JockStrap

• Defrag: Portable Office, Driver Bugchecks, C9 Win8 App

  Apr 04, 2013 at 3:17 PM

  @LarryLarsen: @Duncanma: Thanks guys that explains it and also really appreciate you making the original source available.

  However what is this using "Adobe Premier", come on guys "Microsoft Expression Encoder 4" FTW

• Defrag: Portable Office, Driver Bugchecks, C9 Win8 App

  Apr 03, 2013 at 3:17 PM

  Great show guys (as always). Here is a little question for you - why do the encoded video sizes differ so greatly on here. The Mid wmv is 90Mb but the High wmv is weighing in at over 1.5Gb. Now of course the mid is a much smaller frame size (512x288) and the high is usually a 1280x720 but they normally are around the 300-400Mb mark. This is not the first time I have seen such coding variations on Channel 9 but what better forum to ask than in Defrag's own comments. The answer of course is the way it was encoded but obviously someone is doing this and must see the massive size difference in certain cases. For most you need the High version to be able to see a lot of the text clearly enough, so it is not just cosmetic to want the larger size video. thanks for your time

• Ping 173: IllumiShare, Worldwide Telescope, Play to Earn on Xbox, Developer Challenge to Down Under

  Apr 02, 2013 at 4:05 PM

  Thanks for another great show and in the nicest possible way can I say that Laura you looked extremely hot this week, so not only did you and Paul do a great show but props to the production crew for their great work again and especially the make-up team (well not so much on Paul's end)

  Harping back to the $100 incentive, at least Microsoft is trying to do something to encourage developers to the platform, anyone how has done iOS development will know it costs you $99 a year to even try your own app on your own hardware, plus you need to buy a Mac or "illegally" run OS-X on a virtual machine. So yeah sure it is a bit of bribery but really no developer is going to get rich off a $100 per app bonus but I see it as a very positive and proactive step in encouraging developers to take the first leap into the app store. Plus we do know that Apple likes to trot out it's fluff about how "we have a gazillion apps in the app store"

• Say Sasa! (Think "Big collection of .Net extensions, functions, methods and such")

  Mar 27, 2013 at 5:34 PM

  @naasking: That would be fantastic. Trouble with most extensions is that most features never get used because you just never know what is available or have simple examples of how to use them. Thanks for making this available to us all and the time you devoted to it as well.

• Ping 163: Xbox Countdown, Programming language popularity, 3D presentations, Eye controlled computer

  Jan 13, 2013 at 2:21 PM

  Thanks and you make some very valid and well researched comments.

  I guess it does depend a little on your prespective whether a new console is needed or just wanted because its new and faster. There are a lot of factors to consider aside from the hardware, and particularly when we are taking about a possible major.architecture change here with the xbox.

  One thing we can be sure of - we wont hear anything offical until its officaly as that would really slow the sales of current gen xbox 360s.

  3 days ago, n0x30n wrote

  I follow a lot of game developers on twitter and a lot of them can't wait for the new consoles to come out. They are eager to learn something new.
  Programmers don't want to do the same stuff year after year after year. They are happy if they get a new toy to play around with. It's fun for them to fgure out how to get the best performance out of this new thing.

  @n0x30n:

  Dont we all love to play with new stuff?

  The cold hard reality is that game dev is a business and business wants sales with the highest profit margin (or atleast to make a profit).

  Sure major gaming houses and game engine developers may be looking forward to a new console and no doubt if there is a new console coming they will already dev consoles to be working on, but the smaller indie players will be put further behind and certainly wont be the ones on twitter that are heralding the new dawn if they have already made a significant investment in the existing space. I think the only ones on there saying it is good will be the ones with badly performing software that are seeing a boost in hardware as the messiah that is going to lift some of the restrictions they have to work in at the moment.

  I still think +1 for a high speed interconnection on the xbox that is not USB to allow for external modules to be built unfortunately I dont see it happening.

• Ping 163: Xbox Countdown, Programming language popularity, 3D presentations, Eye controlled computer

  Jan 09, 2013 at 3:09 PM

  @n0x30n:You are quite right that the specs of the existing Xbox are quite low by what is possible right now however a successful console does not have to have the highest spec'ed components.

  Look with the PS3, far more raw computing power but it has fallen down the list of consoles. Also other powerful hardware like the Commodore Amiga lost the race. 

  My worry would be that even with a new Xbox (720) that it will still be the same Xbox live, Hub, infrastructure etc, the only thing that will change will be the processing power. It will be like the Italian sports car in the suburbs - looks great and everyone wants one but you never get to use the full potential of it because of other constraints.

  You also raise the point of the "developers", many on here are developers and I for one would hate the thought of an entirely new platform to have to learn how to squeeze out the best from. The success of the 360 now is that developers have had years of experience in getting the best out what the hardware has, and knowing that every Xbox is the same. I see where you are coming from that it may be easier for a developer to get a certain minimum FPS with faster hardware but that defeats the purpose of having faster hardware (Wirth's law).

  The rumour mill about what an Xbox 720 will contain is some Intel multi-core beast with loads of memory, sounds just like a laptop in a Xbox case. And to support the existing 360 games there could be essentially the 360 hardware included - Wow how did that work for the PS3, remember they had hardware to support the PS2 games and took it out. All I see is a greater attack surface for modders/hackers and that is why I love the existing 360, it may be lower spec'ed but the system is tight, if they lose that then they lose developers and content providers.

  If I was on the Xbox team I would be pushing for some sort of fast interconnect system (forget USB 3), so that add-on modules can be added to the Xbox - wouldnt it be great to have something like "Sony's Play TV", and a more powerful Kinetic sensor

  The future is streamed content, games on demand and call me old but I cant tell the difference between Black Ops II running at 80fps or 100fps

  Thanks for reading my rant

• Ping 163: Xbox Countdown, Programming language popularity, 3D presentations, Eye controlled computer

  Jan 08, 2013 at 5:32 PM

  Do we really need a new Xbox? The 360 is still very awesome and the games are getting better and better, aside from the obvious missing Blu-Ray player

  A real plus is that the existing Xbox has been so hard for people to mod which makes online play enjoyable as you dont get as many modders and hackers ruining the game.

  If it's not broken dont fix it.

  Thanks for adding fuel to the E3 release of the new Xbox 720 rumour mill, the xbox team will now have to release it then since everyone has built up the hype for them!

  As always loved the show and your energy, keep up the great work and props to the production team as the post-production is always hilarious - well done to all

• Defrag: Change Pinned Sites Icons, Laptop WiFi Router, Full Path for File

  Feb 20, 2012 at 4:51 PM

  Thanks Larry, seems like an excellent app, just wondering what the catch is? Always suspicious of "free' apps that seem so well polished

• Defrag: Change Pinned Sites Icons, Laptop WiFi Router, Full Path for File

  Feb 11, 2012 at 12:41 PM

  Can you please tell me what the "solodo" (dont know the spelling) program is that Larry talks about in the section "Closed laptop during updates, now PC hangs." - seems to be some sort of boot time monitoring.

• Visual Studio Toolbox: Entity Framework Part 2

  Feb 07, 2012 at 3:27 PM

  Awesome series and great job by all - got me to look back to EF as a real option once again.

  It was good that the episodes were actually longer than usual and being an Aussie I found Rowan very easy to listen to. Diego (sorry if it is not right) had a harder accent for me but a very smart and reserved guy. And Robert, well great as always, keeping it focused but asking questions that most of us would have too - great host on a valuable and informative show.

  Keep up the good work and +1 for more of these "meaty" shows rather than video reviews of products. Thanks guys!

  ps: didnt understand the logic of going to EF 5 rather than EF 4.5 as a numbering, as it contradicted the reasons for the team going straight from EF1 / 2 straight to EF4

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