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 News Archive
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Chat with Jim Sachs (August 17th, 2003) Jim Sachs joined us for a scheduled chat August 17th, 2003 from 5:00pm (ET) to 6:00pm for a chat about the Aquarium and his plans for the future. |
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Goldfish Aquarium build 5034 (July 23rd, 2003) The latest version of LifeGlobe Goldfish Aquarium has been released!
Floating debris, and different fish selections for each tank have been added. There are different groupings of the plants and background now available and there are now 10 goldfish to choose from. More info... |
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Chat with Jim Sachs (July 19th, 2003) Jim Sachs joined us for a scheduled chat July 19th, 2003 from 5:00pm (ET) to 6:00pm for a chat about the Aquarium and his plans for the future. |
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Goldfish Aquarium build 3950 (July 2nd, 2003) The latest version of LifeGlobe Goldfish Aquarium has been released!
There are now 4 selectable tanks and 7 goldfish to choose from. Several bugs have also been resolved and loading time reduced. More info... |
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Fish & Feature Wishlist (April 21st, 2003) The Fish and Special Creature Wishlist has been been completely rewritten in PHP and ~40 fish/special creatures added. You can use the drop-down menus to adjust the layout. There are still 2-3 bugs to fix! |
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Chat with Jim Sachs (April 19th, 2003) Jim Sachs joined us for a scheduled chat April 19th, 2003 from 5:00pm (ET) to 6:00pm for a chat about the Aquarium and his plans for the future. |
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Marine Aquarium 2.0 Update (April 17th, 2003) Many bugs that have been reported in Marine Aquarium 2 have now been fixed. If you have had problems with the Aquarium, please visit SereneScreen.com and re-download the Free/Trial/Full version. If you have NOT had problems, this is not recommended. |
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Marine Aquarium Time Released! (April 17th, 2003) Marine Aquarium Time has now been released! [More Info...] |
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Chat with Jim Sachs (March 15th, 2003) Jim Sachs joined us for a scheduled chat March 15th, 2003 from 5:00pm (ET) to 6:00pm for a chat about the Aquarium and his plans for the future. |
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Chat with Jim Sachs (February 15th, 2003) Jim Sachs joined us for a scheduled chat February 15th, 2003 from 9:00pm to 10:00pm for a chat about the Aquarium and his plans for the future. |
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Chat with Jim Sachs (December 7th, 2002) Jim Sachs joined us for a scheduled chat December 7th, 2002 from 9:00pm to 10:00pm for a chat about the Aquarium, and his plans for the future. |
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German and United Kingdom Localised (October 15th, 2002) SereneScreen Aquarium has been translated into German and a localised version of the Aquarium has been made available in the United Kingdom. This brings retail presence of the Aquarium to 4 countries: USA, Japan, Germany, and the UK. |
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SereneScreen Aquarium @ CompUSA (October 2nd, 2002) SereneScreen Aquarium is now available for purchase at CompUSA!! Availability may vary from store to store.
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SereneScreen Aquarium for Mac OS 9 version 1.1 released! (September 2002) The Mac OS 9 release version of SereneScreen Aquarium is now available for download!
Download or visit our Macintosh Area for more information! |
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SereneScreen Aquarium for Mac OS 9 beta released! (August 22nd, 2002) A beta of the Mac OS 9 version of SereneScreen Aquarium is now available for download!
Download or visit our Macintosh Area for more information! |
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Chat with Jim Sachs (July 26th, 2002) Jim Sachs joined us for a scheduled chat July 26th, 2002 from 7:00pm to 8:00pm for a chat about the Aquarium, his plans for the future, and other issues. |
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SereneScreen Aquarium for Mac OS X release version 1.1! (July 24th, 2002) Mac OS X release version 1.1 of SereneScreen Aquarium is now available for download!
Download or visit our Macintosh Area for more information! |
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SereneScreen Aquarium for Mac OS X Beta! (July 2nd, 2002) The Mac OS X beta of SereneScreen Aquarium is now available for download! Visit our Macintosh page for more information! |
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Macintosh News! (June 22nd, 2002) An exciting bit of news! The Macintosh version of SereneScreen Aquarium is nearly ready for Beta testing! Visit our Macintosh page for more information! |
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Website Update (June 22nd, 2002) A major update to the website has been performed, including the unveiling of a Freshwater Aquarium section. |
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SereneScreen Freshwater Aquarium Announced (April 4th, 2002) Jim Sachs has announced that his next project is the SereneScreen Freshwater Aquarium. This surprise announcement included the explanation that Prolific Publishing and SereneScreen have been unable to secure distribution deals for the marine version of the Aquarium with retailers like CompUSA, Best Buy, Wal-Mart, and Circuit City. All of these companies require at least two products per vendor. Building on the success of the Aquarium, a Freshwater version seemed like the best choice to fulfill this need in a short amount of time.
Work began on the Freshwater Aquarium in late March 2002 with no release date announced. It is not clear exactly how much this will delay the saltwater version of the Aquarium. At this time, there are plans for the Freshwater Aquarium to get additional fish and add-on packages, but not until after more progress has been made on the saltwater Aquarium. |
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Version 1.1 Launch (February 22nd, 2002) Version 1.1 of the Aquarium was released late Friday evening with the full involvement of the Prolific team (Ron, Will, Jim and Reichart), the SereneScreen tech support team, and Jim Sachs himself. The most complicated part of the new rollout were the new keycodes. Some keycode issues started to occur and it became clear that the keycode database had to be stripped and rebuilt, a process which took nearly 3 hours. In the SereneScreen Chat room, at one time, there were 20 people present, including all the key personnel at Prolific involved in the Aquarium, Jim Sachs, myself, and Michael (Jav400, forum co-administrator). We were fielding questions, comments, praise and frustrations from 7pm until 3am.
At approximately 2am, the keycode database rebuild was complete. Over the next 2 months, SereneScreen tech support would be swamped, working 12 hour shifts, because of issues with the customer database and with the online ordering system. Many of the e-mails which SereneScreen was receiving at this time started out with vulgarity, hostility, and threats of lawsuits and/or contacting civic organizations such as the Better Business Bureau. Although two people left SereneScreen during this time, these departures were unrelated to contacts with customers.
A large part of the delay in the launch of version 1.1 of the Aquarium was not the creation of the Lionfish itself, but rewriting the fish avoidance procedures which keep the fish from bumping into--or worse--passing through each other, the coral, etc. Jim Sachs has stated that the algorithym used in version 1.1 is temporary and will replaced by a true collision detection system with the release of the 3D Background version of the Aquarium.
Around this time, Jim mentioned that he was going to be involved in at least 2 film projects, modifying the Aquarium for an opening titles sequence and an effects shot involving fish.
Work resumed on the 3D Background in early March. |
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Fish & Feature Wishlist (January 3rd, 2002) The Fish & Feature Wishlist has been updated to add about a dozen species and also to speed up display for dialup modem users. |
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Chat with Jim Sachs (December 19th, 2001) Jim Sachs joined us for a scheduled chat December 19th, 2001 from 7:00pm to 8:00pm for a chat about the Aquarium, his plans for the future, and other issues. |
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Version 1.0 and 3D Background Update (December 14th, 2001) Jim has been giving us progress reports over the last month and a half regarding version 1.0 (mostly on the forum) and on the 3D background (mostly in the chat). UPDATE: Version 1.0 is being skipped in favor of version 1.1 with the Lionfish. Prolific Publishing wants to make sure that the automated 99L-to-1.1 upgrade is as painless as possible for all users.
Regarding the 3D background, Jim has been working on it off-and-on since early fall. He has informed us that he has decided to create and release the free specialty creature to all purchasers/upgraders of the Aquarium (purchasers of 1.0 and beyond have to pay extra) before he continues work on the 3D background. The 3D background is proving incredibly difficult. |
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The Aquarium Arrives @ Prolific! (November 20th, 2001) The boxed version of the Aquarium (version 1.0) has arrived at Prolific's warehouse and is awaiting shipment. Deals are still being struck with the major retailers.
The boxed version of the Aquarium is available at Fry's.
We will try to keep you posted on where you can find the boxed version in your area. The Aquarium is even going on sale in Japan! Click on the images below (or the icon to the left) to see pictures of the Aquarium boxes being unloaded into the warehouse and also to see the box artwork that appears on the boxes themselves.
The main purpose of 1.0 is to switch to a new serial number system and to make password protection work better on Windows 95, 98, and ME.
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New Forum!! (October 31st, 2001) Happy Halloween! Trick or treat? Well, you're in for a treat! In less than 72 hours we have managed to switch over from the EZBoard forum system to vBulletin Forum software located here on FeldonCentral.com. We got all the messages copied over (Thank you vBulletin!) and everything is searchable now! If you had an account on EZBoard, please head over and Register for a new one. We'll even fix your post counter so it reads the number of posts you had on EZBoard. Dive in! |
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Windows XP Plus pack & Windows XP OEM (September 6th, 2001) Jim Sachs, with the help of Prolific Publishing, struck a deal in May with Microsoft to include a 3 fish demo of the Aquarium with the Microsoft Plus XP pack.
This 3 fish demo, the flagship item in the Microsoft XP Plus pack, is shipping on all OEM computers pre-installed with XP (that's basically every brand name computer in the US) starting October 25th. No word on the number of Plus packs that were sold or were bundled. Sales of the Aquarium at SereneScreen are up some 600% since October 25th. Snapshots and more discussion... |
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SereneScreen makeover (September 11th, 2001) A few hours before disaster struck the World Trade Center and Pentagon, SereneScreen.com transitioned over to a new set of graphics with an advanced online ordering system. We will provide news of the release of 1.0 as soon as it happens. All registered owners of the Aquarium should get an e-mail notification about version 1.0's release. Please check out the new site. |
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World Trade Center Disaster (September 11th, 2001) Our deepest sympathies go out to the families of victims of the New York World Trade Center attack, families of the passengers and crew of American Airlines flights 11 & 77, United Airlines flights 93 & 175, families of personnel in the Pentagon complex, and to the families of slain NY police and firefighters who died in the line of duty.
Our message to the victims and families. |
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TechTV Coverage! (August 21st, 2001) SereneScreen Aquarium was just featured on TechTV, a nationally carried cable/sat station about technology news. Click here for more information about what was said. It was seen on "TechTV Live".
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99L "Beta 2" Released (August 2nd, 2001) Download the updated 99L version of the Aquarium. The new version is still labeled .99L but should be dated August 2nd or later. It fixes the following bugs:
Adding a RANDOM fish slot causes the Aquarium to kick out
Aquarium would not run if you didn't have a sound card
Starfish floating in the center of the screen
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.99L Released! (July 18th, 2001) A new version of the Aquarium has officially been released!
Koran Angel
Three Stripe Damsel
Queen Angel (teenager)
Flame Angel (new photo)
Starfish that moves along the gravel floor and, with a little privacy, can climb up on the glass
Volume control bar
Light + shadows now radiate from the bubble column
'EnergyStar' toggle/setting, so when the Aquarium runs, you can keep your monitor from sleeping
"Always on Top" applies to Windowed Mode
To read more about version .99L of the Aquarium, head to the Forum topic about it! |
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.99L Announced! (June 11th, 2001) Jim has officially announced the .99L version of the Aquarium. This will be out soon and may be the last .99 version before we hit 1.0. Version 1.0 will only be available to people who have purchased the Aquarium--the key generators out there won't work. If you've been using a "free" version, it's time to get a job at McDonald's and make that whopping $20 to pay for Jim's year and a half of work on this thing. Of course there will be many many updates after 1.0, including more fish, more features, more creatures, etc.
Version .99L
Koran Angelfish
Black-tailed Damsel
Reddish-orange Starfish with moving tentacles
Volume control bar
'EnergyStar' toggle/setting, so when the Aquarium runs, you can keep your monitor from sleeping
Always on Top applies to Windowed Mode (already in .99K WS)
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.99L Info(June 2nd, 2001) People always want to know what's next, but I hate to put pressure on Jim to put a feature in that he's mentioned, even if it turns out to be a LOT harder to implement than originally thought. .99K took a while because I'd mentioned here on the website that EnergyStar sleep mode would be fixed. This turned out to be nearly a week-long job. I even asked him if he could put out an "insomnia" version that wouldn't sleep, but he said 'too late, it's already been mentioned on the website'. *sigh*.
We found out that we would be receiving a Koran Angelfish, Black-tailed Damsel, a Volume control bar, and maybe another surprise or two! |
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.99K Widescreen Released! (May 28th, 2001) Jim has created a widescreen version of the Aquarium. It has all the features and fish of .99K plus it has a little bit more coral to make it look good on a 16:9 display, and you can have 8 fish on-screen at once.
Even though this was designed specifically for widescreen displays, hundreds of people are using it on their regular monitors and TVs. A 12MB video card is recommended for the widescreen version if you will be running it in a window, and if you run .99K WS full screen, you will have to adjust the geometry settings on your monitor to make it the narrower height.
You must be a registered user to get the widescreen version. More information here. |
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.99K Released! (May 11th, 2001) After a leaked version, the REAL .99K is here! This version uses DirectX 6 yet provides almost all the features Jim had planned for the DX8 version:
Picasso Trigger has been improved
new Regal Angel
new Blue Damsel
Background rescales to fit all ratios including 1280x1024 and HDTV
'No duplicate Random' feature
Awesome new sound
Remembers status of the 'speed stabilizer' (press Ctrl-S in the Aquarium)
'Always On Top' feature
Windows 2000 sound loop bug fixed (hopefully)
'Waking up' on Windows 2000 and/or Microsoft Intellimouse fixed
Improved timing on the automatic lighting changes, so that it works the same on all processors
This version covers the major things 95% of people have been requesting AND gives us 2 more fish! |
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Forum and Wishlist Update (May 10th, 2001) On the 9th, I updated the graphics and design of the Forum with the help of Jav400, Pyros9, and of course Jim! On the 10th, I updated the fish and invertebrates on the Wishlist with help from Jav400 and hooters. Note that the Invertebrates are now on page 3 of the Wishlist and that fish/creatures we're likely to see in the future are starred(*). |
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.99K Coming Soon (April 27th, 2001) Jim and I have each gotten back from our individual vacations, and we both had a great time! He went to Hawaii with his family, I went to the Okefenokee swamp and hung out with some of my electronic music buddies. Jim is back at work on the Aquarium now and having lots of meetings with Microsoft and his new publisher, Prolific Publishing.
Basically the DX8 version is at a standstill because some of the DX8 libraries Jim is working on are not Windows 98-friendly. So we will be seeing a few more .99_ versions.
With that, .99K has been announced, and it will have one of the previously announced DX8 features: a scaleable background. This will be of benefit for users of widescreen (such as HDTV) displays and even users who operate at 1280x1024 resolution. We also expect a new fish, a Banggai Cardinal (delayed, more complicated model will be done later) and a tuned up Picasso Trigger. We'll keep you posted! Prolific will soon be adding an e-mail sign-up list so you get an e-mail when a new version has been released. |
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Future Version UPDATE (May 9th, 2001) Details on the future 'DX8' version of the Aquarium have been provided. It will be a complete DirectX 8.0a rewrite with these improvements:
All resolutions of your video card and monitor are supported. (no more 16-bit switching)
Secondary cards (dual-head and pass-thru) are supported. (Voodoo + Matrox) |
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Aquarium hits 16 fish! (April 6th, 2001) Version .99J Jim was unable to complete the DX8 version of the Aquarium due to various programming issues, so he has provided the Picasso Trigger and new Flame Angel to us through an update to 99H. Notice also that the Flame Angel is brand new, and the Purple Tang and Forceps Angel have been updated.
Jim is taking a much-needed vacation next week in Hawaii. He has been working nearly non-stop 12-16 hours a day for the last year to make the Aquarium what it is. Have fun! |
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Aquarium hits 15 fish! (March 19th, 2001) Version .99H, the latest version of the Aquarium has been released introducing a Purple Sailfin Tang and a new version of the Queen Angel . This new version also includes enhanced sound effects. .99H was updated later in the day to resolve a 4 pixel defect. |
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Future Version Information (March 4th, 2001) Details on the next version of the Aquarium have been provided. It will be a complete DirectX 8.0a rewrite and is expected to provide many fixes and improvements:
The background picture will resize itself to any aspect ratio
Monitor shutdown (Energy Star) is working again
Alt+Tab and Ctrl+Alt+Del bypassing of password is disabled
All resolutions of your video card and monitor are supported. (no more 16-bit switching)
Secondary cards (dual-head and pass-thru) are supported. (Voodoo + Matrox)
Windows 2000 sound loop bug fixed (hopefully)
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Website now 800x600 friendly (March 4th, 2001) 1024x768 bias has been stamped out! (I moved the counter) |
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Aquarium Boxed Version Now Available (February 1st, 2002) The boxed version of the Aquarium is now for sale from the following retailers:
Fry's (26 stores across the US)
North Alabama Computers (purchase online)
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Aquarium hits 14 fish! (Jan 26th, 2001) Version .99G, the latest version of the Aquarium, was released with the Clown Trigger and much awaited Percula Clown. |
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Queen Angel Vote (Jan 26th, 2001) Many people are hoping that Jim will put an adult Queen Angel in the tank. What's your opinion? Make it known by voting in the Forums. |
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Wishlist Correction (Jan 26th, 2001) Someone from the Forums e-mailed me some pictures but with Hotmail, you never see the NAME of the attachment. So I flubbed the Cuban Hogfish and Scissortail Gobi names. Hogfish... what an awful name for such a beautiful fish! They now both appear on the Wishlist, properly named. Where's my coffee? :) |
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Wishlist Split (Jan 26th, 2001) Due to popular demand (and straining 56k modems), the Wishlist has been split into two pages. Not to mention even more fish. |
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Wishlist Updated (Jan 23rd, 2001) Fairly major upgrade to the Wishlist including more features and, as promised, ratings for which features might happen. We're on the virge of the release of .99G!!! Jim has said either this or Wednesday morning! |
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Wishlist Updated (Jan 18th, 2001) Facula Butterfly and Lionfish are back and a few more 'frequently asked questions' are answered below on the Wishlist. |
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Wishlist Updated (Jan 17th, 2001) I've updated the Wishlist to include more fish that people have requested. |
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.99G Announced (Jan 16th, 2001)According to Jim, the next version of the Aquarium will likely include a free-swimming Percula Clown and Clown Trigger. In addition, there's word that the next version beyond that will have several DirectX 8-exclusive features and so Jim will be abandoning support for DirectX versions prior to 8. |
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Netscape fix (Jan 12th, 2001) I didn't know people still used Netscape! Someone notified me that the Wishlist was showing a blank screen. Turns out I nested the tables backwards. It's fixed now! |
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Wishlist Updated (Jan 11th, 2001) I've updated the Wishlist to include all known requested fish and invertebrates. |
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16-bit Switcher (Jan 4th, 2001) Although it's rather crude, I've written a Windows batch file that can be used in conjunction with the QRes utility which must be installed for this to work. Put this batch file in the same directory as the Fish.scr file and then make a shortcut to it and put it on your desktop. The script switches to 16-bit and then runs the Aquarium, and then upon exit switches to 24 bit. You may need to modify the script further if you run the Aquarium at a different resolution than your normal display, or if you want to come back to 32 bit instead of 24. Refer to the QRes documentation. Jim is feverishly working on programming the Aquarium to always switch to 16-bit on launch, we'll keep you posted! |
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FeldonCentral.com/Sachs/ (Jan 4th, 2001) We've moved to my new multi-purpose domain FeldonCentral.com! Please reflect this in your bookmarks/favorites. |
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Sachs Uninstall (Jan 3nd, 2001) Added a Windows Registry script you can use to uninstall the Aquarium in case of corruption or to go back to an older version. Download it here and select 'Open this file from its current location...' and answer the prompts. Then when you run the Aquarium next time, it will be a fresh install. |
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2 New Fish! (Jan 2nd, 2001) Version .99F of the Aquarium released with the Forceps Butterfly and Regal Tang plus the ability to randomize one or more of your 7 fish slots in the tank. |
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Background Sound (Jan 1st, 2001) At the request of several Aquarium users, Jim has opened up to the possibility of including lengthier and more inclusive sound loops for the aquarium than the present drone of the bubbles. Check out the Forums for more info. You're encouraged to submit your own ideas and/or recordings of sounds for the Aquarium. |
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Jim's Next Project? (Dec 24th, 2000) Jim has hinted at his next screen saver! A Butterfly screen saver, potentially with motion blur. Expect this no sooner than Fall 2001--Still plenty of fish in the sea! |
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Inside the Tank linked! (Dec 12th, 2000) Inside the Tank was linked to Serenescreen.com. |
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Sachs Discussion Forum (Dec 12th, 2000) As traffic to this site grew, I spoke to Jim and decided to launch a discussion forum for the Sachs Aquarium including praise, questions, plus feature and fish requests. Custom graphics were added 2 weeks later. Eventually, the forum will be housed locally and have more features. |
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3 New Fish! (Dec 12th, 2000) Version .99E of the Aquarium released with the Addis Butterfly, a juvenile French Angel, and the Wimplefish. Awesome fish! |
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Inside the Tank launched! (Dec 11th, 2000) On December 11th, I launched this site. |
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