These HD-DVD players being released right now do not support 1080p, only 720p for the time being. The Toshiba DVD players do not support the dual-link HDMI-B specification required for true 1080p output. At best, for all your money you'd be putting out you're only getting 4/9 or 44% of the resolution offerd by true 1080p. That's GARGBAGE!
Save you money. I watch 720p shows on the HD movie channels already, and its not -that- much better than a DVD. You can see the difference, but knowing that real -1080p- players are right around the corner, no way I'm being duped into HD-DVD.
We're all better off waiting until TVs widely support the HDMI-B specification for 1080p and the HD-DVD/Blu-Ray players support that output resolution as well.
The HD-DVD discs are encoded in 1080p however, and if watched on (for instance) a capable computer monitor the movies should show in true 1080p. Blu-Ray players, though non-existent, support 1080p output natively.
...someone who is coming into the field with a clean slate. It's because of the current ways of dealing with numbers, equations, and topography that these problems appear to be unsolvable. I'm all for the wiki and people education themselves about the problems (reading and thinking about them reinvigorated -my- interest in mathematics) but I don't think that a session of collaborative "group think" will help solve these problems. The answers will almost surely come as a "divine spark" of genius to someone who's approaching the problems in a new light.
In fact, it's widely thought (by the creators of the Millenium Problems no less)that the P=NP problem will be solved by someone with virtually no experience in the problem at all.
I think the Wiki is a good idea to inform new people (with potentially new ideas) of the problems, but I don't gathering a bunch of likeminds to solve them will yield many results.
I second that notion. Fire Pro D is the best, and in a completely different way (as another commenter mentioned) Giant Gram 2000 was an equally cool/great 3D wrestling game for the Dreamcast. LARIATOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
More than any other site, Slashdot completely ruins itself on April Fools. They post so many garbage stories I usually avoid the site completely April 1st & 2nd. Not so this year, though I wish I would've and might stop slashdotting for few days in protest. While the pink might have been "funny", all the stores that look like they written by a 14 year old girl on MSN really are awful. Not funny, not -gotcha, April Fools!-, just awful.
Notice how my subject was "I didn't think they could sue."
It's because I don't think that they can, and probably shouldn't be allowed to. But what I am saying is that Dan Brown owes a whole lot to HBHG and I'm not surpised that they are suing. And while there is no moral obligation, or legal obligation on Dan Brown's part... he did basically steal someones elses ideas wholesale and run with them. I know it's legal, and I never said that conjecture should be patentable, all I'm saying is that I'm not suprised that the authors of HBHG feel that they're owed something from Dan Brown due to him using them as a stepping stone.
I've read the The Holy Blood And The Holy Grail (HBHG) 3 times. It's a book presented as fact or moreover, fact mixed with conjecture. The facts are readily available. Da Vinci's artwork, Rennes Le Chateau (sp?), documents from the French National archives, all of that. All that stuff is fact. What is conjecture is the idea that all of this ties together into a secret society that clandestinely is protecting a blood line with lineage that draws back to Jesus Christ. That is one hell of an idea that they came up with, and one that seemed to be theirs alone. Dan Brown in the Da Vinic code literally took all of their work, all of their ideas, and crafted a fictional story around it.
I personally never understood with the Da Vinci Code was making so much money, when the real meat of matter at hand was all directly from the Holy Blood And The Holy Grail. I get the Da Vinci Code may have add some plot twists and intrigue, but by reading it you were also hearing the information from a second hand source, Dan Brown. Like I said, if people were so interested in the subject matter, it was lost on me a long time why people weren't reading HBHG.
A book was written called The Coming Global Superstorm (by Art Bell & Whitley Strieber) that was later adapted into The Day After Tomorrow. If someone rehashed all the new ideas -DIRECTLY- from Art Bell's book, released it as their own book and sold their book as movie to some studio, wouldn't Art Bell be entitled to some of the proceeds from that studio? They are using his ideas, just with a pretty bow on it.
If you think of an idea as a patent... you can't just go stealing a patent, and a patent is an idea that you can develop to make money. If someone comes up with an idea that is originally there own, aren't they the ones entitled to make money off of it???
Dan Brown's book would literally be nothing if he hadn't stolen every juicy tidbit in it from the HBHG, and for that I think the writers of HBHG should be compensated.
Realistically, that's nonsense. 1080p is lower resolution than many computer monitors (UXGA, 1600x1200) and about the same as most (SXGA, 1280x1024), and the analog interfaces work just fine for those.
On many current HDTVs, the HDMI input only results in 720p (1280x720) which is lower than many computer monitors, but as you see I'm talking about 1080p (1920x1080). So -realistically-, what's you're saying is factually inaccurate. And the 1080p TV's on the market currently only support two HDMIs, which is pitiful considering all of the HD-ready gadets that everyone who's buying these TV's will inevitably had.
A component splitter box costs $100 at my local Best Buy. An HDMI cable is $80-$100 (or so), I can't imagine how much a theoretical HDMI splitter would cost, much less all the money you'd spend on cables. I'd be spending $3000 on my TV and $600+ hooking up my devices via HDMI.:)
I'm not a fan of this decision, but quite frankly I don't mind. Realistcally, when I'm streaming a 1080p signal to my HDTV coming from a digital source (such as an HD-DVD player, PS3, Blu-Ray, etc) it would be -crazy- to use anything other than the HDMI (high definition multimedia interface) cables that this article is referencing. Honestly, using analog component would be tantamount to using a wireless audio connection for your speakers instead of an optical output... Especially when you consider the amount of data being moved in hd video vs audio.
The real way that we earlier adopters, and the semi earlier adopters (like myself) get screwed is through the -lack- of inputs. In time, everything will go to copy protected digital inputs like HDMI, but many TVs only have 1 input. So between my HD PVR, PS3, HD-DVD Player, Output from my PC (maybe even throw in a 360) I have -ONE- HDMI input and so do many other people. Even the highest end commercial DLP HDTVs currently only have 2 HDMI inputs. It's just simply not enough.
And that's to say nothing about the impending HDCP debacle!
"The cheapness of the console will help it sell and it's unlikely that Nintendo will face production shortages since it won't use exotic and difficult-to-make components."
Nintendo has recently stated that Revolution will be "under $300" and will be here for Thanksgiving. We all know that means $299. Not exactly cheap, though it should be possible for it to come in at lower price point considering it's relatively low-tech. Nintendo has a history of making a -profit- selling their consoles while Sony/Microsoft off technology that thus far have forced them to sell systems for a loss. All I'm saying is that Revolution might not be as cheap as we all hope.
The Liberal (as in the party in power) government in Canada is close to be being brought down. Inspite of the Liberal's opposition, a no-confidence motion should be put on the table and passed by the end of the month. While the bill will still be introduced, once the government falls the bill will die before it has a chance to be written into law.
While I'll hate the upcoming election, I'll enjoy this law not being passed.
I'm not sure how recent this news, because I've been aware of it for close to 4 years now and I'm a layman. i> Specifically, and someone disturbingly it came to my attention while watching a show about homosexual subcultures on the CBC (Canadian Broadcastin Corporation). One thing it featured was a group of men who actively were trying to become infected with H.I.V. in order to die some sort of "warriors homosexual death." They wanted to embraced and were proud to eventually die from AIDS. They thought of themselves as martyrs or something.
The thing was, they featured this one guy who had slept with no less than 10 postively tested, certifiably infected men. They all had H.I.V. but this man, after sleeping with 10 of them, was still not infected with the virus. He appeared to be immune from it.
From that point on they dug into how HIV actually derived in some fashion from the Black Death, and how the actual process of an H.I.V. infection takes place exactly in the same manner the plague infected individuals. As a result, those whose families never caught the plague, their decsendants would also seem to be immune from H.I.V... much like this odd fellow from the TV show.
Anyways, this isn't new news. Or if it suddenly is news, it has been common knowledge among certain circles for some time now.
"The Inquirer is running an article detailing how Blu-Ray drives for the Playstation 3 will cost Sony a small fortune. It turns out that at the release of the console in the first half of 2006, Sony will have to pay more than $100 per drive which will dramatically increase the unit cost of the PS3."
Though this story was recently posted by the inquirer, it's very old news, and only a third of the story.
I already rebuked the story a couple days ago on my own website at http://www.gamegeeknews.com/?p=140 which itself referenced a GamesIndustry story from the end of June.
In short, Merril Lynch Japan has determined that it would cost Sony +$101 per part to manufacture each of the PS3's key components (Cell CPU, nVIDIA GPU, Blu-Ray Drives). That said, it expected Sony to sell the PS3 for $399 and to stomach a +$100 loss on each system sold.
So this isn't new news, it doesn't mean the PS3's price is going to sky rocket... It's all already been covered.
I don't know why people post such bullshit stories on the internet. It's especially frustrating when the story not only make no logic sense, but it's source is some idiots thread on a message board nameless message board. Then on top of all of this, the story makes its way onto the hallowed pages of Slashdot????? Devastating.
Basically, again, the internet got this story wrong. To me, this is a non-story. These comments in the article were actually made by Bill Gates at a Toshiba hosted HD-DVD conference in Japan at the end of June. Not over the weekend, June. Gates' speech was widely published and commented on previously, so I have no idea why 2 months later it becomes "news" again.
What's more, he didn't say Xbox360 would include HD-DVD. What he said was: "We are looking at whether future versions of Xbox 360 will incorporate an additional capacity of an HD-DVD player or something else."
"Or something else". This might be reading into it too much but......if an HD-DVD rom is added to be used with games at any point in the systems lifecycle it would break compatiblity with the system. I'd hope Microsoft isn't dumb enough to do that. So realistically, the only upside to adding an HD-DVD player to the Xbox 360 would be to play HD-DVD movies. But if the Xbox 360 is the run away hit Microsoft is hoping for, there isn't going to be a need to add next-gen video disc support right away.
Adding hd-dvd/blu-ray support would a move strictly for the movie watchers, not for the developers or gamers. That said, it would only make sense for Microsoft to sit out the ensuing format war for a little bit, wait till the price of the hardware itself comes down, then to go with the winning next-gen video format.
As of this past weekend, with Fox choosing Blu-Ray, major movie studios are split 6 and 6 between the formats. It's tough to pick a winner, but with the PS3 Blu-Ray is going to get the first mass market penetration and um, Blu-Ray is the only format to have Star Wars & Justice League HD... so that matters to me anyways.:)
Thanks. That's good to know that most of these players -can- do that with a little trickery. Like you said, great for us... not so hot for everybody else. But on these new HD-DVD players, it sounds like there isn't any analog outputs to speak of. It sounds like they'll strictly be running from HDMI and that the 720p analog hack won't really be applicable. I suppose it still could be, I'm just hoping that everything will be compatible with HDMI->Component converter. Most earlier adopter HDTV's only have one HDMI/DVI input and being -forced- to use it for one particular thing is really a pain in the ass when the component input are so much more plentiful. Thanks for the info.
I sware that all the upconverting DVD players that are out now, and they are the only things that will currently output an HD signal (720p, 1080i), will output the upconverted signal over HDMI. I don't have one, but that's what I've been told.
So these new HD DVD players are exactly the same as the current upconverting DVD players.
Also, even though it only outputs via HDMI you could buy an HDMI to Component converter and just use those cables. Eventually that might not work, but until -EVERYTHING- complies to those standards I think we could get away with it.
The wording on the post is misleading and or perhaps the article is wrong. I was just looking into UMD sales figures the other day and Resident Evil 2 & House of Flying Daggers have -EACH- sold over 100,000 copies themselves.
I'm not sure about the total numbers, but the news is that two titles have reached the 100,000 mark after 5 months or so on the market. Air Force One with the first DVD to sell 100,000 units, and that took -9 months-.
On a somewhat related note...
I believe this illustrates how Blu-Ray included with the PS3 will defeat HD-DVD. No one in their right mind would buy a "UMD player" but by virtue of it being included with the PSP, the sales are relatively soaring. All the studios (except Warner Bros) have abandoned the Warner Bros. mini-DVD in favor of the UMD, and I think the same will happen with Blu-Ray/PS3 v. HD-DVD. Blu-Ray will get fast and massive market penetration riding the coat tails of the PS3, while HD-DVD has to fend for itself solely on its own merits.
Ken Kutaragi, SCE President, confirmed that after a long period of talks Toshiba and Sony cannot see eye to eye on the next generation of DVD format. Blu-ray discs, then, will be the only supported format on the upcoming Playstation 3 console.
That was news on Thursday the 16th, not Monday the 20th. The news as of today on Gamespot however is that the talks are back on. In the coming weeks both Sony & Toshiba top management are going to be reshuffled, the new blood may well find a new solution.
Either way, I'm sure Blu-Ray is going to win, and here's why. Installed user base & storage capacity.
The day HD-DVD players go on sale, do you think that there are going to be a million people drooling, cash-in-hand, ready to buy one? Because there will be a million people DYING to buy a PS3 this spring. And as we all know, the PS3 plays Blu-Ray discs, and that is why Blu-Ray will win out in the end. When I look at myself and my friends, 90% of us use our PS2's as our DVD players. And 99/100 a PS2 was the first DVD player we ever owned. When PS2's were $450 (CDN) DVD players were still $250 (CDN). It was like getting a DVD player for free, and that is exactly what's going to be happening with the PS3. Would we like a PS3 for $500 or a stand-alone HD-DVD/Blu-Ray player for $300?
Originally the XBOX 360 was going to support HD-DVD, but since its being rushed to market ahead of schedule they can't afford to include the technology... Which is working out great for Sony.
Additionally, we have the storage capacity issue:
Blu-Ray Single-Layer:
Storage: 25 gigs
MPEG-4's H.264/AVC codec: 4 hours Hi-Def video
MPEG2 codec: 2 hours Hi-Def video
HD-DVD Single-Layer:
Storage: 15 gigs
MPEG-4's H.264/AVC codec: 2 hours 24 minutes Hi-Def video
MPEG2 codec: 1.2 hours Hi-Def video
You can just look at the HD-DVD storage numbers, so the math in your head, and see how paltry its real-world storage capacity is. Of course using a dual-layered disc somewhat alleviates that problem for HD-DVD, but when Blu-Ray is dual-layered it doesn't just become "good enough" as HD-DVD does, it becomes exceptional. All of a sudden you can store 8 hours of HD content on one disc. Not only is that great for us from a convience standpoint, but shouldn't the storage capacity of the Blu-Ray disc compensate for its higher price point? Things could fit on a 1 or 2 Blu-Ray discs where it would take 3 or 4 HD-DVD discs.
All that being said, I believe that the Revolution will at least support 480p so the quality on a HDTV shouldn't be too bad. If it's only 480i I definitely won't touch the Revolution with a 10 foot pole.
In the back of mind, I was thinking that the revolution would support 480p as well, but then I realized something.
As of about a year ago, Nintendo removed the ability for Gamecubes to output progressive scan. They released a 101 model with the digital a/v output removed which also removed to ability for one to use component cables. With Gamecube (and perhaps everything else ??) you need component cables to run something in progressive scan mode. So while some games still support it, from a hardware standpoint Nintendo has removed any & all progressive scan functionality from the Gamecube itself. So if the Gamecube doesn't need it, why would the Revolution?
There is a royalty to be paid on every piece of hardware that implements progressive scan, so maybe Nintendo is just abandoning it all together.
I looked into the projections and I read that by 2007 some +40% or homes will have HD and by 2008 +60% are expected. And I still insist, anyone who's spent the money on a HDTV is going to go out of there way to play games that take advantage of it. If the Revolution doesn't support HD, people who have HD will abandon it.
Can you imagine... Madden 2007 in 1080p on the PS3 and Madden 2007 in 480p or even 480i on the Revolution? Good idea Nintendo. GREAT IDEA.:)
Both TV's were DLP. For the money, they easily had the best picture. I looked at LCD/RP LCD/Plasma and all the rest, even the CRT. SD does look alright on some plasma TV's because the majority of them are only EDTV (852x480) not HDTV.
But to that extent, it is my TV. That is the reason why it looks like garbage. It won't look like garbage on your CRT, but the point is that the future HDTV aren't going to be CRT's. They're going to be LCD/Plamsa/LCoS/DLP and these technologies do no favors whatsoever with a less than progressive scan signal.
The basic point I'm trying to make is that people who invest all that money into nice high-end HD sets are going to go for the systems that use what they bought. 480p PS2/XBOX games look fine on my TV, but if the PS2 version is 480p, and the XBOX version is 720p I'm not buying the PS2 version.:) There is a big difference in quality, especially on a +50" screen.
But also, Nintendo as of about a year ago pulled the digital a/v jack from its gamecubes as well as the ability for its gamecubes to use component cables (component cables are required to for GC to run at 480p). So while a number of games might support progressive scan, Nintendo from a hardware point of has abandoned it completely. Not a very good mindset.:)
It doesn't sound like anyone leaving these comments actually have an high definition television set. I'm almost completely sure they don't, because they're missing the main point of why the Revolution should support HD.
Regular signals look like GARBAGE on an HDTV. People who say they can barely notice the difference between progessive scan and an interlaced signal, obviously don't have a HDTV. Its tough to describe, but a 480i signal just looks muddy. And what's worse, each TV varies in how good it displays a standard definition (SD) signal.
I used to own a Toshiba 52HM84 but I returned it for a Panasonic 50DL54 just because non-progressive scan games look so bad. I'd hook my PS2 up to my shitty 27" Trinitron just to play Metal Gear Solid 3 because it looked so bad on my Toshiba HDTV. If an HDTV gets a less than HD signal, all it does is exponentially magnify the poor quality of the signal. Not a good thing.
People who own HDTV will be -alienated- by the Nintendo Revolution. We don't spend $3000 on our TV's to have stuff look like crap on them.
It's not the fact that HD doesn't "add to the quality of the game" as Nintendo said, its the fact that the 12.5% of North America that have HD televisions won't want to be bothered with something that doesn't support it. And if someone has money to spend on a fancy TV, they're probably the exact same person who has money to spend on video games.
I used to be a PS2 guy, but since I got my HDTV's I'm a closet XBOX guy. Why? Because to a greater agree, it takes advantage my TV.
Once you're HD equipped, and have seen a game in HD, trust me, TRUST ME. You'll never go back. And as time goes on, more and more people are going to be HD-ready, and they're going to want nothing to do with anything that isn't.
Oh right... but Nintendo only makes games for 8 year olds and 8 year olds can't really afford HDTV's. My bad.:)
How are they going to create better copyright protection if its illegal to break it? Don't you generally make somethings security better by cracking it, then fixing what you just cracked?
Perhaps not realistically, but at least theoretically, doesn't the DMCA encourage lazy/passive copyright protection schemes that as time passes will become increasingly easy to hack? Doesn't it give companies a false sense of security what it comes to protecting their valuable copyrighted material?
You're not going to stop people decrypting dvd's by making it illegal, you're going to stop it by making the encryption better... in theory anyways.:)
What about releasing a GUI version of DVD Decrypter that lacks the ability to crack CSS encryption? It could talk to the DeCSS command line tool that you may or may not have on your computer. That way, couldn't everyone keep the DVD Decrypter they know and love and it'd be up to the person whether or not to break the law with DeCSS?:)
I know the difference between RISC and CISC. I took computer engineering in school, but I haven't touched the field since I left. From my years of using a PC and working with x86 chips, it seemed as though there were a million things wrong with them. All this legacy crap. It's all slow and clunky, and gah. All the hwile, I've been amazed at the CPU used in gaming consoles.
Spec wise they seem so pathetic. The SNES ran it 2.8Mhz, the Sega Genesis at 3.6Mhz, PS1 at 33MHz, The PS2 ran at just under 300 MHz, and now the PS3 is going to be running at 3GHz. Performance wise though, they've always seemed to put the relative performance of a x86 CPU to shame. But all co-processors to want on a system, could anyone imagine a game like Yoshi's Island for the SNES running on a 2.8Mhz x86 chip?
I realize that you can't do a straight across comparision of game console power to pc's, but the x86 always has seemed to, and I content still does, underperform.
Sega Dreamcast, PS1, PS2, PS3 all used RISC chips, and for good reason. Hell, the cell chip in the PS3 is pimped out PowerPC running at 3.0GHz with the power of about 4 x86's running at 3.0GHz. When they needed power, no one has even been clamoring for an x86 chip.
Hasn't the deal with Mac's always been there power? Isn't that way they've been used so heavily in video production? As a guy that's never used a Mac, I've ALWAYS been under the impression that a high-end Pentium couldn't wipe a high-end G5's ass. Am I wrong?
It just seems ridiculous to me. I thought Apple was always about innovation and being ahead of the curve... isn't slumming with the PC crowd and their miserable pentiums a step back?
Is Intel making an entirely new chip for Apple? I can't imagine they'd be doing that... I also can't imagine seeing a Mac with "Intel Inside" on it, heh.
I remember around the time that Virtua Racing hit the arcades I heard a lot of patent talk relating to Sega. Essentially, they claimed a patent on what was tantamount to rendering polygons.
I just a cursory 1/2 second search, I found a reference to Yu Suzuki (legendary programmer) having obtained a patent on switching views in a 3D racing game. That was directly tied to Virtua Racing. The patent number was allegedly #2687989 though I don't know in what patent office that was. Perhaps Japan.
Apparently in Europe Sega owns the method and the idea of using 3 dimensional calculations to render an object in 2 dimensions on a screen, heh.
Video game patents are old news, though I'm not sure if any of them actually stick. I'm sure there is bound to be a case of "Prior Art" for virtually every patent.
Slashdot Mirror
These HD-DVD players being released right now do not support 1080p, only 720p for the time being. The Toshiba DVD players do not support the dual-link HDMI-B specification required for true 1080p output. At best, for all your money you'd be putting out you're only getting 4/9 or 44% of the resolution offerd by true 1080p. That's GARGBAGE!
Save you money. I watch 720p shows on the HD movie channels already, and its not -that- much better than a DVD. You can see the difference, but knowing that real -1080p- players are right around the corner, no way I'm being duped into HD-DVD.
We're all better off waiting until TVs widely support the HDMI-B specification for 1080p and the HD-DVD/Blu-Ray players support that output resolution as well.
The HD-DVD discs are encoded in 1080p however, and if watched on (for instance) a capable computer monitor the movies should show in true 1080p. Blu-Ray players, though non-existent, support 1080p output natively.
...someone who is coming into the field with a clean slate. It's because of the current ways of dealing with numbers, equations, and topography that these problems appear to be unsolvable. I'm all for the wiki and people education themselves about the problems (reading and thinking about them reinvigorated -my- interest in mathematics) but I don't think that a session of collaborative "group think" will help solve these problems. The answers will almost surely come as a "divine spark" of genius to someone who's approaching the problems in a new light.
In fact, it's widely thought (by the creators of the Millenium Problems no less)that the P=NP problem will be solved by someone with virtually no experience in the problem at all.
I think the Wiki is a good idea to inform new people (with potentially new ideas) of the problems, but I don't gathering a bunch of likeminds to solve them will yield many results.
I second that notion. Fire Pro D is the best, and in a completely different way (as another commenter mentioned) Giant Gram 2000 was an equally cool/great 3D wrestling game for the Dreamcast. LARIATOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
More than any other site, Slashdot completely ruins itself on April Fools. They post so many garbage stories I usually avoid the site completely April 1st & 2nd. Not so this year, though I wish I would've and might stop slashdotting for few days in protest. While the pink might have been "funny", all the stores that look like they written by a 14 year old girl on MSN really are awful. Not funny, not -gotcha, April Fools!-, just awful.
Notice how my subject was "I didn't think they could sue."
It's because I don't think that they can, and probably shouldn't be allowed to. But what I am saying is that Dan Brown owes a whole lot to HBHG and I'm not surpised that they are suing. And while there is no moral obligation, or legal obligation on Dan Brown's part... he did basically steal someones elses ideas wholesale and run with them. I know it's legal, and I never said that conjecture should be patentable, all I'm saying is that I'm not suprised that the authors of HBHG feel that they're owed something from Dan Brown due to him using them as a stepping stone.
Laughable.
I've read the The Holy Blood And The Holy Grail (HBHG) 3 times. It's a book presented as fact or moreover, fact mixed with conjecture. The facts are readily available. Da Vinci's artwork, Rennes Le Chateau (sp?), documents from the French National archives, all of that. All that stuff is fact. What is conjecture is the idea that all of this ties together into a secret society that clandestinely is protecting a blood line with lineage that draws back to Jesus Christ. That is one hell of an idea that they came up with, and one that seemed to be theirs alone. Dan Brown in the Da Vinic code literally took all of their work, all of their ideas, and crafted a fictional story around it.
I personally never understood with the Da Vinci Code was making so much money, when the real meat of matter at hand was all directly from the Holy Blood And The Holy Grail. I get the Da Vinci Code may have add some plot twists and intrigue, but by reading it you were also hearing the information from a second hand source, Dan Brown. Like I said, if people were so interested in the subject matter, it was lost on me a long time why people weren't reading HBHG.
A book was written called The Coming Global Superstorm (by Art Bell & Whitley Strieber) that was later adapted into The Day After Tomorrow. If someone rehashed all the new ideas -DIRECTLY- from Art Bell's book, released it as their own book and sold their book as movie to some studio, wouldn't Art Bell be entitled to some of the proceeds from that studio? They are using his ideas, just with a pretty bow on it.
If you think of an idea as a patent... you can't just go stealing a patent, and a patent is an idea that you can develop to make money. If someone comes up with an idea that is originally there own, aren't they the ones entitled to make money off of it???
Dan Brown's book would literally be nothing if he hadn't stolen every juicy tidbit in it from the HBHG, and for that I think the writers of HBHG should be compensated.
Realistically, that's nonsense. 1080p is lower resolution than many computer monitors (UXGA, 1600x1200) and about the same as most (SXGA, 1280x1024), and the analog interfaces work just fine for those.
:)
On many current HDTVs, the HDMI input only results in 720p (1280x720) which is lower than many computer monitors, but as you see I'm talking about 1080p (1920x1080). So -realistically-, what's you're saying is factually inaccurate. And the 1080p TV's on the market currently only support two HDMIs, which is pitiful considering all of the HD-ready gadets that everyone who's buying these TV's will inevitably had.
A component splitter box costs $100 at my local Best Buy. An HDMI cable is $80-$100 (or so), I can't imagine how much a theoretical HDMI splitter would cost, much less all the money you'd spend on cables. I'd be spending $3000 on my TV and $600+ hooking up my devices via HDMI.
I agree whole heartedly with FueledByRamen.
I'm not a fan of this decision, but quite frankly I don't mind. Realistcally, when I'm streaming a 1080p signal to my HDTV coming from a digital source (such as an HD-DVD player, PS3, Blu-Ray, etc) it would be -crazy- to use anything other than the HDMI (high definition multimedia interface) cables that this article is referencing. Honestly, using analog component would be tantamount to using a wireless audio connection for your speakers instead of an optical output... Especially when you consider the amount of data being moved in hd video vs audio.
The real way that we earlier adopters, and the semi earlier adopters (like myself) get screwed is through the -lack- of inputs. In time, everything will go to copy protected digital inputs like HDMI, but many TVs only have 1 input. So between my HD PVR, PS3, HD-DVD Player, Output from my PC (maybe even throw in a 360) I have -ONE- HDMI input and so do many other people. Even the highest end commercial DLP HDTVs currently only have 2 HDMI inputs. It's just simply not enough.
And that's to say nothing about the impending HDCP debacle!
"The cheapness of the console will help it sell and it's unlikely that Nintendo will face production shortages since it won't use exotic and difficult-to-make components."
Nintendo has recently stated that Revolution will be "under $300" and will be here for Thanksgiving. We all know that means $299. Not exactly cheap, though it should be possible for it to come in at lower price point considering it's relatively low-tech. Nintendo has a history of making a -profit- selling their consoles while Sony/Microsoft off technology that thus far have forced them to sell systems for a loss. All I'm saying is that Revolution might not be as cheap as we all hope.
The Liberal (as in the party in power) government in Canada is close to be being brought down. Inspite of the Liberal's opposition, a no-confidence motion should be put on the table and passed by the end of the month. While the bill will still be introduced, once the government falls the bill will die before it has a chance to be written into law.
While I'll hate the upcoming election, I'll enjoy this law not being passed.
I'm not sure how recent this news, because I've been aware of it for close to 4 years now and I'm a layman.
i>
Specifically, and someone disturbingly it came to my attention while watching a show about homosexual subcultures on the CBC (Canadian Broadcastin Corporation). One thing it featured was a group of men who actively were trying to become infected with H.I.V. in order to die some sort of "warriors homosexual death." They wanted to embraced and were proud to eventually die from AIDS. They thought of themselves as martyrs or something.
The thing was, they featured this one guy who had slept with no less than 10 postively tested, certifiably infected men. They all had H.I.V. but this man, after sleeping with 10 of them, was still not infected with the virus. He appeared to be immune from it.
From that point on they dug into how HIV actually derived in some fashion from the Black Death, and how the actual process of an H.I.V. infection takes place exactly in the same manner the plague infected individuals. As a result, those whose families never caught the plague, their decsendants would also seem to be immune from H.I.V... much like this odd fellow from the TV show.
Anyways, this isn't new news. Or if it suddenly is news, it has been common knowledge among certain circles for some time now.
"The Inquirer is running an article detailing how Blu-Ray drives for the Playstation 3 will cost Sony a small fortune. It turns out that at the release of the console in the first half of 2006, Sony will have to pay more than $100 per drive which will dramatically increase the unit cost of the PS3."
Though this story was recently posted by the inquirer, it's very old news, and only a third of the story.
I already rebuked the story a couple days ago on my own website at http://www.gamegeeknews.com/?p=140 which itself referenced a GamesIndustry story from the end of June.
In short, Merril Lynch Japan has determined that it would cost Sony +$101 per part to manufacture each of the PS3's key components (Cell CPU, nVIDIA GPU, Blu-Ray Drives). That said, it expected Sony to sell the PS3 for $399 and to stomach a +$100 loss on each system sold. So this isn't new news, it doesn't mean the PS3's price is going to sky rocket... It's all already been covered.
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=25862
I don't know why people post such bullshit stories on the internet. It's especially frustrating when the story not only make no logic sense, but it's source is some idiots thread on a message board nameless message board. Then on top of all of this, the story makes its way onto the hallowed pages of Slashdot????? Devastating.
Basically, again, the internet got this story wrong. To me, this is a non-story. These comments in the article were actually made by Bill Gates at a Toshiba hosted HD-DVD conference in Japan at the end of June. Not over the weekend, June. Gates' speech was widely published and commented on previously, so I have no idea why 2 months later it becomes "news" again.
...if an HD-DVD rom is added to be used with games at any point in the systems lifecycle it would break compatiblity with the system. I'd hope Microsoft isn't dumb enough to do that. So realistically, the only upside to adding an HD-DVD player to the Xbox 360 would be to play HD-DVD movies. But if the Xbox 360 is the run away hit Microsoft is hoping for, there isn't going to be a need to add next-gen video disc support right away.
:)
What's more, he didn't say Xbox360 would include HD-DVD. What he said was:
"We are looking at whether future versions of Xbox 360 will incorporate an additional capacity of an HD-DVD player or something else."
"Or something else". This might be reading into it too much but...
Adding hd-dvd/blu-ray support would a move strictly for the movie watchers, not for the developers or gamers. That said, it would only make sense for Microsoft to sit out the ensuing format war for a little bit, wait till the price of the hardware itself comes down, then to go with the winning next-gen video format.
As of this past weekend, with Fox choosing Blu-Ray, major movie studios are split 6 and 6 between the formats. It's tough to pick a winner, but with the PS3 Blu-Ray is going to get the first mass market penetration and um, Blu-Ray is the only format to have Star Wars & Justice League HD... so that matters to me anyways.
http://www.gamegeeknews.com/?p=8 --- Original post on the subject.
Thanks. That's good to know that most of these players -can- do that with a little trickery. Like you said, great for us... not so hot for everybody else. But on these new HD-DVD players, it sounds like there isn't any analog outputs to speak of. It sounds like they'll strictly be running from HDMI and that the 720p analog hack won't really be applicable. I suppose it still could be, I'm just hoping that everything will be compatible with HDMI->Component converter. Most earlier adopter HDTV's only have one HDMI/DVI input and being -forced- to use it for one particular thing is really a pain in the ass when the component input are so much more plentiful. Thanks for the info.
I sware that all the upconverting DVD players that are out now, and they are the only things that will currently output an HD signal (720p, 1080i), will output the upconverted signal over HDMI. I don't have one, but that's what I've been told.
So these new HD DVD players are exactly the same as the current upconverting DVD players.
Also, even though it only outputs via HDMI you could buy an HDMI to Component converter and just use those cables. Eventually that might not work, but until -EVERYTHING- complies to those standards I think we could get away with it.
The wording on the post is misleading and or perhaps the article is wrong. I was just looking into UMD sales figures the other day and Resident Evil 2 & House of Flying Daggers have -EACH- sold over 100,000 copies themselves.
I'm not sure about the total numbers, but the news is that two titles have reached the 100,000 mark after 5 months or so on the market. Air Force One with the first DVD to sell 100,000 units, and that took -9 months-.
On a somewhat related note...
I believe this illustrates how Blu-Ray included with the PS3 will defeat HD-DVD. No one in their right mind would buy a "UMD player" but by virtue of it being included with the PSP, the sales are relatively soaring. All the studios (except Warner Bros) have abandoned the Warner Bros. mini-DVD in favor of the UMD, and I think the same will happen with Blu-Ray/PS3 v. HD-DVD. Blu-Ray will get fast and massive market penetration riding the coat tails of the PS3, while HD-DVD has to fend for itself solely on its own merits.
Ken Kutaragi, SCE President, confirmed that after a long period of talks Toshiba and Sony cannot see eye to eye on the next generation of DVD format. Blu-ray discs, then, will be the only supported format on the upcoming Playstation 3 console.
:)
That was news on Thursday the 16th, not Monday the 20th. The news as of today on Gamespot however is that the talks are back on. In the coming weeks both Sony & Toshiba top management are going to be reshuffled, the new blood may well find a new solution.
Either way, I'm sure Blu-Ray is going to win, and here's why. Installed user base & storage capacity.
The day HD-DVD players go on sale, do you think that there are going to be a million people drooling, cash-in-hand, ready to buy one? Because there will be a million people DYING to buy a PS3 this spring. And as we all know, the PS3 plays Blu-Ray discs, and that is why Blu-Ray will win out in the end. When I look at myself and my friends, 90% of us use our PS2's as our DVD players. And 99/100 a PS2 was the first DVD player we ever owned. When PS2's were $450 (CDN) DVD players were still $250 (CDN). It was like getting a DVD player for free, and that is exactly what's going to be happening with the PS3. Would we like a PS3 for $500 or a stand-alone HD-DVD/Blu-Ray player for $300?
Originally the XBOX 360 was going to support HD-DVD, but since its being rushed to market ahead of schedule they can't afford to include the technology... Which is working out great for Sony.
Additionally, we have the storage capacity issue:
Blu-Ray Single-Layer:
Storage: 25 gigs
MPEG-4's H.264/AVC codec: 4 hours Hi-Def video
MPEG2 codec: 2 hours Hi-Def video
HD-DVD Single-Layer:
Storage: 15 gigs
MPEG-4's H.264/AVC codec: 2 hours 24 minutes Hi-Def video
MPEG2 codec: 1.2 hours Hi-Def video
You can just look at the HD-DVD storage numbers, so the math in your head, and see how paltry its real-world storage capacity is. Of course using a dual-layered disc somewhat alleviates that problem for HD-DVD, but when Blu-Ray is dual-layered it doesn't just become "good enough" as HD-DVD does, it becomes exceptional. All of a sudden you can store 8 hours of HD content on one disc. Not only is that great for us from a convience standpoint, but shouldn't the storage capacity of the Blu-Ray disc compensate for its higher price point? Things could fit on a 1 or 2 Blu-Ray discs where it would take 3 or 4 HD-DVD discs.
I hope I've somewhat made my point.
All that being said, I believe that the Revolution will at least support 480p so the quality on a HDTV shouldn't be too bad. If it's only 480i I definitely won't touch the Revolution with a 10 foot pole.
:)
In the back of mind, I was thinking that the revolution would support 480p as well, but then I realized something.
As of about a year ago, Nintendo removed the ability for Gamecubes to output progressive scan. They released a 101 model with the digital a/v output removed which also removed to ability for one to use component cables. With Gamecube (and perhaps everything else ??) you need component cables to run something in progressive scan mode. So while some games still support it, from a hardware standpoint Nintendo has removed any & all progressive scan functionality from the Gamecube itself. So if the Gamecube doesn't need it, why would the Revolution?
There is a royalty to be paid on every piece of hardware that implements progressive scan, so maybe Nintendo is just abandoning it all together.
I looked into the projections and I read that by 2007 some +40% or homes will have HD and by 2008 +60% are expected. And I still insist, anyone who's spent the money on a HDTV is going to go out of there way to play games that take advantage of it. If the Revolution doesn't support HD, people who have HD will abandon it.
Can you imagine... Madden 2007 in 1080p on the PS3 and Madden 2007 in 480p or even 480i on the Revolution? Good idea Nintendo. GREAT IDEA.
Both TV's were DLP. For the money, they easily had the best picture. I looked at LCD/RP LCD/Plasma and all the rest, even the CRT. SD does look alright on some plasma TV's because the majority of them are only EDTV (852x480) not HDTV.
:) There is a big difference in quality, especially on a +50" screen.
:)
But to that extent, it is my TV. That is the reason why it looks like garbage. It won't look like garbage on your CRT, but the point is that the future HDTV aren't going to be CRT's. They're going to be LCD/Plamsa/LCoS/DLP and these technologies do no favors whatsoever with a less than progressive scan signal.
The basic point I'm trying to make is that people who invest all that money into nice high-end HD sets are going to go for the systems that use what they bought. 480p PS2/XBOX games look fine on my TV, but if the PS2 version is 480p, and the XBOX version is 720p I'm not buying the PS2 version.
But also, Nintendo as of about a year ago pulled the digital a/v jack from its gamecubes as well as the ability for its gamecubes to use component cables (component cables are required to for GC to run at 480p). So while a number of games might support progressive scan, Nintendo from a hardware point of has abandoned it completely. Not a very good mindset.
It doesn't sound like anyone leaving these comments actually have an high definition television set. I'm almost completely sure they don't, because they're missing the main point of why the Revolution should support HD.
:)
Regular signals look like GARBAGE on an HDTV. People who say they can barely notice the difference between progessive scan and an interlaced signal, obviously don't have a HDTV. Its tough to describe, but a 480i signal just looks muddy. And what's worse, each TV varies in how good it displays a standard definition (SD) signal.
I used to own a Toshiba 52HM84 but I returned it for a Panasonic 50DL54 just because non-progressive scan games look so bad. I'd hook my PS2 up to my shitty 27" Trinitron just to play Metal Gear Solid 3 because it looked so bad on my Toshiba HDTV. If an HDTV gets a less than HD signal, all it does is exponentially magnify the poor quality of the signal. Not a good thing.
People who own HDTV will be -alienated- by the Nintendo Revolution. We don't spend $3000 on our TV's to have stuff look like crap on them.
It's not the fact that HD doesn't "add to the quality of the game" as Nintendo said, its the fact that the 12.5% of North America that have HD televisions won't want to be bothered with something that doesn't support it. And if someone has money to spend on a fancy TV, they're probably the exact same person who has money to spend on video games.
I used to be a PS2 guy, but since I got my HDTV's I'm a closet XBOX guy. Why? Because to a greater agree, it takes advantage my TV.
Once you're HD equipped, and have seen a game in HD, trust me, TRUST ME. You'll never go back. And as time goes on, more and more people are going to be HD-ready, and they're going to want nothing to do with anything that isn't.
Oh right... but Nintendo only makes games for 8 year olds and 8 year olds can't really afford HDTV's. My bad.
How are they going to create better copyright protection if its illegal to break it? Don't you generally make somethings security better by cracking it, then fixing what you just cracked?
:)
Perhaps not realistically, but at least theoretically, doesn't the DMCA encourage lazy/passive copyright protection schemes that as time passes will become increasingly easy to hack? Doesn't it give companies a false sense of security what it comes to protecting their valuable copyrighted material?
You're not going to stop people decrypting dvd's by making it illegal, you're going to stop it by making the encryption better... in theory anyways.
What about releasing a GUI version of DVD Decrypter that lacks the ability to crack CSS encryption? It could talk to the DeCSS command line tool that you may or may not have on your computer. That way, couldn't everyone keep the DVD Decrypter they know and love and it'd be up to the person whether or not to break the law with DeCSS? :)
Don't x86 chips suck? As in, really suck?
I know the difference between RISC and CISC. I took computer engineering in school, but I haven't touched the field since I left. From my years of using a PC and working with x86 chips, it seemed as though there were a million things wrong with them. All this legacy crap. It's all slow and clunky, and gah. All the hwile, I've been amazed at the CPU used in gaming consoles.
Spec wise they seem so pathetic. The SNES ran it 2.8Mhz, the Sega Genesis at 3.6Mhz, PS1 at 33MHz, The PS2 ran at just under 300 MHz, and now the PS3 is going to be running at 3GHz. Performance wise though, they've always seemed to put the relative performance of a x86 CPU to shame. But all co-processors to want on a system, could anyone imagine a game like Yoshi's Island for the SNES running on a 2.8Mhz x86 chip?
I realize that you can't do a straight across comparision of game console power to pc's, but the x86 always has seemed to, and I content still does, underperform.
Sega Dreamcast, PS1, PS2, PS3 all used RISC chips, and for good reason. Hell, the cell chip in the PS3 is pimped out PowerPC running at 3.0GHz with the power of about 4 x86's running at 3.0GHz. When they needed power, no one has even been clamoring for an x86 chip.
Hasn't the deal with Mac's always been there power? Isn't that way they've been used so heavily in video production? As a guy that's never used a Mac, I've ALWAYS been under the impression that a high-end Pentium couldn't wipe a high-end G5's ass. Am I wrong?
It just seems ridiculous to me. I thought Apple was always about innovation and being ahead of the curve... isn't slumming with the PC crowd and their miserable pentiums a step back?
Is Intel making an entirely new chip for Apple? I can't imagine they'd be doing that... I also can't imagine seeing a Mac with "Intel Inside" on it, heh.
I remember around the time that Virtua Racing hit the arcades I heard a lot of patent talk relating to Sega. Essentially, they claimed a patent on what was tantamount to rendering polygons.
I just a cursory 1/2 second search, I found a reference to Yu Suzuki (legendary programmer) having obtained a patent on switching views in a 3D racing game. That was directly tied to Virtua Racing. The patent number was allegedly #2687989 though I don't know in what patent office that was. Perhaps Japan.
Additionally, you may want to look at:
http://gauss.ffii.org/PatentView/EP1033682
http://gauss.ffii.org/PatentView/EP981107
Apparently in Europe Sega owns the method and the idea of using 3 dimensional calculations to render an object in 2 dimensions on a screen, heh.
Video game patents are old news, though I'm not sure if any of them actually stick. I'm sure there is bound to be a case of "Prior Art" for virtually every patent.