Do I just don't get it?

YEAH! AOE2!!! :)

-Norm
 I7000

was that a sarcastic "YEAH!", or are you a fan as well?
... waiting for conquerors....


-Geoff
Former XPSB owner who traded in for an I3800

Some of us dont have a choice, we cant buy a desktop because we move around and the like. When we buy something that's called a "desktop replacement" we'd like to have that actually be true. Anyway, it's not that hard for manufacturers *cough in ATI's direction* to make high end mobile components. The radeon is pretty much an everything-in-one-chip-solution as it is. It'd be easy for ATI to mobilize it. However, they dont want to for marketing reasons. If they release an mRadeon, then what'll happen to the 128? Companies usually dont want happy customers, they want paying ones; and when a customer cannot choose a better option, they'll pay lots of money for a bad one. Basic marketing. Production costs are lower, revenue is higher, and ATI gets to claim that since it's based on an older and "custom" product, they dont have to support it (which is pure BS since i've seen non-mobility specific drivers working on a mobility like you wouldn't believe).

-RageLtMan
-Boris Lukashev

Nono... it was legit... a sarcastic yeah would be like this:

"YEAH!... :P"

and it was a "yeah" towards AOE2.

I'm waiting for conquerors too, except I don't like MS all that much (their strategy for making players BUY the conqueror's expansion FOR the patches and fixes in the game... MS is NOT releasing any patches/fixes for AOE2 for free... except for that AI Update that fixes the problem with the AI resigning in single player right when you start getting the upper hand). I mean, what kind of freakin' retarded game manufacturer does that??? Aparently MS.

-Norm
 I7000

Hi, (privet) ;)

I fully agree with your accessment, but ATI does seem to preach 6 month release cycle now in a way NVIDIA does, I don't know about the balance of truth and marketing in their claims, but if it's more or less true, then they will have a new more powerful chip than Radeon to battle NVIDIA's NV20 (due to release in a few months time before Xmas). They'd better have one!

If so, they might have no choice but to accellerate their mobile development, as when Radeon gets outdated for desktops in 6 months, then it might make sense for them to release mobile version of Radeon, which personally I would be happy to pocess.

Another 6 month wait though.

Alexei

P.S. I was just reading interview with Michael Abrash (the one who co-developed original Quake) about MS Xbox's video solution (developed by NVIDIA), see it there

And the features NVIDIA is going to have in their chip are amazing and I didn't want to settle for something less already! They also say that this chip will ok for XBox for 4-5 years, which probably means all this crazy new release stuff will more or less stabilise, so we won't buy expensive stuff that becomes old tomorrow. Oh well, I wish!

ATi can preach all they want, but their track record is one of slipping schedules and mediocre drivers. Every card they announce has the potential to completely dominate the gaming market, but by the time a card actually ships, it's no longer SOTA. (The Radeon is an exception to this rule, but over the years ATi's become the focal point of a lot of ill will.)

You can't directly compare a game console's video capabilities to a PC's. A game console runs games at 640x480 and does very little else. This allows a manufacturer to make design decisions that can't be made in laptops or desktops, which have to handle a much wider variety of circumstances. Also, a game console will sell for years; when the design is upgraded, it's in the form of an entirely new unit. Computer designs, however, receive rather small upgrades every week or so--50 MHz here, a faster DVD drive there, a new model that contains slightly updated components.

Interesting theory, but I think you're putting too much owness on ATI. Admittedly, I don't know much about this Radeon chip or really any of ATI video products, as I have used only nVidia, Voodoo, or Matrox in the past in my Desktops. However, I have never had a laptop that didn't have enough video memory to serve it's purpose. Not as good as on my 19" Trintron with Geforce 32mb, but definitely adequate considering the bonus I get as far as mobility as saving space. However, I do know alot about marketing, and the economics of business, being an honors economic major myself. You say that ATI is "not interested happy customers, just paying ones". What company isn't? Anyone who tells you differently is lying. The goal of every business is to make money. If it is more profitable to produce another chip and market it, they will. However, it seems that the demand in ATI's current mobile product is inelastic, with respect to it's usefulness, and not price. I'm a perfect example. I just ordered a laptop last week. Sure I love to have the top video card as much as the next guy, but I was willing to purchase what was available. If at some point these message boards are empty, because no one is buying Dell laptops on account of the video processor, you can go to the bank that a new one will be offered. Simple economics....

I'm gonna have to argue with you now, look E what you've done! :) The paying-vs-happy customer thing wouldn't apply. I'm 16, and i've already learned that happy customers are willing to come back. The drivers i make are free, however, i constantly get cash offers for them. Had i done the evil shareware thing and charged $10 per driver, i'd have somewhere around $220,000 today. Happy customers are paying cutomers, whereas unhappy customers will pay once, and but from someone else next time. As for the Radeon stuff, it wouldn't be too hard to do, but ATI prefers the easy-way-out-with-one-time-customers idea to the one in which they have to work a bit, and bring themselves a large customer base that'll keep coming back. I will admit however that i do not have a degree in marketing, and that all of my experience is based on my own lifetime, and what i've seen, read, saw, and experienced.

-RageLtMan
-Boris Lukashev

Yes, more Russians, we're gathering now... :) (davay vseh amerikancov zamochem i zahvatem etot forum?) hehe.

-RageLtMan
-Boris Lukashev

In the next few weeks Im buying a new system, was going to be a new Inspiron but i dont take advantage of its portability like I originally thought I would so for the same money Im going after the Dimension B-series 1Ghz with a 64MB-DDR Geforce2 GTS card. Inspirons are a very nice laptop but do not offer state-of-the-art performance for a hardcore PC gamer like myself. Granted, I can run Quake3, TheSims, Diablo2, and the Elite Forces demo on my 11month old I7k but not at the resolutions and framerates I would love.

Moscow :). Nu tagda davay ih vseh zamochem, kakie problemi? :-D

-RageLtMan
-Boris Lukashev

If corporate bull wasn't at an all-time high, you could do that on a laptop. But ATI will bleed it's users to the last drop before releasing a new mobile vid chip on which to bleed them. Dont you just love ATI? (hey!, it didn't catch ATI as a swear! bad software...)

-RageLtMan
-Boris Lukashev

The answer is simple. I can't take my desktop to bed with me. Or to my dinner table.

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@Crusader2001 wrote:
8MB ram is more than sufficient. Just my 2 cents...

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Lol, I love when people rehash 4 year old threads!