Category: Software

7 out of 10 OS’s

I have been recently pondering when I rebuild my gaming PC if I should go for Windows 10, I have been happy with Windows 7 and so far haven’t really had a strong enough reason to switch.

Pros

  • DX12 support
  • Fast boot
  • Smaller OS footprint

Cons

  • My experience of Windows 10 is that I have seen more Blue Screens in the 18 months of using the OS than I have ever seen with Windows 7.
  • I still regularly hear stories of unexpected or breaking OS updates hampering gamers.

So I decided to see what the take up of the OS from fellow gamers has been, visiting the Steam Survey site, I have to say I was quite surprised by what I found.

Steam Survey Jun 2018

In the last 5 months there has been a vast change in the Steam user base (that have given information for the survey) shifting massively from Windows 7 64bit to Windows 10 64bit.

I know that Sea of Thieves released in mid-march, which was only available on Windows 10, but could that have impacted the metrics so much?
Yesterday Microsoft reported that more than 5 million people have played the game since launch, bearing in mind that in the the first week the number of copies solds was 2 million, it’s not a terrible figure to wave about.
Admittedly those figures cover both PC and XBox but it’s interesting to think that it may have spurred people into updating, but maybe not the sole reason.

Perhaps like myself it was just a natural time for a large number of people to upgrade their machines, taking the opportunity to move OS’s too.
Are DX11 is more performant on Windows 10 and people want to get the most from their existing games?

As more upcoming titles begin to opt for DX12 the last bastions of Windows 7 will start to crumble, maybe I just have to endure the random updates and blue-screens with everyone else.

Android Apps 2018

Outside of the regular applications on my Android devices, I decided to list some of my frequently used applications.

Pixlr

[Free/Paid] Aside from the usual photo focused applications, I often find that performing simple tasks like rotating or trimming a photo isn’t always that straight forward so my goto app is Pixlr. Another feature that I use Pixlr for is the ability to create a varied number of photo collage.

Google Keep

[Free] I use Google keep for all manner of purposes, as you can cut and paste all sorts of things into a note, it’s become my goto application for saving notes and links when I’m out and about. I can then access them via my tablet or desktop when needed.

Pocket Casts

[Paid] This application remains my favourite Podcast, I haven’t discovered a feature that is missing yet. It does cost, but then I’d been using it for years and believe it to be my best android purchase to date

WifiScheduler

[Free] I know there are alot of apps that focus on automating tasks on your devices, however I didn’t want something that need to be tweaked for disabling and re-enabling, Wireless, so this app will switch on and off on a schedule. Which means I’m not spending half the day with Wifi enabled and no networks.

Nova Launcher with Belle UI Icon Pack

[Paid] I can’t imagine going back to a stock Launcher for my Android devices now, the ability to configure small homescreen details is something that eluded me for so long, Grouping Applications on tabs means I only see the common apps first, plus I can hide app I don’t want to see, like the build in HTC apps.

Ticket to Ride Scoreboard

[Free] If you play any Ticket To Ride board game in real life, then this application is a must for taking the pain out of verifying and calculating scores. There are a few apps that do the same thing but had adverts, but this one I have been using for years without a sniff of adverts being added.

My Data Manager – Data Usage

[Free] I’ve been using this app forever as originally I only had 1GB data and the default apps if not changed can burn through data with automatica update pretty fast. This app was a godsend in locating what app are using the data but also daily usage alerts if you are predicting to go over your data plan.

A humble brag

I’ve always enjoyed the offerings from Humble Bundles and I have purchased a large number of deals from the website in the last few years. Mostly for 1 maybe 2 of the games in each bundle and I have a healthly game backlog growing

So when the monthly subscription was announced I was more than happy to give it a whirl, because who doesn’t like a mystery box.

So far I’ve received 3 monthly bundles containing a good mixture of games, these have been:

  • November 2015 Humble Monthly
    • Steam Keys
      • Legend of Grimrock 2 [Preorder]
      • Towerfall Ascension
      • Besiege
      • Valkyria Chronicles
      • Lethal League
      • SanctuaryRPG: Black Edition
      • Saints Row IV
    • DRM Free
      • Legend of Grimrock 2
      • Towerfall Ascension
      • Besiege
      • Towerfall Ascension
  • December 2015 Humble Monthly
    • Steam Keys
      • Banished
      • Rust (Early Access Game)
      • Chroma Squad
      • Neon Struct Deluxe Edition
      • Company of Heroes™ 2
        • Company of Heroes™ 2: The British Forces
        • Company of Heroes™ 2 – The Western Front Armies: US Forces
        • Company of Heroes™ 2 – The Western Front Armies: Oberkommando West
      • Payday 2
        • Payday 2: The Big Bank Heist
        • Payday 2: Gage Mod Courier
        • Payday 2: Gage Assault Pack
        • Payday 2: Dragan Character Pack
    • DRM Free
      • Banished
      • Chroma Squad
      • Neon Struct
      • Neon Struct : The Dulce Archives
      • Shadwen Sneak Peek [Only for monthly subscribers]
  • January 2016 Humble Monthly
    • Steam Keys
      • The Talos Principle
      • The Masterplan
      • Mushroom 11
      • Grim Fandango Remastered
      • Spelunky
      • A Fistful of Gun
    • DRM Free
      • The Masterplan
      • Mushroom 11
      • Grim Fandango Remastered
      • Spelunky
      • A Fistful of Gun

Thankfully I have mostly received games that I don’t already own, with a few exceptions but then the normal bundles can often have the same issue. One of the things that I enjoy the most is that unlike Loot Crate or Nerd Block, the only thing that get cluttered up is my steam library, which is easily resolved.

Forged online

In the last week we’ve upgraded our Monitors and Graphics cards and have been enjoying playing games in proper widescreen and without as much glitchiness.
Plus I get to say “My new years resolution is 1920 by 1080” 😉

forge-black

I’ve been trying to remember to run Forge when I’m playing a game it supports, for those who aren’t familiar (really it’s been around ages) with the website/software, it a simple way to share your gaming. It allows you to stream live and allows you to extract screenshots and up to 30 second clips, all without the annoying set up of OBS or XSplit for video capture, but also it’s a one way channel, people can watch you stream but there is no chat that you have to monitor or feel obliged to use to interact with other people.

I’m still finding that the quality of the recordings is a little lacking and I can’t figure out if it’s just my rig that has issues or just a limitation of the software.  There is a new version coming soon that with have better native recording.

Like not my favourite

5 Days before my 8th Twttr birthday they announced that they were rebranding Favourite to Like, apparently it’s part of “the company’s latest effort to simplify the user experience as it looks to attract new users”, which translates into what?
We want to be like Facebook so people can sign up and find out it’s nothing like Facebook.
At least the introduction of the Twitter Poll avoids the stupid “If you agree like, if you disagree retweet” Facebook style polls.

Maybe the star is confusing or misleading, perhaps some people were making a wish when they clicked it.
Anyway someone should tell Google that Chrome is the odd one out now.
favourites

The sad part is that I would often use the favourite feature to mark tweets I wanted to reply or discuss later, often it was to remind me to visit a link that had been posted to a blog or game. Almost in the same vein as bookmarking the Tweet.
That said in the early days I used to go through them on a weekend and clear the favourites off the tweets. Maybe not so easy now as I tend to Favourite more frequently.

Maybe Like doesn’t convey the usage just the fact I’ve seen it or maybe it will evolve to become the same thing as Favourite did.
However the strange thing about Twitter Likes versus Facebook Likes, is that Twitter makes it a big visible part of your profile, “Come and look at all the things this person favourited but now they are listed as likes and have a different meaning”.

Maybe that part of my frustration is that they altered the meaning, now it implies that I like and support everything, rather than just favouriting it for later.
I suppose I can just look back and find interesting items completely out of context like this.

This verge articles closing statement sums it up really :

The newest mode of engagement on Twitter is a bit less versatile, a bit less powerful, a bit more compressed.