If it comes out this year, or in 2011, will people still want it? I'm sure it will hurt them, the engine is getting old, fans are feeling alienated. Way to blow a fantastic franchise Valve.
And yet people still put faith into Activision/Blizzard that by the time they get around to the third installment of Starcraft2, they won't have lost interest/developers/goodfaith and will put out something at the same quality (if they ever get around to it) as the first 'third' of the game.
That's cute but if you put those small motherboards in a small case, what's going to happen with all that heat generated by the processor and all the other components for that matter?
I've built several systems using these small form factor items, and with careful placement I've built fanless systems that are still running 2-3 years later. I was on a budget, so I dind't use flash storage, and even then, the heat remained 'manageable'.
What I would do today is this: I'd run a standard wall-wart power supply to provide the DC power and thus remove the powersupply as part of the equation. I'd use the mounting as a heat-sink near the heat generating portions of the board. I'd also use a flash drive for data storage. I didn't do any of those things with my current setup and as I mentioned, it is running well.
These boards are getting very close in size to some of the microcontrollers I've worked with in the past (HC12, etc) It was just for college, and I've no real world experience in them, so I was wondering if some of the more advanced hobby builders or professionals could comment on this:
These boards are getting much lower in power-consumption and seem to offer a lot more in terms of flexibility, and by providing the ability to run standard operating systems through the use of SSDs you have available to you a vast number of open projects which you can tailor for your purposes. The cost is now around $100 or so, which is what I remember the microcontrollers costing.
So, given the choice between some of the newer mini-ITX systems, what are the advantages that a basic microcontroller would offer?
(Again, it's been a while since I did anything with them, so I might be missing something big)
Only if you have two functional eyes. Non- depth perception 3D is perfectly acceptable to use with only one eye. New polarised glasses do nothing for those with only one eye, if games start going in the direction of requiring depth perception of the type requiring two eyes, that just fucks up gaming for them. Sure they could still enjoy a movie but playing a game where they have to interact at $distance?
Just like switching from monochrome displays destroyed gaming for me due to my colorblindness.
Granted, I'd much prefer that game designers don't do fucking retarded interfaces in which choices are presented as viable by shifting the color from a light grey to a light green.
But somehow I managed to beat Freespace2. (Though that game and it's ship loadout screen will forever be my example of the worst interface for colorblind people in the history of interfaces. It was like they took the damned color pallete straight from the Ishihara test, and to this day, is the only scenario where I actually saw that pallete used in real life and was impacted by my colorblindess)
Oh, you wanted an easy solution that didn't entail you having to change your lifestyle any? Try at the next kiosk - there may be a politician willing to lie to you at that one
Actually I was just hoping for a solution that had a basis in reality and had a hope of actually being pulled off.
I'll tell you what, when you can figure out a way for me to pay the rent to live close enough to a major city to do what you are asking (remember, everyone else will be moving closer as well), then maybe we can think about your 'solution'.
10 miles per US gallon = 23.52 L/100km (mind-bogglingly bad) 20 miles per US gallon = 11.76 L/100km (very bad) 33 miles per US gallon = 7.13 L/100km (OK for SUV, not so good for a car) 50 miles per US gallon = 4.7 L/100km (good for medium or large car, not so good for compact car)
Maybe where diesel is a viable option for engines I'd agree with those numbers. Here in the US you have the option for Gasoline, and not much else. I remember I wasn't permitted to purchase a new diesel vehicle due to emissions standards (which came from California and New York copied)
All those new German diesel passenger vehicles? You aren't allowed to register them in 5 US states.
Ill challenge the notion that end-users will need retraining. Have you tried to use anything under a Linux Desktop? There would not need to be any retraining as it works the same as the XP, 2000, etc. desktop.
Sure it does. If all you do is click on the little icon on the desktop. I hope you like tickets, because you are going to get a hell of a lot.
BTW, how much do you think it costs that Fortune 500 company if the users even spend 15 minutes figuring out the new desktop?
Desktop support techs would need minimal retraining as it can be set up with buttons from the L1 point of view to fix or restore an image.
This I cannot believe. You are telling me that it would just take a minimum of training to train your techs to learn an entirely new operating system?
Are you assuming that every desktop in that Fortune 500 company is identical? I've been an engineer for a Fortune 500 company and we never even had a single department with a uniform desktop environment.
As to the admins, fire them and hire new ones that know how to manage Linux systems. It is getting harder and harder to find a windows admin that dose not know how to manage linux.
Yeah, that would be inexpensive. And an interesting way that you think you can avoid the training costs.
As to "Those handy applications" Name one! Everyone talks about how the apps would need to be rewritten but what apps? Let me see what is installed on my desktop Ms Office, Outlook, Adobe Reader, Roxio CD/DVD Creator, Symantec Antivirus, Symantec Firewall, Firefox, and a custom Helpdesk app that opens IE and takes me to the webpage for Helpdesk.
That is it and this is a standard desktop install here. Every bit of it can be replaced and run on linux
How much do YOU need to manage your servers? Not much, as they are pretty much designed to be handled remotely.
Now are you going to tell me that there are no apps that the finance guys use that aren't available on Linux, no apps that the engineers use? No apps that management uses?
but no, we get a 2 month training window to re-train all the employees on the use of the new Office version... Yet my suggestion to switch to Open Office was shot down with the "It will cost too much to re-train".. no wonder I quit and left that company.
Have you seen how much has changed since Office2000? Those 'simple' shifts in how things are arranged, let alone the damned ribbon concept, threw people for a loop. I freaking hate Word 2007 with how things are arranged and I've been using it for over a year now, and I'M the guy that's supposed to pick up these things quickly. At home I do use OpenOffice, but damned if that isn't as big or bigger of a change to users than the switch from Office 2003 to 2007.
If you quit your job because of that, then you probably shouldn't have picked a career in IT where not everyone is IT.
If they had both followed the speed limit in force at the location, neither accident would have occurred. How is that not related to speeding?
I know it sounds pedantic, but it's the same situation as outdriving your headlights. Depending on the conditions, you could be doing 30MPH in a 45MPH zone and STILL be driving dangerously.
The only real solution is near 100% enforcement - either the law will be generally accepted or you'll finally manage to piss off so many people that the law is changed.
So when I get a ticket driving through Louisiana, how many pissed off out of staters will it take to get the law changed? Or do laws have to be so draconian so that significantly impact the day to day lives of everyone before we can decide that they are probably bad laws?
And that's why you can get a ticket for speeding ("too fast for conditions") even if you are going the posted speed limit or less. Or it may be written for careless or wreckless.
I had a ticket written like that. Except according to NOAA, it was 70F and sunny at Noon when the ticket was written. It was also physically impossible for me to violate the speed limit at that location due to the fact that my car couldn't break the speed limit in under the 25 feet from my driveway.
The cop didn't show up and the judge STILL tried to convict me until he got to the part where the cop forgot to even fill in what method he used to determine that I was driving too fast. If I hadn't lived on that road for 25 years, I'd probably have had to pay the $150 ticket (so much for a reasonable fine for a minor infraction)
Now, how much of a tax increase can I put you down for?
Would it be such a horrible thing to see the true cost of our services bundled to a direct tax?
Actually, that would be pretty damned awesome. It would be a hell of a lot better than having the fund for a service split between Hotel Room taxes, Alcohol tax, income tax, telecom surcharges, beverage taxes, alcohol license fees, fines, and 50c per drink served at the bar (isn't that something Pittsburgh implemented?)
People drive like idiots and then have the balls to complain about tickets. How many accidents are caused by people driving too fast with limited visibility? How many accidents are caused by people racing a yellow light? How is getting to your destination five minutes sooner worth the added risk of getting someone else injured or killed?
If anything, the penalties for moving violations aren't harsh enough. People don't realize that a car going 60MPH has more potential for damage than a bullet. People get shot every day and live; you don't walk away from being body-slammed by a pickup truck at 60 MPH.
The bad joke is because you WERE being melodramatic.
You argue that penalties should be harsher, yet you don't give any reasons other than 'I have an emotional reaction to the concept of people breaking the speed limit' without any consideration for just how much danger you are adding. You haven't proven that breaking the speed limit should be treated with harsher penalties, you haven't even shown that the penalties we have aren't already too harsh.
It wasn't speed that hurt your mother, it was an inattentive driver who didn't drive at a speed that allowed him to stop in time before the point where his vision ends.
Lets say he rearended your mother but the speed limit where it happened was 60MPH. Would that change the outcome? No, he was still not paying attention to the road and adjusting his speed to compensate for not being able to see around the bend. That he wasn't violating an ordinance would be of no comfort to you would it?
We can't rely on speed limits to tell us exactly what speed to drive, they might be outdated, they might be wrong, and when you rely on something like that telling you what is 'safe' you get into trouble.
Most people realize that it's rather stupid to make yourself look like a jerk and prejudice the jury and judge against you by doing so.
I'm talking about after the verdict is rendered. Though even before the verdict is rendered, if the judge lets a 1.5 trillion dollar case proceed, I think he deserves the contempt.
My grandmother was nearly killed by a driver going 70 in a 55 zone. Sure "everyone" drives that fast on that mountain highway, but that means that "everyone" is also running the very real risk of running in to someone turning left in an area with rather limited visibility.
I was nearly killed when the combination of letters you just typed nearly caused my monitor to explode. In fact, the excess current that my monitor had to draw to render the black from the extra quotes you put there nearly caused the local power generator to overload and cut off power to a hospital.
Yeah, cause the best way to respond is to do something that is guaranteed to piss off the court and get yourself into a bigger mess.
What are they going to do? Throw you in prison? Oh noes, contempt of court charges! You can take the fine out of my bank account that is currently overdrawn to the tune of $-1,500,000,000,000.00
If you ever put me that far into debt, it's like tunneling through the world and coming out the other side, the punishment loops around. You have set the punishment to such a ridiculous level that you have effectively made me my own sovereign entity since nothing you can do starts to approach what you have already done.
And no, I don't consider threat of prison to be greater than eternal slavery.
Is there anyway you could have said that and come off as more of an elitist douche bag?
Well, it's obvious that the only correct opinions can come from those who live in highly urbanized environments. And if you disagree, you are obviously wrong. My highly cultured urbanized way of thinking is clearly better, because there is no culture outside of the major cities. Just stay the hell out of my way and accept what's best for you.
Unfortunately, if you're serious about boycotting a company then that means avoiding the good as well as the bad. If you say "I'll never but from Sony again. Except this eReader" then you're not really serious about boycotting.
Exactly, Sony's eReaders have been pretty much well reviewed. If it wasn't for them being a Sony product, I probably would have purchased one.
Sometimes it isn't easy to participate in a boycott. In fact, the best boycotts are those that can persist through inconvenience.
I'm not sure why you want to hate on the Sony reader.
I don't hate on their reader. I hate on Sony.
Rootkits in CDs, built to spec DVD players that force me to watch 5 previews and 2 copyright warnings and disable just skipping to the damned DVD menu (Or perish the thought, just playing the damned movie), Removing other OS from the PS3 and since the upgrades are required for new games, effectively banning me from new games if I want to keep linux on my PS3.
Their products are generally sound, and their eReaders are very nice, but the company is not one I care to send my money to based on their anti-consumer practices. (That ignores their whole music-branch which for their participation in the absurd copyright infringement lawsuits means I will not even go to the concert of a band that is signed with them)
So Apple is out, as well as Sony. I agree with your sentiment, I really do want some of these products, but I'm fed up with the companies that present them.
I'm in the market for several new products:
1. Smartphone I want to ditch AT&T and would like something that is as flexible as my older generation jailbroken iPhone. (VNC, Strong developer base, etc)
2. eReader Though eInk displays are pretty much all the same, anyone have any luck with an eReader that isn't Sony but lets you have flexibility with the device?
3. A non-rented media recorder ie: Non-Tivo and non-TV company owned. Is MythTV really the only option right now?
4. Unicorns. I mean, as long as I'm asking I might as well get it all out there.
Slashdot Mirror
If it comes out this year, or in 2011, will people still want it? I'm sure it will hurt them, the engine is getting old, fans are feeling alienated. Way to blow a fantastic franchise Valve.
And yet people still put faith into Activision/Blizzard that by the time they get around to the third installment of Starcraft2, they won't have lost interest/developers/goodfaith and will put out something at the same quality (if they ever get around to it) as the first 'third' of the game.
That's cute but if you put those small motherboards in a small case, what's going to happen with all that heat generated by the processor and all the other components for that matter?
I've built several systems using these small form factor items, and with careful placement I've built fanless systems that are still running 2-3 years later. I was on a budget, so I dind't use flash storage, and even then, the heat remained 'manageable'.
What I would do today is this: I'd run a standard wall-wart power supply to provide the DC power and thus remove the powersupply as part of the equation. I'd use the mounting as a heat-sink near the heat generating portions of the board. I'd also use a flash drive for data storage. I didn't do any of those things with my current setup and as I mentioned, it is running well.
These boards are getting very close in size to some of the microcontrollers I've worked with in the past (HC12, etc) It was just for college, and I've no real world experience in them, so I was wondering if some of the more advanced hobby builders or professionals could comment on this:
These boards are getting much lower in power-consumption and seem to offer a lot more in terms of flexibility, and by providing the ability to run standard operating systems through the use of SSDs you have available to you a vast number of open projects which you can tailor for your purposes. The cost is now around $100 or so, which is what I remember the microcontrollers costing.
So, given the choice between some of the newer mini-ITX systems, what are the advantages that a basic microcontroller would offer?
(Again, it's been a while since I did anything with them, so I might be missing something big)
Only if you have two functional eyes. Non- depth perception 3D is perfectly acceptable to use with only one eye. New polarised glasses do nothing for those with only one eye, if games start going in the direction of requiring depth perception of the type requiring two eyes, that just fucks up gaming for them. Sure they could still enjoy a movie but playing a game where they have to interact at $distance?
Just like switching from monochrome displays destroyed gaming for me due to my colorblindness.
Granted, I'd much prefer that game designers don't do fucking retarded interfaces in which choices are presented as viable by shifting the color from a light grey to a light green.
But somehow I managed to beat Freespace2. (Though that game and it's ship loadout screen will forever be my example of the worst interface for colorblind people in the history of interfaces. It was like they took the damned color pallete straight from the Ishihara test, and to this day, is the only scenario where I actually saw that pallete used in real life and was impacted by my colorblindess)
Oh, you wanted an easy solution that didn't entail you having to change your lifestyle any? Try at the next kiosk - there may be a politician willing to lie to you at that one
Actually I was just hoping for a solution that had a basis in reality and had a hope of actually being pulled off.
I'll tell you what, when you can figure out a way for me to pay the rent to live close enough to a major city to do what you are asking (remember, everyone else will be moving closer as well), then maybe we can think about your 'solution'.
10 miles per US gallon = 23.52 L/100km (mind-bogglingly bad)
20 miles per US gallon = 11.76 L/100km (very bad)
33 miles per US gallon = 7.13 L/100km (OK for SUV, not so good for a car)
50 miles per US gallon = 4.7 L/100km (good for medium or large car, not so good for compact car)
Maybe where diesel is a viable option for engines I'd agree with those numbers. Here in the US you have the option for Gasoline, and not much else. I remember I wasn't permitted to purchase a new diesel vehicle due to emissions standards (which came from California and New York copied)
All those new German diesel passenger vehicles? You aren't allowed to register them in 5 US states.
Ill challenge the notion that end-users will need retraining. Have you tried to use anything under a Linux Desktop? There would not need to be any retraining as it works the same as the XP, 2000, etc. desktop.
Sure it does. If all you do is click on the little icon on the desktop. I hope you like tickets, because you are going to get a hell of a lot.
BTW, how much do you think it costs that Fortune 500 company if the users even spend 15 minutes figuring out the new desktop?
Desktop support techs would need minimal retraining as it can be set up with buttons from the L1 point of view to fix or restore an image.
This I cannot believe. You are telling me that it would just take a minimum of training to train your techs to learn an entirely new operating system?
Are you assuming that every desktop in that Fortune 500 company is identical? I've been an engineer for a Fortune 500 company and we never even had a single department with a uniform desktop environment.
As to the admins, fire them and hire new ones that know how to manage Linux systems. It is getting harder and harder to find a windows admin that dose not know how to manage linux.
Yeah, that would be inexpensive. And an interesting way that you think you can avoid the training costs.
As to "Those handy applications" Name one! Everyone talks about how the apps would need to be rewritten but what apps? Let me see what is installed on my desktop Ms Office, Outlook, Adobe Reader, Roxio CD/DVD Creator, Symantec Antivirus, Symantec Firewall, Firefox, and a custom Helpdesk app that opens IE and takes me to the webpage for Helpdesk.
That is it and this is a standard desktop install here. Every bit of it can be replaced and run on linux
How much do YOU need to manage your servers? Not much, as they are pretty much designed to be handled remotely.
Now are you going to tell me that there are no apps that the finance guys use that aren't available on Linux, no apps that the engineers use? No apps that management uses?
But just to cover this angle completely:
http://www.3ds.com/products/
As far as I know, not available for Linux, and used throughout the industry.
but no, we get a 2 month training window to re-train all the employees on the use of the new Office version... Yet my suggestion to switch to Open Office was shot down with the "It will cost too much to re-train".. no wonder I quit and left that company.
Have you seen how much has changed since Office2000? Those 'simple' shifts in how things are arranged, let alone the damned ribbon concept, threw people for a loop. I freaking hate Word 2007 with how things are arranged and I've been using it for over a year now, and I'M the guy that's supposed to pick up these things quickly. At home I do use OpenOffice, but damned if that isn't as big or bigger of a change to users than the switch from Office 2003 to 2007.
If you quit your job because of that, then you probably shouldn't have picked a career in IT where not everyone is IT.
If they had both followed the speed limit in force at the location, neither accident would have occurred. How is that not related to speeding?
I know it sounds pedantic, but it's the same situation as outdriving your headlights. Depending on the conditions, you could be doing 30MPH in a 45MPH zone and STILL be driving dangerously.
The only real solution is near 100% enforcement - either the law will be generally accepted or you'll finally manage to piss off so many people that the law is changed.
So when I get a ticket driving through Louisiana, how many pissed off out of staters will it take to get the law changed? Or do laws have to be so draconian so that significantly impact the day to day lives of everyone before we can decide that they are probably bad laws?
And that's why you can get a ticket for speeding ("too fast for conditions") even if you are going the posted speed limit or less. Or it may be written for careless or wreckless.
I had a ticket written like that. Except according to NOAA, it was 70F and sunny at Noon when the ticket was written. It was also physically impossible for me to violate the speed limit at that location due to the fact that my car couldn't break the speed limit in under the 25 feet from my driveway.
The cop didn't show up and the judge STILL tried to convict me until he got to the part where the cop forgot to even fill in what method he used to determine that I was driving too fast. If I hadn't lived on that road for 25 years, I'd probably have had to pay the $150 ticket (so much for a reasonable fine for a minor infraction)
First time I've ever heard that one. But I haven't spent much time in TX (I assume you're there). Seems odd.
I've been pulled over many times for 'reports of someone matching your description'.
"Really officer, I must be the first white guy driving a Buick you have seen all day."
Now, how much of a tax increase can I put you down for?
Would it be such a horrible thing to see the true cost of our services bundled to a direct tax?
Actually, that would be pretty damned awesome. It would be a hell of a lot better than having the fund for a service split between Hotel Room taxes, Alcohol tax, income tax, telecom surcharges, beverage taxes, alcohol license fees, fines, and 50c per drink served at the bar (isn't that something Pittsburgh implemented?)
Having a single x% Police tax would be a godsend.
but do you really think that lack of enforcement is the best way to solve that problem?
I have a problem that the enforcement seems more tied to revenue than safety.
People drive like idiots and then have the balls to complain about tickets. How many accidents are caused by people driving too fast with limited visibility? How many accidents are caused by people racing a yellow light? How is getting to your destination five minutes sooner worth the added risk of getting someone else injured or killed?
If anything, the penalties for moving violations aren't harsh enough. People don't realize that a car going 60MPH has more potential for damage than a bullet. People get shot every day and live; you don't walk away from being body-slammed by a pickup truck at 60 MPH.
The bad joke is because you WERE being melodramatic.
You argue that penalties should be harsher, yet you don't give any reasons other than 'I have an emotional reaction to the concept of people breaking the speed limit' without any consideration for just how much danger you are adding. You haven't proven that breaking the speed limit should be treated with harsher penalties, you haven't even shown that the penalties we have aren't already too harsh.
It wasn't speed that hurt your mother, it was an inattentive driver who didn't drive at a speed that allowed him to stop in time before the point where his vision ends.
Lets say he rearended your mother but the speed limit where it happened was 60MPH. Would that change the outcome? No, he was still not paying attention to the road and adjusting his speed to compensate for not being able to see around the bend. That he wasn't violating an ordinance would be of no comfort to you would it?
We can't rely on speed limits to tell us exactly what speed to drive, they might be outdated, they might be wrong, and when you rely on something like that telling you what is 'safe' you get into trouble.
How is that statements contradictory? All man has the inalienable right to freedom of speech.
It's another matter whether they still have freedom after speech.
There is a delay before many of your comments are published. That delay is to ensure that they are properly censored.
Most people realize that it's rather stupid to make yourself look like a jerk and prejudice the jury and judge against you by doing so.
I'm talking about after the verdict is rendered. Though even before the verdict is rendered, if the judge lets a 1.5 trillion dollar case proceed, I think he deserves the contempt.
I wonder why the city had a .com to begin with - it would've been more appropriate to have a .us or .gov
Well, since the police became a tool for revenue generation, it would seem that .com is highly appropriate.
However technically right you may be this is playing with fire while surrounded by dynamite.
The level of enjoyment in an activity is often directly proportional to the level of risk associated with the activity.
Playing with fire wouldn't be nearly as amazing of fun if there wasn't a risk of getting burned.
My grandmother was nearly killed by a driver going 70 in a 55 zone. Sure "everyone" drives that fast on that mountain highway, but that means that "everyone" is also running the very real risk of running in to someone turning left in an area with rather limited visibility.
I was nearly killed when the combination of letters you just typed nearly caused my monitor to explode. In fact, the excess current that my monitor had to draw to render the black from the extra quotes you put there nearly caused the local power generator to overload and cut off power to a hospital.
How could you be so inconsiderate?
Yeah, cause the best way to respond is to do something that is guaranteed to piss off the court and get yourself into a bigger mess.
What are they going to do? Throw you in prison? Oh noes, contempt of court charges! You can take the fine out of my bank account that is currently overdrawn to the tune of $-1,500,000,000,000.00
If you ever put me that far into debt, it's like tunneling through the world and coming out the other side, the punishment loops around. You have set the punishment to such a ridiculous level that you have effectively made me my own sovereign entity since nothing you can do starts to approach what you have already done.
And no, I don't consider threat of prison to be greater than eternal slavery.
Is there anyway you could have said that and come off as more of an elitist douche bag?
Well, it's obvious that the only correct opinions can come from those who live in highly urbanized environments. And if you disagree, you are obviously wrong. My highly cultured urbanized way of thinking is clearly better, because there is no culture outside of the major cities. Just stay the hell out of my way and accept what's best for you.
Unfortunately, if you're serious about boycotting a company then that means avoiding the good as well as the bad. If you say "I'll never but from Sony again. Except this eReader" then you're not really serious about boycotting.
Exactly, Sony's eReaders have been pretty much well reviewed. If it wasn't for them being a Sony product, I probably would have purchased one.
Sometimes it isn't easy to participate in a boycott. In fact, the best boycotts are those that can persist through inconvenience.
I'm not sure why you want to hate on the Sony reader.
I don't hate on their reader. I hate on Sony.
Rootkits in CDs, built to spec DVD players that force me to watch 5 previews and 2 copyright warnings and disable just skipping to the damned DVD menu (Or perish the thought, just playing the damned movie), Removing other OS from the PS3 and since the upgrades are required for new games, effectively banning me from new games if I want to keep linux on my PS3.
Their products are generally sound, and their eReaders are very nice, but the company is not one I care to send my money to based on their anti-consumer practices. (That ignores their whole music-branch which for their participation in the absurd copyright infringement lawsuits means I will not even go to the concert of a band that is signed with them)
So Apple is out, as well as Sony.
I agree with your sentiment, I really do want some of these products, but I'm fed up with the companies that present them.
I'm in the market for several new products:
1. Smartphone
I want to ditch AT&T and would like something that is as flexible as my older generation jailbroken iPhone. (VNC, Strong developer base, etc)
2. eReader
Though eInk displays are pretty much all the same, anyone have any luck with an eReader that isn't Sony but lets you have flexibility with the device?
3. A non-rented media recorder
ie: Non-Tivo and non-TV company owned. Is MythTV really the only option right now?
4. Unicorns.
I mean, as long as I'm asking I might as well get it all out there.