And before we all start yapping, I quote from the (CNN) article:
This effect cannot be used to send information back in time," said Lijun Wang, a researcher with the private NEC Institute. "However, our experiment does show that the generally held misconception that `nothing can travel faster than the speed of light' is wrong.
Hahha I totally agree. (And I am not biased, I am dual bootin Ubuntu and Windows 2003 EE)
Re:Have you looked at smartphones?
on
Best PDA for College?
·
· Score: 2, Informative
Hey. I am a college student (UC Berkeley, Go Bears!) and I am using a series 60 phone right now (Nokia 6600) and have to say that the OS kicks ass....people always complained about Symbian being slow and unresponsive, but they are all idiots. The system will get slow only when you fill up the system memory with crap like songs, shitty ringtones, and images...but that is why a lot of these phones have a separate Flash card inside - so you can store your crap there and leave the main memory alone. On my 6600 I have it set so that pictures I take are directly stored onto the flash card so I don't have to move them later.
Everything runs smoothly, there are a lot of apps available (check out this and this), though I have only tried them out briefly and then removed them - everything I need to do like alarms, to-do's, meeting times, etc. is already on the phone. I would definitely recommend the Nokia 6600 among these phones, because it has a lot of features, and is one of the lower SAR radiation phones - it has a score of 0.5, whereas most phones tend to be 0.7+ (and actually all the Sony-Ericsson phones are above 1!).
Price is only $50 after rebates (only 6 month contract!) if you sign up with a plan, at amazon.
Nintendo has always been a customer-friendly company so I doubt they would do something like that. Anyways, we all know that Xenon and Cell suck - Anandtech had an article on it but that article was mysteriously removed from the website, no doubt because of Sony or MS putting (legal?) pressure on them. Luckily, you can read it here.
The revolution has a fair amount of features to satisfy us, and we don't have to deal with Sony and MS's shit. Quite possibly, GC is the only one that will deliver on their projected system specs seeing how Sony hyped up Cell just like they did the Emotion Engine back in the day.
Furthermore, most people don't particularly care about device convergence for a console, as the people who are buying a next-gen console already have something to play their music, movies, etc. The fact that Revolution will use a strange disc format is immaterial. And if you read the interview above, you will see that it has a (most likely) programmable controller so that you can play NES, SNES, N64, and Gamecube games comfortably - and no mention of fckin locking out 3rd parties.
All my hopes rest on Revolution. Nintendo, you are my only hope!
When I went to India a few years ago to visit relatives, I was surprised to see that they were all toting cell phones (and better ones than my lame Noka 2260 at the time!) and when I asked about their plans I was surprised to know that they had plans with UNLIMITED minutes for very low prices.
I am glad to see that we have innovation that will help connect the rest of the world, but I have to wonder, why the hell can't phones be made here at ultra-low costs? And what of the plans??!?! Everytime I want a deal on a cell phone I have to sign a contract (and these days you get the special deal only on 2 year contracts - read more at end of this post) and am locked into a shitty phone and a shitty plan. BTW if you have seen the list prices of phones (w/out service plan deal, you will notice how ridiculously pricey they are).
Note about 2-year contracts: The exception I've seen (at amazon.com's cell phone site at least) regarding cell phone contracts is T-Mobile, which requires only a 1 year contract for all their deals. After hearing many horror stories about them I took a chance with them last year and was surprised to have absolutely no problems with reception or dropped calls or whatever here in CA (it seems like those problems were unique to an earlier range of phone models only). I once made a call to change the plan to a family plan and was also impressed by their AWESOME tech support, which doesn't go to some cheap call-center overseas like ATT.
Having only a single shell clicking is a bad idea - I mean having a much more clear-cut outline would be more convenient rather than relying on some underlying touch-sensitive detector to figure out where we clicked from.
The mouse may be sleek, it may have the mark of Apple written all over it, but come on to match the functionality of my regular (meaning non-Apple) optical mouse it has to have some clear cut dividers with separate RESPONSE!
From the article:
More software is taking advantage of the Hardware Abstraction Layer from Project Utopia. HAL-aware applications can display more information to the user, as well as benefit from "it just works" plug and play style hardware support. GNOME-VFS in GNOME 2.12 has improved integration with HAL, and now gives more visual cues about the types and names of media devices.
I am looking forward to this feature, especially - just another step towards making Linux more user-friendly.
In fact, this prerelease tour shows many exciting features for those who want to see a real desktop linux - improvements to Nautilus, a panel with Edit Menu option compliant with Freedesktop.org spec (how long have we been looking for something like this?), and more. Yay
But New Scientist magazine reported Wednesday that during tests carried out at Kirtland Air Force Base in New Mexico, participants playing the part of rioters were told to remove glasses and contact lenses to protect their eyes.
In another test they were also told to remove metal objects such as coins from their clothing to prevent local hot spots from developing on their skin.
In real life obviously there are going to be people wearing lenses or carrying metal objects so what gives???
Is Iraq just the guinea pig for our experiments now?
While I certainly support non-lethal weapons in use of riot dispersion, this does not seem safe at all (and certainly, I do not want to be aimed at with microwaves!)
The NVidia 7800 comes from their next generation G70 line of chips...X850 is not ATI's new generation of GPU's (the codenamed r520 line) so the comparisons are not exactly fair either.
How can such a mistake be made?
on
A $251 Million Typo
·
· Score: 4, Insightful
This is somewhat confusing to me - wouldn't a stock firm have some software (if this is an electronic transaction, which it appears to be) with a CONFIRMATION PAGE or something? Or warnings on massive orders? This just seems like a basic 'good design' feature to me...you can't particularly blame the individual here, it is just her random misfortune to be the one to have made that error - if not her it would have been some other employee.
Some interesting quotes: "The natural product of the fusion reaction is a small amount of helium, which is completely harmless to life and does not contribute to global warming. "
"The half-life of the radioisotopes produced by fusion tend to be less than those from fission, so that the inventory decreases more rapidly. Furthermore, there are fewer different species, and they tend to be non-volatile and biologically less active. As opposed to nuclear fission, where there is hardly any possibility to influence the spectrum of fission products, the problems can be further reduced by careful choice of the materials used."
"Although fusion power uses nuclear technology, the overlap with nuclear weapons technology is small. "
I am pissed off that everytime something innovative comes out, someone has to be a token Slashdot user and say 'No Linux Version' or 'No *nix? This sucks' or whatever other equivalent you can pull out of Slashdot's archives.
I was checking out the comments on Threshold 5 and was surprised to find half the comments along these same lines!!!
This is a FREE PROGRAM. It is FREE. It is also damn innovative, one of a kind (well...not quite, but for the features it has, definitely), and they even took the time to make it run on DirectX and OpenGL.
My gut instinct tells me that there will be a Linux Port sometime - it's in freakin' beta people quit your bitching.
Even if there isn't a linux port, you shouldn't be complaining because someone has to take the time to code all that - are you willing to go put in the time and do that work? I thought not. Now shut up while I go fly through San Francisco checking out Google Earth's awesomeness in 3D.
OK lets be honest here. Really honest. Most of you USE open source software or are using a system with linux on it or use linux exclusively on the job. Heck, Slashdot is part of the Open Source Technology Group. In fact, above this 'Post Comment' page's title I see a little message saying "Don't Fear the Penguins". Basically, you are all biased.
On the laptop which I am using right now, I am running Fedora alongside Windows 2003 Enterprise. My past computers have used Red Hat (6.2-9), Solaris, Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows ME, Windows 98, Windows 95, Windows 3.1, and DOS. I can say without even a glint of doubt that Windows is the best OS for the desktop. Yes, even better than you Mac lover's OSX (for some reasons you see below, though few:D):
1) Installation of Windows is a piece of cake. You pop in the CD, hit setup, follow the VERY easy directions on screen, and it takes care of itself. Come back in a half hour and your computer is ready to go. Today's Linux distributions have gotten better - Fedora for one, was easy to setup thanks to Anaconda. HOWEVER, not all of the distros are like that. For example, Debian's installation process is cruel and unusual, and yes this is mainly cuz it lacks a nice slick GUI.
2) With Windows, everything just works. I have never had a single connectivity issue with windows. With Windows XP, the only device that I use for which I had to actually install drivers was my digital camera. Nothing else at all. In Linux, I struggled forever with ALSA to get my sound to work. Who knows how many countless scripts I edited, or what exactly I even did since I ended up going to one forum after the next getting random tips that I then threw together until the right recipe worked. And this is only ONE example. I have to proceed similarly with everything, trembling at each step about what might go wrong.
3) Almost all of the best software is available for windows (my one complaint about macs, tho they certainly have their niche too). Most people are willing to pay a little to get a proper working piece of software along with technical support. Obviously there is good software for linux - but I'll be damned if you can point out a slicker cpp editor on linux than windows (seriously, don't even point out some random ass text editor like pico or something and say that it r0xx0rs Visual Studio). And there is no alternative to many of the other software I use daily. One major example is AIM. There are no AIM clients for Linux that hold a candle to the windows clients. GAIM can't even handle file transfers properly so you cannot say it is better.
4) Windows is EASY to fix or maintain. If I want to update windows, I go to windows update and just click away. In Linux, the update programs alone fail. In fact, to get up to speed, I had to go install other 'updating' programs such as Apt (+Synaptic) or Yum (+GYUM). Even so, repositories are such an annoying way to install programs. Having individual binaries is the best way - the linux project that aims to provide the same 'Click Setup and Walk Away' approach (can't recall name right now, sorry) is a good start towards this.
5) Perhaps the best thing is that Windows is standardized. Having a large stew of linux distributions each which their own quirks is confusing, annoying, and unproductive. Having more options to choose from can be a bad thing if overdone.
Anyways I am not saying Windows >>> Linux all the time (read: servers). I am just trying to pull those of you who seem so biased back to center.
Bandwidth and the Potential of this Card
on
Four GPU Motherboard
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
I know a lot of you are gonna be saying that there is no mobo with two x16 PCI-E slots so let me point out one right now:
Tyan Thunder K8WE - definitely the top of the line for dual-opteron mobo's right now IMHO.
Anyways, the reason this is a stupid idea is of course that as soon as someone 'upgrades' to this and squeezes out a refresh rate higher than our monitors can produce or our eyes can detect, we will have our next-gen cards and games.
Next-gen cards of course will have hardware features (read: steeped in the architecture) that no matter what you do, this generation of cards won't be able to support. For example, think of the GeForce 4MX versus the GeForce 3 Ti 200. As you may know, the 4MX does not have any shaders and the Ti 200 does. Even if I bundled up 4 4MX's, I would not be able to render reflective water in Far Cry or Half Life 2 (assuming the game in question allowed it with out inferior GPU first of all) simply because there is no dedicated hardware for volumetric per-pixel effects.
So then, instead of getting more GPU's (or spending money on a more expensive mobo just to be able to SLI) people should just wait until we actually need that extra juice - and now certainly is not the time. I recall that in one of the Unreal 3 Engine demos from a long while back, someone commented that the 6800's would run U3 like crap even on low settings (I think they said 25 FPS).
CRT:
Very Fast Response Time
Perfect Viewing Angles
Massive and Heavy
LCD:
Lower Resolutions
Bad Viewing Angles
Bad Response Times (though recent 8ms panels reduce this immensely)
Expensive
Very Nice Colors
Thin and Light
Doesn't hurt the eye
Plasma:
Dies in 5 years due to gas leakage
Rear-projector:
Yea these suck from the sides or close-up so let's not even mention these
Carbon-nanotube (CNT) based Motorola Display:
Because it uses phosphors like in CRTs, good brightness
Fast response time
Good viewing angle
Thin and light
Cheap
DOESNT NEED BACKLIGHT (no more washed-out colors in sunlight)
Longevity compared to plasmas
Though this is a 5" prototype, it is a 5" section of a larger 42" CNT grid for a large HD display, so stop bitching about this being 5 inches
Other notes: Since CNTs are small and the phosphor technology is the same as in CRTs (excite phosphor atoms to give off photons by making appropriate electrical connections using switches...in this case, CNT's) I am assuming that we can actually get large high-resolution monitors (this one is 1280 x 720) perhaps just like the crazy CRTs with 2XXX by 1XXX resolution.
Wow...this is similar to other screenshots of the XBOX 360 that have been floating around the internet (side view, 3-4th view, etc). Those screenshots can now be found at gamespot's website here.
I have to say that it will fit in nicer with other electronic equipment that sits on our entertainment center but this seriously lacks a cool factor. Its colors are too passive, and the curves are all way too smooth...replacing the silver finish with a jet-black polished finish alone would make it look ten times better. Oh well. BTW does anyone else think the name XBOX 360 sounds lame?
The XBOX 360 will definitely not be using the Cell...it has been known for some time now that it will be using PowerPC-architecture based processors. You probably confused this with the fact that the Cell's main core (which 'directs' the other SPE's) is thought to be using a PowerPC architecture also, though this hasn't been confirmed I think...check the ARS article for more info.
The article is dated in some ways (like when it says 16 cores...I believe it is half that right?) but it does point out some interesting things, for example, like the fact that there will be a Cell SDK and a end-user OS aimed at embedded devices and the like.
If you google around for 'cell forums' you will come across interesting discussions where they point out that linux will be ported very quickly to cell and that IBM has hinted at possible uses for Cell as a workstation. Also, Cell is OS NEUTRAL meaning that it does not have any particular hardware functionality that makes one OS run any faster.
Overall, I would say that since market penetration is needed, you can't just say "Here is our OS and our SDK, use it from now on". The trick will be of course, to assuage the existing target audience who use today's OS's.
Also, note that the Cell is not a processor bred entirely for the PS3 or anything like that - it will be embedded in devices such as PVR's, TV's, music players, and in all likelyhood, it will even find its way to the desktop - with its potential it is likely to also find some niche in supercomputing since it will be cheap (if 4 whole cells can be thrown into a game console why not?)
You are right that it looks EXACTLY like WMP in full-screen mode. However, it seems unlikely that they ported it over to the weird OS they have going.
Most likely they decode the streams and send raw data streams over a fast gigabit ethernet over to a comp with a media player that just chugs it through onto the screen. Or something like that anyways.
Slashdot Mirror
I got something harder than diamond for you....
:)
PS: only women
PS2: ok so no one from slashdot
Is this really that new? This has happened before. Read here: CNN: Light can break its own speed limit
And before we all start yapping, I quote from the (CNN) article:
This effect cannot be used to send information back in time," said Lijun Wang, a researcher with the private NEC Institute. "However, our experiment does show that the generally held misconception that `nothing can travel faster than the speed of light' is wrong.
Simply drive REALLY fast like 70mph or something and the camera won't be able to capture it properly ^_^
Bwaha
Hahha I totally agree. (And I am not biased, I am dual bootin Ubuntu and Windows 2003 EE)
Hey. I am a college student (UC Berkeley, Go Bears!) and I am using a series 60 phone right now (Nokia 6600) and have to say that the OS kicks ass....people always complained about Symbian being slow and unresponsive, but they are all idiots. The system will get slow only when you fill up the system memory with crap like songs, shitty ringtones, and images...but that is why a lot of these phones have a separate Flash card inside - so you can store your crap there and leave the main memory alone. On my 6600 I have it set so that pictures I take are directly stored onto the flash card so I don't have to move them later.
Everything runs smoothly, there are a lot of apps available (check out this and this), though I have only tried them out briefly and then removed them - everything I need to do like alarms, to-do's, meeting times, etc. is already on the phone. I would definitely recommend the Nokia 6600 among these phones, because it has a lot of features, and is one of the lower SAR radiation phones - it has a score of 0.5, whereas most phones tend to be 0.7+ (and actually all the Sony-Ericsson phones are above 1!).
Price is only $50 after rebates (only 6 month contract!) if you sign up with a plan, at amazon.
Hope that helps you.
Nintendo has always been a customer-friendly company so I doubt they would do something like that. Anyways, we all know that Xenon and Cell suck - Anandtech had an article on it but that article was mysteriously removed from the website, no doubt because of Sony or MS putting (legal?) pressure on them. Luckily, you can read it here.
The revolution has a fair amount of features to satisfy us, and we don't have to deal with Sony and MS's shit. Quite possibly, GC is the only one that will deliver on their projected system specs seeing how Sony hyped up Cell just like they did the Emotion Engine back in the day.
Furthermore, most people don't particularly care about device convergence for a console, as the people who are buying a next-gen console already have something to play their music, movies, etc. The fact that Revolution will use a strange disc format is immaterial. And if you read the interview above, you will see that it has a (most likely) programmable controller so that you can play NES, SNES, N64, and Gamecube games comfortably - and no mention of fckin locking out 3rd parties.
All my hopes rest on Revolution. Nintendo, you are my only hope!
When I went to India a few years ago to visit relatives, I was surprised to see that they were all toting cell phones (and better ones than my lame Noka 2260 at the time!) and when I asked about their plans I was surprised to know that they had plans with UNLIMITED minutes for very low prices.
I am glad to see that we have innovation that will help connect the rest of the world, but I have to wonder, why the hell can't phones be made here at ultra-low costs? And what of the plans??!?! Everytime I want a deal on a cell phone I have to sign a contract (and these days you get the special deal only on 2 year contracts - read more at end of this post) and am locked into a shitty phone and a shitty plan. BTW if you have seen the list prices of phones (w/out service plan deal, you will notice how ridiculously pricey they are).
Note about 2-year contracts:
The exception I've seen (at amazon.com's cell phone site at least) regarding cell phone contracts is T-Mobile, which requires only a 1 year contract for all their deals. After hearing many horror stories about them I took a chance with them last year and was surprised to have absolutely no problems with reception or dropped calls or whatever here in CA (it seems like those problems were unique to an earlier range of phone models only). I once made a call to change the plan to a family plan and was also impressed by their AWESOME tech support, which doesn't go to some cheap call-center overseas like ATT.
Best working conditions --> Best Programmers --> Best Software --> Profit!
WTF happened to the ??? step!
Having only a single shell clicking is a bad idea - I mean having a much more clear-cut outline would be more convenient rather than relying on some underlying touch-sensitive detector to figure out where we clicked from.
The mouse may be sleek, it may have the mark of Apple written all over it, but come on to match the functionality of my regular (meaning non-Apple) optical mouse it has to have some clear cut dividers with separate RESPONSE!
From the article: More software is taking advantage of the Hardware Abstraction Layer from Project Utopia. HAL-aware applications can display more information to the user, as well as benefit from "it just works" plug and play style hardware support. GNOME-VFS in GNOME 2.12 has improved integration with HAL, and now gives more visual cues about the types and names of media devices.
I am looking forward to this feature, especially - just another step towards making Linux more user-friendly.
In fact, this prerelease tour shows many exciting features for those who want to see a real desktop linux - improvements to Nautilus, a panel with Edit Menu option compliant with Freedesktop.org spec (how long have we been looking for something like this?), and more. Yay
But New Scientist magazine reported Wednesday that during tests carried out at Kirtland Air Force Base in New Mexico, participants playing the part of rioters were told to remove glasses and contact lenses to protect their eyes. In another test they were also told to remove metal objects such as coins from their clothing to prevent local hot spots from developing on their skin.
In real life obviously there are going to be people wearing lenses or carrying metal objects so what gives???
Is Iraq just the guinea pig for our experiments now?
While I certainly support non-lethal weapons in use of riot dispersion, this does not seem safe at all (and certainly, I do not want to be aimed at with microwaves!)
...from all the web traffic that is gonna come flowing in from Slashdot.
The NVidia 7800 comes from their next generation G70 line of chips...X850 is not ATI's new generation of GPU's (the codenamed r520 line) so the comparisons are not exactly fair either.
This is somewhat confusing to me - wouldn't a stock firm have some software (if this is an electronic transaction, which it appears to be) with a CONFIRMATION PAGE or something? Or warnings on massive orders? This just seems like a basic 'good design' feature to me...you can't particularly blame the individual here, it is just her random misfortune to be the one to have made that error - if not her it would have been some other employee.
For those of you who don't know what fusion is exactly, read at Wikipedia:
Fusion Power
Some interesting quotes:
"The natural product of the fusion reaction is a small amount of helium, which is completely harmless to life and does not contribute to global warming. "
"The half-life of the radioisotopes produced by fusion tend to be less than those from fission, so that the inventory decreases more rapidly. Furthermore, there are fewer different species, and they tend to be non-volatile and biologically less active. As opposed to nuclear fission, where there is hardly any possibility to influence the spectrum of fission products, the problems can be further reduced by careful choice of the materials used."
"Although fusion power uses nuclear technology, the overlap with nuclear weapons technology is small. "
I am pissed off that everytime something innovative comes out, someone has to be a token Slashdot user and say 'No Linux Version' or 'No *nix? This sucks' or whatever other equivalent you can pull out of Slashdot's archives.
I was checking out the comments on Threshold 5 and was surprised to find half the comments along these same lines!!!
This is a FREE PROGRAM. It is FREE. It is also damn innovative, one of a kind (well...not quite, but for the features it has, definitely), and they even took the time to make it run on DirectX and OpenGL.
My gut instinct tells me that there will be a Linux Port sometime - it's in freakin' beta people quit your bitching.
Even if there isn't a linux port, you shouldn't be complaining because someone has to take the time to code all that - are you willing to go put in the time and do that work? I thought not. Now shut up while I go fly through San Francisco checking out Google Earth's awesomeness in 3D.
OK lets be honest here. Really honest. Most of you USE open source software or are using a system with linux on it or use linux exclusively on the job. Heck, Slashdot is part of the Open Source Technology Group. In fact, above this 'Post Comment' page's title I see a little message saying "Don't Fear the Penguins". Basically, you are all biased.
:D):
On the laptop which I am using right now, I am running Fedora alongside Windows 2003 Enterprise. My past computers have used Red Hat (6.2-9), Solaris, Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows ME, Windows 98, Windows 95, Windows 3.1, and DOS. I can say without even a glint of doubt that Windows is the best OS for the desktop. Yes, even better than you Mac lover's OSX (for some reasons you see below, though few
1) Installation of Windows is a piece of cake. You pop in the CD, hit setup, follow the VERY easy directions on screen, and it takes care of itself. Come back in a half hour and your computer is ready to go. Today's Linux distributions have gotten better - Fedora for one, was easy to setup thanks to Anaconda. HOWEVER, not all of the distros are like that. For example, Debian's installation process is cruel and unusual, and yes this is mainly cuz it lacks a nice slick GUI.
2) With Windows, everything just works. I have never had a single connectivity issue with windows. With Windows XP, the only device that I use for which I had to actually install drivers was my digital camera. Nothing else at all. In Linux, I struggled forever with ALSA to get my sound to work. Who knows how many countless scripts I edited, or what exactly I even did since I ended up going to one forum after the next getting random tips that I then threw together until the right recipe worked. And this is only ONE example. I have to proceed similarly with everything, trembling at each step about what might go wrong.
3) Almost all of the best software is available for windows (my one complaint about macs, tho they certainly have their niche too). Most people are willing to pay a little to get a proper working piece of software along with technical support. Obviously there is good software for linux - but I'll be damned if you can point out a slicker cpp editor on linux than windows (seriously, don't even point out some random ass text editor like pico or something and say that it r0xx0rs Visual Studio). And there is no alternative to many of the other software I use daily. One major example is AIM. There are no AIM clients for Linux that hold a candle to the windows clients. GAIM can't even handle file transfers properly so you cannot say it is better.
4) Windows is EASY to fix or maintain. If I want to update windows, I go to windows update and just click away. In Linux, the update programs alone fail. In fact, to get up to speed, I had to go install other 'updating' programs such as Apt (+Synaptic) or Yum (+GYUM). Even so, repositories are such an annoying way to install programs. Having individual binaries is the best way - the linux project that aims to provide the same 'Click Setup and Walk Away' approach (can't recall name right now, sorry) is a good start towards this.
5) Perhaps the best thing is that Windows is standardized. Having a large stew of linux distributions each which their own quirks is confusing, annoying, and unproductive. Having more options to choose from can be a bad thing if overdone.
Anyways I am not saying Windows >>> Linux all the time (read: servers). I am just trying to pull those of you who seem so biased back to center.
I know a lot of you are gonna be saying that there is no mobo with two x16 PCI-E slots so let me point out one right now:
Tyan Thunder K8WE - definitely the top of the line for dual-opteron mobo's right now IMHO.
Anyways, the reason this is a stupid idea is of course that as soon as someone 'upgrades' to this and squeezes out a refresh rate higher than our monitors can produce or our eyes can detect, we will have our next-gen cards and games.
Next-gen cards of course will have hardware features (read: steeped in the architecture) that no matter what you do, this generation of cards won't be able to support. For example, think of the GeForce 4MX versus the GeForce 3 Ti 200. As you may know, the 4MX does not have any shaders and the Ti 200 does. Even if I bundled up 4 4MX's, I would not be able to render reflective water in Far Cry or Half Life 2 (assuming the game in question allowed it with out inferior GPU first of all) simply because there is no dedicated hardware for volumetric per-pixel effects.
So then, instead of getting more GPU's (or spending money on a more expensive mobo just to be able to SLI) people should just wait until we actually need that extra juice - and now certainly is not the time. I recall that in one of the Unreal 3 Engine demos from a long while back, someone commented that the 6800's would run U3 like crap even on low settings (I think they said 25 FPS).
CRT:
Very Fast Response Time
Perfect Viewing Angles
Massive and Heavy
LCD:
Lower Resolutions
Bad Viewing Angles
Bad Response Times (though recent 8ms panels reduce this immensely)
Expensive
Very Nice Colors
Thin and Light
Doesn't hurt the eye
Plasma:
Dies in 5 years due to gas leakage
Rear-projector:
Yea these suck from the sides or close-up so let's not even mention these
Carbon-nanotube (CNT) based Motorola Display:
Because it uses phosphors like in CRTs, good brightness
Fast response time
Good viewing angle
Thin and light
Cheap
DOESNT NEED BACKLIGHT (no more washed-out colors in sunlight)
Longevity compared to plasmas
Though this is a 5" prototype, it is a 5" section of a larger 42" CNT grid for a large HD display, so stop bitching about this being 5 inches
Other notes: Since CNTs are small and the phosphor technology is the same as in CRTs (excite phosphor atoms to give off photons by making appropriate electrical connections using switches...in this case, CNT's) I am assuming that we can actually get large high-resolution monitors (this one is 1280 x 720) perhaps just like the crazy CRTs with 2XXX by 1XXX resolution.
Wow...this is similar to other screenshots of the XBOX 360 that have been floating around the internet (side view, 3-4th view, etc). Those screenshots can now be found at gamespot's website here.
I have to say that it will fit in nicer with other electronic equipment that sits on our entertainment center but this seriously lacks a cool factor. Its colors are too passive, and the curves are all way too smooth...replacing the silver finish with a jet-black polished finish alone would make it look ten times better. Oh well. BTW does anyone else think the name XBOX 360 sounds lame?
I like how under the list of 'What Is Not Allowed' it lists:
5. Physical Attacks
Because, you know, us axe-murderer geek slashdotters were going to charge into the building where the server is and hack away using our cleaver 2d6.
XBox 360 Projected Specs
The XBOX 360 will definitely not be using the Cell...it has been known for some time now that it will be using PowerPC-architecture based processors. You probably confused this with the fact that the Cell's main core (which 'directs' the other SPE's) is thought to be using a PowerPC architecture also, though this hasn't been confirmed I think...check the ARS article for more info.
For all those talking about what kind of OS Cell will run:
ZDNet Article on Cell
The article is dated in some ways (like when it says 16 cores...I believe it is half that right?) but it does point out some interesting things, for example, like the fact that there will be a Cell SDK and a end-user OS aimed at embedded devices and the like.
If you google around for 'cell forums' you will come across interesting discussions where they point out that linux will be ported very quickly to cell and that IBM has hinted at possible uses for Cell as a workstation. Also, Cell is OS NEUTRAL meaning that it does not have any particular hardware functionality that makes one OS run any faster.
Overall, I would say that since market penetration is needed, you can't just say "Here is our OS and our SDK, use it from now on". The trick will be of course, to assuage the existing target audience who use today's OS's.
Also, note that the Cell is not a processor bred entirely for the PS3 or anything like that - it will be embedded in devices such as PVR's, TV's, music players, and in all likelyhood, it will even find its way to the desktop - with its potential it is likely to also find some niche in supercomputing since it will be cheap (if 4 whole cells can be thrown into a game console why not?)
You are right that it looks EXACTLY like WMP in full-screen mode. However, it seems unlikely that they ported it over to the weird OS they have going. Most likely they decode the streams and send raw data streams over a fast gigabit ethernet over to a comp with a media player that just chugs it through onto the screen. Or something like that anyways.
...they will realize that there isn't anything more malicious than the traffic from Slashdot.