(no subject)

[chipotle]

It's been another none-too-productive week at the ranch, but a fairly nice last few days nonetheless.

Yesterday I stayed home sick, but after having a surprising recovery in the afternoon (cough), I wandered about a few stores looking at Things To Eventually Purchase. Actually, in one case, the absence of things to eventually purchase: I'm still contemplating a digital camera, but not contemplating any of the ones I could find in stores, with the possible exception of the Sony DSC-F707. When I break down and get one it's likely to be an SLR.

The other thing I'm contemplating is a Nintendo GameCube. Why? I'm not entirely sure. I enjoy playing computer games sometimes--but usually in short doses. My PC isn't powerful to play modern computer games and I don't really want to commit to a huge online multiplayer mega-adventure. And, even if I did, upgrading the PC would cost almost as much as a GameCube anyway--a video card that doesn't suck is over $100, and a Celeron 433 processor is, by game standards, at the trailing edge of technology.

At the same time I'm thinking of getting more gadgets, I'm contemplating getting rid of a couple I already have. The scanner I got a couple months ago is a great scanner, but I have to face facts--for the use I'm likely to get out of it, I might as well scan the remaining film that I want digitized, sell this one and get a $99 flatbed. I'd also been considering selling my DVD player--it's progressive scan, DVD-Audio, DTS, and probably a few other buzzwords I'm forgetting. But I almost never watch DVDs.

Both of these purchases are ones I might well not have made if I'd been honest with myself beforehand. The scanner was mostly a purchase to convince myself not to get a digital camera--but, well, if I want to get 35mm film into my computer, I can get it "developed" to CD at most places now at a resolution at least as high as the flatbed could do it. And the DVD player purchase was made in blithe denial of the extreme lack of use I got from my laserdisc player. I told myself that was because I'd had the misfortune to get into laserdiscs as they were on their way out. And I did. But the main reason, I think, is that I just don't have much inclination to collect movies I've already seen and watch them over and over.

Unfortunately, I've confirmed that my PowerBook really sucks eggs as a DVD player connected to the TV, so my idea of using it as a replacement for occasional viewing won't pan out. I should be able to get $300 for the scanner (new two months ago it was $400), but I'll be lucky to get $150 for the DVD player, I suspect, which may make it not worth the effort--replacing it won't give me any profit.

Today, John Cooner and I wandered out to downtown Orlando and the Fringe Festival to see Toxic Audio, an a capella group that John told me about a couple weeks ago. They're a pretty amazing combination of singing group and comedy troupe. After that we went to a taqueria called Tijuana Flats. Pretty good food, and with a hot sauce bar--with serious hot sauces--rather than a salsa bar.

After that I stopped by Herbie Bearclaw's with John, but decided to bow out of watching "Dead Alive," an old Peter Jackson movie which is apparently considered one of the goriest films ever made. I'm told that in context it's kind of a witty spoof of gore movies, but my gore tolerance tends to be pretty low, so I bowed out. The night ended on a cheerfully surreal note at a rest stop, as I noted the security guard pulling up in a pickup-bed camper marked "Rest Stop Security" and getting out to strike up a conversation with two people at a picnic table who obviously not only knew him but were apparently expected. Questions: does the security guard sleep in the camper when he's not on duty? Does he live on site? And are those two people he talked to rest stop regulars?

Tomorrow (technically "later today") I should really see about writing some more. Yesterday I did get a few hundred words written on my current story, at least. I'll have to decide whether I'm coherent enough to try to do something with Mom for Mother's Day, too.

Comments

[kareem.livejournal.com]

Not to try and sway you, as I was thinking about getting a LameCube too, you should really think about upgrading your system. The main problem is that you can always upgrade your PC, while you can't usually upgrade a console (the expansion package for the N64 actually made games look nicer, but slowed them down).

I'm not using much of a system, really, in comparison to the stuff that's on the market today, but I've got no problem running any of the latest games. Sure, they might have to be run in a slightly lower resolution, to make up on Frame Rate, but hell, they look nice regardless.

---

800mhz Duron
256MG DDR RAM
GeForce 2 MX400 64MG
K7S5A Motherboard with SiS735 chipset (Award Winning!)

---

Now that's a fairly cheap system. Now remember, even though an upgrade might be slightly more expensive than a console, keep in mind that each console game is at a fixed price, way above PC titles of even the same game. I'm trying not to sound like a bean counter, but I'd go for the upgrade, every time.

Unless I was rich, then I'd buy everything, but hey. Oh, and don't get into MMORPGs. They're money vampires, and the relationship between them and their victim isn't very symbiotic.

[chipotle.livejournal.com]

I'm aware of the drawbacks to consoles. Nonetheless, there's a couple advantages . A console would be connected to the TV and my audio system; connecting the computer to the audio system is possible, but putting it in the center of the living area in place of the TV isn't really possible. It's easy to find places to rent console games if I don't want to buy them, but it's not too easy to rent PC games (most stores consider that an invitation to piracy, which it probably would be). And, actually, when I look at game prices, most titles come out at $40-50 for both PCs and consoles over here--the big difference seems to be that console games don't depreciate nearly as quickly. In under a year, new copies of the PC game will be down to $20; the console game will probably have only been marked down to $30-40. On the flip side, just like rental software, there's a big market for used console games which doesn't seem nearly as well-developed for the PC games.

And, there's the subtle question--do I want to get stuck in the upgrade cycle for PCs anyway? Neither my desktop nor laptop are blindingly fast. If I spend about $300 now for an "average" upgrade, DirectX 9 will be out at the end of this year. By the end of next year games will be on the market taking advantage of DirectX 9 specific features that my card doesn't support and the 800 MHz CPU that's at the "recommended" level now will be the "bare minimum" level. The lack of upgradabability in a console can be seen as a perverse advantage--as long as companies want to keep writing software for a console you've bought, they're never going to be writing software that targets hardware you don't have. (Setting aside software that requires odd accessories, but historically those game titles seem to be pretty rare.)

Of course, there's always the third choice: don't spend money on either of these things, since it'd probably behoove me to keep saving. I've decided to table the question until my next paycheck, which coincidentally is about the time that NetPoodles needs to release their most recent quarterly financial report. A lot of my plans, both frivolous and quite serious, might depend on whether that report paints a picture of a company with a future or a company that's continuing to rearrange deck chairs on the Titanic.

Re:

[kareem.livejournal.com]

Hey, I agree entirely, but my personal opinion is that dropping anchor on your computers technological progression is unwise, especially if you use it often. :)

[chipuni.livejournal.com]

My thoughts...

Okay... these thoughts come from a techno-geek who is constantly reading about computers (and biology), and whose job depends on him constantly learning, growing, and moving forward...

If what you have works for you, don't change. If you play games rarely, save your money.

Both of my computers are now considered trailing-edge. And I'm waiting one more year to upgrade, because they still do what I need.

Will the upgrade be like another DVD player for you... an expensive toy that you rarely use?

[chipotle.livejournal.com]

Will the upgrade be like another DVD player for you... an expensive toy that you rarely use?

It's quite possible. I used to be a tremendous game player--in the sense of quantity, not skill--but haven't been for years. On the other hand, I've liked "little" games I've played over the years that don't require a great deal of commitment on the part of players, and there have been console titles that I've liked. When I happened to live with a console game system--Higgins' Saturn--I played it a few times a week, at least. I'm just the sort who'll play for a half-hour at a time then maybe come back the next night. To me consoles deliver a better "experience" at that than PCs, with the possible exception of the MAME arcade emulator. :)

The few PC games that have really drawn me in have been, in no particular order, text adventures, King of Dragon Pass (a kind of kingdom management game with roleplaying aspects set in Glorantha, the world from the RuneQuest RPG), NetHack, and, of course, FurryMUCK. These are all things consoles can't do--and they're also things that fast graphic cards and CPUs aren't very important for.

So at this point, this is mostly idle musing about what I'll do when (and indeed, if) I decide I want to play arcade games. People have presented good arguments for getting a PC upgrade instead, but heck, if OS X had its act together with external monitor support (on my PowerBook, I can't run just the external monitor with the lid closed) I'd be tempted to get rid of the PC entirely. There's very little I use it for these days.

[tacit.livejournal.com]

"And, even if I did, upgrading the PC would cost almost as much as a GameCube anyway--a video card that doesn't suck is over $100, and a Celeron 433 processor is, by game standards, at the trailing edge of technology."

If you buy at a regular computer store, maybe. Buy at a hole-in-the-wall PC reseller and you'd be amazed what you can get. last week, i built myself a new 1.2Ghz Athlon XP system with 64MB accelerated AGP graphics card for about $420.

If you want to stay current, you have to keep upgrading video game consoles as well as PCs. But the advantage of the PC is that you can use it for things other than games. Today's fast PC is tomorrow's slow PC, but today's cutting-edge game console system is tomorrow's paperweight.

[kareem.livejournal.com]

Well, that's the thing isn't it. When you upgrade your PC, it opens up doors to quicker loading times and better performance across the board. You may well think that and $300 upgrade is pricey compared to a $160 GameCube, but you can't do 3D modelling on the latter. Still though, Chipotle's not stupid, and what works for one person may not for another. To be perfectly honest I was planning to get a GameCube before their launch over here. (Planning as in, looking at the posters and going, 'I wouldn't mind one of those' while I walked down the street). But, I'm under the impression they've got the Mac for CAD stuff. :)

[chipotle.livejournal.com]

Well, I've got the Mac for more 'serious' stuff, which is mostly going to be publishing and web development. If I wanted to get into computer animation or the like with any degree of seriousness, the upgrade to the computer would not be just $300. :) (A professional animation package like Maya "strongly recommends" not only 512M RAM but a professional OpenGL card, i.e., moving to the nVidia Quadro rather than nVidia GeForce. That latter requirement is one area where Macs can't compete with PCs currently, even though a lot of Mac partisans would string me up for pointing it out.)