The Windows API is not open. There are lots of calls that no one knows about. Unless Microsoft gets in on this, which they won't, any attempt at copying the Windows API would have terrible compatability. Just look at Wine and ReactOS. They can't have access to the API, so they have to take applications and run them, creating new calls as they find them. It takes years, and once you are done with one application, chances are, another application won't have the same calls, and you have to keep changing things.
10 minutes of fiddling with color calibration will fix it enough to stop being noticable most of the time. For instance, my $400 professional graphics 19" LCD had much better color calibration out of the box than the $170 no name LCD I bought to use as a secondary monitor. However, I was able to match the cheaper monitor to the more expensive one well enough that it is hard to notice the transition, except when squinting at photoshop color pallets and such. I recomend using the calibration tools in the monitor's controls, not using software calibration, unless you have a hardware color sensor. I find that the software tools are harder to get right, and when you reinstall your OS, or switch to a game, often the color profile goes away. With two monitors hardware calibated, yuou dont have that problem.
Except companies are cheapass and don't use that anymore. When I send e-mails and the server I send to is down, my SMTP server bitches to me after only 5 minutes, not 12 hours.
Its not a force field and its not particularly mysterious. It is a radar system and automated shotgun, basically. When the radar detects an object of the right size and velocity coming towards the tank, it quickly aims and fires a shotgun at the missle/rocket propelled grenade. The shotgun is supposed to destroy/detonate the projectile before it reaches the tank. This system has been in use since the 1970s on US battleships. As for mysterious, it isn't particularly, except for the details, like who makes the components, and what exactly its range is.
There are several problems with this system. For one, it can only stop slower projectiles, so it is limited to crude missles and rocket propelled grenades, no shells or other artillery. Also, if you happen to be in a crowded area when the system is triggered, there is a good chance that 1000 rounds of amunition are going to be sprayed out into the crowd as the gun trys to hit the incoming projectile, all in 1/10 of a second.
If the bank that held your life savings was robbed, do you think you would want a say in a new law punishing bank robbers? Well, Mircosoft should probably have a say in a law that effects people who steal their software.
I don't think Mac OS X could ever make significant inroads into the Windows market, if it were realeased for general consumtion (i.e. it would be released for Dells, etc...). For one thing, MS could put pressure on OEMs to not offer it as an install option, this would squash any OEM sales other than Apple. Not many people buy operating systems seperately from their computer purchases. Quite a few people who genuinely prefer Mac OS might put it on their PCs, but on the other hand, most of these people already own Macs. Also, releasing an OS for specialized hardware is one thing, but releasing it for general hardware is quite another. Mac OS would have TERRIBLE driver support for quite awhile. This would take away much of the "stability and simplicity" advantage Macs enjoy, and might discourage early adopters from sticking with Mac OS. On the other hand, the Mac audience is ripe for Windows adoption. Mac people always feel pressure to run Windows, be it because of an all Windows work/school network, a website that Safari can't render, a professional software package with no mac version, or a game that only runs on PCs. I don't think this can be compared to the above war, or any war. Steve Jobs is a smart guy. When he came back to Apple, he was relentless in axing projects and products that were not good for Apple. At this point, I think OS X might be holding Apple back. It has huge developement costs, and almost no returns when compared to iTMS.
I don't know, it makes some sense. Apple's computer and OS divisions are already marginally profitable divisons hanging onto the gigantic iPod/iTunes division. In fact, Apple recently created a whole new division just for iTunes and the iPod, taking them away from their hardware and software divisions. Developing an OS has to be quite expensive, and selling custom hardware at competitive prices means no profit. I see a slow fade out of Mac OS. First, you get optional Windows Compatability (BootCamp). Then you can order their computers with both OS X and XP/Vista installed. Then they port their big name apps to Windows (Logic, Final Cut, ect...) Then they port their iLife apps, and maybe even some libraries allowing some Mac OS X apps to run on Windows. A couple years later, they discontinue OS X. There are several well publicised macfan suicides, and mac people refuse to buy new products for several days. 3 days later, all mac fans come crying back to Steve Jobs for their Apple fix. I predict this will all happen by 2010. At that point, Mac hardware is just fancy looking PC hardware, with no BIOS differences or wierd IRQ assignments.
You know, before this, I wasn't sure, but now I can confidently say that covering any piece of crap in gold and diamonds will make it an obscenely expensive piece of crap. Substitute whatever object you want (i.e. pen, mp3 player, cellphone, car, wife) for "piece of crap". I call it Jozer's Law.
You kidding? On my 2GB machine, XP installs using about 260 MB (grows as you install stuff). On the same machine, SuSE 10 installs using over 512MB, with the standard packages (none of the fancy OpenGL desktops or anything).
I guess it would be pretty hard to do, but someone should really do a through test of the three next-gen (are they current gen tech now, or are we living in the future?) consoles. I'm not talking game play, but benchmarking with various floating point, memory bandwidth, bus speed, and polygon tests, as objectively as possible. That would certainly settle some questions. I do believe that Revolution will be less powerful than XBox360 and PS3, but I don't think that matters much. With XBox360 costing $400 (the real version, not the lite one) and some reports (probably false) of an $800 PS3, its nice to see a console for $150. Plus, Nintendo has always been big on gameplay, not graphics (SNES vs. PSX, NES vs. Genisis, ect...). Just look at the DS. Its wimpy compared to the PSP, but is still sold out years after launch, while the PSP languishes on shelves. If Nintendo can do the same for the living-room console, they can rest assured of a healthy chunk of console sales.
Really now? Last time I checked, TV tuning on mac was pretty crappy. You have 2 or 3 tuners, overpriced, and the only software is from EyeTV, as far as I can tell, its pretty low quality compared to most Mac software (I will admit that Mac software is in general better than PC software), and has bascially the functionality of free programs such as Haupaggue WinTV, or DScaler for Windows or Linux. EyeTV in no way competes featurewise with media center, while costing almost the same amount (eyetv + tuner cost more than MCE OS). True, you guys have that new app on the new intel macs, but you can't watch or record TV in it, which is the feature I use most on my MCE PC. Dual tuners, HDTV? Don't think so...
This is probably evidence FOR their case of name stealing. However, hasn't this same basic case been tried in court before (I know there were other ones dealing with apple computer soundcards)? The 5th ammendment to the US Constitution has a clause about double jeopardy, or the right of a citizen to not have to stand trial twice for the same crime (I.E. if you are procaimed innocent the first time, there can be no second trial). I guess the UK doesn't have this, or that it only applies to individuals.
Funny, I didn't remember hearing that Apple software runs on Tablet PCs, or embedded computers, or media centers... Maybe the fact that they only have two OSes is because they only have three form factors (desktop, laptop, and server), not the dozens that microsoft has (desktop, laptop, media center, tablet, server, pda, embedded server, thin client, etc...).
Who cares about specifications! All that is important is that it is now possible to crash a 10 million dollar+ piece of equiptment into a planet at mach 10! Imagine what NASA could do with this!
Thats because it is a quicktime panorama. Quicktime is not a very well writen program (expecially on windows). It is not hardware accelerated. Bascially, your computer is doing mathmatical warping of a GIGANTIC image in real time to wrap it around you in a sphere.
I used to do work creating QTVR 360 panoramas. Not fun stuff, even on a dual P3 800 (top of the line back them).
Probably you will have to pay, but at least its possible. The PS2 can not only emulate the PSOne, but even do extra anti-aliasing on the emulation. The PSP isn't that much less powerful than the PS2, right? Plus, eventually someone will hack the emulator to play ROMs off of the MS slot.
Thank you for the explanation. Now another question, why don't they change it? Obviously, other BSD distros have it fixed, and swapping kernels might not be too terrible.
I'm not asking if you can live with it, just why it exists. Plus, from the benchmarks I have seen, the slow memory access commands also exist on the PowerPC versions of OS X, they are just not quite as bad.
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The Windows API is not open. There are lots of calls that no one knows about. Unless Microsoft gets in on this, which they won't, any attempt at copying the Windows API would have terrible compatability. Just look at Wine and ReactOS. They can't have access to the API, so they have to take applications and run them, creating new calls as they find them. It takes years, and once you are done with one application, chances are, another application won't have the same calls, and you have to keep changing things.
10 minutes of fiddling with color calibration will fix it enough to stop being noticable most of the time. For instance, my $400 professional graphics 19" LCD had much better color calibration out of the box than the $170 no name LCD I bought to use as a secondary monitor. However, I was able to match the cheaper monitor to the more expensive one well enough that it is hard to notice the transition, except when squinting at photoshop color pallets and such. I recomend using the calibration tools in the monitor's controls, not using software calibration, unless you have a hardware color sensor. I find that the software tools are harder to get right, and when you reinstall your OS, or switch to a game, often the color profile goes away. With two monitors hardware calibated, yuou dont have that problem.
Not quite. Most N64 games were 64MB or under, but there were several 128MB games.
Except companies are cheapass and don't use that anymore. When I send e-mails and the server I send to is down, my SMTP server bitches to me after only 5 minutes, not 12 hours.
Its not a force field and its not particularly mysterious. It is a radar system and automated shotgun, basically. When the radar detects an object of the right size and velocity coming towards the tank, it quickly aims and fires a shotgun at the missle/rocket propelled grenade. The shotgun is supposed to destroy/detonate the projectile before it reaches the tank. This system has been in use since the 1970s on US battleships. As for mysterious, it isn't particularly, except for the details, like who makes the components, and what exactly its range is. There are several problems with this system. For one, it can only stop slower projectiles, so it is limited to crude missles and rocket propelled grenades, no shells or other artillery. Also, if you happen to be in a crowded area when the system is triggered, there is a good chance that 1000 rounds of amunition are going to be sprayed out into the crowd as the gun trys to hit the incoming projectile, all in 1/10 of a second.
If the bank that held your life savings was robbed, do you think you would want a say in a new law punishing bank robbers? Well, Mircosoft should probably have a say in a law that effects people who steal their software.
I don't think Mac OS X could ever make significant inroads into the Windows market, if it were realeased for general consumtion (i.e. it would be released for Dells, etc...). For one thing, MS could put pressure on OEMs to not offer it as an install option, this would squash any OEM sales other than Apple. Not many people buy operating systems seperately from their computer purchases. Quite a few people who genuinely prefer Mac OS might put it on their PCs, but on the other hand, most of these people already own Macs. Also, releasing an OS for specialized hardware is one thing, but releasing it for general hardware is quite another. Mac OS would have TERRIBLE driver support for quite awhile. This would take away much of the "stability and simplicity" advantage Macs enjoy, and might discourage early adopters from sticking with Mac OS. On the other hand, the Mac audience is ripe for Windows adoption. Mac people always feel pressure to run Windows, be it because of an all Windows work/school network, a website that Safari can't render, a professional software package with no mac version, or a game that only runs on PCs. I don't think this can be compared to the above war, or any war. Steve Jobs is a smart guy. When he came back to Apple, he was relentless in axing projects and products that were not good for Apple. At this point, I think OS X might be holding Apple back. It has huge developement costs, and almost no returns when compared to iTMS.
I don't know, it makes some sense. Apple's computer and OS divisions are already marginally profitable divisons hanging onto the gigantic iPod/iTunes division. In fact, Apple recently created a whole new division just for iTunes and the iPod, taking them away from their hardware and software divisions. Developing an OS has to be quite expensive, and selling custom hardware at competitive prices means no profit. I see a slow fade out of Mac OS. First, you get optional Windows Compatability (BootCamp). Then you can order their computers with both OS X and XP/Vista installed. Then they port their big name apps to Windows (Logic, Final Cut, ect...) Then they port their iLife apps, and maybe even some libraries allowing some Mac OS X apps to run on Windows. A couple years later, they discontinue OS X. There are several well publicised macfan suicides, and mac people refuse to buy new products for several days. 3 days later, all mac fans come crying back to Steve Jobs for their Apple fix. I predict this will all happen by 2010. At that point, Mac hardware is just fancy looking PC hardware, with no BIOS differences or wierd IRQ assignments.
Or the invention of pencilin drastically reduced the skills of the average person at digging a 6 foot deep hole.
You know, before this, I wasn't sure, but now I can confidently say that covering any piece of crap in gold and diamonds will make it an obscenely expensive piece of crap. Substitute whatever object you want (i.e. pen, mp3 player, cellphone, car, wife) for "piece of crap". I call it Jozer's Law.
Didn't Homer Simpson already invent self hammering nails? That didn't turn out too well...
You kidding? On my 2GB machine, XP installs using about 260 MB (grows as you install stuff). On the same machine, SuSE 10 installs using over 512MB, with the standard packages (none of the fancy OpenGL desktops or anything).
Didn't you read the article yesterday? All you need is an ACID2 compatable browser!
Ya, but the N64 came out 2-3 years AFTER then PSX (1994 vs 1996).
I guess it would be pretty hard to do, but someone should really do a through test of the three next-gen (are they current gen tech now, or are we living in the future?) consoles. I'm not talking game play, but benchmarking with various floating point, memory bandwidth, bus speed, and polygon tests, as objectively as possible. That would certainly settle some questions. I do believe that Revolution will be less powerful than XBox360 and PS3, but I don't think that matters much. With XBox360 costing $400 (the real version, not the lite one) and some reports (probably false) of an $800 PS3, its nice to see a console for $150. Plus, Nintendo has always been big on gameplay, not graphics (SNES vs. PSX, NES vs. Genisis, ect...). Just look at the DS. Its wimpy compared to the PSP, but is still sold out years after launch, while the PSP languishes on shelves. If Nintendo can do the same for the living-room console, they can rest assured of a healthy chunk of console sales.
Ever used SETI or UD? Those are running on hundreds of thousands or even millions of processors. This is just faster.
Really now? Last time I checked, TV tuning on mac was pretty crappy. You have 2 or 3 tuners, overpriced, and the only software is from EyeTV, as far as I can tell, its pretty low quality compared to most Mac software (I will admit that Mac software is in general better than PC software), and has bascially the functionality of free programs such as Haupaggue WinTV, or DScaler for Windows or Linux. EyeTV in no way competes featurewise with media center, while costing almost the same amount (eyetv + tuner cost more than MCE OS). True, you guys have that new app on the new intel macs, but you can't watch or record TV in it, which is the feature I use most on my MCE PC. Dual tuners, HDTV? Don't think so...
This is probably evidence FOR their case of name stealing. However, hasn't this same basic case been tried in court before (I know there were other ones dealing with apple computer soundcards)? The 5th ammendment to the US Constitution has a clause about double jeopardy, or the right of a citizen to not have to stand trial twice for the same crime (I.E. if you are procaimed innocent the first time, there can be no second trial). I guess the UK doesn't have this, or that it only applies to individuals.
Funny, I didn't remember hearing that Apple software runs on Tablet PCs, or embedded computers, or media centers... Maybe the fact that they only have two OSes is because they only have three form factors (desktop, laptop, and server), not the dozens that microsoft has (desktop, laptop, media center, tablet, server, pda, embedded server, thin client, etc...).
Who cares about specifications! All that is important is that it is now possible to crash a 10 million dollar+ piece of equiptment into a planet at mach 10! Imagine what NASA could do with this!
Thats because it is a quicktime panorama. Quicktime is not a very well writen program (expecially on windows). It is not hardware accelerated. Bascially, your computer is doing mathmatical warping of a GIGANTIC image in real time to wrap it around you in a sphere. I used to do work creating QTVR 360 panoramas. Not fun stuff, even on a dual P3 800 (top of the line back them).
Probably you will have to pay, but at least its possible. The PS2 can not only emulate the PSOne, but even do extra anti-aliasing on the emulation. The PSP isn't that much less powerful than the PS2, right? Plus, eventually someone will hack the emulator to play ROMs off of the MS slot.
Thank you for the explanation. Now another question, why don't they change it? Obviously, other BSD distros have it fixed, and swapping kernels might not be too terrible.
News report tomorrow:
"Brist say: As we suspected, scramjets and crashing into earth don't mix."
I'm not asking if you can live with it, just why it exists. Plus, from the benchmarks I have seen, the slow memory access commands also exist on the PowerPC versions of OS X, they are just not quite as bad.