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Didn't watch the movie, but the description sounds good enough for a publication. Besides, since this will be the last April 1 to grace TASVideos :'( :'(, at least one such joke submission should be accepted. In fact, due to the recently demonstrated impossibility of accurate emulation, they should all be accepted.
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The administrators (and whoever else had access to this topic when it was hidden) deserve an award for the planning and resolve that went into this decision.
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So, I got a Sony VAIO notebook with Win7 Home Premium and an Intel Core i3 CPU (full specs here). It's generally working great, but I do have some complaints:
No floppy drive :'( :'( :'(
The Start menu doesn't expand folders any longer. It fits everything into a little box, forcing you to scroll up and down. It's horribly annoying.
There are separate Program Files directories for 32- and 64-bit programs. This isn't a problem as much as a "why do this?" thing.
The intro video for the Best Buy Software Installer said something about how annoying it is to have a computer come with a bunch of preinstalled software that you're not going to use, yet I found Google Chrome, MS Works, and a 60-day trial of MS Office 2007 on this computer. Those are the programs I immediately identified, so who knows what else is on it.
MS Paint is way different from the WinXP version. There are some new features that look interesting, but the menu is gone. Icons are nice and everything, but I'm a literate person, and I don't want to guess about what some unlabeled button will do. It's a good thing I finished the Outlands maps before the old screen died.
You can no longer view the contents of the clipboard. While commands like echo off | clip supposedly clear the contents, I'd like to see the contents actually disappear when I tell it to clear, like in WinXP.
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I'm home for Spring Break now, and I disassembled the laptop again to check if maybe one of the video cables had been damaged since I replaced the screen's hinges a few years ago. That doesn't seem to be the case as far as I can tell; it must be the backlight lamp that's dead. The directions I've found online for replacing it are way beyond my comfort level, however, so I guess it's time for a new laptop.
EEssentia wrote:
7 Professional and higher has XP Mode
I'll probably stick with VMWare Player. It doesn't require a Win7 Pro or higher version or a CPU that has hardware virtualization, and there are ways to get the XP Mode working in it. Oh, and it supports more OSes than Virtual PC.
Incidentally, looking up info about XP Mode reminded me of what I've mostly been using floppies for lately: Transferring info between my main OS and the emulated/virtual ones. I prefer to keep them separate rather than have them "integrated." I'll admit, however, that I haven't used real floppies since I found the Virtual Floppy Drive (VFD) program.
Also, thanks to EEssentia and Tub for clarifying that RAM doesn't wear out.
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Tub wrote:
the only thing I see on your list that really requires cpu power is bochs.
What about VMWare? Sysinternals has a program (disk2vhd) that lets you clone a HDD and convert it to a virtual machine. I'm thinking about doing that with this laptop's HDD for those programs that will refuse to work under newer versions of Windows. I hope there aren't too many of those, but I assume that might require more CPU power than a command-line only VM of Debian.
Tub wrote:
Gimp and OpenOffice may be a little sluggish (just like you know them), but they'll work.
They haven't been too sluggish for me so far (other than the start-up times), but I haven't used them for any large projects/files. Or maybe they've been sluggish the whole time, and I didn't know any better ;).
EEssentia wrote:
As for the hardware no, you misunderstood me.
No, I knew what you meant; I just wrote about an unusual way to interpret what you wrote. To get back to your real meaning, I remember reading an online article a few weeks ago about Win7's new method of handling RAM wherein it tries to fill the RAM with files and programs it predicts (somehow) you might use most frequently. I don't remember too many details because I didn't anticipate having to switch to Win7 at the time, but someone brought up the point that this might wear out RAM faster than previous versions of Windows. Unless I misunderstood how that works, it doesn't seem like an improvement.
Eessentia wrote:
Now, for the rest, you need to choose between:
<description>
You're saying that netbooks cost more just because they have a longer battery life (and lack a ton of near-essential features)?
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I've updated the first post with my current laptop specs, in case those are at all relevant.
arflech wrote:
Pivot doesn't work in XP
I just read a bit on that site and didn't watch the video, but I'm not sure I'd be interested in this Pivot thing. I'll look into it more, but if it's just about integrating various online tasks, I'm fine with them as they are currently.
moozooh wrote:
there is no particular brand free from deserved criticism
I agree with all those points, but one purpose of this topic was to learn if there are any specific models or brands that have been problematic for multiple people, which I'm assuming would indicate they are more likely to be problematic for me.
moozooh wrote:
6-7 years is way more of a span than one might think about computers
I'm not expecting it to work for so long without any problems whatsoever. For example, my current laptop's floppy and optical drives have problems reading media a good portion of the time. I've also had to replace the AC adapter and the hinges on the monitor (once each). Though the latter may have been due to some one-time unintended trauma more than normal wear-and-tear. The HDD hasn't failed, however, and I've never lost important data or had to reformat due to major crashes from failure of any other component.
The majority of the use that a new laptop would see, as far as school goes, would be typing/typesetting reports, possibly making presentations, and watching/listening to media files in preparation for exams (including online study courses such as Kaplan for licensing exams). I suspect that the most power would be required by things like the Bochs emulator or VMWare, which I use only occasionally (i.e., 10 or fewer times per month).
Omega wrote:
As for your old one, to me it sounds like the backlight of your LCD panel broke. It might be possible to fix, but only if you're a handy guy.
I'd consider this, but I'm not sure it's worth it. First, the replacement cost might be better spent toward a new laptop. Second, I don't have any instructions for disassembling and reassembling the screen, whereas I found an official Compaq document that helped me replace the monitor hinges.
EEssentia wrote:
Also, drop the floppy. Do you honestly need one today?
Probably not, but I'd like to have the option. [As a totally unrelated aside, I found your comment about taking advantage of hardware better with Win7 somewhat ironic in that it is my understanding that you can't actually access the hardware directly in protected-mode OSes like Windows. I know that's what what you meant.]
To deal with some other issues that have come up:
Modern PC games do not interest me, in general. Occasionally, I play some indie ones such as Battle for Wesnoth, Knytt, Megabot, seiklus, and Within A Deep Forest. Most of the stuff I play is through emulators, though.
I use sites like KeepVid and YouDDL to download YouTube videos and watch them. This is partly because I haven't updated Opera and Firefox in years and partly because YouTube doesn't like some of the extensions and options I have set in those browsers. Of course, I'll install the latest versions of those browsers on a new laptop, but I'll probably still download the videos for viewing.
I don't use GMail or Google Buzz.
Based on what I've read here so far, it appears that a Core 2 Duo CPU is more recommended than an Atom one. I'll look into more info about those and about the HP dv series.
Thanks again for all of your input, and more info is always welcome.
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arflech: Based on the first paragraph of the Wikipedia article about them, I'm probably not going to get a netbook. Like I said, this will be my primary computer for [hopefully] the next several years. If these netbook things don't even have DVD drives, they're out of the question.
Ubuntu isn't an appealing option to me. I have a rarely used virtual machine with Debian on this laptop, and I'll probably set up a similar one on the new one.
funnyhair: Yes, I do live in the U.S. I'll look into that deal at Best Buy. Why do you recommend getting the cheapest laptop, though?
Randil: Thanks for the info. I'm mostly going to be using the new laptop for casual purposes as well, other than the virtual machines and emulators (VMWare, Bochs, DOSBox, and emulators up through N64/PSX era). What did you find the largest differences between WinXP and Win7?
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Unfortunately, the light for my laptop's screen mostly died last night. I say mostly because it's still possible to very vaguely see things as long as there's sufficient contrast (i.e., black text on white background); using the Windows magnifying glass feature is also helpful. Since the laptop is over 7 years old, I was expecting something to fail sooner or later.
I'm probably going to have to get a new laptop, and I would like to get some advice from you guys. I'm mostly interested in which brands you would recommend and which I should avoid. Durability is the most important criterion for me atm, since it would become my primary computer and should last for several years (another 6-7 would be nice).
Regarding the OS, I'm assuming that the chance of finding a laptop with WinXP is near 0 by now, as is the chance of finding one with a floppy drive. Correct me if I'm wrong, though. From what little I've read online, it seems that Win7 is way better than Vista. If anyone here has personal experience with both of them, I am interested in reading your thoughts.
Thanks for any help.
EDIT:
I should have posted this originally, but here are the specs for the current laptop:
CPU: Pentium 4, 2 GHz
RAM: 480 MB (says Windows; System info for Windows says 2×256 MB)
Graphics: ATI Radeon IGP 340M (32 MB RAM says SiW)
HDD: 27-28 GiB
8.5" × 11.25" of actual display (measured with ruler)
2 USB ports
Ports for Ethernet and dial-up connections
DVD/CD-RW combo drive and floppy drive
Serial monitor and printer ports, S-Video port (what's this?), green non-USB port for mouse or keyboard
I don't care about the specific screen size as long as it's not much smaller than my current one. Also, I don't remember ever using any of the things on the last bullet.
As far as what programs I use, here's the list from the batch file that I use to launch them:
1. Delete 21. CamStudio 41. Safely Remove Hardware
2. Defrag 22. DVI Viewer 42. Services
3. Disk cleanup 23. Finale 43. Shutdown
4. Defrag + DirMS 24. GIMP 44. SIW
5. Archive 25. GraphCalc 45. Spybot
6. Proxomitron 26. GSview 46. UBASIC
7. Arachnophilia 27. HIEW 47. VFD
8. CCleaner 28. HxD 48. VMWare Server
9. Opera 29. Internet Explorer 49. Volume Control
10. Firefox 30. IrfanView 50. WinDirStat
11. OpenOffice 31. Irssi 51. XVI32
12. Adobe Reader 32. IZArc
13. Media Player Classic 33. Log off
14. VLC 34. Lynx
15. Windows Explorer 35. Notepad
16. Abort shutdown 36. Noteworthy Player
17. Ad-Aware 37. Ollydbg
18. Agent Ransack 38. Process Explorer
19. Avast! 39. Regshot
20. Bochs 40. Restart
Numbers 1-15 and 29 are/once were the most frequently used, while the others can vary from several times a day to less than once a month.
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Wow, that was one weird game. I've never played it, but the movie looked nice. It seemed like you didn't even give the bosses a chance to attack. Maybe that was just my inexperience with the game, though.
Yes vote.
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It seemed like the ducks and clay pigeons had variable delay times before they appeared. Is this the case, or are the times fixed? If they're variable, were they optimized for this TAS?
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CtrlAltDestroy wrote:
9) Bubble Bobble: Level 57
The only way to win is to stand in the line of fire, blow a tower of bubbles in the center of the room, then jump on them before they straighten out fully and hope they don't just randomly burst when you land on them.
Interesting. Every time I've beaten that level without using warps or items that killed the enemies, I jumped up using bubbles along one side of the room.
Derakon wrote:
And the Grand Palace is a bit of a slog, but I never recall having any serious difficulty making it through -- assuming I have some lives to spare.
You don't need that many extra lives if you abuse the drops every 6 or so enemies killed. Just get to one of the screens where those flying dragon(?) heads come toward you without you having to move. Then downthrust until you get enough magic to refill health. You can also do the same thing with the giant bot near the Thunderbird's room, but it takes longer because you have to move off the screen for it to respawn.
My personal hardest levels:
SMB3 - 7-7?
You have to run over a ton of plants using stars. I think I made it once.
Lost Vikings II - World 5 Area 4 (4RGH)
Based on the docs at GameFAQs and the map at VGMaps, I'm pretty sure it was this level. I resorted to reading an FAQ because I couldn't figure out how to get Baleog to the top through all those tunnels. It seemed like there were way more tunnels when I was actually playing it, though.
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mz wrote:
Any Soccer Game - Using the U.S. men's national team
Actually, the U.S. team in Nintendo World Cup has the most variety in that each member has a different super kick. They also have varied HP values and speeds. For the other teams, these variables are exactly the same for each member. However, the U.S. HP and speeds are used regardless of the team you select if you're playing Tournament Mode.
SMB - Jumping over the flagpole
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There are some obvious grammatical errors in the intro text, such as having a comma after man. Also, why the quotes around man?
I liked the intro music—the Moonlight Sonata sounded too electric, though—but not the music that played when actual TASing was shown. I haven't played most of the games in the video, so I'm not sure just how much it shows off. As some other posters have said, however, I think that a better clip could have been chosen for OoT. I'm pretty sure I know what it was showing (skipping part of Dodongo's Cavern, right?), but I don't think that clip showed enough of the location for someone to get a quick idea of what was going on unless he was already familiar with the glitch.
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ShinyDoofy wrote:
1) Drop duplicate frames. By this, mencoder takes at every frame and compares it to the one before. If they are exactly the same (i.e. not one pixel changed), the second one is dropped.
How does this affect the final length of the encoded movie? Does it end up being shorter because it has fewer frames? If so, isn't it less accurate to do this than to leave in those duplicate frames that were actually present in the TAS?
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Bisqwit wrote:
For the record, I use http://tasvideos.org/Search.html for searching the forums, rather than the phpBB feature.
Wrote it myself, but still like it better.
I just tried that search feature a few times and got no results at all, even when searching for something that I was sure would produce results (Metroid). This happened in Firefox, IE, and Opera. Maybe there's a problem because of the site move?
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I think this TAS should be published. It's a great example of what TASing can achieve. For the original LoZ, the dungeons don't contain puzzles as much as they are puzzles, and Outlands expands on this idea very nicely. I find it entertaining that the glitch allows the player to just disregard this fact and plow through minimal portions of the levels before completing the game.
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MUGG: What version of FCEU did you use for those movies? The Out of Bounds glitch just seems to freeze the game when the opposing player is about to tackle you. Is that what it's supposed to do?
AKheon: What do you mean by a "full" TAS?
BTW, I've done some work on hacking this game and found some useful RAM addresses (e.g., player positions, steps taken) in the process. If anyone wants those, just ask.
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Mr. Kelly R. Flewin wrote:
Color Me A Dinosaur!
I think I should work on Lemmings instead ;).
Lord Tom wrote:
I don't know if you ever saw the WIP I did for the NES version of the 1st five levels a few months back, but check it out if not (linked to one page back, I believe).
Yes, I saw it. With your permission, and if I don't find better solutions, I'll use your solutions in my movie and list you as a joint author. It will be a while before I get to those levels, though. The extra jobs they give you in the Fun levels probably make them harder than the other difficulties because of possible alternate solutions.
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Is there any interest remaining in the NES version of Lemmings? I'm planning to eventually finish my TAS (using FCEU 0.98.13) regardless, but I'll be even less hurried than I am currently if no one is interested.