" I haven't really gotten mpeg4 to look as well as mpeg2 even with the lowest compression setting. I'm not sure if mpeg4 was simply designed for streaming or whatnot. "
I had that problem early on, then I found the 'Maximum Quantizer' setting. It defaults to 16. I think what that means is "How big of artifact should you allow?" (I'd appreciate some correction on that if I'm wrong...) I turned that down to 8 (sometimes even 4) and it behaved MUCH better.
Just thought I'd recommend you try that. If you already have, I'm not sure what to tell ya. I've had pretty good luck with it, but I haven't compared it to MPEG2 because the video I do is pretty much for web delivery.
Articles like these are fun. Geeks like me are supposed to be the ones finding cool uses for new technology, yet everybody describes in detail how they can live without it simply by jumping through a few extra hoops. I wish I was around when 2x CD-ROMS were announced. "All they did was spin the platter twice as fast, I can do the exact same thing by waiting twice as long for my data!"
"Ok, I'm a little confused, are they saying that this will replace laptops and PDAs altogether or are they saying that this is merely a more flexible means of storage that can be accessed from other PCs or PDAs?"
It means that PDA's/Laptops/Etc become terminals that react based on this personal server of yours. One real obvious use of this product would be no more synching. Your data is in one big central place.
"Oops, sorry. Got a little carried away there. Seriously though, this is exactly what every computer in the movies or on TV has been doing for years, from the Lost in Space movie to Dark Angel on TV."
Yeah, what I'm imagining is a more evolved version of what you've mentioned. I've been kicking around the idea of using a form of music to get into the rythmn of using your computer. Each app gets it's own theme, and switching apps changes the song kind of like incidental music. I doubt that'd fly too high, but I think a variant of this idea would be advantageous.
I used to have a Ghostbusters game on my old Atari 800. The intro of the game went through the GB's advertising skit. "We're ready to believe you!" As the letters appeared on the screen (much like on Star Trek) there was short clicking sound. Whoever programmed that did a good job because the silence in between each blip seemed to coincide with the syllables of the words. You could almost hear the words coming down. That was cool.
I think the 3D acellerated desktop is nice from a "let's offload the graphic chores off the CPU" point of view, and I definitely look forward to the added capabilities that'd be involved like smooth rescaling etc, but I am a little concerned that MS is overlooking an under-utilized aspect of the UI. Sound.
Now, spare me the "No no, computers should be quiet" lectures because I'm not proposing making the noisy or obnoxious. Rather, I'd like for MS to provide more sound options to add. For example, it'd be cool if progress bars could alter the pitch of a.wav file that's playing.
It may not be immediately obvious to people why anybody'd propose this, to them I say "think about the information your unblinking ear could receive." A lot of us listen to music while using our computer, right? Well why not provide some extra cues as to what your machine's doing?
I like to multi-task. I do 3D stuff and find my computer chewing up CPU cycles for minutes at a time. While it's doing that, I fool around on Slashdot or IM or whatever else is entertaining. Sometimes, though, I don't realize when it's done. I just keep an eye on task manager. It'd be nice if I could set up progress bars to generate a tone or drum beat that changes as the process gets closer to finished. I'd like to be able to have scrollbars provide clicking noises to let me know how far they've moved, that way when I use the wheel to move I can have an audio cue to let me know that.
If I put more time into brainstorming ideas, I'm sure I could cook up a lot of useful things to cue sound effects off to. Sadly, though, I don't always have access to them. I'm a little bummed about that. Adding sounds to Opera to let me know things like when a page is opened has given me a lot of insight into what the machine's doing under my active window.
Now, again, before everybody tells me how annoying that'd be, consider that every video game you play has a lot of sound effects, and your computer has a volume control. I'd like MS to explore more audio related UI experiences so I have more to play with. That doesn't necessarily mean I want everybody's computer to sound like R2-D2.
"Can someone tell me why I need a 3d accelerated desktop?"
Yes, the graphic load is moved off your CPU to your 3D Card, thus improving GUI responsiveness. If that's not a good enough explanation, then try using a dual machine. You'll be surprised at how much more responsive it becomes.
"Would it be easier for me to navigate my windows if I could move between them as if I played Quake, instead of just clicking on the particular window I wanted?"
Where does it say that the Windows shell will be like that? + 1 Imaginitive, -1 Offtopic.
"Would I get more girls if my mailbox spun in cool 3d, instead of just opening?""Would my productivity improve if it took 5 more seconds to open a window just because it had to be animated, instead of just appearing?"
Would you be more productive if your UI was more responsive while the CPU is busy? (you know, that little thing called multi-tasking?) Meanwhile, animations like that give you more visual elements to 'reflex' off of. I mean, if a light turns red at an intersection, do you start moving because you see the light or because the other cars start moving?
"Would it be easier for me to read text if all windows were transparent?"
You don't understand the value of transparency? I have an 'always on top' app on my screen right now that allows me to rapidly switch between desktop and apps within those desktops. It's all icon based, so I made it transparent. I can read text underneat it *and* see what apps I have running without having problems with clashing. You're right, transparent text on transparent text is bad. Icons and transparent text give your screen an added dimension of real-estate. Instead of assuming the worse, look at it's strengths.
"Is the human mind better trained to cope with windows if they are rotated 45 degrees along some axis?"
Were you able to read the scrolling text in the intro to Star Wars?
"I simply don't get the 3d desktop, but then, I prefer stuff that work, instead of stuff that looks good and doesn't work."
The whole point of it is to offload the graphics processing to the unused 3D Card, and free up CPU stuff for other things. The result is a more responsive UI. To boot, they can add features that some apps will find rather useful, like the task switching app I used (it's called AltDesk btw). The extra graphic goodies are actually quite useful. Imagine running at 1600 by 1200, but resizing a web page window with small text very smoothly. (Current methods create nasty nearest neighbor artifacts.)
You may or may not care about this, but some of us that spend a great deal of time making good use of our UI find it rather exciting. If I can smoothly resize windows no matter what their native resolution is, that's damn cool.
"//H, just realized he has another flamebait post on his record. Damn that karma!"
You made some good points. It's sad, though, that you didn't just ask so you could learn. I mean, if you have to ask so many questions about why somebody's investing a lot of time and resources, then doesn't it strike you that maybe you just don't get it?
For example, I think Bablyon 5 is stupid. I think the fans overrate it. But I don't go on long-winded rants about it because I know they enjoy it in a way that I haven't discovered. See my point? I'd sound like a total dumb-ass to them if I said "I don't see why you guys are so immersed in such a corny show."
Heh I hope I made my point instead of pissing everybody off.
"In Rio de Janeiro, for example, if you wait at a red light when there are no cars going through the intersection, you're liable to be either a) beat up by the people in the cars behind you, or b) mugged by pedestrians.
Really. "
I can verify that. I've spent a month in Brazil and that's seriously how it works there. They also toot their horn when coming through an intersection to warn red-light runners. I'm worried Portland will turn the same way, people thing red lights are a personal challenge.
On a side note, am I the only one who drives more carefully because of GTA3? My driving is now slower and more controlled, plus I'm more aware of traffic around me. Maybe I just really suck at GTA.:P
Well, seeing as how the RIAA's moves threaten independent artists, I suggest we coin a new name for the RIAA. We'll just prefix 'Denying Independent Artists' to their existing name.
"But it's all in the name of stopping pirates, right? It's scary to see such tactics even being considered, and the thoughts of these being used is even worse."
I wonder if they'd consider making my super-hero status legal. I'm sick of bringing bad guys in just so they can be out on the street again trying to build laser cannons on the moon.
As opposed to enticing people to buy stuff with lower prices and better products?
I mean seriously, the RIAA created this problem for themselves. Music's expensive. You can't try it out, once the CD's opened you own it. And you can't buy what you want. You can only buy their expensive albums.
I'm not surprised that the customers have leveled the playing field by creating the services the RIAA should have provided. Too bad they choose to fight instead of listen to the people that hand them their money in good faith.
" Something very original, not your typical clever, good looking, young lawyer that beats the big bad guy. Not as predictible as the average movie either, and the "standard american set of morales" is not necessarely respected, contrary to 90% of movies coming out of Hollywood."
You didn't find the Matrix to be predictable?
"I agree. I personally do not care for for special effects, but I need a good story, and the Matrix was a very good story"
It had an okay derivitive story. Strip out the effects, and you have a movie most people won't care a whole lot about. Wanna know why? Because there was virtually no character development. There was nothing to make you go "Oh shit! NO way!" if you read gossip about how one of the main characters in the sequal dies.
I can only hope that the sequal to Matrix took a cue from X-Men.
" That is, we don't have real violence because of violent video games, we have violent video games because of all the real violence in the world. Oh, and a lack of creativity. "
Um well yeah imagine how much fun a game of Command and Conquer where you win by guiding UN Weapons Inspectors around the bad guy base.
... that he doesn't like GTA3? I can't find any reference to that. Either the story submitter forgot to mention other interviews with this guy, or he drew a conclusion based on a comment he did make.
Oh well. If GTA3 is any indication, people (parents in particular) take video games way too seriously. If playing a game was all it took to make a kid do something stupid, then television advertising would be a much more succesful business than it is today.
"Just the far end of the bell curve? A quick photoshop job on the screenshots? Or... maybe Windows is of some use as a server OS after all?"
My company had a WinNT4 Server with at least 6 months uptime. Sadly we took it down to move offices, so who knows how long it would have lasted. Also, we have Exchange running on NT Server that stays up for months at a time. We're all surprised about that though because the machine has a buggy motherboard (it's a prototype machine) a hard-drive that should fail any day now, and temperature problems. Frankly, even *I* am surprised it's gone on this long. That damn server just won't die!
To anybody still running NT Server and IIS today, I have a little piece of advice: Install 'URLScan' from MS's site. What it does is it takes a URL request and filters it out based on parameters you define. The idea here is to prevent buffer-overflows by stopping unusual requsets. (For example, why would 'cmd.exe' need to be in a URL?) I installed that (during the Code Red days) and never had to mess with that machine again.
Slashdot Mirror
" I haven't really gotten mpeg4 to look as well as mpeg2 even with the lowest compression setting. I'm not sure if mpeg4 was simply designed for streaming or whatnot. "
I had that problem early on, then I found the 'Maximum Quantizer' setting. It defaults to 16. I think what that means is "How big of artifact should you allow?" (I'd appreciate some correction on that if I'm wrong...) I turned that down to 8 (sometimes even 4) and it behaved MUCH better.
Just thought I'd recommend you try that. If you already have, I'm not sure what to tell ya. I've had pretty good luck with it, but I haven't compared it to MPEG2 because the video I do is pretty much for web delivery.
Articles like these are fun. Geeks like me are supposed to be the ones finding cool uses for new technology, yet everybody describes in detail how they can live without it simply by jumping through a few extra hoops. I wish I was around when 2x CD-ROMS were announced. "All they did was spin the platter twice as fast, I can do the exact same thing by waiting twice as long for my data!"
They're our future everyone!
"I read "no i/o" and thought, well, bricks don't have i/o either... so what?"
Don't knock bricks man. You can deliver messages with bricks that 802.11b has a hard time penetrating.
"Ok, I'm a little confused, are they saying that this will replace laptops and PDAs altogether or are they saying that this is merely a more flexible means of storage that can be accessed from other PCs or PDAs?"
It means that PDA's/Laptops/Etc become terminals that react based on this personal server of yours. One real obvious use of this product would be no more synching. Your data is in one big central place.
"But I'll believe it when I can buy it. And it works on linux out of the box."
Suddenly the appeal of Windows comes sharply into focus.
"I have broadband and ssh.
Leave the server at home. There is a thing called "the internet" that does this well already. "
And for the handful of us that like graphics, we have Intel's product..
"Oops, sorry. Got a little carried away there. Seriously though, this is exactly what every computer in the movies or on TV has been doing for years, from the Lost in Space movie to Dark Angel on TV."
Yeah, what I'm imagining is a more evolved version of what you've mentioned. I've been kicking around the idea of using a form of music to get into the rythmn of using your computer. Each app gets it's own theme, and switching apps changes the song kind of like incidental music. I doubt that'd fly too high, but I think a variant of this idea would be advantageous.
I used to have a Ghostbusters game on my old Atari 800. The intro of the game went through the GB's advertising skit. "We're ready to believe you!" As the letters appeared on the screen (much like on Star Trek) there was short clicking sound. Whoever programmed that did a good job because the silence in between each blip seemed to coincide with the syllables of the words. You could almost hear the words coming down. That was cool.
"I don't know about you, but I usually stop when the light turns red. "
You must not be from Portland here then. When a light turns red, everybody either speeds up or stops. I judge that based on what traffic's doing.
(gotta admit, that's a damn good recovery from a bone-headed mistake!)
I think the 3D acellerated desktop is nice from a "let's offload the graphic chores off the CPU" point of view, and I definitely look forward to the added capabilities that'd be involved like smooth rescaling etc, but I am a little concerned that MS is overlooking an under-utilized aspect of the UI. Sound.
.wav file that's playing.
Now, spare me the "No no, computers should be quiet" lectures because I'm not proposing making the noisy or obnoxious. Rather, I'd like for MS to provide more sound options to add. For example, it'd be cool if progress bars could alter the pitch of a
It may not be immediately obvious to people why anybody'd propose this, to them I say "think about the information your unblinking ear could receive." A lot of us listen to music while using our computer, right? Well why not provide some extra cues as to what your machine's doing?
I like to multi-task. I do 3D stuff and find my computer chewing up CPU cycles for minutes at a time. While it's doing that, I fool around on Slashdot or IM or whatever else is entertaining. Sometimes, though, I don't realize when it's done. I just keep an eye on task manager. It'd be nice if I could set up progress bars to generate a tone or drum beat that changes as the process gets closer to finished. I'd like to be able to have scrollbars provide clicking noises to let me know how far they've moved, that way when I use the wheel to move I can have an audio cue to let me know that.
If I put more time into brainstorming ideas, I'm sure I could cook up a lot of useful things to cue sound effects off to. Sadly, though, I don't always have access to them. I'm a little bummed about that. Adding sounds to Opera to let me know things like when a page is opened has given me a lot of insight into what the machine's doing under my active window.
Now, again, before everybody tells me how annoying that'd be, consider that every video game you play has a lot of sound effects, and your computer has a volume control. I'd like MS to explore more audio related UI experiences so I have more to play with. That doesn't necessarily mean I want everybody's computer to sound like R2-D2.
"Can someone tell me why I need a 3d accelerated desktop?"
Yes, the graphic load is moved off your CPU to your 3D Card, thus improving GUI responsiveness. If that's not a good enough explanation, then try using a dual machine. You'll be surprised at how much more responsive it becomes.
"Would it be easier for me to navigate my windows if I could move between them as if I played Quake, instead of just clicking on the particular window I wanted?"
Where does it say that the Windows shell will be like that? + 1 Imaginitive, -1 Offtopic.
"Would I get more girls if my mailbox spun in cool 3d, instead of just opening?""Would my productivity improve if it took 5 more seconds to open a window just because it had to be animated, instead of just appearing?"
Would you be more productive if your UI was more responsive while the CPU is busy? (you know, that little thing called multi-tasking?) Meanwhile, animations like that give you more visual elements to 'reflex' off of. I mean, if a light turns red at an intersection, do you start moving because you see the light or because the other cars start moving?
"Would it be easier for me to read text if all windows were transparent?"
You don't understand the value of transparency? I have an 'always on top' app on my screen right now that allows me to rapidly switch between desktop and apps within those desktops. It's all icon based, so I made it transparent. I can read text underneat it *and* see what apps I have running without having problems with clashing. You're right, transparent text on transparent text is bad. Icons and transparent text give your screen an added dimension of real-estate. Instead of assuming the worse, look at it's strengths.
"Is the human mind better trained to cope with windows if they are rotated 45 degrees along some axis?"
Were you able to read the scrolling text in the intro to Star Wars?
"I simply don't get the 3d desktop, but then, I prefer stuff that work, instead of stuff that looks good and doesn't work."
The whole point of it is to offload the graphics processing to the unused 3D Card, and free up CPU stuff for other things. The result is a more responsive UI. To boot, they can add features that some apps will find rather useful, like the task switching app I used (it's called AltDesk btw). The extra graphic goodies are actually quite useful. Imagine running at 1600 by 1200, but resizing a web page window with small text very smoothly. (Current methods create nasty nearest neighbor artifacts.)
You may or may not care about this, but some of us that spend a great deal of time making good use of our UI find it rather exciting. If I can smoothly resize windows no matter what their native resolution is, that's damn cool.
"//H, just realized he has another flamebait post on his record. Damn that karma!"
You made some good points. It's sad, though, that you didn't just ask so you could learn. I mean, if you have to ask so many questions about why somebody's investing a lot of time and resources, then doesn't it strike you that maybe you just don't get it?
For example, I think Bablyon 5 is stupid. I think the fans overrate it. But I don't go on long-winded rants about it because I know they enjoy it in a way that I haven't discovered. See my point? I'd sound like a total dumb-ass to them if I said "I don't see why you guys are so immersed in such a corny show."
Heh I hope I made my point instead of pissing everybody off.
"In addition to this, it will include a journaling file system, so us mere mortals can enjoy what Linux Geeks have had for years."
4 years from now Slashdot will have a headline about how KDE's 3D accelerated desktop finally reached version 1.
"In Rio de Janeiro, for example, if you wait at a red light when there are no cars going through the intersection, you're liable to be either a) beat up by the people in the cars behind you, or b) mugged by pedestrians.
:P
Really. "
I can verify that. I've spent a month in Brazil and that's seriously how it works there. They also toot their horn when coming through an intersection to warn red-light runners. I'm worried Portland will turn the same way, people thing red lights are a personal challenge.
On a side note, am I the only one who drives more carefully because of GTA3? My driving is now slower and more controlled, plus I'm more aware of traffic around me. Maybe I just really suck at GTA.
Glad you liked it. Thank you for letting me know! :)
Nano
... Uh dear.. well.. uh I need you to sit on the scanner... Please, don't ask.
Well, seeing as how the RIAA's moves threaten independent artists, I suggest we coin a new name for the RIAA. We'll just prefix 'Denying Independent Artists' to their existing name.
DIA-RIAA has a nice ring to it.
"But it's all in the name of stopping pirates, right? It's scary to see such tactics even being considered, and the thoughts of these being used is even worse."
I wonder if they'd consider making my super-hero status legal. I'm sick of bringing bad guys in just so they can be out on the street again trying to build laser cannons on the moon.
As opposed to enticing people to buy stuff with lower prices and better products?
I mean seriously, the RIAA created this problem for themselves. Music's expensive. You can't try it out, once the CD's opened you own it. And you can't buy what you want. You can only buy their expensive albums.
I'm not surprised that the customers have leveled the playing field by creating the services the RIAA should have provided. Too bad they choose to fight instead of listen to the people that hand them their money in good faith.
"Does this mean that MPAA boycatt ends on May 15th???"
Heh. Don't worry, when the next cool scifi-movie is beaten by a romantic comedy starring Jennifer Lopez, the Bocyott will be back on.
" Something very original, not your typical clever, good looking, young lawyer that beats the big bad guy. Not as predictible as the average movie either, and the "standard american set of morales" is not necessarely respected, contrary to 90% of movies coming out of Hollywood."
You didn't find the Matrix to be predictable?
"I agree. I personally do not care for for special effects, but I need a good story, and the Matrix was a very good story"
It had an okay derivitive story. Strip out the effects, and you have a movie most people won't care a whole lot about. Wanna know why? Because there was virtually no character development. There was nothing to make you go "Oh shit! NO way!" if you read gossip about how one of the main characters in the sequal dies.
I can only hope that the sequal to Matrix took a cue from X-Men.
" That is, we don't have real violence because of violent video games, we have violent video games because of all the real violence in the world. Oh, and a lack of creativity. "
Um well yeah imagine how much fun a game of Command and Conquer where you win by guiding UN Weapons Inspectors around the bad guy base.
"even he realizes that Games.Slashdot.org is dying "
Yeah, just like Apple, BSD, and Stephen King.
... that he doesn't like GTA3? I can't find any reference to that. Either the story submitter forgot to mention other interviews with this guy, or he drew a conclusion based on a comment he did make.
Oh well. If GTA3 is any indication, people (parents in particular) take video games way too seriously. If playing a game was all it took to make a kid do something stupid, then television advertising would be a much more succesful business than it is today.
"Just the far end of the bell curve? A quick photoshop job on the screenshots? Or... maybe Windows is of some use as a server OS after all?"
My company had a WinNT4 Server with at least 6 months uptime. Sadly we took it down to move offices, so who knows how long it would have lasted. Also, we have Exchange running on NT Server that stays up for months at a time. We're all surprised about that though because the machine has a buggy motherboard (it's a prototype machine) a hard-drive that should fail any day now, and temperature problems. Frankly, even *I* am surprised it's gone on this long. That damn server just won't die!
To anybody still running NT Server and IIS today, I have a little piece of advice: Install 'URLScan' from MS's site. What it does is it takes a URL request and filters it out based on parameters you define. The idea here is to prevent buffer-overflows by stopping unusual requsets. (For example, why would 'cmd.exe' need to be in a URL?) I installed that (during the Code Red days) and never had to mess with that machine again.
"Well, before Windows 2000 there was Windows 3.
I guess that would make it 2000 years old now."
Now I understand why Slashdot was so whoopty doo over Mozilla reaching version 1.
"Yellow Dog Linux 3.0 Hits Mirrors" ...a handful of people rejoice! :-)