Xbox 2 SDK Released On Mac G5? 527
Espectr0 writes "The Inquirer reports rumors, courtesy anonymous sources, that Microsoft has released the Xbox 2 SDK to select videogame developers, and they are using 'dual Apple Power Mac G5 systems running a custom Windows NT Kernel.' This ties up with earlier rumors which mention that the XBox 2 will be powered by the IBM chip, and ATI will be providing the video chip." The report also notes: "Interestingly, the SDK apparently also features an Apple logo on a side bar within the application."
Xbox (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Xbox (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Xbox (Score:5, Funny)
Yea, but nobody knows how the fuck you're supposed to pronounce it!
Re:Xbox (Score:5, Funny)
Yea, but nobody knows how the fuck you're supposed to pronounce it!
Oh-Sex-Box perhaps?
Re:Xbox (Score:5, Funny)
I like it. I'll take 4.
Re:Xbox (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Xbox (Score:5, Informative)
Nope. Because the GameCube has very little in common with a PC. It has a G3 CPU, then a massive all in one control chip that contains the ArtX designed GPU and other components.
The XBox on the other hand was very much like a computer.
YellowDog? Re:Xbox (Score:5, Interesting)
everyone knows Xbox and PS2 and all those game systems are sold at a loss, and they make up for it when users by software and maybe accessories. So the fact that someone will be selling hardware with a G5 for $600 won't matter too much. By the time the Xbox ships they may have 970/G5 chips in eMacs and they run about $1000 anyway.
Re:Xbox (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Xbox (Score:5, Funny)
Apples controllers would be all screwy, though, with the buttons on the wrong side of the remote and a plug that doesn't fit into any known port in the universe. However, it would be very easy to use, and would only occasionally cause the console to bluescreen. Oh, and it would be all white, with only one button-- a glowing green button labelled only as "Press." Pressing this button would cause a menu to pop up mid-game, with "iBrazen" and "Imagine" as the two choices. Selecting either one would go back to the game, with no noticeable effect.
It would also be programmed to suck when being used with 95% of modern games. The remaining 5% would consist entirely of rehashed board games, ports of classic arcade games, Myst, and Spaceward Ho!
(I own three Macs, which has helped me become acquainted with their limitations. I do actually like them, but they can be ornery at times.
Duh. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Duh. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Duh. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Duh. (Score:3, Funny)
Actually (Score:5, Funny)
Nahhh, no BSDs (Score:5, Funny)
They'll have those perdy Apple kernel panic screens that have been professionally designed by typographers.
Funny AND true (Score:4, Interesting)
Yup, in multiple languages. Check it [apple.com](scroll down - it wasn't pretty before 10.1).
I would like to see... (Score:5, Interesting)
Does anyone have a screenshot? I would like to see what size M$ put the logo.
Re:I would like to see... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I would like to see... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I would like to see... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:I would like to see... (Score:5, Interesting)
_screenBytes = (unsigned char *)CGDisplayBaseAddress(kCGDirectMainDisplay);
If it's some wacky NT derived OS though, who knows...
Microsoft uses a Phone-a-friend lifeline? (Score:5, Insightful)
Clearly, the final specs for the XBox2 aren't set in stone. So, since they can't deliver any XBox2 motherboards because they're not exactly fully designed yet, Apple's a reasonable place to turn for successful implementation of the IBM processor chips. It's likely that the Apple logo within the software was part of the price Microsoft had to pay for Apple's assitance in supplying a little help in writing that NT-on-PowerPC kernel...
Re:Microsoft uses a Phone-a-friend lifeline? (Score:5, Informative)
Here's a link [gte.net].
Re:Microsoft uses a Phone-a-friend lifeline? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Microsoft uses a Phone-a-friend lifeline? (Score:5, Interesting)
There is nothing, absolutely nothing, to run on NT/PPC except what comes on the Microsoft CD itself. I browsed the web, best as I could, using the IE 2.0 that everybody remembers less-than-fondly from their NT 4.0 install years back.
Then I formatted the drive, installed AIX on the box, and sold it on eBay.
PReP boxes like that RS/6000 box are extremely similar to PC's. It had built in S3-trio64 graphics, IDE and SCSI ports, PCI and ISA slots for regular expansion cards, used PS/2 keyboard and mouse, etc.
It's worth noting that Apple has moved closer and closer to the Commodity PC hardware scheme themselves. They use IDE drives now, based on the good old IBM PC-AT. They use the same memory technology as PCs. Not much in a modern Mac isn't commodity PC stuff, same chips and parts as any cloner puts on a motherboard.
Re:Microsoft uses a Phone-a-friend lifeline? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Microsoft uses a Phone-a-friend lifeline? (Score:4, Insightful)
It's interesting to see that we've reached a point where most OSes and software is portable enough to run on most 32- and 64-bit systems with little modification. (and where MS can switch CPU architectures without Xbox developers throwing a fit). A long way from the day of writing everything in assembly.
Re:Microsoft uses a Phone-a-friend lifeline? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Microsoft uses a Phone-a-friend lifeline? (Score:4, Informative)
The universe is always broken in this example, as there's nothing there to overwrite pChars[0]. pInts[1] == pChars[0] + sizeof(int). Since on no platform is zero the size of an int, pChars[0] (which was memset back to 0) will always be zero.
Endianness refers to the internal representation of the numbers, i.e. what's happening in pChars[3] through pChars[7]. The ints themselves still advance normally.
--Dan
www.doxpara.com
Re:Microsoft uses a Phone-a-friend lifeline? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Microsoft uses a Phone-a-friend lifeline? (Score:4, Informative)
Also, NT has been on PPC. NT 4.0 was available for x86, Alpha and PPC architectures. However the target of NT 4 PPC was IBM systems, not Macs. Neither it nor the Alpha version did well, so they were discontinued with Windows 2000.
The NT architecture is highly portable and was designed that way from the beginning. Porting it to a new chip is not a major feat. For something like the X-box, even easier since it runs a much stripped down version of Windows.
Re:Microsoft uses a Phone-a-friend lifeline? (Score:5, Funny)
Apple G5 Uses HyperTransport (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.apple.com/powermac/architecture.html
I believe that only AMD Opteron systems have a similar architecture.
While both PCs and Macs support the PCI, USB and Firewire standards, the connections between the chips that implement these standards is quite different.
Re:Microsoft uses a Phone-a-friend lifeline? (Score:5, Interesting)
Really, the difference is in the CPU and more importantly in the OS. The hardware is nothing special. They use harddrives from manufacutrers like Western Digital and Maxtor, graphics cards from nVidia and ATi, and so on. There isn't an underpants gnome in there that makes it a Mac or anything.
Re:Microsoft uses a Phone-a-friend lifeline? (Score:4, Funny)
XBox2 is going to be released in late 2005(read 2006). Wait a 'few years'(3+), and you will have an awesome system in every room in 2009.
Anxiously awaiting pics ;)
Re:Microsoft uses a Phone-a-friend lifeline? (Score:5, Informative)
XBox Emulation on the Mac (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:XBox Emulation on the Mac (Score:5, Interesting)
Somehow, the Wintel alliance seems to have broken up, and Intel's in danger of being voted out at the next tribal council now...
Re:XBox Emulation on the Mac (Score:5, Informative)
Re:XBox Emulation on the Mac (Score:5, Funny)
What's the funniest thing about IA-64?
More bits than users.
LOL!
Re:XBox Emulation on the Mac (Score:4, Informative)
Re:XBox Emulation on the Mac (Score:5, Informative)
Otherwise, there would be no point in AMD making chips.
Which is why AMD has a different set of X86 extensions to do mostly what MMX does compared to Intel, which was some of the first new tech on X86 chips that AMD could not duplicate (terms of the lawsuit judgement).
Intel tried to first kill AMD with MMX, but that did not really work as well as Intel wanted it to, as Microsoft kept their options open and also coded Windows 9x to use AMD's multimedia extensions as well.
At that time, while 99.5% compatibility between K5 and K6 chips with Intel-equivalents was there (which should have been good enough for everyone), there was quite an anti-AMD bias amongst those who bought computers in large quantities, because the occaisional problems with K5/K6-based computers at the time wasn't necessarily the CPU's fault, but crappy drivers and bad motherboards.
As it stands, how many companies (esp. Fortune 500) have tried to save a few thousand dollars on their big computer upgrade cycles by getting AMD-based instead of Intel-based computers for their Windows users? Not too many.
Yet somehow AMD has managed to find a niche in the computer market, and enough collective mindshare to survive to the point that now Intel is reacting to AMD's moves, not the other way around.
I know that the next x86-based computer I get/build will probably be AMD-64 based.
As much as I want one, I can't quite justify getting a new Macintosh. I don't do Photoshop, and too many of the things I do/like do not provide enough options for Macs.
Perhaps eventually (Score:5, Interesting)
So instead of just being a matter of emulating BIOS and then running the game, you have to emulate the environment, and translate things that can't be executed directly.
It's akin to DOS emulators like DOSBox on NT. You can't just run DOS programs straight, they try and do things that aren't allowed by NT security. So you have to emulate an environment. Some things you pass straight through, and just execute natively, like most Ring 3 code. Some things, you have to go and emulate or fake or translate.
Now on a Mac it gets even harder since the X-box speaks DirectX and so probably will the X-box 2. I mean it's an MS system, they are going to use their API. Well that means that whereas on a PC you could at least pass some of that on as is, or with minor translations, you have to translate the whole thing to an API the Mac speaks.
So it certianly is possible, and something we'll probably see in time, but not something that will be trivially easy.
Re:Perhaps eventually (Score:4, Informative)
The whole point of an API is that you have an abstraction AWAY from hardware to either make coding easier or code more portable.
Dual processor emulation... (Score:5, Interesting)
The Sega Saturn was a console with multiple processors, and to this day there is no decent Saturn emulator. The hardware set-up of the Saturn made it one of the most difficult to emulate systems thus far, this has long been known/commented on/talked about [emuunlim.com].
Just because something runs on X processor, does not mean that even a computer with the same processor, or even 2-3 times the processing power can emulate it. The N64 had a 93.75MHz processor, and 3d hardware archaic by todays standards, but most PC N64 emulators list 1ghz+ processors in their requirements.
Re:XBox Emulation on the Mac (Score:4, Insightful)
So, yeah, you're right to degree, but there's still emulation to be done here.
Well (Score:5, Interesting)
Heat (Score:5, Insightful)
It will be interesting to see how this plays out, though. Getting Windows to run on a new architecture will likely take more than a new kernel.
Money (Score:5, Insightful)
I would bet that IBM is probably going to sell the 970s for X-box 2s at close to cost. For them it's not a money making move, it's a publicity move. As of late IBM's chip division has kind been seen only as a high-end server/supercomputer thing. Thier midrange market is almost non existant and their embedded market has been shrinking. Well the 970 is a serious midrange contender and I'm sure they want people to know it. Being the chip in one of the big 3 consoles certianly goes a long way for that.
Re:Money (Score:5, Informative)
As of late IBM's chip division has kind been seen only as a high-end server/supercomputer thing. Thier midrange market is almost non existant and their embedded market has been shrinking. Well the 970 is a serious midrange contender and I'm sure they want people to know it.
"midrange" is a very subjective term. IBM has been making some of the G3s for Apple for some time. However, it is true that IBM processors generally go into their servers (This isn't limited to just "high-end" and supercomputers). You can buy a IBM p615 with a real POWER 4+ processor for a relatively affordable (depending on what you consider relatively affordable) price of $5745. But I do agree that their consumer processor business as well as embedded market has been shrinking.
Re:Money (Score:5, Informative)
"Well the 970 is a serious midrange contender and I'm sure they want people to know it. Being the chip in one of the big 3 consoles certianly goes a long way for that."
IBM doesn't just have 'a chip' in one of the big three consoles - it is making all the chips in all the consoles.
As well process innovations in fabrication will allow IBM to reduce the cost of production on the 970s over the lifespan of the X-Box 2 - in addition - economies of scale should kick in to a large degree considering the scale of the resource commitment for the cpu's in a console.
And lets not forget (Score:4, Insightful)
So as a long-term plan, this is A Smart Move.
The x86 crew are producing ever more power-hungry CPUs with each generation, on the other hand IBM is busily rolling out technology which goes in the opposite direction while still beating x86 architecture CPUs even with both hands tied behind its back.
Think in terms of them bringing out the xBox3, same basic platform (PPC) 30% of the power needs, significantly faster CPU overall. The time to migrate architectures is *now*, before all the *new features* (ie PC replacement type functionality) have been developed.
Who knows, perhaps one day we'll see the return of MS Supported OS and Apps on PPC?
IBM scores being the reborn center of The PC. MS scores as they have multiple architecture support. Apple might even score, and sell you a Mac you could load Windows on (yeah, there are all kinds of kinky people out there with some of the weirdest fetishes).
Intel and AMD? Well they'll need to pickup their CPU design skills and put out a quality processor instead of beating each other around the head and shoulders with market-speak.
Sounds to me like this sux for nobody.
Not Surprised (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Apple game console? (Score:4, Insightful)
Rumors (Score:4, Insightful)
Until then the SDK is just Vaporware.
Probably Piracy Prevention (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Probably Piracy Prevention (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, because that Xbox1 emulator scene on the PC is just booming... ;-)
You'll be able to run all kinds of games... (Score:5, Funny)
Perhaps.... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Perhaps.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Microsoft is also apparently updating Connectix's Virtual PC to run on G5, which could be used to help emulate the XBox on XBox2 should they choose to.
Re:Perhaps.... (Score:3, Interesting)
Windows on a mac (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Windows on a mac (Score:3, Interesting)
Very old news indeed. MS WNT started its life as MS OS/2 3.0 NT for the i860, later ported to the i960, then the Alpha, and finally the i386. There was port planned for the Clipper, a never released one for the SPARC, and commercial ones for MIPS and PowerPC.
Even MS W2K had an Alpha port that made it to the GM release but was never commercialised -- looks like there are OpenVMS diehards who still run this v
Re:Windows on a mac (Score:5, Insightful)
The reason you don't see it for Macs is monetary and licensing. Apple wouldn't be happy with them if they tried (might even wind up in court) and there'd be no economic incentive since a large majority of Mac users use Mac to NOT use Windows. Also, software would still have to be recompiled for the new processor. So it's not like there would be a huge library of apps out there.
That was the problem with NT on the Alpha. It was NT in every way, and all the included software worked great and very fast. However, there was very little effort on the part of software companies to release Alpha versions of their apps. There was an emulator out there that allowed x86 apps to execute on Alpha, but as with all emulators it was slow. Given that speed was the allure of the Alpha, most people elected to use the cheaper x86 if NT was what they needed.
Can't believe this hasn't already been posted. (Score:5, Funny)
burning bridges? (Score:5, Interesting)
On a more practical note this doesn't hold out much hope for XBOX-1 game compatibility, does it?
On Compatability (Score:5, Interesting)
So will that matter? It SAVED the PS2 early on, but who knows if it will be needed for the X-Box 2. I would REALLY love it to have the compatability (which they could still do through emulation, I suppose) but if they don't have it they could really shoot themselves in the foot. Videogamers have had that abaility for years on the GameBoy, and the PS2 has it now. This could be a real big deal, depending on what they decide. It's not like the X-Box has a huge library of major titles though (the PS1 did), so it might not be worth the effort.
As for some of the other decisions they have made, I'm not suprised. Intel was dumped both because they didn't have a 64 bit CPU (which doing all the stuff in games could be handy) and I'm guessing because of the heat problems (which have only gotten worse, and would make for one LOUD console). As for nVidia, many people believe that they lost the lead in the 3D race with this last generation (although new rumors over the next GeForce look amazing!), and if you combine that with when they asked for more money publicly and had a little tiff with MS over that, I'm not suprised that they're gone.
All and all, it should be very interesting to see this next generation. Between the X-Box 2, the PS3 (will it run PS1/2 games? What's up with cell?), and the Game Cube's successor (should also be interesting) we should be in for some interesting developments (not to say anything about Nintendo's DS, the GBA's eventual successor, the PSP, and the persistant rumors of MS looking at portables). Video game fans, get ready for some cool stuff!
XBox2 to be world's most expensive console... (Score:4, Interesting)
Seriously, how much is this thing gonna *cost*? The rumor I'm hearing everywhere is that the box will have three G5's and video superior to the current Radeon 9800. Dual G5's with a Radeon 9600 in an Apple wrapper costs nearly three grand! I mean, even if you drop the hard drive, you're knocking maybe $50 off of the cost to MS of this thing. Since Apple's hardware margins (once you take into account marketing, R&D, etc. - gross margins are higher) run about 4%, we're still talking about MS having north of $2500 in each of these units, unless component prices really drop by launch date.
I don't care how many launch titles it has, I'm not going to pay much more than $300 for a videogame system. I can't imagine anyone else will either. I don't see Microsoft being willing to lose $2200 on a console, then wait for me to buy 44 $50 games to make their money back.
What gives?
Re:XBox2 to be world's most expensive console... (Score:5, Insightful)
Besides, everything gets cheaper when you buy it in bulk...
remember the $99 mini-iPod (Score:5, Funny)
Whatever you read on the internet more than a year before a product's release is most likely baloney.
How about this rumor. Every XBox2 will have a miniaturized human inside. This will give the X2 far superior natural language handling capabilities. As an even greater benefit, thousands of lonely dorks all over the country will finally be able to strike up friendships with their game console.
I place the previous paragraph in the public domain. Please feel free to spread that rumor wherever.
You're not getting the big picture (Score:5, Insightful)
- plays next generation videogames
- plays DVDs (HD-DVD maybe?)
- acts as a PVR
- plays MP3/WMA music, with a nice on-screen browser
- acts as a server or client to distribute media
to all the TVs/stereos in your house (they are already doing this with XBOX and Windows MCE)
This is the goal of the XBox2. It is not just another videogame system. It is Microsoft's next attempt at becoming a real player in the consumer electronics market.
My guess (Score:5, Interesting)
If that is the case (no HD in Xbox2), I bet a Windows MCE computer will be required, to act as the server for your house. You can then have various Xbox2 systems as "clients" in each room in your house. http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2004/Jan
OR
Your data is stored on MS servers. You pay a monthly fee, like Xbox Live, and can stream your data for playback when needed.
Note to Bill... (Score:5, Interesting)
Reason for Sega Saturn's failure - lack of backward compatibility for Sega CD
Reason for Playstation 2's overwhelming success - presence of backward compatiblity for Playstation 1
Reason for X-Box 2's eventual failure - do I need to spell it out for you?
Well, I'm sure everyone is going to be happy to throw away their X-Box's, with its DX8 graphics, and resolution higher than most TV sets, and huge software library to buy a new X-Box 2, with its only slightly better graphics, at the same resolution without the ubergeek hacking potential.
Bill's short list of utter failures:
1990: MS-DOS 4
1995: Microsoft Bob
1999: Windows ME
2005: X-Box 2
But, hey, Microsoft is so big, that a huge failure can only mean one thing: Government Bailout!
Re:Note to Bill... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Note to Bill... (Score:4, Informative)
Splinter Cell is one game that uses NVIDIA proprietary stuff. If you don't use an NVIDIA >= GeForce3 (excluding the 4 MX series), you'll notice that the shadows in the PC version will run differently to the Xbox one, even with a Radeon 97/800 something.
Atomic MPC [atomicmpc.com.au] ran an article on how Splinter Cell was ported across four platforms. Very interesting read. The PlayStation 2 ended up being the worst of the lot.
Re:Note to Bill... (Score:3, Interesting)
None of the Ninetendo Series systems ever had backwards compat. They handled this by having huge increases in power between releases.
MS has never made money on the X-Box - it's vastly undersold pricewise compared to its hardware, hence everyone keeps trying to get an OS on it. Short term and medium term financial losses are part of MS's long term strategies for 90% of all its product lines.
MS owns one of the most popular x86 emulators around for PPC.
If you port, say, DirectX, to PPC the
Hmmmm (Score:5, Informative)
For Nintendo:
SNES: Success, not backward compatible with NES.
N64: Success, not backward compatible with SNES or NES.
Gamecube: Success, not backward compatible with N64, SNES, or NES.
For Sega:
Genesis: Success, not backward compatible with SMS.
Saturn: Failure, because of lack of 3d. The Saturn was designed to be the ultimate 2d console, which it was. 3d was an afterthought, and never worked well.
For Sony:
Playstation: Success, not compatible with ANY other system, being their first.
So it looks to me like backwards compatibility is a nice feature, nothing more. Nintendo, being the oldest company, is the most shining example. NONE of their consoles have been compatible. They thought about it with the SNES, hence the use of the 65C816 (which has a compatibility mode for 6502 code) but didn't end up doing it. The rest of the consoles aren't even remotely compatible. None the less, each has been a success.
What makes a console succede? Two main things:
1) Having flashy graphics to attract people, and the marketing to let people know about them. You may not, but most people gravitate towards pretty graphics.
2) More importantly: Good games. This is REALLY what makes or breaks a console. If your system has the games people want to play, they'll buy it. If it doesn't they won't. This is also a positive feedback loop since the more good games you have the more you sell and the more consolse you sell the more developers that will want to release for your console.
That's why Sony succeded, despite being new to the market. They released the games people wanted to play, and had stunning graphics for the time. Combine that with good marketing, you've got a winner.
Re:Note to Bill... (Score:4, Insightful)
You have very selective memory. Remember the Dreamcast? That came out way before the PS2. "High-quality third party support from the beginning"? Name one absolutely must-have launch title. The PS2 launch, by comparison to every other console this generation, was an absolute disaster. The must-have games didn't start to come to the system until a year later -- conveniently, just before the GC and XBox launched. But the first year for the PS2 was pretty damned lousy.
PPC vs x86 (Score:4, Interesting)
BUT What I thought was interesting want the article iself but rather a link to this article Xbox2 is Microsoft's attempt to replace PC [theinquirer.net]
I have looked at, or should I say drooled at some of the IBM big iron running the PPC architecture but never gave it much more thought, With IBM now cranking out some nice PPC silicon and MS Jumping on the PPC bandwagon albeit limited, I think I might have to look a little more
Any reccomendations on cheap, well reasonable used IBM PPC systems that are still of the same basic architecture of what is being sold now, like what will run RHEL 3 AS ?
This is really in Apple's best interest (Score:5, Interesting)
Windows on PPC is the goal (Score:5, Insightful)
What if instead of choosing PPC for the Xbox2 and porting Windows, they first chose to port Windows. Perhaps Xbox2 is a testbed for Windows-on-PPC, subsidizing the cost for writing the port through console licensing and mitigating the risk that PPC won't achieve wide adoption. The payoff is being able to continue to market Windows as a standard platform for both the desktop and server if PPC gains wider adoption.
With
The real race after Xbox2 comes out (Score:3, Informative)
Almost... (Score:3, Insightful)
Michael Hanscom almost blew the XBox2 story wide open back in October.
Remember when Microsoft fired that guy [michaelhanscom.com] because he mentioned that they bought G5s [michaelhanscom.com]. Too bad he didn't know anything about why they bought them.
Not Apple (Score:4, Insightful)
Slow Down! (Score:4, Funny)
...and the moon became as blood... (Score:5, Funny)
Could this be the REAL purpose of VirtualPC... (Score:5, Interesting)
I use a powerbook with Mac OS X. I've played with VirtualPC and it's not too bad for most things. It's definately not a substitute for a physical x86 machine for any really hairy apps like Oracle or say Pro/Engineer or heavy Photoshop usage(it's just for the sake of argument. I know, why use Windows Photoshop when there is a native mac version) Terminal Services/Remote Desktop is much better for that purpose. If the release of Xbox 2 is still a year or two off. I'm sure IBM will have ramped up the speed even more. possibly by that time a G5 would easily be able to emulate a PIII 500 or 733 or what ever lower end PIII the xbox was using thus solving the possible backward compatiblity problem
Well this is interesting (Score:5, Interesting)
I just don't see why we here even care what the hardware is in these boxes. In general, the user experience between all 3 of the current consoles is nearly identical. The Xbox is more geared toward online gaming than the others, but that's about it. I first played this one game on PS2 a couple months ago, and even though I am new to owning a console, I knew that I most likely would be able to get the exact same game for my GameCube and it would look and feel the same. Sure enough, I picked it up for the same price and it was essentially the same game. Considering the GameCube media has maybe a third of the storage capacity of the full DVD media found in the other 2 consoles, this is kind of surprising, but shows that games still aren't that huge on the most part.
What I am really trying to get at here is we can admire and debate the specs of these consoles, but these specs have little to do with the fact that there hasn't really been any innovation since the first game console, unless you consider 3D and vibrating controllers amazing innovations (no, I'm not discrediting these ideas, but little has been done to make games more enjoyable to play, they're only more enjoyable to look at).
Re:Could it be a first????Post that is... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Porting software (Score:4, Insightful)
Microsoft does NOT own part of Apple! (Score:5, Insightful)
August 6, 1997- Microsoft agreed to purchase $150 million in non-voting Apple preferred stock. Note that it was NON-VOTING stock-- so essentially this was just a goodwill investment in Apple. Microsoft was required to hold the stock for at least 3 years before selling. Another clause of this investment was that Microsoft was to continue to produce Macintosh products, including all new versions of the Microsoft Office product, for a period of five years. In exchange, Apple would make Internet Explorer the default web browser on Macs, and not sue the living hell out of Microsoft.* Microsoft has since sold all of this stock, at a nice profit, I might add. This agreement expired in August 2002, and since then MS has occasionally made noise about discontinuing Mac Office. Apple is also no longer bound to the terms of this agreement, so expect to see IE vanish from new Macs as soon as Apple's Safari browser goes 1.0.
* Strong rumors from several sources indicate that the 1997 deal was the public portion of a settlement made after Apple discovered substantial patent and/or copyright infringment by MS in Windows. Word is that there was a meeting between senior Apple and MS officials where Apple laid out the evidence and an ultimatum. Personally, I think there is some credibility to this, as Microsoft rarely if ever does anything that could be deemed 'nice,' especially to a competitor. There is, however, another school of thought that says Microsoft was only acting in their own self-interest, propping up Apple so they would have a competitor to point to when the antitrust thing really built up some steam. I question the use of the term 'propping up,' as Apple had a few billion in the bank at the time and did not need the $150M, and the government would have realized that.
Web Browsers (Score:3, Informative)
Just a tidbit of info. My version of Safari seems to be v1.2. IE is still included with the freshest build of Panther, but it is no longer the default browser.
Wrong, wrong, wrong (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Wrong, wrong, wrong (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Wrong, wrong, wrong (Score:4, Insightful)
(Of course, the people who modded me as off-topic presumably didn't see the post I was replying to, because it's currently at -1.)
Re:NT? (Score:3, Informative)
WinXP = NT 5.1 (Score:5, Informative)
Windows 2K is NT 5.0 and Windows XP is NT 5.1. Server 2003 is NT 5.2. These are the official version strings from Microsoft.
There is very little under-the-hood change between Windows 2000 (NT 5.0) and Windows XP (NT 5.1) aside from GUI modifications. From an application's point of view (or even a power user who makes all of his settings via the registry) there is not much different between the two. A lot of little things have been refined and updated, yes, but nothing huge.
And really... Win2K (NT 5.0) isn't a whole lot more than NT 4.0 SP4/SP5 + modern version of Direct X + modern drivers + light GUI polish. When NT 4 first shipped it did not come with Internet Explorer... later versions included a standalone version of IE... and still later versions included the deeply-rooted IE that we know and hate today.
NT 3.x was pretty archaic *looking* (Windows 3.x GUI, ugh!!) but still had most of the guts that NT 4 later used....
Call it what you will, but NT was the best thing Microsoft has ever done. We could all be using a heavily patched version of Win95 running atop DOS 7. "Win98 Seventh Edition!"
Re:First post? (Score:3, Interesting)
Maybe it's all
Re:Xbox2: Pirates and PPC hardware... (Score:4, Interesting)
Actually, it wasn't so easy. Still to this day the Linux/XBox project isn't finished; you still need a modchip.
Everyone in the world uses PCs, and the software was easily ported, and the hardware easily understood. Microsoft will _not_ make the same mistake again.
Wrong again. Microsoft tried a new Xbox release with a tougher hardware configuration to break, and, lo and behold, it was immediately broken by the Linux on Xbox team.
You have to remember that the PPC only has about 1% of the global computing marketshare.
Man, can you get ANY of your facts straight? The current marketshare for Macs is 3% worldwide. However, since Mac users hang onto their expensive hardware longer, the real number of Mac users is very likely to be a couple of percentage points higher.
It is a platform that is always the _last_ to get any homebrew apps, like ports of utilities to transfer or unpack xbox isos for instance.
Yeah, that's definitely the software I had in mind as the standard of a homebrew app which everyone wants. Name ONE technology and/or application which is really useful or necessary, and I will show you a Mac implementation of it. Oracle? Oracle9i exists for the Mac. A good music player? How about iTunes. Linux software? I can run it all on the Mac thanks to X11 and the FINK project. Games? More than enough, although I will venture to say that if it's lots of games you want, get a Playstation II. Rapid development of apps with distributed compiling? Try xcode and CodeWarrior. Web Browsers? Safari beats the pants off of Internet Explorer in speed, stability, tabbed browsing, googling, and many other features. Email? Apple Mail far outdoes Outlook, but you can also run Outlook on the Mac (hint: they named it Entourage). Office? It exists on the Mac, along with all of the open source competitors OpenOffice, AbiWord, etc. Firewall? Built-in. Stability? I reboot my Mac every three months. Web,FTP, and Windows file server? Built-in. VNC and VPN? Also there.
There just arent enough people on Mac. If you take the 1-2% of the global computer base, then take the fraction of a percent of that which are people capable of writing programs, and then the fraction of them who have time to make a mac app to interface a game console etc.. I think you're left with 3 people, and from what I'm told, they live in Sweden.
Hmmm, since there are over 20,000 applications written by Mac developers since I checked last year, those 3 Swedish guys must be exhausted!
As if switching to a virtually unknown hardware platform wasn't enough...
Perhaps it is unknown to you... I think you failed to notice that the Linux on Xbox team is moving their work to the GameCube, most notably because it also runs on PPC. This wasn't an easy task since the Gamecube has such limited options for transferring data. If Microsoft really wants to keep the XBOX2 from being appealing to modders, they will learn from Nintendo, which did an excellent job at keeping the modders away.