That would be a shameless plug, which is a never done on Slashdot... and besides, that post was my attempt at self-deprecating humor. I see it's mostly failed so far.

My band went from 72 views to 5. Damn you Google!

The Albany-Saratoga metro has about a million people in it. Saratoga is the fastest growing county in the state. Add in Global Foundries in Malta and a proposed Apple plant there, and the population is going to grow even faster. So, it's not just Buffalo, Rochester, NYC - other areas of the state are growing faster.

But you are right, the samethe rail system in NY is antiquated - it basically follows pattern the Thruway does - NYC - Albany - Rochester - Buffalo. It's not exactly a meshed rail system - rather point to point.

Politically, there seems to be a Chicken and Egg issue happening with the rail system in NY - ridership doesn't warrant pouring a lot of money into the system - but if they did, their might be more ridership. They've recently started funding the rail system, but most of it seems to been used to update the stations rather than provide better service on the rails.

Take down the website the easy way - post a link to it on Slashdot.

My guess... They are in beta..

They already ported the Source engine - so games like LFD2 (which they used for the port), and Portal 1 & 2 were left out (both commercial)... and they left a small test bed of games that they can get good feedback on. The one thing I already see - the Steam Client is far from perfect, but running well - some of the games are not yet... Linux, and OpenGL are still infants as far as game development... But if a few hurdles are overcome --- especially nvidia and amd drivers, then maybe it opens a certain type of floodgate... Once a system is stable and consistent to develop on - and standards actually are standard, it makes development that much easier... That was always a knock on Linux gaming - and I would not be surprised if Steam does come out with their own Linux gaming distribution.... much to the horror of Canonical and the FSF... But hey... open source means open for anyone...

Maybe I have bad drivers, crappy hardware, and my capacity at gaming sucks.. But I feel like the old ladies that used to complain of upgrading from Word Perfect to Office...

Maybe at 40 years old I should just put down my mouse, and order depends..

I bet there is an algorithm out there that will calculate what the density is of the blades of grass, how many feet you need to step, and somewhere throw in velocity, and you have the perfect get of your lawn app for the TI-84....

One last point to my horrid opinion on gaming... Back in the BBS days (yes, those), I used to be able to login and play the same game on my TRS-80 or on my friends Commodore 64 down the street... Tradewars... it's almost like pixels are finally catching up to ASCII in portability terms.

Seen the ti-84 mentioned a lot lately... The only thing I remember was I could program it, and my professor let me for my Calculus 1 class. I still don't know a lot about Calculus, but I know more about programming... Makes me think if calculators are good for learning the subject, or for learning how to program the subject.

Yes, it could change my opinion... Right now the developer mentality on them is write little and make a little.. Something like Witcher 3 on a tablet, or EVE-Online, or any of the mainstream MMORPG's that immerse the user would be key.... Vendetta Online, while a weak desktop game by today's standards found new life on a tablet... No reason other games can't make the jump... But the reason PC gaming still goes strong isn't always the power behind the game, but the way you play it. Keyboard and Mouse... Cosnoles haven't replaced it (how many gamers play WoW with a controller?)... And not saying a controller is bad - but there is a sweet spot to PC gaming. As much as Steam pushes big picture (a 43+" screen is nice), nothing beats the immersion of a good sized monitor (23 or so) and keyboard and mouse... Tablets are good diversions while riding the bus.. or even on the couch for a bit... they leave a lot desired when someone wants to REALLY play a good game that isn't Solitaire on steroids... I don't see PC or Console gaming going away anytime soon... Pong would've never been pong if they made it tablet size...

I know your point though... Bring a tablet --- hook it up to a tv... then hook up the controllers... then hook up blah blah blah... but isn't that what the console already is? My estimation is SteamBox becomes like a Roku box, but with real gaming... they will probably introduce a decent controller for it that crosses over somehow... but somewhere in the corner is the desktop to escape too... There will (should) be always some game that is developed on a creation content machine (as I am now calling desktops) that is meant to be played on the creations content machine... Nethack still feels like a piece of shit on a tablet --- 30 years later...

I never felt Windows was bad enough to cut out for gaming, until I tried Windows 8. I use Linux for a lot of things, even bought all the Loki games when they were around, but never had too much of an issue with Windows Gaming to say I would drop it if Linux caught up.

I changed my mind. Windows 8 has been horrid on the desktop for gaming. I've had several crashes due to DirectX driver incompatibility.. Most of them due to having the XBOX 360 Controller plugged in. I have older hardware no longer supported - and no word if it will be. Metro isn't really that intuitive for launching games (although it is for buying them I guess). My AMD Radeon card has been overheating lately because their drivers aren't up to snuff on Windows 8, go figure... It's been overclocking itself. Which I know isn't all Microsoft's fault - but it does seem like PC Gaming is an afterthought over tablet gaming with the newest release. Seriously, bejeweled type games are at the forefront of the metro store.

Gabe got a lot of flack for looking at linux as a platform that steam will run on, but I'm all for it. A game distributor gets all access to the OS that they will be delivering on? I'd be hard pressed to think of real reasons that game producers won't want to jump at it. Definitely like the idea of a SteamBox too... I can play the same game on my laptop, desktop and console? and have all my save games with me to jump right in at the same point I left off on? Sounds damn good to me.

Steam also gets some flack for pricing - but I always wait for the deals. Trine 2 cost me $4, a game I would've never tried unless it was on the Linux Beta, and loving it... so is my son.

I'm not overjoyed.. maybe 8 years ago I would've been... When enlightment kicked Windows XP out of the water... When Linux Desktop was promising some hope... But, I would definitely replace Windows with Linux as my desktop if gaming went that way... Gaming sucks on tablets for me... and tablet OS's suck for gaming.. So maybe it is finally the year of the linux desktop.

They don't just succeed making servers and workstations - while some of their acquisitions have been flops, others have been pretty solid. Equallogic and Compellent on the storage front are two huge markets that cover medium - large business needs. Force 10 in my opinion can be one of their biggest acquisitions as it finally lets them compete in higher end networking. These acquisitions alone allow them to provide complete solutions of their own in the datacenter. I'm interested in seeing what their OpenStack impelementation consists of - I'm guessing they can do everything from SAN to Switch to Servers in house with their own products.

Another interesting acquisition is Wyse - they now have a VDI solution. Can they deliver over the internet at some point? Most VDI implementations are in house right now - can Dell deliver one over the cloud?

Android doesn't make too much sense in the enterprise. Yes, email and scheduling - but from a business app development stand point - it's just not there. It's a great consumer/consumption OS - and entertainment OS. The thing I questions is whether Windows 8 really fills that void either. As a desktop OS, it's clunky at best. The verdict is still out whether it becomes a good consumer OS too. It's stuck in limbo - but never the less, it's being forced on users at this point. Most enterprises looking at windows 8 want to make it behave like Windows 7 before they deploy it. So what's the point?

Dell has spent a lot of money acquiring technology recently. Some have already failed - but others are just ramping up. They even have a software house now. It will be interesting to see if they tie it all together and become what IBM used to be. A one stop shop for enterprise IT.

I was actually thinking of Stripes ...

Man I wanted that bad ass RV when I was a kid.

Support for XP ends April 8th, 2014, not 2013. FYI. We actually had to roll out another phase of XP upgrades to 2014 because of cuts to our operating budget - so I know the date very well.

According to the Microsoft Lifecycle page, you will have support for Windows 7 until 2020.