Wedbush Morgan's Michael Pachter says Take-Two management has "stumbled badly for the first time" with the delay of GTA IV, and said that he believes difficulties porting the game to the PlayStation 3 are to blame and that the company's new green light policy appears to be a failure."
Who is this Michael Pachter and why does his opinion matter? He doesn't work for Take-Two nor is he quoting a Take-Two representitive. It's just his opinion that the PS3 is to blame for the GTA IV delay. Hardly news worthy.
While this may be true, I also believe fitting GTA4 on an Xbox360 DVD9 might also be an issue.
One thing that always bothered me were certain Apple prices, like adding hard drives or memory to a Mac Pro, for instance:
Hard Drive - Bay 1 Your Mac Pro includes four Serial ATA 3Gb/s hard drive bays, offering up to 3 terabytes of data storage. Configure each drive bay separately. arrow_open.gif arrow_closed.gif Learn more Loading...
250GB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s
500GB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s [Add $129]
750GB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s [Add $299]
It costs an additional $129 to upgrade the built-in 250GB drive to a 500GB...This seems odd, considering a 500GB Seagate hard drive costs $115 Canadian.
Hard Drive - Bay 2 Configure the second hard drive bay with a 500GB or 750GB drive.
None
500GB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s [Add $329]
750GB 7200-rpm Serial ATA 3Gb/s [Add $499]
Now if I want to add a second, third or fourth hard drive, it costs $329 USD for each 500GB hard drive. Meanwhile I can buy a 500GB Seagate for $115 CDN...what gives? $115 CDN vs $329 USD per drive is quite a large difference.
Now look at the ram prices..
Memory Mac Pro systems support up to 16GB of 667MHz DDR2 fully buffered ECC RAM in eight FB-DIMM slots. Choose among a variety of memory amounts and configurations. arrow_open.gif arrow_closed.gif Learn more Loading...
1GB (2 x 512MB)
2GB (4 x 512MB) [Add $299]
4GB (4 x 1GB) [Add $699]
8GB (8 x 1GB) [Add $1699]
8GB (4 x 2GB) [Add $2099]
16GB (8 x 2GB) [Add $4499]
You can get 2x1GB of 667MHz FB-DIMM ECC RAM for $167.49 USD on newegg, compare that to Apple's 2G (4x512MB) for an additional $299 over the standard 1GB (2x512MB). Similarly, 4GB of the same type of ram costs around $300 where as Apple charges an extra $699 ontop of the base price.
My question is, why does Apple charge such large premiums for things like hard drives and RAM? Surely it doesn't cost $100-200 to install each additional hard drive and stick of ram?
The real question is: how much of the maintenance can be done remotely? Being a Linux distro, I have to imagine that most, if not all, of it can.
I use Webmin, it's the best free remote administration tool for unix and linux that I know of. It makes setting up things like Apache and Samba really simple for a non-expert like myself, no need to modify config files directly.
It's a hybrid, meaning it has a gas engine aswell for when you need it. I know most trips I make are to the local convenience store and back, which is well within the range of an 8 mile round trip. So while 8 miles doesn't sound like much, you would probably save a lot buying less gas in the long run.
Warhammer Online might be a great game, but I fail to see what will make it stand out. I'm getting kind of sick of the same old Medieval RPG theme. I've been playing Medieval MMO's since Ultima Online (still my favourite), Everquest 1, Lineage 1 and finally World of Warcraft.
It all seems like the same formula we've been seeing for the last 10 years.
Fantasy/Medieval Based? Check. Orcs, Humans and Elves? Check. Two Factions at war with each other? Check. Grinding? Check.
What I'd like to see is something really original that sets it apart. I'm not trying to hate on Warhammer, I just don't see how it's going to bring anything new to the table. More sci-fi and less medieval fantasy would be a good start.
Just by looking at those specs, the reason for the price difference is probably:
1. Dell E4300 vs System76 E6300 (Allendale vs Conroe) 2. Dell probably gets much better volume discounts so they can offer parts for cheaper 3. System76 probably charges more for putting a PC together and doesn't sell nearly as many PCs as Dell, so they need a wider profit margin per PC.
Still, $255 is a pretty big difference for such similar systems, Dell must really get good bulk discounts and/or they're selling each PC at razor thin profit margins.
Dell Canada does not offer Ubuntu We currently do not offer Ubuntu or any other open source solution. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause. Check out the Dell Community forums for additional information.
I went to http://www.dell.ca/ to check out Ubuntu laptop prices and was greeted with this message when I did a search for Ubuntu:
"Dell Canada does not offer Ubuntu We currently do not offer Ubuntu or any other open source solution. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause. Check out the Dell Community forums for additional information."
Needless to say, I was pretty disappointed. Why isn't Dell selling Ubuntu PCs in Canada?
I always thought the Linksys WRT54G(L/S) was a great piece of hardware. Admitedly, the default Linksys firmware was garbage. That's why there's custom firmware like DD-WRT or OpenWRT. Cisco should have bought DD-WRT or OpenWRT and used that instead of their own firmware, that would've been a good start.
More on topic, I really don't see the point of giving up a well established brand like Linksys. It already says "A Division of Cisco" with the Cisco bridge logo on both the retail box and router itself. Isn't that good enough?
From the website you linked:
"This tag is officially deprecated. That means that this tag is being phased out, and it is strongly suggested that you not use it."
Because of the particular characteristics of flash memory, it is best used with specifically designed file systems which spread writes over the media and deal with the long erase times of NOR flash blocks. The basic concept behind flash file systems is: When the flash store is to be updated, the file system will write a new copy of the changed data over to a fresh block, remap the file pointers, then erase the old block later when it has time. One of the earliest flash file systems was Microsoft's FFS2 (presumably preceded by FFS1), for use with MS-DOS in the early 1990s. Around 1994, the PCMCIA industry group approved the FTL (Flash Translation Layer) specification, which allowed a flash device to look like a FAT disk, but still have effective wear levelling. Other commercial systems such as FlashFX by Datalight were created to avoid patent concerns with FTL.
JFFS was the first flash-specific file system for Linux, but it was quickly superseded by JFFS2, originally developed for NOR flash. Then YAFFS was released in 2003, dealing specifically with NAND flash, and JFFS2 was updated to support NAND flash too. In practice, these filesystems are only used for "Memory Technology Devices" ("MTD"), which are embedded flash memories which do not have a controller. Removable flash media, such as SD and CF cards and USB flash drives, have a controller (often built into the card) to perform wear-levelling and error correction, so use of JFFS2 or YAFFS does not add any benefit. These removable flash memory devices are often used with the old FAT filesystem for compatibility with cameras and other portable devices. Controllerless removable flash memory devices also exist; For example, SmartMedia is even electrically compatible with the Toshiba TC58 series of NAND flash chips.
More info on JFFS2 can be found here. I also recommend you take a look at this pdf, which was converted from a slideshow (so it's pretty light reading).
I'm sure we Canadians should get a say, but since Lake Michigan is completely in the states, they probably don't care, and we probably can't do anything to stop them.
Actually we do care, lake Ontario is the most polluted of the great lakes thanks to runoff from the other lakes.
I had time to kill, so I decided to go through that list of 60 games:
(Originally I had a nice list, but I had to condense it to get past the lameness filter)
Non-Exclusive / Multi-Platform (34 total):
Oblivion, Need for Speed: Carbon, Marvel: Ultimate Alliance, Tony Hawk's Project 8, Call of Duty 3, The Darkness, Sonic the Hedgehog, Virtua Fighter 5,Joust, The BIGS, Surf's Up, Def Jam: Icon, Armored Core 4, Enchanted Arms, Blazing Angels: Squadrons of WWII, F.E.A.R, Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Vegas, Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell Double Agent, NHL 2K7, NBA 2K7, Madden NFL 07, Major League Baseball 2K7, NBA Street Homecourt, The Godfather, MLB 07: The Show, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Transformers: The Game, Fantastic 4: Rise of the Silver Surfer, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, Spider-Man 3, Virtua Tennis 3, College Hoops 2K7, Fight Night Round 3, Tiger Woogs PGA Tour 07
PS3 Exclusives (13 total):
Ninja Gaiden Sigma, MotorStorm, Genji: Days of the Blade, Resistance: Fall of Man, Mobile Suit Gundam: Crossfire, Blast Factor Advanced Research, Untold Legends: Dark Kingdom, Ridge Racer 7, GripShift, Full Auto 2: Battlelines, Tekken 5: Dark Resurrection, Formula One Championship Edition, NBA 07
Downloadable PS3 Content / Old Ports (13 total):
Cash Guns Chaos, Q*bert, Go! Puzzle, Championship Sprint, Rampage World Tour, Super Stardust HD, Rampart, Super Rub a Dub, Gauntlet 2, Mortal Kombat 2, Calling All Cars, flOw, Lemmings
From what I've read, it's more than just a shell. At first I thought it was just a shell to hold the Wiimote + nunchuk, but then I read that it doesn't house the nun-chuk at all.
Supposedly, the handle is touch sensitive, i.e for squeezing, maybe to perform a reload action or something. It's too early to tell and this is mostly just speculation at this point... I can't wait though, it looks extremely cool.
Go ahead and remove the ultra-violence so the consoles will license it...
You must not be familiar with Manhunt. If they removed the ultra-violence, you'd have nothing left but the loading and options screen. Here's a gameplay trailer if you're not familiar with the original Manhunt: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sG06AVnla5c
Supposedly Manhunt 2 was supposed to have even more violent "kill animations".
Slashdot Mirror
Who is this Michael Pachter and why does his opinion matter? He doesn't work for Take-Two nor is he quoting a Take-Two representitive. It's just his opinion that the PS3 is to blame for the GTA IV delay. Hardly news worthy.
While this may be true, I also believe fitting GTA4 on an Xbox360 DVD9 might also be an issue.
Don't forget Gran Turismo 5.
It costs an additional $129 to upgrade the built-in 250GB drive to a 500GB...This seems odd, considering a 500GB Seagate hard drive costs $115 Canadian.
Now if I want to add a second, third or fourth hard drive, it costs $329 USD for each 500GB hard drive. Meanwhile I can buy a 500GB Seagate for $115 CDN...what gives? $115 CDN vs $329 USD per drive is quite a large difference.
Now look at the ram prices..
You can get 2x1GB of 667MHz FB-DIMM ECC RAM for $167.49 USD on newegg, compare that to Apple's 2G (4x512MB) for an additional $299 over the standard 1GB (2x512MB). Similarly, 4GB of the same type of ram costs around $300 where as Apple charges an extra $699 ontop of the base price.
My question is, why does Apple charge such large premiums for things like hard drives and RAM? Surely it doesn't cost $100-200 to install each additional hard drive and stick of ram?
I use Webmin, it's the best free remote administration tool for unix and linux that I know of. It makes setting up things like Apache and Samba really simple for a non-expert like myself, no need to modify config files directly.
If I remember correctly, Blizzard actually hired Bram Cohen to design their custom bittorrent client for updating WoW. What was your point again?
It's a hybrid, meaning it has a gas engine aswell for when you need it. I know most trips I make are to the local convenience store and back, which is well within the range of an 8 mile round trip. So while 8 miles doesn't sound like much, you would probably save a lot buying less gas in the long run.
You're comparing a $20k vehicle to a $100k vehicle. The majority of us can't afford the $100k Tesla Roadster, though it would be pretty nice...
Warhammer Online might be a great game, but I fail to see what will make it stand out. I'm getting kind of sick of the same old Medieval RPG theme. I've been playing Medieval MMO's since Ultima Online (still my favourite), Everquest 1, Lineage 1 and finally World of Warcraft.
It all seems like the same formula we've been seeing for the last 10 years.
Fantasy/Medieval Based? Check.
Orcs, Humans and Elves? Check.
Two Factions at war with each other? Check.
Grinding? Check.
What I'd like to see is something really original that sets it apart. I'm not trying to hate on Warhammer, I just don't see how it's going to bring anything new to the table. More sci-fi and less medieval fantasy would be a good start.
Just by looking at those specs, the reason for the price difference is probably:
1. Dell E4300 vs System76 E6300 (Allendale vs Conroe)
2. Dell probably gets much better volume discounts so they can offer parts for cheaper
3. System76 probably charges more for putting a PC together and doesn't sell nearly as many PCs as Dell, so they need a wider profit margin per PC.
Still, $255 is a pretty big difference for such similar systems, Dell must really get good bulk discounts and/or they're selling each PC at razor thin profit margins.
From http://www.dell.ca/ (do a search for Ubuntu):
I went to http://www.dell.ca/ to check out Ubuntu laptop prices and was greeted with this message when I did a search for Ubuntu:
"Dell Canada does not offer Ubuntu
We currently do not offer Ubuntu or any other open source solution. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.
Check out the Dell Community forums for additional information."
Needless to say, I was pretty disappointed. Why isn't Dell selling Ubuntu PCs in Canada?
I always thought the Linksys WRT54G(L/S) was a great piece of hardware. Admitedly, the default Linksys firmware was garbage. That's why there's custom firmware like DD-WRT or OpenWRT. Cisco should have bought DD-WRT or OpenWRT and used that instead of their own firmware, that would've been a good start.
More on topic, I really don't see the point of giving up a well established brand like Linksys. It already says "A Division of Cisco" with the Cisco bridge logo on both the retail box and router itself. Isn't that good enough?
You can buy sata data cables with a locking mechanism. http://www.ncix.com/products/index.php?mode=produc treviewread&product_id=20770&review=14
I'd agree with your point though, I've had drive issues a couple times just because a sata data cable came loose.
From the website you linked: "This tag is officially deprecated. That means that this tag is being phased out, and it is strongly suggested that you not use it."
Here's a select quote:
More info on JFFS2 can be found here. I also recommend you take a look at this pdf, which was converted from a slideshow (so it's pretty light reading).
This is probably the most insight post of the bunch, well done.
There's a planned price cut for Intel on July 22nd. http://www.vr-zone.com/index.php?i=4976
Q6600 2.4 1066 $530 $266
E6850 3.0 1333 - $266
E6750 2.66 1333 - $183
E6550 2.33 1333 - $163
E6540 2.33 1333 - $163
The quad core (Q6600) is getting a ~50% price cut.
Actually we do care, lake Ontario is the most polluted of the great lakes thanks to runoff from the other lakes.
http://www.thestar.com/sciencetech/Environment/ar
How do you create content on a PS3 is what I want to know...How do you write new mods or create new graphics without PC software?
User created content? Finally! Welcome to 1995 PC Gaming...
Just thought you might enjoy my analysis of those 60 "PS3" games: http://games.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=248665&c id=19837159
13 out of 60 are PS3 exclusives, another 13 out of 60 are downloadable ports, 34 out of 60 are non-exclusive.
I had time to kill, so I decided to go through that list of 60 games:
(Originally I had a nice list, but I had to condense it to get past the lameness filter)
Non-Exclusive / Multi-Platform (34 total):
Oblivion, Need for Speed: Carbon, Marvel: Ultimate Alliance, Tony Hawk's Project 8, Call of Duty 3, The Darkness, Sonic the Hedgehog, Virtua Fighter 5,Joust, The BIGS, Surf's Up, Def Jam: Icon, Armored Core 4, Enchanted Arms, Blazing Angels: Squadrons of WWII, F.E.A.R, Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Vegas, Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell Double Agent, NHL 2K7, NBA 2K7, Madden NFL 07, Major League Baseball 2K7, NBA Street Homecourt, The Godfather, MLB 07: The Show, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Transformers: The Game, Fantastic 4: Rise of the Silver Surfer, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, Spider-Man 3, Virtua Tennis 3, College Hoops 2K7, Fight Night Round 3, Tiger Woogs PGA Tour 07
PS3 Exclusives (13 total):
Ninja Gaiden Sigma, MotorStorm, Genji: Days of the Blade, Resistance: Fall of Man, Mobile Suit Gundam: Crossfire, Blast Factor Advanced Research, Untold Legends: Dark Kingdom, Ridge Racer 7, GripShift, Full Auto 2: Battlelines, Tekken 5: Dark Resurrection, Formula One Championship Edition, NBA 07
Downloadable PS3 Content / Old Ports (13 total):
Cash Guns Chaos, Q*bert, Go! Puzzle, Championship Sprint, Rampage World Tour, Super Stardust HD, Rampart, Super Rub a Dub, Gauntlet 2, Mortal Kombat 2, Calling All Cars, flOw, Lemmings
http://www.gamesarefun.com/consoles/wii/zapper1.jp g
p g
From what I've read, it's more than just a shell. At first I thought it was just a shell to hold the Wiimote + nunchuk, but then I read that it doesn't house the nun-chuk at all.
This side shot shows it better: http://www.gamesarefun.com/consoles/wii/zapper2.j
Supposedly, the handle is touch sensitive, i.e for squeezing, maybe to perform a reload action or something. It's too early to tell and this is mostly just speculation at this point... I can't wait though, it looks extremely cool.
I think this graphic says it best: http://www.overclock247.com/pyr0/EA.png