Tuesday, May 2, 2000

New SB Live! Drivers -- 11:06 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

Creative has slapped up new drivers for their Sound Blaster Live! series of audio cards. You can download the new versions for Windows NT 4.0 or Windows 95/98. Here are the changes:

• Updated version of Surround Mixer 1.0 and AudioHQ.
• 1024-voice software MIDI synth for Sound Blaster Live! (Option to select up to 1024 software voices)
• Win95/98: Improved support for Occlusion and Obstruction effects in EAX2.0
• WinNT4:Automatic update of EAX1.0 to EAX2.0.

Thanks Voodoo Extreme for the links.

Game Servers Shut Down -- 10:57 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

Effective immediately, the EZ-Net game servers have been shut down to help test some bandwidth concerns. Hopefully, we will be able to start them back up before too long, but I would expect that they will be down for at least a couple of days. Sorry for any inconvenience this may cause. Believe you me, no one will be affected more than I will be :)

Installing NVIDIA's XFree 4.0 Drivers -- 3:49 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

As promised, I have posted a summary of my adventures installing the new NVIDIA beta XFree 4.0 drivers. Let's just say it was a very interesting trip. The good news is that I was rewarded for my efforts with Q3A timedemo scores that rival my Win32 scores. The bad news is that I managed to break XFS (the X Font Server), which just means that I'm without the use of TrueType fonts until I figure out how to fix it.

All this kind of reminds me of my old DOS days, struggling with QEMM to wrest every last byte of that precious first 640K. Ahh, those were the days.

J.t.Qbe comments: I'm still trying to get every possible byte out of that first 640K for the DOS games I'm still playing!

More M$ Insanity -- 2:16 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

According to this InfoWorld column, as of April 1, OEMs will no longer be able to give full copies of Microsoft OSs (except Windows 2000 Server) with the systems they sell. OEMs can either give "recovery CDs" or have a mirror on the hard drive. All of that is fine and good until you decide to a) upgrade your PC or b) your PC's hard drive crashes. M$ claims it is to reduce piracy. In reality it gives M$ the opportunity to charge full price for the OS without having to package anything, under the assumption that everyone who buys their software is a pirate. If this doesn't prove Microsoft's arrogance and contempt for their customers, I don't know what will. Thanks Ars Technica.

J.t.Qbe comments: Micro$oft's arrogance and contempt for its customers shows in many things it does: its old per-CPU licensing fees; Bill Gates' insistence that Windows has no bugs but that users are stupid; Windows itself. Really, have you ever tried to install Windows from an OEM package? Most home users simply wouldn't be able to do it. M$ doesn't care; it already has the money. Want to quit being a MicroSerf, paying what and when Bill tells you to pay? One word: Linux. One more word: FreeBSD.

Micro$oft is a master of dirty tricks. M$ won't ever get another penny from me. Too bad; Starlancer looks like a cool game.

It Works! -- 12:23 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

It wasn't pretty, but I got the new XFree86 4.0 drivers from NVIDIA to work! I'll write up a little article later telling you how I did it. Here's the good news. I installed the Quake III Arena demo for Linux and ran timedemos on DEMO001. Here are my results:

Win32: 44.8 fps

Run using the full version of Q3A patched to 1.16n with NVIDIA's 5.13 Detonator drivers in Windows 98.

Linux: 41.5 fps

Run using the Q3A Linux demo with NVIDIA's new beta XFree86 4.0 drivers in Red Hat 6.2.

Pretty slick, eh? Almost as fast as Windows! That is a dramatic improvement over the old NVIDIA drivers which sucked so badly they could suck a monkey through 25 feet of garden hose.

Mac UT 413 Patch -- 9:02 am CST, Update by A.T. Hun

At long last, Mac users can join Windows and Linux users in enjoying the 413 patch to Unreal Tournament. Westlake Interactive announced the patch's release yesterday. You can download it from one of their mirror sites (3.2M). Thanks Blue.

History today -- 8:33 am CST, Update by The Master

• 1519: Leonardo da Vinci dies.
• 1670: The Hudson Bay Company is chartered by King Charles II of England.
• 1863: Confederate General Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson was accidentally wounded by his own troops at Chancellorsville, VA. He died 8 days later of complications resulting from his wounds.
• 1936: "Peter and the Wolf" had it's world premiere in Moscow.
• 1945: The Soviet Union announces the fall of Berlin, and the Allies announce the surrender of Nazi troops in Italy and parts of Austria.
• 1965: The "Early Bird" satellite is used to transmit television signals across the Atlantic.
• 1972: J. Edgar Hoover dies in Washington D.C. at the age of 77.
• 1994: Nelson Mandella wins the first Democratic elections in South Africa.

More Meat -- 8:25 am CST, Update by The Master

The second installment in the Meatpak Q3A map series is available over on 3D-Downloads. Check it out-the Meatpak maps are really intriguing.

Monday, May 1, 2000

Starlancer Demo Soon(ish)? -- 10:08 am CST, Update by A.T. Hun

Voodoo Extreme posted a link to Starlancer Vault's Starlancer FAQ that contained this interesting nugget o' info:

When is the demo expected to come out?

The demo for StarLancer is expected to come out in the middle of May. You will be able to fly as a part of the Ronin in events prior to StarLancer just after the outbreak of the war.

Starlancer is the new Digital Anvil (led by Chris Roberts, the founder of the Wing Commander series) space sim. I'd definitely be interested in checking the demo out. I saw the full version in Best Buy yesterday. The box art made it look like an updated version of the original Wing Commander, which would have been enough for me to buy it on general principle if it would have been on sale. Check out the official Starlancer site for more information.

NVIDIA (Mis)Uses GPL'd Code -- 9:50 am CST, Update by A.T. Hun

It seems that someone found a bit of code that NVIDIA had used in their closed-source Linux drivers that was licensed under the General Public License (GPL). The GPL says, among other things, that since GPL'd source code is freely available if you use it in a project, your project's source code must also be freely available. Slashdot reports that someone informed NVIDIA of the problem and, through a polite discussion, the problem was resolved. It's nice to see that things can be "fixed" without resorting to lawsuits.

Take Two purchases GOD -- 9:27 am CST, Update by The Master

How's that for a subject? :-) According to this Press Release, Take Two has aquired Gathering of Developers-which will supposedly continue to operate as a wholly independent subsidiary. Thanks Blue.

Update: Mike Wilson updated his .plan with additional details on this aquisition. Sounds like a good deal at first glace.

History today -- 9:22 am CST, Update by The Master

• 1893: The World's Columbian Exposition was officially opened in Chicago.
• 1931: Empire State Building is dedicated in New York.
• 1941: Orson Welles "Citizen Kane" premieres in New York.
• 1948: North Korea is proclaimed as a state.
• 1960: A U-2 spyplane flown by Francis Gary Powers is shot down near Sverdlovsk in Soviet territory. Powers is captured.
• 1971: Amtrak begins operations.
• 1999: The "Liberty Bell 7", the Mercury space capsule piloted by Gus Grissom is found 300 miles southwest of Cape Canaveral, 38 years after it's loss at sea.

Past Two Days' News

The Haus is powered by:

All original information on this website is copyright © TheHaus.Net, 1999-2005. The use of original images, text, and/or code from this website without expressed written consent is prohibited. The authors of this site cannot be held responsible for any damage, real or imagined, which comes from the use of information presented on this site. All trademarks used are the properties of their respective owners. This site is not to be used as a floatation device (but if you try, I want a video tape of it).