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Why PS4 downloads are so slow

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Re: Why PS4 downloads are so slow

#81

Post by jzwinck »

jwilk wrote: post #38
Sukera wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Quick note: The situation is not different on Linux, MacOS, or other operating systems because all executable formats have some way to embed images. What publishers should do is remove unncessary metadata before publishing, which is easy to do in the case of the PNG because we can simply omit the iTXt chunk. From your link - so I guess the situation on linux isn't different? Or am I missing something, other than th…

I'm not quite sure what exactly the author's point is. Yes, you could embed images in ELFs, too, if you really wanted, but why? There's no standardized way to do it, and putting the images in separate files is easier.

There is a standard way to embed any file into an ELF. The program "objcopy" creates object files from arbitrary input files. You then simply link the objects into your executable. The program can then access those arbitrary embedded data chunks by their symbol names, just as if they were literal strings in the source code.

I explain how to do this in the context of embedding a version file here: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/16349557/does-gcc-have-a...

Re: Why PS4 downloads are so slow

#82

Post by ripdog »

ex3ndr wrote: post #68
g09980 wrote: post #36

Want to see something like this for (Apple's) App Store. Downloads are fast, but the App Store experience itself is so, so slow. Takes maybe five seconds to load search results or reviews even on a wi-fi connection.

Same with Google Play since day 0.

Really? On my galaxy note 4, Google Play pages open within ~400ms consistently.

Re: Why PS4 downloads are so slow

#83

Post by ripdog »

stordoff wrote: post #50
MBCook wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of the reasons I switched off of AT&T uVerse is they seemed to give you the absolute minimum upload bandwidth needed to achieve the advertised download bandwidth. So if you were downloading or streaming and uploaded anything more than a small image your download speed would plummet as you ran out of upstream bandwidth. Online backups/syncing? Hope you're not trying to do anything else that requires bandwidth.

> Hope you're not trying to do anything else that requires bandwidth. I get the same on Sky (UK) ADSL (fibre[TTC] seems to be unaffected). When I'm uploading e.g. a video to YouTube, even something like Hacker News will often time out.

You get ADSL backed by FTTC? Not even VDSL? Who thought that was a good idea?

Re: Why PS4 downloads are so slow

#84

Post by barrkel »

xorblurb wrote: post #41
amluto wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought Windows had a fancy interrupt priority system that should, in principle, allow sound playback to preempt network interrupts? AMD64 added a fancy feature (CR8 access to the task priority register) just to accelerate interrupt prioritization. (This is all very vague memory. I know how this stuff works on Linux. Linux does not have interrupt priorities.)

Windows does not really have interrupt priorities IIRC. It kind of sort of have some, but the applicative code (device driver included) can't chose at which level they run their ISR, so its quite random whether or not the ISR you prefer should preempt others. Plus typically general purpose OSes don't map hw interrupt priorities mechanisms to their own priorities (and very soon the hw interrupt controllers do not even…

Windows interrupt priorities are called IRQLs, see https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/doronh/2010/02/02/what-is-i... for a discussion.

Mostly PnP decides the levels, unless you have multiple IRQs and you need to specify the priority.

Re: Why PS4 downloads are so slow

#85

Post by colechristensen »

andrewstuart wrote: post #71

Its bizarre because I bought something from the PlayStation store on my PS4 and it took DAYS to download. The strange part of the story is that it took so long to download that the next day I went and bought the game (Battlefield 4) from the shop and brought it back home and installed it and started playing it, all whilst the original purchase from the PlayStation store was still downloading. I ask Sony if they would…

When I read stories like this I'm bothered by the fact that the author didn't go to their credit card company and chargeback the unwanted purpose. Your credit card is a powerful tool to mitigate retailers not giving you what you expect, using it motivates bad actors quite well. Chargebacks are expensive and too many chargebacks leads to unfavorable terms with the credit card companies which are inescapable to the retailers. (just like PlayStation has a captive market, so does Visa)

Re: Why PS4 downloads are so slow

#86

Post by andrewstuart »

ripdog wrote: post #80
andrewstuart wrote: post #71

Its bizarre because I bought something from the PlayStation store on my PS4 and it took DAYS to download. The strange part of the story is that it took so long to download that the next day I went and bought the game (Battlefield 4) from the shop and brought it back home and installed it and started playing it, all whilst the original purchase from the PlayStation store was still downloading. I ask Sony if they would…

Because they are in a dominant market position. Honestly, it's your fault for buying a console - you knew you'd be at sony's mercy due to the monopolistic nature of consoles. The cost of switching to the one comparible console option is so great, most people will not bother unless sony's issues become too great - and network speed is presumably not a deal-breaker for enough people for sony to care. So you will contin…

I left PC gaming behind years ago.

I like to sit on the couch and I want my gaming device to be a black box that does its job and is dedicated to couch based entertainment (I use it for TV too).

PC gaming requires a...... PC... usually sitting at a desk, much more powerful than I need, lots of configuration etc etc to hard.... I'm a couch gamer in the evening after the programming is done.

I don't care much about the PlayStation download thing. I generally prefer to buy my games on DVD anyway.

Sony should care however.... despite not wanting to spend money on digital downloads I find I spend ever more with Apple App Store because despite my hesitations they make it easy and it works, whereas I don't want to buy digital with Sony and they make it easy not to do that.

>>>PC means freedom, or not being at the mercy of a single uncaring corporate entity

I just don't care about that stuff any more.. life's too short to worry about who our corporate overlords are.

Re: Why PS4 downloads are so slow

#87

Post by AlexC04 »

cm2187 wrote: post #47
ploxiln wrote: post #18

Reminds me of how Windows Vista's "Multimedia Class Scheduler Service" would put a low cap on network throughput if any sound was playing: http://www.zdnet.com/article/follow-up-playing-music-severel... Mark Russinovich justified it by explaining that the network interrupt routine was just too expensive to be able to guarantee no glitches in media playback, so it was limited to 10 packets per millisecond when any med…

Reminds me of Apple's Jim Reekes "engineers are retarded". https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=C5d151lqJsA (The annecdote really starts at 2:30).

That was amazing. I love crotchety grizzled engineers more than anyone I think. This was classic and hilarious. I can't wait to share with everyone at work.

Re: Why PS4 downloads are so slow

#88

Post by cuckcuckspruce »

colechristensen wrote: post #85
andrewstuart wrote: post #71

Its bizarre because I bought something from the PlayStation store on my PS4 and it took DAYS to download. The strange part of the story is that it took so long to download that the next day I went and bought the game (Battlefield 4) from the shop and brought it back home and installed it and started playing it, all whilst the original purchase from the PlayStation store was still downloading. I ask Sony if they would…

When I read stories like this I'm bothered by the fact that the author didn't go to their credit card company and chargeback the unwanted purpose. Your credit card is a powerful tool to mitigate retailers not giving you what you expect, using it motivates bad actors quite well. Chargebacks are expensive and too many chargebacks leads to unfavorable terms with the credit card companies which are inescapable to the ret…

Sony bans your PlayStation Store account and you lose all your games when you do a chargeback[1]. Yet another reason to never buy digital downloads from Sony.

Edit: Steam puts your account in a restricted mode when you issue a chargeback[2].

[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/PS4/comments/2ivsz3/beware_if_you_s...

[2] https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?ref=6687-HJV...

Re: Why PS4 downloads are so slow

#89

Post by stevenwoo »

colechristensen wrote: post #85
andrewstuart wrote: post #71

Its bizarre because I bought something from the PlayStation store on my PS4 and it took DAYS to download. The strange part of the story is that it took so long to download that the next day I went and bought the game (Battlefield 4) from the shop and brought it back home and installed it and started playing it, all whilst the original purchase from the PlayStation store was still downloading. I ask Sony if they would…

When I read stories like this I'm bothered by the fact that the author didn't go to their credit card company and chargeback the unwanted purpose. Your credit card is a powerful tool to mitigate retailers not giving you what you expect, using it motivates bad actors quite well. Chargebacks are expensive and too many chargebacks leads to unfavorable terms with the credit card companies which are inescapable to the ret…

There is a problem with doing a chargeback to a console/platform exclusive service - they can give you your one refund then terminate your service and you lose access to the service. IIRC one of the big game services does this.

Re: Why PS4 downloads are so slow

#90

Post by benwilber0 »

colechristensen wrote: post #85
andrewstuart wrote: post #71

Its bizarre because I bought something from the PlayStation store on my PS4 and it took DAYS to download. The strange part of the story is that it took so long to download that the next day I went and bought the game (Battlefield 4) from the shop and brought it back home and installed it and started playing it, all whilst the original purchase from the PlayStation store was still downloading. I ask Sony if they would…

When I read stories like this I'm bothered by the fact that the author didn't go to their credit card company and chargeback the unwanted purpose. Your credit card is a powerful tool to mitigate retailers not giving you what you expect, using it motivates bad actors quite well. Chargebacks are expensive and too many chargebacks leads to unfavorable terms with the credit card companies which are inescapable to the ret…

On the other hand be careful with chargebacks especially against a retailer (Sony PlayStation store) that you would like to keep your account with. They could very easily just close your account and then your PlayStation is mostly worthless.
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