Bits and Bytes

[Lex]

Please post any new technical developments in production now that will have up to a dramatic impact on other HTPC, HDTPC, or just performance desktops.

New means developed or enhanced this year and representing current technology.

Enjoy!

Lex




Cable Guy DVD Collection

[JonMarsh]

Nothing is new under the sun, and everything is new when you first experience it.

So I decided to try out an M-Audio 24/96 card for the PC. It's on order, probably be in by the end of the week, and will go into the living room HTPC.

I'm planning to build a new gaming PC, the SB Live Platinum 5.1 from the living room system will go into it- and I'm going RETRO! for the video card, 3DFX, so I can run the cool older games that are 3DFX only, like some of the Origin sims and Wing Commander titles, and Independence War, etc. And the ones written primarily for 3DFX, and don't run for cr*p on DirectX.

Not my old Voodoo2, but a last generation 5500. Should be a hoot.

I've been working seven days a week for over a month now, so I apologize for my absence. I *may* get this weekend off- we'll see.

So, what's going to affect everyone? My money is on Windows XP- can't live with Micr$oft, but you may not be able to live without this OS if it's promise is realized in the shipping version. The most significant OS upgrade for the consumer since 95. I've turned into one of those people that loves to hate a lot of the things Microsoft does, but WIN2K and WINXP go some ways to redeeming all the other B$.

Best to everyone,

Jon




Earth First!
_______________________________
We'll screw up the other planets later....

[Andrew Pratt]

Jon what are your thoughts on technology like bluetooth?

[JonMarsh]

Hi Andrew,

That's an interesting question- and it depends on how attractive or "necessary" the technology is to end users, and how quickly it's debugged.

The company I work for, Infineon, is big in Bluetooth development (not in my group; I'm in power semiconductors), and we're betting pretty heavily on it. To the best of my knowledge, it's not quite ready for prime time, yet- very few folks' demos at CEBIT this year actually worked properly, and interoperability is stil an issue. This isn't uncommon in new techologies.

How consumers react, well, you can can answer that yourself- is there a Bluetooth application or announced product that you find compelling, as a "must have" technology or feature? Me, I'm just starting to use USB for more than a mouse, and USB 2.0 is just around the corner. Wireless sounds cool in principle, but how will it playout in practice? I have used wireless mouse, keyboard; liked the former, the latter wasn't reliable enough.

In a sense, though, I'm not the right guy to be asking- for some of the new fangled stuff I like to play with, like PC-DVD, projectors, high end PCs, SACD, etc., I'm a somewhat retro kind of guy technology wise. I'm old enough to have started and worked for years with vacuum tubes, though not old enought yet to qualify for AARP (boy, did I ever milk that when ThomasW hit that milestone!).

I think along the lines that digital fuel injection and ingnition control on a motorcyle is a good thing, because it extends the performance envelope and economy; I look at things like GM's "On Star" with thinly disguised distaste, as just a clever way to milk extra money from consumers.

So, I tend to be slow to embrace new technologies on the PC, unless I see a clear functional and quality advantage, for the things that are important to me. Those things boil down to performance, storage, and data integrity. I'm still using SCSI, I'm still a big fan of MO drives, because of their compact size, media stability, etc. I'm fascinated with current CPU design phiolosphies and trade-offs; it's one of the most interesting times we live in for that.

But so far, Bluetooth hasn't caught fire for me. But then, I dont' have a PDA or a cellular phone, either. Just call me Retro-Techno. But I do have five PC's in my home. Not counting the company laptop.

Regards,

Jon




Earth First!
_______________________________
We'll screw up the other planets later....

[Andrew Pratt]

I get the feeling that the PC industry is moving far faster then the consumers so there's a lot of great products that don't make b/c they are ahead of their time. Time will tell if Bluetooth is one of them but I can easily see the need for it. You are starting to see more and more people thinking wireless so I think it will happen just maybe not as quick as some of us would like

[Lex]

Good post Jon. Interesting stuff. Whew 5 PCs, you got me beat. just 3 and a laptop here, that are real computers, and 1 paperweight oldie that runs DOS and is a dual flopping system, you know, the big 5.25s, no hard drive! lol.

Lex




Cable Guy DVD Collection