First of all, the PC is only an expensive platform if it is purchased solely for gaming. How often is this the case? Most households are connected to the internet nowadays, implying that they own a PC. And even a sub-$500 PC will play almost all games fairly decently. As for the OS, what PC doesn't have it installed anyway? This is part of the cost of the PC, which is not necessarily a cost for gaming.
Plus, to make a good performing gaming PC, all one really needs is a $200-300 video card, which is right in the range of console prices. CPU speed is generally less important with most games.
Secondly, you're ignoring an important advantage PC games have: modding. If Halflife had've been released on the Xbox, would there have been a Counterstrike? Furthermore, much of the enjoyment I get out of some of my old games comes from playing custom levels with custom models, even if it isn't a total mod (like with some of the X-Wing series of games, for example... Just drop in some new ship models and add value to the game).
The thing is, PC games were never more popular when I was growing up. Ever since the NES came into my life, I've always known way more people who play console games than PC games. The only real difference now is that there are three big consoles, so the market has probably shifted a little further towards consoles. This doesn't mean the end of PC gaming. There are still millions of PC gamers, and this demand will continue to drive a supply to meet it, Duke Nukem Forever jokes aside.
Some of your other points are valid, though maybe not as important as you make them out to be. Yes, some game developers release problematic first versions to fix them with patches, but this is the exception, not the norm. More often than not, changes are to fix glitches on certain hardware, and this is something that no amount of QA in house can completely get rid of. It also serves to counter your "Game-breaking driver and hardware-related problems" point, as games are generally updated to fix such problems. Heck, there are quite a few old games that got updates to make them Windows XP compatable.
Basically, the only games I have that I can't play anymore are the ones that came before Windows 95. Basically that's a bunch of games that are at least 10 years old. How many people are still playing console games from 10 years ago? Sure, there may be some, but there are also some who kept around their old PCs or set up a DOS boot partition to play their old PC games.
The only real con I see for PC games is the ease of use. The cost doesn't have to be high, both in initial investment and upkeep, since games are very good and making sure they work respectably on older hardware. Consoles just have the simplicity that a PC can't have, and this is especially appealing to parents who don't really know any better. This is why consoles are definitely still marketed towards younger audiences, as well.
Now, I'm not going to get into the multiplayer argument because I've never used Xbox Live, but it is safe to say that there is nothing there that can't be done with PCs. The other issue is that besides MMORPGs, multiplayer PC games are generally free.
The joke is that initially we think that Brian's mother mistakes it with a bomb, when it turns out to be some ferocious animal she dreamed about.
Actually, the part of the movie that is surest to get a laugh out of me every time is the rooster sound at the start of the day... i.e. one of the Pythons pretending to be a rooster. Somehow it catches me by surprise every single time.
You can't download a live concert experience. Nothing is a substitue for actually BEING THERE.
And, most importantly, the artist gets a good portion of the money.
The thing I've enver understood is why popular artists don't dump the RIAA. Once an artist has made it big, wouldn't they then have the capital to be able to put out the CDs themselves? Think of the possible benefits... As far as the artist is concerned, even if they sell the CD for $5, they're making way more than they did before, and albums would sell like candy at those prices. Thus increasing their popularity further and allowing them to make a killing on concerts as well.
This was acknowledged by the presenter himself, who said that they really want to have third parties hosting such services.
It's not intended for people who do a good job of backing up their own systems anyway. It's meant for the less skilled computer user who doesn't want to have to build a new online identity because they accidentally hosed their machine.
It was bad enough when US businesses started to buy up top-level domains from countries that were lucky enough to have two-letter TLDs that had cute meanings to US audiences.
It's not just the US. There are lots of Danish sites in the.nu domain since it means "now" in Danish.
In fact, when I visit the registration site, it defaults to Danish. (That's possibly because of my regional settings though)
I'm sure the people of Niue aren't complaining about the extra revenue though:)
This problem really arises because of the inherent differences between software and other works, like books for example.
When an author writes a book, it probably takes a significant amount of time, goes through an editorial process, and in the end is copyrighted as a completed work. There might be minor corrections later on, but the work is basically finished.
Software, on the other hand, evolves over time. The first version of something probably doesn't take that long to make, depending on the project. A single contribution to an open source project could be quite small. And it's likely to change sometime down the road.
The two things are just so different that having them governed by the same system is just silly, IMHO.
I attended an MS tech talk a couple of months ago about the identity system coming in Longhorn. It seems like they are really targetting mass acceptance with that one too.
While I can't remember exactly how everything worked (hey, I was there for the food), it was basically an RSA key system, with the private key stored on ones own computer. The main MS involvement was to have some servers set up to allow one to back up their private key so they aren't screwed over if their computer crashes without a backup... and the presenter seemed confident that there would be non-MS providers of the service as well.
It seemed like a pretty neat idea anyway... There were also systems in place to allow one to deactivate their key if it was compromised. Basically one's computer could notify all of the places it had exchanged its public key with to tell them that it is no longer valid anymore. It seemed like an interesting system that took a lot of the control away from MS, as long as one trusts the OS not to beam the keys back to them:)
The only real downside was that it seemed like they weren't too keen on getting the server-side software operating on non-MS platforms. But who knows... It certainly seems to be a better solution than Passport, since there would be no fees beyond having a supported OS.
OK, your numbers are horribly wrong, but console games do not outsell PC games 10 to 1 at least. Your 5 to 1 estimate was probably pretty close.
In 2003, the total retail revenue for console games, hardware, and accessories in the US was $10 billion.
In 2003, the total retail revenue for PC games in the US was $1.2 billion.
Notice that the figure for consoles includes hardware and accessories. So considering that the hardware probably had an average unit price of about $250, and a given console might have more spent in games, that knocks at least a few billion off of the revenue if one wants to adjust it to just be the games.
Piracy is really not all that big a deal because of multiplayer gaming. Most games nowadays fight key generators by having a stricter check when a user logs on to the multiplayer server. This prevents people from just copying the game and logging in, because they'll need a unique and legal cd-key to play.
PC games are still a very profitable industry, and one that will continue to be profitable. Would there be two large competitors in the video card market releasing new hardware every 6-12 months if there weren't a big market? People doing professional 3D graphics are not their key market, you know. Those figures were only for the US, think of the worldwide market.
Console games have the advantage of ease of use and low cost. While computers can never be easier than a console, one can actually buy a reasonable gaming computer without going too far over console prices, however. What a computer gives though are multitudes of possibilities. Not only is it a general-purpose appliance, but even inside the realm of gaming it gives much more freedom. There are far more input devices available for PCs than for consoles. (I mean different types of input devices, not necessarily how many kinds of gamepads there are) PCs are generally more powerful, though consoles can be optimized for. PCs generally have much better resolution displays. PCs allow easier multiplayer play that doesn't require a fee for most games. PCs allow a company to update their games. Sure, some might take advantage of this and release a lousy product to start with, but usually it's value added. PCs allow game mods to flourish.
There's also the issue that some games work on PCs but not on consoles, but the reverse isn't true. RTS games are a good example of this... It's a genre that really benefits from mouse and keyboard. But all console games can be played on a PC, because a PC supports those input devices.
Anyway, the reason why the ratio is so skewed towards consoles is because of the cost and ease of use. This is especially true for small children, they get more out of a console until they learn how to use a PC. The other issue is that many households that have a PC also have a console anyway. I know that we had a few consoles when I was growing up, while having a PC at the same time. So this helps increase that ratio as well. It doesn't mean that the PC gaming market is dying, since I doubt it's been the leader for a couple of decades if it even has been.
This is how it has always been... If one buys the latest and greatest part, it's going to come with a large premium. And that price premium isn't going to correlate with the increase in clock speed.
Heck, the P4EE and Athlon 64 FX processors aren't even at the top of all of the tests, yet they cost how much more?
This may be an uninteresting processor to BUY at the current time, but it is my opinion that this is a very interesting processor to STUDY. With the Prescott, Intel increased the pipeline stages by roughly 50% and yet the Prescott processors are still competitive. Further, tests like this allow one to judge how well the new model of P4 scale with clock speed compared to the Northwoods.
In short, these processors are the future. Just because it would be silly to buy one now doesn't mean that the benchmark is useless.
Support for PCI Express and DDR2 are dependent on the chipset, not the processor, in Intel CPUs. So saying that the Nocona processors support PCI Express and DDR2 is pretty stupid... Any Intel processor could use them so long as they were running on a chipset that did.
Of course, Intel normally releases new chipsets with a new revision of a processor family, but that is another matter entirely. Since the site is down, I have no idea if this is discussed at all.
These sites are almost always reviewing products that haven't hit the market yet. They can't just go out and buy a retail unit if there aren't any available yet.
This is also how they can get away with paper launches... Make a few samples available to the reviewers to make it seem like the processor is available. In these cases, usually the review sample is such an early revision that anything a consumer touches probably works better.
First off, since the author worked for Intel over a long period of time, I wouldn't call him the most unbiased of observers... And his claim that he's just an engineer seems rather odd as well. The computer engineers I know are probably more interested in making things run as fast as possible.
Secondly, there isn't this automatic corellation between overclocking and instability. Sure, it's less stable if one takes it too far, but the way modern processors are made, most lower-speed processors are capable of running with their higher-speed brethren. Sure, if one buys the latest and greatest, it probably isn't going to go very far. But when the P4 and 2.4 GHz is identical to the one running at 1.8 GHz but for the multiplier, it's another story.
I overclock my processor and video card to avoid having to buy a more expensive component. I don't go too far, don't overvolt the processor too much, etc. So I don't have any instability issues. Yet I still run my components about 25% faster.
This is certainly quite cool, but I thought it was illegal to tamper with currency like this? And to sell it afterwards would make things worse if that is the case... Perhaps I am mistaken or confusing American laws with another country's, however.
I don't think that any sites should be forced into doing this, but that it would be cool if sites did it voluntarily. I mean, I'm sure the sites don't really want kids visiting anyway... they probably aren't going to be able to find a way to pay for content.
At my school, everything runs through priority queues. All of the servers and important research computers are highest priority, and are guaranteed bandwidth. Open computer labs are medium priority. Dorm rooms are low priority. P2P traffic is never a problem because those connections are only getting allocated what's left of the bandwidth after the more important users get their share.
I believe they also use a similar method to bump the priority of P2P ports down relative to the rest. They also cut off anyone using P2P over port 80 and block P2P from the public computers.
Lawsuits are another matter, but schools should be willing to put up a fight for their students. In some cases here, the school has given warnings to people they've gotten complaints about, without revealing their identities. That was a classy decision in my opinion, and something that doesn't take a lot of effort.
On my university's network, all connections are grouped into various priority classes. Stuff used for research is high priority, general campus computer labs are medium priority, and connections to dorms are low priority. As a result, the impact of allowing P2P traffic through is quite low, since it only ever uses what's left over of the available bandwidth after the most important users are served.
The only downside to this is that during the day (when there is a lot of on-campus activity), the connections to the dorm rooms slow down. It's still a decent speed though, and it's the time when most students aren't in their rooms anyway.
...and your point is what exactly? No, Windows isn't the most secure OS, but don't point the finger at Redmond when this is a case of sheer incompetence by the admins.
Even if they are running 100% Windows (which I can see by other comments they are not), a competent admin can configure it and put it behind a good firewall to make it quite secure. Incidents might happen, but not enough to warrent cutting the whole office off the net.
Personally I can't really see how the artwork should fall under open source. They're binary files, right?
This is purely a branding issue, it has nothing to do with the underlying program. They want to be able to make some money off of merchandise that they will hopefully invest in bettering their technology. How is this a bad thing?
I found it funny that the original poster felt it necessary to add "albeit with friendly overtones". I guess this was an attempt to ward off the knee-jerk reactions? Really, I wouldn't see the problem if they were rude about it, they have a right to protect their name and logo.
Well, I've used a Pentium M-based laptop for many hours and it didn't get hot at all... In fact, the only time it was ever warm was when I was defragging the hard drive, and it was only warm over the HD.
Compare that to the P4M processors... Those got really really hot.
Actually, my friend has a Tramsmeta-based tablet PC, and it gets quite hot after a short time as well. That is probably more to do with other components though. But the point is that other components are a big part of power consumption (and thus are heat sources)
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Since Mac has what, 5% of the market give or take, it implies that the average net-connected household has a PC.
Besides which, it's silly that the term "PC" doesn't include Macs anyway. In my view, PC means a privately owned computer, nothing more.
I would add a couple of points here, however.
First of all, the PC is only an expensive platform if it is purchased solely for gaming. How often is this the case? Most households are connected to the internet nowadays, implying that they own a PC. And even a sub-$500 PC will play almost all games fairly decently. As for the OS, what PC doesn't have it installed anyway? This is part of the cost of the PC, which is not necessarily a cost for gaming.
Plus, to make a good performing gaming PC, all one really needs is a $200-300 video card, which is right in the range of console prices. CPU speed is generally less important with most games.
Secondly, you're ignoring an important advantage PC games have: modding. If Halflife had've been released on the Xbox, would there have been a Counterstrike? Furthermore, much of the enjoyment I get out of some of my old games comes from playing custom levels with custom models, even if it isn't a total mod (like with some of the X-Wing series of games, for example... Just drop in some new ship models and add value to the game).
The thing is, PC games were never more popular when I was growing up. Ever since the NES came into my life, I've always known way more people who play console games than PC games. The only real difference now is that there are three big consoles, so the market has probably shifted a little further towards consoles. This doesn't mean the end of PC gaming. There are still millions of PC gamers, and this demand will continue to drive a supply to meet it, Duke Nukem Forever jokes aside.
Some of your other points are valid, though maybe not as important as you make them out to be. Yes, some game developers release problematic first versions to fix them with patches, but this is the exception, not the norm. More often than not, changes are to fix glitches on certain hardware, and this is something that no amount of QA in house can completely get rid of. It also serves to counter your "Game-breaking driver and hardware-related problems" point, as games are generally updated to fix such problems. Heck, there are quite a few old games that got updates to make them Windows XP compatable.
Basically, the only games I have that I can't play anymore are the ones that came before Windows 95. Basically that's a bunch of games that are at least 10 years old. How many people are still playing console games from 10 years ago? Sure, there may be some, but there are also some who kept around their old PCs or set up a DOS boot partition to play their old PC games.
The only real con I see for PC games is the ease of use. The cost doesn't have to be high, both in initial investment and upkeep, since games are very good and making sure they work respectably on older hardware. Consoles just have the simplicity that a PC can't have, and this is especially appealing to parents who don't really know any better. This is why consoles are definitely still marketed towards younger audiences, as well.
Now, I'm not going to get into the multiplayer argument because I've never used Xbox Live, but it is safe to say that there is nothing there that can't be done with PCs. The other issue is that besides MMORPGs, multiplayer PC games are generally free.
I think you mean "balm".
The joke is that initially we think that Brian's mother mistakes it with a bomb, when it turns out to be some ferocious animal she dreamed about.
Actually, the part of the movie that is surest to get a laugh out of me every time is the rooster sound at the start of the day... i.e. one of the Pythons pretending to be a rooster. Somehow it catches me by surprise every single time.
You can't download a live concert experience. Nothing is a substitue for actually BEING THERE.
And, most importantly, the artist gets a good portion of the money.
The thing I've enver understood is why popular artists don't dump the RIAA. Once an artist has made it big, wouldn't they then have the capital to be able to put out the CDs themselves? Think of the possible benefits... As far as the artist is concerned, even if they sell the CD for $5, they're making way more than they did before, and albums would sell like candy at those prices. Thus increasing their popularity further and allowing them to make a killing on concerts as well.
This was acknowledged by the presenter himself, who said that they really want to have third parties hosting such services.
It's not intended for people who do a good job of backing up their own systems anyway. It's meant for the less skilled computer user who doesn't want to have to build a new online identity because they accidentally hosed their machine.
It was bad enough when US businesses started to buy up top-level domains from countries that were lucky enough to have two-letter TLDs that had cute meanings to US audiences.
.nu domain since it means "now" in Danish.
:)
It's not just the US. There are lots of Danish sites in the
In fact, when I visit the registration site, it defaults to Danish. (That's possibly because of my regional settings though)
I'm sure the people of Niue aren't complaining about the extra revenue though
This problem really arises because of the inherent differences between software and other works, like books for example.
When an author writes a book, it probably takes a significant amount of time, goes through an editorial process, and in the end is copyrighted as a completed work. There might be minor corrections later on, but the work is basically finished.
Software, on the other hand, evolves over time. The first version of something probably doesn't take that long to make, depending on the project. A single contribution to an open source project could be quite small. And it's likely to change sometime down the road.
The two things are just so different that having them governed by the same system is just silly, IMHO.
I attended an MS tech talk a couple of months ago about the identity system coming in Longhorn. It seems like they are really targetting mass acceptance with that one too.
:)
While I can't remember exactly how everything worked (hey, I was there for the food), it was basically an RSA key system, with the private key stored on ones own computer. The main MS involvement was to have some servers set up to allow one to back up their private key so they aren't screwed over if their computer crashes without a backup... and the presenter seemed confident that there would be non-MS providers of the service as well.
It seemed like a pretty neat idea anyway... There were also systems in place to allow one to deactivate their key if it was compromised. Basically one's computer could notify all of the places it had exchanged its public key with to tell them that it is no longer valid anymore. It seemed like an interesting system that took a lot of the control away from MS, as long as one trusts the OS not to beam the keys back to them
The only real downside was that it seemed like they weren't too keen on getting the server-side software operating on non-MS platforms. But who knows... It certainly seems to be a better solution than Passport, since there would be no fees beyond having a supported OS.
I don't know if they still do or not, but eBay used it at one point.
OK, your numbers are horribly wrong, but console games do not outsell PC games 10 to 1 at least. Your 5 to 1 estimate was probably pretty close.
In 2003, the total retail revenue for console games, hardware, and accessories in the US was $10 billion.
In 2003, the total retail revenue for PC games in the US was $1.2 billion.
Notice that the figure for consoles includes hardware and accessories. So considering that the hardware probably had an average unit price of about $250, and a given console might have more spent in games, that knocks at least a few billion off of the revenue if one wants to adjust it to just be the games.
Piracy is really not all that big a deal because of multiplayer gaming. Most games nowadays fight key generators by having a stricter check when a user logs on to the multiplayer server. This prevents people from just copying the game and logging in, because they'll need a unique and legal cd-key to play.
PC games are still a very profitable industry, and one that will continue to be profitable. Would there be two large competitors in the video card market releasing new hardware every 6-12 months if there weren't a big market? People doing professional 3D graphics are not their key market, you know. Those figures were only for the US, think of the worldwide market.
Console games have the advantage of ease of use and low cost. While computers can never be easier than a console, one can actually buy a reasonable gaming computer without going too far over console prices, however. What a computer gives though are multitudes of possibilities. Not only is it a general-purpose appliance, but even inside the realm of gaming it gives much more freedom. There are far more input devices available for PCs than for consoles. (I mean different types of input devices, not necessarily how many kinds of gamepads there are) PCs are generally more powerful, though consoles can be optimized for. PCs generally have much better resolution displays. PCs allow easier multiplayer play that doesn't require a fee for most games. PCs allow a company to update their games. Sure, some might take advantage of this and release a lousy product to start with, but usually it's value added. PCs allow game mods to flourish.
There's also the issue that some games work on PCs but not on consoles, but the reverse isn't true. RTS games are a good example of this... It's a genre that really benefits from mouse and keyboard. But all console games can be played on a PC, because a PC supports those input devices.
Anyway, the reason why the ratio is so skewed towards consoles is because of the cost and ease of use. This is especially true for small children, they get more out of a console until they learn how to use a PC. The other issue is that many households that have a PC also have a console anyway. I know that we had a few consoles when I was growing up, while having a PC at the same time. So this helps increase that ratio as well. It doesn't mean that the PC gaming market is dying, since I doubt it's been the leader for a couple of decades if it even has been.
A good start would be to remove a couple of those superfluous letters in his name. :)
This is how it has always been... If one buys the latest and greatest part, it's going to come with a large premium. And that price premium isn't going to correlate with the increase in clock speed.
Heck, the P4EE and Athlon 64 FX processors aren't even at the top of all of the tests, yet they cost how much more?
This may be an uninteresting processor to BUY at the current time, but it is my opinion that this is a very interesting processor to STUDY. With the Prescott, Intel increased the pipeline stages by roughly 50% and yet the Prescott processors are still competitive. Further, tests like this allow one to judge how well the new model of P4 scale with clock speed compared to the Northwoods.
In short, these processors are the future. Just because it would be silly to buy one now doesn't mean that the benchmark is useless.
...consider the price difference between those two processors. Here's one case where the AMD is the overly expensive part.
Support for PCI Express and DDR2 are dependent on the chipset, not the processor, in Intel CPUs. So saying that the Nocona processors support PCI Express and DDR2 is pretty stupid... Any Intel processor could use them so long as they were running on a chipset that did.
Of course, Intel normally releases new chipsets with a new revision of a processor family, but that is another matter entirely. Since the site is down, I have no idea if this is discussed at all.
These sites are almost always reviewing products that haven't hit the market yet. They can't just go out and buy a retail unit if there aren't any available yet.
This is also how they can get away with paper launches... Make a few samples available to the reviewers to make it seem like the processor is available. In these cases, usually the review sample is such an early revision that anything a consumer touches probably works better.
First off, since the author worked for Intel over a long period of time, I wouldn't call him the most unbiased of observers... And his claim that he's just an engineer seems rather odd as well. The computer engineers I know are probably more interested in making things run as fast as possible.
Secondly, there isn't this automatic corellation between overclocking and instability. Sure, it's less stable if one takes it too far, but the way modern processors are made, most lower-speed processors are capable of running with their higher-speed brethren. Sure, if one buys the latest and greatest, it probably isn't going to go very far. But when the P4 and 2.4 GHz is identical to the one running at 1.8 GHz but for the multiplier, it's another story.
I overclock my processor and video card to avoid having to buy a more expensive component. I don't go too far, don't overvolt the processor too much, etc. So I don't have any instability issues. Yet I still run my components about 25% faster.
This is certainly quite cool, but I thought it was illegal to tamper with currency like this? And to sell it afterwards would make things worse if that is the case... Perhaps I am mistaken or confusing American laws with another country's, however.
I don't think that any sites should be forced into doing this, but that it would be cool if sites did it voluntarily. I mean, I'm sure the sites don't really want kids visiting anyway... they probably aren't going to be able to find a way to pay for content.
At my school, everything runs through priority queues. All of the servers and important research computers are highest priority, and are guaranteed bandwidth. Open computer labs are medium priority. Dorm rooms are low priority. P2P traffic is never a problem because those connections are only getting allocated what's left of the bandwidth after the more important users get their share.
I believe they also use a similar method to bump the priority of P2P ports down relative to the rest. They also cut off anyone using P2P over port 80 and block P2P from the public computers.
Lawsuits are another matter, but schools should be willing to put up a fight for their students. In some cases here, the school has given warnings to people they've gotten complaints about, without revealing their identities. That was a classy decision in my opinion, and something that doesn't take a lot of effort.
On my university's network, all connections are grouped into various priority classes. Stuff used for research is high priority, general campus computer labs are medium priority, and connections to dorms are low priority. As a result, the impact of allowing P2P traffic through is quite low, since it only ever uses what's left over of the available bandwidth after the most important users are served.
The only downside to this is that during the day (when there is a lot of on-campus activity), the connections to the dorm rooms slow down. It's still a decent speed though, and it's the time when most students aren't in their rooms anyway.
...and your point is what exactly? No, Windows isn't the most secure OS, but don't point the finger at Redmond when this is a case of sheer incompetence by the admins.
Even if they are running 100% Windows (which I can see by other comments they are not), a competent admin can configure it and put it behind a good firewall to make it quite secure. Incidents might happen, but not enough to warrent cutting the whole office off the net.
Personally I can't really see how the artwork should fall under open source. They're binary files, right?
This is purely a branding issue, it has nothing to do with the underlying program. They want to be able to make some money off of merchandise that they will hopefully invest in bettering their technology. How is this a bad thing?
I found it funny that the original poster felt it necessary to add "albeit with friendly overtones". I guess this was an attempt to ward off the knee-jerk reactions? Really, I wouldn't see the problem if they were rude about it, they have a right to protect their name and logo.
Isn't this why Americans have the right to bear arms? :)
Well, technically Kirk never said anything in ST:TOS. When he was speaking, it wasn't called Star Trek: The Original Series, was it? :)
Well, I've used a Pentium M-based laptop for many hours and it didn't get hot at all... In fact, the only time it was ever warm was when I was defragging the hard drive, and it was only warm over the HD.
Compare that to the P4M processors... Those got really really hot.
Actually, my friend has a Tramsmeta-based tablet PC, and it gets quite hot after a short time as well. That is probably more to do with other components though. But the point is that other components are a big part of power consumption (and thus are heat sources)