Old MERVERNATION Stuff

MERVERNATION News

12/31/1999

Happy New Year to everyone.
I am rather confident that on saturday morning this page will still be accessable by most.
Hope everyone has a great and safe celebration tonight.
And remember. if the phones dont appear to work when midnight rolls around, its not because all the phone systems arent 2000 ready,.. Its because everyone else has picked up the phone at midnoght to see if they are working and there are no circuits left. :)
WORD WERD W3RD

12/29/1999

And another thing that bothers me about the ignorance of year 2000 people show... nevermind the computers all crashing,.. there are actually people that think the world will end. there are people that actually believe that the sun will burn out and that the earth will stop spinning. All I can say about that is this... What if the people that began keeping track of the years started a 365 days earlier? that means our 1999 would have really been a mark of 2000 years. the sun doesnt know which day we started counting. of course I could be wrong. there could be a god. he could be watching. he could say that he would give us our educated 2000 years to get life right. he will see that for the most part his creation has gone down hill and our trial period will be up...... but religous belief aside, Ill stil with what I said in the first place.

How bout this?... Marlin made a statement on his page about the new millenium really starting in 2001 rather than 2000. I have heard this many times before and I would have to argue it for this reason.... If humans began counting at 1 then the new millenium would start at 2001. however if humans began counting at 0 which would make sence to me because starting at 0 and going 365 days would take you to the number 1, meaning you have completed 1 full year. so 0-1 would be 1,.. 1-2 would be 2,.. 2-3 would be 3,.. and so on. therefor 10 would be an even 10 rather than 9 if we starting counting at 1. of course no one alive now knows how it started so what are we to do? I personally think that 0 should be the start of a new count. that would make 2000 the begining of a new millenium and that makes more sence. For those who are asking why the hell would you start counting at 0? think of your age... when you are bore you are not automatically 1 year old.... you are 3 weeks, then 1 month, then 6 months, THEN you are 1 year old. that is how I think it should work with the calandar and I dont see any reasons why it wouldnt. it simply makes the most sence.

12/24/1999

Hope everyone has a nice Christmas. Im off from work from noon today until January 3rd. WOOHOO! I will be sure to update from home. Its not like I cant,.. the only reason I always update from work is cause I usually have some slow times at work that allow for thought and typing. lol. happy holidays from Mermaid and Verona.

12/22/1999

ok, this is starting to drive me insane.... I am so sick and tired of EVERYONE trying to be so creative and use forms of Y2K in their product names and stuff. they all do the same thing,.. they take Y2-(something) or (something)-2K and its just so damn lame now. this has been going on for over a year now and there are still people comming up with this stuff and thinking they are so origional and full of talent. ok great.. the number 2000 looks cool in a title or product name. BIG DEAL! that doesnt mean you have to use it.... for crying out loud come up with something new. (nothing against you flan, but you put me over the line)... Flan at digitalfl00d decided to make a new page and call it DF2K (that took a lot of thought to render) I saw him mention it the other day, and I just let it go. then today he did again, and confirmed it would be the new name and that was enough for me. I knew he was gonna make a new page for 2000 and I knew before he even muttered it that he would call it DF2K. well maybe I am being stupid here. maybe instead of complaining about it, I should cash in on it too. I think I will change my musiical name to MERVER-K-TION. is anyone else out there sick of seeing the big flock of monkeys run twords the same monolith?

12/20/1999

Whats going on? NOTHING AT ALL. nothing to really post about. nothing cool going on. nothing fun. nothing bad, nothing much at all. well... I guess in order to waste some time, I will find something to type about where no one gives a crap.............. cant think of anything.... hmmm. I sound like eskimo over at pointless things. hes always posting about why he doesnt post anymore... talk about that pointless things page. He should change the name to "entertainment things" cause all the posters over there ever seem to post about is sports and television.... now they are raving cause that "family guy" show is comming back... I dont get that show. I think that stupid football headed baby ruins the whole thing. the father is funny but every bit of humor on that show is basically taken right out of the simpsons. you have to wonder how stuff like that can get contracts for money. same goes for music. how the hell do certain people get record deals. go to CDNOW and do an artist search for "wesley willis" and listen to some of real audio samples. that guy is a bundle of talent. hes got like 20 records. I dont get it... talk about not getting it.. whos the one that keeps giving Bill Gates permission to change our keyboard? those stupid 3 extra keys just get in the way. I dont know 1 person who uses them. all they do is make the space bar shorter. if that wasnt bad enough, now he goes and breaks the thing in half and gives us 2 space bars. come to think of it... the standard KB is known as a 101 key keyboard. then with the 2 Windows and Macro button it became known as a 104 key keyboard... how come the split keyboard with 2 space bars is not a 105 key keyboard. I still always see it called a 104. well whatever. now that I have wasted some time I am happy now.

12/15/1999

Marlin has posted an interesting reply to the video card issue. Id have to say that there are probably good points and bad points for both chip sets. jut as it is with ANY 2 compeeting products on the market today. I still personally like the 3Dfx better just because they were the first on the market. I also dont like the way that every time nVIDIA comes out with a card, they put a lot of money in to advritising that its better than 3Dfx. of course in those ads, they dont mention that they needed to use more RAM to get the job done... but when 3Dfx released a card, they just spit it in to the stores, and let it be. they let people make up their own mind. I guess its just that simple for me. I made up my own mind on which chipset impressed me more. I am also a "loyaist".. until I am shown a good reason to switch,.. I wont. both cards have unique features which could be used to say they are the better choice. I happen to like the features of 3Dfx. True GL being one of them. So yes Regis. that is my final answer.

On a related note, I now own the full blown version of Quake III Arena and all I can say is "HOLY CRAP".. this game is VERY well done. the levels are intense and the graphics are very impressive. bunches of maps and characters to pick from. the Demo does NOT do it justice. it just doesnt. If you liked the demo or the tests, definatly go get this. its well worth it.

12/13/1999

Hmmm.... I think my post got messes up some how. I was writing the last one at about 4 in the morning while listening to solid state and the last line of it as I remember typing it wasnt supposed to make the post sound so harsh. it actually read "I dont know why you made such a stupid statement trying to compare apples and oranges like that... unless you just wanted to get me to put up an equally stupid post which you did." <-- thats what I thought I sent over to the server. Ill have to find out what happened to it. but thats basically it. so to continue on with you... a hardware discussion could be nice... I would have to believe that the 3Dfx set has always given TNT a run for their money and the same hold true the back the other way. I personally do not like the D3D based games because A) its supporting Microsoft all that much more. (which is NOT an underdog at all).. B) 3Dfx did what they did first. they deserve the credit. but as usual MS pushed a different company to make something else that would be supported by MS. that kind of low level working is just cold. and its typical of MS. they always try to crush anyone who has an origional thought, take the thought and make it their own... and C) their are small details missing from a lot of the D3D based games. like the transparency factor in Quake, or the fog in turok. they either dont exist or dont look right in the D3D versions. that may not bother some people at all, but when I play GL Quake, I want to see GL and all of its abilities. not just smoothed out graphics of what was already there... as far as the chips themselvs go,.. if you look back so far. when TNT got themselvs to a point of being competitive was when companies starting putting the GLIDE, or D3D option in the game setup. of course that caused the games to grow considerably. so at that point some games started comming with only D3D programming. why? because of the fact that the 3Dfx chip would support 3Dfx Glide AND Microsoft D3D.. so if you had the TNT board you could run it cause it was programed for it. if you had a 3Dfx board you could still run it because the chipset knew what to do with it.... 3Dfx has been using multi chip design for a while. not just to catch up to TNT.. what finally pushed TNT over 3Dfx in the D3D games was the fact that they began to use more video memmory. now you are comparing a 2 chip 3Dfx card with 12 or 16 MB of RAM to a 1 chip TNT card with 32 MB of RAM,. and to compare, a game in D3D mode is being used. When statements like yours are made... "it takes 3Dfx 2 chips to do what 1 TNT chip can do" but the RAM and the rendering instructions are not mentioned and its not fair. but it sure looks good in writing. I still say, due to the transparency options and other types of effects that I just never see in D3D apps that the 3Dfx has more options... its like this... you have a bendy drinking straw. you can drink with it... then you have a normal drinking straw. a straight plastic tube... the normal straw will be cheaper due to its simplicity. they both deliver your drink to your mouth. so a statement like "its taking the bendy straw 35% more plastic to do what the normal straw can do" is valid... but the bendy straw has options. it can do something that makes it unique.

What do you think?

In your opinion, from your experience, which chipset do you prefer?

3Dfx (VooDoo, Glide)
NVIDIA (Riva, TNT, D3D)
I dont care, as long as it delivers some sort of smooth graphics.

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12/12/1999

I never comment on other page posts much, so why do people have to rip on me? my pal Marlin had to comment on my post about the video card... for whatever reason, for about the last year or so he has been feeling the need to use and defend the minority products in most areas. in this case he believes that the NVIDIA chipset is better than the 3Dfx chipset. I have seen not 1 game yet that works better on NVIDIA than 3Dfx. not one. they either are equal or the 3Dfx is better because of the development for it. infact the 16meg 3Dfx cards run games as fast or faster than the 32meg TNT cards. the TNT cards relt more on software for their rendering and thus requires a bit faster of a computer. with a little research, one can find that the TNT based boards were actually developed and being sold for graphics work rather than games. it just happened that games fit in as well and that the board was affordable. as far as his post today goes.... it was just a simple attempt to defend what he believes in. which is fine,.. but the fact remains that the TNT only ever beats out 3Dfx in things that were developed more specifically for D3D, and anything thats out right now wont do a quarter of what the card I pointed out the other day will do, so I dont know why you made such a stupid statement trying to compare apples and oranges like that.

Quake 3 Arena came out the other day. I hope to pick up copy at the computer show this weekend. Mmmmm registered version :)

12/10/1999

Thats it... I am getting one of THESE.

12/09/1999

Wow.. I think I almost forgot how to drive... I got my SHO back again yesterday. I never posted that I didnt have it again, so heres what happened... Took it back to AAMCO so they could adjust anything that needed adjustment after the work they did. I then decided to go for a full blown tune up which is recomended between 85,000 and 100,000 miles on an SHO.. an SHO is VERY difficult to work on. theres not a lot of room under the hood, and theres not a lot of mechanics willing to work on them, and theres not a lot of places to get the correct parts. I knew this when I bought it, but that was something I was willing to deal with. So now it has an enhanced and newly built tranny, performance BOSCH Platnium spark plugs and the SHO performance wires that go with them, new SHO serpentine belt, new SHO timing belt, new high end SHO water pump, new SHO idler pully, everything retimed, and tuned for optimum performance. 2,776 bux later I have a car that is just itching to go fast. its smooth as can be while its driving, and it has some nice pickup :) (not that it didnt before,.. but now its even beter than it was.) so a total of about 3 weeks I wasnt driving. I get behind the wheel and realize that I had almost forgotten how much fun driving is.. especially with the car of your dreams.

12/02/1999

So,.. who here knows why American cars got a bad reputation which stays in the minds of people to this day?... ME ME ME!!
I was chatting with a mechanic friend today, and he told me this bit of information which makes PERFECT sence. Years ago, when the forgien (mainly japaneese) cars were becoming big in the US and people began to buy them.. if you had a problem or wanted a tune up, you couldnt take it to your local mechanic for service. they would see it and say "take it away, I dont want to work on that"... you were left with no choice but to take it to the dealer where you bought it... you would pay more for the service, but you would get genuine parts that fit the car, and away you went,. the car would last for a long long time. If you had your american car, and took it to the mechanic down the street, he was happy to work on it, but rather than using the genuine parts, he would use generic parts. he might have 1 oil filter that could fit 20 different engines, and it was close enough for your car. he could provide you with the service for about half the cost of the dealer. the engine in the american car could last just as long as the japaneese car, but because the japaneese car was being serviced with the correct parts, it would out last the american car with the generic parts which the owner was never told about. had the american car owners been forced to get it serviced at the dealer and pay the extra money for the parts that were made for the car, they would have lasted much much longer. So now you have the american cars quitting before their time, and getting a bad reputation. even though 90% of the time on the japaneese cars, the body would practically fall off before the car quit running, "well... thats because its an old battle wagon, its served a lot of time".. people bought this concept, and the japaneese car manufactures used this to their advantage, and got the idea in peoples heads they what they need is a 4 cylinder japaneese car.... taking us to present time. now you see a lot more people getting service at the dealer, or a lot of mechanics using the correct parts and the american cars are not quitting so fast anymore. should be interesting to see what 10 years from now will bring in way of cars and their reputations.

12/01/1999

I was talking with my neighbor last night, and he asked me what I thought about the gas prices. we were in agreement that they are just unbelievable. I hit a new record the other day. it took 27 dollars to fill my tank, and it wasnt even sucking fumes like it often does. The scary part is that its expected to go up further. Im paying $1.63 now for the 94 octane stuff... the nice part about where I live is the fact that I am about 15 minutes from the New Jersy boarder... I cross the line, and fill up there for about 30� a gallon less than what it costs here in New York. I saw a poll on the wonderful dataway we call the internet, and it was asking what you were going to do about the rising prices.. the options were to drive less, car pool, or do nothing but complain. 60% chose to do nothing but complain... big surprise right? I say we have another one of them days where NO ONE buys gas for that day. we should pick a day and just not buy gas. how bout.... 12/15/1999 thats a wednesday. whoever reads this.. dont buy gas on that day, pass it to your friends. maybe it will make them lower prices... yeah right,.. but it will still be fun to do though.. just like in school when you would set up a day to have everyone pay for their lunch in pennies... so anyway.. theres one thing that I do actually like about all this.. those silly people that buy a 4 wheel drive SUV which will never see off road because all they use it for is commuting 40 miles to work, going 35 in the 55 the whole way. just because they had to be part of the trend and have one of those worthless annoying vehicles. those thing use double the gas that a car does, and they are paying double the gas increase now... HA HA HA!! PAYBACK IS A BITCH SUCKERS!!! ... well whatever.. I guess thats it for now.

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