H.O.D

wow that's a really really large post! I think the mods will get a doubt whether it is all your original content or has been picked up from somewhere so I hope it is original content, or you're going to end up with a lot of negative mycents! It's not always wise to have such a big post.coming back to the topic at hand, the first mmo i played was an mmorg and its called Tibia. I think it is a really old game and was started way before World of Warcraft came and took the online gaming industry by storm. Unlike World of Warcraft, Tibia doesn't feature a 3D environment. It is an old-fashioned 2D side scrolling game which is very basic and yet addictive at some places. That explains why it is still existing and is popular in some countries.one thing which is clear from playing this game is that it has a lot of players from europe and south american countries. the players always keep asking everyone else are you from portugal or from netherlands, etc. sometimes i had trouble finding anyone around me who could speak english! there are so many non-english speaking players that it takes off the fun from the game a little bit. its supposed to be a multiplayer game so unless we team up and play with other players it will get boring very soon.it took me three days to level up to the required level (i think it was 8 or 10) to reach the "mainland". after reaching there i noticed so many players that i was first confused what to do and where to go. this is where tibia fails the most - its confusing for new players. finding a proper team also proved tough for me because of the language problem and the few english speakers seemed too snobby. i tried playing alone for a while but it soon got boring. after a while i just got bored of the whole thing and quit!tibia is a good place to start for someone who hasn't played mmorps till now and are wondering whether or not to play World of Warcraft like 10 million players do every month! by playing tibia you can get an idea about how such games work and how repetitive it can get. since its free there's no loss involved except loss of time.so head over to tibia if you're looking to kill some time but don't blame me if you get bored too soon! it was my first mmorpg and it wasnt too good, wasnt too bad.

Ubuntu heavily publicised that its latest release would significantly decrease the boot time. Now Microsoft is also following this move and it is said that the next Windows OS, codenamed Windows 8, will focus on decreasing the boot time of the OS. It will also include support for USB 3.0 and other technologies so this makes it an intense OS, but decreasing the boot time too seems like a challenge and I'm eager to see how microsoft performs this task without any glaring errors. I seriously doubt it though. 7 was better than XP in booting up but MS getting lucky twice is highly doubtful!

Wouldn't it be better if you used Linux for online transactions, as it is much safer than any Windows? i haven't seen many people talking about this error; are you sure it's widespread? Or maybe it's just the dvd you're using which is at fault.

I tried to use an "unlimited" plan for a month as I mentioned on July 1 and the speed promised was 256kbps which translates to a download speed of around 20-30kilobytes per second. The promised speed was indeed delivered and since this was encouraging, in this month (August) I moved on to a higher speed plan (512kbps) and am getting download speeds of 60-90kilobytes which seems to be good value for the money I'm paying. In other countries I don't know how the plans are - unlimited plans come with speeds in Mbps? That's a far away dream right now but at the moment things are looking just sort of okay. Browsing speed has been very good and youtube videos play with minimum buffering which is something phenomenal for this plan! I haven't read through all the replies in this thread but one of the interesting claims was that the modem could affect the internet speed. I have used a very old modem since my very first broadband connection;for almost five years and it fell down very roughly on the floor many times and got a few loose parts. Even then it managed to function fine and when I had the 2mbps connection, in its peak time the modem was able to deliver 220+ kbps download speed which was very impressive. After switching to the new connection I decided to upgrade the modem as well, and the new modem functions as a router as well, and there's hardly any change in performance. So I think there's no real impact of the modem on speed unless one really wants it to reduce the speed. There is a trick available for bumping up the speed by a few kilobytes but it doesn't involve the modem at all. Anyway thanks for all the responses to this thread. Over the past two months I got to know a few aspects of how speed varies over the internet and what factors affect it . For now I'm very happy with my new unlimited connection as it offers a respectable and decent download speed and I can download at any time of the day instead of staying up late at midnight to download something. Now am just looking forward to the day when my ISP will introduce unlimited plans in mbps. It already exists in the form of data cards, but would be nice to see it for my wired connection as well.

actually the first ever Windows is supposed to be the worst ever. vista at least sold a few million copies before people started losing interest in it. the fist Windows ever was supposedly very bad and it was only from Windows 3.0 that the product started gaining trust and value among consumers. after that only Vista has been the worst windows since then. in any case the entire Windows brand is slowly starting to go down the hill now, although it will take a few more years for the real damage to start showing. coming back to which operating system is better, there are a few linux distros which allow the users to build their own linux distro, with select packages and features. this might be feasible for advanced users only but still it's good to have an option where we can customise each and every part of the operating system ourselves and build or remove whatever we want. such options are good for people who think they aren't getting what they want from the existing operating systems.

using a software to give your speed a boost is possible but it won't be a significant change. it may mostly increase by 10-15kbps that's all. only your isp has the power to increase/decrease your bandwidth and the control to "choke" your bandwidth at 128kbits/sec lies with the isp. i don't know if this is the same in all countries but at least at my isp i saw that the bandwidth choke can be increased or decreased at their will and they can do so instantly on request. i wanted to get unlimited traffic and that meant changing to a lower bandwidth, and the folks at the office did it in a second! so try contacting your isp and see if there are better plans available with them.

First there was Netscape Navigator. Then came Internet Explorer. In between there were some other browsers which may or may not be worth mentioning but after the two above mentioned browsers, the only other browser which can be mentioned as revolutionary is Mozilla Firefox. From the very first day it made sure that it is a freeware which is not to be taken lightly. Since then there has been no looking back. However, if I'm not wrong, Firefox is a derivative of Netscape Navigator, right? Likewise, there have been a few derivatives from Firefox as well. The only one I knew about till now was Seamonkey. Then I came to know about another one called Epic, which is a very new browser based on Firefox. I realised that there must be many more like these, based on firefox and bringing something new at the same time. Does anyone know more about these derivatives? Have you used any of these browsers till now? I used Seamonkey on Ubuntu and although it seemed good it wasn't anything out of the ordinary. I haven't used Epic yet because it is available only for Windows. So if you have used any other derivative browsers please give your experience here.

i took a look at this game today and i think although popular, it can't beat the currently popular games like farmville where the objective is the same - to build a community or alliances and move ahead in the game. the concept is the same although both games are miles apart when compared to each other. however i think being too realistic can't be too good for a game. you can only love reality in a game to some extent. if everything seems too similar to the real world it can get boring or even irritating for some. comparing this again with farmville, it's not realistic at all! not even a single bit! even so its the most popular game online today. some people even say that realistic games are just like saying, "we have no imagination so we've given you whatever you see daily; now go play!" of course it's not like that with everyone but the more imaginative the games are, the more fun they are to play. cybernations is a fun game to play too, but it's definitely not going to catch up to the other popular games, so i hope it retains its loyal gamers for its survival.

at one time, whenever someone mentioned a video game with racing in it, the first thing that used to come to my mind was need for speed. it was the ultimate thrill in racing games and i can never forget the first full version that i played - need for speed 2:special edition :Dsome ten years later the series still exists but it is struggling to maintain its image as the best racing game series ever. "burnout" is just one of the names which is being heard a lot these days whenever racing games are mentioned. i haven't played a single burnout game till now but all this talk is making me wonder if need for speed is losing its image. has the damage been done too much?the next game to come out in the series is titled "need for speed:hot pursuit" No, its not the 1998 game but has the same title as that one. this shows that the series is trying out its luck by returning to the old formula! the old hot pursuit game was fun and so was hot pursuit 2. after that the series sort of fizzled out with little hope from pro street and shift. then there are two more games in development including shift 2.i'm really hoping that the next games bring back the series to life because i'm just not ready to let go of the series like many people are doing. there may be better games out there but this was the series which taught a lesson or two to all the others! so what about you other gamers out there. are you ready to give the series another chance or will you just move on and wait for the next big sensation?!!!! i hope there are still a lot of nfs fans out there, even if many of them are complaining a lot

the education system in india cant be blamed entirely. spare a thought for the large number of students seeking admission for a limited number of seats in a few good colleges. the population explosion is much to blame in this situation and another problem is the majority of the students are still confused about what their real interest is. if everyone started choosing the course of their interest then there would surely be an even spread of students across various courses and the problem would be a little less. but now majority of students are after popular courses like engineering, medicine, finance, etc and so the colleges offering these courses are forced to introduce a strict filter to deal with the rush. for less-popular courses there are no strict regulations because the demand is less. entrance tests and cut-off percentages are completely valid filters and there would be utter chaos without them. and while it's true that the marks obtained by the student in earlier courses or in the entrance exam may not truly represent the talent of the student, one can't help the situation when too many people are involved. the student simply has to grab the opportunity or try to carve a different path, cut off from the others. so for now i think the present system, although not at all efficient, is at least capable of dealing with the rest. unless some innovative changes appear, it's better to continue with the existing system only.

actually we need to give some credit to microsoft for taking care of the driver compatibility problems to some extent. when vista came out the situation was really very confusing and it was at that time that i seriously started looking for alternatives to windows. thank god that i found ubuntu linux and am now fully happy with it. coming back to windows 7, it's cool that it helps users get adjusted to the change soon and there aren't many problems with the drivers. as for the speed it can get slower on older systems so people who haven't upgraded their computers in a while could find things going on very slowly indeed. on the other hand, ubuntu linux is one of the fastest operating systems around and the latest version can boot up in 10 seconds on a decently-configured computer. besides the boot up advantage, it is also speedy in many aspects and unlike windows it doesn't slow down after a period of time. this, i feel is a very good advantage as too many programs often tend to slow down the system once in a while. so it would be good to see more people using ubuntu linux - they can try it without making any changes to their system, through a Live CD. they can experience the difference in speed and security this way. i have a friend who doesn't want to install ubuntu linux but still likes it anyway, so every time he wants to use the internet he boots off the Live CD, surfs the net and removes the cd when he's done. this may not be very convenient for all but at least its safe and fast! wow i'm surprised that vista ever made the list! dos was good in its day and age so that position is justified, but i think vista doesn't even need to be on the list.

frontpage was convenient to use at one time but later we saw some better tools like dreamweaver and compared to them frontpage doesn't seem like a good choice for building pages today. and since it has been discontinued now we can't expect any new features from it. so it would make sense not to use frontpage for today's websites. i dont know of many tools other than dreamweaver but there are some other software makers like MAGIX coming out with website-building tools which are a little simpler than dreamweaver and are easier to use. there is another tool which you might already be knowing about - bluevoda. it is a good and simple tool to use which can build good looking pages very quickly. that would be a good place to start and then dreamweaver can be used for more complex constructions.

i read in wikipedia that although god of war 3 is the end of the trilogy which contains the main storyline, the game is not the end of the series. the second god of war game for the psp is coming out soon and it will be the sixth game in the series. after that there may be other games as well and sony will continue milking money out of the loyal fans. i have only played god of war and god of war 2; am yet to get a ps3 and psp and so i cant say how the other games are but everyone's been saying that gow3 is really awesome and makes the previous games look bad! as for the psp games i havent heard much about them but they're bound to be good too otherwise the series would have ended long ago. so what do you think about the whole series. should it end soon or should they keep it going for as long as possible?

i'm surprised no one is talking about the movie inception over here! usually all new movies are ripped to shreds by our forum critics, right? a lot of people have been talking about inception at my college and while some of them are complaining that it was too complex, some can't stop saying how superb it is. i found it to be both - a complex and superb thriller and i knew that the ending would be left as a puzzle to the audience; it was something that i was expecting from the moment the "totems" were explained. on the whole the film was simply amazing and clever! has anyone here seen it? how did you think it was?

ah it's good to be back here after a long time and the main reason i left was because of the mycent system. i recently heard that its back and now when i see this thread with people doubting its return, i'm not entirely sure whether or not i should relax yet i will try to stick around, though. the new forum looks much better than the old one and it seems to be more friendly too. so i'll go and fire away some replies and hope that my account is credited soon

paypal was good once but now there seem to be issues every other day. this is getting very irritating and im really hoping that there is another good alternative for paypal. the problem is that most companies dont support any other online payment system other than paypal so people are forced to stick to it even though they are not entirely happy with it! so for now paypal will continue to remain the most widely used system.

Many people keep saying that its good that wikipedia has references and I think we must applaud the people who take the time to update the article and mention the references as well. some articles seem to have over 50-100 references that makes the article seem too long! yes actually there is no point in discussing these topics after a while before it leads to nowhere and usually the members involved just keep flaming at each other or end up irritating the whole forum. so such topics, although important, should be kept in control at all times. that is best for all the members involved and maintains a safe environment in the forum. as for such topics in wikipedia, its best to steer clear of them too because anyone has the power to edit them, and although there is a good chance that they will be reverted back to their original state, in the time the fake news is posted it may be a bit damaging. so its best to stay away from them at wikipedia too!

i have BSNL connection as well and i have to agree that no one else provides plans at these rates so cost-wise, it is the best. seeing the whole picture bsnl also is offering less value for money - just when comparing to other ISPs it is better. the common problems everyone has with BSNL is that their customer service is very poor in most of the areas. it depends on luck whether you get a rude or pleasant customer care executive. chances are more for getting the rude ones only! other than this BSNL chokes the speed if it gets too bored and the speed for the limited plans keeps fluctuating more than it is supposed to. i've only begun using an unlimited plan and so far its been good - have to wait and see what more surprises BSNL will be planning.as for 3G, BSNL is doing a good job there too. 30p/sec for video calls? i think that's a price other operators won't be able to beat once they enter the market too. and mobile internet has a long way to go in India - just keep hoping for the best. half of 2010 is already over - maybe in this second half we may be getting some better news.

no no i wasn't saying that i pay for download time. what is the use of downloading 100mb in 1 hour when it should have been finished in 10 minutes (according to the plan). in this unlimited plan there is less speed so the ISP knows less bandwidth will be consumed even if used extensively so i'm getting the mentioned speed without any problem. in the limited plan the speed is high so the ISP is trying to conserve bandwidth by choking the speed and then trying to put the blame on someone else

there are still quite a few people using other search engines so obviously the ad revenue is still continuing to come in, even if it is not as much as google's share. why would they like to let this money go waste -that's why they are still trying to be in the competition and maybe they too know that they're never going to win, but still they're in it for the little they're getting from the business.

well i didn't manage to find out why the speed was getting decreased but for now i've switched to an unlimited plan. it doesn't affect my browsing speed in any way; just the download speed gets reduced a great deal. anyway since i don't download much it should be fine. still, i tested the download speed and found that i was getting the correct speed as mentioned in the plan. so maybe the ISP has no worry about giving speed to unlimited plan owners because the promised speed is less anyway, and since the limited plan owners will download cautiously the ISP saves bandwidth there also by giving less speed and then saying its not their fault. this is simply too idiotic and silly and the ISP is coolly pocketing our money without fulfilling the promise entirely.

i don't understand why yahoo, microsoft (bing) and the others just don't give up and accept the fact that they will never catch up to google. i know yahoo existed well before google but now they are no longer the best at the search engine business. so the best thing would be to just quit. as for their i think you are one of the few people who really care about them (no offence). yahoo still gets thousands and even millions of visitors daily but all them are forced in some way or the other to do so. people know the power of google and even after knowing it if they are going to yahoo then it only means they are attracted by those "contests" or something similar. without their own benefit i think there are very few people using yahoo when compared to google.

well my ISP is a government managed one - BSNL - and their way of functioning is a deep mystery. I don't think they are giving dedicated lines to all users with plans of 2mbps. In fact, their unlimited plans with less speed cost much more than the limited plans with more speed. Obviously more people prefer unlimited so this old 2mbps plan is getting neglected. Their response is not so good and they think if they hurl a few tech terms people will be quiet about it! I checked again today morning and the speed was 50kbps. I checked my connection speed at speedtest and it was 0.7mbps. I think the speed is varying a lot and is decreasing and increasing at random. Hopefully it will increase for a few days so that I can finish my fedora download.

i have a 2mbps connection at home and though i mostly use it only for browsing, sometimes i download linux distos and stuff like that. yesterday i was trying to download fedora 13 and noticed that i was getting a download speed of 20kpbs, while i remembered that i used to get around 150-200kbps earlier. i had noticed no difference in the browsing speed - only the download was slow. thinking it to be the fedora server's fault, i decided to test with some other download. i went to ubuntu's website and tried to download their image - once again the speed was 20kbps! so it was not just one website but my connection was giving me 20kbps when it was supposed to give 150-200kbps. i called up my isp and asked what the matter was and the customer care person said it was some problem of "international latency" or something like that. it seemed he had rehearsed this one line well and when i asked him to explain what it meant he couldn't give a satisfactory answer at all. what i could decipher from his answer was that it wasn't the isp's fault that my speed is low. so what is that international latency and whose fault is it really, and more importantly, how do i fix this problem?

one thing seems to be sure that it will never be as popular as the iPhone, let alone the iPod. apple really needs to rethink their strategy to include new and more useful features in the iPad. mere marketing won't help sell their product if there's nothing in it. i find that i don't use many features in my cell-phone too i mostly use it for messaging, surfing the net, and the occasional call too for everything else i have my handy laptop so buying high-end phones seems a bit pointless to me right now. $300 is indeed a steep price for a product which doesn't perform most of the functions that a basic laptop would. just because it looks attractive it doesn't mean that it is a good buy. right now it is not available in all countries and im sure it won't do as well as it is in the US (if the sales in the US can be called good!). americans have good spending power so they are open to trying out products like this, and especially when a company like apple brings out something it is sure to get good sales initially, and when the initial excitement wears off, the true value of the product is known. in this case, the iPad is an average device which offers nothing much promising. people in other countries who don't have very good spending power will definitely think twice or even thrice before buying such a thing. so i think it is not going to be a hit internationally. @yordan: you said you won't get the iPad, and yet you have started a thread asking people whether or not they will buy it. so somewhere deep within you may be having an interest for the iPad and given a chance i think you would like to try it out. this sort of interest is there in a lot of people and thats why the initial sales of the iPad seemed to look really good. but there are people who think like you do, especially the subscription part and this will discourage them from making their move and getting the device. i think the best thing to do would be to wait for a while to see for any useful upgrade that may come for the iPad, or otherwise there is always the option to go for a similar tablet from one of the other leading companies. everyone seems to be coming out with their own tablet PC so looking at one of these could be a good idea.