I think they meant "M2", although even that's started downhill now. We'll have reached the apogee of corporate programming when they have to launch "M3" that shows only videos.
What *I* don't understand is people who can't take care of CDs. I have audio CDs over 10 years old that still play fine, and I've never had a PSX or other CD-based game become unplayable. In fact, my 1995 PSX launch titles all still run fine on my PS2.
Except that the current Xbox has no video-in hardware and no obvious way to connect it (they took out the USB/1394 ports it had originally been rumored to have). So unless MS offers a trade-in/upgrade program you'll still end up buying another box.
I'm quite happy with my separate PS2, Gamecube, and TiVo thanks:)
Re:Why can't anyone see the implications of this?
on
This is IT?
·
· Score: 3, Funny
The article mentions "software which puts Microsoft to shame", so it could be running Linux. Or any of a number of other things.
Games using DX8 won't be very thick on the ground until next fall. Developers do not reflexively upgrade every time MS says "jump" - it's in fact in their best interests not to. The higher the DX version you require, the more likely most sold copies will be returned as defective because users are dumb and later DX versions are buggy on some PC configurations (and I don't mean [H]ardcore gamers with 10000 RPM fans on their overclocked Athlon XP, I mean people who bought a reasonable PC at Best Buy and want to play games).
Re:A PS2 with different games
on
XBox Released
·
· Score: 2
Actually, in 16:9 the Xbox does NOT run a higher horizontal resolution - it's the same anamorphic-but-not-entirely you've seen since some of the later PS1 games.
I'd consider that more a harbinger - MS is now bringing "DLL hell" to your living room. Games are dynamically linked against system libraries in flash ROM on the system, so if they ever upgrade those libraries there's a very good change they'll break or introduce bugs to older games. Both Sony and Nintendo do 100% static linking of the OS and system libraries so they're immune to such hijinx.
Moreover, multiple hardware sites have had instances of Athlons *immediately* frying themselves when powered up without a heatsink and fan, including most recently HardOCP (who acidentally wrecked one of the 1800+ Athlons). It would appear whatever monitoring AMD is trying to show doesn't exist in most real world mobos.
AMD needs to quit playing the marketing games and get their clock speeds up.
Even using DGA2 and all the other latest X speedups, the same program running on Linux is in my testing between 10 and 20 FPS slower than Windows *on the same hardware*. That's IMO unacceptable *especially* for e.g. 400 MHz systems like yours.
FYI, framerates in OpenGL games aren't the issue since with DRI/DRM/the NVIDIA driver they pretty much just bypass X anyway. I'm talking about blit speed for windowed or fullscreen 2D games, which DirectFB sounds like a terrific solution for.
The new Andrea VM is *much* smoother and more reliable for me in my standard desktop "working set". My machine has 512 MB RAM and 640 MB swap. I run KDE 2.2 and normally have Mozilla, KMail, the CRiSP editor, XMMS, GAIM, and a sprinkling of xterms open and doing stuff. I update and compile several large projects frequently including Wine and XMame.
Prior to 2.4.10, this resulted in the machine gradually filling all swap and then becoming very slow. With the 2.4.10+ VM my system rarely if ever touches swap, and when it does it often eventally comes back out of swap when necessary. It's overall much faster and smoother, and my HD runs less. I haven't tried any of the late model AC kernels where Rik actually started fixing his problems (spurred on no doubt by Linus giving up on him) - they may also run well too, I don't know.
What I do know is 2.4.10 and.11 are among the smoothest kernels I've run since back in 2.2 (as Alan points out, Andrea was ultimately responsible for smoothing out 2.2's VM as well).
One caveat with 2.4.11: starting with 2.4.11pre5 it plays very poorly with USB MS Intellimice. I have to unplug mine while booting 2.4.11 or else I get a continuous scroll of errors and no further boot progress (plugging it back in later resulted in normal operation including in X, but I'm still wary of the updated USB drivers).
Performance under my normal working set (KDE 2.2 w/default theme + Mozilla nightly version + the CRiSP text editor + KMail + XMMS + GAIM + several xterms, with occasional compiles and runs of very large apps like Wine and XMame) is substantially better (faster, smoother, way less swapping) on 2.4.10 vs. 2.4.9. I should note I'm running 512 MB RAM and 640 MB of swap on 2 partitions, and the system barely ever goes to swap now (with the previous VM, just starting up that environment got me into swap and it quickly maxxed out the swap from there).
So while I do appreciate Alan Cox's caution, the new VM works substantially better for me and I say "Go Andrea and Al!"
You have to realize the reason he doesn't like the API requiring preemptive multitasking is that the "classic" MacOS doesn't have it. That's not even an issue on Linux, Win32, or MacOS X.
2000 is indeed a quantum leap in stability, but if you're doing serious development-type work on it you can still make it unstable an unsettling amount of the time. At least when IE fucks up it no longer takes out all your work though.
Re:Isn't X-Box Hackproof?
on
MAME on X-Box
·
· Score: 2
This is correct. Xbox does not use a standard filesystem on the discs (they don't read on a PC), it's designed not to read CD-Rs, and the Win32 varient it uses isn't real compatible with the normal verison (the exe format is different among other things).
Microsoft *very much* wants to discourage homebrew development, to the point that they're ready to pounce on anyone who manages to hack around the above issues with the DMCA.
The problem is the PS2 has only a 294 MHz CPU and very high-latency RAMBUS RAM, so portable emulators will not run well on it. Ones written especially for it in MIPS that take advantage of the on-CPU scratchpad RAM will fare a lot better.
Ahh, but the Irish are teaching them all a thing or two about how taxes *really* work (and the Belgians hate every minute of it). Italy and Sweden are getting the message, and France is rumored to be as well. It's a beautiful thing, even though it means in the short term our own US Democratic Party is farther left on economics than actual admit it-in-public socialists. Whoda thunkit?
Nah. Those are what Windows programmers call "owner-draw", meaning Quicktime draws them instead of relying on Win32 widgets. So they're not an issue for Wine. Anyway, bleeding-edge Wine CVS just had patches submitted that allows QT5 to play (in full-screen mode, windowed is being worked on).
The protests about Kyoto are great because of their breathtaking display of European hypocracy. Not a single country any of those protesters are from has signed the treaty or has any plan to. No country with an operating economy has even considered it thanks to common sense. And yet they act offended when the US displays the same common sense.
Good thing Al "Earth in the Balance" Gore was saving the planet all his years in Congress and the White House by being driven everywhere in a 4 mile-per-gallon limo eh?
What's really wrong with it?
on
Eco-Terrorism
·
· Score: 2
Since should you determine what I should drive? Hmm?
Actually GNU tools for Win32 development are becoming increasingly popular, what with VC++ being $300. The Win32 version of MAME is now built with MinGW32, and when a project that big makes the jump a lot of others probably won't be far behind.
Because people just as strident as you (maybe even you?) would claim there was a Massive CmdrTaco Conspiracy if the news was NOT reported, given that VA 0wnz/.
The very reason GCC 3.0 is out now rather than in 2005 is precisely because RH "jumped the gun" and submitted hundreds of bugfix patches to GCC 3.0 in the process. Meanwhile Redhat's GCC 2.96-81 is less buggy in my experience than 2.95.2 and the new features are great.
There's absolutely nothing sexier than the titanium powerbook however. (no notebook computer anyhow;). That's the *real* reason everyone wants one, even if they won't admit it.
Slashdot Mirror
I think they meant "M2", although even that's started downhill now. We'll have reached the apogee of corporate programming when they have to launch "M3" that shows only videos.
What *I* don't understand is people who can't take care of CDs. I have audio CDs over 10 years old that still play fine, and I've never had a PSX or other CD-based game become unplayable. In fact, my 1995 PSX launch titles all still run fine on my PS2.
Except that the current Xbox has no video-in hardware and no obvious way to connect it (they took out the USB/1394 ports it had originally been rumored to have). So unless MS offers a trade-in/upgrade program you'll still end up buying another box.
:)
I'm quite happy with my separate PS2, Gamecube, and TiVo thanks
The article mentions "software which puts Microsoft to shame", so it could be running Linux. Or any of a number of other things.
Games using DX8 won't be very thick on the ground until next fall. Developers do not reflexively upgrade every time MS says "jump" - it's in fact in their best interests not to. The higher the DX version you require, the more likely most sold copies will be returned as defective because users are dumb and later DX versions are buggy on some PC configurations (and I don't mean [H]ardcore gamers with 10000 RPM fans on their overclocked Athlon XP, I mean people who bought a reasonable PC at Best Buy and want to play games).
Actually, in 16:9 the Xbox does NOT run a higher horizontal resolution - it's the same anamorphic-but-not-entirely you've seen since some of the later PS1 games.
I'd consider that more a harbinger - MS is now bringing "DLL hell" to your living room. Games are dynamically linked against system libraries in flash ROM on the system, so if they ever upgrade those libraries there's a very good change they'll break or introduce bugs to older games. Both Sony and Nintendo do 100% static linking of the OS and system libraries so they're immune to such hijinx.
Moreover, multiple hardware sites have had instances of Athlons *immediately* frying themselves when powered up without a heatsink and fan, including most recently HardOCP (who acidentally wrecked one of the 1800+ Athlons). It would appear whatever monitoring AMD is trying to show doesn't exist in most real world mobos.
AMD needs to quit playing the marketing games and get their clock speeds up.
Even using DGA2 and all the other latest X speedups, the same program running on Linux is in my testing between 10 and 20 FPS slower than Windows *on the same hardware*. That's IMO unacceptable *especially* for e.g. 400 MHz systems like yours.
FYI, framerates in OpenGL games aren't the issue since with DRI/DRM/the NVIDIA driver they pretty much just bypass X anyway. I'm talking about blit speed for windowed or fullscreen 2D games, which DirectFB sounds like a terrific solution for.
The new Andrea VM is *much* smoother and more reliable for me in my standard desktop "working set". My machine has 512 MB RAM and 640 MB swap. I run KDE 2.2 and normally have Mozilla, KMail, the CRiSP editor, XMMS, GAIM, and a sprinkling of xterms open and doing stuff. I update and compile several large projects frequently including Wine and XMame.
.11 are among the smoothest kernels I've run since back in 2.2 (as Alan points out, Andrea was ultimately responsible for smoothing out 2.2's VM as well).
Prior to 2.4.10, this resulted in the machine gradually filling all swap and then becoming very slow. With the 2.4.10+ VM my system rarely if ever touches swap, and when it does it often eventally comes back out of swap when necessary. It's overall much faster and smoother, and my HD runs less. I haven't tried any of the late model AC kernels where Rik actually started fixing his problems (spurred on no doubt by Linus giving up on him) - they may also run well too, I don't know.
What I do know is 2.4.10 and
One caveat with 2.4.11: starting with 2.4.11pre5 it plays very poorly with USB MS Intellimice. I have to unplug mine while booting 2.4.11 or else I get a continuous scroll of errors and no further boot progress (plugging it back in later resulted in normal operation including in X, but I'm still wary of the updated USB drivers).
Performance under my normal working set (KDE 2.2 w/default theme + Mozilla nightly version + the CRiSP text editor + KMail + XMMS + GAIM + several xterms, with occasional compiles and runs of very large apps like Wine and XMame) is substantially better (faster, smoother, way less swapping) on 2.4.10 vs. 2.4.9. I should note I'm running 512 MB RAM and 640 MB of swap on 2 partitions, and the system barely ever goes to swap now (with the previous VM, just starting up that environment got me into swap and it quickly maxxed out the swap from there).
So while I do appreciate Alan Cox's caution, the new VM works substantially better for me and I say "Go Andrea and Al!"
You have to realize the reason he doesn't like the API requiring preemptive multitasking is that the "classic" MacOS doesn't have it. That's not even an issue on Linux, Win32, or MacOS X.
2000 is indeed a quantum leap in stability, but if you're doing serious development-type work on it you can still make it unstable an unsettling amount of the time. At least when IE fucks up it no longer takes out all your work though.
This is correct. Xbox does not use a standard filesystem on the discs (they don't read on a PC), it's designed not to read CD-Rs, and the Win32 varient it uses isn't real compatible with the normal verison (the exe format is different among other things).
Microsoft *very much* wants to discourage homebrew development, to the point that they're ready to pounce on anyone who manages to hack around the above issues with the DMCA.
The problem is the PS2 has only a 294 MHz CPU and very high-latency RAMBUS RAM, so portable emulators will not run well on it. Ones written especially for it in MIPS that take advantage of the on-CPU scratchpad RAM will fare a lot better.
Ahh, this must be the famous tolerance of the left I keep hearing about.
And who the hell wasted mod points on this? There's true comedy gold below...
Ahh, but the Irish are teaching them all a thing or two about how taxes *really* work (and the Belgians hate every minute of it). Italy and Sweden are getting the message, and France is rumored to be as well. It's a beautiful thing, even though it means in the short term our own US Democratic Party is farther left on economics than actual admit it-in-public socialists. Whoda thunkit?
Nah. Those are what Windows programmers call "owner-draw", meaning Quicktime draws them instead of relying on Win32 widgets. So they're not an issue for Wine. Anyway, bleeding-edge Wine CVS just had patches submitted that allows QT5 to play (in full-screen mode, windowed is being worked on).
The protests about Kyoto are great because of their breathtaking display of European hypocracy. Not a single country any of those protesters are from has signed the treaty or has any plan to. No country with an operating economy has even considered it thanks to common sense. And yet they act offended when the US displays the same common sense.
Good thing Al "Earth in the Balance" Gore was saving the planet all his years in Congress and the White House by being driven everywhere in a 4 mile-per-gallon limo eh?
Since should you determine what I should drive? Hmm?
Actually GNU tools for Win32 development are becoming increasingly popular, what with VC++ being $300. The Win32 version of MAME is now built with MinGW32, and when a project that big makes the jump a lot of others probably won't be far behind.
Because people just as strident as you (maybe even you?) would claim there was a Massive CmdrTaco Conspiracy if the news was NOT reported, given that VA 0wnz /.
The very reason GCC 3.0 is out now rather than in 2005 is precisely because RH "jumped the gun" and submitted hundreds of bugfix patches to GCC 3.0 in the process. Meanwhile Redhat's GCC 2.96-81 is less buggy in my experience than 2.95.2 and the new features are great.
There's absolutely nothing sexier than the titanium powerbook however. (no notebook computer anyhow ;). That's the *real* reason everyone wants one, even if they won't admit it.