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Issue 4.11 | Nov 1996

PC of the Future?

Printing? Use this version
Prez Wants Privacy(But Only for Himself)

Machiavelli Telly

Planned Obsolescence? Or Recycling Opportunity?

Seize the Desktop

Five Percent Wiretap-Free (Guaranteed!)

Politics 1996/2000

The Bells' Toll

I Want My WebTV

When Worlds Collide

anon.penet.fi RIP

PC of the Future?

The Nintendo 64 has arrived, its guts the most powerful to hit the gaming market. But now that it's here, what will Nintendo do with a US$200 machine that outperforms most PCs?With so much power under the hood, possible N64 add-ons include modems and storage devices, perhaps even a Java cartridge or an Excel 64 spreadsheet. And behind the curtain, third parties are clamoring to build extensions. But Nintendo, for the moment, is concentrating on making sure its baby sells.

CPU: The 64-bit custom-designed Silicon Graphics's MIPS CPU runs at 93.75 MHz, which puts it in the class of low-end PowerPCs - but with much less operating system overhead.

Memory: The 4 Mbytes of Rambus memory are capable of data transfers of 4,500 Mbps over a 250-MHz bus. In plainspeak, this means the N64 can shuttle calculations between its three processors faster than most PCs.

Controller Ports: The controller ports are the easiest candidates for extensibility. The four ports, handling up to 56 Kbps of data, could connect to a keyboard, a 28.8 modem - basically anything.

Expansion Port: The expansion port, located on the N64's belly, is fully extensible with pins that can control all aspects of the machine. The 64DD disk drive is the only extension Nintendo is planning so far.

Reality Engine Coprocessor: The heart of the N64 (and no small source of pride for Silicon Graphics), Reality is actually two independent processors: one manages texturing (texture maps, antialiasing), while the other manhandles video, audio, and polygons. This segments the processing load in complex games like Super Mario 64.

64DD: Nintendo unveils its magnetic disk drive in Japan this November. The drive accepts 64-Mbyte magnetic disks (like the Zip drive) that provide cheaper media than N64 cartridges, store large amounts of data, and are fully writable. Simply put, the 64DD is the revolution no other set-top boxes and game machines have.

­Tim Barkow

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