I don't know who the original author of this is, but here you go:
Yeah, I was lucky enough to receive my copy today, so I'll share it with you guys.
1. 6800 is a tad faster than X800 cards. Both run it in full glory
2. The game has four render paths: NV10, NV20, R200, and ARB2. All paths look awesome, even down to a g4mx, but the ARB2 path is the "full package," and is used for the R300+ and Geforce FX+ cards. It does all it's fancy **** in one pass.
3. PCI Express enhances NOTHING.
4. The difference between a 128mb and 256mb card is that the former uses compressed textures whereas the latter only compresses diffuse and specualr maps. In another words, no big deal. However, a 500mb card is needed to run the game in Ultra Quality mode.
5. 512MB is the ideal system total memory. 384 is required, 1GB is nice, but the difference is negligible.
6. Nothing special is included for a 64-bit OS.
7. A 1.5 Ghz processor is the least recommended, but a 2Ghz and above will help since...
8...The sound engine is entirely CPU dependant. Therefore a crappy soundcard works flawlessly. Not to worry, the enfine only uses a "small percentage of cycles, much less than if the engine relied on a soundcard.
9. The only reccommendation regarding faster framerates is to disable to "advanced special effects option." In other words, upgrade if you have problems.
10. They tie it up by providing three levels of "Doom lovin' PC's"
Low-End: 1.5GhzP4 or equivalent 512MB Ram Geforce4 Ti 4800 or Radeon 9500
Mid-Range: 2.4GhzP4 or equivalent 1GB RAM Geforce5950 or Radeon 9800 Pro/XT
High_End: Aka Hardware that doesn't exist, but best guess anyway 3.4GhzP4 or AMD equivalent 2GB RAM GeForce 6800 Ultra or Radeon X800 XT PE.
In conclusion, the game will run well on a variety of hardware, and Rob Duffy, the lead programmer, says that the game looks real good no matter what, and that it will continue to look better as hardware improves. Like all previous id engines, we'll be playing games based on D3 for another five years down the road.
Well, the difficulty changes only after loading. Saving isn't a problem.
However, travelling across a level divide and back again will lower the AI difficulty as well. Most levels require you to do this. With the patch, you can still play the game using the self-enforced no-load rule. Other ways to increase difficulty include:
Playing without being seen
+ without ko/killing anyone
+ and not dousing any lights
+ using thiefbot to increase AI difficulty even higher than expert (and have it remain high even in the city)
In my area, we've had high-speed cable internet available for 7 years, and DSL the last 4 years.
Both DSL and Cable have been increasing their bandwidth to compete with each other, Cable just changed to 5mbit/s, DSL is 4mbit/s. Pricing has remained relatively flat, about $40can/month for both services. However recently Bell has been forced to share their lines, as a result, 4mbit DSL can be found for as low as $30/month.
With the recent release of the new 166MMX Pentiums, I was calling around to get prices. One store, after asking to verify that the price was indeed for the MMX version, the salesperson admitted he didn't know and told me I'd have to talk to their tech.
When I asked their tech, he replied angrily "Why does everyone keep asking me that question! ALL Pentium processors have MMX!"
I thanked him for clarifying that for me and hung up.
I had bees nesting in my dish also. Home was hidden inside the arm and out of the way of the lnb, so I only got the nasty surprise when it came time to move...
Is it me, or are there way too many links in that article. Do we really need seperate links to the source code download, binaries download, release notes and system requirements pages?
If someone has done a study on the most effective text to link ratio, I'm sure they'd find that this Ars article is about 10x higher.
So you want to move hundreds of millions of customers to a new CPU design that's elegeant and does away with all the x86 junk.
How do you get around the chicken and the egg problem where there's no software developing as there's no customers, and no customers interested because there's no software?
Here's how: You start in a market that can afford to spend lots of money on developing their own software. The only way to enter in this market is to make your CPU run these customers' programs the fastest. Eventually you'll get enough software support to move this CPU down and sell to the medium and eventually the low end servers, but it'll take a few years. In this range, OS's will be building the capability to emulate x86 with little or no performance hit, and programs will be migrating to run natively in the new format. A few more years and many native apps later, you'll get high-end desktops/workstations migrating. Finally, the flood of average consumers will start rolling in.
How long will this process take? Let's look at the closest example of switching consumers to something that wasn't backwards compatible: DOS/Win3.1 to Windows NT. WinXP was the first "NT" version marketed to, and accepted by the average consumer. NT 3.1 was first released to the public in October '93. We have a full ten years to make the migration.
So you really shouldn't be comparing these processors just because their bits are the same. They're all 64 because very soon now 4 gigs of memory will no longer be enough for the desktop. The real comparison is x86 vs IA64 and the big question is whether IA64 really has what it takes to beat out x86 a few generations down the road.
The Itanium is still a kid, and it has a lot of battles ahead of itself before it's a consumer CPU, but IMO it has passed its first tests. I hated NT once also, but I've learned my lesson now.
Installing from source
on
Review: KDE 3.2
·
· Score: 3, Informative
I to, have installed KDE today. I also installed it yesterday, the day before, and I probably will still be installing it tomorrow.
Next time I wait for the RPMs.
"oh, by the way, if you want a UI, don't forget to also download such and such at website t46."
the part number on the other side of the card identified it as a 3rd party clone using licensed ATI parts/design. Also, it would not accept any of the drivers on ATI's site
So some super cheap brand didn't follows ATI's reference design properly. If you don't pay for a real ATI card, don't expect real ATI support. I'm sure the driver disk that came with the card would have had drivers that worked fine. I've come across a similar card myself, and it sucks, but it's what you end up with when you try to cut system costs to the absolute minimum.
Also, my test box at home is a K6-II with an old ATI card in it. Solaris identifies it as a RAGE PRO TURBO. Various implementations of XFree86 and/or lspci have identified it as such:...
Geforce2 Pro
Geforce2 Ti
Geforce2 Ultra
Geforce2 GTS
Geforce2 MX
Geforce2 MX200
Geforce2 MX400
(Note I didn't bother listing the DDR/SDR versions)
Don't tell me that XFree86 and lspci all agree and can properly identify these cards everytime. Remember, these cards are only half as old as your ATI, the differences here are still considered somewhat important today. Yes it's a pain that there's a lot of different names for what today we consider to be essentialy the same card. However, back when these were top of the line, the differences were important, and as such needed different names.
You're using a true 3200+, and not an overclocked processor? Since I've never seen anyone buy anything over 2800+, I guess I can't comment on the retail fans for those. I can say 80C is within AMDs specifications. I personally don't like seeing them near 60 under load though..
Oh, and the heatsink isn't making your room unbearably hot, ignoring the 30-40C temperatures, it's the CPU that's adding the heat, and it'll give off the same amount regardless of heatsink used.
The latest batch of heatsinks coming with retail Athlon XPs are actually fairly quiet. They're not what I'd consider silent, but you likely have something louder in your system.
At this point, only overclockers should be considering 3rd party cooling solutions.
Am I the only one who has been getting XP SP1 cd's? I haven't seen a new pre-SP1 CD in over 6 months, any system/copy of XP on the shelves nowadays surely has SP1 built in.
Someone I knew had a bad Visiontek 4200, after 2 months of complaining, they were given a choice between a 128mb 9500pro or a 256mb 9600pro, at no additional cost.
Visiontek originally tried to pull the "upgrade" trick on them also.
The only people who would find this article noteworthy are people with AMD processors on Abit motherboards (only company with the softmenu bios option to my knowledge) that have the via KT266a or KT333 chipsets.
Many of these bios settings are based on these boards in particular, most of the time other motherboards don't have these settings, or they're called something else. It's a shame the article is written for Abit boards, because generally if you've gone out of your way to buy one, you already know a bit about overclocking.
There is some info here if you've got an Nforce2 board, but some of it is wrong. The article says to run memory at 166mhz, but these boards can run at 200 (or higher).
It seems the Bartons can overclock to about the same clockspeed as the T-Breds. However the Bartons have 512KB l2 cache, whereas the T-Bred is only 256, so at the same clock speed the Barton is generally much faster.
So the 2500 is cheaper and usually ends up being faster than the 2600.
Slashdot Mirror
(found in the nvnews forum)
I think it's just that slashdotters can't stand having a windows box in the house.
Well, the difficulty changes only after loading. Saving isn't a problem.
However, travelling across a level divide and back again will lower the AI difficulty as well. Most levels require you to do this.
With the patch, you can still play the game using the self-enforced no-load rule. Other ways to increase difficulty include:
Playing without being seen
+ without ko/killing anyone
+ and not dousing any lights
+ using thiefbot to increase AI difficulty even higher than expert (and have it remain high even in the city)
In my area, we've had high-speed cable internet available for 7 years, and DSL the last 4 years.
Both DSL and Cable have been increasing their bandwidth to compete with each other, Cable just changed to 5mbit/s, DSL is 4mbit/s. Pricing has remained relatively flat, about $40can/month for both services. However recently Bell has been forced to share their lines, as a result, 4mbit DSL can be found for as low as $30/month.
My guess is he meant 1 port router...
With the recent release of the new 166MMX Pentiums, I was calling around to get prices. One store, after asking to verify that the price was indeed for the MMX version, the salesperson admitted he didn't know and told me I'd have to talk to their tech.
When I asked their tech, he replied angrily "Why does everyone keep asking me that question! ALL Pentium processors have MMX!"
I thanked him for clarifying that for me and hung up.
I had bees nesting in my dish also. Home was hidden inside the arm and out of the way of the lnb, so I only got the nasty surprise when it came time to move...
...it looks like a giant pencil.
Is it me, or are there way too many links in that article. Do we really need seperate links to the source code download, binaries download, release notes and system requirements pages?
If someone has done a study on the most effective text to link ratio, I'm sure they'd find that this Ars article is about 10x higher.
So you want to move hundreds of millions of customers to a new CPU design that's elegeant and does away with all the x86 junk.
How do you get around the chicken and the egg problem where there's no software developing as there's no customers, and no customers interested because there's no software?
Here's how: You start in a market that can afford to spend lots of money on developing their own software. The only way to enter in this market is to make your CPU run these customers' programs the fastest. Eventually you'll get enough software support to move this CPU down and sell to the medium and eventually the low end servers, but it'll take a few years. In this range, OS's will be building the capability to emulate x86 with little or no performance hit, and programs will be migrating to run natively in the new format. A few more years and many native apps later, you'll get high-end desktops/workstations migrating. Finally, the flood of average consumers will start rolling in.
How long will this process take? Let's look at the closest example of switching consumers to something that wasn't backwards compatible: DOS/Win3.1 to Windows NT. WinXP was the first "NT" version marketed to, and accepted by the average consumer. NT 3.1 was first released to the public in October '93. We have a full ten years to make the migration.
So you really shouldn't be comparing these processors just because their bits are the same. They're all 64 because very soon now 4 gigs of memory will no longer be enough for the desktop. The real comparison is x86 vs IA64 and the big question is whether IA64 really has what it takes to beat out x86 a few generations down the road.
The Itanium is still a kid, and it has a lot of battles ahead of itself before it's a consumer CPU, but IMO it has passed its first tests. I hated NT once also, but I've learned my lesson now.
I to, have installed KDE today. I also installed it yesterday, the day before, and I probably will still be installing it tomorrow.
Next time I wait for the RPMs.
"oh, by the way, if you want a UI, don't forget to also download such and such at website t46."
I've found that the key difference between mediocre and excellent programmers is whether or not they know assembly language.
You've got it backwards I think. The excellent programmers actually care about what they're doing, and as such have all learned assembly.
Teaching assembly to someone who doesn't care won't turn them into an excellent programmer.
"This is a good opportunity for Windows users to migrate to a free desktop."
So it has a one click install then?
the part number on the other side of the card identified it as a 3rd party clone using licensed ATI parts/design. Also, it would not accept any of the drivers on ATI's site
...
So some super cheap brand didn't follows ATI's reference design properly. If you don't pay for a real ATI card, don't expect real ATI support. I'm sure the driver disk that came with the card would have had drivers that worked fine. I've come across a similar card myself, and it sucks, but it's what you end up with when you try to cut system costs to the absolute minimum.
Also, my test box at home is a K6-II with an old ATI card in it. Solaris identifies it as a RAGE PRO TURBO. Various implementations of XFree86 and/or lspci have identified it as such:
Geforce2 Pro
Geforce2 Ti
Geforce2 Ultra
Geforce2 GTS
Geforce2 MX
Geforce2 MX200
Geforce2 MX400
(Note I didn't bother listing the DDR/SDR versions)
Don't tell me that XFree86 and lspci all agree and can properly identify these cards everytime. Remember, these cards are only half as old as your ATI, the differences here are still considered somewhat important today. Yes it's a pain that there's a lot of different names for what today we consider to be essentialy the same card. However, back when these were top of the line, the differences were important, and as such needed different names.
You're using a true 3200+, and not an overclocked processor? Since I've never seen anyone buy anything over 2800+, I guess I can't comment on the retail fans for those. I can say 80C is within AMDs specifications. I personally don't like seeing them near 60 under load though..
Oh, and the heatsink isn't making your room unbearably hot, ignoring the 30-40C temperatures, it's the CPU that's adding the heat, and it'll give off the same amount regardless of heatsink used.
The latest batch of heatsinks coming with retail Athlon XPs are actually fairly quiet. They're not what I'd consider silent, but you likely have something louder in your system.
At this point, only overclockers should be considering 3rd party cooling solutions.
Am I the only one who has been getting XP SP1 cd's? I haven't seen a new pre-SP1 CD in over 6 months, any system/copy of XP on the shelves nowadays surely has SP1 built in.
Someone I knew had a bad Visiontek 4200, after 2 months of complaining, they were given a choice between a 128mb 9500pro or a 256mb 9600pro, at no additional cost. Visiontek originally tried to pull the "upgrade" trick on them also.
The only people who would find this article noteworthy are people with AMD processors on Abit motherboards (only company with the softmenu bios option to my knowledge) that have the via KT266a or KT333 chipsets.
Many of these bios settings are based on these boards in particular, most of the time other motherboards don't have these settings, or they're called something else. It's a shame the article is written for Abit boards, because generally if you've gone out of your way to buy one, you already know a bit about overclocking.
There is some info here if you've got an Nforce2 board, but some of it is wrong. The article says to run memory at 166mhz, but these boards can run at 200 (or higher).
The 2500+.
It's a Barton running at 1.83 Ghz.
The 2600+ is a T-Bred, clocked at 2.08 Ghz.
It seems the Bartons can overclock to about the same clockspeed as the T-Breds. However the Bartons have 512KB l2 cache, whereas the T-Bred is only 256, so at the same clock speed the Barton is generally much faster.
So the 2500 is cheaper and usually ends up being faster than the 2600.