Beat Journal Five
New Media Technology
As students of new media we are expected to know how to use a wide variety of technologies. At OSU we are exposed to blogging, video production, 3D animation, and a little web design. In addition to the requirements, there are many other opportunities to learn new technologies. I had the opportunity to be part of a four-person team tasked with the setup and maintenance of the New Media Communications Advanced Gaming Lab, or game lab for short. The reasoning behind the game lab was that film students watch movies to learn so shouldn’t new media students be exposed to games to learn? It’s kind of a touchy subject and I think just having this lab has given the department very mixed feedback. Many students are thrilled by this idea, most have no idea about it, and others think it’s a total joke and a waste of money. The technology in the game lab includes the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii, Dell XPS desktop computers, high performance Mac desktops, and high definition televisions including our 60″ Samsung full 1080p screen.
I wanted to write about some of this new technology because some of it is completely revolutionary and stretches beyond the typical gamers living room. I think it’s extremely relevant to be exposed to this technology because it is what the future has in store for us. Let me try to explain how some of this technology goes beyond gaming. The PlayStation 3 actually qualifies as a super computer. You may have heard about dual core processing, which is a technology that uses two cores in a processing ship to twice as many packets of data to be processed at a time. You can even get quad-core now. Well the PS3 has eight cores. You can actually plug in human interface devices like a mouse and keyboard and install an operating system like Linux to use the machine as a computer. Folding@Home is software that requires a super computer to calculate complex algorithms related to protein folding for the purpose of researching Alzheimer’s disease. By releasing this software for free over the PlayStation Network, PS3 owners can help process this research at break neck speeds. In its first month of release, Folding@Home calculated a years worth of research. A years worth of research in one month is huge, and it;s only getting bigger. We run our PS3 at the game lab around the clock to support this cause.
The Wii is revolutionary in it’s motion control capabilities in a light-weight, inexpensive piece of hardware. It has revolutionized social gaming. No longer do people sit drooling on their couches as they gun down Nazi regimes, but instead they invite a group over and engage in interactive physical activity in the living room. It’s important that we study the relationship between man and machine.
Even the TVs are important because they represent a huge technological leap. Pretty much everybody has a TV, but they are now becoming more and more obsolete. In less than a year, the digital television transition act will be put into action and people receiving analog, over-the-air signals will be out of luck. In addition, more and more broadcast television is moving towards high definition signals. I think this is important to study because the markets have taken advantage of the fact that most people are completely uneducated on the subject and have jacked up their prices accordingly. My grandfather bought a high definition TV about a year ago because his eye sight has become so poor, he cannot read text on a standard definition screen. I think he overpaid by about $400 and once he set up his TV, no one told him he had to get high definition service to actually receive HD broadcasts. You see, standard definition broadcasts actually look worse on an HD screen. In addition, there is a ton of confusion over the formats which are given cryptic names 480i, 480p, 720p, 1080i, and 1080p. The number stands for the number of horizontal lines of resolution and the little letter (p or i) represent the display of these lines where i = interlaced and p = progressive scan. If your lost you should check out this link:
http://alvyray.com/DigitalTV/Naming_Proposal.htm
High definition DVDs have a huge amount of confusion as well. Until very recently, a battle was raging between Sony and Toshiba (and their supporting companies) over the future of high definition DVDs. The two formats were Sony’s BluRay and Toshiba’s HDDVD. Blockbuster dropped HD DVD this summer which was a big hit for them, but it wasn’t until a few weeks ago when Walmart dropped HD DVD that Toshiba threw in the towel. Well what happens to all those people who spent $1000 on an HD DVD player that is now obsolete? Basically they’re screwed. The lack of comsumer information and what I would call unethical format wars has been extremely costly to the average Joe.
In short, I think it’s all worth researching.
http://www.crn.com/digital-home/206504481
http://www.ntia.doc.gov/otiahome/dtv/
http://www.intel.com/products/processor/core2duo/index.htm?cid=cim:ggl|c2d_us_dualcore|k6CEF|s
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/gaming/2007-01-15-oregon-research_x.htm
