Near gave me a heart attack, but the last paragraph gave it away even before I clicked the "Media Release". Absolutely believable that Alston (ex telecomunications minister) would have so little integrity.
You forgot rights to ideas, creations and works created following completion of employment with the company... (unfortunately, not unknown for some bastards to try and claim these too - at least for a period of time).
You must have a pretty crappy machine. My Athlon XP 2500+ with Radeon 9500 (non-pro) ran it just fine once I'd upped the RAM to 1GB. Yes it was better when I eventually upgraded to a 9700 Pro, but the main difference was that I could run at 6xFSAA and 16xAF with no slowdown. Absolutely gorgeous - you've got to play the Ocean House Hotel with maximum graphics settings and good headphones.
The only real performance problem with Bloodlines was the amount of RAM. If you had 512MB or less it was dog-slow at loading areas (like 4-5 minutes for the major hubs). But once you hit 768MB that dropped to 20-30 seconds to load a major hub.
Whilst I much prefer turn-based isometric games (Fallout/Arcanum) Bloodlines was a lot of fun with (IMO) very good gameplay. Combat was great for me - a lot of twitch gamers didn't like the combat system, but a lot of us loved it.
I believe that Troika never got the final builds of Source and had to use older versions - despite being forced to delay until HL2 was released. Quite a few of the bugs present in Bloodlines were also in HL2 - but Valve were in a position to patch HL2...
Personally, I never noticed any significant performance problems with XP on an i815/866MHz P3 (Gateway machine). In fact, it ran very well. It's since gone from being my server to my father's machine.
Of course, I habitually turn off *every* bit of eye candy except for windows contents while dragging. And turn off things like NTFS access time recording. Perhaps you were short on RAM. 256MB is OK, but you really want 512MB if you can get it.
I've also run XP on a Pentium Pro with 256MB RAM. Responsiveness of the interface was fine (although opening applications could be a little slow...).
And yet we appear to be observing it here in Australia, where over the last 30-odd years *three* species of snake appear to have bred out mouths large enough to eat cane toads that are old enough to produce enough poison to kill them.
These snakes can still eat younger cane toads, but not the ones that can kill them.
There's a severe flaw with this methodology though.
The two machines are different (even if their specs are theoretically the same). Minor differences in characteristics can result in highly sub-optimal results if you move the determined parameters from one machine to another.
To obtain *useful* parameter sets, you will need to do it on the machine in question. Your second option points towards this.
Having done both, I'd disagree with that "always".
Where I currently work, we have strong, well-understood and well-followed processes that result in higher-quality code - source control, design and code reviews, requirements gathering, etc.
Too often in a project "done for love" these things get ignored (yes - that happens very often when done for money too). That's because (a) setting these things takes time away from the fun part of the project and (b) often the person doing the project for love just doesn't understand the need for it or (as in my case) isn't disciplined enough to do it without a framework in place (both process and social).
There are examples and counter-examples all over the place - I'm just saying don't be blind to the idea that work done for pay can be superior.
Buy it from Australia when Madman releases it here.
Madman does a superb job on their discs, at very reasonable prices. They're currently in the process of releasing 10 Studio Ghibli shows. The first four - Kiki, Laputa, Mononoke and Spirited Away - have been out for a couple of months now. Actually, Spirited Away was released about the same time it was released in the US, but it was re-released with the other three.
Of course, if someone is installing an OS (hint - Windows XP in the article) for the first time on their only computer, they may not have a way to go online and view the EULA...
If you've encountered an error like the example you've given, and can confirm that it is due to *Python* (as opposed to a third-party library you're using) the python developers would be *very* anxious to hear about it - especially as Python 2.4 has just been released.
Please raise a bug report on SourceForge with the Python version, Windows OS and as short a sample script as you can that replicates the problem.
However, in almost all cases this is caused by a misbehaving third-party library written in C/C++ - usually a wild store, mismatched memory allocation/deallocation, etc. If this is the case, please submit a bug report to the author of the third-party library.
Perhaps the first time on *release*, but the second Temple of Elemental Evil *patch* included updated copy protection that didn't work with any of my CD/DVD drives (2 DVD, 1 CD, 1 DVD+/-RW).
Now it turns out that Vampire: Bloodlines has the "won't run (or maybe install) if Daemon Tools is installed". Hello NOCD crack - or updated CloneCD and Daemon Tools... or most likely both.
He's not on broadband. It takes quite a while for his anti-virus to check outgoing mail. By the time the mail is actually being sent, he's often hung up.
So it costs him both time and money (extra phone call).
This would make the situation much worse.
The majority of home users with net access in the world are still on dial-up - yes, that is changing, but it's still the case.
I just put together a Sempron 3100+ (i.e. A64 core) system for a mate. As an indication of it's use, it has a 9600XT - so "mid-level" gaming - Neverwinter Nights, Doom 3 on reasonable quality levels.
I was impressed by the performance. But I was blown away by the temperatures. After pushing it though 3DMark 2001 and Aquamark (12301 and 29381 respectively - highest score on any of our machines) it was running at 43 celsius. Ambient at the time was about 30 celsius. And this was in a system so quiet that I couldn't hear a damn thing, even with my ear right near the box (Antec).
The new core is *much* better than the Athlon XP core.
Slashdot Mirror
1. Alston to take top Telstra job
...
http://whirlpool.net.au/article.cfm/1462
Near gave me a heart attack, but the last paragraph gave it away even before I clicked the "Media Release". Absolutely believable that Alston (ex telecomunications minister) would have so little integrity.
2. "Son of Kong" - King Kong production diary day 123.
http://www.kongisking.net/index.shtml
This was one that took some real planning and work.
Damn PJ has lost some weight
Perhaps you ought to visit outside of the US ... it's been April 1 here for the last 14 hours.
True. OK - looks like an *attempt* at Duff's device ;)
You forgot rights to ideas, creations and works created following completion of employment with the company ... (unfortunately, not unknown for some bastards to try and claim these too - at least for a period of time).
Looks like Duff's device to me ... (BTW - < ...).
You must have a pretty crappy machine. My Athlon XP 2500+ with Radeon 9500 (non-pro) ran it just fine once I'd upped the RAM to 1GB. Yes it was better when I eventually upgraded to a 9700 Pro, but the main difference was that I could run at 6xFSAA and 16xAF with no slowdown. Absolutely gorgeous - you've got to play the Ocean House Hotel with maximum graphics settings and good headphones.
The only real performance problem with Bloodlines was the amount of RAM. If you had 512MB or less it was dog-slow at loading areas (like 4-5 minutes for the major hubs). But once you hit 768MB that dropped to 20-30 seconds to load a major hub.
Whilst I much prefer turn-based isometric games (Fallout/Arcanum) Bloodlines was a lot of fun with (IMO) very good gameplay. Combat was great for me - a lot of twitch gamers didn't like the combat system, but a lot of us loved it.
I believe that Troika never got the final builds of Source and had to use older versions - despite being forced to delay until HL2 was released. Quite a few of the bugs present in Bloodlines were also in HL2 - but Valve were in a position to patch HL2...
Paperless! I win!
Try putting a space after the *comma* ...
javascript:goLink('http://www.google.com', 'http://www.fark.com')
Actually, it still uses 2.1(.1). I built psyco to work with it ... (didn't give me a performance improvement unfortunately).
That would be why the Bloodlines 1.2 patch is available ...
Personally, I never noticed any significant performance problems with XP on an i815/866MHz P3 (Gateway machine). In fact, it ran very well. It's since gone from being my server to my father's machine.
...).
Of course, I habitually turn off *every* bit of eye candy except for windows contents while dragging. And turn off things like NTFS access time recording. Perhaps you were short on RAM. 256MB is OK, but you really want 512MB if you can get it.
I've also run XP on a Pentium Pro with 256MB RAM. Responsiveness of the interface was fine (although opening applications could be a little slow
And yet we appear to be observing it here in Australia, where over the last 30-odd years *three* species of snake appear to have bred out mouths large enough to eat cane toads that are old enough to produce enough poison to kill them.
These snakes can still eat younger cane toads, but not the ones that can kill them.
But no one's ever observed macro evolution.
How moronic. In every sensible system, the *sender* pays for SMS.
There's a severe flaw with this methodology though.
The two machines are different (even if their specs are theoretically the same). Minor differences in characteristics can result in highly sub-optimal results if you move the determined parameters from one machine to another.
To obtain *useful* parameter sets, you will need to do it on the machine in question. Your second option points towards this.
Having done both, I'd disagree with that "always".
Where I currently work, we have strong, well-understood and well-followed processes that result in higher-quality code - source control, design and code reviews, requirements gathering, etc.
Too often in a project "done for love" these things get ignored (yes - that happens very often when done for money too). That's because (a) setting these things takes time away from the fun part of the project and (b) often the person doing the project for love just doesn't understand the need for it or (as in my case) isn't disciplined enough to do it without a framework in place (both process and social).
There are examples and counter-examples all over the place - I'm just saying don't be blind to the idea that work done for pay can be superior.
Buy it from Australia when Madman releases it here.
Madman does a superb job on their discs, at very reasonable prices. They're currently in the process of releasing 10 Studio Ghibli shows. The first four - Kiki, Laputa, Mononoke and Spirited Away - have been out for a couple of months now. Actually, Spirited Away was released about the same time it was released in the US, but it was re-released with the other three.
Of course, if someone is installing an OS (hint - Windows XP in the article) for the first time on their only computer, they may not have a way to go online and view the EULA ...
If you've encountered an error like the example you've given, and can confirm that it is due to *Python* (as opposed to a third-party library you're using) the python developers would be *very* anxious to hear about it - especially as Python 2.4 has just been released.
Please raise a bug report on SourceForge with the Python version, Windows OS and as short a sample script as you can that replicates the problem.
However, in almost all cases this is caused by a misbehaving third-party library written in C/C++ - usually a wild store, mismatched memory allocation/deallocation, etc. If this is the case, please submit a bug report to the author of the third-party library.
Thanks - reports have been conflicting. Of course, I have to wait until the end of next week until VtM:B is available here in Australia ...
Perhaps the first time on *release*, but the second Temple of Elemental Evil *patch* included updated copy protection that didn't work with any of my CD/DVD drives (2 DVD, 1 CD, 1 DVD+/-RW).
... or most likely both.
Thank you Atari. Hello NOCD crack! BTW - patch 2 executable size - 1.5MB. Patch 2 NOCD executable size - 36KB.
Now it turns out that Vampire: Bloodlines has the "won't run (or maybe install) if Daemon Tools is installed". Hello NOCD crack - or updated CloneCD and Daemon Tools
I like to be able to play the games I buy.
He's not on broadband. It takes quite a while for his anti-virus to check outgoing mail. By the time the mail is actually being sent, he's often hung up.
So it costs him both time and money (extra phone call).
This would make the situation much worse.
The majority of home users with net access in the world are still on dial-up - yes, that is changing, but it's still the case.
I just put together a Sempron 3100+ (i.e. A64 core) system for a mate. As an indication of it's use, it has a 9600XT - so "mid-level" gaming - Neverwinter Nights, Doom 3 on reasonable quality levels.
I was impressed by the performance. But I was blown away by the temperatures. After pushing it though 3DMark 2001 and Aquamark (12301 and 29381 respectively - highest score on any of our machines) it was running at 43 celsius. Ambient at the time was about 30 celsius. And this was in a system so quiet that I couldn't hear a damn thing, even with my ear right near the box (Antec).
The new core is *much* better than the Athlon XP core.
... and someone feels the need to post it to slashdot.
Mickey (the kitten in question) is now a good looking, well-grown cat.
Figured. You Are A Moron.
Have you posted a bug report with your NIC, etc? It's unlikely to be fixed unless they know about it.
Regressions happen regrettably, and no one has a large enough range of hardwre available to do all the testing themselves.