10 Things That You've Wildly Overhyped!

Will Smith — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 21:06:36 -0500

You know it, we know it, the whole damn world knows it: On ever-so-rare occasions, there are technologies that we, the nerd elite, have ever-so-slightly... umm... overhyped. That's right, we said it. Overhyped. It's just that when we're talking with engineers or reading about about some hot new technology, we get so damn excited. So excited! And can you really blame us? I mean, who wouldn't get excited when you hear about CPUs that clock in over 4GHz, or instruction sets that will multiply your CPU's performance? And geez, who wouldn't want to turbocharge his gaming framerate? Hell, we shouldn't be blamed for overhyping, it's those damn engineers fault!

#10: Asus's Eee PC

We get it. It's a very small notebook, and you're a cheapskate. But anytime the hype from one product single-handedly launches a whole new product category, we get suspicious. The Eee and its "Netbook" ilk are (a) criminally underpowered, (b) sport keyboards that will be fat-fingered by anyone who doesn't describe his hands as "fey" or "elfin," and (c) include displays with maximum resolutions that we haven't seen since we upgraded to a 12-inch CRT. It's great that you can trade in some cereal boxtops for a "Netbook", but we'd rather spend a buck or two and get a real computer. You know, something that wouldn't have been considered underpowered in 1997.

#9: High-Definition TV

We're now on the cusp of the sixth year that has been described as "the year" that HDTV adoption will finally take off and Change the World™. Sometime in mid-2003 we proclaimed that HDTV-madness was sweeping the nation. And now, almost six years later, even our moms have finally bought shiny, beautiful 1080p sets and invested in HD cable or satellite. But the general public? The general public is so dumb and lazy that they're watching YouTube quality video on their plasmas and LCDs, because they're too cheap (or aforementionedly dumb and lazy) to invest in HD signals. Meanwhile, I'm the dumbass who's watching HD content on the four-foot thick, 500-pound rear-projection behemoth I "early-adopted" in 2001. Yes, I'm bitter. Still.

#8: Facebook

Distracting? Yes. Fun? Yes. Revolutionary? No. Facebook isn't anything special. It's simply the best execution of an idea that started way back when with Friendster, took a wrong turn as Orkut, and accidentally pandered to the teenybopper audience in the form of Myspace before inadvertantly backing into the mainstream by giving drunken college kids a place to post pictures from last night's party. Yes. I'm looking at you, Norm.

#7: Battlestar Galactica

I said it in the magazine, and legions of superfans got pissed. So I'll say it again right now! Right up until the point that everyone went camping on New Caprica, Battlestar Galactica was the best thing on TV. Since then, it's been more about who fraks who than sending toasters to hell. A once-awesome sci-fi masterpiece has been reduced to Melrose Place in space. Meh.

#6: Wil Wright’s Spore

Spore's finally been released, but that's not stifled its critics, who say that it's nothing more than a stripped-down version of better, more complex, more interesting games. Of course, the true irony is that the game Wil Wright built to save science doesn't allow your critters to evolve naturally. Instead, it's nothing more than a treatise in bump-mapped intelligent design. Oops.

#5: 64-bit Computing

PCs can address more than 4GB of memory now, and the 64-bit version of Vista is surprisingly capable. That's great and all, but what we really want are more 64-bit native apps that can address all that memory in our rigs. Sure, the CAD and content creation guys are stoked that they can pack 16GB of RAM in a workstation, but 64-bit has essentially fizzled for normal folks like you and me. So we humbly extend a hardy "thanks" to Microsoft, the computing-industrial hardware complex, and of course ISVs for making Maximum PC look like a hulking bunch of know-nothings in its campaign to tout 64-bit computing as anything that anyone should possibly care about at all.

#4: Downloading Movies From the Internet

Oh, doesn't the promise of instant movie downloads from the Internet seem glorious? The only problem is that with 30,000 companies launching virtually the same service, and with all of them tied to different pieces of hardware, there's absolutely no reason to invest in any of the providers services--at least until the movie industry gives up on DRM, and everyone decides it makes sense for different services to talk to each other.

#3: Nintendo Wii

Wii is a lame name for anything. We don't care if they've sold even 50 bazillion consoles, it's still a dumb name. If Nintendo wanted a name that perfectly captures the essence of the Wii, they'd have called it the Nintendo Sits-In-My-Closet-Til-People-Come-Over-or-a-Mario-Game-Comes-Out.

#2: SLI and Crossfire

Let's do a little videocard math problem. If you're on a train heading east and you have two videocards that draw two times the power and generate four times the noise, how much faster will Crysis run? If you answered "1.5X faster and 5X as expensive," you've probably upgraded your power supply recently. Bravo, Jimmy! You too are a dumbass -- just like the Maximum PC editors who should have been a wee bit more concerned about price, noise and whether Crysis is really all that life-changingingly awesome.

#1: The iPhone 3g

It’s indubitably the coolest phone normal folk can actually buy, but nothing could have lived up to its hype overdose. With a much faster data connection and integrated GPS on top of the killer 3D accelerated interface and the biggest screen we've seen on any smartphone, this a great phone. But Apple's tight rein on App Store submissions and the lack of requisite features--like copy/paste and MMS messages--land the iPhone solidly in the overhyped category.

No BS Podcast #78 The Amazing Flying Cat Edition

The Maximum PC Staff — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 22:15:49 -0500

The podcast gang was in awe of the amazing winged cat! After the sense of wonder and amazement passed, we talked of Nvision, the amazing demoscene stuff that came out at Nvision this week, Video Games Live, and manage not to answer a single tech question in our Q&A bit. Also, Dave interviews Tricia Helfer and Nuclearbastard. And we talk about the freaky cat with wings some more.

Do you have a tech question? A comment? A tale of technological triumph? Just need to get something off your chest? A secret to share? Email us at maximumpcpodcast@gmail.com or call our 24-hour No BS Podcast hotline at 877.404.1337 x1337--operators are standing by.

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