Alienware ALX
by Kirby Webber · in General Discussion · 05/28/2004 (7:37 am) · 8 replies
Every time new hardware comes out, all the "high-end" PC vendors start spouting off about "raising the bar" and "redefining the industry" and blah, blah, blah.
I generally don't put much stock in it, but this - well this is interesting. ;-)
Video Array at E3
I generally don't put much stock in it, but this - well this is interesting. ;-)
Video Array at E3
#2
05/28/2004 (8:19 am)
Yeah it is interesting but it will be much more interesting when this is more affordable.
#3
Granted, this has been designed with Halflife 2 and Doom 3 in mind, but when you start opening up the hardware like this, the possibilities become endless.
Sure - it's going to be a bank buster out of the gate, but when it turns the heads of the rest of the industry (whihc I do not doubt it will) the rest will race to catch up - that's when the price point will start dropping. =)
It's funny too. When I first looked at the specs on PCI Xpress, I thought to myslef, "man wouldn't it be cool to run multiple video cards this way."
Apparently I wasn't the only one. ;-)
05/28/2004 (8:41 am)
The performance benefit is what I find particularly interesting.Granted, this has been designed with Halflife 2 and Doom 3 in mind, but when you start opening up the hardware like this, the possibilities become endless.
Sure - it's going to be a bank buster out of the gate, but when it turns the heads of the rest of the industry (whihc I do not doubt it will) the rest will race to catch up - that's when the price point will start dropping. =)
It's funny too. When I first looked at the specs on PCI Xpress, I thought to myslef, "man wouldn't it be cool to run multiple video cards this way."
Apparently I wasn't the only one. ;-)
#4
05/28/2004 (9:10 am)
I don't know. This kind of stacking hardware on a pile and calling it innovation never really appealed to me. I think it's quite silly actually, the price goes up at the same rate as the performance. Rendering arrays have been around for ages. I'll give it a little "hmm.. cool but not useful or practical". Then again it's Alienware and they've always been walking that thin line between impractical and cool.
#5
Of course it does... at first, but what goes up, must come down.
Basically, when something takes off, and this very well could, and gets adopted into the more "mainstream", the price point begins to drop until, much like CDR and CDRW drives, it becomes a commodity item.
This is true, but we are talking about something made for games after all.
Sure, one could argue the practical applications of countless technologies developed by and for games, but the games themselves aren't practical and aren't meant to be. Games == entertainment.
The fact is that there is a booming industry for high end PC's for the sole purpose of running games, which is anything but practical.
I gues I'm just enamoured of the potential.
It seems to me that as hardware plateaus, developers start refining things to squeeze more performance out of it.
As hardware capabilities expand, so too do the development possibilities.
I look at it as being handed "free" overhead. =)
Heck - Microsoft wants to build a "3D" operating system. Now, at face value, I question the validity and practicality of this, but have no doubt that in ten or fifteen years we'll all look back and wonder how we ever got along without it.
05/28/2004 (1:15 pm)
Quote:the price goes up at the same rate as the performance
Of course it does... at first, but what goes up, must come down.
Basically, when something takes off, and this very well could, and gets adopted into the more "mainstream", the price point begins to drop until, much like CDR and CDRW drives, it becomes a commodity item.
Quote:cool but not useful or practical
This is true, but we are talking about something made for games after all.
Sure, one could argue the practical applications of countless technologies developed by and for games, but the games themselves aren't practical and aren't meant to be. Games == entertainment.
The fact is that there is a booming industry for high end PC's for the sole purpose of running games, which is anything but practical.
I gues I'm just enamoured of the potential.
It seems to me that as hardware plateaus, developers start refining things to squeeze more performance out of it.
As hardware capabilities expand, so too do the development possibilities.
I look at it as being handed "free" overhead. =)
Heck - Microsoft wants to build a "3D" operating system. Now, at face value, I question the validity and practicality of this, but have no doubt that in ten or fifteen years we'll all look back and wonder how we ever got along without it.
#6
05/28/2004 (2:32 pm)
Kirby,Quote:I hardly think having a alienware computer or doing parallell rendering with two graphics cards will become as "mainstream" as owning a cdrom.. If we start to move to having two graphics cards what's to stop us from moving to three and four and so on. It's a negative trend. There's also the little issue of the 800 W power supply they use. What I see here is the fact that hardware is unable to keep up with software and consumer demand. There's a reason why most cars have a single engine. The engine in the car satisfies consumer demand. Currently I'm seeing my power supply strength double every 4 - 5 years. I'd hate to see the personal nuclear reactor I'll need in 25-30 years. This is impractical for everyone.
Basically, when something takes off, and this very well could, and gets adopted into the more "mainstream", the price point begins to drop until, much like CDR and CDRW drives, it becomes a commodity item.
Quote:I was actually looking at it as practical for a consumer, in this case gamers. When I'm thinking high end graphics cards I'm looking at adding a lot of cost to the system. Usually the cost/benefit ratio isn't that great unless there has been a recent generation shift. Now this expense would be doubled. Alienware is already targeting the people who are willing to pay a lot just to be at the absolute top of the performance hill so it'll probably work out well for them. Even if you're really die hard about performance there's still practical limits like cost (do I have this much money?) and energy consumption (will I make this much money?). I'm sure it will backfire sooner or later. Then again I guess alienware might prove me wrong and everyone will be running double X800's. I know I wont, for the same reason I'm not running two or more CPU's right now. I could really benefit from the decreased compile times. Maybe I'm just not in their target market group.
Sure, one could argue the practical applications of countless technologies developed by and for games, but the games themselves aren't practical and aren't meant to be.
#7
05/28/2004 (4:49 pm)
Peter I guess you never saw the need for more than 64kb either! real-time parallel rendering on mainstream graphics hardware has ALREADY been accepted as mainstream, years ago in fact, I guess you never heard of SLI mode of the 3DFX Voodoo II cards eh? They were expensive but never out of line with what the top end cards are now.
#8
That's the point I was trying to make.
Of course, it's just my personal opinion as well. /shrug
I think increasing the graphics horsepower ius a wonderful thing, even if we may have to wait several years for it to "trickle" down to a reasonable consumer level - but that's just me I guess. =\
05/28/2004 (5:52 pm)
Once upon a time, graphics cards were extremely expensive and considered "impractical" from a consumer standpoint. Now they're practically REQUIRED. Many older cards are still sold to this day at a price point that would qualify them as a commodiy item.That's the point I was trying to make.
Of course, it's just my personal opinion as well. /shrug
I think increasing the graphics horsepower ius a wonderful thing, even if we may have to wait several years for it to "trickle" down to a reasonable consumer level - but that's just me I guess. =\
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