Wednesday, May 5, 2004

Gmail Account -- 7:01 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

Thanks to J.t.Qbe, I am now the proud owner of a Google Mail account. It's hard to believe that people are selling their beta accounts for quite a bit of cash on eBay. I'm sure that J.t. and I will keep you posted on how the service progresses.

NGSCB aka Palladium Axed -- 6:31 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

Microsoft has decided to drop Next Generation Secure Computing Base, formerly known as Palladium. This would have thrust DRM on users who understandably were not exactly willing to give up control of their computers, especially not Microsoft. Check out Ars Technica's news blurb on it for a bit more detail. I just have two words to say: good riddance.

Longhorn "Average" Specs? -- 9:45 am CST, Update by A.T. Hun

It's hard to say how true this is since Longhorn is still a couple of years away (at least), but Microsoft Watch posted what they claim are "average" specs for a Longhorn machine. Read 'em and weep:

Microsoft is expected to recommend that the "average" Longhorn PC feature a dual-core CPU running at 4 to 6GHz; a minimum of 2 gigs of RAM; up to a terabyte of storage; a 1 Gbit, built-in, Ethernet-wired port and an 802.11g wireless link; and a graphics processor that runs three times faster than those on the market today.

The really sad thing with the software industry as a whole is that we've found absolutely nothing interesting or new to do with all of this CPU horsepower at our disposal other than bloat the operating system. I want to know what in the heck Longhorn is going to do with all of this power. No wonder MS keeps pushing it back. Thanks Slashdot.

J.t.Qbe comments: Maybe they're trying to shut out any competition. Well, this should be a real shot in the arm for the hardware industry: when MS starts forcing businesses to move to "Longhorn", they'll need to spend huge amounts of money to throw away the old PCs and buy the latest-and-greatest. Since I'm always way behind the bleeding edge (still running Windows 98 on my game system), I'll probably meet those specs around, oh, 2018 or so. Not that I'll be running "Longhorn" when I get there.

Tuesday, May 4, 2004

Tribes(x) Free Released -- 7:34 pm CST, Update by The Master

Dynamix has come through on it's promise to release the complete Tribes and Tribes II games as free download releases. Here's the links:

• Tribes (136mb): FilePlanet
• Tribes II (539 mb): Fileplanet.

Wow. You can download two complete games for the time of one demo nowadays. How the times have changed . . .

J.t.Qbe comments: If you're too lazy or bandwidth-challenged to download them, the latest issue of Computer Gaming World comes with a DVD containing both games. It'll probably cost you $8 or $9 at the store.

No Old News

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