There was a game a couple of years back called Trespasser, which while abysmal in terms of overall game experience had some really cool elements. For a start it had a brilliant physics engine, which while clunky to use from a users point of view, could do everything that Half Life 2 could do, and a little bit more (like rotate objects in your hand). So the physics in Half Life 2 aren't as revolutionary as people are making out. They're just better used.
My overall impression of Half Life 2 has been great, but not as great as some of the reviewers are making out. It's a fun game, with plenty of different experiences. The facial expressions and scripted scenes are another level above anything done before. But to offset that the levels are all very linear. Some of the environments look incredible (particularly where water is involved), but other than the shader effects the graphics don't feel as next generation as Doom 3's (in terms of visual complexity and polygon count). I think it's mainly the normal mapping and shadows that set Doom 3 apart graphically.
So in my view both bring large advances to the table. Couple Half Life 2's physics, facial animation, shaders and level designers, with the Doom 3 normal mapping, shadow rendering, and the guys responsible for the look of the architecture in Doom 3 and you're going to approach perfection with todays technology.
And that's the best thing about ID. While their games may be lacking, other companies license that technology, add to it, and make fantastic games (see original Half Life).
One theory is that the 'myth' of Atlantis, and the biblical flood stories, are based on the floods and land loss at the end of the last ice age. Something like one third (figure pulled out of rectum) of the land mass was reclaimed by the sea over a relatively short period of time (geologically speaking).
So it is quite possible that folk law accumulated into the legend of Atlantis.
Precisely. I would be suprised if they could make such a chip and keep it both X86 compatible, and fast for todays applications. If it's only slightly parallel then it's no more than a dual core chip with hyperthreading. If it's massively parallel like the grand parent post suggested, then each individual thread is unlikely to run as fast as a P4 or Athlon64 chip today, and that will hurt applications that don't benefit from being mulithreaded (ie. most of todays unoptimised apps).
The probelm for Intel is this: By the time they get this chip to market, or certainly not long after, Microsoft will actually ship Windows XP 64.
While the Pentium M may be able to close the gap to the Athlon 64 when running in 32 bit mode, possibly even beat the AMD chip if Intel are successful in increasing the M's clock speed, the Athlon is just waiting to really stretch it's legs. In some situations moving to 64 bits will not improve performance, and could possibly even hamper it, but for the majority of desktop applications and games with optimised code the 64 bit version with the extra registers will trounce the 32 bit chips.
I'm sorry but anyone who reads how these statistics are generated will realise they are utter bollocks. I'm sorry to use such harsh terms but there is no other word for them, as they not only generalise on a rediculous extrapolation and assumption, they also distort the figures by the areas of Iraq they look at. These figures are distorted by concentrating (allegedly by random chance) on the main areas of fighting. So not only are the figures compiled through the most inacurate methods (asking the locals what they think), but then they are multiplied throughout the county as if all areas of Iraq are experiencing the same levels of violence and thus death.
The killings of inocents in Iraq are wrong, but so are the distortions of the truth that are presented as the truth by both sides of the political divide.
For the love of all that is sacred (your PC for example) please don't get one. They're horrible! We have one as an office pool car and everyone refuses to drive it. The steering is suprisingly heavy for a "town" car (being un-powered), the chassis is appalling around corners (okay so this is based on UK experience not American where negotiating corners isn't usually considered as part of the design critera of cars), and absolutely worst feature of all.... the flipping awful gear box. 3 seconds to change gear!
And it thinks it knows best. Get up to a junction in second thinking to yourself "well I'm still doing 5mph, I'm sure it doesn't need first gear". Put your foot on the accelerator to pull away and it decides to change gear to first for you. Even when you're in manual mode. This leaves you rolling into the middle of a junction with absolutely no drive for 3 seconds! Madness.
But surely a well designed, well built and secure OS shouldn't be so susceptable to userland failures trashing the entire machine. Microsoft have more resources available to them than any other tech company, but they still cannot provide an OS that doesn't have a nervous breakdown every time one of the applications it's running collapses.
If you don't migrate your changes upstream, then when the next release of the software comes out you have to make all your changes again, or fork the software completely.
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There was a game a couple of years back called Trespasser, which while abysmal in terms of overall game experience had some really cool elements. For a start it had a brilliant physics engine, which while clunky to use from a users point of view, could do everything that Half Life 2 could do, and a little bit more (like rotate objects in your hand). So the physics in Half Life 2 aren't as revolutionary as people are making out. They're just better used.
My overall impression of Half Life 2 has been great, but not as great as some of the reviewers are making out. It's a fun game, with plenty of different experiences. The facial expressions and scripted scenes are another level above anything done before. But to offset that the levels are all very linear. Some of the environments look incredible (particularly where water is involved), but other than the shader effects the graphics don't feel as next generation as Doom 3's (in terms of visual complexity and polygon count). I think it's mainly the normal mapping and shadows that set Doom 3 apart graphically.
So in my view both bring large advances to the table. Couple Half Life 2's physics, facial animation, shaders and level designers, with the Doom 3 normal mapping, shadow rendering, and the guys responsible for the look of the architecture in Doom 3 and you're going to approach perfection with todays technology.
And that's the best thing about ID. While their games may be lacking, other companies license that technology, add to it, and make fantastic games (see original Half Life).
One theory is that the 'myth' of Atlantis, and the biblical flood stories, are based on the floods and land loss at the end of the last ice age. Something like one third (figure pulled out of rectum) of the land mass was reclaimed by the sea over a relatively short period of time (geologically speaking).
So it is quite possible that folk law accumulated into the legend of Atlantis.
Precisely. I would be suprised if they could make such a chip and keep it both X86 compatible, and fast for todays applications. If it's only slightly parallel then it's no more than a dual core chip with hyperthreading. If it's massively parallel like the grand parent post suggested, then each individual thread is unlikely to run as fast as a P4 or Athlon64 chip today, and that will hurt applications that don't benefit from being mulithreaded (ie. most of todays unoptimised apps).
The probelm for Intel is this: By the time they get this chip to market, or certainly not long after, Microsoft will actually ship Windows XP 64.
While the Pentium M may be able to close the gap to the Athlon 64 when running in 32 bit mode, possibly even beat the AMD chip if Intel are successful in increasing the M's clock speed, the Athlon is just waiting to really stretch it's legs. In some situations moving to 64 bits will not improve performance, and could possibly even hamper it, but for the majority of desktop applications and games with optimised code the 64 bit version with the extra registers will trounce the 32 bit chips.
I'm sorry but anyone who reads how these statistics are generated will realise they are utter bollocks. I'm sorry to use such harsh terms but there is no other word for them, as they not only generalise on a rediculous extrapolation and assumption, they also distort the figures by the areas of Iraq they look at. These figures are distorted by concentrating (allegedly by random chance) on the main areas of fighting. So not only are the figures compiled through the most inacurate methods (asking the locals what they think), but then they are multiplied throughout the county as if all areas of Iraq are experiencing the same levels of violence and thus death.
The killings of inocents in Iraq are wrong, but so are the distortions of the truth that are presented as the truth by both sides of the political divide.
"What strange, bizarre, and wacky habits do your co-workers have?"
Working?
For the love of all that is sacred (your PC for example) please don't get one. They're horrible! We have one as an office pool car and everyone refuses to drive it. The steering is suprisingly heavy for a "town" car (being un-powered), the chassis is appalling around corners (okay so this is based on UK experience not American where negotiating corners isn't usually considered as part of the design critera of cars), and absolutely worst feature of all.... the flipping awful gear box. 3 seconds to change gear!
And it thinks it knows best. Get up to a junction in second thinking to yourself "well I'm still doing 5mph, I'm sure it doesn't need first gear". Put your foot on the accelerator to pull away and it decides to change gear to first for you. Even when you're in manual mode. This leaves you rolling into the middle of a junction with absolutely no drive for 3 seconds! Madness.
But surely a well designed, well built and secure OS shouldn't be so susceptable to userland failures trashing the entire machine. Microsoft have more resources available to them than any other tech company, but they still cannot provide an OS that doesn't have a nervous breakdown every time one of the applications it's running collapses.
If you don't migrate your changes upstream, then when the next release of the software comes out you have to make all your changes again, or fork the software completely.