Hello and welcome to this special entry, “Generations 1989 – 2005: Handhelds”. In this entry I really want to give the specs of Gameboy Color and Gameboy Advance. I never owned a Gameboy until 2001. I should take pictures, and put all my handhelds up on my Angelfire site! I have two Gameboys (Gameboy Advance and Gameboy Advance SP). According to Wikipedia, GBA is Nintendo’s fifth generation of handheld. First was the Game and Watch (1985 – 1989), than came Gameboy (1989 – 1997), Gameboy Pocket (1997 – 1998) Gameboy Color (1999 – 2001), GBA (2001 – Present ) and GBASP (2003 – Present). According to the Geniis Book of World Records - the most successful handheld in sales is the Gameboy Color, and most popular handheld game to date is Super Mario Bros. DX. Keeping this in mine, GBA can play all the original GB and GB Color game carts. One Nintendo propaganda gimmick is to keep their Pocket Monsters franchise on the GB and GBA so kids would buy Game Boys. It works out for Nintendo, adult gamers will buy Gameboys. Those who still find playing games fun.
| Gameboy Advance |
As far as handheld specs go, the Gameboy Advance can slow 15-bit color (32768 colors). Features a 32-bit RISC processor (like PDAs use) and a separate 8-bit processor for Gameboy Color games. The GBA doesn’t use both processors at the same time. Not that that’s really important, but it does show that GameBoy Advance does not emulate GameBoy games rather read it with a real GB processor. One important thing about GameBoy is that the early games showed Dark on it. This is fixed by owning a 10 dollar mini-light that plugs into the GBA. I happen to own one. It works well. I use to play all my games in bed when I was 16. I can get at least 5 ½ hours of game play in with 2 fully charged AA alkaline batteries. I can get twice that with no light. I usually didn’t play sound and that saved me 40 minutes to 1 hour of battery life. With no light and no sound, I can play GBA for over approximately 7 hours. I haven’t tested my GBA SP’s longevity yet. I was fond of the back-light in GBA SP. That’s one of the reasons I bought it at Wal-Mart at a full 99. I never have to buy batteries for it. If the lithium battery ever wears out, I simply replace it with another lithium battery. I don’t think I played more then 5 hours with it since I bought. The GBA, however, I played almost everyday during lunch break in high school. I’ve grown old and I look on Gameboy as an expensive kid’s toy. People can buy several LCD screens for cars at Best Buy and Circuit City now-a-days, playing PS2 or Xbox in your car isn’t an issue any longer.
| Gameboy / Gameboy Pocket / Gameboy Color |
The original Gameboy ran on the 8-bit Z80 processor. Z80 was created in 1976 as a very powerful prototype. It was designed by Federico Figgin at Zilog Inc. The frequency of the Z80 was 2.5 MHz. The Z80a was introduced in 1977 and was clocked up too 4 MHz. The Z80 can do approx. 272 instructions per second. The processor is still used today in many mobile devices, Gameboy being to most recognizable. Gameboy supported the most powerful handheld processor in mobile gaming devices from 1989 through 1990 until the Sega Game Gear came out in 1990 in the US. In Japan it was out in 1989. The Game Boy was created by Gunpei Yokoi who later also created the Wonderspan for Bandai. Yokoi died in a car accident in 1997 while going to Kyoto, Japan. He produced and created the popular Nintendo character “Samus Aran™” seen in Metroid and Super Smash Brothers. Another character he created who isn’t as well known is Kid Icarus. I think that game use to be on the NES. Metriod is actually unlockable after Metroid Prime is beaten or if you beaten Metriod Fusion on Gameboy Advance and hook the link cable up to the Gamecube to unlock Metroid. I cheat by loading my Action Replay code which allows you to bypass both requirements stated above, and play Metriod on-the-spot!
Specs of Gameboy / Gameboy Pocket
• CPU: 8-bit Z80 at 4.194304 MHz
• RAM: 8 kbit internal
• ROM: 256 kbit, 512 kbit, 1 Mbit, 2 Mbit and 4 Mbit and 8 Mbit cartridges
• Video RAM: 8 kbit internal
• Sound: 4 channel stereo sound. The unit only has one speaker, but headphones provide stereo sound
• Display: Reflective LCD 160 x 144 pixels
• Screen Size: 66 mm (2.6 in) diagonal
• Color Palette: 4 shades of gray
• Communication: Up to 4 Game Boys can be linked together via serial ports
• Power: 6 V, 0.7 W (4 AA batteries provide ~35 hours)
Gameboy Color
• CPU: 4/8-bit Z80, ran in single mode (4 MHz) and double mode (8 MHz)
• RAM: 32 kbit (plus 128 kbit on cartridges)
• ROM: Cartridges up to 64 Mbit were made
• Video RAM: 16 kbit
• Sound: Same as Game Boy
• Video: Highly reflective TFT LCD, 160x144 pixels made by Sharp
• Color Palette: 32,768 colors; Supports 10, 32, or 56 simultaneous colors on-screen
• Communication: Serial or Infrared
o Serial: 512 kbit/s; up to 4 consoles at a time
o Infrared: Less than 2 meters at 45 degrees
• Power: 2 AA batteries provide 30 hours. An AC Adapter (DC 3V) was also available.
That question about Game Boy Advance worth the money I paid for it? It’s a no-brainer for me. Yep, it’s worth every penny. I don’t see any money wasted. The first GBA was a Birthday Present. In December 2003, I choice whether or not to buy a GBASP or a Gamecube. I think I bought it because it looked cool. You already know what I’ve chosen. I already made up the minor set back with chores I did around the house in January.
| SEGA GAME GEAR (1990 – 1997 USA) |
Sega’s first handheld was the Game Gear. It was in color! I see one in Toyriffic every time I go in the store and actually handled one for the first time 3 weeks ago. I really don’t know much about it. Toyriffic didn’t have a very good selection- in fact – the store had more used Game Gears than Game Gear games! We already know it was a failure. I don’t know why gaming sites keep saying that. I think everyone who’s into handheld videogames knows this. I call this anti-SEGA propaganda. Okay, yes, you’re absolutely right about Game Gear being a failure! Well I believe you said that [to site] because you took information off another site, and said “Sega Sucks” because you know you’ve would agree with 8 out of ten people, and the fact it makes you look good. Obviously, if the Game Gear did well enough, SEGA would have made a Game Gear 2. So I mean come on here. I am referring to Wikipedia’s description of Game Gear.
Majesco came in and manufactured the Game Gear Core System sometimes called the Game Gear Pocket due to its smaller design. Majestco also manufactured the Sega Genesis v3 in 1998. The difference is there is no difference! The buttons are configured the same, and the hardware quality is comparable to previous Genesis, and the price is a lot cheaper. It is rumored in 8 years, Majesco will publish one of the current generation consoles, and may cost as little as 40 dollars in 2010. On Majesco.com, I found out a neat accessory for Game Boy Advance that lets you send text messages up to 3 miles away using a wireless band called the Majesco Wireless Messenger. It uses very low power of the GBA, and can actually make GBA run as much as 3 times as long as it normally would when playing a game. It’s a good idea, but I rather talk through conventual’s 3 mile radius walkie-talkies. I do own a pair of walkie talkies that broadcast up to 2 miles. I’m cheap, I won’t even buy a weather band radio, and that’s pretty bad because those start at 50 dollars.
| Bandai Wonderswan 1996 – 2001 |
There are three versions of Wonderswan. The clunky black and white one. The Wonderswan Color (it’s in color what can I say?), and the Wonderswan Crystal (A Wonderswan that looks more high tech than it really is) The Wonderswan Color runs on one AA battery which is suppose to last 20 hours. The CPU is a 16-bit RISC like the Game Gear is. The most noticeable game on it is probably either Metal Slug or Final Fantasy 1 & 2. The game is identical to the Gameboy Advance versions. Remember, Wonderswan shared 2% of the market in 2000 in the USA. More importantly, Wonderswan owners usually also owned a Gameboy Color. A lot of kids knew that Gameboy had more games out so I’m sure they knew that Wonderswan was undergoing a slow death as soon as it first came to Toys R Us.
Technical Specs:
CPU: 16-bit (3.072MHz)
RAM: 512K
Colors: 4096 (241 on screen)
Resolution: 224x144 pixels
Sound: 4-channel mono (stereo with headphones adaptor)
Screen: 2.1" LCD, reflective TFT
| Nintendo Dual Screen |
Announced in 2003, rumors were defiantly floating around months after Gameboy Advance SP was released. Nintendo Dual Screen can be considered a 64-bit Gameboy except it probably won’t carry the Gameboy name. It won’t have the name Nintendo Gameboy Dual Screen. The system will feature a touch-screen based color LCD screens that can do high resolution polygon displays. Most popular games on it are Super Mario 64x4, New Super Mario Bros, and Metroid Prime (FPS for a handheld). Rumors going around message boards is Super Mario 64x4 is the first of many N64 ports onto the handheld. Legend of Zelda - Ocarina of Time, Goldeneye, and Star Fox 64 may also find a 2nd home on Nintendo DS. The handheld has a d-pad (directional pad), 4 buttons (A, B, X, Y), and two triggers. It will use a lot less battery life than the Playstation Pocket will, and be priced 100 dollars less. Who wants a Playstation Pocket that sucks up tons of battery life, anyways?
Tech Specs:
• Dual Processors: ARM 9 clocked at 67 MHz and an ARM 7 clocked at 33 MHz. It will feature 4-MB of video RAM and can do about 120,000 polygons onscreen.
• Dual Screens both 256 x 192 resolution.
| Sony’s Playstation Pocket |
Second 128-bit handheld on the market (if you include the Tapwave Zodiac 2). It’s games will be based on mini-cd or mini-dvd, and the unit will market at 300 dollars US. It will have a 24-bit liquid crystal LCD screen and will play FMV. The Dual-CPUs is going to be 333 MHz, and the video card will be at least 16-MB. Rumored to not have very good battery life due to the graphics processing and the mini-dvd player, about half the time you get with an ordinary CD-player. The PSP is not on my list of things to buy next year.
MD(Universal Media Disc)
60mm
Laser Diode:660nm
Dual Layer :1.8GB
Transfer Rate:11Mbps
Shock Proof
Secure ROM by AES
Unique Disc ID
PSP CPU CORE
MIPS R4000 32bit Core
128bit Bus
1 - 333MHz @ 1.2V
Main Memory :8MB(eDRAM)
Bus Bandwidth :2.6GB/sec
I-Cache, D-Cache
FPU, VFPU (Vector Unit) @ 2.6GFlops
3D-CG Extended Instructions
PSP Media Engine
MIPS R4000 32bit Core
128bit Bus
1 - 333MHz @ 1.2V
Sub Memory:2MB(eDRAM) @ 2.6GB/sec
I-Cache, D-Cache
90nm CMOS
PSP Graphics Core 1
3D Curved Surface + 3D Polygon
Compressed Texture
Hardware Clipping, Morphing, Bone(8)
Hardware Tessellator
Bezier, B-Spline(NURBS)
ex 4x4, 16x16, 64x64 sub-division
PSP Graphics Core 2
'Rendering Engine' + 'Surface Engine'
256bit Bus, 1-166 MHz @ 1.2V
VRAM :2MB(eDRAM)
Bus Bandwidth :5.3GB/sec
Pixel Fill Rate :664 M pixels/sec
max 33 M polygon /sec(T&L)
24bit Full Color:RGBA
PSP Sound Core: VME
Reconfigurable DSPs
128bit Bus
166MHz @1.2V
5 Giga Operations /sec
CODEC
3D Sound, Multi-Channel
Synthesizer, Effecter, etc
AVC Decoder
AVC(H.264) Decoder
Main Profile
Baseline Profile
@Level1,Level2,Level 3
2Hours(High Quality) - DVD movie
4Hours(Standard Quality) - CS Digital
I/O
USB 2.0
Memory Stick
Extension Port(reserved)
Stereo Head phone Out
Communication
Wireless LAN (i802.11)
IrDA
USB 2.0
Earlier today was much like yesterday - surfing the Internet, looking at game reviews especially the SNES ones. I find it fun reading. So around 4pm yesterday I walk into the Game Store (Toyriffic, formerly known as Toys 4 Trade). Weird how the guy at the counter loves all the games I mention. He’s the same guy that cuts me deals off videogames. Ironically, River Falls store does not. What store you think most budget conscience gamers go to buy new games? Almost everything I told him he said he loves. For example, I ask for Super Mario World 2 – Yoshi’s Island, and he says it’s his favorite game on Super Nintendo. I mean what a quiescence. So I’m thinking of owning this game, since I hear it’s got good game play and Mario is in it. I hear the person who created Mario is extremely talented programmer / artist. His name is Shigeru Miyamoto. I end up buying Donkey Kong 64, Star Fox, and Yoshi’s Island at the Hudson game store. I’ve been reading reviews on Star Fox, and it was only 10 dollars over there. I had 10 bucks in pocket change – literally. I thought about buying 1080 Snowboarding along with 1080 Avalanche, but I only had enough money for one or the other. And I use to own Donkey Kong 64 for a while. I sold it to the Hudson game store a year back, and I wanted it back. Donkey Kong 64 is RAREWARE’s 3rd to last platform game for N64. I know have seven SNES games. Wow, I remember late last year when I only had two. I tested out Star Fox, Super Mario World 2, and Secret of Mana. As expected – all the games work fine. I took a pure alcohol solution and a couple of Cube picks, and cleaned the cartridges out by pressing against the insert feed. A lot of black stuff came off of the Star Fox cartridge. It’s almost like owning a brand new game. I really recommend everyone to clean their game out. Your cartridges last longer and it doesn’t have to cost a lot of money. Remember clean them with a pure alcohol solution and not peroxide.
New Games I will add to my VG list:
http://www.ian1984.m...gview&blog_id=152484
• Star Ocean 3 (when I get it this week)
• Super Mario World 2
• Star Fox
• Donkey Kong 64
I went to a Bittorrent protocol site called http://suprnova.org. Yes, it’s supposed to be spelled without a ‘e’. It has ISO rips of several Dreamcast, Gamecube, Playstation 2, Playstation, and Saturn games. I wish I could download some of them like the Panzer Dragoon Saga, but I don’t have the bandwidth. I also found Grandia on it! It’s times like these I wish I had a modded Playstation 2. Darn! All my console games are legit copies. It’s that not all my computer games are original copies. Suprnova also has plenty of movies on it too. I imagine that I can download 150 MB of MP3 easily on Monday. My first Bittorrent download is the Final Fantasy 1 & 2 GBA rom. I mentioned above this is one of Wonderswan’s most famous games. I downloaded Bittorrent, ABC v2.6.9 [Another Bittorrent Client], and Azureus 2.1.0.4 over the school’s sever. All those programs are under 5 MB. I honestly do not think I’ll be able to download them. I found out by looking at my favorite open-source webpage, http://sourceforge.org. It gives me some ideas about what to download at school. Strangely, no students are at school after 4:30 PM on weekdays. I think I know why. In rural areas ppl need high speed Internet by satellite, even if it’s costs more than DSL, and has about the same bandwidth of it. That’s what I think. Other people who don’t care about satellite - I completely disagree. We need cheaper Internet out where I live.
Good Bittorent servers lists: http://members.chell...p.wiersema/list.html
Sunday, August 29, 2004
Friday, August 27, 2004
Origin of Ian Goes back to 12th century Scotland
[First Topic #1]
I wonder why I haven’t thought of this sooner – my origin of my name. According to one site, Ian came from Iain (pronounced E N not I-in). Iain is the old English version of Ian or sometimes Iann starting sometime in the 1800s in Scotland. Ian was spelled Iain in mid-evil Scotland. The meaning of Ian is “God’s Gift.”
Anyway, Celtic/Gaelic versions of present day Ian before the 19th century was spelled Eion, but sounded exactly like today’s spelling of Ian. However, it’s a little confusing because Ian did not start it’s spelling at this time. Some Eions spelled Ian are found in the 14th century. It’s confusing. So in the 14th century we have Eion, Iain, Ian, and Iann. The first two spellings died out over time and today two spellings remain in present day. In English the only proper way to spell “E” is with an IA, EE, EA.
Also interesting is John and Ian mean the same thing. In 19th century Eion was translated into English as John which is a more popular American name.
Here’s how my name is spelled in Chinese:
Oh yeah, I tried writing an entry on CISCO about hexadecimals and binary, but it only got 2 hits in two hours so I realized that it was a bad entry, therefore, I deleted it. Simply put, binary and hexadecimal is the computer language down to the 1s and 0s. Standard of each character is 8 bits or 1 byte of data. 100 bytes make up one kilobyte.
[Next Topic #2]
I am sure that a lot of you know how to count in binary. I never had binary or hexidecimal math in high school therefore, I find it fascinating. Binary goes from left to right while reducing the number in half after each step. See how every number doubles after each step. I have to the 8 total steps backwards left to right starting dividing 128 into what number I need to ‘decode’ (seen below) until I get to step 8:
1
2
4
8
16
32
64
128
If my address was 192.100.189.0
For 192 I would take 192 minus 128 and that would equal 64. So 128 is less than 192 and that would be 1. Then I take 64 minus 64 and that would be 1 because it is excepted by 64. Since it equals 0, the other numbers will not apply.
Binary version of 192 is 11000000 (fixed)
For 100, the next group of digits in the IP address. I can not do 100 – 128 so the first process is 0. 100 can be divided into 64. [100 minus 64 equals 38] so the next digit is 1. 32 can be divided into 38 [38 minus 32 equals 6] We can not do division with 16 or 8. However, 4 works since [6 minus 4 equals 2] so the end result is also 1 in binary. We can do 2 (as seen above) because 2 minus 2 equals 0. As long as 2 can be subtracted into 2 the binary equivalent is 1. 1 we can not do so that binary step is 0. If 0 is subtracted by 0 to equal 0 - I could do this infinite times so that’s why IP addresses only have 8 digits/bits of binary.
Binary version of “100” is 01100110
For 189 I would take 189 minus 128 equals 61 or X so my binary number will be 1. The next step, which is dividing X minus 64 to equal Y. This is not possible since 61 is smaller than 64 already so the next digit must be 0. 61 can be minus by 32 to equal 29 so the third binary digit is 1. 29 can be minus by 16 which will equal 13 so the forth binary digit is 1. 13 minus 8 is 5 since 8 is already smaller than 13 and would counted as 1 as the fifth binary digit. 5 can be minus from 4 so that would be the sixth binary digit of 1. Next I skip 2 because it’s impossible for me to minus 2 from 1 so the seventh binary digit is 0. This would in fact get me into negative numbers. And 1 can minus 1 to equal 0 so the final digit is 1.
Binary version of 189 is 10111101
And the binary version of 0 is 00000000 once.
Binary version of 192.100.189.0.0 is (11000000) . (01100110) . (10111101). (00000000)
Now yets say I wanted to decode 10111101 into decimal that is really easy. Just add these numbers: 128+32+16+8+4+1.
Now Hexadecimal is:
8 is first digit | 4 is second digit | 2 is third digit | 1 is fourth digit
1 = 0001 (1)
2 = 0010 (2)
3 = 0011 (2 + 1)
4 = 0100 (4)
5 = 0101 (4 + 1)
6 = 0110 (4 + 2)
7 = 0111 (4 + 2 + 1)
8 = 1000 (8)
9 = 1001 (8 + 1)
A (10) = 1010 (8 + 2)
B (11) = 1011 (8 + 2 + 1)
C (12) = 1100 (8 + 4)
D (13) = 1101 (8 + 4 + 1)
E (14) = 1110 (8 + 4 + 2)
F (15) = 1111 (8 + 4 + 2 + 1)
Now if 8 digits equal one byte. The Hex version is A5F1 That’s (1010) (0101) (1111) (0001). I can now decode Decimal to Binary or Binary to Decimal or Hex to Decimal or Decimal to Hex.
Some get binary confused with ACSI. The standard ACSI is used by default in the Text editor. ACSI is binary. But what’s confusing is I can do 1 through F in binary. What happened to G through Z and all the funky symbols like ? / ! @ $ % & * ( ) - = + ‘ . | Okay you get my point. For these you need twice the digits which will do 256 characters. Don’t ask me the grouping of 1s and 0s for those because I don’t know. Actually, there are only 255 characters in the computer translation of English language. Think of HMTL with all these 1s and 0s for one character that makes up source code. Actually, technicians don’t refer binary as this. Binary is simply the computer language called ACSI. Yes. Your keyboard can convert decimal to hexadecimal so the CPU and video card can make use of it. I didn't know my keyboard did the encoding!
Now for color we know them as pixels okay. In monochrome bitmap anyways black represents 1 and white represents 0. Now if there is 1000/1000 image. There are 1,000,000 1s and 0s in that monochrome bitmap. Let’s say you have a 4 bit color BITMAP.
Blue is 8
Green is 4
Yellow is 2
Red 1
0100 or 1010 is Green
0010 is Yellow
1000 is blue
0001 is red
0100 or Green is counted as 1 pixel. Now, 8-bit color is hexadecimal. I think this is so because there are 256 possible colors in 8-bit color. Think way back to APPLE ][e color screens in the 1980s. 8 digits can do 256 characters on the computer screen. But ACSI only uses 255 characters. One reason is you don’t want to minus 128 from 256 and get 128. You would run out of digits in hex. 16-bit color would be 256 to the 256th power to get the answer of 65,536 possible colors. Or add 256 [256] times. 32-bit color would be [256] to the 256th power, and then the next number again to the 256th power. his answer would be 4,294,967,296 colors. 16-bit, 24-bit, 32-bit color is something else. It’s defiantly not binary or hexadecimal. T Since this is massive CPU color for GPUs only games have 32-bit color. The desktop resolution is usually 24-bit to ease CPU power. To display high resolution images all I need is 24-bit color.
Now for the confusing part. Compression like GIF and PNG is very complex. You must convert the binary BITMAP to compression compiler or “codec”. CODEC stands for “Compress Decompress” compiler. Some people think it’s “Code Decode” when it’s not. Codecs can be closed source (freeware or shareware) or open source. You must than have an image compression decoding compiler or “codec” in your computer. A compiler takes the compressed data and translates it to color. For this, the compiler is made in hexadecimal because the source code is made up of 255 characters. Don’t ask me how. In fact, I don’t why any open source image formats thus every image codec is copyrighted! Then I ask myself if the image compiler is closed source than why the hell can Linux and Unix have it? The answer to this is simple. The Internet uses these as a standard. A web browser must compile these so they must be free. This is why the Microsoft Anti Trust was concerning Internet Explorer. While Internet Explorer is closed source, open source browsers must have the right to read the same content. So the US Government actually stepped in and said to the organizations such as the “Joint Photographic Experts Group” to let Mozilla and Konquenor programmers see their closed source code to plug the CODEC into Mozilla, and Konquenor so they can include it in their web browser. Problem is Mozilla and Konquenor were created before the Microsoft anti-trust. This ment legal Internet competition. The Supreme Count realized that it couldn't make MS smaller using the web browser monopoly gimmick. Better luck next time supreme judge! JPEG had to agree to this. The deal was that the image CODEC must have tags in the source code giving credit to JPEG or GIF organizations, and can not be modified or it would be illegal.
-- End of Transmission --
I wonder why I haven’t thought of this sooner – my origin of my name. According to one site, Ian came from Iain (pronounced E N not I-in). Iain is the old English version of Ian or sometimes Iann starting sometime in the 1800s in Scotland. Ian was spelled Iain in mid-evil Scotland. The meaning of Ian is “God’s Gift.”
Anyway, Celtic/Gaelic versions of present day Ian before the 19th century was spelled Eion, but sounded exactly like today’s spelling of Ian. However, it’s a little confusing because Ian did not start it’s spelling at this time. Some Eions spelled Ian are found in the 14th century. It’s confusing. So in the 14th century we have Eion, Iain, Ian, and Iann. The first two spellings died out over time and today two spellings remain in present day. In English the only proper way to spell “E” is with an IA, EE, EA.
Also interesting is John and Ian mean the same thing. In 19th century Eion was translated into English as John which is a more popular American name.
Here’s how my name is spelled in Chinese:
Oh yeah, I tried writing an entry on CISCO about hexadecimals and binary, but it only got 2 hits in two hours so I realized that it was a bad entry, therefore, I deleted it. Simply put, binary and hexadecimal is the computer language down to the 1s and 0s. Standard of each character is 8 bits or 1 byte of data. 100 bytes make up one kilobyte.
[Next Topic #2]
I am sure that a lot of you know how to count in binary. I never had binary or hexidecimal math in high school therefore, I find it fascinating. Binary goes from left to right while reducing the number in half after each step. See how every number doubles after each step. I have to the 8 total steps backwards left to right starting dividing 128 into what number I need to ‘decode’ (seen below) until I get to step 8:
1
2
4
8
16
32
64
128
If my address was 192.100.189.0
For 192 I would take 192 minus 128 and that would equal 64. So 128 is less than 192 and that would be 1. Then I take 64 minus 64 and that would be 1 because it is excepted by 64. Since it equals 0, the other numbers will not apply.
Binary version of 192 is 11000000 (fixed)
For 100, the next group of digits in the IP address. I can not do 100 – 128 so the first process is 0. 100 can be divided into 64. [100 minus 64 equals 38] so the next digit is 1. 32 can be divided into 38 [38 minus 32 equals 6] We can not do division with 16 or 8. However, 4 works since [6 minus 4 equals 2] so the end result is also 1 in binary. We can do 2 (as seen above) because 2 minus 2 equals 0. As long as 2 can be subtracted into 2 the binary equivalent is 1. 1 we can not do so that binary step is 0. If 0 is subtracted by 0 to equal 0 - I could do this infinite times so that’s why IP addresses only have 8 digits/bits of binary.
Binary version of “100” is 01100110
For 189 I would take 189 minus 128 equals 61 or X so my binary number will be 1. The next step, which is dividing X minus 64 to equal Y. This is not possible since 61 is smaller than 64 already so the next digit must be 0. 61 can be minus by 32 to equal 29 so the third binary digit is 1. 29 can be minus by 16 which will equal 13 so the forth binary digit is 1. 13 minus 8 is 5 since 8 is already smaller than 13 and would counted as 1 as the fifth binary digit. 5 can be minus from 4 so that would be the sixth binary digit of 1. Next I skip 2 because it’s impossible for me to minus 2 from 1 so the seventh binary digit is 0. This would in fact get me into negative numbers. And 1 can minus 1 to equal 0 so the final digit is 1.
Binary version of 189 is 10111101
And the binary version of 0 is 00000000 once.
Binary version of 192.100.189.0.0 is (11000000) . (01100110) . (10111101). (00000000)
Now yets say I wanted to decode 10111101 into decimal that is really easy. Just add these numbers: 128+32+16+8+4+1.
Now Hexadecimal is:
8 is first digit | 4 is second digit | 2 is third digit | 1 is fourth digit
1 = 0001 (1)
2 = 0010 (2)
3 = 0011 (2 + 1)
4 = 0100 (4)
5 = 0101 (4 + 1)
6 = 0110 (4 + 2)
7 = 0111 (4 + 2 + 1)
8 = 1000 (8)
9 = 1001 (8 + 1)
A (10) = 1010 (8 + 2)
B (11) = 1011 (8 + 2 + 1)
C (12) = 1100 (8 + 4)
D (13) = 1101 (8 + 4 + 1)
E (14) = 1110 (8 + 4 + 2)
F (15) = 1111 (8 + 4 + 2 + 1)
Now if 8 digits equal one byte. The Hex version is A5F1 That’s (1010) (0101) (1111) (0001). I can now decode Decimal to Binary or Binary to Decimal or Hex to Decimal or Decimal to Hex.
Some get binary confused with ACSI. The standard ACSI is used by default in the Text editor. ACSI is binary. But what’s confusing is I can do 1 through F in binary. What happened to G through Z and all the funky symbols like ? / ! @ $ % & * ( ) - = + ‘ . | Okay you get my point. For these you need twice the digits which will do 256 characters. Don’t ask me the grouping of 1s and 0s for those because I don’t know. Actually, there are only 255 characters in the computer translation of English language. Think of HMTL with all these 1s and 0s for one character that makes up source code. Actually, technicians don’t refer binary as this. Binary is simply the computer language called ACSI. Yes. Your keyboard can convert decimal to hexadecimal so the CPU and video card can make use of it. I didn't know my keyboard did the encoding!
Now for color we know them as pixels okay. In monochrome bitmap anyways black represents 1 and white represents 0. Now if there is 1000/1000 image. There are 1,000,000 1s and 0s in that monochrome bitmap. Let’s say you have a 4 bit color BITMAP.
Blue is 8
Green is 4
Yellow is 2
Red 1
0100 or 1010 is Green
0010 is Yellow
1000 is blue
0001 is red
0100 or Green is counted as 1 pixel. Now, 8-bit color is hexadecimal. I think this is so because there are 256 possible colors in 8-bit color. Think way back to APPLE ][e color screens in the 1980s. 8 digits can do 256 characters on the computer screen. But ACSI only uses 255 characters. One reason is you don’t want to minus 128 from 256 and get 128. You would run out of digits in hex. 16-bit color would be 256 to the 256th power to get the answer of 65,536 possible colors. Or add 256 [256] times. 32-bit color would be [256] to the 256th power, and then the next number again to the 256th power. his answer would be 4,294,967,296 colors. 16-bit, 24-bit, 32-bit color is something else. It’s defiantly not binary or hexadecimal. T Since this is massive CPU color for GPUs only games have 32-bit color. The desktop resolution is usually 24-bit to ease CPU power. To display high resolution images all I need is 24-bit color.
Now for the confusing part. Compression like GIF and PNG is very complex. You must convert the binary BITMAP to compression compiler or “codec”. CODEC stands for “Compress Decompress” compiler. Some people think it’s “Code Decode” when it’s not. Codecs can be closed source (freeware or shareware) or open source. You must than have an image compression decoding compiler or “codec” in your computer. A compiler takes the compressed data and translates it to color. For this, the compiler is made in hexadecimal because the source code is made up of 255 characters. Don’t ask me how. In fact, I don’t why any open source image formats thus every image codec is copyrighted! Then I ask myself if the image compiler is closed source than why the hell can Linux and Unix have it? The answer to this is simple. The Internet uses these as a standard. A web browser must compile these so they must be free. This is why the Microsoft Anti Trust was concerning Internet Explorer. While Internet Explorer is closed source, open source browsers must have the right to read the same content. So the US Government actually stepped in and said to the organizations such as the “Joint Photographic Experts Group” to let Mozilla and Konquenor programmers see their closed source code to plug the CODEC into Mozilla, and Konquenor so they can include it in their web browser. Problem is Mozilla and Konquenor were created before the Microsoft anti-trust. This ment legal Internet competition. The Supreme Count realized that it couldn't make MS smaller using the web browser monopoly gimmick. Better luck next time supreme judge! JPEG had to agree to this. The deal was that the image CODEC must have tags in the source code giving credit to JPEG or GIF organizations, and can not be modified or it would be illegal.
-- End of Transmission --
Tuesday, August 24, 2004
"Counter Strike: SOURCE" beta now avaliable
I am sorry about the last 2 blog entries. They were filled with grammar errors - so therefore - they weren’t up to par with some of my other well-thought out entries. I am trying to quality control my site. Not just everything can be said here – it must have meaning in computer technology. There are days were I just write whatever on my mind. There is very little grouping. I found out that a lot of bloggers have shorter entries, and don’t modify them more than once. Shall I write shorter entries? There is no such thing of a short version of the long entry, but there is a long version of a short entry – at least in my mind. Short entries are for short reading. I like to read several paragraphs of something. Okay?
Today’s conversation is back on Half-Life 2 which has now been delayed until next year. Surely it’s because Valve is doing tweaking / polishing / and more tweaking until perfection. Valve confirmed “Counter-Strike: Source”, and “Half-life: Source” is included in the Half-life 2 box. As in buy one game and get 2 games free. Counter-Strike: Source is Counter-Strike 2.0 in discuss. I have never played Counter-Strike. I hear it’s fun. IGN.com got a preview up of this game before I ever knew it existed. Actually, I knew Valve was going to port Half-life into the Source Engine – because they’ve would have hurt themselves otherwise. This is a free bonus courtesy of Valve. Counter-Strike: Source is a stand alone game meaning unlike Counter-Strike 1.5 and below, you don’t need another game installed to play it. I downloaded both Counter-Strike 1.5 and Counter-Strike 1.6 a while back. I know it’s popular, but haven’t had time play it. I just remember I heard some bad things about version 1.6 so I downloaded 1.5 too.
To download the beta (CS: Source), you must download the application that’ll download the game directly from Valve’s servers onto your computer. This is done for security reasons. I got CS1.5 and CS 1.6 off Soft32.com, and that’s not secure. Maybe there are loop-holes (in terms of downloading games)? The game is a 350 MB download - smaller than Counter-Strike 1.6. You’ll need a password from Counter-Strike: Conduction Zero to unlock the download screen. Plus, I don’t know why anyone would want to download the beta. It’s filed with bug crashes, and it’s going to come packaged with less glitches with Half-life 2 next year. It is rumored that’s exactly why Half-life 2 is delayed presently. I’ve been reading most of the reader reviews. It’s 50/50 whether or not it’s better than the Counter-Strike mod. Some say Condition Zero for Xbox wasn’t very good at all according to many Internet sources.
Today’s been chaotic. I went to CISCO taught by Joyce. Told her that my online curriculum wouldn’t show up at home. One of the student’s commented that my Internet Security is too high. I have to set it on “low” for CISCO online to show up. I’m sure it has to put cookies on my hard drive. Cookies aren’t bad – they’re just little files that have user data on them. Then I went to student services to get help in note taking for CISCO. I didn’t get any help. No one knows anything about Cisco. So I compromised and agreed for the teachers to look at my notes. My notes looked fine. Then I got home and started to read the first and second chapter in my Human Relations textbook. That took time out of my day.
On my slack off time I spared, I looked up if there were any new Half-Life 2 information. Which there was. I also found out what the new Counter-Strike is called (stated above). Next, I looked up Microsoft Xenon facts again. It tickles my hardware funny bone. Headlines: “Xenon: The PowerPC made by Microsoft.” Earlier, I found out the official specs, but just to make sure I was right, I reread the Xenon (really pronounced Zenon) article.
XEXON FAQ - http://xbox.gamespy.com/articles/527/527245p1.html?fromint=1
Today’s conversation is back on Half-Life 2 which has now been delayed until next year. Surely it’s because Valve is doing tweaking / polishing / and more tweaking until perfection. Valve confirmed “Counter-Strike: Source”, and “Half-life: Source” is included in the Half-life 2 box. As in buy one game and get 2 games free. Counter-Strike: Source is Counter-Strike 2.0 in discuss. I have never played Counter-Strike. I hear it’s fun. IGN.com got a preview up of this game before I ever knew it existed. Actually, I knew Valve was going to port Half-life into the Source Engine – because they’ve would have hurt themselves otherwise. This is a free bonus courtesy of Valve. Counter-Strike: Source is a stand alone game meaning unlike Counter-Strike 1.5 and below, you don’t need another game installed to play it. I downloaded both Counter-Strike 1.5 and Counter-Strike 1.6 a while back. I know it’s popular, but haven’t had time play it. I just remember I heard some bad things about version 1.6 so I downloaded 1.5 too.
To download the beta (CS: Source), you must download the application that’ll download the game directly from Valve’s servers onto your computer. This is done for security reasons. I got CS1.5 and CS 1.6 off Soft32.com, and that’s not secure. Maybe there are loop-holes (in terms of downloading games)? The game is a 350 MB download - smaller than Counter-Strike 1.6. You’ll need a password from Counter-Strike: Conduction Zero to unlock the download screen. Plus, I don’t know why anyone would want to download the beta. It’s filed with bug crashes, and it’s going to come packaged with less glitches with Half-life 2 next year. It is rumored that’s exactly why Half-life 2 is delayed presently. I’ve been reading most of the reader reviews. It’s 50/50 whether or not it’s better than the Counter-Strike mod. Some say Condition Zero for Xbox wasn’t very good at all according to many Internet sources.
Today’s been chaotic. I went to CISCO taught by Joyce. Told her that my online curriculum wouldn’t show up at home. One of the student’s commented that my Internet Security is too high. I have to set it on “low” for CISCO online to show up. I’m sure it has to put cookies on my hard drive. Cookies aren’t bad – they’re just little files that have user data on them. Then I went to student services to get help in note taking for CISCO. I didn’t get any help. No one knows anything about Cisco. So I compromised and agreed for the teachers to look at my notes. My notes looked fine. Then I got home and started to read the first and second chapter in my Human Relations textbook. That took time out of my day.
On my slack off time I spared, I looked up if there were any new Half-Life 2 information. Which there was. I also found out what the new Counter-Strike is called (stated above). Next, I looked up Microsoft Xenon facts again. It tickles my hardware funny bone. Headlines: “Xenon: The PowerPC made by Microsoft.” Earlier, I found out the official specs, but just to make sure I was right, I reread the Xenon (really pronounced Zenon) article.
XEXON FAQ - http://xbox.gamespy.com/articles/527/527245p1.html?fromint=1
Monday, August 23, 2004
School starts
http://Stuff5.modblog.com recognized my JPEG 2000 plugin suggestion! It was a pretty damn good suggestion I think. JPEG2000 (JPG2) is state-of-the-art JPEG compression. JPG as many of us know – is a huge – it’s the second web browser standard (first was GIF), and now JPEG2000 is the forth. GIF (1993), JPEG (1995), PNG (1999), Macromedia Flash (1999), and JPEG2000 (2004).
On Saturday, I woke up and played a little Tales of Symphonia (Gamecube RPG). I’m currently on Chapter 3. My dad was in the other room watching baseball so I was afraid of him staring at the weird music in this game. I, personally like the game play, and I’m a little interested in the cut-scenes. Namco definitely didn’t rush through the voice-overs. I was right about the game playing a lot like Grandia II. That’s a big plus. Grandia II was really long, the battles were intense, and it had an interesting enough story that I played to the end. With the Dreamcast version, I was able to download hacked game saves from the Internet via Dreamcast. By hacked, I mean someone actually upped the stats of the characters and gave me 99 of all items. The bosses in Grandia II really bug me, as in a lot of them have physical and magic spells, which of course, is in a lot of RPGs. I played closely to the Walkthrough, so I knew what I was doing. Plus you can see your enemies on screen before activating a battle sequence. Tales of Symphonia is the exact same except it keeps the side view in the battles. The game is cell-shaded, and everything is in 3 dimensions including the battle sequence. After that, I played Wave Race. Not great, not bad. One thing I like about Wave Race: Blue Storm is the wave effects - they still look above average. I completed Normal Championship cup. The sequel makes me remember the old Wave Race 64 game that I also own. That game was cool even if it’s one of the first N64 games to come out, thus it’s has out-dated graphics on N64 near the end of it’s life. The Gamecube version looks photo-realistic. Well, of course, not as photo-realistic as Resident Evil and Resident Evil Zero. My point is – it’s still a load of fun to play. Then I played Colin McRae 04 on X-box. My skills improve enough that I broke my own record a couple of times. Colin McRae is made by Codemasters, and was out for Xbox in 2003. Codemasters is making a Colin McRae 2005 coming out in December. Xbox has 2 big Rally games. Colin McRae is more of a realistic simulation like Gran Turismo 3 while Rallisport Challenge aims more towards an arcade simulation. Arcade simulations are about driving fast and beating your best time. Simulations are about realistic features, and are often prettier and challenging at the same time.
After my late dinner, I went over to see my friend Randy, whom I haven’t seen for more than a month. I came over about 8PM. He happened to be playing Madden 2004 on his new Playstation 2. I knew it was Madden because I know what John Madden’s voice sounds like. I joked about it barely looking high resolution. His TV is a little old so it doesn’t have as nice displays as a new television would. He had the sound hooked up to the stereo speakers to give it that boosted surround sound capability. Him being the Green Bay Packers, and the other team the Pittsburg Steelers. He said there was a Madden 2005 Collectors Edition for 60 dollars. So he just bought the normal 50 dollar version. Madden 2005 seemed to have a graphical boost compared to my Madden 2002. Then again, PS2 is already out of date. I don’t know if the hardware is ancient, but today’s computers look a whole lot better. Still, it’s high resolution and can support full 3D games. The PSone could do that – but not as well. I always find most average Playstation games having a lack of texture – don’t know why because Final Fantasy and Gran Turismo games always had great texture Then he showed me Need for Speed Underground. He loves the game – it’s all he plays. I brought Winning Eleven Soccer 6 and Mega Man Anniversary Edition over there. Winning Eleven (produced and developed by Konami Japan) is the top franchise all over the world in Soccer games. It beats EA Sports FIFA everywhere except USA. But WES6 was the first of the franchise to come to North America. In other parts of the world, it’s known as football. And NFL Europe is known as American Football. Anyways Randy commented that the game’s commentators really like their soccer which, of course, were British. The British are known to go crazy over their beloved soccer (in the stadium. In UK, it’s not just any sport – it’s THE sport! In US, we have the MLS, but it’s not as nearly as popular as NFL or NASCAR. Okay, so it’s more popular than NCAA (college) baseball, but that’s about all. It ranks below College Football, and College Basketball in ratings. Randy and I had a hard time scoring goals. I thought the R3 button scored goals, but soccer guy always passes it away from the goal. This makes me very mad. Whenever I use circle or square, it always goes above the net or the Goalie catches it. Our game went through the first, and second halves than both extended times to the shoot out. Randy didn’t control the net in the shoot out. If my ball didn’t hit the edge of the post, and bounce off, I would have won that game. Randy wasn’t even guarding that end of the net!
Then we played Mega Man and Mega Man 7. No comment on this. Winners can only brag, losers can not at least in gaming. It doesn’t sound right if the ‘underdog’ brags. In the gaming industry, it’s weird how small companies brag about their game. That’s what VG review sites are for…to reveal the truth of any of them. Neither one of us completed a level. Yes, we were that bad at it. I scored even were Randy was so we where even on skills. The game is pretty difficult for a 16 year old game. I told him I’ve beaten Mega Man through JNES with an invincibility code.
On Sunday, the Minnesota Twins (http://minnesota.twins.mlb.com/) were playing the Cleveland Indians. Twins won. The Twins are a small market team, one of the smallest in the National League. Their pay roll is about 30 million. Sometimes the Twins play really good, like they’ve done tonight against Cleveland. For an example - Christian Guzman hit a double with no outs. The Cleveland pitcher walks the 3rd batter so when the bases are loaded, the Indians could make a double play. Then one of the worst players on the Twins struck out (Ford). Torii Hunter almost hit a home run on STRIKE 3, but instead it bounced off the Metrodome wall below the stands which freed up all the bases. Best thing – it was a pitcher’s worst nightmare which put the Twins ahead, and the game was pretty much over then.
I went to the Toyriffic, and didn’t see anything good. I was looking for Rallisport Challenge II. They didn’t have it. However, I did buy ESPN Football 2K5 for 20 dollars.
I got home and played ESPN Football 2K5. This is the first time I played football since I bought Madden 2002 8 months ago. I picked Vikings as my home team against 49ers. MN Vikings are my favorite NFL team. I played picked a random selection for possible plays. I feel unlucky. I don’t know a heck a lot about football. I feel dumb at it because I read the manual, and did the plays threw the football with X button, and tried to catch it, but the quarter-back threw it out of bounds. I wasn’t even aiming towards the sidelines. When it was my turn, I couldn’t figure out how to make the catcher catch the ball. This would definitely help a lot if he did. I tried pressing X on the dual shock II controller, and the running back didn’t do anything to catch the ball automatically. Soccer, on the other end, evolves around no coaching so, therefore, it is more fun to play. Turning coaching off in NFL football would make the game harder, and I had it on the easiest setting. I’ve got frustrated and turned the PS2 off.
Then today I watched Star Wars – A New Hope, and Star Wars – Empire Strikes Back. Two very old movies. Oh, Star Wars fan base is huge. Internet sites everywhere. I am not a fan of the prequels. Star Wars doesn’t have very good actors – but its story and effects are questionable. I own the Star Wars Trilogy Special Edition. Darth Vador is very cool. I like the part were he squishes the necks of those who disobeyed him. Carrie Fisher is a hottie in the early 80s. That scene in the beginning of Return of the Jedi when she was I was in a bikini (obviously propaganda) made her look a bit how should we say – out of the ordinary. I wouldn’t want to be close to a slimy disgusting slug neither. George Lucas has a sick mind having Luke Skywalker save a princess, who’s barely wearing anything. That slug definitely has issues. I was looking up the homebrew Star Wars sites after I saw Empire Strike Back. If I had a choice of which one is my favorite of all the Star Wars films – I would pick Empire Strikes Back.
I found out the name of Episode III – it’s called “Star Wars Episode III – Revenge of the Sith”. We know Anekin Skywalker gets married, and turns to the dark side as Darth Vador. What will make people watch it is the fact it’s Star Wars, and that it has state-of-the-art special effects.
I just started “Fundamentals of Human Relations" today. I’m being thought by Dr. Kezner again. Dr. Kezner is a nice guy. It’s old about 60 and served in Vietnam War or so he told us. My dad also got drafted too, and may be as old as he is, but didn’t go to Vietnam. He was in Company C. Dr. Kezner was too short – he had to be at least 5.7 feet. He’s like 5.3. It’s odd because my dad’s dad was also in company C which didn’t go into the war itself. Company C was more a reserve. A platoon is 6 men. A Company is 600 – 800 men. My dad keeps his Dad’s WWII uniform that had Corporal signature on it. Yes, this is only one rank up from Private, but remember neither one saw action so --. Anyway, I entered class at WITC for the 2nd day. Everyone was talking, of course, because they can. Talking is aloud. It IS an American right and it’s human nature. They all know everybody anyways. I don’t know anyone. Then Kezner joked about when we had a discussion with someone, that’s 40% of the class right there. The book is much smaller than last year so – therefore - it should be easier? Answer to this: Yes and No. The language hasn’t changed at all in 25 years. So no. The book is much smaller therefore a little easier to comprehend and memorize. It always helps. So I’ll wait and see what happens. Phil Kezner probably knows this class in his sleep. He knows all this information in the textbook that cost me 80 dollars today, and than some. At school today - Kezner brought up John Kerry. I don’t believe that students there don’t know who the president elect runner up is? That is the most ridiculous news of the day.
At school - I downloaded Knoppix 3.4. The program took 2 hours to download, and nearly 10 seconds to the finished download, the computer shuts off and restarts. I know what it was too. The Novell Network Agent restarted the computer before it could achieve 100%. Why didn’t the agent restart when the download started? The answers to this….I have no idea. So I’m leaving that terminal on over night. I even made desktop wallpaper saying please don’t delete my download. Well, with any luck, my download will be there tomorrow.
I was thinking about my CISCO textbook today. My text book is long and it’s a lot of reading. I mean come on! I looked at the online course – it looks a lot higher tech.
Time to study CISCO – bye! The CISCO online course is only on at certain parts of the day! It’s not available at night. I found the curriculum off Emule today. I’m downloading it right now. Its 26 MB total compressed. It has all the content of the online Cisco course. Problem is I’m downloading the 3.0 version not the 3.1.1 version. I hope there isn’t too much difference.
I’m studying the PowerPoint that still may be useful. I was thinking of zipping all the content I have, but that’s illegal, and I probably do not have that kind of server space. 0catch has 100 MB though. 0catch is a free server. No one would want my outdated information. It’s still good information. Just that CISCO has improved somehow…I can’t figure how though. It’s a mystery.
This is Ian signing off.
On Saturday, I woke up and played a little Tales of Symphonia (Gamecube RPG). I’m currently on Chapter 3. My dad was in the other room watching baseball so I was afraid of him staring at the weird music in this game. I, personally like the game play, and I’m a little interested in the cut-scenes. Namco definitely didn’t rush through the voice-overs. I was right about the game playing a lot like Grandia II. That’s a big plus. Grandia II was really long, the battles were intense, and it had an interesting enough story that I played to the end. With the Dreamcast version, I was able to download hacked game saves from the Internet via Dreamcast. By hacked, I mean someone actually upped the stats of the characters and gave me 99 of all items. The bosses in Grandia II really bug me, as in a lot of them have physical and magic spells, which of course, is in a lot of RPGs. I played closely to the Walkthrough, so I knew what I was doing. Plus you can see your enemies on screen before activating a battle sequence. Tales of Symphonia is the exact same except it keeps the side view in the battles. The game is cell-shaded, and everything is in 3 dimensions including the battle sequence. After that, I played Wave Race. Not great, not bad. One thing I like about Wave Race: Blue Storm is the wave effects - they still look above average. I completed Normal Championship cup. The sequel makes me remember the old Wave Race 64 game that I also own. That game was cool even if it’s one of the first N64 games to come out, thus it’s has out-dated graphics on N64 near the end of it’s life. The Gamecube version looks photo-realistic. Well, of course, not as photo-realistic as Resident Evil and Resident Evil Zero. My point is – it’s still a load of fun to play. Then I played Colin McRae 04 on X-box. My skills improve enough that I broke my own record a couple of times. Colin McRae is made by Codemasters, and was out for Xbox in 2003. Codemasters is making a Colin McRae 2005 coming out in December. Xbox has 2 big Rally games. Colin McRae is more of a realistic simulation like Gran Turismo 3 while Rallisport Challenge aims more towards an arcade simulation. Arcade simulations are about driving fast and beating your best time. Simulations are about realistic features, and are often prettier and challenging at the same time.
After my late dinner, I went over to see my friend Randy, whom I haven’t seen for more than a month. I came over about 8PM. He happened to be playing Madden 2004 on his new Playstation 2. I knew it was Madden because I know what John Madden’s voice sounds like. I joked about it barely looking high resolution. His TV is a little old so it doesn’t have as nice displays as a new television would. He had the sound hooked up to the stereo speakers to give it that boosted surround sound capability. Him being the Green Bay Packers, and the other team the Pittsburg Steelers. He said there was a Madden 2005 Collectors Edition for 60 dollars. So he just bought the normal 50 dollar version. Madden 2005 seemed to have a graphical boost compared to my Madden 2002. Then again, PS2 is already out of date. I don’t know if the hardware is ancient, but today’s computers look a whole lot better. Still, it’s high resolution and can support full 3D games. The PSone could do that – but not as well. I always find most average Playstation games having a lack of texture – don’t know why because Final Fantasy and Gran Turismo games always had great texture Then he showed me Need for Speed Underground. He loves the game – it’s all he plays. I brought Winning Eleven Soccer 6 and Mega Man Anniversary Edition over there. Winning Eleven (produced and developed by Konami Japan) is the top franchise all over the world in Soccer games. It beats EA Sports FIFA everywhere except USA. But WES6 was the first of the franchise to come to North America. In other parts of the world, it’s known as football. And NFL Europe is known as American Football. Anyways Randy commented that the game’s commentators really like their soccer which, of course, were British. The British are known to go crazy over their beloved soccer (in the stadium. In UK, it’s not just any sport – it’s THE sport! In US, we have the MLS, but it’s not as nearly as popular as NFL or NASCAR. Okay, so it’s more popular than NCAA (college) baseball, but that’s about all. It ranks below College Football, and College Basketball in ratings. Randy and I had a hard time scoring goals. I thought the R3 button scored goals, but soccer guy always passes it away from the goal. This makes me very mad. Whenever I use circle or square, it always goes above the net or the Goalie catches it. Our game went through the first, and second halves than both extended times to the shoot out. Randy didn’t control the net in the shoot out. If my ball didn’t hit the edge of the post, and bounce off, I would have won that game. Randy wasn’t even guarding that end of the net!
Then we played Mega Man and Mega Man 7. No comment on this. Winners can only brag, losers can not at least in gaming. It doesn’t sound right if the ‘underdog’ brags. In the gaming industry, it’s weird how small companies brag about their game. That’s what VG review sites are for…to reveal the truth of any of them. Neither one of us completed a level. Yes, we were that bad at it. I scored even were Randy was so we where even on skills. The game is pretty difficult for a 16 year old game. I told him I’ve beaten Mega Man through JNES with an invincibility code.
On Sunday, the Minnesota Twins (http://minnesota.twins.mlb.com/) were playing the Cleveland Indians. Twins won. The Twins are a small market team, one of the smallest in the National League. Their pay roll is about 30 million. Sometimes the Twins play really good, like they’ve done tonight against Cleveland. For an example - Christian Guzman hit a double with no outs. The Cleveland pitcher walks the 3rd batter so when the bases are loaded, the Indians could make a double play. Then one of the worst players on the Twins struck out (Ford). Torii Hunter almost hit a home run on STRIKE 3, but instead it bounced off the Metrodome wall below the stands which freed up all the bases. Best thing – it was a pitcher’s worst nightmare which put the Twins ahead, and the game was pretty much over then.
I went to the Toyriffic, and didn’t see anything good. I was looking for Rallisport Challenge II. They didn’t have it. However, I did buy ESPN Football 2K5 for 20 dollars.
I got home and played ESPN Football 2K5. This is the first time I played football since I bought Madden 2002 8 months ago. I picked Vikings as my home team against 49ers. MN Vikings are my favorite NFL team. I played picked a random selection for possible plays. I feel unlucky. I don’t know a heck a lot about football. I feel dumb at it because I read the manual, and did the plays threw the football with X button, and tried to catch it, but the quarter-back threw it out of bounds. I wasn’t even aiming towards the sidelines. When it was my turn, I couldn’t figure out how to make the catcher catch the ball. This would definitely help a lot if he did. I tried pressing X on the dual shock II controller, and the running back didn’t do anything to catch the ball automatically. Soccer, on the other end, evolves around no coaching so, therefore, it is more fun to play. Turning coaching off in NFL football would make the game harder, and I had it on the easiest setting. I’ve got frustrated and turned the PS2 off.
Then today I watched Star Wars – A New Hope, and Star Wars – Empire Strikes Back. Two very old movies. Oh, Star Wars fan base is huge. Internet sites everywhere. I am not a fan of the prequels. Star Wars doesn’t have very good actors – but its story and effects are questionable. I own the Star Wars Trilogy Special Edition. Darth Vador is very cool. I like the part were he squishes the necks of those who disobeyed him. Carrie Fisher is a hottie in the early 80s. That scene in the beginning of Return of the Jedi when she was I was in a bikini (obviously propaganda) made her look a bit how should we say – out of the ordinary. I wouldn’t want to be close to a slimy disgusting slug neither. George Lucas has a sick mind having Luke Skywalker save a princess, who’s barely wearing anything. That slug definitely has issues. I was looking up the homebrew Star Wars sites after I saw Empire Strike Back. If I had a choice of which one is my favorite of all the Star Wars films – I would pick Empire Strikes Back.
I found out the name of Episode III – it’s called “Star Wars Episode III – Revenge of the Sith”. We know Anekin Skywalker gets married, and turns to the dark side as Darth Vador. What will make people watch it is the fact it’s Star Wars, and that it has state-of-the-art special effects.
I just started “Fundamentals of Human Relations" today. I’m being thought by Dr. Kezner again. Dr. Kezner is a nice guy. It’s old about 60 and served in Vietnam War or so he told us. My dad also got drafted too, and may be as old as he is, but didn’t go to Vietnam. He was in Company C. Dr. Kezner was too short – he had to be at least 5.7 feet. He’s like 5.3. It’s odd because my dad’s dad was also in company C which didn’t go into the war itself. Company C was more a reserve. A platoon is 6 men. A Company is 600 – 800 men. My dad keeps his Dad’s WWII uniform that had Corporal signature on it. Yes, this is only one rank up from Private, but remember neither one saw action so --. Anyway, I entered class at WITC for the 2nd day. Everyone was talking, of course, because they can. Talking is aloud. It IS an American right and it’s human nature. They all know everybody anyways. I don’t know anyone. Then Kezner joked about when we had a discussion with someone, that’s 40% of the class right there. The book is much smaller than last year so – therefore - it should be easier? Answer to this: Yes and No. The language hasn’t changed at all in 25 years. So no. The book is much smaller therefore a little easier to comprehend and memorize. It always helps. So I’ll wait and see what happens. Phil Kezner probably knows this class in his sleep. He knows all this information in the textbook that cost me 80 dollars today, and than some. At school today - Kezner brought up John Kerry. I don’t believe that students there don’t know who the president elect runner up is? That is the most ridiculous news of the day.
At school - I downloaded Knoppix 3.4. The program took 2 hours to download, and nearly 10 seconds to the finished download, the computer shuts off and restarts. I know what it was too. The Novell Network Agent restarted the computer before it could achieve 100%. Why didn’t the agent restart when the download started? The answers to this….I have no idea. So I’m leaving that terminal on over night. I even made desktop wallpaper saying please don’t delete my download. Well, with any luck, my download will be there tomorrow.
I was thinking about my CISCO textbook today. My text book is long and it’s a lot of reading. I mean come on! I looked at the online course – it looks a lot higher tech.
Time to study CISCO – bye! The CISCO online course is only on at certain parts of the day! It’s not available at night. I found the curriculum off Emule today. I’m downloading it right now. Its 26 MB total compressed. It has all the content of the online Cisco course. Problem is I’m downloading the 3.0 version not the 3.1.1 version. I hope there isn’t too much difference.
I’m studying the PowerPoint that still may be useful. I was thinking of zipping all the content I have, but that’s illegal, and I probably do not have that kind of server space. 0catch has 100 MB though. 0catch is a free server. No one would want my outdated information. It’s still good information. Just that CISCO has improved somehow…I can’t figure how though. It’s a mystery.
This is Ian signing off.
Saturday, August 21, 2004
Please support JPEG2000! Browser plugin is free.
Hello all. It’s me and I want to say I’ve seen the next best thing in graphic files. And it is called JPEG2000! Best of all, JPEG2000 browser plug-ins are free! JPEG2000 has a better pixel resolution for the file size. I want to use JPEG 2000, but am afraid it’s not standardized for most users. JPEG 2000 is state-of-the-art compression for images. JPEG 2000 files always have the *.J2C or *.J2K extensions. But I found out that Paint Shop Pro 7 and 8, and Adobe Photoshop 7, 8, 9 have support for it. You can also download Morgan Media's JPEG tool to make J2C files. This is a shareware program. I recommend anyone to download the free browser plugin, and forget about it. I have it installed and all it does is adds support for J2K files. I want to use JPEG2000 on my webpage, but I can’t because more than half of Internet users don't have support for it. There is enough pixel enhancements for this format to make a difference in Internet. JPEG is 14 years old. JPEG 2000 just came out in 2001. Please support JPEG 2000, and hope Microsoft Corp. standardizes it in Internet Explorer 7.0
I’m sorry. I can’t show you a JPEG2000 image on here because it won’t show up if you don’t download and install the plugin.
16KB JPEG file
PNG image acting as if it were a 16 KB JPEG 2000 image
This is the actual JPEG2000 image compressed at 16K....like it :)
Below is the very useful image tag for J2c and J2K files :)
I’m sorry. I can’t show you a JPEG2000 image on here because it won’t show up if you don’t download and install the plugin.
16KB JPEG file
PNG image acting as if it were a 16 KB JPEG 2000 image
This is the actual JPEG2000 image compressed at 16K....like it :)
Below is the very useful image tag for J2c and J2K files :)
"embed src="image.jp2" width="400" height="300">
Please become supporters today!
Free Mozilla JPEG 2000 Plugin - http://www.morgan-multimedia.com/download/setup_Moz_plugin.exe
Free Internet Explorer JPEG2000 Plugin - http://www.morgan-multimedia.com/download/MMJP2KAX.exe
Download this Image creation tool (Morgan JPEG Toolbox V2 ) if you don’t have Paint Shop Pro or Photoshop installed. URL - http://www.morgan-multimedia.com/JPEG2000/Toolbox.htm
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