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[Update] - Weird Black Box

Jul 18, 2002, 1:44pm
It certainly looks like it wouldn't hurt, Brock. Usually those types of
visual anomalies are caused by a lack of video RAM, but since you have a
GF4 card, that isn't the case. Like you stated in your previous thread
on this issue, it only happens in DX 8.x mode in AW. Doesn't that link
say that the fix works for DX 8.x? I know I had an old GF card with an
AMD proc and it would crash when using AW without a registry fix (either
by Microsoft or AMD). So, in short, yes...try what that post says and
report back to us.

-Builderz

[View Quote]

MS V-Chat

Jul 22, 2002, 12:43am
I've been waiting for someone to mention V-Chat here. ;) V-Chat,
unfortunately, has run its course. It has been off-line for at least a
year I believe. It was more of a 2D or "semi-3D" program than a 3D one.
Let's just say that the graphics were no where near AW 2.x graphics, and
V-Chat was much slower than AW. You could edit a world from a bunch of
templates, but you really couldn't move things around much or do
anything remotely similar to AW's building features. About the only
similarities were 2D chat and avatars. ;) Looking past its flaws, it was
a great program in its "hay day." I have many fond memories using it
with my friends from years ago. However, I highly doubt MS will bring
back the main server.

-Builderz

[View Quote]

What is Vaporware?

Aug 4, 2002, 2:50pm
Check out PlasticPlanet 3D at http://pp.pl2.com/ and see my FAQ about it
at http://www.3dhost.net/pp3d/. The creator is working on the world
server at this time I believe. Right now you can build, but changes do
not stay and only you can see them locally.

-Builderz

[View Quote]

What is Vaporware?

Aug 4, 2002, 5:32pm
You are semi correct. PlasticPlanet 3D (PP3D for short) cannot be run
without first connecting to a central server. It cannot be run off-line
or in "local mode" at this point in time. When you start the program, it
asks you for a username and a password. Pick anything you want that has
not already been taken, click "Logon," and it should connect to the
server and load the default world.

Right now, there is only one main world. You *can* build while connected
to the world, but there are only three or so editable objects there at
this point in time. You can move them, rotate them, click on them, etc.
Here is where things differ. Currently, when you build or edit an
object, the changes take effect only to you, not others around you. The
changes are not stored on the server, nor locally on your system. The
objects appear the way they were before you edited them. So you can mess
with them to your heart's delight, close PP3D, start it again and the
objects will revert back to their normal place.

The lead programmer of PP3D was on vacation for a few weeks. Like I said
before, he is working on the server aspect of the software. This will
allow objects to stay changed when users log on or off, support more
than one world, allow changes to be seen by other users, etc. One last
thing; you mentioned bots. To my knowledge, there are no bots available
for PP3D yet.

-Builderz

[View Quote]

bot host

Aug 12, 2002, 2:48am
Anduin is talking about "fan buses" or "bay buses." They are pieces of
hardware that allow you to turn certain fans on or off inside of your
computer, thus reducing the noise or "whine" of the fans. Besides using
those, you could get some sound proofing products made to be put inside
of computer cases (prices are around $15 - $35 USD). Other options
include moving the system to another area or putting on noise canceling
headphones when the noise irritates you.

-Builderz

[View Quote]

bot host

Aug 12, 2002, 12:49pm
I agree with chazrad. The Seagate Barracuda drives are extremely quiet,
even when the drive is seeking. If you don't want to go buy an entire
new drive, you could buy an enclosure for the drive that tries to dampen
its sound. Just look through some PC hardware and/or overclocking sites
and you'll find one.

-Builderz

[View Quote] > buy a seagate barracuda they r comp-letely noisfree

andras.net is down

Aug 24, 2002, 2:32pm
Sorry to hear about that, Andras. Good luck with fixing/replacing the
hardware.

-Builderz

[View Quote]

Disk Usage Bug

Sep 24, 2002, 1:25pm
The Disk Usage Tab has always been buggy for me ever since I can
remember. Sometimes it is a bit off, other times it just sticks at
"Calculating..." forever. However, I don't think I have ever seen it
report a negative number. Try and do a scandisk on your disk and see if
that helps.

-Builderz

[View Quote]

pimp rig baby (for all you coffee drinkers)

Sep 25, 2002, 6:55pm
FYI: The rig was also featured in the latest issue of Maximum PC.

-Builderz

[View Quote]

Background Music/MP3s

Sep 29, 2002, 12:35pm
I was just wondering:

Would anyone be interested in original background music in MP3 format
for their worlds or builds (either for free or commercially)? I know
some MP3s take a while to download on a slower connection and not
everyone has sound turned on in AW. However, I don't know of anyone else
in the AW community that offers royalty free MP3 background music for
use in AW. Am I crazy or would some of you actually make use of such a
thing? Thoughts, comments?

-Builderz

Background Music/MP3s

Sep 29, 2002, 3:55pm
Thanks for replying to my post. Which music genres interest you the
most, Lady Barbara?

-Builderz

[View Quote]

Why isn't anyone renewing?

Oct 21, 2002, 11:26pm
I have also noticed the same thing and assume that the people who are
not renewing are either bored with AW (or do not have many friends
there) or cannot afford to remain a citizen. Personally, I'll keep
renewing until either a) I die or go bankrupt, b) AW goes under. ;)

-Builderz

[View Quote]

Internet addiction

Nov 5, 2002, 11:31am
ROFL. These are the ones that are most relevant to me:

[View Quote] Sadly, I've actually done this once.

> 14. You sneak away to your computer when everyone goes to sleep.

Well, I don't really "sneak," I just use it late at night while everyone
*is* sleeping. :)

> 15. You talk on the phone with the same person you are sending an
> instant message to.

I did this at least once with an ex-girlfriend.

> 16. You look at an annoying person off line and wish that you had your
> ignore button handy.

That would be great...

> 17. You start to experience "withdrawal" after not being online for a
> while.

Been here, too...

> 18. "Where did the time go??"

=(

> 19. You sit on to activeworlds for 6 hours for that certain special
> person to sign on.

Maybe not six hours, but I've waited for people to login for a while
before.

> 28. Your teacher or boss recommends a drug test for the blood shot eyes.

No one has ever mentioned it to me, but my eyes do get terribly blood
shot after using the PC for hours every day. I've tried both CRT and LCD
displays and it makes no difference. Maybe I just need to blink more
often or get some eye drops.

-Builderz

Just me?

Nov 6, 2002, 8:30pm
No, it isn't just you. Here is what Calpantera (Bill) said about it:

"Also I wanted to apologize for the renumbering of the news server
articles. You may have noticed all posts now show as unread. While
trying to clean up some of the other newsgroups that are filled with
idiotic ramblings, petty arguments and flame wars (Come on people its
only VR!!) I had to do a rebuild_piles and unfortunately in the build of
Dnews we are running there is a bug that causes the articles to be
renumbered."

-Builderz

[View Quote]

Is Flagg Alive?

Nov 28, 2002, 2:05pm
I've telegrammed and sent him an e-mail over a week ago and have yet
received no reply. He owes me a P-50 world. Anyone know where I can
reach him?

-Builderz

Is Flagg Alive?

Nov 29, 2002, 12:46am
Yes, I already sent an e-mail to tom at activeworlds.com. Thanks for
pointing that out, maki.

-Builderz

[View Quote]

Is Flagg Alive?

Nov 29, 2002, 12:49am
Thanks, Bowen. If you hear anything, please let me know. *sings* "Oh
where, oh where has little Flagg gone? Oh where, oh where could he
beee..." (j/k)

-Builderz

[View Quote] > Of course he is; he's just on one of his numerous names to hide from people. I'll
> tell him when I can. :P

Is Flagg Alive?

Nov 30, 2002, 10:12pm
Normally I am patient about things such as this, Andras. But Flagg was
supposed to contact me over three weeks ago. The least he could have
done was sent me back a reply such as "I'm busy, will talk to you later"
or something.

-Builderz

[View Quote] > He is alive but busy like hell. People - please have a little patience with him, OK?

High CPU Usage

Nov 30, 2002, 10:03pm
The reason this happened is because now most of the rendering work has
been offloaded onto your video card instead of your CPU. Less CPU work,
less heat. Less heat equals cooler temperature. When in software mode,
most of rendering work is sent to your CPU and not your laptop's video
card. It also helps since your video card has built-in DirectX
instructions.

-Builderz

[View Quote]

High CPU Usage

Dec 1, 2002, 4:09am
I have a Dell laptop similar to yours, but with a P4M 1.8 GHz CPU and an
nVIDIA GeForce 4 Go video card. I use AW on it almost every day. A good
program to monitor your temperature (and to even set profiles for when
your laptop's fans should turn on and off and switch from high to low)
can be found at http://www.diefer.de/i8kfan/ (it is called I8kfanGUI,
which works with the 4150). I had the exact same problem as you -- my
temps used to be very high and the laptop's fans would spin at their
highest setting after I was in AW for a few minutes. I even bought one
of those laptop cooling pads, which didn't help much.

Through a modification in the BIOS, I got the P4's SpeedStep technology
to go no higher than 1.2 GHz. I think I enabled the option "MAXIMUM
BATTERY" in the BIOS to achieve this (even when on AC power). This
helped a bit with the temps, but not much. Then I found out that Windows
XP looks at the "Power Options" in the Control Panel to help determine
the P4's SpeedStep "rating." After I set my power scheme to "Max
Battery" as well, my CPU speed (which was previously at 1.8 GHz and 1.2
GHz) was down to 789 MHz when idle and doing non-intensive tasks (such
as surfing the Web, reading e-mail, etc). With this setting, my fans
don't come on nearly as often as they did, and the time they are on is
much shorter. My CPU temperature still rises, but it takes much longer
now. The way things are now, my temp is less than 50C when I boot up and
gradually reaches 60C. Once it hits 60C, I8KfanGUI kicks in and brings
the temp back down to 50C. This temp cycle repeats until I turn the
system off or use an extremely CPU intensive program.

However, this still didn't help my problem with AW. Whenever I start AW,
SpeedStep ramps the CPU back up to 1.2 GHz. I couldn't find any other
ways to lower it (or keep it lowered). I even went so far as to buy a
small portable desk fan and aim at the CPU's grill/vent on the laptop
(there is a heat pipe type thing inside of there). With AW running and
the fan blowing in the vent, my temps were stable at around 45C (usually
less than what I idle at). In less than a week, the desktop fan broke.
*sigh* I doubt you'd want to go to this extreme, but it is an option.

Although not the exact solution you are looking for, I do have an idea.
Minimize any and all running programs, load AW, and go to the area you
want to go to. With AW open (but not maximized), you should be able to
see a portion of your Windows desktop. Well, as you've said, when the AW
window isn't in focus, it doesn't use as many CPU cycles. What I do is
click on the AW window (when I need to use it) and just click off
anywhere on my desktop. This takes the focus off of AW and does indeed
lower my CPU temps a tiny bit. The nice is, is that AW allows telegram
notices and chat to appear, even when AW is not the main focus. So you
could stand still in any world and still be able to see chat scrolling
on the screen. When you want to type something, click on AW, type
whatever it is, and click back onto your desktop. It works for me. ;)

The only other suggestions I have are the following: 1) muck around with
AW's video settings and the Display settings in Control Panel (for
example, I noticed that when antialiasing is on, my temps were a bit
higher), 2) resize AW's "rendering window" to make it smaller, 3)
decrease AW's thread/process priority using the Task Manager.

-Builderz

[View Quote] *snip*

High CPU Usage

Dec 2, 2002, 1:44am
Please see my reply below:

[View Quote] Yes, I noticed this too. The pitch was a bit different and I could see
from I8KfanGUI that the fans were spinning at a slower RPM speed. When I
changed the power scheme in Power Options (in the Control Panel) to "Max
Battery," the RPM of the fans actually increased (again, verified by
I8KfanGUI and my ears). The fans now spin a bit faster and sound a
little louder, but they also shut off sooner.

> Hehehe....had actually considered this too, although from my work
> building other PC's, I found that too many fans is often overkill, and
> depending on the direction of the air flow, can actually cause the
> temperature to *rise* higher than using just one or two fans. Weird, I
> know.

Yep, I know what you mean. I installed a PCI slot cooler/blower into one
of my systems (placing it as high as I could so that it would help
exhaust hot air out of the case). Turns out it actually made the case
temperature a bit higher instead of lower. I removed it and put it in
another system and the case temperature went down. Each system is
different. ;)

> I even tried another idea, only to find out that it really didn't
> work. I got to thinking about how when another window was on top and
> the one in focus, caused the temps to drop. So I thought...what about
> the programs like Winamp and the like, which had a mini-mode that
> would allow for a thin version of the program to run at the top of my
> screen? If I set it to be "Always on Top", would it keep the focus so
> that AW would never cause the temps to shoot up? I actually tried it
> with 2 similar programs, and as hopeful as I was, it didn't work. Nice
> concept though. :)

Ah yes, that *is* an interesting idea that didn't occur to me before.
Too bad it didn't work. =(

> Thanks for all your help, Builderz. :)

No problem, Kimi. Hmm...maybe Dell or Intel needs to release a CPU
throttling program (separate from SpeedStep) so that we can
underclock/overclock our laptops at will.

-Builderz

Nvidia drivers

Dec 1, 2002, 4:16am
If I can remember correctly, you shouldn't need to reinstall AW because
of that error. However, I recommend you run a scandisk or chkdsk on your
hard drive. Another thing you may want to try is clearing your cache.

-Builderz

[View Quote]

I call them as I see them LOL

Dec 17, 2002, 1:52pm
I've seen that pic at least twice before. I still can't tell if its real
or if it was computer manipulated. Anyway, I might as well add a link of
dozens of funny pics that a friend sent me.

WARNING: Some pictures not for people under the age of 18. You have been
warned!

http://www.student.smsu.edu/s/san232s/hardfunnypics/

-Builderz

[View Quote]

Tom (Flagg) is leaving AW

Jan 27, 2003, 10:01pm
I would have to disagree with you on that, Shred. I've e-mailed and
tgrammed Flagg about a world I won as part of Newsgroup Survivor a few
months ago and have still never received a reply. Personal thoughts
aside, I am sorry to hear about Flagg leaving AWI. I wonder what will
happen to all of the Flagg worlds now...

-Builderz

[View Quote] *snip*
>Those two, along with Facter (though short-lived), always seemed to answer every telegram and e-mail no matter how many they got or how busy they were. They went the extra mile.

Tom (Flagg) is leaving AW

Jan 29, 2003, 6:53pm
I stand corrected. Flagg saw my post and cleared up the issue (I got the
world) promptly.

-Builderz

[View Quote]

aw is dead :( aw managmenmt sucks

Jul 1, 2003, 10:29am
See my comments below:

[View Quote] While I agree that E N Z O and the other staff should be a bit more
active at times, E N Z O isn't the "be all, end all" of AW. He can't
magically create twenty new worlds a day and bring in thousands of new
tourists (well, maybe he could if AWI launched a large TV ad campaign).
Take into account the staffers that aren't here anymore: Roland, HamFon,
Facter, and Flagg. I'm sure that doesn't help AWI to get things done any
quicker. Regarding the cit prices, some may consider than high in price
(IMO, the "world license" fee is my main grudge with pricing). But
really now, can you expect AW to be here X amount of years from now if
everything is free? Maybe you would feel better if another large company
or a mid-sized gaming company acquired and ran AW?

> When i 1st came to AW in 1998 aw was very active and
> everynite there was an event or function, or a community gathering with
> many people who enjoyed the building and friendships in aw. Now this
> place is INAVTIVEWORLDS and enzo i suggest u hurry up and register
> www.inactiveworlds.com befor someone else does. But then again anyone
> else would actually try and help this program. So is aw gonna get
> better? are we gonna get more cits to play with? guess not. Mebbe i
> will leave to what a shame to give up such a good idea. but then again
> enzo and AW managment sucks. :)

Have you tried looking at the events listed on the AWEC site? What about
the AW Festival 2003? You into those RPG worlds (plenty are now active)?
I've been in AW since 1996 and I've seen just about everything there is
to see, but I'm still here. Right now most of the staff are on vacation.
Sure, there are some bugs left in AW 3.4, but you have to give AWI some
credit with so few staffers (compared to other large companies, such as
Adobe with Adobe Atmosphere). One thing I do miss is Tech Talks,
however, and I'd also like to see NewAW open within the next few weeks.

If you are bored or have a lack of interest with AW, then put that
feeling to good use and be productive. Go out and create the next killer
event, town, world, object path, bot, or whatever instead of whining
about things like so many others do. Great things that don't "get old
fast" take time and planning. Finally, AW isn't for everyone -- if you
can't take the heat, then get out of the kitchen (or however that saying
goes).

Another option would be to get a team together and make your own AW-type
program. Find some coders, modelers, texture artists, etc. and then you
may realize just how much work really does into AW. :) I'm not saying AW
is perfect by a long shot, but it is unique. I've tried MMORPGs, Second
Life, Adobe Atmosphere, Plastic Planet 3D and other VR programs, but I
still keep coming back to AW.

> (spell checker broken)

Might want to look into that spell checker problem. ;)

Builderz
http://www.3dhost.net

aw is dead :( aw managmenmt sucks

Jul 1, 2003, 10:41am
Don't forget about JP (Cryonics), too! ;) And while you're at it, you
can also blame Protagonist, Worlds Inc., COF Studios... they didn't make
X or they didn't add X feature so they must be bad. Tney are evil and
everything is their fault (yea, okay).

What competition are you referring to, Duskbat? I tried Plastic Planet
3D (very good, but it will take a while to mature), Adobe Atmosphere
(not really my thing yet, but may improve over time to a better level),
Second Life (I honestly don't like it at all), and others. The only
other major competitor that I see right now is There, and the graphics
look too "cartoonish" right now.

Builderz
http://www.3dhost.net

[View Quote] > ENZO its up to u also to help make this place the best of all colonized
> cyberspace or watch the compition put u on un employment lines. what a
> blow that would be for u and this community and this program like no
> other. I got 12,000 happy customers at my work, how many happy
> customers in aw :)

aw is dead :( aw managmenmt sucks

Jul 1, 2003, 11:26am
Whatever happened to the mute, confirm join requests, and eject
features? Isn't that what Eep used to do (either mute a person or argue
with them until they stand down)? I know eject isn't available for
everyone, but it works nicely for world owners. Telegram spamming is
still a problem, but you can block all telegrams for a few minutes if
that happens. Sending files via AW can also be blocked in the options or
by using a firewall/router if you keep getting sent malicious things. As
for swearing, the browser could have a built-in swear word (cuss) filter
as an option that you can turn on off. For everything else, you are
right -- there is no easy solution. Some people just need to grow up.

Builderz
http://www.3dhost.net

[View Quote]

Certain worlds don't work on my 3.4 browser.

Jul 2, 2003, 12:30pm
What type of graphics card do you have in your system and what render
mode do you use in the browser settings? Have you tried clearing your
cache and doing a scan disk/chkdsk?

Builderz
http://www.3dhost.net

[View Quote]

Virus Warning

Jul 3, 2003, 1:02am
I tried to do a WHOIS on that domain name, but it looks like the WHOIS
server for it is down at the moment (or fake).

However, the IP address of www.runescapeaddicts.com belongs to Everyones
Internet, so it is probably on a server in the RackShack/EV1 datacenter.
M A T T could have his own server (I doubt it) or have an account with
another host there.

Builderz
http://www.3dhost.net

[View Quote]

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