3DRealms is alive and kickin’
Believe it or not, 3DRealms is about to release a game Really Soon Now. And I don’t mean the kind of »RSN« they kept telling us for the last ten years – this time, they have released a demo of the...
View Article»Snakes on a Plane«
There has been quite some hype about this movie: Having a title that is both straightforward and funny (because »snakes on a plane« seems to be some American proverb whose true meaning I haven’t found...
View ArticleWindows Vista RC1 reviewed
Not even three months after the Beta 2 version, Microsoft released the first Release Candidate of its forthcoming Windows Vista operating system to the public. My Beta 2 test lasted only one week,...
View ArticleUbuntu 6.10 is totally messed up
Today’s long-awaited release of Ubuntu 6.10 »Edgy Eft« was a good opportunity for me to restore the inactive Linux installation on my main workstation. This computer mainly runs Windows and since the...
View ArticleAn excellent DVD: Mindcandy Vol. 2
At tUM, I received a Freax Art Album book and a Mindcandy Volume 2 DVD as prizes for the vector graphics compo. The book isn’t as interesting as the first volume (which I loved) – it’s a picture book...
View ArticleUbuntu 7.04 »Feisty Fawn«
The long-awaited release of the new Ubuntu version, 7.04 alias »Feisty Fawn«, was done today as scheduled. Just after work, I downloaded my copy (rather slowly, just 100 KB/sec, even though I used...
View Article2008 demo retrospection
Like last year, I’d like to give some recommendations what demos of 2008 are worth watching. As usual, this reflects only my personal opinion. That means if you totally love MFX demos, you won’t like...
View ArticleDivX, the new king
Today, DivX Inc. released the new version of its famous video codec. Usually, this is utterly uninteresting news, but not this time: Version 7 is actually not an MPEG-4 ASP codec like its predecessors,...
View ArticleCompiler benchmark
I usually write my demos using Microsofts C Compiler for Win32 and GCC for Linux. But how good does Intel’s compiler optimize? And can the performance of MSVC and GCC be improved using a clever...
View ArticleFour generations of iPod nanos compared
Over the last few years, I bought one specimen of all four generations of Apple’s iPod nano media player, mainly to make rePear compatible with each new model. (In fact, rePear’s main development...
View ArticleH.264 Decoder Benchmark, Part 2
After the H.264 decoder benchmark I did when DivX 7 came out, I got some comments that I misrepresented CoreAVC by using an outdated version. Recently, I repeated the benchmarks using the newest...
View ArticleMy new toy: Fujifilm F200EXR
I’m a happy user of the Fujifilm S9500 bridge camera since 2005, but lately, I noticed that it would also be really nice to have a second, smaller camera that I can take with me (almost) everywhere....
View ArticleMovies 2009
I love going to the cinema after work: The Tuesday afternoon showings at my local cinema are quite affordable, and for most movies except the biggest blockbusters, the auditorium is usually almost...
View ArticleMy new (sort-of) home theater
Over the last few weeks, I upgraded my old TV set to a shiny new LCD TV, along with a 5.1-channel AVR and a Blu-ray player. This was done for two different reasons: First, I wanted a HDTV set for quite...
View ArticleVideo encoder comparison
There has been some buzz about HTML5 web video lately. I won’t retell the story here, because it’s almost completely political and not technical, while I’m only interested in the technical side of...
View ArticleVideo on the Canon EOS 550D
A few weeks ago, my father bought a shiny new Canon EOS 550D DSLR camera, not only for capturing photos, but for videos too. Why not – after all, the video functions are finally taken seriously by the...
View ArticleAnother new toy: Sony SLT-A77V
After six years, it was time for my good old Fujifilm FinePix S9500 bridge camera to be replaced by a more recent model. It served me well during all the years and still works perfectly. However, it’s...
View ArticleSony Xperia XZ1 Compact review
I got a new phone for christmas, a Sony Xperia XZ1 Compact, to replace my old (well, not that old actually) Xperia Z3 Compact. After using it for a few months, I’d like to share my experiences with...
View ArticleBlack Mesa review
For years (actually more than a decade!), the world eagerly waited for a new game in the »Half-Life« franchise, well knowing that there may never be such a thing. So imagine everyone’s surprise when...
View ArticleSony Xperia 5 III review
After three years with my Sony Xperia XZ1 Compact, I got myself a new phone, and again it’s made by Sony: an Xperia 5 III (pronounced »Xperia five mark three«), the smallest version of Sony’s current...
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