Comments on: Is OnLive OnCrack?

By: remote control software

remote control software — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 14:03:03 +0000

Way too much overhead for this to be successful. $20 million just to start is an absurd number to begin with. Good luck with this, but I see a flop.

By: Tom

Tom — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 15:25:55 +0000

I agree about hardware costs, for the most part. But what’s lacking in the calculation of cost is regular business capital, i.e. warehouse storage, installation, cooling, repair, advertising, upgrading over time, etc…. I don’t think it will add too considerably to the total for the service, but its not negligible either.

As for latency, obviously if it was really bad that would suck, but I for one would still go for it if it were only noticeable and not annoying. I know many wouldn’t, but if it’s worth shelling out the bucks to get/make your own system, you’re welcome to it.

By: The Far Edge » Blog Archive » Videos: OTOY In Action. You Have To See This.

Fri, 19 Jun 2009 02:59:20 +0000

[...] ripples around much of the gaming world with a similar concept of cloud-based gaming (both good and bad). But OTOY believes it has a more lightweight and elegant way to do things, that is also more [...]

By: Videos: OTOY In Action. You Have To See This.

Videos: OTOY In Action. You Have To See This. — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 22:21:56 +0000

By: Kristian Kiehn Holst

Kristian Kiehn Holst — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 11:44:01 +0000

nope the have hit break-even according to the most recent isupply teardown. The actual cost for cell + gpu is even lower that I wrote above.
My point is that the hardware part is: a) not going to be impossibly expensive as Devin described, and b) their biggest problem (that’s latency)

By: Civilization

Civilization — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 10:06:26 +0000

you couldent run all high crysis on a striped down ps3 lol anyways they sell those Way less then what they cost to make

I think sony loses $100 for every one they sell

They would need a hell of a super computer to render crysis 1000 times real time at once

By: Civilization

Civilization — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 10:01:11 +0000

1ms is imposable that was there computer set up by them probably 20 ft away from the other one

The lag was reported a 40ms – 50ms and up to 80ms For actual field testing

50 ms is alot fingering how people spend an extra $100 to get a monitor with 2ms responce instead of 6ms or so

By: Kristian Kiehn Holst

Kristian Kiehn Holst — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 19:30:05 +0000

@Devin
Sorry but $1000/user for hardware as you imply is way off.
Lets assume for a second that the avrage user will need the equvivalent performance of a ps3. such a thing cost $400, and if you start removing all excessive parts such as cabinet, blu-ray etc. we are down to $200 or lower for the core rendering CPU and GPU hardware. Then remember that 1 OnLive user dosn’t equal 1 machine, as people don’t game 24/7. Over time the might be able to have 4+ users per machine – then we are down to $50/user. Such a service will cost around $10/mo + as they are also the retailer of all games sold they will also get around 30% off all those expensive games. Very good business in the long run.

Shure they will have some initial and especially peak performance problems, but if they have spend 7 years developing this I suspect they are in it for the long run.
The latency problem seems more endangering.
Just my 2 cent.
//Kristian

By: Cyber Akuma

Cyber Akuma — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 22:37:26 +0000

Didn’t sega channel download the entire game into memory first THEN play it?

By: JoeyBert

JoeyBert — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 23:01:48 +0000

don’t we all remember Sega Channel?

By: Einstein

Einstein — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 20:31:20 +0000

186,000 miles per second – it’s not just a good idea, it’s the law. A 1ms latency is physically impossible for anyone not living in their datacenter.

By: Liam

Liam — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 16:24:00 +0000

well the latency between there sever is 1ms latency i just dont understands how much that will go up after being transfered to you computer

By: Liam

Liam — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 16:20:19 +0000

they have less then a 1ms latency on there servers to you i dont know how they just did it

By: Liam

Liam — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 16:19:36 +0000

although i completely agree with this article saying that it wont work with the masive overhead the company is gonna have to pay
they are doing something totaly revolutionary
buying a little box that puts out 720p over the internet? not only that but there graphicly demanding games its totaly revolutionary thats why it sounds rediculous but i mean its a awsome concept never havong to upgrade your hardware. Games on demand? its just awsome and ill buy one when they come out.

By: SpitfireUK

SpitfireUK — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 15:09:50 +0000

Why is hardware not a problem?

By: Gryphyn

Gryphyn — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 13:25:08 +0000

Hardware is not a problem. Latency will kill this. Nobody will play a fast paced game with a constant delay between your input and the reaction on the screen.

So, unless they only want to host RPGs and building simulations, I don’t see it working.

By: SpitfireUK

SpitfireUK — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 12:27:09 +0000

The Hardware problem was my main concern as well…

The PS3 has a rough power of 1.8 teraflops, and I am forever hearing how a top end PC today can run rings around a PS3. So lets say you need 2.5 Tflops to run crysis at the stated specs (60fps, 720p, full detail). So to have a 100,000 people playing crysis, you would need 250,000 TFlops of power to render it all.

The best supercomputers today can manage roughly 1 Petaflop, (1000 Teraflops), so you would need roughly 250 of the fastest supercomputers (E.g. RoadRunner, $133 million x 250 = $lots) on the planet today.

That is the part that I find hard to understand. I’m not saying it can’t be done, it’s just that the costs look impossible.

All that stuff is from my layman calculations. If somebody with a bit more knowledge on the subject could show me the error of my ways then I’d be very grateful

By: [TechBlogWatch] Best of Blogs für den 27.3.2009 | TechFieber | Hot Gadgets. Smart TechNews.

Fri, 27 Mar 2009 06:55:18 +0000

[...] Is OnLive OnCrack? [...]

By: Zacqary Adam Green

Zacqary Adam Green — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 04:10:47 +0000

Interesting how you’re thinking system requirements could be a barrier. I don’t recall them mentioning anything about their servers running Windows.

Yes, it’s far-fetched that they created some kind of hyper-optimized Windows-compatible custom OS, but we’re already being asked to suspend our disbelief that it can work at all.

I agree with Eurogamer that I want this to work, though I’m less skeptical that they’ve truly pulled it off. Then again, I tend to suspend my disbelief when faced with something that I’ve been hoping would happen for years.

By: matt

matt — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 01:58:11 +0000

If they’re serving 20k people at a time, that means they have at least 100k users. If they can milk $20 out of each user, that’s $20m. With a subscription service like $10 a month, they are banking quite well. And with compression, 720p shouldn’t be a problem over home broadband.

Biggest issue I see is the latency… round trip is probably like 150ms on most broadband, which means you move the controller and there’s a delay noticeable to the eye before something moves on the screen.