deanb

It'd be able to re-use whole assets. GPU loads in treeA_01.obj, renders it out branch by branch, leaf by leaf, then moves onto the next file which is treeA_02.obj. Well it's already done the computation for treeA, so it just copy pasts that effort over to treeA_01.obj. Thus saving on the whole effort or making a tree branch by branch, leaf by leaf. Now in comes treeB_01.obj, and it's s conifer, the GPU must now build this up branch by branch, leaf by leaf into a new tree model. You have twenty essays to write about Genghis Khan, it's much simpler to write one essay and copy-paste it with minor changes 19 times than it is to fully write out 20 different essays about Genghis Khan. Here's Microsoft write-up of it, but after the first paragraph it dips right into D3D coding since it is on MSDN:

Because when instancing you only need to compute the object once and apply most of that computation to the duplicate item. It's a bit like muscle memory in doing a repetitive task. http://pixelpaton.com/?p=5591 - A neat write up on using Unity, a 3D SDK, in making 2D games and the whys n why nots. Also plans for PXOD this year include me starting back up again with the "Game Maker" series again. And Unity is on the cards.

http://www.valvetime...venholm.243033/ So there was supposedly a HL2:Ep4 in the works over at Arkane Studios. Guys behind Dark Messiah of Might n Magic. Which implies Ep3 was in the works around then too.

http://www.engadget....rt-plans-in-us/ Samsung won't be supplying Windows RT tablets in the US. Apparently demand is shit, which likely explains the lack of crowing about Surface from MS (Surface Pro, the version with full Windows 8, is yet to ship). In other news, and may or may not be related to this thread, PC sales dipped for the first time in five years during fourth quarter 2012....

I wouldn't be surprised if we end up with Silmarillion from him too before he's done.

JRR Tolkiens estate have been pretty dicky with the rights over the past decade. LotR was hard enough to make.

Take the dishes off the rack and put them back in the pile again.If you've approached him about it then he'll be aware of what's going on and will likely eventually change his ways. My current housemates have a habit of leaving things in the wink with water, which just evenly coats everything in grime even if some stuff was just like a plate for toast or something. For the most part we just wash our own stuff but they both know I want wash up at all if the sink is full of dishes and water. Only put stuff in the bowl if you intend to wash it up there and then. There's nothing we have that requires soaking that can't just be filled with water and left on the side for a bit.

First Cyberpunk teaser trailer out. I think there's to be something more substantial coming out soonish.

..they did well from the Dot-com bubble and din't even have a method of giving away things for nothing back in those days.

Yeah I was gonna suggest taking up that deal, but now you mentioned it and now I looked, I've only bought one game off GMG (They £10 XCOM over Xmas), the rest are the freebies they give away.

Except I've taken no issues with them as an online retailer, as I've mentioned many times already I've being using Amazon for years and find their online retailing skills to be pretty fine. This is specifically talking about handing out digital freebies to people who are already making extensive use of their other digital freebies and them somehow thinking this is going to convert into actual paying customers of at least one of these services. If someone is taking advantage of something because it is free, assume that they will only take advantage of it when it's free. Hence most "freebies" having a catch in being either a sampler, or having some monetisation system. There's no adverts, there's no micro-transactions, it's not time limited. Amazon didn't make their money from giving things away for nothing.

I did give a disclaimer. Anyway try this one I was just going to add in: http://www.greenmangaming.com/s/gb/en/pc/games/shooter/bioshock-infinite/ GMG25-XTYYZ-POSL1 Both of these deals via http://savygamer.co.uk/

Yeah Acers are shit, especially around the power port and the keyboards. My sister is on a Vaio at the moment and is lasting her much longer than her Acer did but you'd have to keep an eye out on them in a sale to get them cheap though. Lenevo are cracking devices, could survive the apocalypse. But they're built for business use, complete opposite of something I'd recommend for gaming in mind.

The recommendations leave a bit to be desired. A single song is not enough to extrapolate from. And given the main physical store is giving me all sorts too it doesn't work much when you're looking at all sorts be it for personal, family and friends, or for PXOD n such. They already had me in their system with the physical stuff on the main site though. It's Amazon, not Tesco, it's all a single account. I've had Kindle app for years and as mentioned been on the app store since it hit UK in August. I use the physical store because they've a wide range of products and stuff arrives pretty sharpish and cheap to boot. But not for everything, where things are cheaper or I've better experience with I'll go there too. Like most of my computer and electronic related purchases are via Ebuyer who I've pumped thousands(not all mine) into over the years. Compared to the 20p I've spent on Amazons digital side. And will likely remain that way. It's more than just Amazon that've done it though. And we may be visiting different retails businesses, I don't know many of them that give away full free products. And when they do I don't think it's converting to full customers. DSG set up a digital games store, gave away free games. I own Alpha Protocol from that. Bought jack shit from them since. How many people are going to buy Photoshop CS6 after the accidental give-away? Give away samples, demos, lite versions and so on, not full products. A full product you take it and run. Rest all do sales; £5 off a shop of £50. Or monetisation, like free photoshoot, and then £50 for the 6"*4" photo at the end. Anyway I'm not the one that started with the arguing, I just posted about spending my free £1 n giving the Amazon MP3 store a spin.

http://www.getgamesgo.com/product/bioshock-Infinite-uk-po Bioshock Infinite for £23.99. May be UK only.

Ah yeah, the Playstation 3, a fantastic android tablet. And having to be a Prime user surely makes it even more expensive to get into? And sure, get folks in an ecosystem, but it's a cruddy ecosystem if you're giving whole products away for free with no in-built monetisation plans. Especially if your app store sucks to use even for getting the free stuff. About the only reason you'd use it to purchases apps is if you're stuck with a Kindle Fire in which case without rooting it's your only choice. @TFG: I was set up with Amazon years back when I bought things from their main store, the point of this offer (which only available to those already with the App store as mentioned previously) isn't there to bring you into Amazons ecosystem. Yes, I've being using the App store a while, and it is shit which is why I only download the free apps. I don't want to be tied into their shit. I've being using it for about 5 months and have downloaded 17 totally free apps, which includes stuff like World of Goo, Plants Versus Zombies, Tetris, Jamie Oliver. I'm not a digital pound at this point, I'm heading into quite a hefty cost. In their digital realm I have spent to date 20p, and that was for the 1,227 QI Facts book for Kindle. Note how I bought this because of a sale. IF your two options are free and full price, it doesn't give much wiggle room. Compare this to Google Play, which doesn't have a daily free app and doesn't throw out £1 credit, but does have sales and I've bought quite a few apps up to now.

Shitty software also affects other software too as I found out over Xmas. Setting up Skype on little sisters tablet and my dad signs in on his laptop for them to test video chat. And is a cat. I end up having to now troubleshoot why Skype is replacing my dad with a cat, going through all the menus to no avail. Go the web looking on Skype to find out why it's making my dad a cat. Turns out it's nothing to do with Skype, it's a program Dell install that replaces webcam output with a cat avatar. Because that's why people use webcams, so they don't get to video chat with people. They've got their own rocketdock thing installed too which only services to confuse. Dock programs are fine, if you know what they are and why you're installing it. But if it's this thing that bursts out the screen now and then it only leads to confuse and annoy.

The streaming web player actually requires zero authorization, it's only when you go to download it asks for authorizing your device. And why would it be incredibly obvious for digital media to be DRM free? I don't even have to point far beyond the borders of the main focus of this forum to show that DRM is very much a thing still for digital media. I'm not assuming anything and the Kindle Fire is a perfect example of nothing. The app store isn't Fire exclusive so you can get the free apps without giving Amazon a penny (and as mentioned before the App Store turns me away more than anything). The Instant Video is the only thing Fire exclusive and as mentioned it's US only unlike Play Movies. Unless you have some other monetization up your sleeve giving away an app for absolutely diddly squat isn't going to make you as much as just putting on for sale for like 50% off, or selling it for 25p in a special sale or what not.

The hassle is equally the same, still have to download an app or program, authorize it and download the music. Just given I use the music mostly on my phone it skips the extra step of "copy music over to the phone". I'm still wary on the whole "DRM" free side of things, especially as it's a bit odd to need to authorise devices if all your authorizing them for is to download a file you can then copy paste all over the place. The only thing referencing DRM-Free is that the CloudPlayer will only import and play non-DRM MP3s, it gives no information on their own files and it does state on the FAQ "Device authorization is required by music rights holders.". That wasn't what we were getting at those is it. It's if the giving away of free apps and credit is converting into paying customers. I'd say that since 9/10 the reviews given for the "free app of the day" is only coming from folks that got it for free, it's likely not something that's encouraging much paying customers. And of course the Kindle store is outselling any other company for digital books, silly question to ask. Though on the movie side given one company is US only and the other across 11 nations I'd say that second company has a slight edge, but we both know Netflix is likely way ahead of both.

So my housemate spied theses on clearance and picked up three. One for herself, one as a birthday present and one I bought off her. Yet to have a crack at it though but I'm sure I'll tweet once I pick a layout I like. As for the Amazon thing. Instead of going via my phone and the Amazon MP3 app that Amazon suggest folks use I used their cloud player, went to download it and was promptly asked to download their client and authorise my PC. So so much for "You don't need to authorize anything unless your'e actually using the Amazon app" (unless "app" in this case is meaning program, in which case what undocumented method are you using?). Also given I've bought it from Amazon, using my amaz\on account which other method do you propose of purchasing the music from Amazon MP3 which doesn't tie it to my Amazon account and their Cloud Player service? A bit of tinkering and I found out how to play local music, think I'll stick with DoubleTwist, a lot shinier and straight forward. In fact I've removed the app itself completely, at the moment music stills seems to be playing okay. As for giving away free apps and £1 credit, not so sure, any evidence of this leading to much sales? I've spent infintiely much more Play with the enticement of apps on sale than I have on Amazons app due to enticement of apps for nothing. Mainly because Amazons app is shit even for the free apps. Wouldn't want to be tied to it for apps I'd spent cash on.

The Dell listed is integrated Intel graphics, as well as a shitty Celeron processor so you can easily dismiss that. Both include HDMI out which should make it pretty straightforward to output to TV should you wish. The HP specs won't blow your socks off but should run stuff like Borderlands 2, TF2, Dead Island etc fine. Might struggle to expand into games built for next-gen though. Resolution of the screen isn't that high either which should help in it playing games.

http://www.razerzone.com/gaming-controllers/razer-sabertooth A 360 controller with 4 extra buttons and many times the price. A Razer one of course. Dunno what freaks of nature they use for hand reference in designing their products. I imagine the d-pad is likely better than normal though.

No my phone copies music fine to it. I can even do it over wi-fi n all sorts if I like. That would be with music I've ripped myself or acquired from distributors other than Amazon n the like... Amazon has an app to authorise your "devices", in this case my phone, to download and play MP3s brought through them. You can also do the "Cloud Player" stuff, so I can play my non-amazon bought music through the Amazon app, but I have to upload them to Amazon first, and at a limit of 250 songs or paying a yearly fee for the privilege Googles' Play Music app lets you import and play local music as well as music purchased through them and uploaded to their cloud services giving it a noticeable edge over Amazon. edit: @HH: At first I was like "Red Sweeper? No I got Melody of Life, that's what I linked to" then clicked you were referencing today's free app of the day, which is Red Wrecker. And no I didn't (not yet at least, I'll have a look). This is from about a week or two back. Was gonna get that Kemosabe but it's unavailable. Checking my past "Orders" and the time of the MP3 promo I got it for downloading The Elf Adventure for my sisters.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B003U04NUK Just bought my first ever MP3. Didn't pay for it mind, since Amazon gave me £1* free for getting one of their free apps from their app store. I think I'll be sticking with shiny DRM free CDs given the whole "buy music. Go to phone, download specific app for this single song. Authorise device. Downlaod song, play single song". There's a fucking "shuffle" option there still. Surprise me amazon, shuffle my music. Thankfully it seems I can at least play this song in my regular music app even if the reverse is not true. Shame I can't just buy song, download song, copy to phone and be done with. * Their songs aren't £1 though, they're like 69p and 89p. I imagine the plan is to tempt people to use it up by buying a second song and thus spending 50p or what not of their own money. But they're giving this free credit to people that already get free apps from them so I don't know what logic they're using here.