If you're wondering about the ROI (Return On Investment) for Litecoin
mining with a shiny new R9 290 or R9 290X, there are quite a few
calculators out there that will help with some rough estimates. The
problem with the calculators is that they're very rough -- they
assume a constant increase in difficulty and a constant price for
Litecoin, neither of which are even remotely likely. They always end up at the point where Litecoin mining becomes "unprofitable", but my experience says that isn't likely to happen -- "ever" (though we need to dig into this more, which is the point of this point). Some may account
for hardware upkeep and other factors, but even then you're going to
need to do a bit more work to even come close to reality. So what is
"reality"? That's what I'm here to talk about today.
My earlier post about paying for the hardware in a month or two was perhaps a bit overzealous -- especially if you haven't ordered the hardware yet! You see, Litecoin and Bitcoin (and pretty much all of the other cryptocurrencies) are designed to have someone find a new block of coins via mining every set interval; on Bitcoin it's every 10 minutes and on Litecoin it's every 2.5 minutes. The more people start mining, the faster blocks would be found, so they scale the difficulty to try to keep the rate more or less constant. The result is that every 2016 blocks that are found, the algorithm looks at how long it took and either scales the difficulty up, down, or keeps it the same. You can find the current difficulty and estimated next difficulty at many places, but the key thing to remember is that it's always changing.
The biggest factor affecting difficulty is the price -- if Litecoin mining becomes highly profitable, as it did during the past month, then more people will mine and difficulty will go up. At the start of November 2013, the difficulty was around 1000; now it's at nearly 2000 -- twice as difficult, or put another way your hardware is now generating half as many LTC. As an even more extreme example of what can happen, Bitcoin difficulty went from around 3.2 million at the start of 2013 to its current 707 million in eleven months -- a 221X increase in difficulty! And it's not set to slow any time soon. But for the time being, that won't happen to Litecoin. Here's why.
Bitcoin difficulty has generally followed the price such that for any set of hardware, you could expect to pay it off in around six months (accounting for electricity costs in the US or $0.10 per kWh). Early on this didn't hold, and even in the CPU mining days it wasn't quite accurate, but since 2011 that's more or less been the status quo. Pricing bubbles cause the difficulty to spike and price crashes cause it to drop -- albeit more slowly -- but the result is pretty constant. There were two major wild cards that screwed things up, however: the advent of GPU mining, followed by the dawn of Bitcoin ASICs.
Even at it's lowest point in 2011 (around $2 per BTC), my GPU mining was pretty close to the break even point, and thanks to constantly dropping difficulty (remember: it follows pricing; it does not lead) my rigs that at one point were perhaps costing a bit more than they were earning in mined coins eventually returned to profitability. Thanks to my $0.10/kWh electricity cost, I can still mine at a profitable rate (even if it's a low rate) when those with higher electrical costs have to quit. Europeans in particular pay some pretty insane rates and thus they don't tend to mine unless it's highly profitable (or if they're looking at a long-term view of the value of BTC/LTC).
So my GPUs are chugging along happily, averaging 5 BTC per day at lower difficulties, then 4, 3, 2, 1... you get the point. My daily power costs are around $10, and my mining income has usually been around $15 -- at the current price at least. Then ASICs start arriving and the early offerings could mine at 330 MHash and 5W compared to my 5870 GPUs doing 380 MHash at 300W -- or in other words, they were 50 times as efficient! The problem was that ASICs weren't readily available, so those that had them reaped massive rewards while those that didn't started trying to get ASICs as quickly as possible.
I should note that FPGAs were always more efficient than GPUs as well, but their costs were such that most people didn't jump on that train -- they're around $600 for a good FPGA (e.g. BitForce) that could mine at 800MHash with a power draw of 80W -- about eight times as efficient as a GPU, but still quite a ways behind any of the proposed ASICs at the time.
When the first generation ASICs actually started shipping, we naturally saw a massive spike in difficulty, just like what happened with the GPU spike a few years earlier. Eventually, difficulty hit the point where anything short of a good ASIC became unprofitable -- which lead to things like a single Block Erupter dropping to a low of $15 on Amazon before the BTC price jumped up to $1000+. You could have purchased 10 for $150 to get 3.3 GHash and a power draw of 50W, and 45 days ago it would have earned $25 per month or so. Today, a better bet would be a similar Block Erupter Blade that will do 10.7 GHash and draw 85W or so of power, for $600. That's actually not a bad deal if you want to grab it, as you will "earn" $200 per month right now. But difficulty for BTC is still increasing quite fast, so it will likely end up being a 5-month ROI.
Okay, I've been talking around things a lot, but let's get to some real numbers. Since difficulty follows price, the only time we will actually reach the point where GPU mining of Litecoin becomes unprofitable is when Litecoin ASICs become so prevalent that GPUs can't compete. There are companies talking about making Litecoin ASICs -- FPGAs having been ruled out due to cost and efficiency considerations -- but the Scrypt algorithm was intentionally designed to make it difficult to implement on GPUs, let alone ASICs. This is why you get 600 KHash from an HD 7950 compared to 650 MHash for SHA256 (Bitcoin) -- it's 1000 times more complex to run the Scrypt hashing algorithm. But that doesn't mean an ASIC is impossible -- just more difficult to make.
One company I've read about is claiming they'll have a Litecoin ASIC in mid-2014 that does 500KHash per chip at 20W. That's over 100X as efficient as mining with a 7950 or R9 290 GPU, though pricing hasn't been fully disclosed yet. Here's the thing: the same company was making claims about an amazing FPGA design for Litecoin before determining it wasn't cost effective, and now they're making big claims for ASICs. I was around when the first Bitcoin ASICs were being discussed, and the claims were similar. Preorders for companies like Butterfly Labs rolled in, with people investing 100BTC at a time when the coins were worth $2.50; two years later when they finally received their ASIC, BTC was worth over $100 -- if they had just "invested" the $250 in holding BTC, they would have made far more than the ASIC will ever deliver. Litecoin ASICs are going to be the same thing, so before you drop $500 or $1000 on an unproven and not yet shipping product, ask yourself: how much will 10 to 25 LTC be worth in a couple years?
With all of that out of the way, here's my final rough guess on how LTC difficulty will proceed. I've normalized LTC production to one R9 290 getting 850 KHash/sec to make things easy. Assuming you start mining today, you'll get around 0.43 LTC until the next difficulty change (every 3.5 days). At that point, we'll likely jump up 10-15% in difficulty, because with a net profit of $50 after just 3.5 days people would be silly to not mine LTC. I'd guess that rate of increase will continue for about three weeks, at which point we'll be at a difficulty of 4000 -- twice what we are now. The rate of increase will start to slow, ranging from 5-10% for the next three weeks, at which point we'll have doubled again up to ~8000 difficulty. From there, it will continue to stabilize until we end up at around 12000-15000 difficulty.
If the price increases or drops (and it will), those difficulty estimates will of course change. If we see $100 LTC I would expect the difficulty to stabilize at a much higher value -- maybe 20,000 or so. If the price drops down to $10 per LTC on the other hand, difficulty will end up closer to where we are now -- around 2,000. Basically, my guess is eventually difficulty will stabilize at a value that leads to a single R9 290 generating $3 per day in profit. At that point, the GPU pays for itself in about four months, and with a four month ROI instead of two or four weeks, people become far less likely to purchase more hardware for mining.
For those that didn't know, Litecoin difficulty has a cool feature: divide your hash rate by the difficulty to determine how many coins you mine per day. That means at a difficulty of 20,000, a single R9 290 would only generate 0.0425 LTC per day, or 1.275 LTC per month. The power cost for running a single R9 290 is going to be about $25 per month, so in order to break even in four months you need to mine $125 per month in LTC. LTC was stable at around 1000 (give or take 10% as it went up and down) from August until early November, because the price wasn't attractive enough to draw additional miners into the fray. A single 7950 was only making about $1 per day, depending on the price, so it was technically profitable but the ROI would have been almost a year for a single 7950 purchase.
We'll eventually get to that point with R9 290 and 290X, and then the early adopters will pat themselves on the back and those that came late will curse their stupidity. They might even exit Litecoin mining altogether and sell off their hardware in order to recover some of the cost. And then, a year from now when LTC is at $100 or more and the next bubble is going on, they'll think, "If only I had kept mining...." Hopefully you have the ability to stick it out until that time.
Got LTC?
In-depth testing and reviews of graphics cards and related technologies, focusing on performance across numerous generations of hardware. Gaming benchmarks galore, plus AI and professional testing on occasion, to show the best value GPUs right now.
Friday, December 6, 2013
Tuesday, December 3, 2013
Litecoin Mining Rig, 4x R9 290 Edition
After the last post, quite a few people have wondered exactly how I would go about building a new Litecoin mining rig. Well, I did the plastic crate thing last time, and I decided that was a bit too ghetto. Yes, the case was cheap, but it's a pain to work with if anything goes wrong. A nice, solid metal frame would be way better, so that's what I'm going to use here. My goal was to get four GPUs into the build, which means this is going to be pretty expensive, but it's also going to crank out some serious hashing power. Here's what I put together for my price list:
Now, obviously that's a lot of money, but let me run through the basic idea. First, we're going to go relatively low-cost on the CPU and motherboard, with enough RAM to keep the system happy. I'm using a 60GB SSD just so it boots quickly and because you need some form of storage, but any HDD would work. Add in a WiFi adapter and we've got the core of the system.
The real meat of the build is in the GPUs of course, and I've used four R9 290 cards from Amazon.com. Unfortunately, Amazon is currently price gouging (thanks to all the Litecoin miners I'd wager), so feel free to shop around. Stock is limited right now but I hope it picks up in the coming weeks. You'll need four riser cables, two x16 to x16 and two x1 to x16 (powered preferably). I couldn't find any of the latter in stock on Amazon, so you might need to resort to eBay or try unpowered connectors. I also went with a single large 1300W 80 Plus Gold PSU to power the whole shebang.
For the case, after using plastic crates, I found that the build just didn't feel very stable and I'm a bit concerned about how well it's cooling. Switching to a metal frame should be relatively easy, as long as you have a drill to work with and some stands for your mobo from a previous build. Assemble the whole thing and you end up with a metal frame with the four GPUs screwed into the frame. I'd suggest orienting the cards so that the exhaust points up to improve cooling.
The total cost for this build as listed above is around $2500, but if you find R9 290 GPUs for the $400 MSRP it would be $2300. Properly configured, we should get around 3400-3600 KHash/sec with a power draw from the wall of around 1100W. With the current difficulty having jumped up quite a bit in just the past week, estimated income is $2100 for the next month, meaning you'll pay off the hardware at current prices in just over a month, maybe two.
Of course, the price could crash and that would leave you with an expensive system that may not be paying itself off very fast. Worst-case, I would guess Litecoin could crash down to single digits again, but I suspect it will stay above $5. At the current difficulty, paying $0.10 per KWh, the break even point for mining is around $1.50 per LTC. My past experience is that even if the price drops into the single digits, difficulty will likewise scale back and so I suspect until (if?) we get Litecoin ASICs this system should remain profitable.
Here's the real trick: if you can stay in this for the long haul, LTC has hit nearly $50 once and stayed above $20 for more than a week. Right now, it doesn't look like we'll drop below $20 any time soon, though it could still happen. I bet that far more likely is LTC will eventually hit prices 10x and even 100x what we've seen right now, so if you can stash away your coins for the future, they could one day be worth hundreds or even thousands of dollars.
The power cost for running this setup is going to be $80 per month, and my advice is to never sell more than half of the coins you mine, unless you reach the point where you're ready to cash out and call it quits. (Or in other words, when you've gotten enough value and you don't want to be greedy.) Within the next two years, we should see prices reach the point where you could sell off all your LTC at more than $200 per coin. Stay the course and you could be the next cryptocoin millionaire.
Some of you are probably shaking your heads saying, "This guy is crazy. There's no way this LTC fad is ever going to be worth $100 again, let along $1000 coins!" I thought the exact same thing about Bitcoin/BTC back in 2011. I was mining and making money, but I sold off most of what I mined on the way down to $2. Then I played around and sold over 200 coins at less than $4. Now, I'm looking at $1000 BTC and realizing that some of the dreamers were right, and we're probably not done yet. Will we see $10,000 BTC in the future? Probably. It might take five years to get there, and you might need to weather some <$100 prices, but we've seen these bubbles three times now and the latest has surpassed my wildest speculation. I'm being far more bullish now and betting LTC will do the same -- maybe only 1/10 what BTC is worth, but even then that's going to be enough to pay off all my debts and then some.
Dare to dream.
Find this useful? Please donate some LTC to help me support my blogging efforts or shop via my affiliate links. Either one is greatly appreciated! Or if you have no LTC, go win some for free!
LTC: LXpEZcNJtikd263z7Ha3vrdYDcLU7hiKWv
Update: Need help? See my Toubeshooting Guide.
| Litecoin Mining Rig, 4x R9 290 Edition | ||
| Component | Description | Cost |
| Processor | AMD A4-4000 | $45 |
| Motherboard | MSI FM2-A85XA-G43 | $85 |
| Memory | 2x4GB DDR3-1600 | $60 |
| GPUs | 4x Radeon R9 290 4GB | $1808 |
| Storage | 60GB 2.5” SSD | $57 |
| WiFi | USB 802.11n N600 | $20 |
| PSU | 1300W 80 Plus Gold | $303 |
| PCIe Extension | 2x x16 to x16 Riser Cable | $13 |
| PCIe Extension | 2x x1 to x16 Riser Cable | $10 |
| Case Parts | 6x 12” Aluminum Tubing | $29 |
| Case Parts | 2x 24” Aluminum Tubing | $24 |
| Case Parts | 12” x 24” Aluminum Sheet | $12 |
| Case Parts | 8x 3-way Corner Connector | $35 |
| Total | $2501 | |
| Alternative Case Parts | 4 x 48” Series 13 Tubing (You'll need to cut this to the appropriate lengths) | $64 |
| Alternative Case Parts | 8x 3-way Series 13 Corner Connector | $35 |
Now, obviously that's a lot of money, but let me run through the basic idea. First, we're going to go relatively low-cost on the CPU and motherboard, with enough RAM to keep the system happy. I'm using a 60GB SSD just so it boots quickly and because you need some form of storage, but any HDD would work. Add in a WiFi adapter and we've got the core of the system.
The real meat of the build is in the GPUs of course, and I've used four R9 290 cards from Amazon.com. Unfortunately, Amazon is currently price gouging (thanks to all the Litecoin miners I'd wager), so feel free to shop around. Stock is limited right now but I hope it picks up in the coming weeks. You'll need four riser cables, two x16 to x16 and two x1 to x16 (powered preferably). I couldn't find any of the latter in stock on Amazon, so you might need to resort to eBay or try unpowered connectors. I also went with a single large 1300W 80 Plus Gold PSU to power the whole shebang.
For the case, after using plastic crates, I found that the build just didn't feel very stable and I'm a bit concerned about how well it's cooling. Switching to a metal frame should be relatively easy, as long as you have a drill to work with and some stands for your mobo from a previous build. Assemble the whole thing and you end up with a metal frame with the four GPUs screwed into the frame. I'd suggest orienting the cards so that the exhaust points up to improve cooling.
The total cost for this build as listed above is around $2500, but if you find R9 290 GPUs for the $400 MSRP it would be $2300. Properly configured, we should get around 3400-3600 KHash/sec with a power draw from the wall of around 1100W. With the current difficulty having jumped up quite a bit in just the past week, estimated income is $2100 for the next month, meaning you'll pay off the hardware at current prices in just over a month, maybe two.
Of course, the price could crash and that would leave you with an expensive system that may not be paying itself off very fast. Worst-case, I would guess Litecoin could crash down to single digits again, but I suspect it will stay above $5. At the current difficulty, paying $0.10 per KWh, the break even point for mining is around $1.50 per LTC. My past experience is that even if the price drops into the single digits, difficulty will likewise scale back and so I suspect until (if?) we get Litecoin ASICs this system should remain profitable.
Here's the real trick: if you can stay in this for the long haul, LTC has hit nearly $50 once and stayed above $20 for more than a week. Right now, it doesn't look like we'll drop below $20 any time soon, though it could still happen. I bet that far more likely is LTC will eventually hit prices 10x and even 100x what we've seen right now, so if you can stash away your coins for the future, they could one day be worth hundreds or even thousands of dollars.
The power cost for running this setup is going to be $80 per month, and my advice is to never sell more than half of the coins you mine, unless you reach the point where you're ready to cash out and call it quits. (Or in other words, when you've gotten enough value and you don't want to be greedy.) Within the next two years, we should see prices reach the point where you could sell off all your LTC at more than $200 per coin. Stay the course and you could be the next cryptocoin millionaire.
Some of you are probably shaking your heads saying, "This guy is crazy. There's no way this LTC fad is ever going to be worth $100 again, let along $1000 coins!" I thought the exact same thing about Bitcoin/BTC back in 2011. I was mining and making money, but I sold off most of what I mined on the way down to $2. Then I played around and sold over 200 coins at less than $4. Now, I'm looking at $1000 BTC and realizing that some of the dreamers were right, and we're probably not done yet. Will we see $10,000 BTC in the future? Probably. It might take five years to get there, and you might need to weather some <$100 prices, but we've seen these bubbles three times now and the latest has surpassed my wildest speculation. I'm being far more bullish now and betting LTC will do the same -- maybe only 1/10 what BTC is worth, but even then that's going to be enough to pay off all my debts and then some.
Dare to dream.
Find this useful? Please donate some LTC to help me support my blogging efforts or shop via my affiliate links. Either one is greatly appreciated! Or if you have no LTC, go win some for free!
LTC: LXpEZcNJtikd263z7Ha3vrdYDcLU7hiKWv
Update: Need help? See my Toubeshooting Guide.
Thursday, November 28, 2013
Litecoin Mining with R9 290 and R9 290X: Settings for 850-1000 KHash/sec
[Update: You can just use Nicehash, with there auto-switching NiceHashMiner. That's what I'm doing these days, and it pays out in BTC. Litecoin has been dramatically affected by ASICs, making the following information below no longer pertinent.]
With the price of Litecoin having jumped up into the high 40s of late, people are getting very interested in mining hardware. Previously, the HD 7950 seemed to be the sweet spot in terms of price and performance, but AMD has released their new R9 290 and R9 290X that take things to another level. Also note that the R9 280X is just a tweaked version of the existing HD 7970, so shop accordingly. Let me quickly show you some rough numbers (~10% margin of error):
Radeon HD 7950 gets ~600Khash/sec @ ~300W = 2.00KHash/Watt
Radeon R9 280X (HD 7970) gets ~700Khash/sec @ ~340W = 2.06KHash/Watt
Radeon R9 290 gets ~900KHash/sec @ ~330W = 2.73KHash/Watt
Wrapping up, I want to mention a few other options. I won't go into a lot of detail here, but if you want to have a 24/7 mining rig you really need to get CGWatcher and use that to launch CGminer. It will restart the mining operation if any of the GPUs go into a DEAD state, or if you're just getting other issues. The only thing that will really halt mining is if your system hard locks (and doesn't automatically reset), or if your network goes down (and doesn't come back up without manual intervention). With the cgminer.conf file above, it's super easy to get CGWatcher running as well -- just create a profile and point it at the CGminer directory and CGminer.conf files and you're set. Then tweak the settings so that CGWatcher starts with Windows and on the Monitor tab configure the appropriate restart options. On my machines, I have it check the status every 10 seconds, restart if mining falls below 50KHash, restart if no accepted shares in 10 minutes, and restart if any GPUs go SICK or DEAD. Awesome!
Speaking of CGminer, there's something else you need to know: the last version to support GPU mining (unless something changes) is 3.7.2 -- everything after that is for FPGA and ASIC mining only, which basically means SHA256 Bitcoin or similar mining. I'd also recommend not investing into any ASIC mining rigs because the difficulty of Bitcoin mining has scaled to massive levels -- it's over 1000 times more difficult to mine Bitcoins today than it was at the start of 2013, and most ASICs will only break even in six months of mining at best (and very likely longer than that as more ASICs continue to come online). Plus, many of the ASICs don't even ship within a few days of ordering. You're far better off buying GPUs and mining LTC than to buy ASICs for BTC in my opinion -- and I don't even know how long that will last. :-)
Speaking of which, you might be wondering: how long before I could break even on a new R9 290 or 290X at these hashing rates and prices? It's a bit crazy but you could actually break even on a new R9 290 in just two weeks. Even with increasing difficulty levels, it shouldn't take more than a month! That's assuming that the prices stay more or less where they're at, which is anything but guaranteed. We could very well see $100 LTC before the year ends...or it might drop back (temporarily at least) to the $10 range. Best advice: don't invest more than you can afford to lose.
Find this useful? Please donate some LTC to help me support my blogging efforts or shop via my affiliate links. Either one is greatly appreciated! Maybe you need an inexpensive laptop or tablet so you can monitor your mining rigs on the go? Or even better, grab a new digital camera so you can take pictures while on your Litecoin-funded vacation! Whatever your poison, happy shopping, and thanks for reading!
LTC: LXpEZcNJtikd263z7Ha3vrdYDcLU7hiKWv
Or if that's too much, go play at the LTC4You faucet and typically win 0.00004 LTC every hour. That's a free $0.00120 for clicking a button and typing a captcha. If every visitor to my site did that once per day, I could make a whopping $3 per day. Which means I need every visitor to do that ten times per day! :-)
Update: Need help? See my Toubeshooting Guide.
With the price of Litecoin having jumped up into the high 40s of late, people are getting very interested in mining hardware. Previously, the HD 7950 seemed to be the sweet spot in terms of price and performance, but AMD has released their new R9 290 and R9 290X that take things to another level. Also note that the R9 280X is just a tweaked version of the existing HD 7970, so shop accordingly. Let me quickly show you some rough numbers (~10% margin of error):
Radeon HD 7950 gets ~600Khash/sec @ ~300W = 2.00KHash/Watt
Radeon R9 280X (HD 7970) gets ~700Khash/sec @ ~340W = 2.06KHash/Watt
Radeon R9 290 gets ~900KHash/sec @ ~330W = 2.73KHash/Watt
Radeon R9 290X gets ~1000KHash/sec @ ~360W = 2.71KHash/Watt
The Radeon HD 7950 was an awesome card for mining Litecoin, but if you're looking for the new hotness, it's all about the R9 290 and R9 290X. There are a few things to keep in mind when setting up a rig with the R9 cards. First, they can generally run pretty hot, so 90-95C isn't the end of the world. Second, they can be relatively loud, but when looking at HD 7950 vs. R9 290 and mining Litecoin, I don't think there's that much of a difference -- gaming, sure, but not for mining where you're at 100% GPU load all the time! Finally, look at the efficiency people are getting from R9 -- almost 30% higher than the old Tahiti GPUs is great stuff. So with that said, let's look at some settings for mining with R9 hardware.
CGminer.conf for R9 290 and ~850KHash -- note that not all cards will handle these clocks!
CGminer.conf for R9 290 and ~850KHash -- note that not all cards will handle these clocks!
{
"pools" : [
{
"url" : "stratum+tcp://coinotron.com:3334",
"user" : "[USER].[WORKER]",
"pass" : "[PASS]"
},
{
"url" : "stratum+tcp://stratum.give-me-ltc.com:3333",
"user" : "[USER].[WORKER]",
"pass" : "[PASS]"
}
],
"intensity" : "20",
"vectors" : "1",
"worksize" : "256",
"lookup-gap" : "2",
"thread-concurrency" : "32768",
"gpu-engine" : "850",
"gpu-fan" : "40-100",
"gpu-memclock" : "1550",
"gpu-powertune" : "20",
"temp-cutoff" : "99",
"temp-overheat" : "95",
"temp-target" : "90",
"api-port" : "4028",
"expiry" : "120",
"failover-only" : true,
"gpu-threads" : "1",
"log" : "5",
"queue" : "1",
"scan-time" : "60",
"temp-hysteresis" : "3",
"scrypt" : true,
"kernel" : "scrypt",
"kernel-path" : "/usr/local/bin"
}
The settings are similar for the R9 290X -- the only change I would make is to the following lines (and again, many cards may not work at these clocks):
"thread-concurrency" : "33792",
"gpu-engine" : "875",
"gpu-fan" : "40-100",
"gpu-memclock" : "1550",
"gpu-powertune" : "20"
The other big item you need to look at is GPU voltages, and don't think for a minute that the default voltage is going to be ideal. I have 7950 cards that are at 1.250V stock, but they run much better (cooler and quieter and faster) at 1.087V -- the reason being that at 1.250V, they simply can't maintain higher hash rates because they get too hot. Crashes are frequent as well if you're getting too hot, so with the R9 290 and R9 290X I'd look at setting voltage to 1.110-1.150. In fact, you're probably better off setting a lower voltage and reducing clock speeds than you are pushing things to the limit.Wrapping up, I want to mention a few other options. I won't go into a lot of detail here, but if you want to have a 24/7 mining rig you really need to get CGWatcher and use that to launch CGminer. It will restart the mining operation if any of the GPUs go into a DEAD state, or if you're just getting other issues. The only thing that will really halt mining is if your system hard locks (and doesn't automatically reset), or if your network goes down (and doesn't come back up without manual intervention). With the cgminer.conf file above, it's super easy to get CGWatcher running as well -- just create a profile and point it at the CGminer directory and CGminer.conf files and you're set. Then tweak the settings so that CGWatcher starts with Windows and on the Monitor tab configure the appropriate restart options. On my machines, I have it check the status every 10 seconds, restart if mining falls below 50KHash, restart if no accepted shares in 10 minutes, and restart if any GPUs go SICK or DEAD. Awesome!
Speaking of CGminer, there's something else you need to know: the last version to support GPU mining (unless something changes) is 3.7.2 -- everything after that is for FPGA and ASIC mining only, which basically means SHA256 Bitcoin or similar mining. I'd also recommend not investing into any ASIC mining rigs because the difficulty of Bitcoin mining has scaled to massive levels -- it's over 1000 times more difficult to mine Bitcoins today than it was at the start of 2013, and most ASICs will only break even in six months of mining at best (and very likely longer than that as more ASICs continue to come online). Plus, many of the ASICs don't even ship within a few days of ordering. You're far better off buying GPUs and mining LTC than to buy ASICs for BTC in my opinion -- and I don't even know how long that will last. :-)
Speaking of which, you might be wondering: how long before I could break even on a new R9 290 or 290X at these hashing rates and prices? It's a bit crazy but you could actually break even on a new R9 290 in just two weeks. Even with increasing difficulty levels, it shouldn't take more than a month! That's assuming that the prices stay more or less where they're at, which is anything but guaranteed. We could very well see $100 LTC before the year ends...or it might drop back (temporarily at least) to the $10 range. Best advice: don't invest more than you can afford to lose.
Find this useful? Please donate some LTC to help me support my blogging efforts or shop via my affiliate links. Either one is greatly appreciated! Maybe you need an inexpensive laptop or tablet so you can monitor your mining rigs on the go? Or even better, grab a new digital camera so you can take pictures while on your Litecoin-funded vacation! Whatever your poison, happy shopping, and thanks for reading!
LTC: LXpEZcNJtikd263z7Ha3vrdYDcLU7hiKWv
Or if that's too much, go play at the LTC4You faucet and typically win 0.00004 LTC every hour. That's a free $0.00120 for clicking a button and typing a captcha. If every visitor to my site did that once per day, I could make a whopping $3 per day. Which means I need every visitor to do that ten times per day! :-)
Update: Need help? See my Toubeshooting Guide.
Monday, November 25, 2013
Trying to Sign Up for ObamaCare: WAHealthPlanFinder Edition
So the open enrollment is going on with Obamacare, and I figured with
all the hoopla I would look into it and see how bad things really are.
I'm a technical guy, so I figure if I can't get a site to work then
probably no one can. But, I live in Washington, so we don't use the
HealthCare.gov site -- we have our own exchange just for the state of
WA: www.wahealthplanfinder.org.
Catchy name, isn't it? What follows is my journey into how NOT to do
things if you're trying to sign up. I've snagged a bunch of images,
grayed out names and dates, but otherwise this is what you'd experience
if you follow the same steps.
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You start at the home page, and there are several large buttons calling for attention: Find and Compare Health Plans, Apply for Coverage, and in the bottom-right is the sign-in section. Naturally, first time users don't have an account yet, but there's an option down there: Create an account. Again, I'm a tech savvy person, so I figured I'd just jump right in and start with creating an account. This, it seems, was a terrible mistake.
Creating an account was pretty straightforward -- choose a user name (it has to have at least six characters with one number and one letter, with a maximum length of 20 characters. The password requirement is a bit more strict: at least eight characters, 1 UPPERCASE letter, 1 lowercase letter, 1 number, and 1 special character. Enter your email address, pick and answer three security questions, agree to the Conditions of Use, and you're done. Ready to search for plans and apply for coverage now? TOO BAD! Here's what you get:
Hmmm...strange,
there doesn't seem to be anything to do. Maybe it's under one of the
other options on the site? Well, I checked around and it appears that's
not the case. The home page in particular has now changed quite a bit,
as all you can do is watch a tutorial video or go back to the useless
dashboard. So that's a problem, but I thought after a bit maybe they
just want me to search for a plan and then apply, so let's try that.
To
find a plan at all, you need to first sign out -- which makes zero
sense. Finding and comparing plans when you're lot signed in is easy
enough, though -- give the site your zip code, birthdates and sex (and
smoking/pregnant status if needed), add household members, and then
input your household income. Search for plans, and in my case I get the
following:
Huzzah!
Check out all these plans! And with four people and a household income
under $60K, there are some subsidies available (with higher subsidies
for lower incomes). So far so good. Since my family is already with
Group Health and we're okay with the care we've received there, let's
just limit things to the Group Health options:
The Silver plan looks pretty good, so let's go ahead and apply for that....
Oh, now I can log in or create an account! We're getting somewhere. Except, we're not, since I already created an account. If I sign in, I'm back to the empty dashboard. If I try to create a new account, the system figures out that I've already created an account (same SSN, after all), and I'm stuck again.
There are a few more pieces of information to tack on, however. First is that the "estimated price after tax credit" figures are apparently a joke -- you'll pay more than this unless you're on Medicaid, from what I've read elsewhere. And that's apparently assuming your application is even accepted, which it might not be -- if it was guaranteed, you wouldn't be applying, right? Of course, you have to go through the site if you want any chance at a tax credit; skip the exchange and you're stuck paying the full price no matter what.
My bet: even if I happen to qualify for a tax credit, it will likely end up being smoke and mirrors. If I get a $200 tax credit on my health insurance but my other federal taxes end up being $300 higher, it's a net loss of $100. And as I've mentioned before, with all of the people now guaranteed the ability to get some form of coverage (if you can't get accepted on an application, you can always go with the single provider government option), I suspect a tax rate hike is coming down the pipe.
I'll be trying to make some phone calls this week to see if I can get to the "apply" stage, which will likely require some serious time on hold. Wish me luck....
You start at the home page, and there are several large buttons calling for attention: Find and Compare Health Plans, Apply for Coverage, and in the bottom-right is the sign-in section. Naturally, first time users don't have an account yet, but there's an option down there: Create an account. Again, I'm a tech savvy person, so I figured I'd just jump right in and start with creating an account. This, it seems, was a terrible mistake.
Creating an account was pretty straightforward -- choose a user name (it has to have at least six characters with one number and one letter, with a maximum length of 20 characters. The password requirement is a bit more strict: at least eight characters, 1 UPPERCASE letter, 1 lowercase letter, 1 number, and 1 special character. Enter your email address, pick and answer three security questions, agree to the Conditions of Use, and you're done. Ready to search for plans and apply for coverage now? TOO BAD! Here's what you get:
Oh, now I can log in or create an account! We're getting somewhere. Except, we're not, since I already created an account. If I sign in, I'm back to the empty dashboard. If I try to create a new account, the system figures out that I've already created an account (same SSN, after all), and I'm stuck again.
There are a few more pieces of information to tack on, however. First is that the "estimated price after tax credit" figures are apparently a joke -- you'll pay more than this unless you're on Medicaid, from what I've read elsewhere. And that's apparently assuming your application is even accepted, which it might not be -- if it was guaranteed, you wouldn't be applying, right? Of course, you have to go through the site if you want any chance at a tax credit; skip the exchange and you're stuck paying the full price no matter what.
My bet: even if I happen to qualify for a tax credit, it will likely end up being smoke and mirrors. If I get a $200 tax credit on my health insurance but my other federal taxes end up being $300 higher, it's a net loss of $100. And as I've mentioned before, with all of the people now guaranteed the ability to get some form of coverage (if you can't get accepted on an application, you can always go with the single provider government option), I suspect a tax rate hike is coming down the pipe.
I'll be trying to make some phone calls this week to see if I can get to the "apply" stage, which will likely require some serious time on hold. Wish me luck....
Wednesday, November 20, 2013
Bitcoin and Litecoin Bubble, November 2013
If you've been following Bitcoin and Litecoin at all, you'll have noticed a massive spike in pricing over the past couple of weeks. I wish I could say that I had called this one, but honestly: it's all just speculation. Plenty of people are patting themselves on the back for buying in at $150 or even $250 on Bitcoin, but if you read around you'll probably find the same people talking about how even $800 was a "great price" -- right before we dropped $200 to $300.
There's still a ton of turmoil in the prices, driven almost entirely by the rampant speculation. People are trying to guess if we're just pausing before another meteoric rise to $2000+, or if we're about ready to take another plunge into the <$200 range. My take: either is possible, short-term. Long-term, though, I'd be far more likely to bet on the increase in price of Bitcoin, and as the top Scrypt-based cryptocurrency, Litecoin as well. Here's why.
First, China has been going crazy, and there are a bunch of real businesses beginning to accept Bitcoin as legal payment. But the reasons for China and other places going crazy might have as much to do with the US government shutdown as anything, as the shutdown illustrated just how fragile our governments can be. If the US goes through hyper-inflation, Bitcoins could skyrocket in value relative to the USD -- and if the USD has serious issues, let me tell you, the rest of the world's currencies aren't going to be far behind, as most of them are at least significantly linked to the USD (in the short- to medium-term).
There are other factors at play as well. Silk Road, a site dealing with the trading of illegal goods (mostly drugs) was closed by the FBI earlier this year in a sting operation that seized a good chunk of BTC (potentially 500K). That caused a short-term panic, but overall the closing of an illegal business has established BTC as a tool with many legal uses.
We've also seen ASICs (Application Specific Integrated Circuits) start shipping in quantity, which has basically driven the difficulty of mining BTC up 200X or more just in 2013. That has killed off the potential for mining BTC with GPUs (all of my computers and GPUs would currently 0.125 BTC per month, with a power cost of $325 or so), but the ASIC pricing has dropped tremendously. The ASICMiner Block Erupter USB sticks for instance were priced at $300 early this year when they first showed up. Last month before this bubble they were even down below the $20 mark, and now with the price increase they're back at $40. Those little USB sticks can do around 330MHash/sec, while drawing less than 5W, leading to a net profit of $5 per month or so. At $20, I should have bought 50; at $40, I'm not so sure, but if the price does go up to into the five digit range and I just sat on all the coins, it would be a guaranteed win.
Let's go back to China for a moment, now that I've mentioned ASICs. With pricing of $40 for a USB stick in the US, it probably costs less than $5 to build one of those over in China. Imagine a bunch of people using ASIC miners in China to get BTC to pay for their Internet service and whatever else, which is very likely already happening. How many Bitcoins does China need to support such services? There are 1.4 billion Chinese, so if each of them happened to hold $100 worth of Bitcoin for purchases, Bitcoin would need at a minimum a market capitalization of $140 billion.
For those that aren't familiar with Bitcoin, there will only be 21 million BTC ever created -- it's part of the design of the currency. Right now, there are roughly 12 million BTC in existence, so a bit more than half of the total. If BTC needed to have a market capital of $12 billion, then each coin would need to be worth $1000; for the capital to reach the $140 billion above, right now we'd need to have coins worth roughly $12,000 each!
Pie in the sky? I thought so too a while back. If I had been a bit more daring, I wouldn't have sold most of the coins I mined prior to the start of 2013 (around 1000BTC). My total costs for mining all of those coins, including power and computer hardware, are around $8000, and I've more than covered that now. But, could you imagine if I had saved them all? I'd have over half a million -- enough to pay for my house and another just like it, plus plenty of other items as well. Of course, if BTC tanked and disappeared, I'd have $8000 in additional debt (expenses) to deal with.
We've now been through this bubble mania three times. The first bubble in May/June 2011 peaked at just over $30, and it was followed by BTC dipping all the way to just under $2. At one point, I had computers that were mining over 5 BTC per day, but my power costs were roughly equal to the value in BTC and I covered those in the interest of being "better safe than sorry". Then in the buildup to April of this year, when we hit $266 or so, we had a crash back to $60. Now we've spiked as high as $900 and have fallen back as low as $450. Perhaps we'll continue down until we're in the $200 range, but there's still an upward trend.
The LTC side has been a bit less chaotic, but it's still interesting. There was a massive bubble in May 2013 where LTC hit roughly $6 before falling into the $2 range, with a dip even into the $1.25 range (when Silk Road was shut down). Last week it spiked up to nearly $10 and it's now down in the $7 range. How many Litecoin have I mined, just since April or so? Over 1600, which if I had kept them all would now be worth over $11,000. I could have purchased four mining rigs in April for around $6000 and already have double my "investment" -- but again, I got a bit scared with those $1.50 coins and panicked.
Now, after several hard lessons, I think I might be seeing the way forward with more clarity. It's time to stop selling coins when we look to the long-term. Short-term is still a guess, but if you're willing to take a chance, I wouldn't be surprised if right now is merely a short-term pull-back before we see another substantial jump in value. In fact, I'd bet heavily that before the end of the year we'll see $1000 BTC, if only for a few of the big investors to say, "I told you so." Litecoin usually stabilizes around 0.012-0.025 BTC, so if that holds we might see LTC go as high as $25 before 2014 rolls around. I sure hope it does, because when I'm sitting on a few hundred LTC in 2014 I suspect I'm going to be looking pretty darn smart.
There's still a ton of turmoil in the prices, driven almost entirely by the rampant speculation. People are trying to guess if we're just pausing before another meteoric rise to $2000+, or if we're about ready to take another plunge into the <$200 range. My take: either is possible, short-term. Long-term, though, I'd be far more likely to bet on the increase in price of Bitcoin, and as the top Scrypt-based cryptocurrency, Litecoin as well. Here's why.
First, China has been going crazy, and there are a bunch of real businesses beginning to accept Bitcoin as legal payment. But the reasons for China and other places going crazy might have as much to do with the US government shutdown as anything, as the shutdown illustrated just how fragile our governments can be. If the US goes through hyper-inflation, Bitcoins could skyrocket in value relative to the USD -- and if the USD has serious issues, let me tell you, the rest of the world's currencies aren't going to be far behind, as most of them are at least significantly linked to the USD (in the short- to medium-term).
There are other factors at play as well. Silk Road, a site dealing with the trading of illegal goods (mostly drugs) was closed by the FBI earlier this year in a sting operation that seized a good chunk of BTC (potentially 500K). That caused a short-term panic, but overall the closing of an illegal business has established BTC as a tool with many legal uses.
Let's go back to China for a moment, now that I've mentioned ASICs. With pricing of $40 for a USB stick in the US, it probably costs less than $5 to build one of those over in China. Imagine a bunch of people using ASIC miners in China to get BTC to pay for their Internet service and whatever else, which is very likely already happening. How many Bitcoins does China need to support such services? There are 1.4 billion Chinese, so if each of them happened to hold $100 worth of Bitcoin for purchases, Bitcoin would need at a minimum a market capitalization of $140 billion.
For those that aren't familiar with Bitcoin, there will only be 21 million BTC ever created -- it's part of the design of the currency. Right now, there are roughly 12 million BTC in existence, so a bit more than half of the total. If BTC needed to have a market capital of $12 billion, then each coin would need to be worth $1000; for the capital to reach the $140 billion above, right now we'd need to have coins worth roughly $12,000 each!
Pie in the sky? I thought so too a while back. If I had been a bit more daring, I wouldn't have sold most of the coins I mined prior to the start of 2013 (around 1000BTC). My total costs for mining all of those coins, including power and computer hardware, are around $8000, and I've more than covered that now. But, could you imagine if I had saved them all? I'd have over half a million -- enough to pay for my house and another just like it, plus plenty of other items as well. Of course, if BTC tanked and disappeared, I'd have $8000 in additional debt (expenses) to deal with.
We've now been through this bubble mania three times. The first bubble in May/June 2011 peaked at just over $30, and it was followed by BTC dipping all the way to just under $2. At one point, I had computers that were mining over 5 BTC per day, but my power costs were roughly equal to the value in BTC and I covered those in the interest of being "better safe than sorry". Then in the buildup to April of this year, when we hit $266 or so, we had a crash back to $60. Now we've spiked as high as $900 and have fallen back as low as $450. Perhaps we'll continue down until we're in the $200 range, but there's still an upward trend.
The LTC side has been a bit less chaotic, but it's still interesting. There was a massive bubble in May 2013 where LTC hit roughly $6 before falling into the $2 range, with a dip even into the $1.25 range (when Silk Road was shut down). Last week it spiked up to nearly $10 and it's now down in the $7 range. How many Litecoin have I mined, just since April or so? Over 1600, which if I had kept them all would now be worth over $11,000. I could have purchased four mining rigs in April for around $6000 and already have double my "investment" -- but again, I got a bit scared with those $1.50 coins and panicked.
Now, after several hard lessons, I think I might be seeing the way forward with more clarity. It's time to stop selling coins when we look to the long-term. Short-term is still a guess, but if you're willing to take a chance, I wouldn't be surprised if right now is merely a short-term pull-back before we see another substantial jump in value. In fact, I'd bet heavily that before the end of the year we'll see $1000 BTC, if only for a few of the big investors to say, "I told you so." Litecoin usually stabilizes around 0.012-0.025 BTC, so if that holds we might see LTC go as high as $25 before 2014 rolls around. I sure hope it does, because when I'm sitting on a few hundred LTC in 2014 I suspect I'm going to be looking pretty darn smart.
Thursday, November 14, 2013
Internet Pornography Filtering Petition - Why It Won't Work
Have you heard about the new petition to help protect us from Internet pornography? Depending on where you fall on the religious, technology, and political spectrums it's either a great idea or a terrible one. Here's what the petition says (for those that can't be bothered to click the above link):
In effect, this is a petition to get government more heavily involved in
our lives, when we have already seen that the government is generally
incapable of effectively running so many things. How are Social Security, the Post Office, Electronic Voting, and ObamaCare Registration going if you think this is a good idea? We're trying to pass
the buck to the ISPs to adequately filter all content for us. But what
happens when some stuff doesn't get filtered? Or what happens when a
site that we want to access that doesn't have pornography inadvertently
gets filtered?
There was an idea going around a while ago to have .porn and .xxx domains and require all sites with pornography to register a new domain name with one of those suffixes. There was resistance for a variety of reasons, and ultimately it didn't happen. I wish it were as simple as just waving a magic petition wand and having the plague of pornography go away, but it's just not. While we're at it, can we also pass legislation to require ISPs to have an "opt out" feature for all viruses, malware, and other undesirable content? That would save me a lot of time cleaning infections on other people's PCs! If you really want to be safe, you're probably better off creating your own filter where only sites and IP addresses you specifically unblock are accessible -- good luck with that, considering there are 150 million domain names just in the most common Top Level Domains (.com, .org, .net, .info, .biz, .us).
I say that last sort of tongue-in-cheek, but that's really the crux of the problem. It's the same idea here as the thought that making all guns illegal will somehow stop criminals from using guns (or other weapons). And as a technology geek, my bet is that if this petition were to actually pass, we would end up with a watered down result that doesn't do much more than what we currently have, and we'd get people suing ISPs because they saw porn and hadn't opted in, and the result would likely be more legislation and higher prices for Internet access. We would also have "ostrich parents" that assume because there's a law in effect, they're now free from the responsibility to monitor their children and they can go back to sticking their heads in the ground.
My best suggestion: if you don't want you or your children to see pornography, find a good filter that will block most undesirable content and that gets updated regularly. Here's a site that has a few good suggestions, but let's be clear: you'll need to do work to protect your PC and family. Also, keep your PC in a location accessible to the whole family if at all possible, and more importantly spouses and parents need to be actively involved in monitoring Internet behavior. Don't forget smartphones and tablets either....
Also, I wonder if the petition hasn't worded things incorrectly. Maybe they just want all search providers to "opt out" of explicit search results by default? I believe Google already does this (and personally, it's the best search engine so why would you want to use anything else?), and Bing has this option as well (listed in the above link). I don't know about most other search engines, but there are many out there and I would recommend sticking to the bigger names like Google and Bing if you want filtered results. I'll also toss out a recommendation that OpenDNS has some reasonable filtering options for free, but it can slow down access to the Internet in some cases and as always: it won't protect you from everything (and a tech savvy youth can easily circumvent OpenDNS filtering).
I'm not sure what the best solution to the pornography problem is, simply because like so many things in life, it's a very complex topic. It's right up there with gun control, gay rights, abortion, religion, health care, alcohol, cigarettes, etc. for being wide open to differing opinions. Trying to involve the government in regulating the Internet in my opinion is about as effective as trying to have the government regulate the climate (which hasn't stopped them from trying).
In its current state, Internet porn seeks out users by email solicitations and massive amounts of free content throughout Internet browser searches. The average person, even children, can type in the word "cat" or "home" or "soup" and instantly be inundated with offensive and disturbing pornographic images. Parents and individuals have to go to great lengths to install Internet filters that often don't weed out all porn. We are asking for greater protection and responsibility from Internet Service providers and our country. We are asking that people who are interested in porn should have to seek it and choose it. They should have to "Opt In" for it by making arrangements to receive it with their Internet Service Provider. Everyone else should be free from it and assumed "Opt Out".If only things were that simple! Here's my problem with this petition: it's not Internet Service Providers (ISPs) that are somehow forcing people to "opt in" to pornography. Rather, it's the nature of the free and open Internet. Someone creates a site with pornography and it can be at any domain name -- for example, I believe LDS.com for a while was a pornography site (thankfully, that site is now Logical Design Solutions). This is why filtering companies and software were created, but they have to be continuously updated to keep track of all the places that have pornography, and inevitably they miss some of it. What's more, one person's definition of "porn" isn't going to be the same as my definition, so some would like to block all scantily clad female and male images where others are only concerned with nudity.
There was an idea going around a while ago to have .porn and .xxx domains and require all sites with pornography to register a new domain name with one of those suffixes. There was resistance for a variety of reasons, and ultimately it didn't happen. I wish it were as simple as just waving a magic petition wand and having the plague of pornography go away, but it's just not. While we're at it, can we also pass legislation to require ISPs to have an "opt out" feature for all viruses, malware, and other undesirable content? That would save me a lot of time cleaning infections on other people's PCs! If you really want to be safe, you're probably better off creating your own filter where only sites and IP addresses you specifically unblock are accessible -- good luck with that, considering there are 150 million domain names just in the most common Top Level Domains (.com, .org, .net, .info, .biz, .us).
I say that last sort of tongue-in-cheek, but that's really the crux of the problem. It's the same idea here as the thought that making all guns illegal will somehow stop criminals from using guns (or other weapons). And as a technology geek, my bet is that if this petition were to actually pass, we would end up with a watered down result that doesn't do much more than what we currently have, and we'd get people suing ISPs because they saw porn and hadn't opted in, and the result would likely be more legislation and higher prices for Internet access. We would also have "ostrich parents" that assume because there's a law in effect, they're now free from the responsibility to monitor their children and they can go back to sticking their heads in the ground.
My best suggestion: if you don't want you or your children to see pornography, find a good filter that will block most undesirable content and that gets updated regularly. Here's a site that has a few good suggestions, but let's be clear: you'll need to do work to protect your PC and family. Also, keep your PC in a location accessible to the whole family if at all possible, and more importantly spouses and parents need to be actively involved in monitoring Internet behavior. Don't forget smartphones and tablets either....
Also, I wonder if the petition hasn't worded things incorrectly. Maybe they just want all search providers to "opt out" of explicit search results by default? I believe Google already does this (and personally, it's the best search engine so why would you want to use anything else?), and Bing has this option as well (listed in the above link). I don't know about most other search engines, but there are many out there and I would recommend sticking to the bigger names like Google and Bing if you want filtered results. I'll also toss out a recommendation that OpenDNS has some reasonable filtering options for free, but it can slow down access to the Internet in some cases and as always: it won't protect you from everything (and a tech savvy youth can easily circumvent OpenDNS filtering).
I'm not sure what the best solution to the pornography problem is, simply because like so many things in life, it's a very complex topic. It's right up there with gun control, gay rights, abortion, religion, health care, alcohol, cigarettes, etc. for being wide open to differing opinions. Trying to involve the government in regulating the Internet in my opinion is about as effective as trying to have the government regulate the climate (which hasn't stopped them from trying).
To be clear: I believe
100% that pornography is bad for us -- for marriages, relationships,
children, self esteem, the people involved in making it, and so on. I
think any responsible adult should decide for themselves (and their
family) what their stance is, and then research the most effective ways
to protect yourself (or not, as the case may be). Parents in particular
need to become more tech savvy in regards to the Internet so that they
can understand what exactly their children are doing (on Facebook,
Instagram, Twitter, etc.) It's not always easy to do, no, but parenting has never been billed as "easy" as far as I'm aware.
Unfortunately, the real problem is for people like me. I'll be frank: like most (probably nearly all) males, I've seen pornography. It's enticing and addictive, and those are two adjectives that I like to avoid where at all possible. I would love to somehow have access to all of the great information and content on the Internet while at the same time being 100% free from the blight of pornography and other garbage. But it's not going to happen. I know enough that no person, petition, or government is going to stop me from viewing pornography...if I want to!
And at the end of the day, that's what it comes down to: developing the moral fiber and support system to help you avoid things that you know are harmful and addictive. So you take it one day at a time, occasionally make mistakes, and try to do your best to avoid it. If you're struggling with pornography, talk to your family, spouse, religious adviser, or find a 12-step addiction recovery group you can attend. And pray, because that will be far more effective than the petition.
Tuesday, November 5, 2013
Humble Bundle: WB Games and Batman Edition
I’ll be honest with you: there are a lot of games we’ve used
as benchmarks that I haven’t quite finished, and some that I hardly even play.
So when a game is good enough to keep me playing, it’s usually worth a look.
Batman: Arkham Asylum is one of the games I completed. Now I’m not saying it
was the greatest beat-em-up game ever, but it did a better job of making you
feel like a superhero than any other game I can recall. It was visceral, and it
controlled well with a mouse and keyboard or with a gamepad; it helped that the
graphics were good as well, and the story kept me going.
All of that is a nice lead-in to the latest Humble Bundle, courtesy of WB
Games. As you can guess, Batman: Arkham
Asylum is part of the package, but it doesn’t stop there. F.E.A.R. 2:
Project Origin and F.E.A.R.
3 (or F.3.A.R. if you prefer) are also part of the base package, which
means any donation of $1 or more snags you those games, with Lord
of the Rings: War in the North rounding out the collection. You might
notice a couple of things with the list; first is that they’re arranged in
order of decreasing score, so Batman walks away with a 91%, FEAR2 gets 79%,
FEAR3 71%, and LotR scrapes by with 66%. The second thing you’ll notice is that
the original F.E.A.R. is
sadly missing from the list, which is a shame as that was probably the best
game of the series. The reason for the omission is pretty simple, though: it
wasn’t published by WB Games.
There are two additional titles as part of the collection, provided you pay more than the current average ($4.47 at the time of writing). Scribblenauts Unlimited is a fun little game that’s perhaps better suited to a device with a stylus or finger input. The final title is a great way to wrap things up, Batman: Arkham City. The sequel to the original sports improved graphics and a larger game world, and it’s every bit as good (in my opinion at least). Even if the package only included the first two Batman games, it would be worth the price of entry – provided of course that you didn’t already own both, which I do; in fact, I already own most of the games, with LotR and Scribblenauts Unlimited being the only ones missing from my Steam list, and I’m still planning on buying the bundle. If you’re curious, the six games (Arkham Asylum, Arkham City, F.E.A.R. 2, F.E.A.R. 3, War in the North, and Scribblenauts Unlimited) would set you back a combined $74.25 (plus tax where applicable).
Now, there's one reason (and one reason only!) for me reposting my story from AnandTech (with minor editing) to my personal blog: I've got a couple extra game keys available, specifically for the two Batman games (which as mentioned I already own). So this is a test of your geek skills, because I will give the codes (individually, so you don't get both -- sorry!) to the first two people to send me an email at my work address, with the subject line "I want Batman: Arkham Asylum" or "I want Batman: Arkham City". I'll update this text when the codes have been claimed.
There are two additional titles as part of the collection, provided you pay more than the current average ($4.47 at the time of writing). Scribblenauts Unlimited is a fun little game that’s perhaps better suited to a device with a stylus or finger input. The final title is a great way to wrap things up, Batman: Arkham City. The sequel to the original sports improved graphics and a larger game world, and it’s every bit as good (in my opinion at least). Even if the package only included the first two Batman games, it would be worth the price of entry – provided of course that you didn’t already own both, which I do; in fact, I already own most of the games, with LotR and Scribblenauts Unlimited being the only ones missing from my Steam list, and I’m still planning on buying the bundle. If you’re curious, the six games (Arkham Asylum, Arkham City, F.E.A.R. 2, F.E.A.R. 3, War in the North, and Scribblenauts Unlimited) would set you back a combined $74.25 (plus tax where applicable).
Sunday, October 20, 2013
Building a Haswell Desktop
I know lots of people are moving to laptops for most of their computing needs. I use laptops plenty, but for use with my older 30" HP LP3065 display I still need something with a dual-link DVI output. There were a few gaming laptops that had such a connection, but these days? Yeah, too bad for me! So I tend to do nearly all of my home computing on a desktop still. If you're like me and prefer to stick with a traditional desktop, and if you happen to be running a system that's several years old or more, the recent launch of Intel's Haswell (4th Generation Core Series) processors may be giving you the itch to upgrade.
Here's a system I'm recommending to a friend. It's pretty easy to put this all together and having a speedy setup for the next five years. I've included a couple options on three key parts: the GPU, the CPU, and the RAM. At the high-end, you might want to go all-out on the performance aspects, and that's where we get the GTX 780, 16GB RAM, and an i7-4770K processor. The nearly as fast but quite a bit more affordable configuration opts for GTX 770, 8GB RAM, and an i5-4570K. For the even less demanding, we can also go with a GTX 760 graphics card -- and if you don't care about gaming, you might just save yourself hundreds of dollars by going with the integrated Intel HD 4600 Graphics. Here's the list of parts:
Intel Core i7-4770K processor ($339)
Intel Core i5-4670K processor ($230)
Corsair H80i Cooler ($75)
ASRock Z87M Pro4 motherboard ($142)
Zotac GTX 780 3GB GDDR5 ($610)
EVGA GTX 770 4GB GDDR5 graphics card ($440)
Gigabyte GTX 760 4GB GDDR5 graphics card ($300)
16GB (2x8GB) G.Skill RipjawsX DDR3-1866 DDR3-1866 memory ($153)
8GB (2x4GB) G.Skill Sniper DDR3-1866 memory ($83)
256GB Corsair Neutron solid state drive ($190)
2TB Western Digital hard drive ($87)
ASUS DVDRW ($22)
Cases:
Rosewill mATX case ($36)
Corsair Obsidian 350D ($80)
Silverstone PS07B ($79)
Bitfenix Prodigy ($80) (White)
Silverstone Tek TJ08B-E case ($100)
Power Supplies:
600W Enermax Platimax 80 Plus Platinum ($184)
450W Antec 80 Plus Platinum ($84)
Corsair RM650 80 Plus Gold ($118)
Corsair CX430 80 Plus Bronze ($40)
Operating System:
Windows 7 Home Premium OEM ($89)
Windows 8.1 OEM ($110)
You'll note that I've gone with a mATX motherboard and case, mostly because I feel the larger cases these days are just way bigger than they need to be. I cheaped out a bit on the case initially, so I added some higher-end options, plus the white Bitfenix Prodigy.
Similarly, the power supply has a few options now; go with the 600W/650W if you want to use the GTX 770 or GTX 780, and 430W/450W for lesser builds. The difference in efficiency between 80 Plus Platinum and 80 Plus Bronze is about 5-7%, so realistically you only save at best 25-50W under load by going with Platinum, and probably 5-10W or less at idle. Running 24/7 at load, that works out to $22-$44 per year, but a more realistic use would be loaded 10% of the time and idle the rest of the time, which would only be $6-$12 per year. Saving $40-$80 on the PSU in the short-term ends up being a wash over five years, but either choice is fine.
The CPU cooler is also optional, but overclocking is possible to if you want to give that a shot I'd grab the cooler. Windows 7 will also save you $21 right not compared to Windows 8.1 (which is still whatever).
Here's what the totals come down to, using Platinum PSUs and Win8.1:
Maximum Performance (i7, 600W, GTX 780, 16GB, Silverstone, H80i): $2012
High-End Performance (i5, 600W, GTX 770, 8GB, Silverstone, H80i): $1663
Moderate Performance (i5, 450W, GTX 760, 8GB, Rosewill): $1284
Moderate Non-Gaming (i5, 450W, 8GB, Rosewill, no HDD): $897
So basically the total would be anywhere from $900 to $2000, depending on how high you want to go on the graphics mostly. The system is of course more upgradeable over the long terms, and it has room for multiple hard drives/solid state drives if you want. You could add more storage, a fast graphics card (two if your power supply and case can handle it -- I'd suggest switching to a full-size ATX case for that, though), or if something breaks down in a few years you can easily find replacement parts.
If you were to go out and buy a Dell, HP, etc. system, the initial pricing may seem much better than a custom-built PC, but there are a few caveats. First, Dell chooses most of the parts, without too many customization options available. One big item that's missing on many big OEM desktops is a good SSD (solid state drive), which is something I require for every system I build -- it just makes such a difference that I'm not willing to put together a system these days without an SSD. So if you take Dell's $700 configuration for something like the XPS 8700, you'd get a slightly slower CPU, a very mediocre GPU (the GT 635), a motherboard with no frills or overclocking, slower RAM, a smaller HDD, no SSD, and a lower quality power supply. If you wanted to get something close to the moderate build I've recommended, it's $890 just to get the SSD.
The problem with big OEM PCs is that Dell, HP, Lenovo, Acer, etc. make systems that are designed to hit a price point, and they cut lots of corners to get there. They're not as upgradeable in some respects, and the quality of the components is lower. As an example, I could get the price of the base level desktop I listed above down about $250 if I just use a lower quality, lower price motherboard (H81 chipset), power supply, RAM, SSD, and a slower CPU (i5-4430) -- but that's not something I am comfortable building, as long-term reliability is more of a concern. So if you've ever looked at OEM systems and wondered, "How can they get all those components into such a system at that price?", that's how. Buy in bulk, user lower quality parts, and you can save 20% on overall costs...and lose out long-term. Don't forget the bloatware software either!
Anyway, I'm working on a guide for my regular job with similar parts to the above -- I just need to do a bit more research before firming up the recommendations, so stay tuned....
Here's a system I'm recommending to a friend. It's pretty easy to put this all together and having a speedy setup for the next five years. I've included a couple options on three key parts: the GPU, the CPU, and the RAM. At the high-end, you might want to go all-out on the performance aspects, and that's where we get the GTX 780, 16GB RAM, and an i7-4770K processor. The nearly as fast but quite a bit more affordable configuration opts for GTX 770, 8GB RAM, and an i5-4570K. For the even less demanding, we can also go with a GTX 760 graphics card -- and if you don't care about gaming, you might just save yourself hundreds of dollars by going with the integrated Intel HD 4600 Graphics. Here's the list of parts:
Intel Core i7-4770K processor ($339)
Intel Core i5-4670K processor ($230)
Corsair H80i Cooler ($75)
ASRock Z87M Pro4 motherboard ($142)
Zotac GTX 780 3GB GDDR5 ($610)
EVGA GTX 770 4GB GDDR5 graphics card ($440)
Gigabyte GTX 760 4GB GDDR5 graphics card ($300)
16GB (2x8GB) G.Skill RipjawsX DDR3-1866 DDR3-1866 memory ($153)
8GB (2x4GB) G.Skill Sniper DDR3-1866 memory ($83)
256GB Corsair Neutron solid state drive ($190)
2TB Western Digital hard drive ($87)
ASUS DVDRW ($22)
Cases:
Rosewill mATX case ($36)
Corsair Obsidian 350D ($80)
Silverstone PS07B ($79)
Bitfenix Prodigy ($80) (White)
Silverstone Tek TJ08B-E case ($100)
Power Supplies:
600W Enermax Platimax 80 Plus Platinum ($184)
450W Antec 80 Plus Platinum ($84)
Corsair RM650 80 Plus Gold ($118)
Corsair CX430 80 Plus Bronze ($40)
Operating System:
Windows 7 Home Premium OEM ($89)
Windows 8.1 OEM ($110)
You'll note that I've gone with a mATX motherboard and case, mostly because I feel the larger cases these days are just way bigger than they need to be. I cheaped out a bit on the case initially, so I added some higher-end options, plus the white Bitfenix Prodigy.
Similarly, the power supply has a few options now; go with the 600W/650W if you want to use the GTX 770 or GTX 780, and 430W/450W for lesser builds. The difference in efficiency between 80 Plus Platinum and 80 Plus Bronze is about 5-7%, so realistically you only save at best 25-50W under load by going with Platinum, and probably 5-10W or less at idle. Running 24/7 at load, that works out to $22-$44 per year, but a more realistic use would be loaded 10% of the time and idle the rest of the time, which would only be $6-$12 per year. Saving $40-$80 on the PSU in the short-term ends up being a wash over five years, but either choice is fine.
The CPU cooler is also optional, but overclocking is possible to if you want to give that a shot I'd grab the cooler. Windows 7 will also save you $21 right not compared to Windows 8.1 (which is still whatever).
Here's what the totals come down to, using Platinum PSUs and Win8.1:
Maximum Performance (i7, 600W, GTX 780, 16GB, Silverstone, H80i): $2012
High-End Performance (i5, 600W, GTX 770, 8GB, Silverstone, H80i): $1663
Moderate Performance (i5, 450W, GTX 760, 8GB, Rosewill): $1284
Moderate Non-Gaming (i5, 450W, 8GB, Rosewill, no HDD): $897
So basically the total would be anywhere from $900 to $2000, depending on how high you want to go on the graphics mostly. The system is of course more upgradeable over the long terms, and it has room for multiple hard drives/solid state drives if you want. You could add more storage, a fast graphics card (two if your power supply and case can handle it -- I'd suggest switching to a full-size ATX case for that, though), or if something breaks down in a few years you can easily find replacement parts.
If you were to go out and buy a Dell, HP, etc. system, the initial pricing may seem much better than a custom-built PC, but there are a few caveats. First, Dell chooses most of the parts, without too many customization options available. One big item that's missing on many big OEM desktops is a good SSD (solid state drive), which is something I require for every system I build -- it just makes such a difference that I'm not willing to put together a system these days without an SSD. So if you take Dell's $700 configuration for something like the XPS 8700, you'd get a slightly slower CPU, a very mediocre GPU (the GT 635), a motherboard with no frills or overclocking, slower RAM, a smaller HDD, no SSD, and a lower quality power supply. If you wanted to get something close to the moderate build I've recommended, it's $890 just to get the SSD.
The problem with big OEM PCs is that Dell, HP, Lenovo, Acer, etc. make systems that are designed to hit a price point, and they cut lots of corners to get there. They're not as upgradeable in some respects, and the quality of the components is lower. As an example, I could get the price of the base level desktop I listed above down about $250 if I just use a lower quality, lower price motherboard (H81 chipset), power supply, RAM, SSD, and a slower CPU (i5-4430) -- but that's not something I am comfortable building, as long-term reliability is more of a concern. So if you've ever looked at OEM systems and wondered, "How can they get all those components into such a system at that price?", that's how. Buy in bulk, user lower quality parts, and you can save 20% on overall costs...and lose out long-term. Don't forget the bloatware software either!
Anyway, I'm working on a guide for my regular job with similar parts to the above -- I just need to do a bit more research before firming up the recommendations, so stay tuned....
Thursday, September 5, 2013
Amazon’s Kindle Paperwhite
With all the advances in tablet technology, the experience
of reading a physical book is still preferred by many people – or if not a
book, then an e-book with electronic ink instead of an LCD or OLED display.
Amazon has had a lot of success with their Kindle e-book readers over the
years, and today they’ve announced the latest model, the Kindle
Paperwhite.
Scheduled to start shipping at the end of the month (September 30, 2013), the Paperwhite boasts an upgraded display, an enhanced backlight for reading in the dark, and faster processing to speed up page turns. All of the new features are certainly welcome updates, but the price is also substantially higher than the standard Kindle: $119 (with the current special offers) will get you the Kindle Paperwhite, while the previous Kindle is available for $69. There’s also a 3G Paperwhite available for $189, which adds free 3G connectivity with no contracts or monthly fees.
There are plenty of reasons for book lovers to prefer the Paperwhite over reading on a tablet. There’s no glare in bright sunlight, for one, and I personally find the reading experience to be more comfortable on the eyes. The Kindle is also lighter than similar size tablets, and battery life (with WiFi off) is listed as up to eight weeks between charges (depending on your usage, naturally). Battery life incidentally is also rated at twice that of the previous Kindle, though whether that’s thanks to improved technology or simply a larger battery I’m not sure (probably a little of both).
I’m still not 100% sold on digital books over normal paperbacks/hardbacks, but the Kindle has some advantages that can be difficult to overcome – like, the ability to pack along hundreds of books wherever you go, in a device that weighs less than half a pound. On the other hand, there are drawbacks: it’s still classified as “portable electronics”, so you can’t use it during takeoff or landing on a flight, and while Amazon does support “loaning” of books to a friend, other than public domain stuff there’s no equivalent of a normal library that I know of. I also like the ability to dog-ear pages, pull out a highlighter for important passages, scribble notes in the margins, etc. – there are analogs to some of these on the Kindle, but they’re not quite the same.
All told, however, there’s a lot to like with the Kindle, and the Paperwhite builds on that legacy. Electronic ink may not draw pages or refresh as fast as a tablet LCD, but it’s far more comfortable to read and you won’t end up recharging every day, even if you read constantly. For the interested, here’s the full set of specifications:
Scheduled to start shipping at the end of the month (September 30, 2013), the Paperwhite boasts an upgraded display, an enhanced backlight for reading in the dark, and faster processing to speed up page turns. All of the new features are certainly welcome updates, but the price is also substantially higher than the standard Kindle: $119 (with the current special offers) will get you the Kindle Paperwhite, while the previous Kindle is available for $69. There’s also a 3G Paperwhite available for $189, which adds free 3G connectivity with no contracts or monthly fees.
There are plenty of reasons for book lovers to prefer the Paperwhite over reading on a tablet. There’s no glare in bright sunlight, for one, and I personally find the reading experience to be more comfortable on the eyes. The Kindle is also lighter than similar size tablets, and battery life (with WiFi off) is listed as up to eight weeks between charges (depending on your usage, naturally). Battery life incidentally is also rated at twice that of the previous Kindle, though whether that’s thanks to improved technology or simply a larger battery I’m not sure (probably a little of both).
I’m still not 100% sold on digital books over normal paperbacks/hardbacks, but the Kindle has some advantages that can be difficult to overcome – like, the ability to pack along hundreds of books wherever you go, in a device that weighs less than half a pound. On the other hand, there are drawbacks: it’s still classified as “portable electronics”, so you can’t use it during takeoff or landing on a flight, and while Amazon does support “loaning” of books to a friend, other than public domain stuff there’s no equivalent of a normal library that I know of. I also like the ability to dog-ear pages, pull out a highlighter for important passages, scribble notes in the margins, etc. – there are analogs to some of these on the Kindle, but they’re not quite the same.
All told, however, there’s a lot to like with the Kindle, and the Paperwhite builds on that legacy. Electronic ink may not draw pages or refresh as fast as a tablet LCD, but it’s far more comfortable to read and you won’t end up recharging every day, even if you read constantly. For the interested, here’s the full set of specifications:
Amazon
Kindle Paperwhite Specifications
|
|
Display
|
6" Paperwhite
Exclusive Carta e-paper technology Next-generation built-in light 212 ppi, 16-level gray scale |
Size
|
6.7" x 4.6" x
0.36"
(169 mm x 117 mm x 9.1 mm) |
Weight
|
7.3 ounces (206 grams)
|
System Requirements
|
None; fully wireless and
no computer required
|
On-Device Storage
|
2 GB internal (~1.25 GB
available)
Holds up to 1,100 books |
Cloud Storage
|
Free cloud storage for
all Amazon content
|
Battery Life
|
A single charge lasts up
to eight weeks
(30 minutes of reading per day, wireless off and light setting at 10) Battery life will vary based on light and wireless usage |
Charge Time
|
Approximately 4 hours
from a computer via USB cable
|
Wi-Fi Connectivity
|
802.11n (WEP, WPA, WPA2
security)
Wi-Fi Protected Setup (WPS) Optional 3G Wireless on Paperwhite 3G |
Content Formats Supported
|
Kindle Format 8 (AZW3)
Kindle (AZW) TXT Unprotected MOBI PRC natively HTML Word (DOC, DOCX) JPEG, GIF, PNG, BMP (through conversion) |
Warranty and Service
|
|
Included in the Box
|
Kindle Paperwhite, USB
2.0 charging cable and Quick Start Guide
|
Price
|
Kindle Paperwhite: $119
promotion, $139 normally
Kindle Paperwhite 3G: $189 promotion, $209 normally |
Tuesday, September 3, 2013
Shadowrun Returns Review: Kickstarter Rocks
Let me get the fanboy stuff out of the way first: I love cyberpunk, especially when it’s done well. My first blush with the genre came all the way back in the days of the venerable Commodore 64, where an unassuming game called Neuromancer was released. It was seriously flawed in some ways (hello super-slow walking across screens!), but I loved the BBS hacking and implementation of Cyberspace. To my teenage mind in the late 80s, this was perhaps the most awesome game ever created –I even went so far as to craft ideas of what could be done for a sequel and mailed them to Interplay! Sadly, I received a polite “thanks but no thanks” response, but I’m still around while Interplay is gone. Take that, big corporate politics!
Naturally, after playing the game I went on to read the Gibson books – all of them, good and bad – and I branched out into reading anything even remotely cyberpunk that I could find. My favorite of the time was Sir Walter Jon Williams’ Hardwired, which I really wish someone would do a proper game set in that universe. Later, I’d also get into Neal Stephenson (Snow Crash was another instant hit for me), but I’m always looking for more good cyberpunk stories, so if you know of any please post a comment.
Okay, back to the topic of gaming, the number of good cyberpunk computer games is decidedly limited. Besides Neuromancer, we have some more cerebral games like Uplink, or old text games that I won’t even bother mentioning now. Syndicate and Syndicate Wars had some cool ideas back in the day, with Syndicate having recently been rebooted as an FPS. Deus Ex is probably one of the best showcases of the genre, but again more of an FPS than an RPG in my book. And then we have Shadowrun, originally released on the SNES and Sega Genesis. I never got into the Genesis release for some reason, but even years after its release when I first played Shadowrun on an SNES (around 2001), I thought it was great. When I discovered (again belatedly) that there was a modern Kickstarter for Shadowrun, and that the game launched last month, I was thrilled – and promptly bought the game on Steam.
You may have seen other reviews of Shadowrun Returns by now, and that’s fine. As a fan of the genre, let me give you my own take on the game. First, the story and setting are extremely well done and anyone who ever wanted a better adaptation of Shadowrun (not the crappy Team Fortress knockoff that Microsoft tried in 2007 for Vista and Xbox 360!) will be pleased. With the original creator of the Shadowrun pen and paper system being part of Harebrained Schemes, that may not be too surprising, but I’m glad to see the setting given its proper respect. You get a decent variety of skills, equipment, character traits, etc.
Graphics are nowhere near state of the art, but they’re good enough and you get an interesting combination of 2D and 3D that should run well even on low-end laptops. Combat foregoes the real-time trend that has become so popular and instead goes with grid-based turns, and you know what? It works, and I love it. Yup, I’m old school that way.
The story follows you from your humble beginnings as a shadowrunner helping out a dead friend through a climactic battle against the forces of evil set to destroy the Earth. You win, naturally, only “winning” in this case is a bit ambiguous as the corporations that run the world basically bury any knowledge of what you’ve done, and the threat that you helped to stop is still out there. But all told, it’s a good tale and anyone familiar with the Shadowrun universe will have a good time. But all is not perfect in our near-future dystopia, sadly.
First, there’s the save system, which basically has you restarting each level. It’s okay but I’d have liked a “save anywhere” option – it’s never good to run out of time half-way through a level and have to go elsewhere. Thankfully, most of the levels take less than 30 minutes, so you’re usually never more than a half hour away from your next checkpoint/save. The worst is really towards the end of the game where some larger battles may take longer – the final battle for instance can last a good two hours. Either way, I don’t think the save system is the end of the world.
Another complaint is the linearity of the game, which basically has you going through each scene, talking to any active characters, and then moving on to the next scene. There is very little to miss, and other than one optional mission there’s basically nothing extra to do. The game is extremely linear, but there are good aspects to such an approach – like keeping you focused instead of wandering lost in a huge world of emergent game play. I didn’t go back and replay the main story as a different character yet, and I can’t really tell how much variation there is, but my initial play through leads me to believe that most of the changes you can make only affect two things: your credstick and your combat. Certain skills/attributes/etiquettes may open up additional conversation options, but I can’t recall any that did more than provide additional money or an extra item.
Finally, there’s cyberspace/the matrix/the grid/etc. This is an area where I had definitely hoped for something more, and in many ways I almost feel like Neuromancer did it better in 1988 on a C64 than what we get with Shadowrun Returns. The visual representation is fine, but ultimately all you get in the Matrix is a new and different form of combat. To “hack” a node, you simply kill whatever programs or deckers are in the area and then click on the node, and there’s very little else to be done. Also, there’s a time limit for how long you can be jacked in, with an alarm level that continuously increases until you start getting more enemies to deal with and are forced to jack out. Cyberspace is like the rest of the world, with limited exploration available. It’s a shame that there’s no extra content or databases to hack into that might flesh things out.
Here’s the good news, though: Shadowrun Returns was released with a full editor and content creation support, and already there are many people hard at work generating new missions and content. Some have added random missions to the main story (or at least they’re working to do so?), others have completely new stories and worlds to explore, and there are new weapons, skills, spells, etc. available. As with any game that supports user generated content, what will come out is only limited by the imagination and skill of the creators, and I’m looking forward to seeing more of Shadowrun.
Short verdict: for a cyberpunk fanboy like myself, this is a no-brainer. Buy the game, and flawed or not you’ll find something to enjoy right now, with more goodness to come. It’s not a triple-A title with a gigantic budget, but in some ways I prefer a game like Shadowrun Returns to Deus Ex: Human Revolution. It’s sort of like the difference between reading a good book where your mind can fill in the blanks and your imagination gets to run wild versus a highly detailed game world where most of the creativity is done for you. Both options have their pros and cons, but for $20 you can do far worse in terms of digital entertainment.
The other thing I want to briefly mention is how great Kickstarter is proving to be for the indie gaming scene. Back in the 80s, it was possible for a single person to create and release a “cutting edge” game. As games and graphics have become more complex, such an undertaking requires far more money, more people, more time…and the bean counters don’t like risk. Everything is becoming more mainstream, because the idea is you can appeal to “everyone” rather than a small niche and therefore make more money – never mind the numerous failed “mass appeal” games that have come and gone over the years.
With Kickstarter, a developer can get funding up front to make a game, rather than having to create something on their own dime and hope it works out, and the people footing the bill are the same ones that want the game in the first place. Community feedback is improved, there’s food on the table, content gets created that would otherwise not exist, and just about everybody benefits. I missed the initial Shadowrun Kickstarter, but I’ve backed a couple others that I’m eager to play: Wasteland 2 and Torment: Tides of Numenera. Such games likely couldn’t be achieved without Kickstarter; now we just need to get someone to do a Neuromancer Kickstarter.
Naturally, after playing the game I went on to read the Gibson books – all of them, good and bad – and I branched out into reading anything even remotely cyberpunk that I could find. My favorite of the time was Sir Walter Jon Williams’ Hardwired, which I really wish someone would do a proper game set in that universe. Later, I’d also get into Neal Stephenson (Snow Crash was another instant hit for me), but I’m always looking for more good cyberpunk stories, so if you know of any please post a comment.
Graphics are nowhere near state of the art, but they’re good enough and you get an interesting combination of 2D and 3D that should run well even on low-end laptops. Combat foregoes the real-time trend that has become so popular and instead goes with grid-based turns, and you know what? It works, and I love it. Yup, I’m old school that way.
First, there’s the save system, which basically has you restarting each level. It’s okay but I’d have liked a “save anywhere” option – it’s never good to run out of time half-way through a level and have to go elsewhere. Thankfully, most of the levels take less than 30 minutes, so you’re usually never more than a half hour away from your next checkpoint/save. The worst is really towards the end of the game where some larger battles may take longer – the final battle for instance can last a good two hours. Either way, I don’t think the save system is the end of the world.
Here’s the good news, though: Shadowrun Returns was released with a full editor and content creation support, and already there are many people hard at work generating new missions and content. Some have added random missions to the main story (or at least they’re working to do so?), others have completely new stories and worlds to explore, and there are new weapons, skills, spells, etc. available. As with any game that supports user generated content, what will come out is only limited by the imagination and skill of the creators, and I’m looking forward to seeing more of Shadowrun.
Short verdict: for a cyberpunk fanboy like myself, this is a no-brainer. Buy the game, and flawed or not you’ll find something to enjoy right now, with more goodness to come. It’s not a triple-A title with a gigantic budget, but in some ways I prefer a game like Shadowrun Returns to Deus Ex: Human Revolution. It’s sort of like the difference between reading a good book where your mind can fill in the blanks and your imagination gets to run wild versus a highly detailed game world where most of the creativity is done for you. Both options have their pros and cons, but for $20 you can do far worse in terms of digital entertainment.
The other thing I want to briefly mention is how great Kickstarter is proving to be for the indie gaming scene. Back in the 80s, it was possible for a single person to create and release a “cutting edge” game. As games and graphics have become more complex, such an undertaking requires far more money, more people, more time…and the bean counters don’t like risk. Everything is becoming more mainstream, because the idea is you can appeal to “everyone” rather than a small niche and therefore make more money – never mind the numerous failed “mass appeal” games that have come and gone over the years.
With Kickstarter, a developer can get funding up front to make a game, rather than having to create something on their own dime and hope it works out, and the people footing the bill are the same ones that want the game in the first place. Community feedback is improved, there’s food on the table, content gets created that would otherwise not exist, and just about everybody benefits. I missed the initial Shadowrun Kickstarter, but I’ve backed a couple others that I’m eager to play: Wasteland 2 and Torment: Tides of Numenera. Such games likely couldn’t be achieved without Kickstarter; now we just need to get someone to do a Neuromancer Kickstarter.
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