Nvidia facing price fixing lawsuits

[ZeroDamage]

oil companies see the future, BP has spent billions in hydrogen.

 

 

They all have and I hate to say it but the hatred for oil companies derives from one thing. People hear the words "oil companies" and what their brains process is "Republicans."

[wayfarer]

Sorry, my brain processes a vision of my wallet. And its empty!

[ZeroDamage]

Sorry, my brain processes a vision of my wallet. And its empty!

 

 

Well yeah, that is normal. I am irritated about it as well. I am referring to the irrational hatred that many have for the oil companies when they know little of how the system works when it comes to oil prices. Their hatred is usually politically motivated.

[Cujo]

well oil companies are at least partly to blame for the electric car being killed.

 

hydrogen is so far away from being plausible it's not even worth discussing. ask yourself this, why would bp spend so much money researching hydrogen when electric cars already exist and are a much better alternative? i'm guessing most of that research was able to be written off thanks to the bush administration as he seems to be the only one that feels hydrogen is a viable alternative.

[wayfarer]

well oil companies are at least partly to blame for the electric car being killed.

 

hydrogen is so far away from being plausible it's not even worth discussing. ask yourself this, why would bp spend so much money researching hydrogen when electric cars already exist and are a much better alternative? i'm guessing most of that research was able to be written off thanks to the bush administration as he seems to be the only one that feels hydrogen is a viable alternative.

There's no money in the electric car. Period. No money to spend on gas,

no money to spend on spare parts. Thats why it got shelved. I don't think

this has anything to do with the bush administration. It's the big automakers.

[Cujo]

well oil companies are at least partly to blame for the electric car being killed.

 

hydrogen is so far away from being plausible it's not even worth discussing. ask yourself this, why would bp spend so much money researching hydrogen when electric cars already exist and are a much better alternative? i'm guessing most of that research was able to be written off thanks to the bush administration as he seems to be the only one that feels hydrogen is a viable alternative.

There's no money in the electric car. Period. No money to spend on gas,

no money to spend on spare parts. Thats why it got shelved. I don't think

this has anything to do with the bush administration. It's the big automakers.

 

 

well no cause if the electric car caught on then oil companies would be screwed. why wouldn't they want to stop it?

 

also, the power companies would make serious money.

 

if the cars never needed parts then automakers could charge so much more and make the same money they do now. just service centres would be screwed.

[anonymo]

Oil companies have been spending billions on hydrogen fuel since the beginning of the 20th century, but if you think they are trying to make a hydrogen car you are sorely mistaken. The fuel cell was invented in 1838 and since then oil companies have invested lots and lots of money in buying up patents only to burn them. My father himself has sold his pump designs to oil companies during the late '70's with their intentions being to squash any hope of a fuel cell run car. It's only now that car manufacturers are so worried about their economic future that they are desperately trying to catch up.

 

Electric cars and these dumb hybrids are actually worse for our environment. The by-products in the production of the batteries used to store power pollute more just in their manufacturing than a well tuned car will produce during the bulk of its life (10years). The only reason they are sold in NA is because the batteries are not manufactured here.

 

As for monopolies...well, no thanks. I'm not really sure where you get this apathy for monopolies from Cujo but if the Canadian government hadn't forced Bell to open up the competition then we wouldn't have cable internet, just Bell DSL (or, gasp, VideoTron cable). Maybe you've never dealt with Bell but they are a pain. That's not to say that Rogers aren't a pain as well, actually I dislike both companies almost equally due to the fact they both seem to think that their business will never be threatened. That is why monopolies are bad, because companies will do whatever they wish if there is no one competing (or if there is no direct competition as we see in the media industry here in Canada). It is fine to say that you don't mind monopolies when they aren't for essentials, but what are essentials to you? They may differ from the next guy, so are you satisfied to have monopolies on the things you consider essential because 51% of the population doesn't consider it essential?

[NOFX]

bikes fellas bikes...

 

I was in Bergen, Norway for about the whole month of May. The majority of people do not have cars. Alot of people use buses or bikes. You also see lots of mopeds and motorbikes. Also a car over there cost about double what it does here. A new toyota Yaris is somewhere in the range of $35,000. All cars have a huge tax on them and it is based on their engine size. I think that trend needs to come over here.

[Cujo]

Oil companies have been spending billions on hydrogen fuel since the beginning of the 20th century, but if you think they are trying to make a hydrogen car you are sorely mistaken. The fuel cell was invented in 1838 and since then oil companies have invested lots and lots of money in buying up patents only to burn them. My father himself has sold his pump designs to oil companies during the late '70's with their intentions being to squash any hope of a fuel cell run car. It's only now that car manufacturers are so worried about their economic future that they are desperately trying to catch up.

 

Electric cars and these dumb hybrids are actually worse for our environment. The by-products in the production of the batteries used to store power pollute more just in their manufacturing than a well tuned car will produce during the bulk of its life (10years). The only reason they are sold in NA is because the batteries are not manufactured here.

 

As for monopolies...well, no thanks. I'm not really sure where you get this apathy for monopolies from Cujo but if the Canadian government hadn't forced Bell to open up the competition then we wouldn't have cable internet, just Bell DSL (or, gasp, VideoTron cable). Maybe you've never dealt with Bell but they are a pain. That's not to say that Rogers aren't a pain as well, actually I dislike both companies almost equally due to the fact they both seem to think that their business will never be threatened. That is why monopolies are bad, because companies will do whatever they wish if there is no one competing (or if there is no direct competition as we see in the media industry here in Canada). It is fine to say that you don't mind monopolies when they aren't for essentials, but what are essentials to you? They may differ from the next guy, so are you satisfied to have monopolies on the things you consider essential because 51% of the population doesn't consider it essential?

 

afaik, bell never had a monopoly on internet. i was referring to actual telephone lines as they "owned" the phone lines. the stupid part is they paid to install them and then when it was opened up to other companies to provide service, those companies got free reign of the phone lines bell spent money to install. similar thing with hydro when they opened it up. the monopoly company spent billions on infrastructure only to have the government step in and say "anyone should be able to sell power, let them use your infrastructure".

 

i also don't feel that *gasp* internet is essential. essential things are things that people going back in history have not be able to live with out. 20th/21st century conveniences are not essential. there are ways around having internet, cell phones, cars, but there's no getting around food or water.

 

btw, i actually have bell internet and it's crap for everything but cs. rogers is worse though and i refuse to pay for "capped" and "throttled" internet.

 

what's your solution to the car problem?

 

bikes fellas bikes...

 

I was in Bergen, Norway for about the whole month of May. The majority of people do not have cars. Alot of people use buses or bikes. You also see lots of mopeds and motorbikes. Also a car over there cost about double what it does here. A new toyota Yaris is somewhere in the range of $35,000. All cars have a huge tax on them and it is based on their engine size. I think that trend needs to come over here.

 

ya, i've thought of this a lot as when i was in germany it was a similar thing. the problem with the way NA is built is that everything is so "sprawled" that bikes are really not feasible. i rode my bike everywhere until i got my licence but my world was so small then. most of my travels at this point take me much farther than a bike could get me. the other issues, at least in canada and the northern us, are sub zero temps and snow.

 

we actually have two scooters and they're awesome but seriously "uncool" in NA. hopefully that will start changing.

[[LaW]Maverick]

Holy poop...this is about graphics cards....

 

 

First off, Oil companies and auto manufacturers have a whole lot of agreements in which they fund one another. For instance, the oil companies might give the auto makers funding for R&D on a new form of hybrid (that still uses gasoline). I need to find some articles...

 

 

But again, BACK TO THE ORIGINAL THREAD, If we let the graphics card companies keep the price of high-end cards at $800, what's to stop them from not lowering the price. In other words. Say the price remains that high for the top-end graphics cards for the next 5 years, which puts the mid-range cards at a $450 to $550, and the next generation of high-end cards is actually significantly better than the mid-range (unlike the current situation). All they have to do is keep the prices high, and people like me that always want to buy the top-end stuff when we upgrade will be stuck with getting something that won't run games with everything cranked (I mean all settings as high as they go) or pay $800.

 

Think 'bout the future my friends. If they are allowed to set these ridiculous prices now, sure...not many people are going to pay, and, quite frankly, the ones that do are idiots (the Ultra is just not that much better). However, what happens when the new nVidia card comes out that's twice as powerful as the Ultra and costs $800...then the game companies start making games that need the power of the new card to run at 100%, then we'll all be saying "Oh crap-a-doodle-do, we should have stopped that price gouging when it started."

 

It's funny everyone has focused on the gas situation, because it's similar. We didn't do a thing when they raised the prices higher than was necessary, because it wasn't all that bad. Now the prices are continuing to go up even though they're purchasing gasoline at a lower cost, and who's getting screwed out of cash? We are. You've gotta hit problems like this when they start, or else it'll have so much momentum that it becomes nearly impossible to correct. I don't like the direction our economy has been going lately...there's less and less competition, and that's bad for the consumer. Yes Creative sells a fantastic product, but should we really have to pay so much for their high-end stuff? No. Wal*Mart is a cheap (and evil) place to shop, but what happens when most of their competition is gone? It's dwindling right now, and Wal*Mart already employs a healthy plethora of unfair and downright wrong business practices. Do we want them ruling the market? Hell no. It's a common trend in today's economy, and it's a bad one. Why do you think cost of living has gone up so much in the past few years? Yes, I know it always increases due to inflation and all sorts of other factors, but come on, there's been a truly significant difference in the past 10 years. Some teenager working a part time job for $5.15 (if that were still the minimum wage) wouldn't be able to afford the gas to get him to and from work and school...especially if he had to pay his own insurance.

 

Competition is good--don't you ever think otherwise. Someone said Microsoft makes a good product with Windows? I ask you, should I have to pay $140 for an UPGRADE, or $220 for the whole thing!? It's freakin' software! It should cost $80 tops. Office is $300!!!! You can go download Open Office for FREE and do all the same stuff. Yes, they put out a good product, but the prices are outrageous. I don't want this happening with hardware too, or else I won't be able to afford my next upgrade. Office should not cost more than my processor.

[anonymo]

we actually have two scooters and they're awesome but seriously "uncool" in NA. hopefully that will start changing.

No...please no! Go to Rome...it's not cool to have to dodge herds of 20 or more scooters driving in packs

 

Bell still doesn't use 70% of their capacity. I agree that they shouldn't have to "share" their infrastructure, but at the same time they shouldn't have built it so no one else could put in their own infrastructure. Bell knew what they were doing when they laid their infrastructure and the gov. made the right decision. Either rip up existing infrastructure along with roads, buildings and parks just so other companies can compete or force the player holding all the cards to share. The only problem with the whole thing is that Bell is being quite greedy and doing everything they can make the whole sharing thing difficult. Don't even get me started on ISDN lines in Toronto and "line picking" that Bell is doing. They are deliberately sabotaging their own services (albeit through other companies) in an effort to weaken the process. Obviously it's not being handled properly and it probably would be better if Bell still held a monopoly, but only because the gov. is fumbling the whole situation, and not because monopolies are good. If anything it's because of monopolies that there are problems in the first place.

 

Oh and Rogers has no capacity limit on their Extreme service (6mbps down 800kbps up). They do have a capacity limit on their Extreme Plus (18Mbps down 1Mbps up) of 90gigs a month. Honestly tell me what you could be doing that would require than bandwidth/capacity that doesn't have to do with a business? (cause I really can't think of anything, unless you're a pron freak)

 

THREAD OFFICIALLY HIJACKED BY THE CANUCKS!

[boiler]

I feel like reporting this thread to the political topics nazi and having it closed. My head is about to asplode!!

 

Graphics cards are expensive. The companies know that there are enough people out there that are crazy enough to spend $800 on a card because they want bragging rights in stupid benchmarks and to run everything ultra high settings at 150fps. Their overhead and development costs for making the 8800ultra can't be much more than it is for the 8800gtx, so why shouldn't they make a faster one and charge much more for it?

 

It's all driven by supply and demand. There is enough demand out there to warrant having the card that is stupid expensive, so they make it. That's just good business. Just because we can't see a need for something that insane doesn't mean that there aren't people out there that see things differently. I spent $400 on my 8800gts, and that was very expensive to me, but the card does absolutely everything that I ask of it. It also helped that I was able to sell my 7800gt for half of what I paid for it two years ago (which was better than I was expecting, honestly.)

 

Prices on that kind of stuff goes up all the time, I'm not suprised that this new generation of "high end" cards starts at around $400. I just find it hard to believe that they two companies conspired to make the prices where they are now when ATI didn't even have their product close to release when those prices were sent already by Nvidia. Makes no sense to me.

 

Anyone mentions gas prices again and I'm leaving

[Cujo]

we actually have two scooters and they're awesome but seriously "uncool" in NA. hopefully that will start changing.

No...please no! Go to Rome...it's not cool to have to dodge herds of 20 or more scooters driving in packs

 

Bell still doesn't use 70% of their capacity. I agree that they shouldn't have to "share" their infrastructure, but at the same time they shouldn't have built it so no one else could put in their own infrastructure. Bell knew what they were doing when they laid their infrastructure and the gov. made the right decision. Either rip up existing infrastructure along with roads, buildings and parks just so other companies can compete or force the player holding all the cards to share. The only problem with the whole thing is that Bell is being quite greedy and doing everything they can make the whole sharing thing difficult. Don't even get me started on ISDN lines in Toronto and "line picking" that Bell is doing. They are deliberately sabotaging their own services (albeit through other companies) in an effort to weaken the process. Obviously it's not being handled properly and it probably would be better if Bell still held a monopoly, but only because the gov. is fumbling the whole situation, and not because monopolies are good. If anything it's because of monopolies that there are problems in the first place.

 

Oh and Rogers has no capacity limit on their Extreme service (6mbps down 800kbps up). They do have a capacity limit on their Extreme Plus (18Mbps down 1Mbps up) of 90gigs a month. Honestly tell me what you could be doing that would require than bandwidth/capacity that doesn't have to do with a business? (cause I really can't think of anything, unless you're a pron freak)

 

THREAD OFFICIALLY HIJACKED BY THE CANUCKS!

 

i called rogers less than a month ago and said i'd like to sign up. she said ok what service. i said do you have a service that doesn't have a bandwidth cap. she said no. i said thanks for your time and hung up.

 

http://www.shoprogers.com/store/cable/inte...LPUEBCXA508BJT1

 

it's 100gb cap on extreme.

 

on my sympatico 1.5mbit/640kbit connection my combined up/down is approx 200gb each month. no pron at all. every hd tv show is at least 1.4gb. sometimes i splurge for the uncompressed ones that are about 4gb each. i'm currrently just finishing up that bbc documentary planet earth. it's 25gb.

 

below is last month. the month before was 173gb.