to a friends house to record the result of any two player games (and maybe as a gimmick tied into store promotions, etc). Maybe it would be useful in a household with multiple users of the X-Box. While something like that would be cool I suspect the percentage of people who'd make use of a 'roaming profile' is very small. I think the existing system works really well and everyone seems happy with it.
Pad-based controller recharging.
The current system on the 360 is already as good as it's going to get - if the battery is flat the game auto-pauses, and plugging in the cord allows you continue playing and re-charges the controller while you play. Something like induction mat charging for PDA's and phones is worth while exploring, but it makes no sense for a controller as then you wouldn't be able to use it while it's charging.
Game Modding and user-created content. I don't know how this would happen, but it needs to happen.
I imagine it could happen fairly easily using a system like X-Box live market place, where users could vote to rank content. I think Microsoft just need need to open up the market place a bit more and make it easier for individual developers / small teams to get content listed (though I'd still like to see quality control in place).
Physics co-processor. There is enough particles bouncing these days that we should have some special purpose iron to help with the load.
I agree the next generation should definately support a hardware accelerated physics engine, though I suspect something integrated into the GPU is how it's going to go. The interactivity in the PC version of GRAW really made it stand out against the 360 version (which I thought was otherwise generally superior). I'm not sure if it's the case, but it seemed like they'd already pushed the X-Box so far graphically (certainly for a near-launch title) there just wasn't more 'oomf' left for the more complex physics of the PC version (which comparatively, doesn't look quite as good I would say - due to differences in the lighting).
While the technology in GRAW was certainly more than 'good enough' to deliver superb gameplay, I would be disappointed not to see a great deal more interactivity in the next generation of console games, though I expect their will be titles on the 360 and PS3 that will feature some great interactive enviornments.
I bought the game, only to find out my serial was already registered and I couldn't play the game no matter what proof I offered!
That is annoying, and I've had that happen to me, it's almost impossible to prevent though (regardless of the sophistication of the algorithm used to validate keys).
You should simply have taken it back to the store where you purchased it from. They are the only ones (typically) legally obligated to give you a refund or replacement (and in most western countries they are legally required to do so). It was really your fault if you didn't, that's fairly basic consumer rights stuff I'd expect everyone to know.
Nether the developers nor distributors are obligated to help you (there are technically some instances where this isn't the case, but it's true as a general rule). For all they know the copy that you have is the one that's not legitimate, it may well have been purchased from a less-than-reputable source or even second hand off some guy off eBay. Even several well known stores have been known to re-stock returned games as 'new', it's sadly surprisingly common practice. Legal obligations aside, it makes the most sense to have to take it back to the store.
I've had that happen to me twice I think (once with PlanetSide, and before that with something like Joint Ops) but I've never had a problem getting a replacement.
Because you can't prevent all of these - and in particular you can't realistically prevent the problem of serial numbers being illegally distributed while they are being circulated during production - the only sure fire way to prevent that is to do use something like Steam / an EA account, but that essencially means not using a retailer.
(You could theoretically purchase and 'activate' something in store and then go home and play it, but that would only really be useful for people without credit or debit cards and almost certainly not worth the hassle of implimenting such a system).
IMO, that's just one more reason why digital distribution is superior (assuming you have a broadband connection) - both for developer and gamer. That, and in a similar vein there is no pressure from publishers to use retarded (i.e. Starforce*) disk copy protection or require users to 'insert the CD'. (I've complained to several games developers about that and they've all said "Yes we know it sucks, sorry, but the publisher made us.")
* I refuse to purchase any game that uses it on the grounds that it fucks up my SATA array when it's installed (I get lots of disk paging errors in the Event log, right before the system reboots) and I've been stupid enough to install it *twice* (the second time, with a different game I went 'hmm, that's really simlar to the problem I had 6 months ago' and *bingo* same cause). Beyond basic required Windows services, I run bupkis in the background / system tray so it's not like it was conflicting with another package trying to access ring0 or something (I'm really retentive like that - I only use Windows for playing games).
Game mechanic seems very different
on
Check Out PoxNora
·
· Score: 1
I had a quick look at the Astral and Etherlords site's - not having heard of them before, though I had also heard of other multiplayer card games - it just seems with them you purchase the game out right as with every other card based video game I've ever seen, and not the individual cards, which seems to be the USP here.
Slashdot Mirror
Your @mac email address is a dead give away.
/. after all that time is pretty low.
That I'm a mac user? Well, erm yeah it is (sorry no cookies left, but feel free to give yourself a gold star). If you'd prefer me to use a CEX, Prestel or WELL address instead I'd be happy to oblige, if I thought they were still running.
If you'd noticed my UID (which ironically is not only displayed right next to my UID, but actually forms part of the email alias), you'll note that I've been around long before pretty much any 'mac zealots' - or you - had even heard of Slashdot (from a time when pretty much all the readers were Unix users), so the chance of me being a ranging mac zealot still on
"From what I can gather" and "if that's true" parts were fairly clearly disclaimers on my post. What you failed to mention is that the iMac's already use a Memron processor, so the chance of the PowerBook's moving to them in the future is quite high.
It seems from your post history you've got issues and are best left ignored. dr.badass appears to have summed it up with "please never attempt to post a comment ever again".
The Intel chips are much less sophisticated than offerings from ATI or Nvidia (to the extent that Intel graphics chips are seen as something of a pariah by gamers ;-), so there is probably a lot less risk in that they are not doing nearly as much either in the chip or in the drivers. In the case of ATI and Nvidia I think a sufficent amount of code remains in the software due to the constantly-evolving and highly competative nature of consumer graphics card market (where it's common to see driver updates that allow existing cards to support the latest effects). If they crammed as much into hardware as was possible, that would reduce the flexibility of the platform quite a bit.
I forget which but either ATI and Nvidia (possibly both) have said the reason why they haven't open sourced their drivers is because they contain valuable intellectual property that could be to the advantage of a competitor (i.e. each other - I assume), and I'm inclined to belive them to a large extent. If that's the case, I think it's certainly conceivable that if it's possible to determine a bit more about how the system operates, that it would make it easier for those looking for both trivial and non-trivial patent violations to make a case, and that might be part of the reason why neither party has been inclined to released open source drivers despite both being sufficently aware of demand that they've provided binary drivers for Linux on x86.
At the end of the day, you can't effectively boycott a company which takes in so much cash per week as Nike, Sony or so on. You may win morally and feel nice inside but they will never see any impact on their bottom line.
If that were true though, companies like Nike wouldn't have spent so much money trying to repair damage to the brand to get consumers back 'on side' (I remember seeing Nike videos after the details about Nike sweatshops first appearing in the press, that were an attempt to show how Nike had cleaned up their act).
It's also worth bearing in mind consumer confidence impacts the share price too (meaning company executives have significant impetuous to keep it in mind). Consumer awareness of how big business operaters is higher than it's ever been and their is considerable public pressure on companies to be seen to behave ethically and responsibly - think of all the adverts you seen from companies like BP ('Beyond Petroleum' indeed!) and Shell about how 'environmentally friendly' they are.
Big companies devote a significant amount of reasources worrying about their public image and how favourably potential customers view them (apparently either not at Sony, or the people in Sony that are paid to worry about that sort of thing have very little clout).
I think whether or not your Core Duo 2 CPU has 64 bit support or not depends on which core it has - Conroe or Merom (Wikipedia mentions a couple of other types). Nothing on the Apple site seems to talk about the technical specifications on that much detail, sadly.
From what I can gather, the MacBook's are using Conroe's (which would explain why Apple arn't touting '64 bit support' in them), if that's true I would guess we may see Memron ones around MWSF (on Googling, a couple of other sites seem to be thinking that too).
Jack Thompson would be made a hero if he would drop the whole video game issue and took up the Bully issue in our schools today.
This is what I've often though when seeing people rant about how popular media is warping the children.
If people cared even half as much about the REAL violence, bulling and intimidation that we ALL KNOW goes on in schools - and of course the quality of the education on offer - as they apparently do about on-screen or in-game content then the world would be a much better place for all of us. And that's something that applies globally.
Apparently, Jack doesn't care as much about the self-perpetuating and much more destructive real violence, bullying and intimidation that goes on in schools (which has been the norm since long before videogames existed) as he does about seeing the the same thing in videogames. Of course, I'm sure he stands to make much more money through all the free publicity surrounding his demonizing of video games than he would do standing up for the rights of children to be free from violence and harrasment (in a place they are forced to go to).
Given the previous encounters between Jack and Rockstar, I can't help but think Rockstar may have thought more about what they were doing in releasing Bully then might initially be apparent.
Sure, obviously. I think the interesting point for discussion is the systems in place which encourage that behaviour, rather than acting to balance against the natural insticints of people to empire build (something that's rarely in the best interest of the company, who are actually paying for the staff in a managers 'empire').
But why do you think anyone would care about what your personal preferences are set to?
Why do you mistakenly think that I would bother to post purely to broadcast that?
I think you've perhaps missed the wider point being made.
It's "simultaneously", my good man.
That clicking sound you hear is me setting my preferences to lower the score of any posts you make so I don't see them in future.
"Those who can, submit constructive and interesting posts. Newbies who can't just try and point out spelling errors to keep busy."
I think it's unfair for that comment to have been marked Troll.
Many large companies grow staff quickly because 'that's what they are expected to do' and because of a perceived need for them, but few compaines really seem to pay much attention to the 'work smater, not harder' approach. I've seen many departments of 20-30 people, with loads of dead weight, that would be far more efficent and deliver better and quicker results if they were instead just handful of really competent staff.
From my own perspective, I work for a large company and have spent the last 6-12 months writing, on my own, some vital software which has out performed in almost every measurable way nearly identical (but addmitedly slightly more complex) systems symoltaniously developed by other teams for other areas of the business (one of which is about 20-30, another is more like double that in terms of active developers). I know the guys in the the other teams and I know the work they are doing - those teams could have written the same software faster if they'd just left the 5 most competant guys to work on it and ditch the rest (but kept the analysts on board for paperwork and liasing with management and other teams).
Given what Google has been doing (the amount of liasing with other companies in particular) I'm sure they do need a lot more staff than they used to, purely due to demand for technical staff to be avalible to able to consult with staff and customers. While an overzealous efficency drive can certainly hurt output, I think most companies (probably not Google, but most existing large companies certainly) could do with a huge amount of 'optimisation' in their IT departments (something that usally needs to be applied to both management and developers).
Companies seem very reticent to do this though, pehaps it's because there is no incentive in having a 'smaller team', or because if you do elect to trim down, HR/senior management will turn round and say 'if you have too many staff, why are your projects late / why don't you taken on more work' and question your management ability. Many managers evidently don't feel comfortable having difficult, perhaps confrontational conversations with senior management in this regard, certainly 'not rocking the boat' invariably seems to be an overriding concern - even when things are going badly wrong.
Really? Please point out what hole I'm in.
It's like goldy and bronzy, only it's made of iron.
The "rather than speeds" part makes it quite clear that he compares it to a no-raid solution.
Given the context, no actually it doesn't.
I think you're so busy trying to be a smartass you are willing to interpret the OP in a way that gives you the most self satisfaction.
Why should I? The parent didn't bother so I was under no obligation. Why don't you refute my claims then?
When your in a hole, it's time to stop digging.
I refuse to play a lot of online serivces, including battle.net and Live, in large part due to the score. Not all of us are competitive, and not all of us are competitive all the time.
That's pretty odd you know! You certainly seem to be worried about what other anonymous people on the internet think (people who by all accounts, are jerks).
Anyone who knows the first thing about the score knows it doesn't mean that much (especially when you have people buying titles like King Kong or Fight Night just because it hands out easy points - not that Fight Night isn't superb). More than anything, it's a general reflection of how much someone plays their 360, though I know people in my friends list who share the account with friends and familer members who come round (and of course, they have the highest scores of anyone I know, no ones ever brought it up though).
I'm far more likely to use Sony's system than MSes due to the fact there is no score.
Sorry, but that's weird. I really don't know why you would care. I think you might be looking at games in a way that might prevent you from getting the most out of them.
FWIW, my gamer score sucks, it's about 730 or so (would be about 930 or so, but not all the achivements were unlocked on the same account). That's pretty sucky, especially as I've bought something like 20 titles so far (so in theory, it could be something like 14,000). I play my 360 a fair bit, I play quite a lot of PC games too - I have a great setup for both environments, which I've invested pretty heavily in (AMDFX CPU, SLI graphics cards, 24" TFT for the PC, 50" HD Plasma for gaming, etc - I definately spend most of my disposal income on gaming) I just suck at most games (I'm only noticeably good at team based FPS games).
I can live with that though, because I still have a shitload of fun playing them. Don't get me wrong, I don't like to lose (especially when it's down to being on the Worst. Team. Ever.), but most games these days aren't just 2 player, so as long as I manage not to be last I'm happy. I play games primarily for fun and immersiveness rather than any sort of challenge (for me, something like Ghost Recon on Normal mode is just perfect in terms of gameplay, difficulty and length - plenty of great gameplay and there were no stupidly difficult end levels).
If I unlock an achievement it's because it was really easy to grab with only a little effort, or as is the case 9 times out of 10, it's just part of normal gameplay and it happens without me expecting it. I unlocked the 'kill 30 enemies in one round of multiplayer without dying' award in GRAW this week, that was a nice surprise, but there is no way I'm going to try and do something crazy like try and get the 'kill 1500 people in multiplayer' award just so I can get 25 points or so.
I actually like the Live system, because I can see how much of a game someone has actually played, so I know if they are talking out of their ass or not, though that's a situation that rarely arises because other people know they can see if someone else has actually finished a title or gotten to level X - so smacktalk is cut right down. It's also so nice to be able to see what people in your friends list are playing and how much of it they've played (or, conversly, if they've not played it at all since they first got it). Lastly (and this has been said before regarding Live), the only feature of keep score that is any use, is in knowing that you are "offically better" than your friends, at least one particular game.
I can almost understand where you are coming from, in that if I'm playing BF2 and me or my squad has just spent the last round solo defending vital flags that won the match for the team while other people went on stats padding killing spree's and are score is pretty crummy at the end of it, that's frustrating (especially if you've got a bunch of solo-artists bickering about who is the leetest in chat), but, I've never heard anyone say anything disparaging to anyone on the basis
All talk, no facts.
Yeah, not like your post, which was a fountain of knowledge.
You could at least have linked to the specs on the Dell website, which lists the the specs as:
CPU options:
* Intel® Core(TM) 2 Duo Processor
* Intel® CoreTM 2 Duo Processor T7200 (2GHz, 4M L2 Cache, 667MHz FSB)
* Intel® CoreTM 2 Duo Processor T7400 (2.16GHz, 4M L2 Cache, 667MHz FSB)
* Intel® CoreTM 2 Duo Processor T7600 (2.33GHz, 4M L2 Cache, 667MHz FSB)
Other misc. info:
* Up to 4 GB of DDR2 dual channel2 memory
* 20.1" Widescreen WSXGA+ display
* 256MB ATI® MobilityTM RADEONTM X1800 Graphics Card for multimedia intensive applications.
* Integrated 1.3 megapixel web cam and array microphone
* 8 speakers and subwoofer
* Up to 240GB3 of storage across two hard drives
* Optional RAID 0 - 1
* 8x DVD/CD Burner (DVD+/-RW)4
Weight & Dimensions
* Width: 18.85"
* Height: 2.90"
* Depth: 15.90"
* Weight (lbs): 18.305
I/O Ports
* IEEE 1394 integrated port (1394 cable and software sold separately)
* 4 USB 2.0 (Universal Serial Bus) compliant 4-pin connectors
* ExpressCard Slot
* RJ45 Ethernet port
* RJ11 Modem port
* Video: Digital Video Interface (DVI)
* S-Video: 7-pin mini-DIN connector
* Component Video, S/PDIF Digital & Analog 7.1/5.1 Audio out
* 13-in-2 removable memory card reader
RAID 1 has data redundancy, but not "automatic backups", with or without quotes. If you lose a file, you lose it from all the mirrors, and can't recover it any more than if it had been on a single drive. It only protects you from drive failure causing data loss. Since there's no hotswapping on this lapstop, you'd still have to stop what you're doing and get a new drive fitted in.
I think we all understand that, and I suspect the OP knows that too.
It only protects you from drive failure causing data loss.
Exactly, it protects you from disk failure, in that sense he was quite correct to refer to it as backup.
Since there's no hotswapping on this lapstop, you'd still have to stop what you're doing and get a new drive fitted in.
That is not correct. Virtually no RAID controllers (except really shitty ancient ADAPTEC PoS's) are so poorly written.
The last time I came across behaviour like that was down to a 3rd party controller in a Compaq Proliant system that was nearly 10 years old.
As for speed, you're wrong there.
I suspect it's you who's mistaken, it seemed to me the parent was suggesting RAID 1 was inferior to RAID 0 from an avid gamers perspective, a statement which is entirely valid.
This is not a tool to help people increase their sites ranking in Google. It's a tool for customers who pay Google for advertising to help those advertisers drive up revenue by converting more visitors (those who notice the advert and click through) into paying customers by making their sited better at driving customers into making a purchase.
It's fanboi comments like this that make the Apple Religious laughing stocks.
Interesting that you should mention stocks.... Despite Dell selling significantly more (cheaper) computers than Apple do, Apple is still worth more (about 15 US Billion more) than Dell, a gap which has been widening all year.
While not the whole story, it's certainly enough to give pause for thought when mulling over whether, compared to Apple, Dell sells 'tat' or not.
AFAIK it's inaccurate for the OP to suggest Dell sells computers that are any less likely to work than Apple's (I don't expect there is much in it either way), but I think it's fair to describe the average quality of a Dell system in other respects (features, design) as being comparatively pretty inferior.
It's no secret that Dell competes almost entirely on price (something they do astoundingly well), only rarely on features and almost never in innovation.
Aaaah, I've just followed the link to your site and realise you almost certianly knew all that already! 8)
:)
The most compelling use for LiveScript at the time was that you could interact with Applets and plugins in the page... Hence the overexcited name change.
I'm not sure I think that was the most compelling use for it (not that I dislike Java), but I can see now why you might see it that way
Personally I'd really like to see more use of scripting languages for simple applications, not least because I think some people would othewise not be able or have the time to write applications would be able to knock out some really great tools.
I think something like JavaScript would be excellent as an option in X-Code for example, as I think AppleScript has gotten a bit too klunky (I'm not sure if I'm alone in finding it easier to write Coca apps in Java and Objective C than AppleScript), and there are so many instances where I'd love to do a minor utility with a GUI, but don't have the time to do it properly in Java or ObjC, but I could hack it up quickly enough using a scripting language.
I was just pointing out the absurdity that web content could have had a really solid programming model underpinning it - Java or something like Java.
I'd very much rather JavaScript was class-based based (and that it was more feature rich) but I would respectfully disagree with the view that something like Java would be a better solution for web based software in favour of an updated ECMAScript language (which sadly, is long over due). Anyone would certainly want to keep most of the benifits of Java, so perhaps I think ideal platform would look a lot like a merger of the features of both.
Writing the majority of your average application in a scripting language, with specific tasks being handed over to a library written in another more feature rich / efficent language (I'm thinking the same way HyperTalk could call XCMD's origionally written in C, or that PHP can interact with modules written in C - or Java for that matter) is what'd I'd prefer - of course this is roughly what you can do today, it's just that JavaScript needs to get just a bit more powerful to get the best out of both (IMO).
As for network storage, this seems close enough to be viable, especially with local mirroring.
Actually, with a local mirror that would be a feature I'd really like (that way I could have information stored locally, but "backed up" on a central service, which would only be adventageous).
If it's going to be wireless, we shouldn't have to keep plugging it in. I've switched back to wired controllers for most of my activities simply because the wireless ones always seem to be either plugged in anyway, or out of batteries and in need of plugging in.
Hmm, I really like the 360 system. I've found than even when I'm using a system that is fully charged I can run out of juice - particularly if I'm playing for a long time at the weekends on one particular game. I've always assumed the Wii would work the same way. I used to have a Logitech re-charable wireless mouse and found that if I used it for really long periods (work or gaming) I'd have the same problem of it going flat after sucessive periods of heavy use.
Raises a good point though, will the Wii battery life be more of a problem - given that more games seem likely to depend on it's motion sensing abilities, how much extra power that might require and how much more cumberson having a cable might prove? I guess the inevitable recharge/power cable will need to be a bit longer than the 360's to be comfortable (to give enough room for movement when your using Wii with it plugged in - bearing in mind a lot of us are sitting further back from TV's than we used to now we have larger (increasingly HD) displays).
And yes, of course recording and recompiling are two different things. But do you really want to have to recompile a hundred different times and then manage each of those compilations? You won't even have finished compiling version 1.2.3 on all the phones by the time 1.2.4 is ready, and then you have to start over again.
I for one totally agree writing for phones (either traditional software or WAP/Web content) is a total nightmare.
I've written DHTML/AJAX sites comparible to Google maps (including one that's actually a scrollable map, though it's for a web based game - not a case of wheel re-invention) and have found it surprisingly straight forward to write for MSIE, Firefox and Safari (and Opera, which hasn't been any more difficult than the other three, but given it's market share is less of a priority - or at least it has been for me).
Writing even a simple WAP page that works across all major phones is nightmare though, and normal WWW pages on a phone are worse when it comes to things like consistant form behaviour, CSS and Javascript support. Arguably, writing a Java application is easier, at least it's vaguely consistant, but even then you've got varing screen resolutions, different levels of support for various features (from 'hardware acellerated' to 'not at all'), different input methods and varing number of - and posititions of - buttons to deal with.
Varing screen resolutions/oriantations is the biggest problem I find - when you have so little to work with in terms of screen real estate it can be frustrating trying to build the best possible interface on a system that is limited in it's interactivity/scriptability, in interface reponsiveness and in network speed.
So now we're imitating real applications in a scripting language that was intended to serve as glue for the real language.
Actually, what is known as "JavaScript" was developed at Netscape (in the pre-AOL purchase days) and the language has nothing to do with Java, and the name to "JavaScript" was a late change (and one that has caused a lot of partly-intentional confusion). It's not glue for Java, it's actually an implimentation of ECMAScript - as is the very similar ActionScript (used by Flash) or JScript (used by IE - as IE doesn't technically support 'JavaScript' but instead has it's own implimentation of ECMAScript, which very similar to and largely compatible with JavaScript).
Boy I would like to get my hands on the PHB at Netscape that decided to name it from LiveScript to JavaScript.
As scripting language, it's actually a better choice for most lightweight applications in a number of ways IMO, not least because from a user perspective it's more convinent in many causes, though in the case of software someone is likely to use often - like Google Maps - a downloadable Java application would definately be preferable.
There are very few sites that really make great use of JavaScript, which I think is a shame as it's really easy to learn and use. It's amazing what you can do with it, though typically it's used in gimmicky ways or for relatively mundane form validation.
Oh, and I know that all sounds negative, I liked the parent post though (good to list options to discuss!).
Hardware HDR. Just give us a really broad palette to work with, and handle the HDR on-chip.
I think that's a reasonable request.
Profile login on a Sim card in the controller. The Xbox 1 had the right idea, but they milked the memory card price too much. Register your controller on the network by popping in a tiny / cheap sim card.
Network Storage. My web host offers 400 GB of storage and a ridiculous amount of bandwidth for not much more than a Live Gold account. Drop the hassle of memory cards, jump to Sim cards, and store the basic game info remotely.
I can't agree with either of those though, I think that's just something that sounds cool but wouldn't be practical.
Having storage online would mean I wouldn't be able to continue saved games when there is a network problem or when X-Box live is down for maintenance (as it was last night, for hours!), which would be too annoying. If you've got a username/password already (and your X-Box can remember that, which it can) their really isn't any need to have a sim card with that information on it.
The only use I can see would be taking it round to a friends house to record the result of any two player games (and maybe as a gimmick tied into store promotions, etc). Maybe it would be useful in a household with multiple users of the X-Box. While something like that would be cool I suspect the percentage of people who'd make use of a 'roaming profile' is very small. I think the existing system works really well and everyone seems happy with it.
Pad-based controller recharging.
The current system on the 360 is already as good as it's going to get - if the battery is flat the game auto-pauses, and plugging in the cord allows you continue playing and re-charges the controller while you play. Something like induction mat charging for PDA's and phones is worth while exploring, but it makes no sense for a controller as then you wouldn't be able to use it while it's charging.
Game Modding and user-created content. I don't know how this would happen, but it needs to happen.
I imagine it could happen fairly easily using a system like X-Box live market place, where users could vote to rank content. I think Microsoft just need need to open up the market place a bit more and make it easier for individual developers / small teams to get content listed (though I'd still like to see quality control in place).
Physics co-processor. There is enough particles bouncing these days that we should have some special purpose iron to help with the load.
I agree the next generation should definately support a hardware accelerated physics engine, though I suspect something integrated into the GPU is how it's going to go. The interactivity in the PC version of GRAW really made it stand out against the 360 version (which I thought was otherwise generally superior). I'm not sure if it's the case, but it seemed like they'd already pushed the X-Box so far graphically (certainly for a near-launch title) there just wasn't more 'oomf' left for the more complex physics of the PC version (which comparatively, doesn't look quite as good I would say - due to differences in the lighting).
While the technology in GRAW was certainly more than 'good enough' to deliver superb gameplay, I would be disappointed not to see a great deal more interactivity in the next generation of console games, though I expect their will be titles on the 360 and PS3 that will feature some great interactive enviornments.
I bought the game, only to find out my serial was already registered and I couldn't play the game no matter what proof I offered!
That is annoying, and I've had that happen to me, it's almost impossible to prevent though (regardless of the sophistication of the algorithm used to validate keys).
You should simply have taken it back to the store where you purchased it from. They are the only ones (typically) legally obligated to give you a refund or replacement (and in most western countries they are legally required to do so). It was really your fault if you didn't, that's fairly basic consumer rights stuff I'd expect everyone to know.
Nether the developers nor distributors are obligated to help you (there are technically some instances where this isn't the case, but it's true as a general rule). For all they know the copy that you have is the one that's not legitimate, it may well have been purchased from a less-than-reputable source or even second hand off some guy off eBay. Even several well known stores have been known to re-stock returned games as 'new', it's sadly surprisingly common practice. Legal obligations aside, it makes the most sense to have to take it back to the store.
I've had that happen to me twice I think (once with PlanetSide, and before that with something like Joint Ops) but I've never had a problem getting a replacement.
Because you can't prevent all of these - and in particular you can't realistically prevent the problem of serial numbers being illegally distributed while they are being circulated during production - the only sure fire way to prevent that is to do use something like Steam / an EA account, but that essencially means not using a retailer.
(You could theoretically purchase and 'activate' something in store and then go home and play it, but that would only really be useful for people without credit or debit cards and almost certainly not worth the hassle of implimenting such a system).
IMO, that's just one more reason why digital distribution is superior (assuming you have a broadband connection) - both for developer and gamer. That, and in a similar vein there is no pressure from publishers to use retarded (i.e. Starforce*) disk copy protection or require users to 'insert the CD'. (I've complained to several games developers about that and they've all said "Yes we know it sucks, sorry, but the publisher made us.")
* I refuse to purchase any game that uses it on the grounds that it fucks up my SATA array when it's installed (I get lots of disk paging errors in the Event log, right before the system reboots) and I've been stupid enough to install it *twice* (the second time, with a different game I went 'hmm, that's really simlar to the problem I had 6 months ago' and *bingo* same cause). Beyond basic required Windows services, I run bupkis in the background / system tray so it's not like it was conflicting with another package trying to access ring0 or something (I'm really retentive like that - I only use Windows for playing games).
I had a quick look at the Astral and Etherlords site's - not having heard of them before, though I had also heard of other multiplayer card games - it just seems with them you purchase the game out right as with every other card based video game I've ever seen, and not the individual cards, which seems to be the USP here.
That's a very different game mechanic.