quakes

With Molly out covering the iPad launch for your local CBS stations, we're free to make wanton puns about knot theory. And we do. Plus Brian Tong gets his brain in knots trying to explain how it applies to tangled headphones. We also have the explanation for why iPad apps are ridiculously expensive. And we compare the JooJoo which is actually here, and explain why it's getting trumped by Apple.

How Long Will It Take iPad App Prices To Drop? … Read more

Quake is one the most popular first-person shooters ever to addict hapless gamers. This free plug-in from Quake's developer, id Software, lets you play the online multiplayer version of Quake, Quake Live, using Microsoft Internet Explorer version 7 or greater. To play you need only register for a free account at the Quake Live Web site.

As with all online versions of sophisticated video games, you really need a broadband Internet connection as well as a reasonably powerful computer, enough RAM, and, most importantly, good graphics capabilities. You can still play if you just squeak by in system requirements, … Read more

Quake Live plug-in (Firefox) is, as the name suggests, a Firefox plug-in that allows users to play Quake Live online from within Firefox. Although there's not much to the plug-in itself, it does effectively give users access to this first-person-shooter game.

Upon going to the Quake Live Web site, users are prompted to download the plug-in if it's not already installed in their copy of Firefox. We had no trouble creating a Quake Live account and beginning the game; the graphics looked great and everything seemed to operate as it should. There's not much else to say … Read more

Most Netbooks are unable to render high-definition videos, not to mention run 3D games. In fact, the standard Intel Atom processor and integrated graphics chipset can barely handle Flash-heavy Web sites.

However, it's beginning to seem like the limitation is not on the hardware, but the drivers. Martin Mohring, from the Linux Foundation, was at a Mobile Dev Camp event in Germany. There, he showed an MSI Wind U115 with an Atom Z530 1.6GHz/Intel GMA 500 combo not only playing an HD video clip, but also running Quake III at about 35fps. The secret? This Netbook is using Moblin Linux, which has optimized drivers to push the graphics performance to another level.

If this gets you all excited, you can download a copy of Moblin Linux here and let us know your experience. But while waiting for the download, check out some videos posted by UMPC Portal and Netbook News.de after the jump. … Read more

Neuroscientists at Princeton University created a new way to study the neurons of the classic mouse-in-a-maze: strap it to a suspended ball and have it run through a virtual maze. That first virtual maze? Derived from a Quake 2 level.

Apparently it's difficult to control and study the neurons of a mouse when it's physically moving, and this method makes that easier. The ball is suspended on a jet of air, and the mouse is strapped in place with a collar on top of it (like a giant trackball, sort of) while running on a spherical treadmill.

Given … Read more

Earthquake 3D provides a fascinating look at recent seismic activity around the globe. While the program provides a great deal of information and options, it suffers from its complete lack of direction.

We were initially impressed with the interface. The controls all looked basic, but soon we discovered that the Help file didn't do more than give a description of the product, and some actions we wanted to perform were not intuitive enough. The program itself was a spinning globe with magnitudes and the traditional multiring circles indicating earthquakes. We appreciated how the control panel let us filter quakes … Read more

A bit of consolidation going on in the video game biz today, as ZeniMax Media, parent company of Bethesda Softworks (Elder Scrolls, Fallout 3), is acquiring id Software, developer of the classic Doom, Quake, and Wolfenstein franchises.

While responsible for some of the most important PC games of all time (and essentially creating the first-person shooter with 1992's Wolfenstein 3D), iD has struggled in recent years to find the same relevance among console gamers and develop new properties. The company has also needed to form a more mutually beneficial relationship with a publisher (which is why there are very … Read more

Set the wayback machine for 1999/2000, and you'll find a lot of Gen-X office workers doing the same thing I was back then--wasting hour upon hour of company time playing "Quake III" (or "Unreal Tournament II") with my office mates. (At least in my case, there were extenuating circumstances: I was covering the video game beat at pop-culture Web site UGO.com at the time).

In the years since then, first-person shooters have come to require the kind of dedicated hardware that virtually no office workers have, effectively eliminating the daily fragfest that was … Read more

You can dig deep into the rankings of search results with SeoQuake, a free toolbar that can help you determine how to better position your Web site and marketing efforts. Analyze page ranks, number of links, and many more details as you unearth a treasure trove of data about site domains and pages.

SeoQuake installs a colorful, data-packed toolbar to Firefox's window. The icons and numbers will be unintelligible to the uninformed user, but users skilled in SEO techniques will immediately appreciate the wealth of detail this add-on provides. Click on any of the toolbar icons while visiting a … Read more