Bill Gates gets Blue Screen of Death at CES demo

[vicicasas]

From the Associated Press:

"During a demonstration of digital photography with a soon-to-be-released Nikon camera, a Windows Media Center PC froze and wouldn't respond to Gates' pushing of the remote control.

Later in the 90-minute presentation, a product manager demonstrated the ostensible user-friendliness of a video game expected to hit retail stores in April, Forza Motor Sport. But instead of configuring a custom-designed race car, the computer monitor displayed the dreaded "blue screen of death" and warned, "out of system memory.""

Read the complete article here

You can also view the complete Gates keynote at the Microsoft web site via streaming video, although Windows Media Player for Mac is obviously required...

Gee, now I really hope Jobs doesn't screw anything up during his keynote!

[Edited on 1-6-2005 by vicicasas]

[vicicasas]

I'm only a couple of minutes into the keynote but I'm enjoying it immensely, since it's hosted by Conan O'Brien and the whole show is patterned after an episode of Conan's show, complete with his opening monologue and a recreation of his Late Night set.

Do watch it! He's hilarious.

"Let me begin tonight by giving you all the good news. All right. When Bill Gates walks onto this stage in a few minutes, the average net worth of each person in this room will be $128 million, congratulations, enjoy. If you're going to hit on somebody, do it now."

[Edited on 1-6-2005 by vicicasas]

[vicicasas]

LOL @ the webcast.

I just watched the whole thing and all i can say is, OMG, Apple's not going to have to work very hard to top this one. They had a Nikon D2X with WiFi on hand so they could demo the instant transfer of photos to a PC, but they couldn't get it working. Then they demoed a build of the upcoming Forza Motorsport game for Xbox, and it crashed out into the Blue Screen of Death during a customization screen. And finally, during a race demo of the game (Conan vs Bill Gates), Conan's Buick crashed hard into a barrier and he couldn't seem to get it back on track, and when it was finally pointing in the right direction, the game noticeably started to stutter, and they surreptitiously "wrapped up" the demo portion.

LOL.

[CooLes]

Am pretty sure Jobs is laughing now. His upcoming keynote will be a surefire success!

Hmmm, if Forza Motorsport won't crash on an Xbox, then why would anyone spend so much on a gaming PC?

[Edited on 1-6-2005 by CooLes]

[totolabradog]

vic, you sure it wasn't the d2x's fault!

[hungryalien]

it wasnt the 1st time Gates got the BSOD while doing public demo..

few years back, they were doing a demo on Win98's plug and play capability.. they plugged in a scanner (i think) and BAM! BSOD! so they closed the laptop's lid immediately hehe

[elbert]

what an embarrassing keynote! And here's an obviously embarrassed speaker...

[Edited on 1-6-2005 by elbertc]

[Polar Mac]

Tried to watch the video this morning since pretty choppy when i watched it for the first time.

clicked on the site vicicassas posted... check this out, hehe

I wonder why..... :lol:

A little video editing perhaps?? :roll:

[Edited on 1-7-2005 by Polar Mac]

[vicicasas]

Originally posted by totolabradog
vic, you sure it wasn't the d2x's fault!

Hahahah, Toto, you know me. I was SOOOO tempted to make that joke on behalf of all Canon users but I decided to just shut up na lang :lol:

[elbert]

In fairness to Nikon, the pictures did go through, as they were later shown on another computer.

Gates said something about "the wrong remote control". Was that a lie, or what? The remote obviously worked at the start. It was the computer (or its software) that froze.

Obviously, the Windows Media Center failed. Considering that this was the supposed to be the 'star' of the CES, it's a major embarrassment. It also appeared as if that computer in front of Gates was supposed to do more demos (they just decided to skip them in favor of Gates' descriptions of what the Media Center can do).

I'm praying to the demo Gods that Steve Jobs' keynote goes without hitch. I think we all should.