1: "58 of 122" postings? Says a lot you guys...
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Q3T on Mac First
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· Score: 1
Lately, the media has taken to quoting Slashdot posts, which I take as evidence the media usually know nothing about the subject they report (or else they would have caught on YEARS before and we'd see quotes from USENET as well).
Anyways, my point of this message is a full 50% of the posts don't even make a 1, how disappointing. I don't see how ANYONE, except the most closed minded of folk, could find something wong with this story. iD software is helping Apple only in the sense that they are shining a painful light on the problems with the OS. Some people will never be satisfied anyways, because the OS is tied to the hardware, it's not fully open source, or they're jealous it has more than a "man page" for help.:-D
I'm sure none of these people are listening anyways,but until something like Linux is all things to all people, people are going to want computers like the Mac (and Windows, although I've known people who just bought a PC without "trying anything else":(
I'm somewhat reminded of the local Operation rescue folk... they speaking up for what they believe in (shudder), but they do nothing constructive. I've never seen one of those dirtbags sign up as a Big Brother/Sister or foster parent, but they're more than ready to throw eggs, write down license plates or take pictures and put them on the web. Do something constructive, like reverse-engineer QuickTime for Linux.:-D
I never thought I'd support Slashdot censoring I mean moderating posts. *sigh*
While there's a downside to the "why" this is going Mac and Linux first, this is still overall a good thing for platform diversity. I'll be waiting in line to buy mine.
It's good that John has come around on Apple (notice I did not say "...MacOS"), and especially the future of the platform, MacOS X. I couldn't imagine ANY game programmer saying nice things about gaming under the ever-changing, four-year late "Cairo" oops I mean Windows 2K (Linux is gonna KILL Wintel for games when all PC's are force-preloaded with that flying pig).
There's sucky things about the MacOS, and I can draw upon time spent behind Wintel, Linux, BeOS, Solaris, and my old reliable GEM/Atari ST system. I have a list of complaints with each platform.. just I'm most comfortable with the Mac list which consistently gets shorter every day..:-D
I think I'm gonna take a day out of work when I get my hands on Quake...
Actually, I *am* a Mac user. If I implied otherwise it's because during any one week I've logeed hours on 4 different platforms.
I actually LIKED IE on the Mac... it's much much better than IE on that Windows thing. For example, IE/Mac you can save HTML pages as an "archive" that wraps both the HTML and all graphics into one file. In typical Microsoft execution however that file format is proprietary to Microsoft.
That said, IE isn't so much better than Netscape that I'm willing to help Microsoft win the Browser Wars. Because Microsoft's goal isn't to spend all their money to give away browser code, it's to CONTROL the internet for more than just selling servers (every smart cookie uses Apache anyways). If Microsoft wins the web "View Source" will become a thing of the past, and they'll deliberately leave Mac and UNIX without a browser (or charge for it).
Does anyone remember the Quicktime MOV "trekkies"? It's a parody of Star Trek TNG + original. They fire on a shuttle containing Wesley Crusher (yeah!) and the scene where Mrs. Crusher made a come-on to Picard, they superimposed some other [naked] woman from the neck down.
Juvenile, sure, but the first time I saw it I absolutely died laughing!:-D
The video disappeared, I presume when Paramount decided fansites were competition or maybe they just flipped when they saw it. It's got a home on my "classic net flicks" CD, right next to the Exploding Whale, Troops, and the Spirit Of Christmas.
I've owned personal computers since 1983 (Atari 8-bit, Atari 16/32, i486 upgraded 3x, then platform switched to Motorola StarMax Mac clone, a P120 for Win95 and Linux, then last month got a shiny BW G3). I've never subscribed to Evangelista so I don't know what I missed.
There WAS a perception out there that these were "fanatical Amiga types" (no dis to Amiga fans), and that's why I probably avoided it. It was enough for me when I saw misinformation online that was SO inaccurate about Apple, that you have to wonder how this person finished school. You know, the stereotypes, the fud, occasional lies. Microsoft did not invent FUD for Linux... if you read the Hallow's Eve document they've implied their past FUD successes without specifically mentioning Apple.
I also stayed away from most Mac-based journals and mailing lists because I've been using computers so long I don't want to hear someone ask how to setup Eudora or import Mickeysoft Word documents. On average, the Mac does MOST of the things I want done better than any OS, although I could draw up a long list of annoyances for any OS (though none would be as long as the M$ list). Apple stressed simplicity to the point of not being able to customize the UI. I don't like that, and I'm glad that philosophy was let go starting with System 8.
I'm kind of sad to learn this list is shutting down, I missed out things I didn't know about like jokes, technical information, job postings and so on. It's too bad I'm learning the list was portrayed and demonized as something it was not. The lesson really is don't judge a group by its members... closer to home we see Slashdot also has a fair share of idiots, trolls, fanatics... sometimes they are who they appear to be (the world isn't perfect), and sometimes they are "the enemy" dressed up like us (like Microsoft seeding online bulletin boards and letter campaigns).
The most important lesson in life is, "Relax, and have a homebrew".
It's much easier now to ignore the trolls without needing to defend Apple... the more these people cling to their stereotypes lies and FUD, whatever it is about, the more they will be marginalized or portrayed as fanatics. (Of course it helps that we are all WINNING for the moment).
Like the idiot at c|net who wrote about the death of MP3... someone said he has worked for Microsoft and besides the MS push for MP3 FUD he also wrote some inaccurate trash about Linux.
So WHY isn't the OS free again? Oh, I get it. Hook the market on IE, including Mac users who know Netscape wasn't fighting their battles on the Mac front anyways..
Now stuff the browser into the NT kernel. Next, pull UNIX and Mac versions of IE off the market after a period of neglect.
Oops, yes the browser if free, see, but you can't run it without our OS, see, and you can't run our OS without the browser. BUT we're keeping our work... it'll always be free. Yeah, um, sure.
I encode all my audio files at 192/44, which during lengthy testing was what I found to be the best compression without noticable loss in quality. I tested my MP3's by two methods: linking my Apple PowerMac B&W G3 to the home stereo, and secondly by burning one set of files BACK to CD so I could remove my soundcard and 50 feet of patch cables as a variable. Sounds great!
Admittedly, I store a lot less MP3 at such a high data rate. Oh well. My server is a 20 GB Linux box, and the files are available over my home webserver (primarily used for this purpose since it's not available to the outside world).
On my PC's cheap speakers, I can still tell the difference between 128/44 and the real CD, but above that it's blurred. I really HATE that "pop" the SB cards put before every track, but then again I'm spoiled by the audio in the G3.
Maybe I *am* buying fewer CD's these days, but it's because I'm more informed after having listened to more tracks of a CD due to MP3. I have a lot of CD's I never play because I bought them on the false assumption the rest of the CD was as good as the tracks I heard elsewhere.
I truly hope the artists exploit this technology. There's just NO NEED to force an artist to deliver 8-12 songs when the artist only feels good about 2 or 3. The artist needs more control.
After reading the article, I had to conclude this will win "FUD article of the year" even though we're only in April.
The author seems to believe MP3 can "go away" or be extended in incompatable ways. This fundamental misunderstanding of what is a semi-open format immediately sounded warnings. Doesn't CNN have technical people all over their company who can proof this crap?
god forbid he reviews Linux. He'd probably declare "they'll be put out of business" or somehow link RedHat to Linux.
Of course, there's always the possibility he is not stupid, but rather he is motivated to write an anti-MP3 FUD story.
It's too bad journalists are not forced to disclose their investments like the politicians are. How can someone be impartial when they have loyalties to the Media, or at least a good chunk of their life savings invested in media stock?
I'm not claiming to know what motivated this aweful story, merely I am publicly speculating what could have gone wrong.
The great thing about all this is time is on our sides; we're NOT a business.. lol!
I didn't intend to come across as implying RC5 cracking was the be-all end-all of benchmarking. It's just one benchmark... a real one perhaps but not very important.
The industry DOES need an accepted *standard* for measuring CPU's. Intel doesn't seem interested in such a thing however.
To me, claiming MHz is EXACTLY the same as "claiming RMP" in a car. Better benchmarks are 0-60, quarter-mile, and the torque curve.
The SpecINT and fpINT, and BYTEmarks are only part of the picture.
At any clock speed, or just simply "close", the G3 MOPS THE FLOOR of *ANY* x86 CPU: Pentium 3, Pentium2, PentiumPro, Celleron, AMD, or Cyrix.
The Celleron DOES get decent floating point but only if you compare it to AMD or Cyrix. If you compare an Intel offering against the PowerPC 750 ("G3") or say an Alpha, you're simply not in the same ballpark.
Read up on it. This is one of the "less disputable" platform-characteristics. Floating Point on Intel sucks. Maya and SoftImage may exist on NT, but that's because of a number of pressures (including IT departments), but floating point is not one of them.
That's a symptom of the "higher initial post" feature. If most of your posts get "bumped up", the system starts to make assumptions. My initial score "should" have been neutral (1), but because of prior posts it was 3 to START with.
One thing I DON'T like about this system is it will auto-subtract posters like MEEPT! who sometimes has some clever (or at least witty) postings that are no less on topic than everyone else. Sometimes...
You're 100% right... there is NO [good] reason we can't have multiple platforms, like during the HEALTHY computer wars of the 1980's. I like to think the 80's were the Golden Age of home.. I mean PERSONAL computers.
From an American perspective at least, if you weren't scared off by FUD and wanted GOOD graphics and an easy to program system.. you got an 8-bit Atari. If you wanted to run "all the latest software"... you got a Commodore 64 (with a pathetic disk i/o system marginally faster than an Atari 1010 tape drive..). Later the roles were somewhat reversed with the Atari ST and the Amiga. The Atari ST was the first Macintosh clone... just buy the Magic Sack, some Apple ROMS and you've got a faster, cheaper Mac.
Porting software between OS's was relatively easy, although the ports sometimes offended advocates (ST users will remember being insulted by that dickhead who now runs 3DO... RIP), like Marble Madness for the ST not eving having a title screen. Programming was easy using BUNDLED TOOLS that came with the computer. I used to type in all the code from Antic, and A.N.A.L.O.G., and port non-Atari stuff from COMPUTE!
These days some people argue against multiple platforms, and this saddens me. Why is it people will bitch about their local cable monopoly by think it would be better for just one software platform? The point of all this is to highlight just one point, which you touched:
It's NOT difficult to port software xplatform, and to a lesser extent but still true it's NOT difficult to support it either.
1st, the LACK of diversity is the #1 reason why Windows sucks so bad... nobody is a real threat so Microsoft won't change. Say goodbye to the last piece of "Open" code in Windows... DOS goes bye-bye in Win2K. Some Windows users say "we need Apple for competition and to make Windows better", but few of these people give serious consideration to Windows "alternatives", so what's the point of lip talk?
2nd, MOST porting difficulty can be attributed to using Microsoft tools in the first place. If you didn't build your freakin app using black boxes like Direct3D and ActiveX you wouldn't be dumbfounded when your app won't port.
You're 100% right... there is NO [good] reason we can't have multiple platforms, like during the HEALTHY computer wars of the 1980's. I like to think the 80's were the Golden Age of home.. I mean PERSONAL computers.
From an American perspective at least, if you weren't scared off by FUD and wanted GOOD graphics and an easy to program system.. you got an 8-bit Atari. If you wanted to run "all the latest software"... you got a Commodore 64 (with a pathetic disk i/o system marginally faster than an Atari 1010 tape drive..). Later the roles were somewhat reversed with the Atari ST and the Amiga. The Atari ST was the first Macintosh clone... just buy the Magic Sack, some Apple ROMS and you've got a faster, cheaper Mac.
Porting software between OS's was relatively easy, although the ports sometimes offended advocates (ST users will remember being insulted by that dickhead who now runs 3DO... RIP), like Marble Madness for the ST not eving having a title screen. Programming was easy using BUNDLED TOOLS that came with the computer. I used to type in all the code from Antic, and A.N.A.L.O.G., and port non-Atari stuff from COMPUTE!
These days some people argue against multiple platforms, and this saddens me. Why is it people will bitch about their local cable monopoly by think it would be better for just one software platform? The point of all this is to highlight just one point, which you touched:
It's NOT difficult to port software xplatform, and to a lesser extent but still true it's NOT difficult to support it either.
1st, the LACK of diversity is the #1 reason why Windows sucks so bad... nobody is a real threat so Microsoft won't change. Say goodbye to the last piece of "Open" code in Windows... DOS goes bye-bye in Win2K. Some Windows users say "we need Apple for competition and to make Windows better", but few of these people give serious consideration to Windows "alternatives", so what's the point of lip talk?
2nd, MOST porting difficulty can be attributed to using Microsoft tools in the first place. If you didn't build your freakin app using black boxes like Direct3D and ActiveX you wouldn't be dumbfounded when your app won't port.
Maybe you should do some investigation. Ask all the little girls at a college or university why they have an iMac and I'm sure they won't tell you because of features. They like the pretty colors.
Oh, and you did this investigation, didja?
Harboring resentment towards women, especially educated ones, will get you nowhere in life unless you live in saf Afghanistan. Get a life -- maybe you won't grow up to be a stalker.
So it can be upgraded. The lack of currently available upgrades does not prove otherwise.. the market is very young and there's just no demand, yet.
Also, because they are built using PowerPC CPU's, the iMacs are very tolerant of overclocking.
As soon as I have had my G3 PowerMac for a full 60 days I will overclock it from 300 to 350, or 400 if it's stable.
The new IBM copper-process PowerPC CPU's can be taken from their "rated" 400 MHz up to the current record of a stable 560MHz... and they DO NOT OVERHEAT. the limiting factor is usually the 100 MHz speed RAM, or the cache.
My PowerPC G3 @ 300 MHz cracks 970,000 - 1,010,000 keys per second... very comperable to a 450 MHz Pentium2. I haven't SEEN an AMD CPU that comes even CLOSE to that!
If you want to be fair, base the AMD against the discontinued G3's that are less than 300 MHz... or maybe a discontinued 604e 200MHz system which can be had *very* cheap these days (and run not just Linux but also BeOS, for whatever that is worth..)
At work I have 2 computers: an Intergraph for SynaFlex and a Dell Dimension for "email and Microsoft office". You don't want rampant Microsoft virii running loose on a production machine, see...;-)
Anyways, last time I priced a Dell Dimension v333c it came out to $2300! Never mind that the G3 is faster than a Pentium3... this Dell is a CELERON! The G3 is faster than the Celleron by *QUITE* a noticable margin.
For THAT price I could get a G3 WITH MONITOR, same memory and a BETTER video card. Dell vs. Apple is a much better comparison than say Apple vs. eMachines
Never spent an hour hunting through every Pep Boys/AutoZone/Wal-Mart in town looking for a set of wipers, eh? Auto manufacturers are just about the worst example of "standards" you could come up with. Aside from the fluids you put in them, there's about 0% "standard parts" in the average automobile...;-)
The wipers were an attempt at irony..:-D There may not be a "standard" wiper, but the general design of them is not patented by Intel, unlike say SLOT ONE (or Two...).
Socket7 was turning the CPU into a commoddity, so Intel's response was not to turn up the technology but to create a new socket and deny access to it, then make the techies take a back seat to Marketing. What a joke.
At least Intel pay well, so they can steal employees from Motorola. Motorola is too busy being anal to their golden employee, and allowing a gestapo-like IT department to "force standardize" on INTEL computers, at the expense of working Motorola-based Apple (or even Windows NT/PowerPC).
THAT must be demoralizing to employees who care about their company. They must have the same pointy-haired bosses middle-management "fat" found in places like IBM and Digital oops I mean Compaq.
Save money by removing the fan and hard disk, while making the system totally silent.
Think, before you speak r00t d00d..
Heat fins on the case? Since when is the CASE a major source of heat? If you want to transfer heat from the hard drive and the CPU ONTO the case, how would you do it? Submerge it in water maybe...:)
CPU's in _general_ aren't the problem; x86 and is hugely innnefficent and generates higher-than-average levels of heat so it needs another fan atop the heat sink. My PowerPC does quite nicely without a CPU fan... the CPU is in my estimation the third source of heat after the hard drive and power supply.
As a result, this G3 is AMAZINGLY quiet. I suppose all fans could be disabled if I got an external hard drive (no thanks) or netbooting (not needed) and moved the power supply out, but I'm not willing to test it. If I wanted absolute quiet I'd get a G3 rackmount from Marathon Computers..
One thing that CAN help reduce noise is applying vibration dampening material to "safe" metal inside the computer, like portions of the frame and maybe the inside of the case cover (YMMV I wouldn't completely cover the case because more heat may build up).
It IS a goal for Linux to be platform independant, and it does a fine job at it. You can run Linux on LOTS of old computers so it's not necessary to buy a new computer as often. For example, all the Windows users will be buying new PC's within a year of Windows2000 for the same reasons people bought new machines when going from Win3.1 to Win95: your old software MAY work just fine but if it's not supported you WILL cough up money for a new system.
HOW MANY users of PhotoShop 3.0 still run on Windows 3.1? By contrast, how capable is the same machine running Linux. EVEN IF Linux were not faster than Windows, the very fact that you can OBTAIN a software upgrade for the computer may be enough to stick with it; some people are "cheap". How many users of 68040 MacOS 7.5 through 8.1 are still out there? LOTS. The systems are slow by today's standards, but you're not kicked down a flight of stairs like Microsoft users are.
All things being the same: price, performance and software availability, would you rule out non-Intel CPU's for a dedicated Linux-only box? You would be foolish to do so. Intel has every reason to fear Linux... after the Microsoft takedown THEY are next!
I'd *love* to see that Russian "Merced killer" become a reality, with a Linux port. CPU's are too expensive. The weakness of any product is allowing the customer to evaluate the competition; this is what software upgrades are all about. Intel's strategy is going to be to encourage BINARY file distribution, discourage commercial software from distributing the source (it's rare but it COULD catch on...), and attempt to introduce Intel-specific bits into libraries and kernels.
Intel is not a standard. REAL Commodities like SVGA monitors, the size of a soda can, analog clocks, and even winshield wipers ARE standards. CPU manufacturers sell magical sealed black boxes that can't be peered into and are just as capable of screwing you over as the Microsoft monopoly.
#1 ---------------- Are glide wrappers available natively for the Mac and Linux?
Some Mac games only supported the choices of 3Dfx or no 3D acceleration. The ATI card used in the new G3's is an excellent card, but unless the game takes advantage of RAVE3D, QuickDraw3D, or OpenGL once the beta drivers ship.. naturally I want these cool effects enabled for games that only did 3Dfx modes.
#2 --------------------- Regarding the Win32 Glide wrappers, and gameplay under VirtualPC.. does anyone know if there would be an advantage to it under VirtualPC for the Mac?
If you hve a "real" 3Dfx card in a Mac, and you run a 3dfx-enabled game under the emulator, the video calls are remapped directly to the Mac driver instead of being emulated. It's supposed to give much better performance for things like Quake II.
If I understand this correctly: 1) Glide wrappers redirect 3dfx calls to non-3dfx hardware, essentially "fooling" software to thinking you have a real 3dfx card so you can enable "3dfx-only" features.
2) The Glide wrappers support the ATI Rage 128 at least on the PC.
3) Does this make sense where I am going? I can test this myself but are there any toold to "detect" if you have 3Dfx? I could always eyeball a game to see if it looks faster but this is not accurate.
Regarding the statement "I can assure you that there is nothing in our deal that keeps us from using other chip makers.", I have some questions to clarify this statement, if you would: * Are there ANY additional Intel conditions regarding non-Intel chips and VA? By "additional conditions" I mean above and beyond the crafty "Intel inside" campaign which this story is all about. I *assume* VA is participating in the intel Inside promotion, which is designed to exclude alternative CPU's and lock-in OEM's. Are any additional conditions thrown in when you're partially owned by Intel? Additionally, does Intel have "any" influence over the management decisions of linux.com? I see this as a first step in an information war to equate Linux with Intel, but I hold out hope the domain will be fair to all variations of Linux (and related alternatives like *BSD).
Slashdot Mirror
Lately, the media has taken to quoting Slashdot posts, which I take as evidence the media usually know nothing about the subject they report (or else they would have caught on YEARS before and we'd see quotes from USENET as well).
:-D
:(
:-D
Anyways, my point of this message is a full 50% of the posts don't even make a 1, how disappointing. I don't see how ANYONE, except the most closed minded of folk, could find something wong with this story. iD software is helping Apple only in the sense that they are shining a painful light on the problems with the OS. Some people will never be satisfied anyways, because the OS is tied to the hardware, it's not fully open source, or they're jealous it has more than a "man page" for help.
I'm sure none of these people are listening anyways,but until something like Linux is all things to all people, people are going to want computers like the Mac (and Windows, although I've known people who just bought a PC without "trying anything else"
I'm somewhat reminded of the local Operation rescue folk... they speaking up for what they believe in (shudder), but they do nothing constructive. I've never seen one of those dirtbags sign up as a Big Brother/Sister or foster parent, but they're more than ready to throw eggs, write down license plates or take pictures and put them on the web. Do something constructive, like reverse-engineer QuickTime for Linux.
I never thought I'd support Slashdot censoring I mean moderating posts. *sigh*
While there's a downside to the "why" this is going Mac and Linux first, this is still overall a good thing for platform diversity. I'll be waiting in line to buy mine.
:-D
It's good that John has come around on Apple (notice I did not say "...MacOS"), and especially the future of the platform, MacOS X. I couldn't imagine ANY game programmer saying nice things about gaming under the ever-changing, four-year late "Cairo" oops I mean Windows 2K (Linux is gonna KILL Wintel for games when all PC's are force-preloaded with that flying pig).
There's sucky things about the MacOS, and I can draw upon time spent behind Wintel, Linux, BeOS, Solaris, and my old reliable GEM/Atari ST system. I have a list of complaints with each platform.. just I'm most comfortable with the Mac list which consistently gets shorter every day..
I think I'm gonna take a day out of work when I get my hands on Quake...
Actually, I *am* a Mac user. If I implied otherwise it's because during any one week I've logeed hours on 4 different platforms.
I actually LIKED IE on the Mac... it's much much better than IE on that Windows thing. For example, IE/Mac you can save HTML pages as an "archive" that wraps both the HTML and all graphics into one file. In typical Microsoft execution however that file format is proprietary to Microsoft.
That said, IE isn't so much better than Netscape that I'm willing to help Microsoft win the Browser Wars. Because Microsoft's goal isn't to spend all their money to give away browser code, it's to CONTROL the internet for more than just selling servers (every smart cookie uses Apache anyways). If Microsoft wins the web "View Source" will become a thing of the past, and they'll deliberately leave Mac and UNIX without a browser (or charge for it).
Does anyone remember the Quicktime MOV "trekkies"? It's a parody of Star Trek TNG + original. They fire on a shuttle containing Wesley Crusher (yeah!) and the scene where Mrs. Crusher made a come-on to Picard, they superimposed some other [naked] woman from the neck down.
:-D
Juvenile, sure, but the first time I saw it I absolutely died laughing!
The video disappeared, I presume when Paramount decided fansites were competition or maybe they just flipped when they saw it. It's got a home on my "classic net flicks" CD, right next to the Exploding Whale, Troops, and the Spirit Of Christmas.
I've owned personal computers since 1983 (Atari 8-bit, Atari 16/32, i486 upgraded 3x, then platform switched to Motorola StarMax Mac clone, a P120 for Win95 and Linux, then last month got a shiny BW G3). I've never subscribed to Evangelista so I don't know what I missed.
There WAS a perception out there that these were "fanatical Amiga types" (no dis to Amiga fans), and that's why I probably avoided it. It was enough for me when I saw misinformation online that was SO inaccurate about Apple, that you have to wonder how this person finished school. You know, the stereotypes, the fud, occasional lies. Microsoft did not invent FUD for Linux... if you read the Hallow's Eve document they've implied their past FUD successes without specifically mentioning Apple.
I also stayed away from most Mac-based journals and mailing lists because I've been using computers so long I don't want to hear someone ask how to setup Eudora or import Mickeysoft Word documents. On average, the Mac does MOST of the things I want done better than any OS, although I could draw up a long list of annoyances for any OS (though none would be as long as the M$ list). Apple stressed simplicity to the point of not being able to customize the UI. I don't like that, and I'm glad that philosophy was let go starting with System 8.
I'm kind of sad to learn this list is shutting down, I missed out things I didn't know about like jokes, technical information, job postings and so on. It's too bad I'm learning the list was portrayed and demonized as something it was not. The lesson really is don't judge a group by its members... closer to home we see Slashdot also has a fair share of idiots, trolls, fanatics... sometimes they are who they appear to be (the world isn't perfect), and sometimes they are "the enemy" dressed up like us (like Microsoft seeding online bulletin boards and letter campaigns).
The most important lesson in life is, "Relax, and have a homebrew".
It's much easier now to ignore the trolls without needing to defend Apple... the more these people cling to their stereotypes lies and FUD, whatever it is about, the more they will be marginalized or portrayed as fanatics. (Of course it helps that we are all WINNING for the moment).
Like the idiot at c|net who wrote about the death of MP3... someone said he has worked for Microsoft and besides the MS push for MP3 FUD he also wrote some inaccurate trash about Linux.
So WHY isn't the OS free again? Oh, I get it. Hook the market on IE, including Mac users who know Netscape wasn't fighting their battles on the Mac front anyways..
Now stuff the browser into the NT kernel. Next, pull UNIX and Mac versions of IE off the market after a period of neglect.
Oops, yes the browser if free, see, but you can't run it without our OS, see, and you can't run our OS without the browser. BUT we're keeping our work... it'll always be free. Yeah, um, sure.
Too bad this article is stale now.
If what you say is true (I'm not doubting you), then your post should be a follow-up article submitted to Slashdot...
We have to expose selective reporting with an agenda.
I encode all my audio files at 192/44, which during lengthy testing was what I found to be the best compression without noticable loss in quality. I tested my MP3's by two methods: linking my Apple PowerMac B&W G3 to the home stereo, and secondly by burning one set of files BACK to CD so I could remove my soundcard and 50 feet of patch cables as a variable. Sounds great!
Admittedly, I store a lot less MP3 at such a high data rate. Oh well. My server is a 20 GB Linux box, and the files are available over my home webserver (primarily used for this purpose since it's not available to the outside world).
On my PC's cheap speakers, I can still tell the difference between 128/44 and the real CD, but above that it's blurred. I really HATE that "pop" the SB cards put before every track, but then again I'm spoiled by the audio in the G3.
Maybe I *am* buying fewer CD's these days, but it's because I'm more informed after having listened to more tracks of a CD due to MP3. I have a lot of CD's I never play because I bought them on the false assumption the rest of the CD was as good as the tracks I heard elsewhere.
I truly hope the artists exploit this technology. There's just NO NEED to force an artist to deliver 8-12 songs when the artist only feels good about 2 or 3. The artist needs more control.
After reading the article, I had to conclude this will win "FUD article of the year" even though we're only in April.
The author seems to believe MP3 can "go away" or be extended in incompatable ways. This fundamental misunderstanding of what is a semi-open format immediately sounded warnings. Doesn't CNN have technical people all over their company who can proof this crap?
god forbid he reviews Linux. He'd probably declare "they'll be put out of business" or somehow link RedHat to Linux.
Of course, there's always the possibility he is not stupid, but rather he is motivated to write an anti-MP3 FUD story.
It's too bad journalists are not forced to disclose their investments like the politicians are. How can someone be impartial when they have loyalties to the Media, or at least a good chunk of their life savings invested in media stock?
I'm not claiming to know what motivated this aweful story, merely I am publicly speculating what could have gone wrong.
The great thing about all this is time is on our sides; we're NOT a business.. lol!
I didn't intend to come across as implying RC5 cracking was the be-all end-all of benchmarking. It's just one benchmark... a real one perhaps but not very important.
The industry DOES need an accepted *standard* for measuring CPU's. Intel doesn't seem interested in such a thing however.
To me, claiming MHz is EXACTLY the same as "claiming RMP" in a car. Better benchmarks are 0-60, quarter-mile, and the torque curve.
The SpecINT and fpINT, and BYTEmarks are only part of the picture.
At any clock speed, or just simply "close", the G3 MOPS THE FLOOR of *ANY* x86 CPU: Pentium 3, Pentium2, PentiumPro, Celleron, AMD, or Cyrix.
The Celleron DOES get decent floating point but only if you compare it to AMD or Cyrix. If you compare an Intel offering against the PowerPC 750 ("G3") or say an Alpha, you're simply not in the same ballpark.
Read up on it. This is one of the "less disputable" platform-characteristics. Floating Point on Intel sucks. Maya and SoftImage may exist on NT, but that's because of a number of pressures (including IT departments), but floating point is not one of them.
That's a symptom of the "higher initial post" feature. If most of your posts get "bumped up", the system starts to make assumptions. My initial score "should" have been neutral (1), but because of prior posts it was 3 to START with.
One thing I DON'T like about this system is it will auto-subtract posters like MEEPT! who sometimes has some clever (or at least witty) postings that are no less on topic than everyone else. Sometimes...
You didn't say, but nothing fits THAT bill. Just listen to Red Hat, who says Linux/Alpha "isn't worth it".
Are you even RUNNING Linux on one of those non-Intel platforms, and would you reccoment it to others?
And doesn't "completely open" mean you're using an open sourced CPU (sputter!), or at least avoiding Intel and their evil Slot One?
Hypocrite.
You're 100% right... there is NO [good] reason we can't have multiple platforms, like during the HEALTHY computer wars of the 1980's. I like to think the 80's were the Golden Age of home.. I mean PERSONAL computers.
:)
From an American perspective at least, if you weren't scared off by FUD and wanted GOOD graphics and an easy to program system.. you got an 8-bit Atari. If you wanted to run "all the latest software"... you got a Commodore 64 (with a pathetic disk i/o system marginally faster than an Atari 1010 tape drive..). Later the roles were somewhat reversed with the Atari ST and the Amiga. The Atari ST was the first Macintosh clone... just buy the Magic Sack, some Apple ROMS and you've got a faster, cheaper Mac.
Porting software between OS's was relatively easy, although the ports sometimes offended advocates (ST users will remember being insulted by that dickhead who now runs 3DO... RIP), like Marble Madness for the ST not eving having a title screen. Programming was easy using BUNDLED TOOLS that came with the computer. I used to type in all the code from Antic, and A.N.A.L.O.G., and port non-Atari stuff from COMPUTE!
These days some people argue against multiple platforms, and this saddens me. Why is it people will bitch about their local cable monopoly by think it would be better for just one software platform? The point of all this is to highlight just one point, which you touched:
It's NOT difficult to port software xplatform, and to a lesser extent but still true it's NOT difficult to support it either.
1st, the LACK of diversity is the #1 reason why Windows sucks so bad... nobody is a real threat so Microsoft won't change. Say goodbye to the last piece of "Open" code in Windows... DOS goes bye-bye in Win2K. Some Windows users say "we need Apple for competition and to make Windows better", but few of these people give serious consideration to Windows "alternatives", so what's the point of lip talk?
2nd, MOST porting difficulty can be attributed to using Microsoft tools in the first place. If you didn't build your freakin app using black boxes like Direct3D and ActiveX you wouldn't be dumbfounded when your app won't port.
That's all. I have work to do.. end rant.
You're 100% right... there is NO [good] reason we can't have multiple platforms, like during the HEALTHY computer wars of the 1980's. I like to think the 80's were the Golden Age of home.. I mean PERSONAL computers.
:)
From an American perspective at least, if you weren't scared off by FUD and wanted GOOD graphics and an easy to program system.. you got an 8-bit Atari. If you wanted to run "all the latest software"... you got a Commodore 64 (with a pathetic disk i/o system marginally faster than an Atari 1010 tape drive..). Later the roles were somewhat reversed with the Atari ST and the Amiga. The Atari ST was the first Macintosh clone... just buy the Magic Sack, some Apple ROMS and you've got a faster, cheaper Mac.
Porting software between OS's was relatively easy, although the ports sometimes offended advocates (ST users will remember being insulted by that dickhead who now runs 3DO... RIP), like Marble Madness for the ST not eving having a title screen. Programming was easy using BUNDLED TOOLS that came with the computer. I used to type in all the code from Antic, and A.N.A.L.O.G., and port non-Atari stuff from COMPUTE!
These days some people argue against multiple platforms, and this saddens me. Why is it people will bitch about their local cable monopoly by think it would be better for just one software platform? The point of all this is to highlight just one point, which you touched:
It's NOT difficult to port software xplatform, and to a lesser extent but still true it's NOT difficult to support it either.
1st, the LACK of diversity is the #1 reason why Windows sucks so bad... nobody is a real threat so Microsoft won't change. Say goodbye to the last piece of "Open" code in Windows... DOS goes bye-bye in Win2K. Some Windows users say "we need Apple for competition and to make Windows better", but few of these people give serious consideration to Windows "alternatives", so what's the point of lip talk?
2nd, MOST porting difficulty can be attributed to using Microsoft tools in the first place. If you didn't build your freakin app using black boxes like Direct3D and ActiveX you wouldn't be dumbfounded when your app won't port.
That's all. I have work to do.. end rant.
Oh, and you did this investigation, didja?
Harboring resentment towards women, especially educated ones, will get you nowhere in life unless you live in saf Afghanistan. Get a life -- maybe you won't grow up to be a stalker.
WAY KEWL pee-cee wEb pAge aRt d00d...
So it can be upgraded. The lack of currently available upgrades does not prove otherwise.. the market is very young and there's just no demand, yet.
Also, because they are built using PowerPC CPU's, the iMacs are very tolerant of overclocking.
As soon as I have had my G3 PowerMac for a full 60 days I will overclock it from 300 to 350, or 400 if it's stable.
The new IBM copper-process PowerPC CPU's can be taken from their "rated" 400 MHz up to the current record of a stable 560MHz... and they DO NOT OVERHEAT. the limiting factor is usually the 100 MHz speed RAM, or the cache.
My PowerPC G3 @ 300 MHz cracks 970,000 - 1,010,000 keys per second... very comperable to a 450 MHz Pentium2. I haven't SEEN an AMD CPU that comes even CLOSE to that!
If you want to be fair, base the AMD against the discontinued G3's that are less than 300 MHz... or maybe a discontinued 604e 200MHz system which can be had *very* cheap these days (and run not just Linux but also BeOS, for whatever that is worth..)
At work I have 2 computers: an Intergraph for SynaFlex and a Dell Dimension for "email and Microsoft office". You don't want rampant Microsoft virii running loose on a production machine, see... ;-)
Anyways, last time I priced a Dell Dimension v333c it came out to $2300! Never mind that the G3 is faster than a Pentium3... this Dell is a CELERON! The G3 is faster than the Celleron by *QUITE* a noticable margin.
For THAT price I could get a G3 WITH MONITOR, same memory and a BETTER video card. Dell vs. Apple is a much better comparison than say Apple vs. eMachines
Never spent an hour hunting through every Pep Boys/AutoZone/Wal-Mart in town looking for a set of wipers, eh? Auto manufacturers are just about the worst example of "standards" you could come up with. Aside from the fluids you put in them, there's about 0% "standard parts" in the average automobile... ;-)
The wipers were an attempt at irony.. :-D
There may not be a "standard" wiper, but the general design of them is not patented by Intel, unlike say SLOT ONE (or Two...).
Socket7 was turning the CPU into a commoddity, so Intel's response was not to turn up the technology but to create a new socket and deny access to it, then make the techies take a back seat to Marketing. What a joke.
At least Intel pay well, so they can steal employees from Motorola. Motorola is too busy being anal to their golden employee, and allowing a gestapo-like IT department to "force standardize" on INTEL computers, at the expense of working Motorola-based Apple (or even Windows NT/PowerPC).
THAT must be demoralizing to employees who care about their company. They must have the same pointy-haired bosses middle-management "fat" found in places like IBM and Digital oops I mean Compaq.
Think, before you speak r00t d00d..
Heat fins on the case? Since when is the CASE a major source of heat? If you want to transfer heat from the hard drive and the CPU ONTO the case, how would you do it? Submerge it in water maybe... :)
CPU's in _general_ aren't the problem; x86 and is hugely innnefficent and generates higher-than-average levels of heat so it needs another fan atop the heat sink. My PowerPC does quite nicely without a CPU fan... the CPU is in my estimation the third source of heat after the hard drive and power supply.
As a result, this G3 is AMAZINGLY quiet. I suppose all fans could be disabled if I got an external hard drive (no thanks) or netbooting (not needed) and moved the power supply out, but I'm not willing to test it. If I wanted absolute quiet I'd get a G3 rackmount from Marathon Computers..
One thing that CAN help reduce noise is applying vibration dampening material to "safe" metal inside the computer, like portions of the frame and maybe the inside of the case cover (YMMV I wouldn't completely cover the case because more heat may build up).
You can get the stuff at a car-stereo shop..
It IS a goal for Linux to be platform independant, and it does a fine job at it. You can run Linux on LOTS of old computers so it's not necessary to buy a new computer as often. For example, all the Windows users will be buying new PC's within a year of Windows2000 for the same reasons people bought new machines when going from Win3.1 to Win95: your old software MAY work just fine but if it's not supported you WILL cough up money for a new system.
HOW MANY users of PhotoShop 3.0 still run on Windows 3.1? By contrast, how capable is the same machine running Linux. EVEN IF Linux were not faster than Windows, the very fact that you can OBTAIN a software upgrade for the computer may be enough to stick with it; some people are "cheap". How many users of 68040 MacOS 7.5 through 8.1 are still out there? LOTS. The systems are slow by today's standards, but you're not kicked down a flight of stairs like Microsoft users are.
All things being the same: price, performance and software availability, would you rule out non-Intel CPU's for a dedicated Linux-only box? You would be foolish to do so. Intel has every reason to fear Linux... after the Microsoft takedown THEY are next!
I'd *love* to see that Russian "Merced killer" become a reality, with a Linux port. CPU's are too expensive. The weakness of any product is allowing the customer to evaluate the competition; this is what software upgrades are all about. Intel's strategy is going to be to encourage BINARY file distribution, discourage commercial software from distributing the source (it's rare but it COULD catch on...), and attempt to introduce Intel-specific bits into libraries and kernels.
Intel is not a standard. REAL Commodities like SVGA monitors, the size of a soda can, analog clocks, and even winshield wipers ARE standards. CPU manufacturers sell magical sealed black boxes that can't be peered into and are just as capable of screwing you over as the Microsoft monopoly.
#1
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Are glide wrappers available natively for the Mac and Linux?
Some Mac games only supported the choices of 3Dfx or no 3D acceleration. The ATI card used in the new G3's is an excellent card, but unless the game takes advantage of RAVE3D, QuickDraw3D, or OpenGL once the beta drivers ship.. naturally I want these cool effects enabled for games that only did 3Dfx modes.
#2
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Regarding the Win32 Glide wrappers, and gameplay under VirtualPC.. does anyone know if there would be an advantage to it under VirtualPC for the Mac?
If you hve a "real" 3Dfx card in a Mac, and you run a 3dfx-enabled game under the emulator, the video calls are remapped directly to the Mac driver instead of being emulated. It's supposed to give much better performance for things like Quake II.
If I understand this correctly:
1) Glide wrappers redirect 3dfx calls to non-3dfx hardware, essentially "fooling" software to thinking you have a real 3dfx card so you can enable "3dfx-only" features.
2) The Glide wrappers support the ATI Rage 128 at least on the PC.
3) Does this make sense where I am going? I can test this myself but are there any toold to "detect" if you have 3Dfx? I could always eyeball a game to see if it looks faster but this is not accurate.
There's hints that it was a hardware manufacturer that closed them down.
:-/
Freedom is dead. We're all workers for the queen bee now. Reality sucks - can I join the Matrix?
Methinks one of the main reasons for the World Bank is to open up countries to the influence of rotten corporations like Microsoft, 3Dfx and so on.
Hello Chris, and thanks for the reply..
Regarding the statement "I can assure you that there is nothing in our deal that keeps us from using other chip makers.", I have some questions to clarify this statement, if you would: * Are there ANY additional Intel conditions regarding non-Intel chips and VA? By "additional conditions" I mean above and beyond the crafty "Intel inside" campaign which this story is all about. I *assume* VA is participating in the intel Inside promotion, which is designed to exclude alternative CPU's and lock-in OEM's. Are any additional conditions thrown in when you're partially owned by Intel? Additionally, does Intel have "any" influence over the management decisions of linux.com? I see this as a first step in an information war to equate Linux with Intel, but I hold out hope the domain will be fair to all variations of Linux (and related alternatives like *BSD).