Server Bake Code

Patrick032986 · January 18, 2013

I personally would like peoples opinion on the server bake code I would love to hear people's feedback on this my opionion on this matter would be stupid on LL's part cause there is a lot people out there that are forced to use the older viewers cause their computers can't handle it and they are gonna lose users cause of this. So I would love to hear what you would think about this.

WolfBaginski Bearsfoot · January 18, 2013

I'm wondering why people aren't able to use recent viewers. I have a rather low-powered laptop, only a couple of gig of RAM, that runs current viewers fine. Set the graphics low-quality, and screen space can be tight, but things will run.

What sort of systems are they that don't work. I hear the claim, but I don't see specifics anywhere. And is it really a lot of people? Is there a problem, or is it just a rumour with long legs?

Paul Hexem · January 18, 2013

If your computer is so old that you're forced to run older viewers, it's time to update.

You can't expect progression and evolution to stop for you, this is the same thing. Times change, technlogy updates. If you can't keep up, you might want to consider a hobby that doesn't evolve.

Like... Stamp collecting.

Patrick032986 · January 18, 2013

As this maybe true, what if someone can not afford the money for a new computer I am not saying me cause I can run the recent viewers just fine but what if in general someone does not have a powerful enough computer to run the recent viewers what are they gonna do then?

solstyse · January 18, 2013

I'd llike to know how people are using older viewers now? I really think that Mesh forced people to update already. server side baking isn't going to do any more than Mesh did.

But then again, I didn't expect the difference in resource use between mesh-enabled viewers and non-mesh-enabled. that was a big disappointment to me.

Theoretically, serverside baking should actually reduce the strain that the newer viewers put on older computers. We'll just have to wait and see if that's how it actually works though. I was expecting sl to speed up after Mesh, and instead it slowed down.

And cam someone PLEASE tell me why every single time one of these threads pops up, someone feels the need to get all tech-snobby and act like there's something wrong with people who run older computers? Can someone possibly reconcile that "I'm better than you because my pc is newer" attitude with the current market trends of smaller, lighter machines? I mean seriously, with the shift to lightweight "apps" making major OS developers and chip manufacturers change their focus from power to efficiency, what is the point of posting all this "you need to upgrade" idiocy. Yeah, technology changes. We get it. We all know that. you want to copy and paste some facts about gravity because you think it makes you just as smart as Sir Isaac Newton too? Take a good look at the technological landscape in recent years and the near future, and you'll clearly see that the shift is toward smaller, more mobile computers with chips that consume less energy, and programming that consumes less resources. Maybe it's the companies that are still making their software more bloated that need to get on board. Maybe, posting that everyone who has an issue with the fact that sl is becoming more of a resource hog just makes you sound like a pompous azz.

That is, of course, unless you plan to fix the problem by purchasing new equipment for everyone who doesn't like the amount of system resources eaten up by SL. Then you won't be a pompous azz. You'll be an altruist.

Paul Hexem · January 19, 2013

Just becuase the facebook generation is moving over to more mobile devices, that doesn't make it the end all, be all platform to develop on.

SL is not a resource hog, compared to many games and graphics software.

And speaking of...

Ask gamers, graphic artists, architects, and other similar computer users, and they'll tell you that small and portable is retarded. No mobile technology that we have today or in development will ever beat a mouse, keyboard, and multiple large monitors for gaming or productivity. Unfortunately, SL falls into both of those categories, as far as technology is concerned.

Cincia Singh · January 19, 2013

Server Side Baking is a done deal. There's no need to discuss it, it's going to happen ... soon. Everything else is just drama-mongering. Nothing to see here, move along!

Patrick032986 · January 19, 2013

well ... we'll have to see what happens I suppose if this was my business which it's not I would worry about the users ... but what do I know ... right? I just wanted to hear peoples feedback on it and I can see no one is really worried at all ...

Darien Caldwell · January 19, 2013

I have to blame PC manufacturers for the current situation. They kept rolling out 400 dollar laptops which were so technologically stunted as to not be good enough for anything more than word processing. And of course people who couldn't afford to pay 1000 for a 'real' laptop bought them. Now they are trying to run applications like SL as if it was a real computer.

Of course the best part is, now PC manufacturers have created an expectation that laptops should always be 400 dollars, and cratered their own market and sales. C'est la vie.

Ayesha Askham · January 19, 2013

Oh Cincia

Server-side baking is a "done deal"? It is nowhere near that yet, though as you rightly say, it WILL happen, someday, no matter what SL residents might say.

The code changes both in Viewer and Server are by no means all cut and dried, and given the recent inability of the programmers to even get basic server functions to work as expected, I am not holding my breath.

As regards new viewers and "older" PCs there are almost as many variations on the basic PC theme as there are instruments out there.

A PC is a consumable and it will not remain useable for ever. One of the major stumbling blocks in SL is the simple fact that a great many of the Residents of SL are not what was perceived as the type of person that would ever use SL, they are non-techy people who simply cannot or will not spend the money necessary to keep up with technical developments.

It is a fundamental mismatch between the makers of SL and a great many of its most loyal and regular users. The makers cannot make a good SL that will run satisfactorily on "older" hardware and the folk that run, code and maintain SL simply do not comprehend those users' needs and a good many of them do not see why they should have to either.

I am not sure that that issue is resolvable, it is one of the fundamental conundrums in SL.

And please do not tell me that "SL looked perfectly good five years ago". It didn't. I know, and so do folk like Cincia, who have been around even longer than I.

Patrick032986 · January 20, 2013

Ayesha Askham wrote:

Oh Cincia

Server-side baking is a "done deal"? It is nowhere near that yet, though as you rightly say, it WILL happen, someday, no matter what SL residents might say.

The code changes both in Viewer and Server are by no means all cut and dried, and given the recent inability of the programmers to even get basic server functions to work as expected, I am not holding my breath.

As regards new viewers and "older" PCs there are almost as many variations on the basic PC theme as there are instruments out there.

A PC is a consumable and it will not remain useable for ever. One of the major stumbling blocks in SL is the simple fact that a great many of the Residents of SL are not what was perceived as the type of person that would ever use SL, they are non-techy people who simply cannot or will not spend the money necessary to keep up with technical developments.

It is a fundamental mismatch between the makers of SL and a great many of its most loyal and regular users. The makers cannot make a good SL that will run satisfactorily on "older" hardware and the folk that run, code and maintain SL simply do not comprehend those users' needs and a good many of them do not see why they should have to either.

I am not sure that that issue is resolvable, it is one of the fundamental conundrums in SL.

And please do not tell me that "SL looked perfectly good five years ago". It didn't. I know, and so do folk like Cincia, who have been around even longer than I.

I completely agree with you their when I first started out with SL years ago I had a crappy PC that not stand up to the SL Viewer at all so I cancelled my account and never used it again then when I got a new PC I went back to it again but ... now since I have rl going and I met someone from SL and moved in with her I decided to back off on SL she is on it more then I am but anyways that's beside the point but yes I agree with you their Ayesha Askham

solstyse · January 21, 2013

Gadget Portal wrote:

Just becuase the facebook generation is moving over to more mobile devices, that doesn't make it the end all, be all platform to develop on.

SL is not a resource hog, compared to many games and graphics software.

And speaking of...

Ask gamers, graphic artists, architects, and other similar computer users, and they'll tell you that small and portable is retarded. No mobile technology that we have today or in development will ever beat a mouse, keyboard, and multiple large monitors for gaming or productivity. Unfortunately, SL falls into both of those categories, as far as technology is concerned.

Riiight. So the cheap laptops that have far eclipsed the sales of those high powered professional rigs aren't what sl should be developing for. The most common machines out there are the ones that Second Life, of all things should be completelly ignoring.

It would be much better if everybody just used professional level computers with graphics cards that cost as much as most full computers sold. That would be great. It really would. Except that development should be for the platforms that are out there. Oh, and everyone NEEDS multiple monitors for SECOND LIFE too!

Reality is that for most of us, second life is, well, SECOND.

And as for sl not being a resource hog, Adobe Creative Suite CS runs better on my machine. SL runs slower since the introduction of Mesh on my computer. But my phone, which "ignores" mesh in Lumiya, and has less than half the processor allows me to walk around much easier.

Furthermore, had my comment about mobile devices been taken in context, OS developers are bringing mobile features to the desktop environment. Ubuntu is adding ARM support. Windows 8 has a mobile style ui, replaces "widgets" with mobile style apps, and is designed to "park" processes not in use so they dont use resources. Intel is focusing on processors that use less electricity (yes, even in desktops) to make use of the same clock speed. Not more, the same. This is all in preparation of ARM's quick development, quick increases in clock speed, and the fact that most ARM devices are subsidized, making thier bi-annual replacement more of a reality to the consumer. So as "retarded" as you think it is, it is set to have a massive effect on computing for the masses.

Look, if you're doing professional work, then yeah. Get a professional computer. If you're a hardcore gamer, odds are you're playing a hardcore game, not second life. If you're asking "why does sl suck on my computer," then you're not looking for an answer like, "Upgrade the machine that does every single other thing you use it for well." You're looking for a way to bring the performance of sl to the level of other things you are doing.

Kwakkelde Kwak · January 21, 2013

solstyse wrote:

Riiight. So the cheap laptops that have far eclipsed the sales of those high powered professional rigs aren't what sl should be developing for. The most common machines out there are the ones that Second Life, of all things should be completelly ignoring.

It would be much better if everybody just used professional level computers with graphics cards that cost as much as most full computers sold. That would be great. It really would. Except that development should be for the platforms that are out there. Oh, and everyone NEEDS multiple monitors for SECOND LIFE too!

Reality is that for most of us, second life is, well, SECOND.

Making SL available to "the masses"? I wonder how you picture this.

First of all, a pentium 4 with a high end GPU from the pentium 4 days (6800 Ultra or something) will run SL just fine. Same for a 5 year old medium range GPU (a 8600 GT or something). The 8600GT is about as "powerful" as the current Intel CPU graphics thing, the HD4000 ( a bit difficult to compare, but as far as I can see they are very similair). Of course you can't max out the display settings and you can forget about shadows and other fancy stuff completely. Anyway, you really do not need a high end computer to run SL, try running a modern game or fancy 3D software on those older machines.

In order to make SL run on machines with not even the oomph of a 5-10 year old machine, just to make sure the lowest end laptops on sale can handle SL, LL would have to seriously lower the possibilities we have now.

If your computer can't handle SL as it is now, either do some serious computer maintainance or (yes I'm going to say it) get some better hardware. Better hardware could be as little as some extra RAM.

And as for sl not being a resource hog, Adobe Creative Suite CS runs better on my machine. SL runs slower since the introduction of Mesh on my computer. But my phone, which "ignores" mesh in Lumiya, and has less than half the processor allows me to walk around much easier.

Of course SL is a resource hog, that's the very nature of how it's set up. Eliminate everything that makes SL a resource hog and you'll have textures no bigger than 256x256, a draw distance of 32 meters, no tori, spheres, cylinders, sculpties, mesh, but only boxes, maybe even no way of creating things at all, since it's not the objects, but the way builders use them that make SL laggy.

Btw, mesh never slowed my SL down, not as far as I could ever tell. SL was laggy before, SL will stay laggy in the future. At least it's ten times better than a couple of years ago. As far as I can think, mesh is only more demanding on your connection than other objects, on your graphics card it is a whole lot friendlier. For example, an SL box has 108 faces to render on its highest LoD, where a mesh box only uses 12.

Lumya ignores a whole lot more than just mesh. It's nice for what it is, but you can't seriousy compare it with a full viewer.

Furthermore, had my comment about mobile devices been taken in context, OS developers are bringing mobile features to the desktop environment. Ubuntu is adding ARM support. Windows 8 has a mobile style ui, replaces "widgets" with mobile style apps, and is designed to "park" processes not in use so they dont use resources. Intel is focusing on processors that use less electricity (yes, even in desktops) to make use of the same clock speed. Not more, the same. This is all in preparation of ARM's quick development, quick increases in clock speed, and the fact that most ARM devices are subsidized, making thier bi-annual replacement more of a reality to the consumer. So as "retarded" as you think it is, it is set to have a massive effect on computing for the masses.

If this is the case, I'd rather wait for the ARM processors to catch up with desktop CPUs and GPUs than seeing LL lowering their requirements AND SL's possibilities. That will take a good couple of years if not decades though. I've said it before in another thread, I think it would be good for SL if LL can make a viewer that will run on mobile devices just as well as it does on desktops, but the two are so far apart, it is not really an option right now.

Look, if you're doing professional work, then yeah. Get a professional computer. If you're a hardcore gamer, odds are you're playing a hardcore game, not second life. If you're asking "why does sl suck on my computer," then you're not looking for an answer like, "Upgrade the machine that does every single other thing you use it for well." You're looking for a way to bring the performance of sl to the level of other things you are doing.

I think that last statement goes both ways. People who use their computer and therefor SL as a social thing, rather than a graphical one, should accept the fact SL doesn't run at computer game framerates and doesn't have computer game appearance. If you turn down the settings, a lot of cheap laptops will run SL just fine. On the other end people with high end computers should be able to get the most out of SL as possible, with long draw distances, lots of detail and high framerates.

If LL limits the creative possibilities in SL, it won't be SL anymore. over the years we have seen "competition" rise and fall. The market may not be that big, but in that market SL is standing out. I'd also like to add I think it's pretty amazing what LL does. My midrange 5 year old computer can run SL fine, my half year old high end computer can be pushed pretty hard by SL, with the resulting graphical enhancements.

Patrick032986 · January 21, 2013

I am liking everyones feedback really I do. Keep them coming please I am also a computer technician I have been for 10 years I am not a certified one but ... but I can tell you though that I got most of my knowledge from google. So yeah I really do love your guys feedback on this it's great to have people share their creativity and ideas .

solstyse · January 22, 2013

I quoted the person who I was responding to in that post. If my viewpoint seemed extreme in any way, it was to make a counterpoint. Maybe I missed the mark?

What I was trying to say is that ignoring marketing trends, and the actions of the people who make the platform that sl runs on is a mistake. Some of the computers on sale now acrually have lower clock speeds than the ones they had years ago. Why? because the manufacturers of those machines are emphasizing portability. I'm not saying it's a good trend. But it's there.

What I truly believe should happen, and what the rl computer market is doing are complete opposites. It would make more sense to me if while phones and laptops get closer in specs (which they are) that would lead to more desktop sales. My logic is that between phones getting smarter, and the existence of better "cloud" connectivity a person's main PC could in fact be LESS portable. The existence of tablets is particularly confusing. Same chipset as a phone, but it can't make calls or fit in your pocket. But, I admit, my logic is flawed. On a purely logical level, I can fully agree that a desktop is the way to go. But reality contradicts logic. Microsoft for some odd reason thinks that their "single user experience" should extend to desktops, including the touch screen ui, tablets are outselling everything, and the desktop is no longer considered the average household computer. For LL to make the chicken little's stop crying that the sky is falling, and to increase their revenues, the average computer needs to be capable of providing it's user iwth a pleasant sl experience. Like it or not, the trend is for machines that are built to pull from the cloud, from servers. Not machines that we're accustomed to that run programs locally. The mroe sl does serverside, and the less it does on people's local machines, the better it will be from both a marketing and a performance standpoint.

As for mesh slowing down sl, I think that might be just for the Phoenix-Firestorm users. Firestorm is much more resource hungry than phoenix was, and the introduction of mesh marks the time when many, many people switched over. It took longer for the Phoenix viewer to adapt thatn the Firestorm viewer, led to rumors that Phoenix was going to die, the developers made the flexible gui in firestorm so it would look more the same, but it always was a "heavier" viewer. My experience in sl actually depends very much on what viewer I use, and how much "ground texture" there is. My computer hates fog and plants.. But generaly speaking, the lighter viewers took longer to adapt to mesh, and look way outdated now. And in my case, the connection isn't taxed any more than it was before. I actually did have to upgrade my ram, and now my stupid apu is the bottleneck. I probably should have been clear that it's the mesh enabled viewers that I blame. not mesh itself.

Paul Hexem · January 22, 2013

The problem with your suggestion, as was just pointed out, is that making SL for mobile machines would be dumbing it down. I want upgrades to the platform to actually upgrade, not remove functionality because people don't want to accept that SL is comparable to 3D PC gaming technology.

Get a gaming rig, or get a new hobby that doesn't require high end hardware.

Imagine if you went to the Battlefield 3 forums, or the forums of any online game, and said "my computer isn't good enough, it can't run the game, please take features and graphics away from everyone else until I can run it on my toaster".

This is the same thing.

Kwakkelde Kwak · January 22, 2013

One can't deny the portable market is growing fast compared to the desktop market. What I ment to say was the difference between the two is so big, it's impossible to make a cross platform viewer that offers everything we have right now without changing the entire architecture of the system.

To illustrate the difference I looked up some numbers in the cross platform CPU benchmark "Geekbench". The A5X in the iPad 3 scores 770, where my pretty high end i7-3770K scores 14000. A 2002 high end Pentium 4 even scores higher than the iPad, with 1150. The difference in graphics processing isn't even taken into account in this benchmark. They're a bit difficult to compare, since the architecture of the GPU's is not the same for a tablet and PC, but looking at the numbers, the difference is staggering. The SGX543 in the iPad3 can process 35 Mtriangles/s, where my (again high end) GTX670 can process 3660. (the 35 is measured @200MHz, while the iPad runs @250MHz and I don't know if the 35 is per core or not, also I don't know if the overdrawing of pixels makes any difference, maybe someone with more technical knowledge can shed some light on this) The iPad will draw 1000 MPixels/s, the GTX670 will draw 30 000. (I'm pretty sure the overdrawing of pixels makes a difference here, so the difference might be 3 times less, but still). The iPad will do 4x6.4=25.6 GFlops, where the GTX670 does about 2500 GFlops. Bus width 64 vs 256 bit.

These figures seem to confirm what I suspect. A tablet will do a good job drawing a nice picture on screen, but it is pretty much incapable of doing any serious processing of textured 3D space.

Btw, the benchmarks also show the much faster improvements on tablets over PCs. The iPad (jan 2010) scored 470, iPad 2 and 3 (march 2011, march 2012) scored 770, the iPad 4 (oct 2012) scored 1780. It's hard to say how long this will continue. The tablets already draw HD pictures, sharper than I can see on tv from my couch. It all depends on what the manufacturers and market want more out of them.

Moving processes from your local machine to the LL servers might be a first step to lower the strain and make it possible to run SL on tablets a bit sooner. But moving all processes except drawing the picture on screen to the servers means LL has to setup the hardware to replace the power of 60 000 users, it will have to completely rewrite server and viewer code and we'd all need a pretty fast internet connection to stream our personal server produced HD movies.

In the end I don't care how the picure ends up on my screen, as long as it ends up there smoothly. If that means streaming instead of processing raw data, all I'd need to upgrade is my internet connection, which will be quite a bit faster in a couple of years. I just don't see it happen anytime soon.

As for mesh being harder on the network, this is just my own thoughtprocess. I can think of ways to "package" the shape of an SL box or a sculpt that take only a couple of kB, where the information for every single vertex, UV point, vertex skin weight, face, normal etc that define a mesh shape is a whole lot bigger. I don't know the compression rate in SL or its internal format, but a set of dae files(with pretty much only relevant information) for a single shape can be several MB's large. One might notice it on a full mesh sim, I don't know.

solstyse · January 23, 2013

Gadget Portal wrote:

The problem with your suggestion, as was just pointed out, is that making SL for mobile machines would be dumbing it down. I want upgrades to the platform to actually upgrade, not remove functionality because people don't want to accept that SL is comparable to 3D PC gaming technology.

Get a gaming rig, or get a new hobby that doesn't require high end hardware.

Imagine if you went to the Battlefield 3 forums, or the forums of any online game, and said "my computer isn't good enough, it can't run the game, please take features and graphics away from everyone else until I can run it on my toaster".

This is the same thing.

Context, yet again.

Windows DESKTOPS are moving to a mobile STYLE ui. DESKTOP computing is more reliant on the cloud, due to the INFLUENCE of tablets. FEWER DESKTOP APPLICATIONS RESIDE ON THE LOCAL MACHINE.

Want to play a Direct X game in Linux? Connect to a REMOTE SERVER. They exist. Want to play an XBOX game on an ARM DEVICE? Connect to a REMOTE SERVER. It works. It's being done. Microsoft office 2013 will be available not only as a local application, but also as a SUBSCRIBTION SERVICE in which A SINGLE PURCHASE will licence MULTIPLE PRODUCTS on MULTIPLE ARCHETECTURES. Are you calling the largest software developers in the world wrong?

Gamers have moved to platforms. Hmmm wonder why. Maybe because to them, buying high end video cards every single year is just a little too... ninety's.

OPERATING SYSTEMS as well as OTHER SOFTWARE is TRENDING TOWARD EFFICIENCY. as is the latest X86 HARDWARE.

The EXODUS OF HARDCORE GAMERS TO PLATFORMS SUCH AS XBOX AND PS3, combined with the INFLUENCE THAT MOBILE PROGRAMMING is having on DESKTOPS will cause the trend of LOWER HARDWARE REQUIREMENTS FOR MANY OF THE SAME FUNCTIONALLITY., EVEN IN DESKTOPS. Which will in turn cause FURTHER DEMAND FOR LOWER COST MACHINES.

Now, does all the capitalizatioin make it clear that mobile platforms have a serious economic and technological impact on every computer, including desktops? Can you finally understand that is what I'm trying to say? They are no longer seperate, and the future will be that mobile and desktop computing will only grow closer?

Now, it's perfectly okay for you to keep living a decade ago instead of looking at current and future trends. It won't hurt you. But LL is a corporation, so they don't have that luxury.

FACT: Desktops are now the smallest and fastest shrinking segment of computing. Low end laptops are the largest and fastest growing. This leads to a stagnation in what technology is considered mosst common.

FACT: Non-local software, which BEGAN with smartphones and tablets, has migrated to the desktop environment.

FACT: The shrinking divide between ARM and x86 archetecture is driving the sales of low to midrange x86 machines, while the migration of gamers to machines that are less volatile is harming the sale of high end machines.

Now, if I was to go to your Battlefield 3 forum asking, "How do I optimize my existing hardware so that I can keep playing." I'd probably get something better for an answer than getting the bashing that seems to invariably come with that question here. My point is, and always has been, that NOBODY NEEDS A LECTURE ABOUT UPGRADING THEIR MACHINE. It's as if deciding that when SL is the ONLY thing it can't do, it is most economically viable to wait until there is at least one other thing that they wish it would do better is somehow being called the less responsible decisiion. That's like saying up is down and left is right. And as time goes on, and people use low draw apps on.... you guessed it, THEIR DESKTOPS it will become more and mroe common for SL to be the ONLY thing that makes them unhappy. And most people will sooner just replace a program than a whole computer. BERATING THOSE PEOPLE WHO ARE OTHERWISE SATISFIED WITH THERI COMPUTER, EVEN THE OTHER 3D GAMES THEY PLAY, WITH THE SOLE EXCEPTION OF SL WILL ONLY MAKE THEM MORE UNHAPPY WITH SL. It's a simple concept. It really is.

Furthermore, the only way that sl will be even remotely close to 3d gaming technology is if, just as developers of 3d gaming technology have done, they optimize their software. If it makes it to that level, then the only way to stay there is to do as they do, and look to the future, not the past.

Kwakkelde Kwak · January 23, 2013

solstyse wrote:

Windows DESKTOPS are moving to a mobile STYLE ui. DESKTOP computing is more reliant on the cloud, due to the INFLUENCE of tablets. FEWER DESKTOP APPLICATIONS RESIDE ON THE LOCAL MACHINE.

Style and actual use aren't the same. I can honestly say all of my programs are run locally. I could render my 3D images in the cloud, but that's it.

Microsoft office 2013 will be available not only as a local application, but also as a SUBSCRIBTION SERVICE in which A SINGLE PURCHASE will licence MULTIPLE PRODUCTS on MULTIPLE ARCHETECTURES. Are you calling the largest software developers in the world wrong?

Licensing and actual use aren't the same. I have bought several licenses. This allows me to legally install the licensed software for a certain period, on my local machine. Office 2013 will have some Cloud services, but it will still be on a local machine.

Gamers have moved to platforms. Hmmm wonder why. Maybe because to them, buying high end video cards every single year is just a little too... ninety's.

If buying gaming PC's is too 90's, I guess history, as usual, is repeating itself. PC gaming dying is as much of a myth as SL dying, we've heard it for years and it's just not the case. Some figures from NVidia (Yes NVidia, so take the figures with a grain of salt as stated in the article)

Tom's Hardware Article

Plenty of other articles on the subject, just google around a bit.

OPERATING SYSTEMS as well as OTHER SOFTWARE is TRENDING TOWARD EFFICIENCY. as is the latest X86 HARDWARE.

The very latest Intel and NVidia changes can't be called a trend I think. It could be the start of one though. Still performance went up with these changes, not down.

The EXODUS OF HARDCORE GAMERS TO PLATFORMS SUCH AS XBOX AND PS3, combined with the INFLUENCE THAT MOBILE PROGRAMMING is having on DESKTOPS will cause the trend of LOWER HARDWARE REQUIREMENTS FOR MANY OF THE SAME FUNCTIONALLITY., EVEN IN DESKTOPS. Which will in turn cause FURTHER DEMAND FOR LOWER COST MACHINES.

What exodus and what lower requirements for the same functionality? Even the requirements for Win 8 are virtually the same as those for Win 7.

Now, does all the capitalizatioin make it clear that mobile platforms have a serious economic and technological impact on every computer, including desktops? Can you finally understand that is what I'm trying to say? They are no longer seperate, and the future will be that mobile and desktop computing will only grow closer?

Now, it's perfectly okay for you to keep living a decade ago instead of looking at current and future trends. It won't hurt you. But LL is a corporation, so they don't have that luxury.

Growing closer? Yes. Are they close to each other? Not by a mile. This means it's impossible to make a viewer that does everything the current viewer does for a tablet. Should LL put a lot of efford into making their viewer available to the tablet market? I think so, but with their current open source model, they already kind of do that. TPV's can run on tablets, but those viewers are lacking a lot of functionality. Should LL keep their eye on the mobile market? I think so, but who says they aren't? We can't look into their kitchen.

FACT: Desktops are now the smallest and fastest shrinking segment of computing. Low end laptops are the largest and fastest growing. This leads to a stagnation in what technology is considered mosst common.

FACT: Non-local software, which BEGAN with smartphones and tablets, has migrated to the desktop environment.

FACT: The shrinking divide between ARM and x86 archetecture is driving the sales of low to midrange x86 machines, while the migration of gamers to machines that are less volatile is harming the sale of high end machines.

Fact 1. A low-mid end laptop should run the current viewer just fine. I think LL does a pretty good job making the viewer available and functional for the entire spectrum, from low to high end. For systems that perform even lower than low, including tablets, there are TPV's because LL made their code available.

Fact 2. I'm not sure what you're trying to say with this.

Fact 3. Again, shrinking? Yes. But ARM technology is at a 2003 PC level, that's a full decade ago. True gamers didn't and don't migrate to ARM devices yet, for the simple reason those things don't run demanding 3D games, at all.

Now, if I was to go to your Battlefield 3 forum asking, "How do I optimize my existing hardware so that I can keep playing." I'd probably get something better for an answer than getting the bashing that seems to invariably come with that question here. My point is, and always has been, that NOBODY NEEDS A LECTURE ABOUT UPGRADING THEIR MACHINE. It's as if deciding that when SL is the ONLY thing it can't do, it is most economically viable to wait until there is at least one other thing that they wish it would do better is somehow being called the less responsible decisiion. That's like saying up is down and left is right. And as time goes on, and people use low draw apps on.... you guessed it, THEIR DESKTOPS it will become more and mroe common for SL to be the ONLY thing that makes them unhappy. And most people will sooner just replace a program than a whole computer. BERATING THOSE PEOPLE WHO ARE OTHERWISE SATISFIED WITH THERI COMPUTER, EVEN THE OTHER 3D GAMES THEY PLAY, WITH THE SOLE EXCEPTION OF SL WILL ONLY MAKE THEM

MORE

UNHAPPY WITH SL. It's a simple concept. It really is.

Furthermore, the only way that sl will be even remotely close to 3d gaming technology is if, just as developers of 3d gaming technology have done, they optimize their software. If it makes it to that level, then the only way to stay there is to do as they do, and look to the future, not the past.

People don't have to upgrade their machine to run SL. A Pentium 4 with decent GPU will run it.

Demanding a lower resource hungry SL is asking for a change of SL completely. It's not the engine, it's not the servers, it's not the architecture or anything LL offers that makes SL what it is. It's user created content. That content makes SL SL, both in uniqueness and resource use. The only way to make this available to tablets is (currently) what Lumiya does. Ripping out functionality, lowering visual quality (which isn't top notch to begin with) and accepting very low framerates. I don't think that will do SL any good.

At the current pace I figure tablets and low end laptops will be able to run the current viewer in a year or two. So it might be a good idea if LL kept their requirements the same for that period. Something they pretty much did for the past 5 years. Why would they invest everything they have in lowering the load on a system if the market, as you say yourself, will catch up, in less time than it would take to rewrite SL?

Darien Caldwell · January 23, 2013