Immy in Blue Mars (^_^)

Oh... And if you want to get an idea of how I've set up my face in Blue Mars...



I know, it needs work. Teh cutenezz is a lifetime struggle. =^-^=

Immy ventures into Caledonia =^-^=

As many people well know, Desmond Shang has expanded his steampunk empire into Blue Mars. He's surely confident that this market will see growth. (^_^)

From what I see, Blue Mars is still slated to be a place where content creators will be able to exercise some advanced tools in creating a virtual world and socializers will be able to enjoy the works. But, it lacks the gray area in between that Second Life has. (>_<)

So, this is the house that Desmond built. (^_^)



So far he's consistent. But, that's where my critique starts. In a way, he has succeeded in making Blue Mars look like Second Life. Now, I'm not sure if this good or bad thing yet. But, to me, it seems like he's under-utilizing the potential Blue Mars has. (>_<)

* Builds are still created with boxes that use textures to simulate depth.

* Plants and trees have a 'default' like appearance that do very little to break the monotony of the area.

* Most of the area resembles a shopping mall. There are plenty of potential rental suites around with no doors, open floor plans, and limited social centers in between.




It's great to see such an ambitious effort. Desmond is taking a risk he regrets NOT taking years ago in Second Life. Still, it doesn't make me any more confident in the platform. What exists so far is a huge investment of time and money with a very fuzzy future. (^_^)

About Blue Mars, itself... I'm still miffed at the forced window size I have to run in. Navigation is a chore. The "pretty" graphics fail to really impress. FPS and performance is far better than SL, I'll give them credit for that. And, without more people, there is zero incentive to use the service since all I've been able to do so far is walk around a static showcase. (=_=)y

I found one reason to complain about Windows7 -or- SpeedFan FTW!

... Okay, it may have NOT been Win7's fault. But, from the day I did the install of the RTS version of Win7, I have been facing overheats. (>_<)

Having spent half a year in the RC version, this came as a surprise. I figured they were the same OS... Just a bit of cleanup and the RTS would come with a license that would last a relative lifetime instead of arbitrarily expiring after the candidate's duty cycle runs up. (^_^)

But, for some odd reason it kept cutting out on me! DX

It really looked heat related so I did the only thing a proper techie would do; I ran it with the case open and a room fan blowing into it. (=_=)

It was annoying, loud, and not a good solution. (=_=)

So, I installed Speedfan and checked things out. Gladly, my board is well documented and a lot of people have worked out how to get Speedfan to work with everything. I've been running the temperature and fan speed logs for about a week. (^_^)

Guess what I found? One of my CPU fans never changed speed. It always stayed at the base 1200 RPM. Why? (O.o)

Well... Digging into Speedfan's advanced settings, I made me a little discovery. =^-^=

PWM 2 mode = Auto on Remote 2 Temp!!! DX

The bloody thing was set to the wrong temperature sensor? What the heck caused that? I'm guessing it was something set around the time I installed Win7 RTS, but, I don't remember running anything that would affect low level motherboard settings like that. (=_=)

Either way... I was able to set it to "Auto on CPU Temp" and it's right back to normal now. SpeedFan FTW!!! \(^o^)/

The real question is, was it something in the Windows7 installer DVD that made this change? Oh, if it is, I sure do weep for anyone that runs the install and knows nothing about SpeedFan. (=_=)y

Little weekend adventures (^_^)

I spent quite a bit of time touring this past weekend. In addition to my NCI visits, Infohub hopping, and meeting up with friends here and there; I took on some SLURLs to check some neat places out. (^_^)

First was a Twitter tweet from M Linden. He found a really slick light&art showcase. =^-^=


secondlife://Ball%20State%20University2/184/33/233

I got no real explanation of what I was entering, just an animated red line on the floor. I assumed I was to follow the red line and was treated to a self-guided walking tour of some fun and wild abstract animations. In some cases, I was walking directly through the exhibit. In others, I was experiencing them as displays on the walls. (^_^)

One problem though... It was my first time in Emerald.1101, so, I may re-visit in Cool Viewer... But, my FPS was taking a major hit there. Just about ever 4 or 5 seconds I'd get a two second freeze up. Could have been attributed to the glut of animated textures? The use of glow? I wasn't aware of any sound sources so the lag was a mystery to me. Once I TP'd home, things were fine. So... It was a beautiful place with just a slight detraction from the overall experience. (^_^)

Next up my best friend tossed me a TP to a place where she bought some body armor. (^_^)


secondlife://6pi/41/79/2

What started as a modest freestanding dock-like build became an epic underwater site starting with a fall down a single shaft. The typical haze that comes with being under water in SL adds greatly to the effects used in the builds all around. From mysterious glowing tubes, to abandoned missile holds, to a giant robotic creature peering at a bird in a glass beaker; the place was a visual feast. (^_^)

I usually adventure a lot, but, I haven't seen place like these in a long time. They really show the artistic potential that SL has beyond cube shaped stores with repetitive royalty free textures. A good artist can make a big difference in the SL experience and these two sims attest to that. (^_^)

All in all, a fun little weekend. =^-^=