I'm not 100% sure this is actually word-for-word, but alas. "In a presentation at Ubuntu Developer Summit currently going on in Denmark, Drew Bliss from Valve said that Linux is more viable than Windows 8 for gaming. Windows 8 ships with its own app store and it is moving away from an open platform model." I feel like a broken record by now but here we go again: keep an eye on Valve, even if you're not into games. This is the company pushing NVIDIA and AMD to improve their Linux support, with enough clout and name to actually get stuff done. Valve doesn't mess around.
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Member since:2007-11-11
Uhhh...how am I "angry" by pointing out something isn't bloated? And are you talking about the 32bit, or the 64bit? Because I have noticed there is a difference as far as memory usage. i just launch the store front and with it AND the taskbar window showing my friends list its using a whopping...180Mb..okay...and?
Lets face it, you're not gaming on anything less than 2Gb anymore, not unless you just like to watch your HDD swap, heck even my $350 netbook has 8Gb now, so Valve spending the time and money to try to shave a few Mb off frankly would just be a wasted effort, as most gamers simply won't notice. And remember Win 7 shows programs using a little more RAM than they actually do, its just the new way that Win 7 figures in shared bytes and private bytes into a program whereas XP only counted private. If you use something like process explorer you can see the difference in the performance tab, Win 7 gives a program more memory based on its highest private byte usage, which is smart as it means a program is less likely to need more allocated to it later, but it does make programs look a little "fatter" than they actually are. Heck I've only got 4 tabs open in Dragon, none of them videos or ads, and its using more memory than Steam.
And Steam isn't "just a front end" as it has to 1.- Have the ability to "call home" to autoupdate friends lists, 2.- Autoupdate ALL the games you have, 3.- To manage presales and time limits. 4.- To sync saves and screencaps to and from their servers. So its only natural that as your games list grows its gonna have to do more to keep all those games up to date and sync your saves to and from the desktop. I have around 50 titles in mine, many released in the last year, and I can tell you that Steam is having to do a LOT of patching just to keep me up to date, heck TF 2 probably gets patches 3 or more times a week from what I've seen.
And thanks for telling me about Batman, I'll have to remember to avoid that one. I bit the bullet on Bioshock II and Bulletstorm but having to fight the horrible UI that is GFWL is truly a pain, as I'm sure you know. I can't say anything about Windows accounts since i just built my boys their own machines, but I assume you just log out of your account and the other person logs in with theirs, yes? I can understand why they ignore user accounts though, MSFT has never been friendly about tying things to Windows login, which is why so many corps have to use login scripts. And of course with Win 8 they are trying to tie everything to Live and their own appstore so even if valve had managed to get it to work before they'd probably be cut off now.
But if you have some good ideas please share them with valve, they do have one of the most responsive forums I've seen around and their devs do seem to care about making things easier. Again this is in contrast to GFWL where I ended up getting a dozen "Why don't you like the X360?" when I pointed out how Games for WINDOWS should actually show me WINDOWS games...sigh. At least when I have a problem with Steam I get somebody that is actually helpful and understood the software, dealing with GFWL support was worse than Dell..ugh.
Member since:2006-02-15
How the heck do you get updates so often? I have ~150 games on my collection and I receive updates only about twice a month.
Let's say user1 logs into Windows, and then logs into Steam with user1steam - account. He plays a while, then logs out of Windows, and user2 logs in. When user2 logs in to Windows and fires up Steam Steam still tries to log in as user1steam instead of noticing that it's an entirely different user account that's in use now.
That is terribly annoying on a computer that is used by multiple people.
It's got nothing to do with MSFT or login scripts. As I said, I have ~150 games in my Steam collection and most of them honor the user accounts - thing just fine. Steam, on the other hand, is still stuck in the Windows '95 - days.
I have, and that is actually one thing I've seen quite a few other people wanting, too, but Valve just hasn't seemed too interested in having to re-work most of their client. I understand it's a lot of work, but still, I hope they'll come around to it some day.
So, the Xbox One disaster continues. Microsoft's policy for dealing with the used games market has reportedly leaked - and it's a clear and direct attack to destroy the used games market. Prices for used games will be set at the retail value of a new game, and retailers have to hook into Microsoft's computer systems and comply with Microsoft's terms and conditions.At an event earlier today, Microsoft unveiled the next Xbox - the third model, but confusingly named Xbox One. The big focus was TV, integrated Kinect, and all the other stuff we all expected to be forced down our throats. I think it took them 25 minutes to actually come to what should be the core of the story: gaming. Nothing groundbreaking in the gaming department, except for how Microsoft intends to handle the used games market and borrowing games from friends: pay up, buddy!
The day has finally come! Jolla has finally announced the launch device for its Sailfish operating system - and by god this is a looker. It's decidedly different from other phones out there, but it has good specifications and carries a relatively reasonably price tag - EUR 399, and it's up for pre-order today, shipping in the fourth quarter of this year.
Why does Google get so much credit in the technology industry? Why, despite the company's many obvious failings, do many geeks and enthusiasts still hold a somewhat positive view on the all-knowing technology giant? A specific talk at Google I/O this week provides the answer.
OSNews is a sponsor of this year's O'Reilly OSCON in Portland, Oregon, USA. A lucky OSNews reader will win a free three-day pass, including two tutorials days. To win the pass, post a comment on this story saying something about Open Source Software or OSCON. We'll pick a winner at random next week. If you don't have an OSNews account, you may email us your entry. Part of the conference is the 9th annual Open Source Awards, and today the 16th is the deadline for nominations. If you'd like to nominate an outstanding open source contributor, do it here. Read on for more information about OSCON. Update: The 20% discount code for OSNews readers is "OSN."
"Windows is indeed slower than other operating systems in many scenarios, and the gap is worsening." That's one way to start an insider explanation of why Windows' performance isn't up to snuff. Written by someone who actually contributes code to the Windows NT kernel, the comment on Hacker News, later deleted but reposted with permission on Marc Bevand's blog, paints a very dreary picture of the state of Windows development. The root issue? Think of how Linux is developed, and you'll know the answer.
This is one of those news items that's fun to write, fun to read, fun to comment on, and where no one will be able to say anything unkind. It's all just one big ball of awesome fluffiness. TuneTracker, the BeOS radio automation software, has just released something very special: TuneTracker System 5, the first version designed entirely and specifically for Haiku. In fact, it actually includes Haiku in the software package. Better yet, TuneTracker also unveiled several system-in-a-box products - which have Haiku and TuneTracker pre-installed.
Exactly twenty years ago, a document was published that played a huge role in establishing the web as we know it today. Twenty years later, and this simple and straightforward document is proof of an irrefutable fact: while closed technologies can change markets, open technologies can change the world.Oh multitasking. That staple of computing that got thrown out the window with many modern smartphones. We got some rudimentary thing in its place - but even as multitasking on phone and tablets improves, its user-visible side remains cumbersome. Windows 8 has a neat implementation, and now it's time Android follows in it footsteps.They're here! Whether that excites you or not remains to be seen, but the Galaxy S4, which will most likely become the best selling Android smartphone of the year by a huge margin, has been reviewed by all the major sites, and there's lots of interesting conclusions in there - although I think most of you will get the gist.
Member since:
2006-02-15
Why are you constantly so damn angry? Cool down a little, you're going to pop a vein! :o
Because it is. With no window open, with no download, no chat, no nothing going on it takes 87 megabytes on RAM, and when I open the main window RAM-usage jumps to 147 megabytes.
False. It is not a gaming platform per se. It's merely a front-end to the Steam website plus chat and the necessities needed to manage one's games and applications. Oh, and Steam DRM, which actually doesn't take much more than a mere few megabytes.
Apples and oranges. You're comparing a store front-end to games.
That I agree with, but then again, that was never questioned by anyone.
I actually have several ones. One of my favorites is Batman: Arkham Asylum, which is unfortunately spoiled a bit by GFWL.
I have actually a lot of small niggles and complaints about it. One of the things that often bothers me is how it completely ignores Windows user accounts.