BioWare CEO reiterates old EA wish for one unified console

[Rosbjerg]

Am I understand this right.. is a download cap common in most countries? (like max 20gb per month or a certain price per megabyte?)

 

God I'm glad the companies in my country hasn't figured that out yet..

[Tigranes]

It is also the case in NZ (since, uh, australia does it). The prices are better than there, though. Australia sometimes gets really screwed over by its own size. You have places like Melbourne where the gigantic, unplanned urban development causes a huge amount of congestion, then you have to spend millions more getting any sort of pipes and services out to the far-reaching suburbs.

[Mamoulian War]

Am I understand this right.. is a download cap common in most countries? (like max 20gb per month or a certain price per megabyte?)

 

God I'm glad the companies in my country hasn't figured that out yet..

 

In here mostly you can choose to pickup cheap flatrate with very limited bandwith... around 1-2Mbit/s

or very fast internet with few GB per month for same price, or extremely expensive and fast flatrate... in a level of few hundred EUR.

 

Fastest internet is for students on campus here, and its also cheapest...

[Gfted1]

Afaik, Comcast hasnt yet instituted a cap (at least in Illinois) and they one of the monster huge companies here in the states.

[alanschu]

I like how 1-2 Mbit is "very limited bandwidth"

[Humodour]

I like how 1-2 Mbit is "very limited bandwidth"

 

Haha.

 

Well, it has to be when places like South Korea are announcing 1 Gbps connections for all their citizens by 2011 (true story).

[Meshugger]

I like how 1-2 Mbit is "very limited bandwidth"

 

Haha.

 

Well, it has to be when places like South Korea are announcing 1 Gbps connections for all their citizens by 2011 (true story).

 

Actually, they delayed it to 2012

[taks]

Nah there are standards made/recommended by organisations like ISO or IEEE, and there are "standards" forced upon customers because there is no other similar product available on the market, like MS Windows for PC based gaming.

again, windows is not a "standard," it is proprietary software. what is being discussed in this article is an open architecture, not unlike the various bus standards, communications standards, etc.

 

If you dont understand what i am meaning blame my english explaining skills (not a native speaker)

i understand your meaning, you simply don't understand the concept.

 

I like how 1-2 Mbit is "very limited bandwidth"

? it is. i get 6-8 Mb/s on a standard link and now have access to 20 Mb/s (fiber came to town!).

 

taks

[Mamoulian War]

Nah there are standards made/recommended by organisations like ISO or IEEE, and there are "standards" forced upon customers because there is no other similar product available on the market, like MS Windows for PC based gaming.

again, windows is not a "standard," it is proprietary software. what is being discussed in this article is an open architecture, not unlike the various bus standards, communications standards, etc.

 

Actualy what is being discussed here is the possiblity, if it ends as a open architecture, which could be good for customers at the end, or it ends up as a closed proprietary milking cow of some big corporation

[alanschu]

I have 10 Mbit and I'm like ZOMG fast!!!!!!!!!

 

Almost unnecessarily fast haha. I remember getting by just fine on 1.5 Mbit ADSL line.

[Purkake]

I like how 1-2 Mbit is "very limited bandwidth"

 

It is okay for surfing and light downloading. You'd want something a bit better for heavy gaming, streaming and downloading.

 

Also, it is never really "fast enough" just like processors are always getting faster and more efficient.

[taks]

Actualy what is being discussed here is the possiblity, if it ends as a open architecture, which could be good for customers at the end, or it ends up as a closed proprietary milking cow of some big corporation

actually, what was being discussed - at least, your complaint - was the article, which is talking about an open architecture, i.e., a standard, not a proprietary hardware equivalent of windows.

 

i think my first PC had a 9.6 kb/s modem, in 1993 or so. V.34bis came out in 1994 allowing 28.8 kb/s, but those modems were expensive as i recall. i keep all my old hardware, so i probably have the original stuff around (i was actually using one of my original HDDs up till a couple years ago).

 

taks

[alanschu]

I do heavy game. All I do is game and game and game and game.

 

 

EDIT: Haha, I remember playing Duke3D on the ol' 9600 baud modem.

Edited February 3, 2009 by alanschu

[taks]

Also, it is never really "fast enough" just like processors are always getting faster and more efficient.

my former employer, in 2000 or so, did a marketing study on network access and user perception. they found that the initial "hit" time is more of a concern than the actual data rate with most people, i.e., how long it takes for the page to first show up is more important for standard browsing than how long it takes for the whole page to load. since we were developing wireless access systems, the original load time was obviously a bigger issue than what you would get at a desktop, and there was a point at which even a fast first load wouldn't overcome nightmarishly long transfer times.

 

taks

[taks]

kwinkidentally, this month's IEEE Communications Society magazine has an article on 4th generation broadband, which is slated to provide 100 Mb/s to 1 Gb/s rates via fiber to the home.

 

taks

[Gfted1]

i think my first PC had a 9.6 kb/s modem, in 1993 or so. V.34bis came out in 1994 allowing 28.8 kb/s, but those modems were expensive as i recall. i keep all my old hardware, so i probably have the original stuff around (i was actually using one of my original HDDs up till a couple years ago).

 

taks

 

Wasnt there a 14.4 in there too?

 

God, I vividly remember the day I got off dialup (56.6 at the time) and switched over to DSL, it was like night and day. Now Im kinda spoiled with broadband and I get aggravated if the page takes longer then a blink or two to load, lol. Ah how times changed from when I would go make a sammich or something while waiting for something to download.

Edited February 3, 2009 by Gfted1

[taks]

yup, but the transition went quickly. most people never got the higher speeds anyway, since you had to be pretty close to the sub-station to get the required SNR as i recall. even when i had the 56 kb/s modem i rarely attached above 28.8 kb/s and probably had a ton of re-transmits to boot. i've got cable modem now, which works significantly better than the DSL variants here in the springs. i won't switch to fiber till i know whether or not i will be moving, at which point (assuming i end up where i expect to), i'll be forced into an ADSL solution because i'll be out in the middle of nowhere.

 

taks

[Mamoulian War]

I like how 1-2 Mbit is "very limited bandwidth"

 

It is okay for surfing and light downloading. You'd want something a bit better for heavy gaming, streaming and downloading.

 

Also, it is never really "fast enough" just like processors are always getting faster and more efficient.

 

Same oppinion, my sister is totaly into streaming video, she almost never use classic television anymore, and 2Mbit is realy very limited for that purpose, especialy now when she found out about High Definiton.

[Purkake]

I like how 1-2 Mbit is "very limited bandwidth"

 

It is okay for surfing and light downloading. You'd want something a bit better for heavy gaming, streaming and downloading.

 

Also, it is never really "fast enough" just like processors are always getting faster and more efficient.

 

Same oppinion, my sister is totaly into streaming video, she almost never use classic television anymore, and 2Mbit is realy very limited for that purpose, especialy now when she found out about High Definiton.

 

Oh totally, I quit "normal" TV about 3 years ago. There's really nothing to watch especially here where all the better shows arrive 2 years later or not at all.

 

Yeah HD is like a drug, once you get a taste of it, all the other stuff looks really bad.

[Purkake]

Something just hit me about the internet and bandwidth stuff. I realized that most people in US and other places(I imagine) get their internet through the TV cable. I don't have and have never had cable TV(it's not that common here), I used to have the normal TV with the "rabbit ear" antenna and now I have digital TV coming through the phoneline.

 

So I get all my 12Mb through the phone(dsl I guess) line. What's the case in your country/home? It's kinda strange to think that it is so different in the US at least. Does anyone know the reason?

[alanschu]

Cable and Telephone compete for broadband internet here. I think both are quite common.

[Purkake]

Cable and Telephone compete for broadband internet here. I think both are quite common.

 

Is there any reason why one is better than the other?

[Hurlshort]

Cable and Telephone compete for broadband internet here. I think both are quite common.

 

Is there any reason why one is better than the other?

 

Nah, it can really vary area by area and depends on the service provider. I had DSL for a long while, but when I moved the phone company told me it was going to take weeks to get it hooked up. I called the cable company and they had it running in a few days.

[Purkake]

Cable and Telephone compete for broadband internet here. I think both are quite common.

 

Is there any reason why one is better than the other?

 

Nah, it can really vary area by area and depends on the service provider. I had DSL for a long while, but when I moved the phone company told me it was going to take weeks to get it hooked up. I called the cable company and they had it running in a few days.

 

Okay, so what's the deal with a lot of people complaining that they only have one service provider in their area? Everyone has phone and apparently also cable. Is the provider the same?

[alanschu]

I can't speak for them so I don't know.

 

I have two and have always had two.