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GeoForce2 GTS 3D BLASTER AGP Launches
What are you paying? UK wise at least, the average street prices is a not so generous £259.
Begger that, get the Creative Labs version from Buy.Com for just £214.50 (£182.55 ex vat).
You will of course want a suitable motherboard to get the best out of your new video card.
Like the Tyan Tiger 133 (S1834) perhaps? I like VERY much!
15th June BT update
It is this persons humble opinion that as far as Surftime and ADSL are concerned, they have'nt got a clue! Like parrots they reel of extracts from the BT website, most of which haven't been revised this past year.
*Throws his hands into the air, exasperated and utters a string of oaths...*
Meanwhile, from less moribund shores...
"AltaVista Internet Access will launch on 30 June 2000. This product is just the start of AltaVista's intention to lead and encourage the British public through the next stage of the internet revolution. It will initially cost £51 (+VAT) [a year - PA], and will enable the user to seamlessly transfer into the new flat rate access product as soon as possible"
Just BT trying it on ?
A group representing European telecoms operators has called for EU member states to stick to the agreed deadline of unbundling the local loop by the end of 2000 - or risk losing jobs.
Computer Weekly [link to article dead]
BT.CON ?
Tried to get Surftime ? Duh! Excuse me Mr "I know what's best for Britain" Bonfield, but have I got STUPID tattoed on my forehead. I don't think so. Why not just come out in the open and say, I'm getting this additional £3 million bonus in my pay for delaying unmetered Internet access to the bitter end.
Do I sound bitter enough? Nah, family site and I can't put into words the frustration I feel. Read on...
First off, the completely untrained operators may tell you that so far 46 ISP's in the UK offer Surftime, as stated on the freephone ISP list and their website. Until you push them or look closer, that is.
My last visit showed 46 ISPS listed. Amazing! Of these:
- 1 = Freeserve
- 2 = Plusnet (2 x Plusnet)
- 4 = BT (2 x BT Connect, 2 x BT Internet)
- 39 = they are all part of Affinity Internet! I'm inclined to wonder if these are part of BT myself!
Yep, only FOUR companies actually offer Surftime:
Affinity Internet
PlusNet
BT Click for Business and
BT Internet
Freeserve - Now Wanadoo
OK, OK. Let's order it anyway...
Needs a special disk, available only on request and subject to delays of 4-10 days.
I've been waiting awhile now!
Is SurfTime available to all customers on 1 June 2000? asks BT's website.
Has ANYONE got it, I am forced to ask!
Now here's a TRUE scenario :
Mr Business: Can I have order Surftime ?
BT Business sales: Sorry, not available until October at the earliest...
Mr Residential - at same address: Can I have order Surftime ?
BT Residential sales: Sorry, not available until 12th June, but you need to order a disk...
Mr Business - Irate: Listen sunshine, about this Surftime...
BT Business sales: Who told you that lie? Oh, Residential. Hmmm. Well, if you pay us £30.50 + vat we'll give you a new number and you can have it from July 12th...
Mr Business - Really Irate: Are you taking the ... And anyway I was told June 12th. and anyway...
BT Business sales: Not all of the exchange is upgraded. July 1st then you can have it...
I am continually fobbed off until I point out that, yes, I know exactly think you are trying to say and want to speak to someone who knows his backside from his elbow. I've yet to meet that person despite spending several days on the phone to clueless BT personel in Cardiff, Liverpool, London, Preston...
Needles to say the few people who DO know are never at there desks and never returns calls...
"BT is currently building the necessary network infrastructure to provide SurfTime throughout the UK. It will be nationally available from November 2000 and we have provided OfTel and Industry with full details of our rollout plan."
Yes, well.
"If you try to order SurfTime on bt.com on 1 June and the service is currently unavailable on your telephone line you can log your interest (online) and BT will notify you by email when the service is available to you.
From current experiences, I don't believe!
"Customers also need to check with their chosen ISP that they are able to support SurfTime on the customers telephone exchange."
Under such ridiculous Terms and Conditions that no virtually no ISP in the country will touch it...
"16. Can I stay connected all the time?
SurfTime is not intended to support continuous or unattended Internet access. BT continuously monitors its network and takes measures to control congestion if there is evidence that this is occurring. If usage is such that it is significantly affecting service to other users of our network then BT will instigate congestion control measures. Individual Internet Service Providers may additionally take measures to limit the length of calls, or otherwise control the use of their service, as is current practice."
17. Will you prevent people from staying on-line?
BT would not expect to prevent people from staying online, however if a single or group of customers' usage prevents other customers from using BT's network services then BT may need to intervene. If customers want always-on services then they would be advised to lease a private circuit as many businesses already do or take ADSL when available.
A vague way of saying they really don't want you to have this and are watching what you are doing...
BT staff CLAIM they are rushing this out as fast as possible...
This again, I feel, is a lie, but one that the other telephone companies are party to.
No, surely not, they are making MAJOR investments, upgrades take time etc etc.
Bull!
The truth is out there!
EVERYTHING that BT seem to be doing, as I feel are Telewest and the others is to tie you into contracts to THEIR services.
Think I'm wrong? Want to sue the tail off me for slandering the great British incumbents?
Well, consider this, as with Family and Friends, Key Numbers or any other service the telephone companies have an interesting option. At a stroke they COULD assign 100% discount to one number. That number could be your Aunt Fanny or ANY ISP you choice. No roll-outs, no engineers, no expensive and futile short term upgrades. The upgrades would be the province of your chosen ISP...
Crunch time
BT Internet will cost me £10 a month, the line another £14, the Surftime a further £23.
Total being about £47 a month for a 56kb/s connection - WHEN I can get it.
ADSL is, of course, I faint blip on the horizon towards never never land...
OR, for an extra £2 a month I can have 512kb/s without Telewests Blueyonder.
AND I can have it today, allowing a few days to install, naturally.
Conclusion?
BT REALLY ARE taking the proverbial but my experiences with Telewest have so soured me I'm loath to have them throwing thick co-ax all other the house.
End scenario?
If you're all so soft as to let them walk all over you like raggedy doormats I think I'll beggar off home to Canada and leave you to it...
NOW I'M REALLY P'D!
After the horrible debacle with Telewest I returned triumphant to BT, awaiting the 24 / 7 internet access via BT's Surftime. It is only on the day it's released that I am told that, sorry, but we had to keep it a secret that only a few exchanges would actually allow it - and you ain't one of them.
If you did that in my country, well you wouldn't. If simply wouldn't be allowed. Gods I hate England!
Tell see what Oftel have to say about it, hmm!?
Incidentally, a quick call to Telewest confirms they STILL haven't got a date for their unmetered Internet package that they offered in March and revoked because people were actually using it! Lots of people.
Just wait till a real company like MCI Worldcom gets their feet into the country. That'll sort them!
Intel cuts prices
Here's the latest reductions are on .18 micron processors, apart for one item, the 500MHz .25 micron Celeron. All prices are for quantities of 1000. (1st June 2000)
Xeon:
- 933Mhz $794
- 866Mhz $612
- 800MHz $435
- 733MHz $425 (May price)
- 700MHz $1,980 - 2Mb on-die cache
- 700MHz $1,177 - 1Mb on-die cache
Coppermine:
- 1GHz $990
- 933MHz $744
- 866MHz $612
- 850MHz $733 (May price)
- 800MHz $435 (May price)
- 750MHz $455 (May price)
- 733MHz $337 (May price)
- 700MHz $316 (May price)
- 666MHz $193
- 650MHz $193
- 600MHz $193
Celeron:
- 600MHz $112
- 566MHz $103 (May price)
- 533MHz $93 (May price)
- 500MHz $69 (.25 micron)
Wanna ramp up Quake 3 ?
Adverts are already promising the Creative GeoForce 2 and 3Dfx's 5500, should be shipping real soon now. Get the cutting edge and stay ahead of the crowd, 'til November at least !
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27th March 2000
Aureal not so sound
Can't say I ever bothered with Aureal products myself, but they are invariably well recieved in the reviews I've read. Anyway, follow the [dead link] to see why their legal battle with Creative is sending them to the wall.
Interested in MS Directx [8] beta testing? Well, it you have the skills and interest and think you fit the bill, follow the link.
Quake, rattle and roll-out
For the gamers out there, things are just getting better. [www.3dfx.com ] 3Dfx's site is full of the cheer of it's new chipsets. And from The Register and other trade orientated techie sites, if not Nvidia's site, leak details of the upcoming NV15 and NV20.
Rather than fill the news section, I've put the details in my fledgling Video Cards page where they belong, for those that are interested.
All revved up and no-where to go?
Tell me, what is the point it whacking out £200-£400 on the fastest video card if your monitor just isn't up to par? Well, it's your lucky day Sir, step this way. Roll up, roll up, feast yer eyes on this beauty. Come on, don't be shy, she'll not bite...
Build up aside, check out Mitsubishi's new Diamond Pro 2040u (replaces the 2020u). I've seen it, touched it and I want one. Today would be nice. And they are available in the UK at last.
Features a eye watering 22 inch Natural Flat CRT with .24 uni-pitch aperture grille and new high efficiency phosphors for superior corner-to-corner focus and brightness uniformity, advanced colour calibration, up and downstream USB ports, with resolutions of up to 1800 x 1440, given the right card
If the very reasonable street price (just £639 + vat at Dabs Direct) is a tad rich, then consider the rest of the Mitsubishi monitor range, like the The Diamond Plus 200, less expensive but still formidable 22" DIAMONDTRON NF (Natural Flat) monitor that delivers exceptional resolution and screen performance.
22nd March 2000
Nvidia NV15 to clock to 200MHz
Reports abound ober the net that the next gen GeoForce is coming :-)
Nvidia's NV15 is expected clock around 200 MHz and offer 64MB of double data rate (DDR) memory for the "pro" version. According to
The Register, "Creative Labs will be the first off the mark with a product, and its likely name will be the 3D Blaster GeForce 2."
"The fill rate may be as high as 1600 million pixels per second, a figure four times greater than previous cards based on the NV10 - the current Geforce256 - processor. That means we can expect 80FPS in Quake 3 at a resolution of 1024x768 in 32-bit colour. The transform and lighting (T&L) features will be augmented by clipping, which is expected to increase the performance of the chip. ®" Nvidia has the T&L support in both the upcoming NV11 and NV15 chipsets, which support DirectX 7 and also some of the features of DirectX 8 - due out later this year.
Other toys Nvidia are releasing / have just announced include a motherboard chipset with integrated 3D (and T&L support), and it's new TNT2, using the Vanta LT3D chips.
Things not to do in a hurry...
I recieve a lot of tech newsletters and masses of stuff on ADSL, which I more or less keep up with. With me so far, well I've a bit more time on my hands lately so I added a number of the AD&D (roleplay) groups to my lists. Only added an extra 100+ messages a day to my in-box...
21st March 2000
While BT differ about offering adsl for fear of affecting their outrageous leased line profits they may want to consider a report by Frost & Sullivan, predicting cable modem growth in Europe rising from the current $162.3m to $5.59bn by 2006. Benelux and Scandanavian coutrries, who offered cable access around late 1998, lead the market, taking 70.4% of revenues.
20th March 2000
Yet more folk to offer unmetered access
You can add LineOne [now Tiscali owned] and Quip (a UK telecoms firm) to the growing list willing to pay BT for your call. The package will be available from 31st March and includes free Net calls, no subscription charge and discounted national and international calls.
The offer costs £20 for a dialler (ad streams coming to a browser near you?) and you have spent at least £5 a month on phone calls. That's £30 a month cheaper that BT's grudging offer...
It's easy money that it will be grossly oversubscribed, but I'm hedging by bets and showing at interest as I already have an account with them, even if I never use it much.
UK surfers will want to check out the new Unmetered Internet page
Backed up your disk lately?
Try backing up this wee beauty from IBM's storage division. As the name suggests, the Deskstar 75GXP has 75Gb of storage space, runs a sleek 7200 rpm and has an average seek time of 8.5ms. I've not checked out the full range yet but it's a safe bet it includes a selection of IDE, SCSI and SCA to suit all tastes, with a suitable range of cache options...
Can I come in please?
MS is, as we all know, fiercely pro Internet. And swears blind by Windows 2000* which has, of course, been fully bug tested prior to release (*with it's 63,000 "features" to be corrected at a later date). Which is why, of course (*grins*), IT WEEK reported on an Internet Explorer glitch. Apparently, IE 5.0 with 128bit encryption will stop users logging in to the W2000 system. Version 5.01 is supplied with the O/S and doesn't have the problem, but it still smacks of a rushed release.
Some friends asked if I had it installed. My answer? At a trade preview they offer Windows 2000 ProFFessional at a discount for quantity (6+). Would you install a product with some 30 million lines of code when they can't even spell check the promotional literature?
Who's code is it anyway?
Office 2000, what a suite! My cousin occasionally uses this for his web pages. Great. Write a document, save as a web page - jobs a good 'un. NOT! Not withstanding backwards compatibility with non-MS browsers, have you ever seen such gargage!
I can't be bothered giving samples etc, but I wrote two web pages to test this. Mine, like all my pages, was done with a simple text editor, then again with Office 2000. The page reads:
"The cat sat on the mat"
That's it, no pictures, line breaks, fancy colours, nada.
The text editor runs to 22 bytes.
The word export runs to 1,650 bytes.
I wrote an article on system architecture which I've yet to post (needs tidying up). The exported html file is
321kb (with another 670kb in the images directory). As a straight html file, it's just 92kb, plus the pictures.
The word file itself is a stomping 2,163kb. Is it any wander the bandwidth is getting soaked up?
It's not just me getting old and cynical (which I am), it's just another symptom of the mess society is in. I won't taint this site with moral stances ("don't even go there, man!"), but I truly wish humans could get out of this obsession of a quick buck, an easy life, so what if someone else gets wasted...
Clocks ticking and I have to say to mankind, sorry y'all they don't make batteries for that thing any more.
*Holds hands up*
*Sighs* long and hard
I know a number of D&D'ers visit the site and a fair number will use the TSR Core Rules coded by Evermore. For those who do, have you ever saved your character as html? Masses of information, tables, image. The coding would take hours, literally. And it is superb! Not just good, but brilliant - put these guys on a pedestal, type good.
And Microsoft, for all it's R&D billions... Dah, wake up guys. It's c**p, pure and utter garbage. The generated source code screams "Look at me, I'm 100% Seattle. You are using Explorer to look at me, aren't you."
Why? *Holds hands up* again. It's a long time since I did any real programming, but I suspect I'd hate to work for MS. They employ - or more often buy - the best people in the world, then turn out all that sloppy code. What a waste, all that creative talent, turned to mush!
*Rubs hands together*
Corel draws Linux 2.4
Ever since I first tried CorelDraw it the late '80s I've loved the company (v4.0 was a dog mind!) and it is with great delight that I say Corel are planning a full monty for Linux in the autumn. The bundle is said to include CorelLinux (using the upcoming 2.4 kernal) along with WordPerfectOffice 2000, PhotoPaint 9 and CorelDraw 9.
CorelDraw 10 should be out in the fall too, but much as I love the company, every second release tends to be rough around the gills, CorelDraw 8.0 being the only real exception. We shall see.
17th March 2000
Want a good giggle?
Highly paid, long term employee:
What do you mean, I'm not getting any severance pay!
HR Manager:
We didn't think you wanted it.
Highly paid, long term employee:
Are you taking the p***?
HR Manager:
Well, it's not as if it's any use to you!
Highly paid, long term employee, getting aggravated:
We are talking £xx,000. What the bl***y h*** makes you think I don't want it?
This continued in a similar line for a while, ending in legal action and would have been hilarious but for two minor details, the Personnel Officer in question belongs to part of a global corporation, a household name no less, and the employee is me. Needless to say I am livid! Outcome pending...
Given the above debacle I'm embroiled in I think I can be forgiven for not updating the site these past few days!
So, what's been happening? Well, BT has done another complete about face on unmetered access, announcing the availability of Surftime (mk III) - in the next month or so. And jolly decent it is too. Makes BT's home page too, no less. Reasonably priced, by their standards at any rate, and coming to an ISP near you real soon now - or not!
Dirty B's that they are, they have glossed over the small print. AOL, suitably incessed, put the matter straight in an exclusive with The Register [article link dead]
£20 a month for 24/7 access.
Yep. Copy that.
Not actually OK'd by Oftel.
Read that caveat somewhere, yes. Carry on.
That's for the first part of the connection.
Hmmm?
Give in to the unwashed? Can't have that, what! Let's charge the ISP's to connect from the local to the regional exchange.
(That local loop monopoly thing again).
How much?
Jolly wheez, haven't decided, per minute metered I should think. Of course they'll have to pass the cost on to the great unwashed, but leaves our hands clean. Have the spin boys put something together...
What if those ISP chappies say it's not fair?
Got that covered - they can buy modems in the local exchange.
WHAT? Buy them them from whom?
That would be us. More champagne with that caviar, Charles?
Overly sarcastic perhaps, just the gist is arrow straight.
While they are extracting the Michael out the British public The Register gave news of a slip from Telewest that they are releasing cable-modems this month. I called them today and they confirmed it's happening, but they are not taking orders until it's officially announced. The vagaries are a standard £50 a month, 512kb downstream / 128kb upstream. Watch this space.
Talking of broadband, Stateside at least:
Creative Labs Modem Blaster DSL is available at a reseller near you...
Supporting G.992.2 (G.Lite) this is one of the first ADSL/G.Lite modems to be fully compliant with the USB standard and does not require an external power supply. The low power consumption is a key feature of this advanced digital modem. Creative has be enable to keep the total power consumption of the modem below 2.25W, which enables the modem to be totally powered by the PC and eliminates the need for an external power supply, as well as the cost and heat associated with the power supply circuitry. The modem has been tested and fully complies with ITU-T G.992.2 standards and is completely interoperable with most major switches.Creative has extensive expertise in developing user - friendly drivers that make installing the modem hassle-free for even the most novice user. Designed with a sleek modern look , this ADSL modem with a USB interface can be installed without opening the computer case or even having to turn it off.
Or for the connoisseur, (something you'll never be on this island due the the fatherless ones at BT)...
Creative Labs ADSL NIC
It supports both full rate (G.dmt) and G.lite, and is ANSI T1.413 Issue 2 compliant. Operating system support includes Windows® 95, 9 8, 98SE and WinNT 4.0. Full rate operation provides data rates up to 8 Mbps down-stream and up to 640 kbps upstream at distances up to 19,000 feet (26 AWG). G.lite operation delivers transfer rates of up to 1.5 Mbps down stream and up to 512 kbps upstream.
0-1000 in a picosecond - who gives a damn!
It's wonderful following the computer industry, I'm constantly asking to be retold statements to see if it sounds better a second time. More sarcasm coming...
Decked in the military navy blue, we have the Intel afficionados and sporting a magenta shade, we have AMD...
So what if they reached 1GHz first!
*Smug grin*
You know for word processing it's only 3% faster than our 733Mhz with this tool
Yes but if we use this tool it's clearly 450% faster using Photoshop 5.5
We've official released OUR 1Ghz now
Ours is available though!
Integers to you
FP, matey
Sad, isn't it. Grown consultants memawing over percentile difference. Hands up anyone who's spreadsheet is so vast that they can notice the difference recalculating a page at 500Mhz or 5,000Mhz. Touch typing at 800 words a minute anyone? Compiling using MS Visual Studio?
(Note to St H. College - you don't apply. 16Mb main memory indeed. *spits*.)
It's a great milestone, yes, but all this coverage from a small gain? At the end of the day the bigger deals are bandwidth, component balance and suitability to task.
As a few friends wanted "entry level" machines, I put together a quick deal.
Full multi-media, integrated V90 modem, 10/100 NIC, onboard sound & vision, 8Gb, a Cyrix/Via 333Mhz. Does the job.
And to you, mon ami, £249 ex vat.
Yep, for less than the price of a vaguely faster chip you can build a full system and still have change for a good curry from the local Balti house...
Heck for another twenty odd quid you can have a 500Mhz AMD instead...
7th March 2000
Articles in todays IT WEEK correct the lay of things, albeit a tad generous, I feel, towards BT. Quoted from Tim Johnson of Ovum, (my italics): "Potentially, people will be able to dial up their ISP for Internet access and voice calls for one flat fee, and BT will be locked into losing money.
Dah! AT&T, Ma Bell and even Kingston Telecom in the UK, are obvious examples that offering ADSL and free local call's will NOT cause massive losses. Fools like this make me sick to the stomach. Read my lips, proverbially, they will NOT loose any money, they will merely MAKE LESS, which will be covered by all the extra lines ordered. Besides which, it's already happening.
T'is like King Canute, trying to turn back the tide. The only difference is Canute got drenched to prove you can't do this, whereas BT are trying at all turns to avoid unmetered access - are even on record as saying it'll be a cold day in hell before they do so.
I don't gamble (ever) but I'm willing to take wagers that whereas said king squelched back to dry land, BT are going to get dragged to a watery grave by the undertow that is public opinion.
Apparently, Oftel forced* BT to pull the plug on the unmetered Surftime option. As I've mentioned before, certain "free" ISP's kicked up a fuss over the deal - basically because it would affect their bottom line (as the said incumbent was offering them a lousy deal). I'm cynical enough to believe the spinners at BT planned with this in mind
* Yeh, right, gummed them into it, did they?
Funnily enough the legislation in question* has absolutely no bearing to Telewests offer, to Screaming.Net, to Altavista, or to the unmetered access offer that NTL announced today...
*Under Oftel's rules, BT had to offer a wholesale version of Surftime to other operators - which they did. Shafted them on price and on terms & conditions, but the offer was there, not the less. They are now thrashing out plans for Surftime II in the summer.
Miraculously, this will, of course be rolled out. How so? According to a statement made to Oftel, the ADSL trials will continue with orders being accepted from 20th April, and services going live from 29th June. Unless, of course, they welsh yet again... Technical difficulties my a***!
6th March 2000
Hoo, hoo, hoo, the natives are gettin' restless!
Stuck in the UK?
Fed up with obscenely high telephone charges?
Who ya gonna call?
Not those B******s at BT, that's for sure.
On national TV, they claimed that offering unmetered access would COST them £25 per person per month. What they REALLY meant was they would make £25 a month less profit (as opposed to actual loss) and they are too greedy and short sighted to see the damage they are causing.
Of course, this is why they have also reneged on their unmetered internet access - at £35 a month - and put back ADSL another six months, despite every analyst and his/her therapist telling them that the delays have already caused irreparable damage to the countries economy, vis a vis, the long term future of e-commerce.
Lets look again at this £25 a month EXCESS PROFIT that BT claim they'll lose...
Duh! Everyone (within spitting distance) who runs up that much time on-line is already defecting to Telewests genuine unmetered internet access for £10 a month. Makes a lie of BT's claims, huh! As do Localtel and Callnet and X-Stream who also offer unmetered interest.
That's free, gratis, no conditions, nada in the case of X-Stream. It's obvious that they are bleeding so much money with covering the call costs - that's why Liberty Surf (a European subscription-free ISP) saw them as a good investment, deciding to spend over $68 million to merge with them.
(It's an absolute nightmare trying to connect, but what's can you expect when it's nowt, given BT is holding the rest of the country to ransom!)
Plastered all over the news broadcasts today is Altavista's input - unmetered access for another £60 a year...
Going over this again.
- BT CLAIM charging £35 a month for unmetered internet would cost them £25 a month - and renege on there offer.
- Locatel offered this for around £25 a month - an got into a fight with BT who claimed they couldn't transfer customers fast enough...
Incidentally, I believe they buy the line capacity off BT...
- Telepwest quietly offer this for £10 a month (and a promise of £10 in normal call charges) - and get swamped with offers
- Altavista, not wanting to get left out, will be charging around £5 a month, paid annualy
Or, by BT's claims, losing £55 a month per user (+£35+£25-£5).
Unless of course, a monopoly utility company are deliberately trying to con the UK over the cost of this - while the government elected to look after the population largely turn a blind eye (whilst making facile pro e-commerce statements) and the toothless wonder that is Oftel do nothing, and not a one of the rival telco's will stand up and give the true figures...
When I run had my computer business I wasn't above stamping on gits who over-charged. One of my "rivals" was grossly overcharging for computer products. I ran adverts like this:
Why not buy your memory from Joe Smoo's - just £149 for 32Mb simms
Why not? Because we only charge £69 for the same product and we're making on the deal...
Apparently, in the UK this just isn't done - and used to be illegal. I had Trading Standards and legal leeches banging on my door.
"Oye, you can't say that".
"B*gger off," says I. "Here's his own pricelist, here's mine - for identical products - here's the REAL price from the same distributers, showing my profits"
The response, to a man... "The greedy b*****d!".
BT makes that guy look like he's selling at a loss, whilst pleading poverty. I have words for people like that, but as I can't afford the legal bills, I can't print them. It makes them no less true for all that.
Tell be I'm wrong...
Fire extinguisher with your chips, Sir?
As AMD bring the release date for the blisteringly fast 1,000Mhz Athlons forward, to much-hand ringing from Intel, I offer my own observation...
*Slavers* Oh YES. I can, can.
I can spend £1,000 ripping out the existing motherboard and chip and wait a year for a game / graphics package that needs that sort of power, by which time they will be creeping up to 2Ghz...
I'll admit I used to be terrible for wanting the biggest fastest video card and swappping boards to get an extra 33Mhz, but it made a real difference then. Now? Unless you're talking cutting edge, rendering realtime 3D animations and the like, why bother. Like the proverbial No. 9, there's another bus due in a minute...
Conversely, to all the news about budget Cyrix chips rising from the ashes, the Joshua's of this world...
Duh!
Unless they are going in discrete mobile devices, why bother. OK, you can shave a few dollars of the price of a system, but why bother, in an age where you can buy 400Mhz Pentiums for £300, who's stupid enough to buy a lesser beast to save £5?
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28th January 2000
Great. All last something to report - there's DEFINITELY nothing happening soon!
I've waited a year for the CTO Show to come around again and find out what's happening. Strictly speaking it's a trade show to talk deals with distributors and wholesalers, but it's also a good place to catch up on gossip, if there was any...
As an example, I read an article in the trade press this week from some Silicon Valley guru telling us all about Ultra 3 SCSI - the new margin maker. Like I wasn't playing with Ultra 160 Quantum kit a year ago or so back...
*Shakes head*
Datrontech put on a good stand, as did one or two others, but I suspect very few big deals went down and that a lot of companies will be counting the cost of this event. I could be wrong, but I don't think so.
Microsoft had a theatre going, explaining the benefits of us all upgrading to Windows 2000 Professional, but I'll wait and see. It may come as no surprise that they exceeded their allocated slot by 15 minutes, disrupting the next session. This was due in no small part to the evangelist part of the talk promising hellfire and brimstone on anyone pirating their new cashcow.
Well, it would have caused a ruckus, but the following talk in question was a dissemble by API about running Linux on Alpha platforms. I kid you not when I say we thought it would be just me and the techie rep. having a one-on-one chat until a dozen or so trailed in five minutes later...
Oh aye, as usual, I couldn't resist having a go at the Microsoft folk.
MS: "The product is the channel now, buy six, get one free for in-house use.*"
Me: "What about the bugs?"
MS: Withering glance "There are no bugs. We have been using this internally since last April and the product is rock solid"
Me: "O Kay." [Waves leaflet] "But it doesn't exactly inspire confident when your promotional material reads Microsoft Windows 2000 Proffessional....
Bows to applause. Thank you, thank you, thank you...
Actually, to be fair, the typo was on a distributors leaflet, but the stand in question was crawling with Microsoft staff reading the scriptures of Bill's bible and not a one of them (or the distie or the printers/proof-readers) spotted the glaring spelling mistake. As I said, if no-one notices spelling mistakes that obvious, what's lurking within the millions of lines of code where errors aren't quite so forgiving?
*(The official release date is supposed to be February 17th incidentally.)
Hot spot
X-Stream now offer 24/7 access on an 0800 number!
Also, PC World are to provide 12 months free weekend Internet calls with a PC bought from them.
On the casualties front
Nokia have dropped their monitor range, sold to Viewsonic, while Western Digital have dropped producing SCSI disks as the HDD wars take toll.
AMD are also discontinuing the 500Mhz range, but that's just natual progress.
FREE DSL SERVICE TO LAUNCH IN APRIL (Stateside)
Bloody great! The fatherless s.o.b's in this country won't even commit to a roll-out plan for commercial ADSL access for fear of damaging lucrative leased line profits, and in the meantime Americans, not only blessed with free Internet access, ADSL, SDSL and Cablemodems, now get the option of free adsl lines.
Did anyone catch Bill Clinton on the news today telling congress how well of they all are now...
Anyway:
The Broadband Digital Group (BDG) will offer free DSL in America starting in April.
While free ISPs are rampant, FreeDSL marks the country's [USA's] first free broadband Internet service for consumers. Of course, nothing is truly free, and questions abound. To participate, users must provide basic personal data. Plus, a window will display personalized ads while you surf -- and it cannot be shut off. The company is being coy as to where the initial rollout will take place, and exactly what kind of DSL services will be offered.
14th January 2000 - Happy Millennium
What a silly expression! How many times has a jubilant colleague, friend or relative wished you a Happy Millennium. Think about it for a second - happy next 1,000 years. Even Methuesala never lasted that long...
So, instead, here's my New Years Greeting...
May your bandwidth never exceed your budget and your width never extend your waistband
So, whats new? You tell me, it's dead out there!
OK, news filters through of the Athlon 1000Mhz, Merced / Itanium trickles to oems for sampling, PIII 800Mhz ships, (in 1's and 2's). but nothing major. Oh yes, the Times Warner / AOL merger goes ahead for an obscene amount of money. Ground-shaking for sure, but that was rumoured last June so it's handly a surprise to anyone in the industry.
Of interest to myself and graphics jockeys is a rumour of the imminent release of the Matrox G450. I'll find out more about this later as there's a big trade show on later this month. I will point out though, I reported on the Matrox G800 series last year, so bear this though in mind.
Internet Access (UK)
While the Americans move towards much contended free ADSL options, we still languish at the mercy of BT. I spent this morning talking to Telewest and BT's ecommerce division to get a feel for things as absolutely nothing new is filtering from the usual grapevines. Strange as it seems, I'm biased in favour of BT, and they offered some good, well thought out arguments, which I shot to pieces, but still. The net result is that no-one in BT knows what the heck is going on - especially the decision makers and the people who should know, the frontline guys, are as much in the dark as everyone else. What to do?
OK, I have two thoughts here, one is to transfer to Telewest.
The benefits are the line rental is £5 a month cheaper, from February 1st, internet access will be 1p a minute at all times (vis a vis AOL) and, commencing February 14th, they are introducing unlimited access for £10 a month with
Surf Unlimited - via their ISP Cableinet [now Blueyonder]. The off-sides are the minimum contract of 12 months and the uncertainty with regard to quality of service as millions connect all day and night...
Or I can wait and see what BT offer, which I shall do, for a few weeks at least!
What I have gathered so far is that it may be cheaper than the previously
proposed charges, that you may be able to choose your own service provider - as long as it's one that uses BT's lines (a factor many ISP's aren't happy with, along with the small print for them). And that no matter how good a deal they appear to offer, they will doing everything they can to claw it back again.
As for ADSL, which everyone I know is gagging for, not a peep, nada, zip. Complete internal and news clamp-down. Finalised roll-out schedule? Cost? Speed? Conditions? I am told that BT will have a big media event when they finally offer ADSL and unmetered access - lamely blaming the toothless wonder Oftel for the delays, crying they really want to offer this, but they are too big for the competition.
Either way, I'm taking bets that the scale of the event will be directionly proportionaly to the revenue lost when millions - and it will be millions - jump ship. Especially if Telewests cable-modems ever make it past Guildford, a likely event given Microsofts involvement. As for Cable & Wireless? Well, I suppose they'll make some announcement, sometime...
Later...
Well, there's a thing. I say there's sod all going down, then Bill Gates makes a liar out of me and steps down from Microsoft, with Steve Balmer taking over as CEO. Bill remains as president. To be honest I missed the rest of the news as my children decided it was a perfect time to choose their noisiest toys! Anyway, by the time you read this it will no doubt be all over the daily press, along with the details I missed about breaking MS into 5 divisions.
Here's what Anchordesk [now back to ZDNet] has to say on the matter.
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