Hard Light Productions Forums
Off-Topic Discussion => Gaming Discussion => Topic started by: jr2 on December 14, 2007, 05:36:14 pm
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http://www.fallingleafsystems.com/ Halo 2 for XP :yes:
EDIT: The Alky project allows 2 things: DX 10 on XP, and also Vista-only games on XP... at least, that's the picture I got. Someone correct me if I'm wrong. If you think it's impossible, then go tell the folks at the Alky project that. :p
Overview
The Alky Project started with the ambitious and somewhat vague goal of running Windows games on alternative platforms. As the project progressed, the goal was refined and focused to implement libraries which would allow DirectX 10 based games to run atop Windows XP and eventually other platforms as well.
In May of 2007, project VAIO, who had implemented a set of libraries of their own to allow certain Windows Vista-only applications to run atop XP, merged with the Alky Project and became a part of Falling Leaf Systems.
These circumstances have led to the creation of two distinct incarnations of the Alky product line.
Alky for Applications
Alky for Applications targets Vista-only application software such as the Windows Sidebar, Windows Vista Screensavers, and Windows Mail. The final release of 1.0 is now available!
Alky for Applications Version 1.0 - Download (http://www.fallingleafsystems.com/site_media/AfA_final.zip) (Supported Applications (http://www.fallingleafsystems.com/site_media/matrix.html))
Alky for Games
Alky for Games is set to launch in the fourth quarter of 2007 or the first quarter of 2008. When launched, it will support all games based upon DirectX 10. You may download a rough, pre-alpha preview copy below. It comes with no support and may or may not work with the current releases of the DirectX 10 SDK from Microsoft. Please download the ZIP file and carefully follow the instructions in the README file inside.
Alky for Games - Download (http://www.fallingleafsystems.com/site_media/preview.zip)
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Considering that Halo 2 doesn't use DirectX 10 someone's got the wrong end of the stick here. :p
A backport of DX10 could be really nice for future DX10 only games but you most certainly don't need this to run Halo 2.
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From what I heard Halo2 is even worse then the first one....and that was allready quite bad on the PC...at least in my opinion.
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Halo 2 wasn't bad, I thought it was great :nervous:
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Halo 2 wasn't bad, I thought it was great :nervous:
It's not a bad game in and unto itself, but it's been borked so heavily in porting that i'd rather play Superman 64. :doubt:
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Halo 1/2 are good games. It just depends on your preferences. However, Direct X 10 can't be ported to XP for the reason Microsoft have to redo all the OS core and not just bring Direct X 10 librairies, plus nVidia/AMD/ATI have to build Dx 10 driver that support Win XP and perhaps the AlkyProject.
So if you want Dx 10 on your rig, just buy Vista and a Dx 10 GPU. If you hate Microsoft so just don't buy Vista and stay with XP and you have to play only Dx 9 video games. Put in mind that you don't spend every year an OS.
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Halo 2 wasn't bad, I thought it was great :nervous:
It's not a bad game in and unto itself, but it's been borked so heavily in porting that i'd rather play Superman 64. :doubt:
Actually, IMHO, Bungie's error in porting Halo 2 was that the developer didn't change enough. They said that Halo 2 would (I think) be a DX10 game, support 1080i resolution, be retextured, etc, etc. Add in that they dumbed down the editor, and you've got yourself a waste of 50 bucks if you already have played the Xbox version... :hopping: :mad:
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Halo 1/2 are good games. It just depends on your preferences. However, Direct X 10 can't be ported to XP for the reason Microsoft have to redo all the OS core and not just bring Direct X 10 librairies, plus nVidia/AMD/ATI have to build Dx 10 driver that support Win XP and perhaps the AlkyProject.
So if you want Dx 10 on your rig, just buy Vista and a Dx 10 GPU. If you hate Microsoft so just don't buy Vista and stay with XP and you have to play only Dx 9 video games. Put in mind that you don't spend every year an OS.
DX10 by itself isn't worth much right now anyway, as the games currently supporting it either look almost the same as in DX9 or are artificially limited to show certain effects only in their DX10 mode (and can often be tweaked to get the same stuff in DX9). One common "feature" many games use is larger textures in DX10 modes, which obviously has nothing to do with the DX version.
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Added to that is that DX10 runs a lot slower than DX9 on mid-range rigs (and even on the higher-end ones), so you pretty much have to have dual 880GTXs in SLI configuration, with 4Gbs of RAM and at least a 2.7GHz dual-core processor to run DX10 smoothly :rolleyes: :mad:
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Added to that is that DX10 runs a lot slower than DX9 on mid-range rigs (and even on the higher-end ones), so you pretty much have to have dual 880GTXs in SLI configuration, with 4Gbs of RAM and at least a 2.7GHz dual-core processor to run DX10 smoothly :rolleyes: :mad:
Note: 4GB of RAM would only help on the 64bit version of XP Pro.
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Or if you're running Crysis on a DX10 chip.
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Added to that is that DX10 runs a lot slower than DX9 on mid-range rigs (and even on the higher-end ones), so you pretty much have to have dual 880GTXs in SLI configuration, with 4Gbs of RAM and at least a 2.7GHz dual-core processor to run DX10 smoothly :rolleyes: :mad:
Huhu -_- Company of Heroes (Dx 10 mode) runs pretty well except when you try to view the horizon. And It doesn't need a SLI/Crossfire setup. World in Conflict runs well, ok you don't have a stable framerate but it's only a RTS so, having 15 or 20 fps it's enought to play and beat the game. Crysis is the only game which use all the GPU resources. Lost Planet is okay for me. The framerate is pretty good.
So I don't see a point to critisize Dx 10 games.
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Added to that is that DX10 runs a lot slower than DX9 on mid-range rigs (and even on the higher-end ones), so you pretty much have to have dual 880GTXs in SLI configuration, with 4Gbs of RAM and at least a 2.7GHz dual-core processor to run DX10 smoothly :rolleyes: :mad:
Note: 4GB of RAM would only help on the 64bit version of XP Pro.
Or if you're running Crysis on a DX10 chip.
32bit operating systems can only allocate 2 gigabytes of RAM to any given process.
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@You all: See my edit on post one. :p
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However, Direct X 10 can't be ported to XP for the reason Microsoft have to redo all the OS core and not just bring Direct X 10 librairies, plus nVidia/AMD/ATI have to build Dx 10 driver that support Win XP and perhaps the AlkyProject.
If MS have to redo their entire OS core in order to port an API they've ****ed up making the API in the first place.
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In fact, with Vista, MS try to allocate all the graphic stuff directly in the GPU instead by going into the CPU then to the GPU. Plus, the OS try and do use all your system memory for best performance (I mean, all your recent program are in the memory so, the more you execute the same programs, and more they'll be loading faster).
I think, we should wait a little more and see other Dx 10 games or other GPU in the next few month and see if performance will be better.
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I heard that the first Vista patch will increase performance quite a lot, beside fixing various errors and bugs. On the other hand I heard that even MS isn't giving to much care about Vista themself. Working on something people call XP2.
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It's actually "Windows 7" they're working on, and it's going to be their new OS, due out in 2 years. IIRC Microsoft is going for an episodic type release of it's OSs now, forcing users to upgrade every time a new one comes out, instead of letting them use XP for the next ten years.
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It's actually "Windows 7" they're working on, and it's going to be their new OS, due out in 2 years. IIRC Microsoft is going for an episodic type release of it's OSs now, forcing users to upgrade every time a new one comes out, instead of letting them use XP for the next ten years.
Considering the fiasco we have seen with Valve and their episodic content, I don't think this is going to go smoothly.
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What is meant by "episodic"? :shaking: This can't be good. What is it?
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What a freaking idea is it to release an OS as "episodes"? This is just bull**** and nothing more then another name for patches.
I would realy wish that they take the ripped down part of Windows 7 I have seen and build the other stuff around it as seperate programs instead of one squisch squasch they have now.
Get rid of these shared files and regestries. I am not a programing dude so what I say might sound wrong but for me an OS is for managing the PC.
It tells the hardware what drivers to use and the programs if they can start and how. As the stripped down W7 has shown its possible to do this with Windows and get a slim program that would fit on a small disk and use 512KB of RAM.
I think they should stop there. Keep this and then add an User interface as an extra. Not make it part of the basic functions of the OS so that when anything is wrong with it...who cares I get thrown back to kinda DOS input but at least I can still operate the sytem. The restart or if its an more heavy error reinstall the interface. Just that part and not the entire OS.
Same goes for all the other programs. I have learned in the last two or three month in which I had to change some of my software to newer versions that a so many components in XP are linked together where I saw no link.
Why should the deinstallation of an editing program **** up my internet connection? What have these two in common?
So everything back to haveing there own files, folders and stuff and give people a easy to use tool to prevent any other programs to touch the config files except you allow it. Also no more common files (think that it the english term) where every company seams to put in their files. Using the same name for files that necessarly do the same thing......
Ok enough ranting and as said I am no programming dude but that is the impression and maybe rage I got from the last two month where I was so very close to erase my HD and start from the beginning.
Back to DOS and Norton commander ^_^
Ok not realy. I like my graphiks on screen but please could someone do a system that dosn't completly falls apart when just one component dosn't work and is still easy do use?
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Who needs DirectX10?
We'll soon have OpenGL 3.0! ;)
From what I heared (and understand) it looks like developers will be a lot more happy with OpenGL 3.0 than they were with OpenGL 2.0.
And I really hope OpenGL will be used a lot more in the future, so that we don't have to buy a new Windows versions each two years, to get an up-to-date DirectX version.
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What a freaking idea is it to release an OS as "episodes"? This is just bull**** and nothing more then another name for patches.
I would realy wish that they take the ripped down part of Windows 7 I have seen and build the other stuff around it as seperate programs instead of one squisch squasch they have now.
Get rid of these shared files and regestries. I am not a programing dude so what I say might sound wrong but for me an OS is for managing the PC.
It tells the hardware what drivers to use and the programs if they can start and how. As the stripped down W7 has shown its possible to do this with Windows and get a slim program that would fit on a small disk and use 512KB of RAM.
I think they should stop there. Keep this and then add an User interface as an extra. Not make it part of the basic functions of the OS so that when anything is wrong with it...who cares I get thrown back to kinda DOS input but at least I can still operate the sytem. The restart or if its an more heavy error reinstall the interface. Just that part and not the entire OS.
Same goes for all the other programs. I have learned in the last two or three month in which I had to change some of my software to newer versions that a so many components in XP are linked together where I saw no link.
Why should the deinstallation of an editing program **** up my internet connection? What have these two in common?
So everything back to haveing there own files, folders and stuff and give people a easy to use tool to prevent any other programs to touch the config files except you allow it. Also no more common files (think that it the english term) where every company seams to put in their files. Using the same name for files that necessarly do the same thing......
Ok enough ranting and as said I am no programming dude but that is the impression and maybe rage I got from the last two month where I was so very close to erase my HD and start from the beginning.
Back to DOS and Norton commander ^_^
Ok not realy. I like my graphiks on screen but please could someone do a system that dosn't completly falls apart when just one component dosn't work and is still easy do use?
You know, it's called Leopard 10.5.
DaBrain is right. OpenGL rulez.
And with buying Bungie, M$ f**ked up the whole Halo series. It ought to be a great game, with _spectcular_ GFX when it firs showed up WWDC. But M$ just rushed the release. Damn moneybags.
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And I really hope OpenGL will be used a lot more in the future, so that we don't have to buy a new Windows versions each two years, to get an up-to-date DirectX version.
I think Dx 9 is already enought to do beautiful thing. I mean, no space opera have propose a great engine except X3 Reunion.
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To make things short...I have seen Macs crashing as often as PCs.
About OpenGL...I also think that it would be cool to have more games written with it. From what I get its very easy for porting games to different platforms. With all the games mostly beeing developed with multiplatform releases in mind it could give OpenGL the deserved attention.
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WEll, the thing with Alky is it's their goal to port DX to different platforms. Did anyone actually read what I posted? I edited the first post, you know. Read it. Then come back, and let me learn from your discussion. I already know M$ are a bunch of cheating, money-hungry thieves. :p
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That's why I'm not buying claims you can't back port DX10. If you can't then you have to wonder what the hell Falling Leaf have been doing. :D
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To make things short...I have seen Macs crashing as often as PCs.
About OpenGL...I also think that it would be cool to have more games written with it. From what I get its very easy for porting games to different platforms. With all the games mostly beeing developed with multiplatform releases in mind it could give OpenGL the deserved attention.
Wait what? Where on earth did you see these macs crashing? Were they being used by monkeys or something? I've had this mac for over 3 years, and I've never ever seen it crash. The one I had before that only crashed like 3 times (and even then all you had to do was restart it).
I'm actually very interested to know how they crashed. Know any specifics?
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To make things short...I have seen Macs crashing as often as PCs.
About OpenGL...I also think that it would be cool to have more games written with it. From what I get its very easy for porting games to different platforms. With all the games mostly beeing developed with multiplatform releases in mind it could give OpenGL the deserved attention.
Wait what? Where on earth did you see these macs crashing? Were they being used by monkeys or something? I've had this mac for over 3 years, done all kinds of crazy things with it, and I've never ever seen it crash. The one I had before that only crashed like 3 times (and even then all you had to do was restart it). I've seen applications crash, sure - but thats basically the fault of lazy developers.
I'm actually very interested to know how they crashed. Know any specifics?
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I have a friend whos shown me proof you can back port to dx 10 but he hasn't given out his secrets :sigh:
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To make things short...I have seen Macs crashing as often as PCs.
About OpenGL...I also think that it would be cool to have more games written with it. From what I get its very easy for porting games to different platforms. With all the games mostly beeing developed with multiplatform releases in mind it could give OpenGL the deserved attention.
Wait what? Where on earth did you see these macs crashing? Were they being used by monkeys or something? I've had this mac for over 3 years, and I've never ever seen it crash. The one I had before that only crashed like 3 times (and even then all you had to do was restart it).
I'm actually very interested to know how they crashed. Know any specifics?
The college I go to has TONS of macs, and I see them crash and malfunction just as often as PCs. In fact, my roommate managed to crash his within a week of getting it, installed XP on it, is running crash free to my knowledge.
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One of the easiest ways was to hit any keyboard combination while Avid was saveing stuff on a Mac. That surely made it crash and me go "WTF now I have to redo all the work I just did?"
Only happend on one of the two Avid-apple systems we had...the other just paused and then started to work again.
These macs allready had quite some problems with starting up. Toke them forever, then stoped at bootup like 2 out of 3 times and rebooting didn't worked that well after crashes cause it got you straigth back to reboot several times.
In defance I have to say these where very old Macs and no one bothered to do any kind of system check or any other caretaking for the system. Poor Macs if you ask me.
In school we also got a good number of macs. They where more modern but I also heard some swearing from their places....and I didn't even entered the room.
I got a magical aura that makes Macs crash just by entering the room.
Ok it happend only ones. A college had a new Powerbook or what its called and everyone was standing around it, he was praising it to heaven. Then I just said "Ah its just a PC don't make such a fuss" and the damn thing crashed. Was hilarious as hell and I was never allowed to be near is Laptop again ^_^
Sometimes I get the feeling that computers understand me. When I say "I have to go to bed at XX:XX" These damn things crash just 5min before that time and that on a nearly regular basis. :nervous:
I have worked on both systems for some time and my experiance could be summed up to about this. Both systems aren't idiotic proved. If you got a person using it who dosn't know how to operate the system it will crash.
Both systems need some attention to it. Keeping a clean system and don't put every trash you find on it.
In the end both are the same.
Or as my math teacher said "The caculator is only so smart as the guy who us it" ^_^
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To make things short...I have seen Macs crashing as often as PCs.
About OpenGL...I also think that it would be cool to have more games written with it. From what I get its very easy for porting games to different platforms. With all the games mostly beeing developed with multiplatform releases in mind it could give OpenGL the deserved attention.
Wait what? Where on earth did you see these macs crashing? Were they being used by monkeys or something? I've had this mac for over 3 years, and I've never ever seen it crash. The one I had before that only crashed like 3 times (and even then all you had to do was restart it).
I'm actually very interested to know how they crashed. Know any specifics?
The college I go to has TONS of macs, and I see them crash and malfunction just as often as PCs. In fact, my roommate managed to crash his within a week of getting it, installed XP on it, is running crash free to my knowledge.
Are they crashing in bootcamp/Vista or something? Are they running 9.2 in Classic (the really old OS)? The only time I saw a mac crash (in OS X) in the past 3 years was on my old machine. It was a kernel panic - and that was when I was literally -trying- to make it crash. What kind of behavior did the school macs have? What kind of crash did your roomate's computer get?
Screenshot or it didn't happen. :nervous:
j/k - its not that I don't believe you, I'm just actually very interested in what makes a mac crash.
I have worked on both systems for some time and my experiance could be summed up to about this. Both systems aren't idiotic proved. If you got a person using it who dosn't know how to operate the system it will crash.
Both systems need some attention to it. Keeping a clean system and don't put every trash you find on it.
Too true. However, in my experience, Windoze seems to be generally much more unstable - more prone to conflicts/complete loss of hard drive/etc. Windows has problems - it could take you an entire day to get things back in order. On OS X, at most it takes a few minutes. Again, just in my experience, but I've worked a fair amount on Windows (my previous job being virus removal, afterall).
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Aren't you supposed to like rebuild the desktop or something on a Mac to keep it stable?
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Yeah, at school, our Mac's crash pretty often too. But infact, only because all these windows users mercilessly pound our iBooks screaming "HEY IT DOESEN'T WORK LIKE ON WINDOWS! THIS MAC IS CRAP!! ASNKBVUFASFBS!!", so our Mac's are completly FUBAR'd.
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Yeah, at school, our Mac's crash pretty often too. But infact, only because all these windows users mercilessly pound our iBooks screaming "HEY IT DOESEN'T WORK LIKE ON WINDOWS! THIS MAC IS CRAP!! ASNKBVUFASFBS!!", so our Mac's are completly FUBAR'd.
LOL, we should name a ship that in a parody campaign
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The most common crashes or crash-like behavior I have seen comes from hardware faults or from running way too many background programs (usually including several types of malware) at once. The cooling on most of these OEM systems is pretty anemic and most people pay no attention to what their machines are running in the background, so both causes are fairly common. A modern OS shouldn't be crashing at all if it's set up correctly and runs on stable hardware.
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Aren't you supposed to like rebuild the desktop or something on a Mac to keep it stable?
Oh man - that brings back memories. About 10 years ago, before Mac OS X (10.0. We are now at 10.5), there was OS 9. If you went a few months without rebuilding the desktop (it was kind-of like a superficial de-frag of your hard drive), you would have significant slowdown, and if left unchecked for a year, your computer would basically die if you were unlucky.
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Aren't you supposed to like rebuild the desktop or something on a Mac to keep it stable?
Oh man - that brings back memories. About 10 years ago, before Mac OS X (10.0. We are now at 10.5), there was OS 9. If you went a few months without rebuilding the desktop (it was kind-of like a superficial de-frag of your hard drive), you would have significant slowdown, and if left unchecked for a year, your computer would basically die if you were unlucky.
So, I take it they made this automatic or fixed it for OS X?
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Wait what? Where on earth did you see these macs crashing? Were they being used by monkeys or something? I've had this mac for over 3 years, and I've never ever seen it crash. The one I had before that only crashed like 3 times (and even then all you had to do was restart it).
I'm actually very interested to know how they crashed. Know any specifics?
I don't know what they did - I know I'd just be using some Mac app and it'd randomly close and bother me to send the error to Apple. And no, they were using OSX from 10.0 to Leopard - they've all crashed. Macs really aren't that stable.
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Yeah, at school, our Mac's crash pretty often too. But infact, only because all these windows users mercilessly pound our iBooks screaming "HEY IT DOESEN'T WORK LIKE ON WINDOWS! THIS MAC IS CRAP!! ASNKBVUFASFBS!!", so our Mac's are completly FUBAR'd.
LOL, we should name a ship that in a parody campaign
You could use that in memory of Vasudan naming habits.
I ate a sheep with a hat on its head. Did I ment.. uh, mention it was a pharao that believed in typhons?
Whoever finds all puns gets a cookie.
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I ate a sheep with a hat on its head.
Hathepshut.
Did I ment.. uh
Mentu
pharao
Pharoah escape pod.
typhons
Typhon destroyer.
Barring misspellings, where's my cookie? :p
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NECROTHREADA... whatever.
Well, you get a virtual cookie.... You could have my personal information stealing google cookies. Or else you modify my microwave into a teleportation device.
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Please don't necro dead threads.