Overrated? Oh, c'mon. Nintendo's well known for keeping the costs of their systems wihtin a certain price range. When prices on components go down a year or two after launch, they often go back and improve the system. In other words, yes, Nintendo intentionally 'de-sexys' their system. They probably could have released this exact system at launch, only it would have been around $200 instead of $150.
I figured by now (you know, after the release of the SP and more recently the version with the nicer screen. Or even the Micro...) this would have been a commonly accepted and well appreciated business model of Nintendo's, but maybe not. I guess it's easier to believe that Nintendo sabotages their own system so they can make money on the second release of it.
"The difference between you and I is that one of us recognizes this fact."
And that's supposed to be the guy saying stuff like "Are you going to tell your grandchildren about how you put your life on the line when the proxy server at work went down, or how you once suffered with a cellphone without a camera, or how many witty comments you made on slashdot?" because he blew a gasket over a Slashdot article?
"I got a PSP in November and I love it. Great for watching movies, listening to mp3s, playing of favorite games (emulated). It might not be for everyone, but I've really enjoyed mine."
I bought a PSP in December, and I hated it. Here's my little story:
I bought the $300 'giga-pack' which came with the 1 gig card. This seemed the only way to not get totally screwed on flash memory. (It was like $120 to buy the 1 gig card seperately, even though equivalent SD and Compact Flash was a lot cheaper...) When I got it home, I made a huge mess opening up the box. Man there was lots of crap in there. In retrospect, it wasn't all bad. Case for the unit, headphones + remote, cleaning cloth, etc. (my main reason for bitching about it was that it was a total pain in the ass to bundle all that shit back together into the box.)
When I turned it on, I noticed 4 stuck pixels on it. I'm not overly pissy about that considering that they're very small and barely noticable (I could only see them on black loading screens etc), but it does speak volumes about Sony's commitment to quality.
I played Liberty City Stories for a little while. I'm happy to report that loading times were not unreasonable and the game was actually quite fun. However, after about 15 minutes into it, something peculiar started to happen. Somehow the Home button was making contact with the casing. If I tapped the unit: "Would you like to quit this game?" would show up. (Note: This would NOT pause the game, either.) I lost a few missions this way. I'd try to shoot somebody and all the sudden the PSP thought I was pressing the Home button. Commitment to quality.
I took the PSP back to Best Buy to exchange it. They were out of 'Giga packs'. They sold out around Christmas, and honestly, I haven't been able to find any since. I asked them if they'd just open up one of the other PSP boxes and do a swap. No dice. (Although they did point out that they'd have been happy to do that had I paid for the replacement warranty. Assholes.)
I never got around to having much fun on that system, I'm sad to say. To Sony's credit, I think I was the victim of bad luck. Can't say it matters much anyway, though. I went and bought a second DS along with Mario Kart. My GF and I have been having a lot of fun with that.
"While they are both fun pieces of hardware in their own respect. I just have a thing for Nintendo and the fact that they still make games that are just fun. This is the same reason I prefer to have a Gamecube over other consoles and will probably buy a Revolution. I just like fun games."
Boy I hear that. I had a PSP for a short period of time. Even though I was having fun with Liberty City Stories, the machine still felt very much like a gadget. (as opposed to a game machine.) I ended up buying another DS for my girlfriend and a copy of Mario Kart. You mentioned just liking having games that are fun... I hear ya, man. Although I am getting called 'bastard' a lot these days.;)
"If it's anything like a MS Windows patch... the heart will work again for a little bit, but other major organs that iteract with the heart will cease to function correctly, and the new patch will somehow allow the heart to be more vulnerable to viruses."
Har harr harr heee heee heee giggle giggle *slapping knee* giggle snort.
Ooo! Tell us the one about the MS car that always crashes!
"Anyway, my answer to his problem is this: What about people who go into hypothermia in normal situations? Or people who are clinically dead but are then resuscitated?"
Depends on how you look at it. If you think of the soul as a form of energy that is trapped in your brain, then the picture gets a little clearer. You might be dead in the sense that your heart isn't beating, but obviously something is still working in your mind when you're reanimated.
I'm fuzzy on this topic, too. I saw a video of a man that had been in a coma since 1984. He woke up in... oh I want to say 04. He was not the same person. The way he talked, the way his memory worked, it was clear he had a lot of brain damage. If I imagine it like his soul disappeared, it makes sense in a weird way.
"Or how about this: If the soul goes to heaven immediately at the time of death, then what's the point of a Christian burial?"
I went to a Christian funeral a few years ago. The man who gave the sermon talked about how Mike was up there in heaven now and that his body was simply a shell. I wish I could quote his words verbatim, but that was so long ago. The ceremony seemed more about consoling the attendees than about doing the right thing with the body. I really feel like it was us he was giving all the attention to, not Mike. On the other hand, 'last rights' (or is it rites?) is delivered preferably before death.
Apologies in advance for not having a richer education on this topic to answer your question with.
Question: Would pressurizing these satellites help with the problem? (Yes, I know that has obvious problems, but I'm just trying to understand the static problem a little better.)
"If you were truly taking a principled stand, you would stop listening to the music altogether. It seems like you are trying to justify knowingly breaking the law with the reason "I like it." Interesting principled stand: "But I like it...."
If everybody had made that move, iTunes wouldn't be around today.
"You will never see a respected developer use jpeg compressed textures."
I wasn't suggesting they will. I was saying that more and more sophisticated compression is being used with every new generation of consoles. Compare FMV from the Sega CD to the original Playstation. Huge difference in quality. Why? More CPU cycles to play with. Blah blah blah.
As for developers never using JPEG, why? Off the top of my head, I figure the main problems would be decode time and the fact that lossy compression is not good for alpha masks. What's on your mind?
"Those bigger textures are going to take up quite a lot more space, so using current game sizes with current texture sizes to figure out if next-gen games will require more than the XBox discs can manage, isn't very useful."
Faster CPU == more compression on the textures. Quadrupling the res on the textures doesn't necessarily mean quadrupling the size requirments. Imagine using a 640 by 480 Gif image for the old console, then using a 1280 by 960 JPEG image on the next console. In one case I tried here, the.GIF was 155K and the JPG awas 197K. 4 times as many pixels, but it was only 30% or so bigger in terms of file size. This is more or less what happens when new consoles come along. More CPU == better compression etc.
I am having a hard time believing the idea that the media is going to make all that much difference between the PS3 and the 360. Both systems only have 512 meg of RAM to fill.
Slashdot Mirror
Heh. So my joke isn't funny until you're using it?
"Blew a gasket? You don't know trolls very well."
Heh. Yeah. "I mean to do that." Smooth.
Overrated? Oh, c'mon. Nintendo's well known for keeping the costs of their systems wihtin a certain price range. When prices on components go down a year or two after launch, they often go back and improve the system. In other words, yes, Nintendo intentionally 'de-sexys' their system. They probably could have released this exact system at launch, only it would have been around $200 instead of $150.
I figured by now (you know, after the release of the SP and more recently the version with the nicer screen. Or even the Micro...) this would have been a commonly accepted and well appreciated business model of Nintendo's, but maybe not. I guess it's easier to believe that Nintendo sabotages their own system so they can make money on the second release of it.
"The difference between you and I is that one of us recognizes this fact."
And that's supposed to be the guy saying stuff like "Are you going to tell your grandchildren about how you put your life on the line when the proxy server at work went down, or how you once suffered with a cellphone without a camera, or how many witty comments you made on slashdot?" because he blew a gasket over a Slashdot article?
"I'm starting to think that Nintendo intentionally de-sexys their first version of any portable, so they can release a hotter version a year later."
It's called "Keeping the price tag low".
"As if sitting in front of a computer isn't enough, your going to go home and watch tv? Get a life." ... said the guy named P3NIS_CLEAVER on Slashdot.
"Intel is seriously droping out of being serious contestant in current technology for quite some time now."
Not in the laptop space.
"By being able to complain about something makes them think they are smart because they knew enough about something to come up with a retort."
Oh please, only stupid people (unlike me) use this excuse.
"Off topic? You shall rue this day... Well go on, start ruing!"
...Men?
Hey! Wait! Mod me back up! I'll give you anything you want! Money!? Women??
"I got a PSP in November and I love it. Great for watching movies, listening to mp3s, playing of favorite games (emulated). It might not be for everyone, but I've really enjoyed mine."
I bought a PSP in December, and I hated it. Here's my little story:
I bought the $300 'giga-pack' which came with the 1 gig card. This seemed the only way to not get totally screwed on flash memory. (It was like $120 to buy the 1 gig card seperately, even though equivalent SD and Compact Flash was a lot cheaper...) When I got it home, I made a huge mess opening up the box. Man there was lots of crap in there. In retrospect, it wasn't all bad. Case for the unit, headphones + remote, cleaning cloth, etc. (my main reason for bitching about it was that it was a total pain in the ass to bundle all that shit back together into the box.)
When I turned it on, I noticed 4 stuck pixels on it. I'm not overly pissy about that considering that they're very small and barely noticable (I could only see them on black loading screens etc), but it does speak volumes about Sony's commitment to quality.
I played Liberty City Stories for a little while. I'm happy to report that loading times were not unreasonable and the game was actually quite fun. However, after about 15 minutes into it, something peculiar started to happen. Somehow the Home button was making contact with the casing. If I tapped the unit: "Would you like to quit this game?" would show up. (Note: This would NOT pause the game, either.) I lost a few missions this way. I'd try to shoot somebody and all the sudden the PSP thought I was pressing the Home button. Commitment to quality.
I took the PSP back to Best Buy to exchange it. They were out of 'Giga packs'. They sold out around Christmas, and honestly, I haven't been able to find any since. I asked them if they'd just open up one of the other PSP boxes and do a swap. No dice. (Although they did point out that they'd have been happy to do that had I paid for the replacement warranty. Assholes.)
I never got around to having much fun on that system, I'm sad to say. To Sony's credit, I think I was the victim of bad luck. Can't say it matters much anyway, though. I went and bought a second DS along with Mario Kart. My GF and I have been having a lot of fun with that.
"While they are both fun pieces of hardware in their own respect. I just have a thing for Nintendo and the fact that they still make games that are just fun. This is the same reason I prefer to have a Gamecube over other consoles and will probably buy a Revolution. I just like fun games."
;)
Boy I hear that. I had a PSP for a short period of time. Even though I was having fun with Liberty City Stories, the machine still felt very much like a gadget. (as opposed to a game machine.) I ended up buying another DS for my girlfriend and a copy of Mario Kart. You mentioned just liking having games that are fun... I hear ya, man. Although I am getting called 'bastard' a lot these days.
"(Yes, I realise people here are stuck to browse with what's at work, but it's still a extra blip of information)"
Normally I'd agree, but with all the browser zealousy going on, do we really want to feed the trolls?
I just bought Resident Evil 4 over the weekend. I'm having trouble buying this guy's argument.
"And, oh yeah, MS fanboys like you who have no sense of humor and can't take a joke."
Not at all. I laughed at that joke the first time I heard it back in 1999.
"FINALLY, there's hope for Dick Cheney! Now if only they knew how to grow a brain for Georie."
Ouch. Be careful with GWB jokes, they can really backfire!
"If it's anything like a MS Windows patch... the heart will work again for a little bit, but other major organs that iteract with the heart will cease to function correctly, and the new patch will somehow allow the heart to be more vulnerable to viruses."
Har harr harr heee heee heee giggle giggle *slapping knee* giggle snort.
Ooo! Tell us the one about the MS car that always crashes!
"Three words for you my friends: tax evasion scam."
He freezes himself shortly after death to evade paying taxes...?
"I've signed up for tons of stuff and nobody sends anything to my $sys$@gmail.com account."
At the risk of sounding like a total dumb ass, what does $sys$ mean?
"Another reason Apple's alliance with Intel wasn't such a good idea. Should have gone AMD, Steve."
I'd rather have an Intel processor in my iBook than an AMD.
"Anyway, my answer to his problem is this: What about people who go into hypothermia in normal situations?
Or people who are clinically dead but are then resuscitated?"
Depends on how you look at it. If you think of the soul as a form of energy that is trapped in your brain, then the picture gets a little clearer. You might be dead in the sense that your heart isn't beating, but obviously something is still working in your mind when you're reanimated.
I'm fuzzy on this topic, too. I saw a video of a man that had been in a coma since 1984. He woke up in... oh I want to say 04. He was not the same person. The way he talked, the way his memory worked, it was clear he had a lot of brain damage. If I imagine it like his soul disappeared, it makes sense in a weird way.
"Or how about this: If the soul goes to heaven immediately at the time of death, then what's the point of a Christian burial?"
I went to a Christian funeral a few years ago. The man who gave the sermon talked about how Mike was up there in heaven now and that his body was simply a shell. I wish I could quote his words verbatim, but that was so long ago. The ceremony seemed more about consoling the attendees than about doing the right thing with the body. I really feel like it was us he was giving all the attention to, not Mike. On the other hand, 'last rights' (or is it rites?) is delivered preferably before death.
Apologies in advance for not having a richer education on this topic to answer your question with.
Question: Would pressurizing these satellites help with the problem? (Yes, I know that has obvious problems, but I'm just trying to understand the static problem a little better.)
"If you were truly taking a principled stand, you would stop listening to the music altogether. It seems like you are trying to justify knowingly breaking the law with the reason "I like it." Interesting principled stand: "But I like it...."
If everybody had made that move, iTunes wouldn't be around today.
"You will never see a respected developer use jpeg compressed textures."
I wasn't suggesting they will. I was saying that more and more sophisticated compression is being used with every new generation of consoles. Compare FMV from the Sega CD to the original Playstation. Huge difference in quality. Why? More CPU cycles to play with. Blah blah blah.
As for developers never using JPEG, why? Off the top of my head, I figure the main problems would be decode time and the fact that lossy compression is not good for alpha masks. What's on your mind?
"Those bigger textures are going to take up quite a lot more space, so using current game sizes with current texture sizes to figure out if next-gen games will require more than the XBox discs can manage, isn't very useful."
.GIF was 155K and the JPG awas 197K. 4 times as many pixels, but it was only 30% or so bigger in terms of file size. This is more or less what happens when new consoles come along. More CPU == better compression etc.
Faster CPU == more compression on the textures. Quadrupling the res on the textures doesn't necessarily mean quadrupling the size requirments. Imagine using a 640 by 480 Gif image for the old console, then using a 1280 by 960 JPEG image on the next console. In one case I tried here, the
I am having a hard time believing the idea that the media is going to make all that much difference between the PS3 and the 360. Both systems only have 512 meg of RAM to fill.
"When PS3 games are coming in at 20+ gigs with insane textures on them I'm sure he will be glad he got that xpox360."
Both systems have the same amount of RAM, you're not going to see significantly better textures on one or the other. Wrong bottleneck.