bloom america

Unknowingly, May is moving away, but June is also quietly approaching.

The villa purchased by Catherine and her companions was already bustling with activity.

At the entrance of the villa, bodyguards are guarding the place.

There are two groups of bodyguards in total.

One team is Catherine's umbrella staff, while the other team is Jenny's bodyguards.

Jenny's grandfather is a director of United Technologies Corporation UTC and owns a small stake in Raytheon Company. He is a veritable arms dealer.

UTC is a powerful company. The reason why Apollo 11 was able to fly was inseparable from UTC's support.

The bodyguards are all strong and strong. More importantly, they all carry guns with them, but the guns are hidden in their clothes.

It is precisely because of these bodyguards with guns that Catherine and the others are not afraid of trouble when they often go out. After all, this is the United States in the 1960s.

At this moment, Catherine's friends are discussing something. Surprisingly, Elsa is also here at this moment.

However, everyone is wearing strange clothes.

Take Elsa, for example, with a pair of white cat ears on her head, cat-paw-shaped gloves on her hands, strange shoes on her feet, and a straight tail behind her. At first glance, she looks really cute.

But Ada's outfit is much hotter - it's a bunny girl outfit.

"What equipment is better for Catherine?"

Lisa seemed to be thinking.

"Bullshit? No, Kate's breasts aren't big enough. It doesn't look like pretending to be cows at all..." Lisa looked at her breasts, maybe she could do it?

"Kate's legs are very long, maybe a horse is good?" Ada smiled.

"But Catherine doesn't seem to like horses?"

Lily seemed to think of Catherine's struggle when riding a horse for the first time.

At this time, Lily was wearing a spotted outfit. At first glance, she looked like a cute dog.

"Hey, just because she doesn't like it, we have to put it on for her~"

Lisa smiled.

"But will Kate like it?"

Jenny was a little suspicious.

At this time, Jenny was wearing a ballet costume with two wings on her back, just like an elegant and lovely swan.

"But I think it's good... By the way, Elsa, what do you think?"

"Ah...er...uh?" Elsa was a little at a loss.

In fact, she was completely dragged here by them.

——Catherine’s friends are preparing to give Catherine a unique birthday.

However, due to confidentiality, Catherine knew nothing about it.

In fact, because of the emergence of z80, Catherine is "discussing Fang Qiu".

Because the emergence of z80 means that the preparation of Microsoft II computers and Xbox have entered the countdown stage!

Catherine first decided to release Xbox and let technicians work hard to develop it.

A CPU alone is not enough. If it is used in a game console, a display processing device is also necessary.

A picture controller (ppu) that can display 64 colors, a total of 4kb of video memory, the screen can display 2 layers of scrolls and 5 pages, of which 2 background pages each occupy 1kb of video memory. The display device can display 32 colors at the same time -

-This is not because Catherine does not display 64 kinds of products, but because the cost is too high and the effort is insufficient.

In fact, Catherine has not considered using the Xbox console to make money, at least not in the early stages of release.

Of course, as the production technology of the assembly line matures, the cost will only get lower and lower in the future.

Now, what Catherine is thinking about is using games such as "Super Mario" to make money!

You know, FC game consoles in history have sold a total of 60 million units, while "Super Mario" has sold an even more terrifying 70 million copies!

Although FC also includes the original games such as Super Mario Bros., there are also countless pirated copies of "Super Mario".

The games that Catherine is thinking about include not only "Super Mario", but also games such as Contra, but "Super Mario" is Catherine's main focus.

During the FC era, a number of very classic games emerged. Because at this time, the performance of consoles was limited, so more game manufacturers focused on the playability of the games.

Civilian products need to be cheap to start with, and the cheaper the better.

When the first Xbox console appeared, it was already late May.

However, the cost of 250 US dollars can definitely kill people.

Even so, if a game is popular, it cannot be stopped.

When FC was launched in Taiwan, Taiwanese people could hardly afford to buy games, so they came up with the idea of ​​renting out game consoles for NT$1 an hour to recoup their costs.

Catherine doesn't know if this method can be used in the United States, but it also shows that when the game becomes popular, there is really no way to stop it.

But this is not the most troublesome thing. What gives Catherine the most headache is the game cartridge.

Although Catherine had considered this issue, the plan Sanders came up with gave Catherine a headache.

Xbox games are stored in read-only ROM format on game cards that can be inserted into the console slot.

The capacities include la series 24k, lb series 40k, lc series 48k, and ld series 64k. There are other media with higher storage capacity, but they are still under development for the time being. There are also some game cartridges with batteries to save game progress, this

If so, it is not realistic for the time being.

The simplest LA series cassette costs more than 100 US dollars, which is still a cost that has been pushed down to the extreme.

The rom-form cassette was rejected by Catherine.

If one plan fails, another plan will be made.

Catherine suddenly thought of something that couldn't be cheaper - tape!

Why can't you achieve your goals through tape?!

You know, in history, there has never been a game cartridge using magnetic tape as a medium!

Today's tapes are almost 100bpi. bpi is how many bytes are stored on a tape per inch. If you calculate it in detail, the capacity of a tape can reach almost 48kb. If it is larger, the tape will need to be enlarged.

The scale is too big and not suitable.

What's more, games like "Super Mario" happen to have just that much (the original file without emulation information is 32kb, and all current Marios contain emulator code.)

In this way, your storage costs are reduced by at least 90% compared to cassettes!

Although if you use tapes, you will need to add about 2kb of memory to read the content, and the speed will also slow down when switching levels, but this is not a problem at all. You must know that the reading time required for later disc games, then

That’s called a tragedy!

Moreover, tape technology is now relatively mature and you can use it yourself!

It's just that this will virtually increase the cost of the host machine. As Catherine predicted, civilian products will be cheaper to start with.

If assembly line production is fully realized, the initial cost will be about US$320. Once the process is proficient, it may continue to drop to US$300 or even lower.

As for the ex-factory price, Catherine set it at 320 US dollars, so she didn’t get a penny, and when taxes were included, she actually lost money.

As for the retail price, Catherine decided to set it at $349.

But as a result, the launch of Xbox has been delayed.

So, in May 1965, Apple Computer decisively delayed shipment...