That's what I've been saying for months when people said $600 for a console was too much, It's not an ordinary console:
PS3/PS2/PS1 games Video on disk and transferred to it's storage Photos Music Web Browsiner (without Linux) and Linux. with the usual Firefox, Thunderbird OO.o combo and GCC.
Course they imagined it, because I've been doing it since 2002 on the PS2, except for OO. They probably decided to do it when they read about those actually using their Linux kits as desktops.
The poly counts aren't that high in the environments....I think. It's hard to tell. But judging SL by the screenshots might be like judging HL based on the screenshots that someone took when it was running on some ancient machine with minimum detail at 640x480
So depending on who took those screenshots and what hardware they were running and what settings would determine how it looks.
For example I have some settings turned up (for avatars) but environments are turned down (mostly) I've got shiny and bumpmapping on but ground detail on low, draw distance set at the minimum and local lighting off.
http://ccslfashionista.blogspot.com/ (yeah I know, yet another SL fashion blog) but that's what it looks like on my Gateway 400SP Plus with integrated graphics. I don't think it's that bad. It'd look better if I turned on local lighting and upped the ground detail.
I've seen builds that look horrible, but I've seen builss that were simply breathtaking. See if you can find images of the 2006 Second LIfe Relay for Life.
I do agree the client needs optimization work and bug fixes.
You had the same problem I had, not knowing where to go.
SL is huge, and there's no helpful "quest givers" out there to give direction and purpose to it. So you have to talk to people in world, or read about SL on the various blogs and websites or both.
Start with the New World Notes That will get you started, tons of links.
The communicating is very important, because in SL what you know and who you know is important It also determines your subcommunity. Scripters tend to know each other, but work with builders and content creators. Fashionistas hang out together but often know builders and scripters.
Ahh, those places with lots of people on the map or in the event list? Don't go there. Really. You're better off going to less popular places or going to someplace like the Shelter or the GNUbie store and asking passerby interesting places to go. Or perhaps searching the various SL blogs.
And yes, the club gals tend to look unreal but the fashionista avatars are some better:
Yes it's slow and laggy, but it's "special" and I think SL or something like it is the future.
I play SL and that Eternal Lands is no match for it in the graphics department.
Remember, content in SL can and is changed at a whim. So you don't have a dozen lookalike guys in camo with M16's., running around in areas that don't change. You've got a dozen very very different individuals. You've got land that anyone could put a giant cow on at any time. A store owner could change their swiss chalet type store to polynesian grass hut in mere moments. Content is streamed on the fly.
True you can run it in a window, but SL is very resource intensive. For the 1.10 cleint it would crash a few minuts after I tried to run any other application at the same time That problem doesn't happen with 1.12 but it's slow. So any thing that can give me access to web pages/news/information in-world without having to open up a browser would be appreciated.
I play SL regularly, but I am still surprised by the number of SL stories on Slashdot recently.
IIRC the # players was just under 700000 when I joined in July, it's over 800000 now, and at this rate will probably hit a million by late November.
It appeals to a different demographic than WoW. there's a lot of artistic folks, art majors, people who do jewelry or fashion related stuff in real life, 2D and 3D modeling folks. There's no grind or worrying to have to keep up with guildmates level wise so plenty of casual players too.
IMHO Google didn't need to pimp up Google Video. because as it is, it's far far superior to YouTube. I loathe flash as a video format. Flash is for animation But Google Video is available in high quality MPEG4.
I've run Mozilla/Firefox under KDE1/2 on a PS2 Linux kit, (294MHz CPU 32MB RAM)as you said, slow but usable. Though Dillo is probably a better choice for basic browsing, especially if you want to do anything else. The RAM is the problem not the CPU speed. I wish I could try out KDE3 on it but QT3 won't compile.
I normally use fluxbox as my window manager of choice on it.
1.11.foo and 1.12.foo clients have been incredibly stable for me even on my low end windows machine. I can do things that would crash 1.10 and not crash.
That Linksys router should stop external attacks cold, unless the router has been compromised or is forwarding ports to the PC. It won't protect you from attacks downloaded by you, either knowingly or unknowingly, but it is a good first line of defense.
Ditto. I know of women who spend hours EVERY evening playing flash games on MSN or Yahoo. Yet if you ask them, they don't consider themselves gamers and would never think of buying a retail game.
Slashdot Mirror
Or why smokers just don't start using nicotine gum even if they don't use it to quit.
That's what I've been saying for months when people said $600 for a console was too much, It's not an ordinary console:
PS3/PS2/PS1 games
Video on disk and transferred to it's storage
Photos
Music
Web Browsiner (without Linux)
and Linux. with the usual Firefox, Thunderbird OO.o combo and GCC.
It's a steal.
I checked the applications section of the TerraSoft website and they have VICE (Commodore emulation and Bochs in there already.
Yeah this is late.
Course they imagined it, because I've been doing it since 2002 on the PS2, except for OO. They probably decided to do it when they read about those actually using their Linux kits as desktops.
The poly counts aren't that high in the environments....I think. It's hard to tell. But judging SL by the screenshots might be like judging HL based on the screenshots that someone took when it was running on some ancient machine with minimum detail at 640x480
So depending on who took those screenshots and what hardware they were running and what settings would determine how it looks.
For example I have some settings turned up (for avatars) but environments are turned down (mostly) I've got shiny and bumpmapping on but ground detail on low, draw distance set at the minimum and local lighting off.
http://ccslfashionista.blogspot.com/ (yeah I know, yet another SL fashion blog) but that's what it looks like on my Gateway 400SP Plus with integrated graphics. I don't think it's that bad. It'd look better if I turned on local lighting and upped the ground detail.
I've seen builds that look horrible, but I've seen builss that were simply breathtaking. See if you can find images of the 2006 Second LIfe Relay for Life.
I do agree the client needs optimization work and bug fixes.
You had the same problem I had, not knowing where to go.
SL is huge, and there's no helpful "quest givers" out there to give direction and purpose to it. So you have to talk to people in world, or read about SL on the various blogs and websites or both.
Start with the New World Notes That will get you started, tons of links.
http://nwn.blogs.com/
The communicating is very important, because in SL what you know and who you know is important It also determines your subcommunity. Scripters tend to know each other, but work with builders and content creators. Fashionistas hang out together but often know builders and scripters.
And don't be afraid to explore.
Ahh, those places with lots of people on the map or in the event list? Don't go there. Really. You're better off going to less popular places or going to someplace like the Shelter or the GNUbie store and asking passerby interesting places to go. Or perhaps searching the various SL blogs.
And yes, the club gals tend to look unreal but the fashionista avatars are some better:
Yes it's slow and laggy, but it's "special" and I think SL or something like it is the future.
I play SL and that Eternal Lands is no match for it in the graphics department.
Remember, content in SL can and is changed at a whim. So you don't have a dozen lookalike guys in camo with M16's., running around in areas that don't change. You've got a dozen very very different individuals. You've got land that anyone could put a giant cow on at any time. A store owner could change their swiss chalet type store to polynesian grass hut in mere moments. Content is streamed on the fly.
True you can run it in a window, but SL is very resource intensive. For the 1.10 cleint it would crash a few minuts after I tried to run any other application at the same time That problem doesn't happen with 1.12 but it's slow. So any thing that can give me access to web pages/news/information in-world without having to open up a browser would be appreciated.
I play SL regularly, but I am still surprised by the number of SL stories on Slashdot recently.
IIRC the # players was just under 700000 when I joined in July, it's over 800000 now, and at this rate will probably hit a million by late November.
It appeals to a different demographic than WoW. there's a lot of artistic folks, art majors, people who do jewelry or fashion related stuff in real life, 2D and 3D modeling folks. There's no grind or worrying to have to keep up with guildmates level wise so plenty of casual players too.
It's fun in a way that's hard to describe.
IMHO Google didn't need to pimp up Google Video. because as it is, it's far far superior to YouTube. I loathe flash as a video format. Flash is for animation But Google Video is available in high quality MPEG4.
I've run Mozilla/Firefox under KDE1/2 on a PS2 Linux kit, (294MHz CPU 32MB RAM)as you said, slow but usable. Though Dillo is probably a better choice for basic browsing, especially if you want to do anything else. The RAM is the problem not the CPU speed. I wish I could try out KDE3 on it but QT3 won't compile.
I normally use fluxbox as my window manager of choice on it.
There's clients for Windows, OSX and LInux (x86). Basic accounts are free. Enjoy.
Not really, think about the EyeToy.
I should remind you that the Dual Shock did not ship with the PS1, but was adopted quite rapidly even before it began being shipped with PS1's
1.11.foo and 1.12.foo clients have been incredibly stable for me even on my low end windows machine. I can do things that would crash 1.10 and not crash.
That Linksys router should stop external attacks cold, unless the router has been compromised or is forwarding ports to the PC. It won't protect you from attacks downloaded by you, either knowingly or unknowingly, but it is a good first line of defense.
The people I know who play those flash games stick to the big "portal" sites like Yahoo and MSN.
I have a female avatar in SL and I've not been hit on. I've received compliments on the avatar yes, but excessively forward behavior? No.
if I was bothered, it's easy enough to leave the area and/or mute the offender.
Maybe the appearance of your female av (besides being female) is attracting attention.
Ditto. I know of women who spend hours EVERY evening playing flash games on MSN or Yahoo. Yet if you ask them, they don't consider themselves gamers and would never think of buying a retail game.
Yes, they're gamers, they play games don't they. Maybe they're not your type of gamer, but they're gamers nonetheless
I'm not referring to the Cross Media Bar interface, thats separate from the full Linux distro with GCC installed.
And I'm most certainly not wrong on the PS2 which itself would make a better C64 (and PET/VIC20/C128) game playing device than the Wii.
Everyone says the Atari 400/800 version was the best, but MULE Is one game that I've never played. I know, gamer sacrilege.
Ummm PS3 + Linux + VICE = any C64 application you want including keyboard intensive games. Same goes for the PS2.
No no no, JiffyDos emulation is what you want.