All "things" you do are serial, you can just have multiple serial tasks going at once. This isn't hardware where we get to make up data paths and insert logic wherever we want.
This is the second post I've seen along these lines and I'm beginning to think people really don't understand what software is or how processors work... Even in the slightest.
A processor can't just magically decide to have, say two multipliers in parallel just because your task demands it. You can do that in hardware because you are physically choosing what happens to the bits on the wires. Processors get around that by being out of order, multiple-issue and super-scalar. But you're limited to the design of the processor.
Well we have threads right? Threading makes anything possible! well no. Starting a thread, consumes time, lots of it. So much so that spawning a thread for a trivial operation is slower than just doing it in sequence. Threads only make sense for either really long operations, or operations that will occur over time, over a long period that is.
As for power consumption, one solution is to clock down resources. No sense idling at 2.8GHz (and despite the common understanding, quite a bit still goes on in an idle processor) which is why both Intel and AMD can clock down their cores. AMD is going further with the quad-core (can't go into details) but it'll be fairly flexible.
Well we can clock down processors, what about chipsets? memory? etc. The answer is they can [to a certain degree] but don't always. What use is idling your processor at 10W if your memory is still consuming the same 50W it was at full load? Truth is, most processors spend the majority of their time idling. Even when I was at IBM in the development centre for DB2, most of the boxes, out of a 24 hour day, were idle more than busy. Fortunately, my quad-processor dual-core boxes all had cpufreq running but even then they were still fairly hot.
The problem with this fantasy is that we have to target a variety of platforms, not all of which have parallel processing capabilities.
Also, we already have threading capabilities that are trivial to make use of. If you're talking about *vectorization*, then yeah, that's not well supported in a portable fashion. But threading? pthreads makes that trivial.
What features from verilog would you want? Concurrent expressions? You realize how expensive that would be ?
a = b + c d = c + e
sure that makes sense in verilog (concurrently) because you are *defining the hardware*. In software, that means spawning a process (thread), issuing the code, destroying the thread, etc. The overhead would be insane. Which is why we manually create threads for things that make sense.
Do you have any idea how large a 1GB dual-port stick of ram would be? It'd probably cost 2 to 3x as much to make.
Also DMAs don't take nearly that long to fulfill. This is how you can copy GBs of data from one drive to another and still have a huge amount of processor power to use. The drives don't lock the bus while performing the read, only when actually transferring data. Otherwise, if you locked the bus for 10ms that means you can't service interrupts, say the timer. Which means your clock would be all over the place whenever the disk was busy.
Internal memories/caches do help avoid bus lock situations.
Text rendering sounds like a job for the GPU not CPU. Things like DCTs [for instance] could be done in the GPU, but they're more universal. For instance, you can do MPEG encoding without a monitor, so why throw a GPU in the box?
Crypto is another big thing. It isn't even that you have to be faster, but safer. Doing AES in hardware for instance, could trivially kill any cache/timing attacks that are out there.
even my box at the office has a PCIe addon GFX card. The onboard nvidia was just too buggy (cursor didn't work, lines would show up, etc) even with the tainted nvidia drivers. I bought a low end 7300 PCIe card and problems solved.
What happens when you hit a limitation/bug in the Intel GPU?
Also, don't misunderestimate:-) the revenue from the home/hobby/gamer market. The R&D cost of most processors is paid for by the gamer/server costs. AMD for instance, doesn't pay off the R&D/fab costs by selling $50 semprons. It's by selling $2000 Opterons (which are more or less the same design).
Adding the GPU isn't "free" as others suggested. A lot of testing has to go into it and every configuration you support makes verification that much harder. You also have to gamble, do I make 50,000 plain cores, or the ones with a GPU this month?
1. Yes there are many integrated graphics cards, but most gamers won't use them. There is a huge market for gamer PCs (hint: who do you think those FX processors are made for?)
2. Don't give Intel that much credit. The P4 *was* a gimmick. And don't think that add HTT is "free" at worst. It takes resources to manage the thread (e.g. stealing memory port access to fetch/execute opcodes for instance).
In the case of the P4 it made a little sense because the pipeline was mostly empty (re: it was a shitty design). In the core 2 duo case, the pipeline is less empty and there really just aren't useful bubbles to fill up with another thread.
1. Putting a GPU on the processor immediately divides the market for it. Unless this is only going to be a laptop processor it probably won't sell well on desktops.
2. Hyperthreading only works well in an idle pipeline. The core 2 duo (like the AMD64) have fairly high IPC counts, and hence, low amount of bubbles (as compared to say the P4). And even on the P4 the benefit is marginal at best and in some cases it hurts performance.
The memory controller makes sense as it lowers the latency to memory.
if Intel wants to spend gates, why not put in more accelerators for things like the variants of the DCT used by MPEG, JPEG and MPEG audio? or how about crypto accelerators for things like AES and bignum math?
Say what? I've had my Inspiron since December 2005 and it's in the same shape now as then. No cracks, scratches, dead pixels, etc. And I've lugged it to the states [via airports] and europe a bunch of times (as well as to/from work).
Maybe, perhaps, you're just careless with your laptops? Ever consider a sturdy metal laptop case? I had for my first laptop [a Compaq Presario] and it took a nice beating (dropped down stairs, off tables, etc).
drfa... it's an fpga with some host controller of some sort? I love when they use human analogies for computing.
I doubt this thing uses random mutations [like living organisms do] to test out for success. Likely, it has programmed variations of a central configuration that it can vary depending on the load/task.
For example, if it was a processor, you could have it configure itself to have a strong ALU and no FPU when the code is only integer, have it reconfigure to have a weaker ALU but a useful FPU when the code has floating point operations, etc. There are already CPU generators for limited RISC type processors on opencores.org.
Because the keyboard shouldn't physically break by putting Linux on it.
Just like your car shouldn't break down because you drove it on a Tuesday (show me in your warranty where it explicitly says the car is guaranteed to work on a specific Tuesday).
If it's a software compatibility problem that's one thing [though I'd argue if your qwerty or dvorak keyboard doesn't work in Linux chances are it's not a real keyboard], but if the hardware is just unreliable, that has nothing to do with the OS.
There is a demand for smart phones from people who think they're super important and *think* they need to have connectivity at all moments. I saw enough of it when I was working for AMD. At the airports you'd see people flip out their BB's to read some email or whatever as soon as the plane touched the ground. Look, you're not that important. Chances are whatever mail you do have can wait till you get to your hotel or office. People just like playing "dress up" and act like what they think an adult/businessperson should act like.
I'm not against the idea of more useful phones. I just hate that people are wholesale willing to buy into anything that comes out on the market. Most phones are the result of amalgamated crap. 0.3MP cameras, slow processors, poor sound/music playback, limited storage, etc... While the features are getting more sophisticated it's happening wickedly too slow because they [samsung/nokia/motorola/etc] know they can drag their feet the entire way. Afterall, people will buy shit, so long as it's ever so slightly better than last years shit.
I'd rather just get decent but cheap phone, and pack an iPod with me then buy an expensive phone that has some limited mp3 playback functionality. My $160 canon camera takes 4MP pictures, can store them on my $50 2GB SD cards, and runs off plain AA batteries [re: no expensive battery packs]. If you add up the cost of my phone, ipod and camera, it costs about as much as the iPhone. But does each of their jobs so much better. Odd that.
I didn't read the review [bah, ads] but the point isn't to be faster, it's to be better. Better often means things radically departed from simply faster.
For example, if AMD made a core, the same clock rate as their current mainstream core [say 2.4GHz], but take 40% less power at maximum, wouldn't that be better? It wouldn't render POV-Ray any faster but it would take less juice to do it. Aside from speed, size matters too. Smaller chips are cheaper to produce, reduces cost. Many design changes are for things customers don't even notice, like diagnostic support.
There is also the issue of the entire system. The CPUs are not the only power hungry thing in the typical box. The memory, south/north bridge, other controllers, storage, GFX, etc, all take power too. Especially north bridges [Intel camp in general] and GPUs take a lot of power.
So "leapfrog" doesn't always have to mean MIPS ratings. If the AMD core takes less power, but is marginally slower, that doesn't mean it's worse. As it stands now Intel is winning on both power and MIPS fronts. But they're competing against a 90nm process and are not winning by a landslide I might add. When AMD hits 65nm the energy scale may tip the other way again.
Yeah, he's doing a degree "for fun". Right. Or maybe he sees the writing on the wall. Not saying admining isn't a good job. But let's not pretend that you're some creative genius or have lots of room to grow [intellectually and career-wise].
It's the sort of job that exists, for the most part, because people are too busy/lazy to do it themselves.
In general, I find people who tell the "I dropped out of school at 16/17 and look how I turned out" fall into one of two camps. Those who are already fairly smart, have an aptitude to learn on their own [and do so]. Then there are those who set the bar just a bit lower than others. But usually the "I'm above schooling" attitude is a sign of someone who really isn't worth talking about, maybe 1 of every 100K dropouts is actually cracked up to be a somebody in their respective fields. The rest work retail or other sorts of jobs.
Which, I should add, aren't bad, but just don't pretend like you're living the high life thumbing your nose at everyone else.
1. algebra 2. calculus 3. data structures 4. algorithms [sorting, searching, etc] 5. compiler theory 6. numerical analysis 7. and a host of practical courses, etc.
And what do I do for a living? Software developer in the field of cryptography. So I need the math, algorithms, etc, etc. Yeah, granted I too taught myself a lot of my skills [like crypto], but to say college was a total waste because I had to sit through a "intro to C" class is ignorant.
Maybe if you had a job that required talent you'd be talking differently. I'm sorry, but setting up servers, changing network settings, etc, isn't exactly a skilled labour. I mean it's a job, but don't pretend you're some tech god because you can make Apache start and host a page.
Sorry for knocking you off your high horse, but you're advice is ignorant and misleading.
Usually assembly is just one of many things you need to be useful at to be a software developer. Not many jobs out there just for assembly programmers.
And yes, it's still important. Knowing how processors/computers work is step 1 in figuring out efficient algorithms.
What? You can leave a label, but only after the term is up. If you sign up for 4 albums, your next 4 albums belong to them. At the end of that time you don't have to re-sign. Most probably don't switch labels because things are working out [re: cocaine supply is steady].
The problem is the bar to get into the field is high. Not only do you [normally] need talent, but you also need gear and people who know how to use the gear. unless you're sitting at a piano or playing an accoustic on your own it's fairly costly to produce an album that people will buy in sufficient numbers to make a quality life from.
So most people take their talent and let a label handle the rest.
Might work if you own the studio and what not. But if you have no money and need access to a quarter of a million dollars worth of recording gear... what are you going to do? The problem is they don't break away from the recording companies soon enough...
As for people not knowing what DRM is... I'd say that's a bit reaching. Most people who have used itunes or DVDs are at least aware of "something" which makes it harder to use things as you'd think you could (re: skip the ads at the start, or copy the itunes files to other machines).
They might not know the intricate details about how the DRM "unworks" the system, but I think they're at least aware of it's presence.
dude, sit down. I never said it was right. Which is why I try to follow the rules as best as I can. Sometimes you'll get to the corner a smidge after them and they're slow off the go. Technically you denied them right of way. As for blowing reds and the like, that's an exageration. I'd never say that's a "minor faux-pas." The minute I start running reds and acting reckless I'll just as soon turn my license in to the popo.
Truth be told, I've granted right of way (e.g. let people pass in front of me, when there is nobody behind me) more than I've goofed it.
And to think you drive perfect is ludicrous. Most people who think they drive perfectly proper regularly commit half a dozen infractions in a 10 minute drive. When I started driving my parents would make comments about this or that (usually the "look out for that car [500m down the road]!"). I turned the tables and started announcing every single one of their infractions. They shut up:-) hehehe.
My point was that of all the mistakes I have made while driving, none of them were GTA inspired. And the reason I'm a safer driver than most, is not because I do or don't play GTA, it's because when I'm driving I pay attention to my surroundings, obey the limits, and [most of the time] am ahead of schedule [thus not impatient].
Oh, yeah, well expect some level of lying. But don't underestimate the # of hands in the pot. Especially sport franchises where they pay millions in license fees just to stick a jersey on some modeled animaton./me plays NES games, and desperately wants a Wii
If the game is selling million*S of copies, there is still a strong demand for it. Lowering the price would not make much economical sense.
When sales taper off they usually promote them as "players choice" or "gold" games for $39 or $49 or whatever...
If you can resist buying a game for the first year after it comes out, you usually can save yourself some money. However, if you instead just buy fewer games you can get them early.
They sell old games at a discount for various reasons
1. To clear stock, selling a game at a lower loss is better than a total loss. 2. Older game could inspire future sales (lead generation) 3. Why the hell not?
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All "things" you do are serial, you can just have multiple serial tasks going at once. This isn't hardware where we get to make up data paths and insert logic wherever we want.
This is the second post I've seen along these lines and I'm beginning to think people really don't understand what software is or how processors work... Even in the slightest.
A processor can't just magically decide to have, say two multipliers in parallel just because your task demands it. You can do that in hardware because you are physically choosing what happens to the bits on the wires. Processors get around that by being out of order, multiple-issue and super-scalar. But you're limited to the design of the processor.
Well we have threads right? Threading makes anything possible! well no. Starting a thread, consumes time, lots of it. So much so that spawning a thread for a trivial operation is slower than just doing it in sequence. Threads only make sense for either really long operations, or operations that will occur over time, over a long period that is.
As for power consumption, one solution is to clock down resources. No sense idling at 2.8GHz (and despite the common understanding, quite a bit still goes on in an idle processor) which is why both Intel and AMD can clock down their cores. AMD is going further with the quad-core (can't go into details) but it'll be fairly flexible.
Well we can clock down processors, what about chipsets? memory? etc. The answer is they can [to a certain degree] but don't always. What use is idling your processor at 10W if your memory is still consuming the same 50W it was at full load? Truth is, most processors spend the majority of their time idling. Even when I was at IBM in the development centre for DB2, most of the boxes, out of a 24 hour day, were idle more than busy. Fortunately, my quad-processor dual-core boxes all had cpufreq running but even then they were still fairly hot.
Tom
The problem with this fantasy is that we have to target a variety of platforms, not all of which have parallel processing capabilities.
Also, we already have threading capabilities that are trivial to make use of. If you're talking about *vectorization*, then yeah, that's not well supported in a portable fashion. But threading? pthreads makes that trivial.
What features from verilog would you want? Concurrent expressions? You realize how expensive that would be ?
a = b + c
d = c + e
sure that makes sense in verilog (concurrently) because you are *defining the hardware*. In software, that means spawning a process (thread), issuing the code, destroying the thread, etc. The overhead would be insane. Which is why we manually create threads for things that make sense.
Tom
Do you have any idea how large a 1GB dual-port stick of ram would be? It'd probably cost 2 to 3x as much to make.
Also DMAs don't take nearly that long to fulfill. This is how you can copy GBs of data from one drive to another and still have a huge amount of processor power to use. The drives don't lock the bus while performing the read, only when actually transferring data. Otherwise, if you locked the bus for 10ms that means you can't service interrupts, say the timer. Which means your clock would be all over the place whenever the disk was busy.
Internal memories/caches do help avoid bus lock situations.
Tom
Text rendering sounds like a job for the GPU not CPU. Things like DCTs [for instance] could be done in the GPU, but they're more universal. For instance, you can do MPEG encoding without a monitor, so why throw a GPU in the box?
Crypto is another big thing. It isn't even that you have to be faster, but safer. Doing AES in hardware for instance, could trivially kill any cache/timing attacks that are out there.
Tom
even my box at the office has a PCIe addon GFX card. The onboard nvidia was just too buggy (cursor didn't work, lines would show up, etc) even with the tainted nvidia drivers. I bought a low end 7300 PCIe card and problems solved.
:-) the revenue from the home/hobby/gamer market. The R&D cost of most processors is paid for by the gamer/server costs. AMD for instance, doesn't pay off the R&D/fab costs by selling $50 semprons. It's by selling $2000 Opterons (which are more or less the same design).
What happens when you hit a limitation/bug in the Intel GPU?
Also, don't misunderestimate
Adding the GPU isn't "free" as others suggested. A lot of testing has to go into it and every configuration you support makes verification that much harder. You also have to gamble, do I make 50,000 plain cores, or the ones with a GPU this month?
Tom
1. Yes there are many integrated graphics cards, but most gamers won't use them. There is a huge market for gamer PCs (hint: who do you think those FX processors are made for?)
2. Don't give Intel that much credit. The P4 *was* a gimmick. And don't think that add HTT is "free" at worst. It takes resources to manage the thread (e.g. stealing memory port access to fetch/execute opcodes for instance).
In the case of the P4 it made a little sense because the pipeline was mostly empty (re: it was a shitty design). In the core 2 duo case, the pipeline is less empty and there really just aren't useful bubbles to fill up with another thread.
Tom
1. Putting a GPU on the processor immediately divides the market for it. Unless this is only going to be a laptop processor it probably won't sell well on desktops.
2. Hyperthreading only works well in an idle pipeline. The core 2 duo (like the AMD64) have fairly high IPC counts, and hence, low amount of bubbles (as compared to say the P4). And even on the P4 the benefit is marginal at best and in some cases it hurts performance.
The memory controller makes sense as it lowers the latency to memory.
if Intel wants to spend gates, why not put in more accelerators for things like the variants of the DCT used by MPEG, JPEG and MPEG audio? or how about crypto accelerators for things like AES and bignum math?
Tom
Say what? I've had my Inspiron since December 2005 and it's in the same shape now as then. No cracks, scratches, dead pixels, etc. And I've lugged it to the states [via airports] and europe a bunch of times (as well as to/from work).
Maybe, perhaps, you're just careless with your laptops? Ever consider a sturdy metal laptop case? I had for my first laptop [a Compaq Presario] and it took a nice beating (dropped down stairs, off tables, etc).
Tom
drfa ... it's an fpga with some host controller of some sort? I love when they use human analogies for computing.
I doubt this thing uses random mutations [like living organisms do] to test out for success. Likely, it has programmed variations of a central configuration that it can vary depending on the load/task.
For example, if it was a processor, you could have it configure itself to have a strong ALU and no FPU when the code is only integer, have it reconfigure to have a weaker ALU but a useful FPU when the code has floating point operations, etc. There are already CPU generators for limited RISC type processors on opencores.org.
Tom
Because the keyboard shouldn't physically break by putting Linux on it.
Just like your car shouldn't break down because you drove it on a Tuesday (show me in your warranty where it explicitly says the car is guaranteed to work on a specific Tuesday).
If it's a software compatibility problem that's one thing [though I'd argue if your qwerty or dvorak keyboard doesn't work in Linux chances are it's not a real keyboard], but if the hardware is just unreliable, that has nothing to do with the OS.
Tom
There is a demand for smart phones from people who think they're super important and *think* they need to have connectivity at all moments. I saw enough of it when I was working for AMD. At the airports you'd see people flip out their BB's to read some email or whatever as soon as the plane touched the ground. Look, you're not that important. Chances are whatever mail you do have can wait till you get to your hotel or office. People just like playing "dress up" and act like what they think an adult/businessperson should act like.
I'm not against the idea of more useful phones. I just hate that people are wholesale willing to buy into anything that comes out on the market. Most phones are the result of amalgamated crap. 0.3MP cameras, slow processors, poor sound/music playback, limited storage, etc... While the features are getting more sophisticated it's happening wickedly too slow because they [samsung/nokia/motorola/etc] know they can drag their feet the entire way. Afterall, people will buy shit, so long as it's ever so slightly better than last years shit.
I'd rather just get decent but cheap phone, and pack an iPod with me then buy an expensive phone that has some limited mp3 playback functionality. My $160 canon camera takes 4MP pictures, can store them on my $50 2GB SD cards, and runs off plain AA batteries [re: no expensive battery packs]. If you add up the cost of my phone, ipod and camera, it costs about as much as the iPhone. But does each of their jobs so much better. Odd that.
Tom
Mod parent retarded. Where do you think insulin injections came/comes from?
Provided you sterilize the thing properly what does it matter where it grew?
Tom
millions will be without phones soon!
Yeah, anarchy! I hope that was the intent of the injuction.
Tom
ya I noticed that 4 seconds after I posted it. Oddly enough, writing wasn't a big part of my college program. [maybe it should have been hehehe].
:-(
Only thing I can do well in the morning [when I posted that] is Piano. I guess if I had a lady friend I'd switch majors...
Tom
algebra? compiler theory? numerical analysis?
How about no.
I didn't read the review [bah, ads] but the point isn't to be faster, it's to be better. Better often means things radically departed from simply faster.
For example, if AMD made a core, the same clock rate as their current mainstream core [say 2.4GHz], but take 40% less power at maximum, wouldn't that be better? It wouldn't render POV-Ray any faster but it would take less juice to do it. Aside from speed, size matters too. Smaller chips are cheaper to produce, reduces cost. Many design changes are for things customers don't even notice, like diagnostic support.
There is also the issue of the entire system. The CPUs are not the only power hungry thing in the typical box. The memory, south/north bridge, other controllers, storage, GFX, etc, all take power too. Especially north bridges [Intel camp in general] and GPUs take a lot of power.
So "leapfrog" doesn't always have to mean MIPS ratings. If the AMD core takes less power, but is marginally slower, that doesn't mean it's worse. As it stands now Intel is winning on both power and MIPS fronts. But they're competing against a 90nm process and are not winning by a landslide I might add. When AMD hits 65nm the energy scale may tip the other way again.
Tom
Yeah, he's doing a degree "for fun". Right. Or maybe he sees the writing on the wall. Not saying admining isn't a good job. But let's not pretend that you're some creative genius or have lots of room to grow [intellectually and career-wise].
It's the sort of job that exists, for the most part, because people are too busy/lazy to do it themselves.
In general, I find people who tell the "I dropped out of school at 16/17 and look how I turned out" fall into one of two camps. Those who are already fairly smart, have an aptitude to learn on their own [and do so]. Then there are those who set the bar just a bit lower than others. But usually the "I'm above schooling" attitude is a sign of someone who really isn't worth talking about, maybe 1 of every 100K dropouts is actually cracked up to be a somebody in their respective fields. The rest work retail or other sorts of jobs.
Which, I should add, aren't bad, but just don't pretend like you're living the high life thumbing your nose at everyone else.
Tom
What skills are involved in admining boxes?
Things I learned in college
1. algebra
2. calculus
3. data structures
4. algorithms [sorting, searching, etc]
5. compiler theory
6. numerical analysis
7. and a host of practical courses, etc.
And what do I do for a living? Software developer in the field of cryptography. So I need the math, algorithms, etc, etc. Yeah, granted I too taught myself a lot of my skills [like crypto], but to say college was a total waste because I had to sit through a "intro to C" class is ignorant.
Maybe if you had a job that required talent you'd be talking differently. I'm sorry, but setting up servers, changing network settings, etc, isn't exactly a skilled labour. I mean it's a job, but don't pretend you're some tech god because you can make Apache start and host a page.
Sorry for knocking you off your high horse, but you're advice is ignorant and misleading.
Tom
Usually assembly is just one of many things you need to be useful at to be a software developer. Not many jobs out there just for assembly programmers.
And yes, it's still important. Knowing how processors/computers work is step 1 in figuring out efficient algorithms.
To stoke the fire, C is still important.
Tom
What? You can leave a label, but only after the term is up. If you sign up for 4 albums, your next 4 albums belong to them. At the end of that time you don't have to re-sign. Most probably don't switch labels because things are working out [re: cocaine supply is steady].
The problem is the bar to get into the field is high. Not only do you [normally] need talent, but you also need gear and people who know how to use the gear. unless you're sitting at a piano or playing an accoustic on your own it's fairly costly to produce an album that people will buy in sufficient numbers to make a quality life from.
So most people take their talent and let a label handle the rest.
Might work if you own the studio and what not. But if you have no money and need access to a quarter of a million dollars worth of recording gear ... what are you going to do? The problem is they don't break away from the recording companies soon enough...
... I'd say that's a bit reaching. Most people who have used itunes or DVDs are at least aware of "something" which makes it harder to use things as you'd think you could (re: skip the ads at the start, or copy the itunes files to other machines).
As for people not knowing what DRM is
They might not know the intricate details about how the DRM "unworks" the system, but I think they're at least aware of it's presence.
Tom
dude, sit down. I never said it was right. Which is why I try to follow the rules as best as I can. Sometimes you'll get to the corner a smidge after them and they're slow off the go. Technically you denied them right of way. As for blowing reds and the like, that's an exageration. I'd never say that's a "minor faux-pas." The minute I start running reds and acting reckless I'll just as soon turn my license in to the popo.
:-) hehehe.
Truth be told, I've granted right of way (e.g. let people pass in front of me, when there is nobody behind me) more than I've goofed it.
And to think you drive perfect is ludicrous. Most people who think they drive perfectly proper regularly commit half a dozen infractions in a 10 minute drive. When I started driving my parents would make comments about this or that (usually the "look out for that car [500m down the road]!"). I turned the tables and started announcing every single one of their infractions. They shut up
My point was that of all the mistakes I have made while driving, none of them were GTA inspired. And the reason I'm a safer driver than most, is not because I do or don't play GTA, it's because when I'm driving I pay attention to my surroundings, obey the limits, and [most of the time] am ahead of schedule [thus not impatient].
Tom
Oh, yeah, well expect some level of lying. But don't underestimate the # of hands in the pot. Especially sport franchises where they pay millions in license fees just to stick a jersey on some modeled animaton. /me plays NES games, and desperately wants a Wii
Supply and demand.
If the game is selling million*S of copies, there is still a strong demand for it. Lowering the price would not make much economical sense.
When sales taper off they usually promote them as "players choice" or "gold" games for $39 or $49 or whatever...
If you can resist buying a game for the first year after it comes out, you usually can save yourself some money. However, if you instead just buy fewer games you can get them early.
They sell old games at a discount for various reasons
1. To clear stock, selling a game at a lower loss is better than a total loss.
2. Older game could inspire future sales (lead generation)
3. Why the hell not?
Tom