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Tuesday, June 30, 2009

post://4306510762466182006/

I received my EVGA 295 GTX Co-Op today and here are the results!

17:45 - Card installed, powered on
18:00 - Drivers Updated, restarted
21:06 - done with benchmarking

Initial observations:
Compared to the 280 GTX:
- same length
- feels heavier
- a tad thinner

Hardware installation included 2 devices (GTX 295)
I left a 280 in there for strictly PhysX for now but going to do try benchmarks both with and without it on both cards.

Test: -/+ for decreased / increased performance

3DMark Vantage (Ambient Occlusion: ON | PhysX: ON): +
Score: 16209
CPU: 33477
Graphics: 13831

3DMark 2006 (Ambient Occlusion: ON | PhysX: ON): =
Score: 13260
SM 2.0: 4953
SM 3.0: 6965
CPU: 3268

3DMark Vantage (Ambient Occlusion: OFF | PhysX: OFF): +
Score: 12415
CPU: 8610
Graphics: 14560

3DMark 2006 (Ambient Occlusion: OFF | PhysX: OFF): -
Score: 13126
SM 2.0: 4830
SM 3.0: 6935
CPU: 3263

GTA IV: -
Benchark @ 1920 x 1200
Texture Quality High
Texture Filter Quality: Very High
View Distance: 25
Detail Distance: 30

Previous (2 x 280 GTX):
Average FPS: 52.01
Duration: 37.55 Sec
CPU Usage: 77%
System Memory Usage: 36%
Video Memory usage 92%

Current (1 x 295 GTX Co-Op):
Average FPS: 48.96
Duration: 37.72 sec
CPU Usage: 78%
System Memory Usage: 38%
Video Memory Usage: 99%

Crysis: -
I was a custom mix of Very High and High with a lower view distance with the previous cards but durring hectic battles I'd notice everything getting really choppy.

With the new card autodetect chose all High
1920 x 1200 was too much for it at first, but after it settled in and had the textures loaded it went relatively smooth and playable. I turned down to 1280 x 800, the next lowest 16:10 resolution in the list but the quality wasn't worth it. The text was way too blocky, and the trees all had squares where light shone in-between the leaves. I turned it up to 2560 x 1600 and it looked really good but and still had similar performance as the other resolutions. Overall I'd say this is an improvement as I can eek up the shaders and the physics with little to no impact in framerate... too bad said framerate is a steady 30 fps or so. I have the latest version and drivers but I remember a past bug in Crysis where it would run worse if you changed the resolution in game so I'll try this one again tomorrow.

NFS Undercover: +
I had it at 1920 x 1200 previously - with medium world effects (I hate the motion blur) all detail set to highest and 6x AA. I had turned off VSynch previously because it was pulling it down to 30 when I was probably getting about 40 or so, but I HAD to enable it with the new card. I was getting at least 60fps easy and even when I turned it up to 2560 x 1600 I had to turn on VSynch to make it not look like everything was in Fast Forward.

Benchmarks really don't gain much over my 2 x 280s and even go down in the game test. That's partly because the new card actually reduces my available video RAM. The RAM is what I had originally targeted as my bottleneck for draw distance in GTA and this isn't going to help at all, I even need to bring it down a little.

I'm not super impressed, especially since I could get the same performance and even better high resolution performance from my 2 (and now much cheaper) 280s. All in all I'm sure if you're running lower resolution you could kick some ass running 2 of these, but good luck with that.

Rendering is faster due to the increased clocks and there is a noticebly higher quality to the image but as far as sheer frame rates go - this card isn't going to cut it for anyone running higher then 1920 x 1200.

My recommendation is that if you're looking for high performance AND high resolution - stick with the 295 GTX 1g+ cards. I'll be waiting for the higher memory cards to come out, and praying my 90 days for the step up program is enough time.

Labels: 2009, 3dmark, consumerism, games, games for windows, hardware, materialism, video

posted @ 18:03

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Sunday, April 26, 2009

post://4009998041866314026/

Randy Boyer just came out with a new track:
Randy Boyer & Kristina Sky (ft Cari Golden) - No Limit

- check it out if you're a fan of trance / dance. I've also seen a couple remixes of his around like this one for darude.

I originally heard about Randy Boyer from a friend at work, another fellow aspiring DJ he was impressed with Randy's style of trance. He introduced me and I caught a show this winter at room 960 in the middle of a blizzard (which s the start to any great story in New England).

It was a great show, he's got an awesome style. You can listen to some of his other tracks over on his site: RandyBoyer.com and if you sign up for the newsletter you'll get a password for the secret area with all sorts of exclusive mixes and songs in MP3.

Check out the video for Randy Boyer & Kristina Sky (ft Cari Golden) - No Limit

Labels: dj, download, mp3, music, video

posted @ 10:11

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Thursday, April 16, 2009

post://441323912637714557/

Frikkin lovin ASOT #400 while I work:
A State of Trance #400 - live April 16, 17, 18

And please... think of Kanye West and download his latest single: Gay Fish.

Labels: link, mp3, music, rave, video

posted @ 23:28

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Tuesday, December 16, 2008

post://5007839232060440479/

I love Hulu, and now they've got my favorite show: It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia - watch the full episodes. If you can get the beginning of the season the final episode will be a lot funnier :)

Labels: funny, tv, video

posted @ 14:03

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Wednesday, December 10, 2008

post://1480953871889639729/

So this shows a few issues with Rockstar's "video editor" in GTA IV for PC.
You'll notice you don't see any fire after the first clip or two yet some vehicles tend to blow up for no reason. I'm a little disssapointed considering it took me over 40 minutes to encode this "web quality" video. Other options are 720p and 1080p. Last time I tried 1080p I crashed. Go fig.

Anyhow, take a look at my GTA 'fire storm' video here.

Labels: games, games for windows, graphics, video

posted @ 23:23

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Saturday, November 15, 2008

post://4115377957762220307/

Have you heard?

The Bird is the Word

S6E2 of Family Guy -

Labels: funny, music, video

posted @ 18:06

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one of the best moments in TV history...

By Jim Bradley, at Saturday, November 22, 2008 8:10:00 PM

Hey Jim!
Do you have a new blog spot?

Your previous domain is now where I'll "find the best stuff on the internet", and other "helpful" links.

By Josh, at Saturday, November 29, 2008 5:07:00 PM

I just started a new blog... http://huskyhiker.com how have ya been? you can email me at jimbradley/at/gmail.com

By Jim Bradley, at Monday, December 01, 2008 9:19:00 PM

Monday, November 03, 2008

post://3136412013318335276/

Hummina humina - Fallout 3 is fabulous. It's everything I wanted it to be. It plays similarly to Oblivion with all the awesomeness of Oblivion & Fallout combined.

The combat system is your run of the mill point and shoot... until you activate VATS which stops the action and allows you to choose which body part of which target you want to shoot, with a very RPG % likeliness of hitting each body part.

You can shoot the gun out of their hand - or blow the arm off completely - and to accompany these shots is an awesome (VERY bloody) camera shot in bullet time. Slice their head with a knife, break their leg with the bat, or shoot off their gun hand - it's great.

Here are some screenshots:

Here is a video montage (sans music?) I made of a few attempts at VATS:

Fallout3 Screenshot 01
Fallout3 Screenshot 02

I was limited to 30 sec with trial version of FRAPs but only took me like 10 takes, so here are the 3 best sequences :)
Fallout3 VATS System Preview Video

**UPDATE** I gave in and got the full version of FRAPs and it was TOTALLY worth it, check it out: Video: VATS Killshot

Coming soon - "killing in the name of" soundtrack

Labels: games, games for windows, graphics, screenshot, video

posted @ 12:29

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Monday, October 13, 2008

post://7660891626207946375/

I've been loving 2560 x 1600 for all games lately with the latest version of nVidia drivers and now I took some video. First one is 25fps, other 2 are 60 fps but I belive Windows Movie Maker does 15fps for WMV 720p. They were originally recorded at 2560 x 1600 but the compression doesn't really do it justice.

In any case, have fun viewing:

Labels: fun, games, games for windows, graphics, racing, video

posted @ 21:58

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Thursday, October 02, 2008

post://2317820311472832986/

nVidia has finally gotten around to upgrading their cards with PhysX. They bought Agea a while ago, and it's been a long time coming. Any nVidia card that is an 8 series or above is able to be upgraded, which means no separate PhysX process is required, the firmware update uses the GPU to do all the cachunking of the (previously) dedicated physics chip.

This means towers that can be taken down, realistic wall destroying, and many other items only possible with a physics engine. Just like GPUs advanced the graphics, Physics processing will advance the gameplay and realworld feeling of video games.

Labels: games, games for windows, graphics, technology, video

posted @ 19:44

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Thursday, June 26, 2008

post://8714019405679459031/

I submitted a photoshop to'day. It's only using paint... so I guess it's a paint-shop. In any case check out the submission. I've also got the original.

Only 3 more days to watch "Back to You" on Hulu!

I found I really liked it once I checked it out - turns out it's because it comes from the creators of Frasier and Just Shoot Me, working together. Don't get too attached to Gracie... I still say they're mad for changing (ie: "...going in a different direction.")

Oh yeah... catch up on your ALF!

Labels: fun, graphics, photoshop, tv, video

posted @ 19:11

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Sunday, June 01, 2008

post://2279815248762638880/

If you thought Crysis was cool:
Video: First look at FarCry2

They did it even better with FarCry 2, without aliens.

Top 100 Best Tech Products - top 10 are right on... minus a few (like Facebook, XP?!!). I had never heard of the SD card that turns your camera into a wifi device.

Labels: games, games for windows, graphics, video

posted @ 09:24

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Thursday, May 08, 2008

post://5836667355410671026/

Miss the Simpsons? how about the Family Guy? They're all here on Hulu for free... with like 1 commercial if you don't skip around a lot.

Labels: link, video

posted @ 07:18

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Monday, February 11, 2008

post://211761023653040712/

Did you know that Hillary is Tracy Flick?

Labels: funny, politics, video

posted @ 18:27

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Saturday, February 09, 2008

post://273113161210045347/

Some random stuff for today. I was trying to use the VISTA dictation but it's very difficult. It types when you want to select something on the screen and it selects something on the screen when you want to type. It always seems to assume the opposite of what I actually want to do.

A creepy message to Scientology ~ where do I sign up?
Newsweek article about it.

Labels: link, video, vista

posted @ 15:22

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Wednesday, February 06, 2008

post://4748629978423493590/

I got Clarissa Explains It All S1D1 in the main today from Netflix and we were wondering what happened to Jason Zimbler... after finding nothing I discovered the following cameo in a recent music video: Video: The XYZ Affair - All My Friends

...look for all your favorite red-headed actors such as the guys from "Pete & Pete", "Salute Your Shorts", and "Clarissa Explains it All".

Check out the Clarissa Explains It All Drinking Game we made up.

Labels: nostalgia, tv, video

posted @ 20:38

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Monday, January 07, 2008

post://9172134586271175690/

All these mulititudes of core... no code to back them... what a shame.
Step up and code in paralell!

Oh, and here's a fun little Red Sox vs Yankees tit-bit.

Labels: link, programming, video

posted @ 17:47

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Wednesday, September 12, 2007

post://4148993935272924570/

I love this show... season 3 premiers tomorrow night, so set your DVRs to FX =)

Watch a "My Space Exclusive" Episode of Always Sunny In Philadelphia
(now with myspace goodness removed):

[ Part 1 ][ Part 2 ][ Part 3 ][ Part 4 ]
[ ~extras ]

Labels: funny, tv, video

posted @ 21:38

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Wednesday, August 15, 2007

post://5821194779799911531/

I'm not sure if you might find this little number on YOUTUBE, but I found it on MEGAVIDEO by accident... how do you say? I was looking for updates for the DM2, it's not installed on my desktop, and my laptop just shit.

Here's the funnest video evar.

Labels: fun, music, video

posted @ 20:11

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Saturday, August 11, 2007

post://5053521076941697038/

I remember hearing someone who wanted this - you often have AVIs or other bits of movies scattered about your HD that you may want to preserve for posterity or give to your grandma for her new DVD player. That said - this allows you to create a DVD without any of those expensive "DVD Authoring" programs.

Choose the AVIs you want to have on the DVD, and blam, it creates the necessary folders to burn direct to DVD. I haven't played with it yet but wanted to include the link:
Make DVDs from AVIs - FAVC 1.04 (Auto Menu Generation)

Labels: burning, dvds, video

posted @ 09:53

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