HardwareLogic's Year in Review: Computer Technology of 2006

[Capper]

At the end of the year, it has become somewhat of a tradition to look back on the year's events and remember the most significant and/or disappointing. Well, in the computer hardware world, 2006 was not unlike any other year and had its share of exciting releases and over rated products. With 2007 just around the corner, it is time for HardwareLogic to take a moment and reflect on the good, the bad, and the ugly computer related technologies of 2006!

HardwareLogic's Year in Review: Computer Technology of 2006

[Panda Man]

Great summary blake! Interesting read, and didn't know that the physX card was that big of a flop (Never knew of the performance issues)

Too bad I can't read :\

[polobunny]

I wouldn't qualify the BigFoot network adapter useless, but they must be targeting rich gamers because there's no way i'm paying over $50.00 for a NIC. Really, I remember buying a 3Com ages ago to decrease my ping (though my NIC died so I needed one anyway) and even if it did I thought help I still thought it was a bad spend.

[Capper]

Blake put a lot of time, effort, and thought into this....and I think it was very well done.
I've seen a wide variety of opinions on the Killer NIC, but I have to say the negatives far outweigh the positives. most every article i've seen points out no gain, or very minimal gain while using the NIC, and for $250, i can think of several upgrades much more worthy.

[One4yu2c]

The problem with the Bigfoot NIC is you're paying a couple of C-notes+ for roughly a 3-4ms drop in ping in most situations. I'd honestly have a tough time paying a budget price for that kind of negligible performance, let alone a healthy chunk of change.

[polobunny]

Originally Posted by Capper

Blake put a lot of time, effort, and thought into this....and I think it was very well done.
I've seen a wide variety of opinions on the Killer NIC, but I have to say the negatives far outweigh the positives. most every article i've seen points out no gain, or very minimal gain while using the NIC, and for $250, i can think of several upgrades much more worthy.

Agreed. It is ridiculously priced for a "common user" NIC. I've seen NIC's going in the thousand dollars but they weren't targeted at you and me.
Besides, anyone should be able to compensate for a tad of ping. Hell, good gamers used to do it all the time "back in the days". :P

[Panda Man]

heh, the way I've always seen it is if your having that big a problem with pings, upgrade your service. I've never really been able to justify buying a new NIC to try and decrease my ping. If anything, I just use free software, such as TCPOptimizer.

[wtcnbrwndo4u]

Originally Posted by Panda Man

heh, the way I've always seen it is if your having that big a problem with pings, upgrade your service. I've never really been able to justify buying a new NIC to try and decrease my ping. If anything, I just use free software, such as TCPOptimizer.

My ping's never that bad. I only play Halo online, but usually I have pings in the 60s, sometimes going up to 130. My internet's really intermittent.

[polobunny]

Originally Posted by gvblake22

As for the NIC, it's hard to justify one of those now because they all give roughly the same performance, but back in the days when cable internet/DSL was only a baby it was rather "common". Just as you'd buy a better 56K modem "hardware", steering away from those cheap winmodems that got all of their business handled by Windows. ;).

Dang, I feel old already.

[gvblake22]

Originally Posted by polobunny

Yes, he is sirious, because internet is sirious bizness.

OMG, I just noticed he said bruner instead of burner