First off, Antivirus is really the very last line of defense. The only reason it should ever need to be used is if you've already screwed up. Second, what kind of XP installs were these? With SP2 slipstreamed? SP2 turns on software firewall by default. Don't you have a copy of Win2k to experiment with? I promise, I'm not full of bullshit. It's for real. I would say that if you have plugged in a barenaked (non-slipstreamed) XP box and not gotten a worm, it is because you were either insanely lucky or (more likely) you just had no damn idea you had a box full of worms, because you were so busy insisting that you didn't need antivirus. I would say that anyone that administrates a facility of computers should wake up and smell the coffee. Anyways, I'm through trying to convince you. You think that the SANS time-to-infection numbers are completely invented and bullshit. That's fine. I'm sure you also have rampant unprotected sex. That's fine too.
Goodluck.
Well, the workstations at your school are almost certainly behind an NAT router, if not a firewall as well. This isn't what I'm talking about. You'll notice that every last comment on this story referred to getting behind an NAT router or firewall. I'm talking about barenaked on the internet. Your XP machines probably have the software firewall turned on. There again, nearly every last comment on this story referred to being sure to turn on a software firewall if a router or hardware firewall was unavailable. I'm serious, go ahead and try my experiment. It's not hype. It's not rampant "SARS is going to get us, Oh Noes!" paranoia. Certain common sense steps have to be taken in this day and age. Many of us can reminisce on the old times, when anti-virus was silly.. When you connected to the internet via $5/month dial-up to a UNIX shell.. and even later when SLIP and PPP became popular, virus really wasn't anything to worry about until Win2k with the advent of severely malicious worms. Worms aren't propogated through running strange executables.. Worms are propogated through having open ports on your machine that the particular exploit will work on. Go ahead.. Try it. Grab Win2k, put it on a bare box, hook it directly to broadband. I dare you. Are you afraid? Want to curl up in a ball and cry? Go ahead.. :)
I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that you're so confident because you're still running Windows 95/98/ME based systems. If you want to experience first hand what all of the paranoia is all about, go ahead and install a fresh copy of Win2k on a box. (I'll wait)..
Ok. Now, go ahead and plug in your raw installed machine to your DSL modem for about (mmmm.. 5 4 3 2 1) Ok. By now you should have upwards of 20+ worms. By the time you get your antivirus installed, you'll definitely be fighting an uphill battle.
(No, I'm not making this up. Try it yourself. Serious).
Well, lucky for you that's not the acrostic for snow.:P
I would get into the theory and practice with you, but I really doubt you're interested. The simple fact is that: Yes, we're talking about "actual mystical effects". Buy a copy of the book and perform the experiments yourself if you like, but like anything else, make sure to follow ALL of the directions, including the 6 month purification period. You might be pleasantly/unpleasantly surprised, depending on how narrow your worldview is.
You should be really careful about posting those, you know. The fact that that one _stuck in your mind_ should be a warning. Lord only knows what that one is _supposed_ to do, but if you read that book, there aren't any acrostics to generate "supposed mystical effects". More like "Smite down your neighbor with boils" or "Create tempests of snow" or whatever. I'm not saying it's not all a bunch of bullshit.. I'm just saying, be careful what you're playing with. Trivializing something doesn't necessarily make it trivial.
Ok, the airport security is silly. I might note that I am currently writing this post from inside a US airport.
I'm a commuter. I fly home for the weekends. There's lots of us like that here. The economy bites.
The 2 things that will absolutely get you a special going over are:
1) One-way ticket
2) Buying your ticket with cash
I fly a LOT. I've never even been looked at. I constantly fly with super weird computer equipment, today I have a handheld ultrasound machine. Does the TSA guy have any idea what that is? No. Does he ask? No.
I'm the first to admit that our airport security is absolutely ridiculous and designed fully to put some kind of sense of security in the inebriated masses. But, FYI, if you avoid those 2 things, you will never be hassled. Even (or perhaps especially) if you are wearing a turban and muttering, "Muhammad, Jihad." repeatedly under your breath.
If I had mod points, I'd mod that up. Apparently, you & I "Vote with our dollar". A huge portion of the world does this too. If your company does something absolutely shitty, no matter how it is.. Microsoft jerks you around on the phone making you prove that you really honest to god bought Windows and yes you really have had it activated before, you just changed out the videocard... or Sony installs a rootkit on your machine.. People remember crap like this. When a business (not just consoles) does me wrong, they receive no more of my money. Ever. Period. (As long as there is any alternative whatsoever, anyways.. And there almost always is).
To be honest, I really don't see the Xbox doing well until they get the idea of exclusive games into their business model. From the beginning, Nintendo has had certain games that you simply cannot get on other systems: Metroid, Zelda, Mario. Sega tried to get in on this very good idea with the Genesis, and I think it is one of the reasons that that machine was so popular.
I own a Gamecube right now, and I'll buy a Revolution... Because I'm hooked on the Metroid games, always have been. But also, because there's not a single game that releases for the Xbox that doesn't release for PC a few months later. Halo? I bought it for PC. KOTOR? PC. KOTOR 2? PC. Morrowind? PC. Every time I would find myself saying, "Wow, now there's a game worth buying that console for".. They'd be busy shooting themselves in the foot. Also, it's important to remember that although Xbox sales and Gamecube sales are nearly identical, Nintendo actually made a profit on each unit sold instead of taking a loss. AFAIK, Nintendo is solidly in the black, while the Xbox project is solidly in the Red.
Ok, I'll have to give it a longer look then.
I used to enjoy building on MUSH's and coding on LPmud's, and the idea of this thing sounds really cool to me.
Well, obviously truly dynamic content is going to have to be downloaded as needed. But when I pop into the game in the newbie area, I'm pretty sure that it could have been included in the installer. Further, I'm willing to hazard a guess that there is a significant amount of static content in the game.. Content that could be included in the installer.
As for the dynamic content, is there a compelling reason why a cache could not be used? When that sign finally pops into view, and I turn around, I shouldn't need to redownload the sign (unless it has changed). Web browsers do this (as you are no doubt aware).
Well, I tried it out.. Looks like it's a broadband only kind of game. Unless there is a local installer that is bigger than the bitty thing they have for download from the site? I'm on dual-channel ISDN, so downloading the entire game in realtime isn't really an option where I am.
Well, I may have to check that out then. I haven't looked at Secondlife, and was offering up the other 2 kind of tongue in cheek. There.com looks to me like a strange and glorified chat-room.. and PE isn't a very good MMORPG at all, even assuming that you put into it the standard $10-15 a month, the "fun" just isn't there. There's no chance of questing for some big piece of gear, everything has to be purchased with real money.
So, how does the "building" work? Is it like on a MUSH, where you get a certain number of build chips per day or whatever?
Sounds pretty slick to me.
Well, I've got mod-points, but I couldn't resist replying to you on this one..
Nowadays, linux is much more likely to just "work" with your hardware than windows. At least, out of the box. When I set up a new machine, I take a look at what its "role" is. Is it worth $150 for a copy of Windows + a pile of time to install? Especially over low-bandwidth, Windows takes a LONG time to install.
Windows XP install - 30 minutes
Tracking down drivers.. This may be easy (brand name) or super-hard (Hewlett-packard)
SP2 install - 130mb (could be overnight, if you're on modem or ISDN)
Assorted security updates (2 or 3 hours over modem, 1 hour over ISDN)
Zonealarm install
AVG install
Firefox install
SpywareBlaster install
Openoffice.org install
Did I miss anything?
A week ago, when I set up a new machine that would be used solely for working at my facility, writing tests in MS Word format.. The machine I found for free to use was a HP Presario machine.. Now, if you've ever messed with HP or Compaq, you know that this is a nightmare under windows. I had Ubuntu installed in 30 minutes, no searching for drivers (I'd like to see you bring up any version of windows on one of these hokey boxen with sound support straight from install), no searching for security updates, no installing virus protection... OpenOffice is pre-installed.
Firewall is kind of optional.. But if you need it, it's as simple as
apt-get update
apt-get install firestarter
Also, thanks to Transgaming and with the use of an Nvidia card, a Linux "gaming platform" is more than possible. Everquest actually runs better on my lower specs linux box than on my windows box.
Oh, you absolutely need MS Office for some reason? I can testify that CrossOver office works beautifully.
Well, I'm not sure if I would jump at the FX 5200, as I'm pretty sure that's a seriously budget card. Most "comparison" charts I've seen put it inline with the Radeon 9200, which is a real dog. I would lean towards The Geforce 4 Ti 4200/4400/4600, I think. I know that was quite a card, and it's what I'm thinking of upgrading my Linux box's Geforce 3 to. They seem pretty cheap, although I have no real idea if they will push Half-life 2 or not. The framerates in benchmarks I've seen (for other games) are really high, even compared to modern cards, they just lack all the pretty pixel shading that modern cards do, being a DX8 board.
Well, it seems to me that it is a slightly dubious statement to say that Quake 4 doesn't run as well on the hardware as Doom 3.. When you have Quake 4 set to higher settings than Doom 3.
I actually don't have a 9500pro, I've got a 9500. I assumed that a 9500pro (being basically a 9500 with twice as many pipelines) would be only more likely to play the games that are playable for me on my device.
The default clockspeeds for my 9500 are 277mhz core and 270mhz memory. I ran the ATI Tray "find max clockspeed" util and have it clocked to the wall at 386mhz core and 303mhz memory. This 9500 didn't respond well to the enable the disabled pipelines hack. (as an aside, I don't overclock my CPU's.. I've had much better luck with GPU's than CPU's. This is a P4 1.7ghz with 512mb of 800mhz RIMM).
Doom 3 @ 800x600 w/ specular w/o shadows - ~63fps
Doom 3 @ 1024x768 w/ specular w/o shadows - ~50-55fps
Doom 3 @ 1024x768 w/ specular w/ shadows - ~25-55fps (very jerky and unpredictable, I suspect that shadows have a lot to do with CPU, my cpu isn't very fast)
Quake 4 @ 640x480 @ low quality - ~35fps
Quake 4 @ 800x600 @ low quality - ~30fps
Higher than 800x600 @ low was very unplayable. Turning up the quality would absolutely kill my system whenever there were smoke effects.
In summary, Yes Quake 4 is a bigger bastard to run than Doom 3. I'm pretty sure that this has a lot to do with the wide open areas. 3d cards (afaik) still have a much easier time with enclosed spaces than with wide open levels.
Also, I'm pretty sure that the biggest place that out opinions differ is in what is "playable". Quake 4 @ 800x600 and ~30fps is "playable" to me. But it'll definitely be my new benchmark for the next vidcard that I purchase.
Cheers,
-Achra
Um, well, I'd have to say that 1280x1024 in medium mode is not the kind of video settings that I would suggest for that hardware. It's not cutting edge hardware, it's a $40 ebay videocard. All I said was that it would play, and not look amazingly pretty doing it.:)
Well, this story is just junk.. But here's my 2 cents.
Buy enough cheap ram to upgrade to 512mb. Make sure that you have a machine that runs in the neighborhood of 2ghz (P4/Athlon XP). Purchase an ATI Radeon 9500Pro ($40ish on ebay). This should be enough to be able to play Doom 3 and the other modern titles. No, they won't look great, but they will certainly be playable. I'm on a rig like that right now, and it runs Doom 3 at 1024x768 with specular lighting at around 30fps.
As a general rule of thumb when purchasing a video card on a budget, always buy yesterday's performance model rather than today's budget model.
Um, how relevant is Minix these days? Is it honestly intended to be used on a PC or is it aimed squarely at embedded devices? I'll admit, I really enjoyed Minix back in the old days, on a single 360k on an 8088.. It was quite an amazing trick. But NOW?
Okay, that may work fine for linux and commercial software, but what about more critical software fields?
Are you seriously saying that all top down specs are bad? I've worked in medical for a long time, and I really doubt that you, me, or the FDA would much appreciate a heart pump that was written from the "bottom to the top".
Specs are there for a very good reason (at least in critical cases). Also, they are absolutely critical in cases where a contract house is building a product for another company. They are the only way to in the end say, "See, here is what you asked us to build. It is perfect in every sense to your spec. Check please."
If I want a heart pump, the very first thing to do is decide what I want. That's a spec. Next comes the hazard analysis, that's a spec too. and on down, until all of the hazards are mitigated and you have a heart-pump that isn't going to do anything unexpected.
This may be an unpopular view in open-source development, but it's certainly a realistic one.
You're saying that the definition of a planet is important not just in this case, but in the case where we're sitting around trying to work out if that pluto equivalent in Tau Ceti (or wherever) is a "planet"? For some reason, people feel really emotional about not considering Pluto to be a planet... You can bet if the kuiper belt didn't exist in our solar system, and we had only clearly defined "planets".. When we began observing other systems and found something similar to the Kuiper belt, we wouldn't start picking bits out of it and naming them planets.
I still think that the definition of a planet should hinge on how easily it can be viewed from Earth. Personally, I don't think that any Kuiper belt object is a planet. Pluto is not a planet. Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn can all be easily observed with the naked eye. Uranus usually requires binoculars to be seen, and Neptune some kind of telescope (however amateur)... Pluto, and the rest of the Kuiper belt, are a very difficult thing to view. If you're an amateur astronomer, you're going to be able to discern a speck of faint light from a "medium" sized telescope.. That is, 6" reflector or so. I would love to see the definition involve being able to view the celestial object as a disc from earth's surface. Hell, even the HST barely discerns much more than a grayish disc. http://hubblesite.org/newscenter/newsdesk/archive/ releases/1996/09/
Slashdot Mirror
First off, Antivirus is really the very last line of defense. The only reason it should ever need to be used is if you've already screwed up. Second, what kind of XP installs were these? With SP2 slipstreamed? SP2 turns on software firewall by default. Don't you have a copy of Win2k to experiment with? I promise, I'm not full of bullshit. It's for real. I would say that if you have plugged in a barenaked (non-slipstreamed) XP box and not gotten a worm, it is because you were either insanely lucky or (more likely) you just had no damn idea you had a box full of worms, because you were so busy insisting that you didn't need antivirus. I would say that anyone that administrates a facility of computers should wake up and smell the coffee. Anyways, I'm through trying to convince you. You think that the SANS time-to-infection numbers are completely invented and bullshit. That's fine. I'm sure you also have rampant unprotected sex. That's fine too. Goodluck.
Well, the workstations at your school are almost certainly behind an NAT router, if not a firewall as well. This isn't what I'm talking about. You'll notice that every last comment on this story referred to getting behind an NAT router or firewall. I'm talking about barenaked on the internet. Your XP machines probably have the software firewall turned on. There again, nearly every last comment on this story referred to being sure to turn on a software firewall if a router or hardware firewall was unavailable. I'm serious, go ahead and try my experiment. It's not hype. It's not rampant "SARS is going to get us, Oh Noes!" paranoia. Certain common sense steps have to be taken in this day and age. Many of us can reminisce on the old times, when anti-virus was silly.. When you connected to the internet via $5/month dial-up to a UNIX shell.. and even later when SLIP and PPP became popular, virus really wasn't anything to worry about until Win2k with the advent of severely malicious worms. Worms aren't propogated through running strange executables.. Worms are propogated through having open ports on your machine that the particular exploit will work on. Go ahead.. Try it. Grab Win2k, put it on a bare box, hook it directly to broadband. I dare you. Are you afraid? Want to curl up in a ball and cry? Go ahead..
:)
I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that you're so confident because you're still running Windows 95/98/ME based systems. If you want to experience first hand what all of the paranoia is all about, go ahead and install a fresh copy of Win2k on a box. (I'll wait).. Ok. Now, go ahead and plug in your raw installed machine to your DSL modem for about (mmmm.. 5 4 3 2 1) Ok. By now you should have upwards of 20+ worms. By the time you get your antivirus installed, you'll definitely be fighting an uphill battle. (No, I'm not making this up. Try it yourself. Serious).
Well, lucky for you that's not the acrostic for snow. :P
I would get into the theory and practice with you, but I really doubt you're interested. The simple fact is that: Yes, we're talking about "actual mystical effects". Buy a copy of the book and perform the experiments yourself if you like, but like anything else, make sure to follow ALL of the directions, including the 6 month purification period. You might be pleasantly/unpleasantly surprised, depending on how narrow your worldview is.
You should be really careful about posting those, you know. The fact that that one _stuck in your mind_ should be a warning. Lord only knows what that one is _supposed_ to do, but if you read that book, there aren't any acrostics to generate "supposed mystical effects". More like "Smite down your neighbor with boils" or "Create tempests of snow" or whatever. I'm not saying it's not all a bunch of bullshit.. I'm just saying, be careful what you're playing with. Trivializing something doesn't necessarily make it trivial.
Rhinoceruses don't play games!
I'll be looking forward to Duke Nukem Forever releasing soon. :)
Ok, the airport security is silly. I might note that I am currently writing this post from inside a US airport.
I'm a commuter. I fly home for the weekends. There's lots of us like that here. The economy bites.
The 2 things that will absolutely get you a special going over are:
1) One-way ticket
2) Buying your ticket with cash
I fly a LOT. I've never even been looked at. I constantly fly with super weird computer equipment, today I have a handheld ultrasound machine. Does the TSA guy have any idea what that is? No. Does he ask? No.
I'm the first to admit that our airport security is absolutely ridiculous and designed fully to put some kind of sense of security in the inebriated masses. But, FYI, if you avoid those 2 things, you will never be hassled. Even (or perhaps especially) if you are wearing a turban and muttering, "Muhammad, Jihad." repeatedly under your breath.
If I had mod points, I'd mod that up. Apparently, you & I "Vote with our dollar". A huge portion of the world does this too. If your company does something absolutely shitty, no matter how it is.. Microsoft jerks you around on the phone making you prove that you really honest to god bought Windows and yes you really have had it activated before, you just changed out the videocard... or Sony installs a rootkit on your machine.. People remember crap like this. When a business (not just consoles) does me wrong, they receive no more of my money. Ever. Period. (As long as there is any alternative whatsoever, anyways.. And there almost always is).
To be honest, I really don't see the Xbox doing well until they get the idea of exclusive games into their business model. From the beginning, Nintendo has had certain games that you simply cannot get on other systems: Metroid, Zelda, Mario. Sega tried to get in on this very good idea with the Genesis, and I think it is one of the reasons that that machine was so popular.
I own a Gamecube right now, and I'll buy a Revolution... Because I'm hooked on the Metroid games, always have been. But also, because there's not a single game that releases for the Xbox that doesn't release for PC a few months later. Halo? I bought it for PC. KOTOR? PC. KOTOR 2? PC. Morrowind? PC. Every time I would find myself saying, "Wow, now there's a game worth buying that console for".. They'd be busy shooting themselves in the foot. Also, it's important to remember that although Xbox sales and Gamecube sales are nearly identical, Nintendo actually made a profit on each unit sold instead of taking a loss. AFAIK, Nintendo is solidly in the black, while the Xbox project is solidly in the Red.
Ok, I'll have to give it a longer look then.
I used to enjoy building on MUSH's and coding on LPmud's, and the idea of this thing sounds really cool to me.
Well, obviously truly dynamic content is going to have to be downloaded as needed. But when I pop into the game in the newbie area, I'm pretty sure that it could have been included in the installer. Further, I'm willing to hazard a guess that there is a significant amount of static content in the game.. Content that could be included in the installer.
As for the dynamic content, is there a compelling reason why a cache could not be used? When that sign finally pops into view, and I turn around, I shouldn't need to redownload the sign (unless it has changed). Web browsers do this (as you are no doubt aware).
Well, I tried it out.. Looks like it's a broadband only kind of game. Unless there is a local installer that is bigger than the bitty thing they have for download from the site? I'm on dual-channel ISDN, so downloading the entire game in realtime isn't really an option where I am.
Well, I may have to check that out then. I haven't looked at Secondlife, and was offering up the other 2 kind of tongue in cheek. There.com looks to me like a strange and glorified chat-room.. and PE isn't a very good MMORPG at all, even assuming that you put into it the standard $10-15 a month, the "fun" just isn't there. There's no chance of questing for some big piece of gear, everything has to be purchased with real money.
So, how does the "building" work? Is it like on a MUSH, where you get a certain number of build chips per day or whatever?
Sounds pretty slick to me.
Well, perhaps it will work when the Cedega 5.0 releases in 5.5 days.
Second Life, hm? What about There.com and Project Entropia?
Well, I've got mod-points, but I couldn't resist replying to you on this one..
Nowadays, linux is much more likely to just "work" with your hardware than windows. At least, out of the box. When I set up a new machine, I take a look at what its "role" is. Is it worth $150 for a copy of Windows + a pile of time to install? Especially over low-bandwidth, Windows takes a LONG time to install.
Windows XP install - 30 minutes
Tracking down drivers.. This may be easy (brand name) or super-hard (Hewlett-packard)
SP2 install - 130mb (could be overnight, if you're on modem or ISDN)
Assorted security updates (2 or 3 hours over modem, 1 hour over ISDN)
Zonealarm install
AVG install
Firefox install
SpywareBlaster install
Openoffice.org install
Did I miss anything?
A week ago, when I set up a new machine that would be used solely for working at my facility, writing tests in MS Word format.. The machine I found for free to use was a HP Presario machine.. Now, if you've ever messed with HP or Compaq, you know that this is a nightmare under windows. I had Ubuntu installed in 30 minutes, no searching for drivers (I'd like to see you bring up any version of windows on one of these hokey boxen with sound support straight from install), no searching for security updates, no installing virus protection... OpenOffice is pre-installed.
Firewall is kind of optional.. But if you need it, it's as simple as
apt-get update
apt-get install firestarter
Also, thanks to Transgaming and with the use of an Nvidia card, a Linux "gaming platform" is more than possible. Everquest actually runs better on my lower specs linux box than on my windows box.
Oh, you absolutely need MS Office for some reason? I can testify that CrossOver office works beautifully.
I think it's time for you to give Linux another look.
http://www.ubuntulinux.org/
Well, I'm not sure if I would jump at the FX 5200, as I'm pretty sure that's a seriously budget card. Most "comparison" charts I've seen put it inline with the Radeon 9200, which is a real dog. I would lean towards The Geforce 4 Ti 4200/4400/4600, I think. I know that was quite a card, and it's what I'm thinking of upgrading my Linux box's Geforce 3 to. They seem pretty cheap, although I have no real idea if they will push Half-life 2 or not. The framerates in benchmarks I've seen (for other games) are really high, even compared to modern cards, they just lack all the pretty pixel shading that modern cards do, being a DX8 board.
Well, it seems to me that it is a slightly dubious statement to say that Quake 4 doesn't run as well on the hardware as Doom 3.. When you have Quake 4 set to higher settings than Doom 3.
I actually don't have a 9500pro, I've got a 9500. I assumed that a 9500pro (being basically a 9500 with twice as many pipelines) would be only more likely to play the games that are playable for me on my device.
The default clockspeeds for my 9500 are 277mhz core and 270mhz memory. I ran the ATI Tray "find max clockspeed" util and have it clocked to the wall at 386mhz core and 303mhz memory. This 9500 didn't respond well to the enable the disabled pipelines hack. (as an aside, I don't overclock my CPU's.. I've had much better luck with GPU's than CPU's. This is a P4 1.7ghz with 512mb of 800mhz RIMM).
Doom 3 @ 800x600 w/ specular w/o shadows - ~63fps
Doom 3 @ 1024x768 w/ specular w/o shadows - ~50-55fps
Doom 3 @ 1024x768 w/ specular w/ shadows - ~25-55fps
(very jerky and unpredictable, I suspect that shadows have a lot to do with CPU, my cpu isn't very fast)
Quake 4 @ 640x480 @ low quality - ~35fps
Quake 4 @ 800x600 @ low quality - ~30fps
Higher than 800x600 @ low was very unplayable. Turning up the quality would absolutely kill my system whenever there were smoke effects.
In summary, Yes Quake 4 is a bigger bastard to run than Doom 3. I'm pretty sure that this has a lot to do with the wide open areas. 3d cards (afaik) still have a much easier time with enclosed spaces than with wide open levels.
Also, I'm pretty sure that the biggest place that out opinions differ is in what is "playable". Quake 4 @ 800x600 and ~30fps is "playable" to me. But it'll definitely be my new benchmark for the next vidcard that I purchase.
Cheers,
-Achra
Um, well, I'd have to say that 1280x1024 in medium mode is not the kind of video settings that I would suggest for that hardware. It's not cutting edge hardware, it's a $40 ebay videocard. All I said was that it would play, and not look amazingly pretty doing it. :)
Well, this story is just junk.. But here's my 2 cents. Buy enough cheap ram to upgrade to 512mb. Make sure that you have a machine that runs in the neighborhood of 2ghz (P4/Athlon XP). Purchase an ATI Radeon 9500Pro ($40ish on ebay). This should be enough to be able to play Doom 3 and the other modern titles. No, they won't look great, but they will certainly be playable. I'm on a rig like that right now, and it runs Doom 3 at 1024x768 with specular lighting at around 30fps.
As a general rule of thumb when purchasing a video card on a budget, always buy yesterday's performance model rather than today's budget model.
Um, how relevant is Minix these days? Is it honestly intended to be used on a PC or is it aimed squarely at embedded devices? I'll admit, I really enjoyed Minix back in the old days, on a single 360k on an 8088.. It was quite an amazing trick. But NOW?
Perhaps...
I envision a project timeline as such:
http://library.thinkquest.org/26157/timeline.html
Okay, that may work fine for linux and commercial software, but what about more critical software fields?
Are you seriously saying that all top down specs are bad? I've worked in medical for a long time, and I really doubt that you, me, or the FDA would much appreciate a heart pump that was written from the "bottom to the top".
Specs are there for a very good reason (at least in critical cases). Also, they are absolutely critical in cases where a contract house is building a product for another company. They are the only way to in the end say, "See, here is what you asked us to build. It is perfect in every sense to your spec. Check please."
If I want a heart pump, the very first thing to do is decide what I want. That's a spec. Next comes the hazard analysis, that's a spec too. and on down, until all of the hazards are mitigated and you have a heart-pump that isn't going to do anything unexpected.
This may be an unpopular view in open-source development, but it's certainly a realistic one.
You're saying that the definition of a planet is important not just in this case, but in the case where we're sitting around trying to work out if that pluto equivalent in Tau Ceti (or wherever) is a "planet"? For some reason, people feel really emotional about not considering Pluto to be a planet... You can bet if the kuiper belt didn't exist in our solar system, and we had only clearly defined "planets".. When we began observing other systems and found something similar to the Kuiper belt, we wouldn't start picking bits out of it and naming them planets.
I still think that the definition of a planet should hinge on how easily it can be viewed from Earth. Personally, I don't think that any Kuiper belt object is a planet. Pluto is not a planet. Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn can all be easily observed with the naked eye. Uranus usually requires binoculars to be seen, and Neptune some kind of telescope (however amateur)... Pluto, and the rest of the Kuiper belt, are a very difficult thing to view. If you're an amateur astronomer, you're going to be able to discern a speck of faint light from a "medium" sized telescope.. That is, 6" reflector or so. I would love to see the definition involve being able to view the celestial object as a disc from earth's surface. Hell, even the HST barely discerns much more than a grayish disc. http://hubblesite.org/newscenter/newsdesk/archive/ releases/1996/09/