Rated: 85% (4 votes)
Loading ...A world without marketing speak
Chris
I have to read a fair amount of marketing speak, you know: “This USB sticks shifts the paradigms of your digital life to enable…” I just want to know how much it is and where I can buy it.
So, I put forward that henceforth all unnecessary enthusiasm be banned, and to help hardware companies make this transition to plain English, I’ve helpfully translated a page of AMD’s website:
Original:
The new, all-AMD “SPIDER” platform.
AMD’s enthusiast platform, code-named “SPIDER,” brings together an all-AMD processor, graphics card, and chipset for the most complete computing platform ever. Combining these best-in-class components gives you the ultimate computing experience with amazing scalability and exceptional efficiency.
Translation:
The new Spider platform.
Combining an AMD processor, graphics card and chipset to give you a computing experience.
Original:
Incredible Computing
- True quad-core performance for an incredibly powerful multitasking experience
- Superb graphics with awesome performance and stunning effects for an intensely visual experience
- Amazing performance tuning with AMD OverDrive™ technology*
- Phenomenal full resolution playback for HD-DVD and Blu-ray content
Translation:
Computing
- Quad-core CPUs, for multitasking
- Graphics, with performance and effects
- Overclocking with AMD OverDrive
- Playback for HD-DVD and Blu-ray
Original:
Amazing Scalability
- Extraordinary platform flexibility so you can buy for today and build towards tomorrow
- Scalable graphics you crave on your budget—up to four cards all running in
ATI CrossFireX™ mode, with support for up to eight monitors - True PCI Express® 2.0 support allows you to take full advantage of the next generation of high-speed components
Translation:
Good Upgrades
- You can buy some cards today and the rest tomorrow
- Up to four graphics cards, with support for up to eight monitors
- PCI Express 2.0 support allows you to use new components
Original:
Striking Efficiency
- Incredible performance-per-dollar, per watt across the entire platform
- Cooler and quieter operation with enhanced power optimization technology including Cool‘n’Quiet™ 2.0 technologyATI Radeon™ HD graphics accelerators and
- Constant monitoring of system workload and adjustment of power consumption and performance to meet user demands
Translation:
Efficiency
- Good performance for the money.
- Cooler and quieter operation with Cool‘n’Quiet.
- Monitoring of system workload and power consumption.
Original:
The AMD “SPIDER” platform. Never before have all of the components of a platform been designed to work together so well, to push each other so far, and to enable a PC experience so complete.
Translation:
The AMD Spider platform. All of the components of the platform are designed to work together, so you can use your PC.
…on second thoughts maybe marketing speak isn’t such a bad thing. 
Rated: 90% (2 votes)
Loading ...Far Cry 2, woot
Chris
I’m a bit bored of alien invasions and having super human powers so I’m refusing to get excited by Crysis. Thankfully, Far Cry 2 sounds like everything Crysis isn’t (well at least as far as I can tell from the Crysis trailers). Ubisoft has bought the rights to the Far Cry name and decided to take the series in a different, less silly direction.
One comment in particular from PC Gamer’s sneak preview of Far Cry 2 caught my eye:
“Neither the player nor the enemy have any ‘powers’ other than those that any individual human can summon up in extreme circumstances”
Nothing to break the illusion, real guns, real tactics, real enemies and a beautiful, massive African savannah to explore - sounds like it’s going to be my sort of game. One thing to note, not bothered which engine Ubisoft use to be honest, but it’s unlikely to be CryEngine 2, as that’s owned by Crytek, and they do not share power…
Who knows though, maybe I’ll be eating my words about Crysis come Christmas.
Rated: 60% (2 votes)
Loading ...Dell v DIY
Chris
The words ‘enthusiast’ and ‘gamer’ aren’t the same thing. The best bit about my job and hobby (and the bit that makes me sound really geeky) isn’t how quickly my games run, but the hardware itself - I find it genuinely exciting. 
That’s why buy expensive cases and CPU coolers from the likes of Lian Li and Zalman (to name a couple of names off the top of my head), yes there will probably be cheaper options that will make games run just as quickly - but I like it when the hardware itself (how it looks, works, sounds) is the design focus.
A custom PC is more than just a games machine; it is in fact a geeky work of art, which should reflect your personality and what you use it for.
As the Dell v DIY feature in Issue 48 shows, there are plenty of reasons to go for a £1,000 off-the-shelf system - But for me, I’d go for the custom PC every time, because as geeky as it may sound, perhaps I want RAM with blue heatspreaders or a case that glows in the dark 
Rated: 60% (6 votes)
Loading ...Bill Bailey for Eurovision
Chris
Facebook is slowly taking over my life, unlike the rest of the internet you can stay on the Facebook as much as you want because it proves that you have friends in the real world.
Anyway, here comes a cheap link to something interesting on Facebook… a group campaigning to get the living legend that is Bill Bailey to be Britain’s entry in next year’s Eurovision Song Contest, I signed up straight away. What’s more, the man himself has confirmed his interest.
If you’re on Facebook then here’s a link to the group, which hosts a debate on which of Bill’s songs would be best suited to the European pallet, and an official petition to rouse the interest of Terry Wogan.
One thing’s for sure, if Bill Bailey was our entry, I’d watch.
Here are my suggestions for potential Eurovision winners via You Tube:
Love Song - which encompasses all aspects of love
The Magic Roundabout - with the secret middle section
Or perhaps Bill’s tribute to Kraftwerk
Rated: 75% (4 votes)
Loading ...Crysis, meh.
Chris
In Far Cry you float along bland corridors, navigate neatly defined obstacles with the crouch and prone keys *yawn*, then stand in gobsmacked awe as you wander into a tropical paradise - and suddenly it’s one of the best FPS games ever. Playing through the levels again though soon reminds you how shallow the gameplay is.
Far Cry’s hotly anticipated, but nowhere near finished yet sequel, Crysis, doesn’t have any gameplay, Crysis isn’t even a game; at the moment it’s a series of videos posted in blogs and on news sites. However, it manages to generate more hype than the rest of the PC games industry put together.
If you’ve yet to sample the delights of a Crysis trailer, check out this low-res video of CryEngine’s level editor, and this more comprehensive 128MB downloadable demo, the latter is well worth the wait if only for the unexpected explosion at the end.
Sunsets, shadows, leaves, mountains; all of these are done much better elsewhere. In real life. Until DX10 hardware prices come down, trekking through the Andes would probably be a cheaper option for most people than putting together a monster gaming rig to run Crysis.
What would really get me interested in Crysis would be proper realism, and that doesn’t require a £1,000 graphics and OS upgrade. I want enemies that don’t walk along a set path, perilously close to explosive barrels in the middle of a hut complex, but hide camouflaged guerilla-style, in the terrain around me. I want to sometimes be able to climb cliffs, rather than them being arbitrary boundaries - or get to a jetty/hill top/beach without a handily placed jet ski/hang glider/speedboat to take me to the next level. Maybe I want to sometimes feel like I’m stuck in the middle of a jungle, rather than stuck in the middle of an 80’s action film. In short, I can pick up a National Geographic if I want to look at scenery.
While Crysis could feature innovative, realistic, more immersive features by the time it’s finished, all the videos so far suggest that it’s mostly going to be about the pretty (admittedly gobsmackingly awesome) sunsets.