quote: Original post by null_pointer
I would be absolutely sure. No one develops games for an extremely small, out-dated, incapable market like that. (...) old (original, as in many years old) Diamond Stealth has hardware support for DirectX. When it came out, it was THE most affordably priced card for quite a while.)

OK, but my point was that people with older harware are being left behind *EARLIER* than we would like to, because software that can be designed to run in say, a DX2/66, requires, say, a Pentium XXXMHz. But software which *REALLY* needs a faster processor, then I agree with you.

quote: Wrong, read my last post. Abstraction is the ONLY way hardware acceleration is possible to software like games. Even in DOS you had to create several drivers with a common interface (do I hear "abstraction," anyone?).

OK, but it is the hardware assistance and not the abstraction which increases the performance and/or number operations per second of DirectX.

quote:
You thought that I was saying that with abstraction all things run the same speed? Software triumphs over hardware? hahaha get real! Only when hardware and software work together can they be more efficient. Abstraction is only applied logic. I haven''t seen code that wasn''t both faster and simpler when it was written logically...on the other hand, many programmers have a horrible lack of logic with their coding. It is the programmers who code illogically, and it is certainly not the fault of logic that the code runs slower.

My point was abstraction increases development time, and not code execution time. However, I totally agree with you that it is *VERY* good (harware abstraction).

quote:
Asm (as a language) is out-of-date. It''s not portable. It forces the developer to re-write large amounts of drivers if they wish to get the most out of every piece of hardware (which is the only reason anyone would try to make a game in asm). Asm is inefficient for development, when compared with other easier ways. However, in my previous post(s), I was mainly talking about the __asm blocks that many C++ programmers use -- all that accomplishes is to try to do the compiler''s job better than it can. Useless. And quite unnecessary for game development. Compilers are notoriously better optimizers than humans

Assmbly (the human readable equivalent to machine language) is the only thing the processor executes, so it''s not outdated, this is my point. *BUT*, for development I totally agree with you that assembly is not the best language (comercially speaking), but I was not talking about this, I was just trying to say that Asm is pretty alive and well.

quote:
Are you talking about how the Windows API was designed? Try re-writing the Windows API yourself, and make it available for any language to use. Do you know how many language "shortcuts" were unavailable to the Windows API programmers because of compatibility with other languages? Do you now understand why they have callbacks and tons of structs and other things that typical programmers sneer at in disgust? Do you now understand that they couldn''t create classes because of languages that don''t support classes? (Just trying to keep unfounded opinions out -- if you know anything about how APIs are written, you won''t gripe about Windows'' API)

Or were you talking about the way the Windows API is implemented? The actual code? As many other people have already pointed out countless times, Windows 9x contains 16-bit code because of DOS COMPATIBILITY. Can you believe there are people out there who insist on legacy DOS support from Windows as an OS? I''m glad MS is officially dropping support for DOS in the near future. You gripe about DOS dying, and you gripe about Windows having slower code because it needs to support DOS. Illogical.

I am not talking about the API, but the code to implement it. For instance, if I am corect, Windows will use the slower virtual memory even if you install the full 4 giga bytes of ram the current x86 processors can address. That has nothing to do (and if it does, that would be also a poor design) the fact the 16/32 bit code is mixed. That''s why I complain about the implementation. Just go to www.anoyances.org to see more examples about many bad things in the Windows implementation. The point is if Windows was implemented well, DOS lovers would more easily acepted the change and we would not be arging here.

I pretty much agree with you, except, basically, ask for a Pentium 200 (or faster) for an application that can be designed to run on, say, a DX2/66, if eficient code is used, and that Assembly of out of date. Well, in assembly you can do *WHATEVER* you can do in other languages, but in other languages you can not do *ALL* that can be done in assembler. The point is Asm is *NOT* out of date (and sorry for this has nothing to do with the subject!)

TG

Amendment:
By the way, yes DOS is dead to Windoze, I think it is understandable why some people don''t want to let it go, for it takes, sometimes a lot of resources to do what GEOS on the old good Commodore 64 could do with just 64k of ram.

Oh well, the spirit is good, but the implementation of the replacement OS just..... well, sucks.

:-) (sorry, I still don''t know how to put the little images)

quote: Original post by Topgoro

quote:
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Original post by Anonymous Poster

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for free (by a relative that recently bought a new computer), although I wish I could have something more powerful .

-CobraA1


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You see why I dislike people who say: "Don''t worry about slow/ineficient/etc code, computers today are fast/have lots of storage/etc" (Not everyone has a fast computer, not everyone has lots of hard drive, *NOT* everyone has fast internet.)

Irrelevant. It''s a fact that people write games to make a profit, and there''s no profit to be made in making games to run on older computers. (If you want a laugh, look at the people who thought machines would put them out of work -- same attitude!)

You completely missed the point of my posts, if you think that I''m advocating slower, poorly done code or wasteful use of resources.

Is there no end to people who will debate DOS vs. Windows when they don''t even know how Windows works?



- null_pointer
Sabre Multimedia

quote: Original post by null_pointer

Irrelevant. It''s a fact that people write games to make a profit, and there''s no profit to be made in making games to run on older computers. (If you want a laugh, look at the people who thought machines would put them out of work -- same attitude!)

You completely missed the point of my posts, if you think that I''m advocating slower, poorly done code or wasteful use of resources.

Is there no end to people who will debate DOS vs. Windows when they don''t even know how Windows works?

I agree with you, but you can always develop for the slowest machine that can run your application, right? A few slower machines where your application can run means a few more potential customers. For instance, 10 years ago, I could not a ford a 386, but I *DID* buy games for my slow 8086.

The point is: people who can not afford a new computer like to play games and *BUY* software.

And what do you like better, people investing money to buy your sofware, or investing it in purchasing new hardware, and then don''t have enough money left to buy your software?

And no, there will be no end to this (rather fruitless, but intereting for some) discussion. I do like windows, but hate having to wait almost a minute on a Pentium 450/128MB for a 1 megabyte image to load when I open it from an email atachement. Or a little aplication I wrote using 11MB of ram, when the actual applcation is hardly 50k and I hardly dinamically allocate 4k of ram. See why people don''t want to let DOS go?

But anyway, thank you for your time (and patience!)

Hi.

By the way, someone sugested that the Pentium should have been designed to only work in protected mode or something similar. Well, guess what, real mode is needed to initialize protected mode. Otherwise, how to set up the memory mappings, selectors, etc?

Later... Topgoro

quote: Original post by Topgoro

I am not talking about the API, but the code to implement it. For instance, if I am corect, Windows will use the slower virtual memory even if you install the full 4 giga bytes of ram the current x86 processors can address. That has nothing to do (and if it does, that would be also a poor design) the fact the 16/32 bit code is mixed. That''s why I complain about the implementation. Just go to www.anoyances.org to see more examples about many bad things in the Windows implementation. The point is if Windows was implemented well, DOS lovers would more easily acepted the change and we would not be arging here.

I pretty much agree with you, except, basically, ask for a Pentium 200 (or faster) for an application that can be designed to run on, say, a DX2/66, if eficient code is used, and that Assembly of out of date. Well, in assembly you can do *WHATEVER* you can do in other languages, but in other languages you can not do *ALL* that can be done in assembler. The point is Asm is *NOT* out of date (and sorry for this has nothing to do with the subject!)

First, what DOS lover has ever accepted a change (without mammoth arguments like this)? (slightly sarcastic )

Second, what software being released today (commercially) doesn''t require a faster processor than a DX2/66? For that matter, what hardware doesn''t require a faster processor? The natural trend is "bigger and better" software and hardware, so I don''t think it will magically reverse itself if we code for DOS.

What I am getting at here is that people using asm and machine-specific code and whining and complaining about cycles and what-not has caused the bad reputation Windows doesn''t deserve. Not the other way around. I could draw up a HUGE list of annoyances with DOS''s implementation, but I didn''t. This topic is about which OS is better, and I still say Windows, because of the abstraction it provides. I certainly don''t think Windows is coded irresponsibly. If it was, it would run MUCH MUCH MUCH slower than it does now. It would slow to a crawl, even on newer processors.

I still think the only thing hampering Windows'' code is its compatibility with older OSes (like DOS) and previous versions that had to have compatibility with DOS, too (like 3.x). I think that if MS were to start fresh, they could code something as good as Linux (or possibly better -- anything''s possible ).

About the RAM problem: Windows 98 is compatible with Windows 95, which is compatible with Windows 3.11, which is compatible with Windows 3.1, which is compatible with...well, all the way down to Windows 1.0, and they are ALL compatible with DOS. So, limitations on, say, Windows 2.0 would have an impact on 98''s memory model. At root, all these problems are DOS-related. Finally, are you sure about the memory problem? How many hoaxs have people believed in the past?


I was talking mostly about the __asm blocks people use. In that situation, they think they''re getting faster code by just using asm, but as you pointed out, C and C++ and all other code just evaluates down to asm anyway.


Well, as this discussion is coming down to dissecting the Windows source code, and we can''t (legally) do that, I say it is all opinion whether or not Windows is coded 100% perfect for what it does and the compatiblity is has. However, this is completely off topic, as the topic is about whether DOS is dead, and why Windows is worse than DOS. No one has (as yet) provided a good argument.

In whatever way you twist it or turn it Windows RuleZ!



- null_pointer
Sabre Multimedia

( I love these aggressive threads )

So guys, if DOS is so good, Windows so bad, assembler so wonderful, and Visual Basic so crappy.... why don''t you all go program an OS in assembler?



#pragma DWIM // Do What I Mean!
~ Mad Keith ~
**I use Software Mode**

Just replying to Painless:

No, don''t insult Linux when you have obviously NEVER used it. It has many drivers, and i have never had a problem with it. In fact Linux has never crashed on me, and i use it on a 586 @ 100mhz, compare that to frequent crashes on my Windows Athlon 500mhz box and you see why linux is a great OS.

Also one thing:

Dos and Windows are basically one OS. Dos after version 6.something was basically combined with windows, and windows needs Dos. None of them can be called an OS by themself, except for under < 6.something. And yes, Windows is basically just .dll''s and drivers.

quote: Original post by MadKeithV

( I love these aggressive threads )

So guys, if DOS is so good, Windows so bad, assembler so wonderful, and Visual Basic so crappy.... why don''t you all go program an OS in assembler?

I don''t have the funds!!!! (I am not being agressive, am I???)

quote: Original post by null_pointer
First, what DOS lover has ever accepted a change (without mammoth arguments like this)? (slightly sarcastic )

I must agree with you hehehe.

quote: Second, what software being released today (commercially) doesn''t require a faster processor than a DX2/66? For that matter, what hardware doesn''t require a faster processor?

Well, some *NEED* a faster processor, and some *WANT* (like Windows) a faster processor.

quote: The natural trend is "bigger and better" software and hardware, so I don''t think it will magically reverse itself if we code for DOS.

Agreed. But somethigs are "bigger and better", while others are "Bigger and *SLIGHTLY* better" (or even worse, "Bigger and the same or worse")

quote: What I am getting at here is that people using asm and machine-specific code and whining and complaining about cycles and what-not has caused the bad reputation Windows doesn''t deserve. Not the other way around. I could draw up a HUGE list of annoyances with DOS''s implementation, but I didn''t. This topic is about which OS is better, and I still say Windows, because of the abstraction it provides. I certainly don''t think Windows is coded irresponsibly. If it was, it would run MUCH MUCH MUCH slower than it does now. It would slow to a crawl, even on newer processors.

But it is still can be improved, and what I am trying to ilustrate is *WHY* (in my opinion) people (or at least me hehehe) find it so hard to accept Windows!!!

quote: I still think the only thing hampering Windows'' code is its compatibility with older OSes (like DOS) and previous versions that had to have compatibility with DOS, too (like 3.x). I think that if MS were to start fresh, they could code something as good as Linux (or possibly better -- anything''s possible ).

That''s hat they are supposed to be doing with NT isn''t it? And while it is more stable, is is *SLOWER*.

About the RAM problem: Windows 98 is compatible with Windows 95, which is compatible with Windows 3.11, which is compatible with Windows 3.1, which is compatible with…well, all the way down to Windows 1.0, and they are ALL compatible with DOS. So, limitations on, say, Windows 2.0 would have an impact on 98''s memory model. At root, all these problems are DOS-related. Finally, are you sure about the memory problem? How many hoaxs have people believed in the past?

I am using windows NT and is the same memory use/need/waste problem.

quote: Well, as this discussion is coming down to dissecting the Windows source code, and we can''t (legally) do that, I say it is all opinion whether or not Windows is coded 100% perfect for what it does and the compatiblity is has. However, this is completely off topic, as the topic is about whether DOS is dead, and why Windows is worse than DOS. No one has (as yet) provided a good argument.

I agree.

quote: In whatever way you twist it or turn it Windows RuleZ!

Well… we will have to live with it :-(
(Let''s see how Lynux, BeOS, etc, do)

Topgoro