Notes on 7: day 1
AmbiguicCoherence
Let me start by saying I’ve been a little lax with throwing up my posts. I’ve been a little too busy with my real job to really get into this. I’ve got a handful of posts written, two or three security things that i’m working on, besides that anti-virus that I kinda let slip through the cracks. Which takes us to here. _____
Windows 7 Beta.
I’ll do a paragraph to long paper write up when I’m done. But, I figure for now, I’ll just throw my notes up as a journal. In my experience, Beta versions for software usually fall apart in a virtual machine. I had trouble with Longhorn back when and I expected to have trouble with 7. Nope. Worked perfectly. The beta has started off on the right foot, and here we go for the first 1 hour of experiencing after installation (which only took 40 minutes).
For marketing/business strategy. Good job Microsoft, you are lucky I hate the
marketing strategies of apple more that I will volunteer to participate in this
beta.
No errors loading it in VMware 6.5
Recognized as Windows Vista x64 Edition
Installation similar to Vista:
Layout, Copying, Expanding, Installing : in only 40 minutes
Took about 45 minutes to install. However, I was running a
lot of other things in the background, plus I only dedicated a small portion of
RAM to the virtual session.
Not impressed by the fish background. Maybe, I just don’t understand the
significance. (dumb)
“windows 7. for testing purposes only. Build 7000”
First look:
As insignificant as it is. I really like the new splash
screen.
Same stupid vista “thinking” cursor. Stupid shiny circle.
Icon sets are arbitrary and everyone deals with the change
between versions. Supposed to make
things more life like, or retro or something.
Large icon taskbar.
Looks as if the notification icons for open programs are spread along
the bottom. Elementary and simple. Thoughts: right off the bat, the learning
curve should be minimal. Simplicity at
the finger tips with a similar windows feel.
I guess we’ll all have to memorize what programs go with what icons
because there are no names on any of this shit.
Breakout taskbar of notification icons versus a slide
over. I like it better, more windows
wont bunch or shift.
“solve pc issues”.
Finally. An idiots guide to completing a set up. – “action center”
Automatic activation after 3 day (good idea Microsoft)
2 click through first time set up options for IE8, unlike
the 6 or so options for IE7. I want to
open and use. … and there it crashes.. let it sit for 15 minutes, and it came
back.
And… www.mozilla.com. But the “good guess” for time left was
off. It showed until completion 3 hours
and took under a minute.
Start menu:
They fixed the shut down button. I see it. I can shut it down without digging
for it.
Everyone was talking about paint and calculator. Here they go.
Damn ribbon type of thing is laid out in paint. What ever. No big difference here, there are
only so many options that can be laid out on a menu bar. At least it doesn’t
wrap or change.
Calculator = freebie giant-button style. But it does have a unit and date conversion
tool built in. guess that’s one less
thing I have to google. There’s even a
template option for gas mileage, lease and mortgage calculation.
Sticky notes: don’t need the trial for 3M’s post it
notes.
Snipping tool? Custom
screen shot app. I guess that comes in handy.
For work, I’m use to the almighty alt+print to grab a shot of an active
window and then crop my shot using another m$ app. I will say this: I am impressed by it. Damn. As simple as it is, damn, it will come
in handy.
Right click to screen resolution. Finally, I can do what I want in a click or
two. Although I am a power use and I
know pretty much where every menu is and can tell ppl where things are
“minority report style” as I wave my hand around the air, less clicks means a
higher productivity.
Devices and printers listed in win explorer = gay.
Sure, it looks good to show a mouse or an external drive, or
even a fancy printer or fax, but all other device look like white box NAS. This is like blind-mode.
Rate your computer tool to actually get a real performance
rating on whether or not you should update hardware (they should give some
options or recommendations).
-Alright, that’s one hour down. I closed it, I’ll look at it again some time this week.
At the end of this coming month (February), I’ll write up the points that pro/con this is better than XP and or Vista.
Nintendo Won the War! What War?
Nintendo Won the War! What War?
After a recent visit to one of my relatives house, I feel pretty comfortable in calling the Wii the winner of this console generation. I know what you’re thinking: that’s crazy, and clearly I’m smoking something. But go by the metrics that people have used to determine the previous winners: the Wii is #1 in many of them. It dominates sales, and makes an insane amount of cash. Game selection isn’t that bad, although average quality could stand to be somewhat higher. I’m not covering the other systems, because they are in their own battle, separate from Nintendo’s, which as I cover below, is a key reason Nintendo is doing so well.
For the past few generations, it was quite clear who won: if you sold the most, you won, and got the benefits of being #1: everyone wanted to make games for you, and anything that wasn’t made by the console maker themselves would likely end up on your system. You’d also benefit from the fact that lots of your customers would know people who had your system, and (hopefully) said good things about it, and thus they would be encouraged to buy the system for themselves. All of this clearly helped Sony who beat the N64 with the Playstation, and used the lead they built to totally dominate everyone with the PS2.
With the Gamecube, Nintendo gave one more try to match technology with its competitors. It lost, narrowly in sales (21 million to 24 million for the Xbox), but took a heavy beating in mindshare, and never really got out of 3rd place, even though market-share wise it might’ve been in 2nd in some places.
From this, they figured out where the next generation was going, and decided it wasn’t feasible to keep chasing new technology like their competitors. This and other factors led to a decision to do a graphically-simpler, but more complex control-wise system.
What Nintendo did next was a daring and bold move, and incredibly simple. They decided to forgo the main audience, and focus on a new, untapped market: casual gamers and people who had never played before. The system is built around this, and is designed to be incredibly easy to use.
In order to make this work, they built a wireless controller that is laid out simply, and has just enough buttons to be useful, but not so many that people get frustrated over not pressing the right button.
All this might have been for nothing if not for two things about the Wii: Mii’s and a pack-in sports game. Miis let you personalize your gaming experience, and in a game such as Wii Sports, gets you involved in the game, and more connected than you would be otherwise, because the character isn’t just a random person, it’s you.
Speaking of Wii Sports, this is an awesome tech demo, which is designed to be a perfect introduction to what the Wii can do. It covers a small number of sports, which incorporate very simple motion and button controls, and can use your Mii. This, and the explicitly laid out instructions on the screen, make it easy to play and give you a sense of actually playing the sport in question. If you pull it out at a party, Nintendo is thrilled- because if anyone buys it to get the Wii Sports game, they’ve just made $250 (a little over 300 if the person gets a 2nd Wiimote and nunchuk). If the person never buys another game, or only takes it out once in a while, it does hurt the market, but Nintendo isn’t terribly concerned- they’ve added a new customer who would’ve otherwise never played video games or bought a system for themselves.
What’s really crazy is that Nintendo KEEPS repeating this:
Sales of Wii Play (a very short & somewhat crappy mini game collection) are a lot higher than they would be otherwise because of the inclusion of a Wiimote. In essence, you pay $10 for a crappy game, and get a Wiimote as well. The shortage of Wiimotes early on in the console’s life definitely helped sales of Wii Play simply because you could buy the game to get a free Wiimote.
The Wii Fit balance board is another example of this- it’s a game+peripheral package that includes some workout games (including yoga) and some other fitness games- balance, strength, and a few others. The board is now usable for several other games, and those companies certainly hope you will buy their games to get more use out of the Balance Board. If you just bought the package because you thought you’d like to try it out and maybe use it as an exercise package, and never really got into it, Nintendo has just got another $89 from you.
To bring this to a point, the anecdote that inspired this. I went over one of my relatives house recently, and they had a Wii setup with some games including Call of Duty: World at War, Shaun White Snowboarding, and Wii Fit. I enjoyed Call of Duty mostly, but only about half the room actually paid attention to the game- mostly guys. The game then got switched to Shaun White snowboarding (which does use the Balance Board), and the reaction was more positive. A few more people tried it, and seemed to enjoy the virtual snowboarding. But the biggest reaction, and most liked was the Wii Fit game. The entire room watched, and almost everyone participated in several rounds of each game. We played the soccer heading one, the ski salom, and the ski jump one, which caused my cousin to want to get a Wii and the Balance Board to play (which is not cheap- $250 for the Wii and $89 for Wii Fit+balance board).
I was amazed that such a short play time (an hour or so) would get someone seriously thinking about spending $350 or so to buy a Wii with with Wii Fit.
If you’ve read this far, thanks. You’re probably wondering what it all means. That I am less clear about, because it depends a lot on how Nintendo and others manage the market, and how the market reacts. If Nintendo can successfully keep the casual market interested, efforts in that direction will stay at their current levels. If they can’t sustain the current levels of interest, they will probably just increase the manpower for new ideas and peripherals, and only fall back to the hardcore market if things become much tougher for them. The best case-scenario for the core folks is that the Wii becomes the PS2 of this generation (it’s not lost on me that the PS2 is still around and kicking) – the system that gets all the games, even though all the other systems are technically superior.
I think it’s important to realize that for Nintendo, the casual market will be #1, and the traditional hardcore gamer market will always be #2- which doesn’t have to be a bad thing, just a big change from the way things were.
Thank you!
