rayzoredge

As evil as it is to feed the Wally Conglomerate Machine, I frequent Wally World because, for the most part, they do have a little of everything, plus it's cheaper there. Being on a budget all my life, it's hard to go anywhere else without wondering if I'm actually saving or spending more.It works out for most people nowadays to go to Walmart to get their stuff, because they do sell cheap stuff (in quality and in price). But you get what you pay for, and sometimes more. I have things that have lasted me years and I have things that break within a year's time. But that's not the fault of Walmart... that's the fault of whoever makes your product. Cheaper brands are a hit-or-miss with things... you just have to figure out what, and by experience and other people's experiences. I never shop for electronics at Walmart because I always research the crap out of it, then try to get it as cheap as possible online used or refurbished (on eBay or using Froogle). Also, for TVs and other electronic hardware, they usually snag the "lower end" of brands (Vizio for TVs) with a few showcases of the decent end with "better" brands (Samsung, Sony)... but they never have the "good stuff." (Not knocking Vizio, because they do have good TVs, but the brand recognition for them isn't really there... yet.) Same with furniture... it's all Mainstays, Basics, and whatever brand there is for cheap furniture. (If you want something that'll last you a while with normal wear and tear, go to a discount furniture store... unless you're not that hard on pressed-wood stuff, which has also lasted me, personally, a while, but not so much in a lot of cases with people I know.) All the small stuff is not bad as long as you take care of your things... but for the most part, you can't really expect lifetimes of use out of things you got at Walmart. A decade or so, at best... methinks.When it comes to food, I don't expect the freshest stuff ever, and therefore, I'm not disappointed. It's good enough for me. I don't care that the meat isn't freshly slaughtered. I don't care if the apples or the oranges are slightly older than what I could get at a farmer's market. Dry goods are dry goods. Food is food. I'm not that picky and I can live off of Great Value stuff, but that's me. If you have a particular taste for things and are a connoisseur of food, you're already doing an injustice to yourself and complaining about Walmart's quality is just redundant and stupid.The customer service is fine by my standards. You're greeted or not at the door, you're greeted at the cash register and either they don't say much or I strike a conversation with them (or joke with them), pay, grab my stuff, and waltz out. I don't expect a heck of a lot out of people because I know they're doing their jobs. They're trained to be friendly but where's the sincerity in that? If I have a Walmart person come up to me to help me find something, I would rather have that than one that really doesn't give a crap about something I could have found by myself anyway. Most likely, too, that person proactively coming up to me will have a clue as to what he or she is talking about, instead of me snagging the nearest person coming out of the warehouse and asking him where medium-sized Kotex with wings can be located or what the difference is between this LCD HDTV and that plasma HDTV. People that complain about customer service seem to be pretty picky themselves and probably need to be reminded that the world doesn't revolve around them (unless they're big enough to warrant a gravitational field )... but of course, it's a different story if someone is outwardly rude. And if they are with no good reason, report them and be on your way! Stop being butthurt and continue with life already! And if you're really complaining that much, stop going there and go somewhere else. Obviously they don't want your business, since you don't want theirs.

x2 on that notion. Edited my previous post to reflect that. I think that it's rather hard to vote for people because, personally, I don't really pay attention that much to who's really here... just the people that ARE here at a given point in time. Some of us, like misanthrope, come in and blow our minds away with a very debatable point or at least provoke thought on another perspective of things, and then there are some of us who live here but post drivel and repeat the sentiments of everyone above them. (Sometimes I read threads and although I do agree and/or want to throw out my consoling thoughts, I leave the thread be since it's not any more comforting for me to add one more "I'm sorry" to the thousands of other "I'm sorry" posts.) (However, I will drive in a point if it deserves "driving," like misanthrope's valuable posting. There are other older members here that come and go with the wind too. For some reason, WaterMonkey sticks in my mind probably because he seems like a discussion instigator... in a good way. He probably made three posts I've actually read, but they were good enough for me to remember him by name. Same with serverph. And sheepdog. And buxgoddess. And TikiPrincess, when she was active. And bthaxor. And SaraInWasteland. Same with a good handful of people that I've mentioned and not mentioned, in the past and present. It's a tough call.

Haha... how the heck did I get Tech Geek? I only discuss what I understand and what I have an interest in for technology... but as far as knowing it all, I'm nowhere near it. Thanks for the nominations, though!Since I usually stop by once a workday and have my occasional long absences, I'm inclined not to throw too much of a serious vote towards anyone for anything, but I will still chip in my two biased cents (nominations/honorable mentions) for what I've seen so far from members. Note my bias, since I mostly participate in threads that involve technology... which probably explains why I was nominated for Tech Geek. -Trapper of the Year: truefusionMost Valuable Poster: truefusion, rvalkass, anwii, k_nitin_r, BuffaloHelp, kobra500, rpgsearcherz, BaniBoy, inverse_bloom, mahesh2K, rob86, serverph, Spudd, The Simpleton, misanthropeMod of the year: truefusionMost Helpful Member: truefusion, rvalkass, BuffaloHelpMost Improved Member: Ash-BashGFXtrap GFX Elite: Not sure7Gears Gamer of the Year: Not sure1337 Programmer: jlhaslip, truefusion, rvalkass, galexcdComedian of the Year: Not sureShoutboxer of the Year: Not sureLives at Xisto: Ash-Bash, truefusion, rvalkass, jhalslip, anwii, inverse_bloom, The Simpleton, sheepdog, Echo_of_thunder, rpgsearcherz, mahesh2K, TheDisturbedOne, Nameless_, -Sky-Tech Geek: truefusion, rvalkass, jhalslip, tramposche, bluedragon, k_nitin_r, Ash-Bash, BuffaloHelp, Saint Michael, shadowx, WatermonkeyWelcome Committee: Fractured.LogicTrap Eye for the Poor Guy: Not sureCrazy Reviewer Person: Not sureDr. Phil Wannabe: anwii, sheepdogMost Creative Trapper: Not surePerson most likely to be Bill Gates Boss: Not sure-I think that truefusion deserves what's coming to him because I've seen him all over Xisto with good input in discussions, always helping out, and I'm just going to assume that he does his job as a mod. This also plays into the Mod of the Year award since I think that a good mod doesn't just volunteer to do the dirty work, but also provide as part of the community as well, and he definitely does just that. Saint Michael does deserve an honorable mention, since he does the same and is a good guy all around, but I haven't seen him around as much as truefusion recently... and that's weird since SM is known to spam. There are too many valuable posters to mention, but I included those that I recognized by name that provided good and/or interesting input in threads. Some of us have our run with posting, then disappear for long periods of time only to come back every now and then. Others seem to lurk and make good, informative posts on a rare but appreciated occasion. I hope I mentioned most of you, lurkers included. Helpful members are always awesome and almost plentiful, so it's hard to nominate just one person here. Since I frequent the tech threads, the tech guys are always around to provide some good insight on a lot of things. Not only do they appear out of nowhere to give some deep depth into the matter at hand, but they do it enough to deserve more than the title of Most Helpful Member. And although BuffaloHelp isn't around as much as everyone else, he always gives you more than you ask for when trying to troubleshoot. I have to say that the most improved member of this year was Ash-Bash. He went from one-line posting/quasi-spamming to actually putting out some encouraging posts and information that was of contribution to the threads he frequented. I know he's not exactly the most popular member here, but we're all different people with different personalities and backgrounds, and without a doubt, he's earned the title of Most Improved just based on his posting habits. 1337 programmers would be hard to judge without actually witnessing any real work, but from what I've observed, the members I mentioned seem to know their snuff like the back of their hands. I have to say that I can't really throw out a Comedian of the Year shout-out since I have a very weird sense of humor and a lot of it is in the realm of things we can't really liberally say on Xisto without getting into trouble... A ton of you literally live here. Like I said, if I can recognize you guys by name, you may have a problem. Seek help immediately... but keep up the good posting. You guys are the more hardcore base of what keeps Xisto alive and well. However, don't let it discourage you if I didn't mention your name, since a) I have a bad memory, you may have been really active and I just don't frequent those threads, c) you are part of an awesome community that relies on each and every one of you, no matter your part. The Tech Geek nominations should rightfully go to those that know their snuff. I'm not saying I'm absolutely retarded, but I do want to say that when it comes to technology, I can look to the words of the people that I deem Tech Geeks of Xisto for advice, insight, and good reading material when they put something out. Some of you may remember Fractured.Logic. She was probably one of the friendliest people I know online, and I'm sure she deserves to be mentioned for the Welcoming Committee. Anwii and sheepdog win with Dr. Phil/Phyllis Wannabe since I frequently see them chipping their two cents into a lot of threads with OPs seeking advice, counseling, and consoling. Keep it up, guys.

Ash-Bash... it's not necessarily about being jealous, it's about the principal of building a machine out of the most expensive, bleeding-edge components that money can buy and that you seem to be having your parents pay every penny of it. You're not even building it yourself! (I actually thought you were going to, but not like it matters, since you seem to have an idea of how to put one together anyway.) That's what disgusts a lot of people... even me, but I have a bias against bleeding-edge things and see it as a waste of money because technology becomes obsolete so quickly. That's why I made that comparison between your dream rig here and my much-cheaper-in-comparison laptop... because Joe Schmoe that saves his money from his minimum-wage job wouldn't even bother and either settle for a mainstream rig that he bought with his own money, earned with his own work and not mooching off of others. My comparison shows that Ray waited over a few years to save up to purchase a refurbished laptop for $650 that runs the same games that you're aiming to play, and it runs them well. The biggest factor is that I spent $650, and you're spending ?3240.54, which is the rough equivalent of $5284 USD. That's over EIGHT times the amount you spent over me... and I can play Crysis and Fallout 3 just fine with high settings. (Mind you, not max... high.) Enthusiasts will probably be able to justify the money they put into their systems that become obsolete in less than half a year's time, but most of us are normal people that don't have the luxury of being able to get whatever they want. If I'm way-off base here and you do spend your own cash, disregard, but if you really are buying all this stuff thanks to mommy and daddy, it's rather disgusting, in my opinion. The one thing I can cred you with, though, is that you don't boast about the fact that your parents are rich. (However, throwing out system specs like that is an inadvertent way of doing it.) Anyway, if you do decide to stick with this configuration, please give out some FRAPS benchmarks. I'll be very interested to take a look at what I missed out on by saving over $4600. Did you take another look into keyboards and mice, by the way? I was serious about the ergonomics. Believe me when I say that you'll pay for it later... I'm only 24 and my wrists have slight spasms from time to time thanks to crappy keyboards. Also, make sure to hit up the Advanced Settings for Power Options in Windows 7. There's a ton of cool tweaks you can do to save power (and elongate the life of your hardware). Do it up first and foremost lest you forget about it. I'm not a tree hugger, but I am a lover of saving on my electricity bill and on being able to enjoy my computer as long as I can before something goes kaput...

This is why commenting is important to the community and anti-virus and anti-malware is a must. If you're going to be jumping out of a plane, best be sporting a parachute AND a backup... know what I mean? Then you either tell people that skydiving is fun or scary as hell and that your parachute worked (or not, inadvertently with your obituary or hospital guests ). Word gets around, the good parachutes are used and the bad ones left behind, and if skydiving is for you, you'll continue to do it. If not, others will try it out and either continue or quit. If you have a bad experience, it's your choice whether to chalk it up to eventual incidence and keep truckin' or quit it and leave it forever.

I must be on the bleeding edge of knowing about technology, because I consider this old news. I think that, for the most part, magazines will stay traditional to what they are today and that advertisements will be the video content that is being demonstrated here. We might get even fancier and get interactive articles later in the future where they can embed videos to enable richer content.I don't think that this will be prevalent until at least a few years pass. Even then, only major publications would be affected. The question is, will advertisers and magazine publishers pass on the costs of "e-paper" onto the consumer? (Probably not the advertiser, but you know what I mean.)

I think that this game comes short of what we're used to nowadays. Reminds me of the days of MUDs. Used to delve into those every now and then at the library... this game would be an upgrade to the genre, since MUDs were text-based.

For the RAM, take into account the specifications for latency and timing as well as speed and compatibility with the motherboard. It won't be much of a real-time difference unless you're going for benchmark improvement. (If the difference is a few bucks, you should pony them up for better specs... but if the price difference is significant, I wouldn't bother.) No reason why not to opt for a larger screen. I honestly think that you won't really be able to tell much of a difference day-to-day, but if they're the same price, go for it. Just make sure that the native resolution is what you want it to be and something that your future graphics card will play nicely with. Also, compare connectivity options... that extra inch in screen real estate probably costs you somewhere else with features, display quality, etc. Save money and buy the graphics card next month. You never lose out on waiting for technology to become cheaper, but you do lose out if you splurge what you have now on a graphics card instead of saving to get a graphics card that will serve you well and future-proof you better than what you can get now. Be patient and you'll be rewarded with a better graphics card that can render games better... and take this time to research what you REALLY want. (Compare DirectX compatibility, DDR2/DDR3 VRAM and amount, benchmark results, etc.) System drivers will come with the hardware itself if you are buying things piece by piece. However, your best bet for updated drivers is to go to the manufacturer's website to download the latest and greatest. Sometimes this is a pain in the butt, though, because sometimes the drivers you attempt to download don't fit the hardware you buy and just don't work, or could cause different problems, or you may not even be able to find the driver, period. I would install using the provided drivers shipped with the hardware, then update them using Windows 7 and Device Manager.

I believe Microsoft discontinued the Arcade variant, although I'm sure you're looking to eBay or some other reseller to snag one. Isn't your warranty still up to snuff? If not, you're probably better off paying to get it fixed instead of stepping down to the Arcade. Maybe you'll get lucky and get a motherboard replacement as well as the heat sink upgrade with the fix I believe the backwards-compatibility is actually emulated and this emulation is fixed (not on a HD, so that's irrelevant) since the Xbox 360 can only play SOME and not ALL original Xbox titles. Keep that in mind. Then again, why wouldn't you want a HD? It's a future-proof investment since most games do utilize the HD in some form or another, to include additional content, save games, etc.

Short answer: No. Make sure that you set up your BIOS so that the HD with Windows 7 on it is the primary and that the secondary hard drive is the slave. If you booted up into Windows 7 to format the secondary hard drive, you're golden anyway, so disregard. You can use the secondary hard drive for storage. What I do personally is have an external HD that I store all of my personal stuff on and I use the eSATA interface to keep access, read, and write speeds at a decent rate, and if for some reason my laptop hard drive bites the dust, I lose nothing. (I also have a clone of this external hard drive in the case THAT one dies too.)

You are not alone. I used to use Torrent Finder as a meta-crawler, but since BTJunkie comes up first, I end up using just BTJunkie anyway.

"Tweaking" uTorrent is moreso optimizing it instead of going for "what's in the box." That's like going out and buying a dSLR camera and never using the functions to take the pictures you want. Like I said, go with what I was saying about doing the math and calculating for your connection. You will not download anything faster than what your bandwidth allows, obviously. However, you CAN maximize that connection for your upload and download transfer rates. Remember that the closer you are to reaching the caps for your upload and download for your P2P, the more hampered your Internet browsing will be (obviously). Upload speed should be independent of download speed. They shouldn't be "clashing" or anything like that... it's a two-lane highway there. @Anwii: You can set up the number of simultaneous downloads through the options instead of falsifying your connection speed using the Speed Guide. Like I said, though, if you don't provide your own numbers to "tweak" uTorrent, your computer will try to make a set number of connections multiplied by the number of active uploads/downloads, and if you bombard your router with all of these incoming and outgoing requests, your Internet surfing will suffer. That's why I suggest you tone down the number of connections manually (not active downloads). Also, in that way, by "tweaking," you can actually have good transfer rates without killing your household Internet connection. I don't know what the real differences are between uTorrent versions... you'd best be off reviewing the revision history. I know that before, uTorrent was downloaded as a stand-alone application. Now, you are presented with installation, although I suspect that it simply just places the application in a standard location to prevent people from accidental moving or deleting the uTorrent application (i.e. into the Program Files\uTorrent folder).

Instinctual impulse: Check your RAM. I've never encountered a BSOD when doing my infamous wipe-and-reinstall-Windows-XP kick. Everything is being loaded from the CD, so maybe the CD is bad (has a corrupted system file that Setup needs) or your RAM is failing (if you're really "fighting" your computer). Replace or off the offending RAM stick and/or try another XP CD if you have access to one.Also, I recommend that you keep a short HD clip handy to test out your setups. I'm a geek so I keep the uber-cool Halo Landfall video handy for when I'm bored and when I want to watch/test 720p HD, but it does come in handy in situations like these.It sucks that you've been dealing with this for almost a month. Damn you technology... damn you.

I don't understand why Intel even showcased Larabee if it wasn't impressive to begin with. Yes, engineers and project designers were probably wow'd by its capabilities, but to Joe Schmoe, it's not going to matter what it can do unless it can compete with discrete graphics card manufacturers. Someone didn't think that idea through... and thanks to that, no one is excited about Larabee anymore. We can actually wait for mid-2010.

All this talk about parents makes me wonder if Ash-Bash actually paid for this stuff or if he's being wicked spoiled. In my opinion, "heavy gaming" is a bad farce but decent excuse to purchase so much computing power. I'm a cheap bum myself so I've lived with lower-end machines for a majority of my geek life, never having experienced a dual core until my wife's Dell Inspiron 1501, and even after finally splurging and upgrading to my Asus G50VT-X5 with a 2.13GHz dual core and 4GB of RAM (from the 2GB I've been used to), it's nice to have better speeds, but if a quad core upgrade for me will be like going from single to dual core, I don't even want to think about getting a computer with a quad core and 8GB of RAM for HALF of what Ash-Bash (or his parents) paid for this rig. Aside from bragging rights (which I don't care about), a slight speed increase (seconds to a couple of minutes... talking about real-time, general tasking), multimedia/CAD processing power (where it actually does count for an upgrade), and increased frame rates in games (again, where it counts for an upgrade), I actually do frown upon such exorbitant purchases, but hey, it's not my money... only my two cents. If you compared my laptop with Ash-Bash's rig here with a game of Fallout 3 (since he is a "heavy gamer") at the highest graphical and processor settings, you would not be able to discern a difference in performance. On benchmarks, he might get a massive increase in frame rates (something like 60FPS vs. 120FPS), but would you honestly be able to see the real-time difference? If you could, is it enough of a difference where you would even care? Note that I have a laptop and this is a desktop rig, and that I have an NVIDIA 9800GS with 512MB of VRAM vs. 2 x ATI Radeon 4890 with 1GB VRAM. It's a different story with Crysis though... I have smooth, fluid gameplay with "medium high" settings at my native resolution (1366x768), but I'm sure that Ash-Bash's rig can handle the highest settings. However, I'm mostly limited with the capabilities of my graphics card, and I know this because the folks at Tom's Hardware have proven that games don't utilize 8GB of RAM... or even 4GB, really. (How do you think your games run smoothly WITH Windows processes as well as background tasks and programs you already have running in tandem?) If I were to have a desktop, I could just easily upgrade my video card, but that would seem rather trifle for me to upgrade an already-capable graphics card that I can play most games with, and downright stupid to put money towards such a slight upgrade. (Again, I am a cheap bum so my perspective is rather biased and skewed towards saving money... something that most people can agree with.) For those of you wishing for "dream rigs," try to keep in mind that you are most better off taking the hand-me-downs and if you have the cash, to upgrade to the second-newest thing out there when it comes to technology to get the most bang from your buck. Of course, this is all relevant to what you will be using your computer for and the type of user you are. I consider myself a quasi-power user and occasional gamer, so I like having decent speed and being able to play games, which works out since I aim for good specifications when it comes to picking out a new machine. I also keep in mind the power consumption of the rig, which is why I deal with laptops and not desktops. (I'm willing to sacrifice customization ability and a slight increase in price for power savings and portability.) If you read my previous thread about laptops vs. desktops from back in the day, I pointed out with theoretical math that the cost of ownership with a laptop compared to a desktop balances out within the third to fourth year of ownership, since you pay more for power consumption with a desktop. Of course, all of this is irrelevant if you have parents that are able and willing to spoil you, if you don't have to worry about ye 'ole electricity bill, if you have the money and don't care about burning it away (which will bite you back in the future... trust me), or if you're stoic in the ways of just getting what you want, no matter what the cost. Now, on to OP's rig. As much as I just seemingly-bashed the crap out of your choice to buy such a power rig, I'm not going to be more or less partial to what you built it with, which is what really matters. Does your motherboard support USB 3.0? I believe it doesn't... which I'm surprised that you're not considering the Asus P7P55D-E Premium which does have USB 3.0 support (as well as the new SATA 6Gbps standard) if you're also aiming to future-proof yourself as much as possible. I know I can't afford to snag the latest and greatest every year, and maybe you can, but to save you some money I would suggest that if you're going to splurge on your hardware now, protect yourself with the newest standards so that you can utilize them years down the road. There might not be many USB 3.0 devices out yet, but remember that it's all backwards-compatible. I find it funny that there's so much stuff in this rig, yet you settle with a DVD burner. Bravo. No gripes there, really... I still think that BluRay is too much of a trend to go out and buy movies now in that format, but maybe you could benefit from a BR player or burner. Personal preference, of course. I know you (or your parents) can probably afford it, but you might want to rethink your choices on the keyboard and mouse, not because I think that Apple is overpriced, but because I think you are setting yourself up for failure because they are not exactly very ergonomically-friendly. You say you're a heavy gamer, yet you pick out two peripherals that are going to kill your wrists. Instead of going for elitist Apple products because they have Steve Jobs's aura on them, go for something that will work for you. I see that Logitech and Microsoft have keyboards that are conformed to the natural placement of a user's hand (notable the Logitech Wave), and a mouse would be something purely of your preference and how YOU use a mouse. (I have small hands so I feel at home with a Logitech MX3200 mouse, and it has a ton of extra features that you could hotkey to gaming purposes.) Also, as a gamer, I'm sure you eat at the keyboard, so maybe the Logitech MX3200 keyboard and mouse combo would be good for you, since it utilizes Agion, an anti-microbial treatment to prohibit the growth of... well, nastiness. It might not be too late to send things back if you decide to heed my advice or the advice of anyone else here. Otherwise, enjoy the crap out of that machine... you're going to have to put a lot of time and abuse into that thing to justify that price tag.

Well played. I see what you did there.

Aren't things still the same as of late, as far as design goes? AMD still has its on-board cache die advantage but for some reason, Intel is slightly better at multimedia processing?I think that with the ubiquity of Intel, AMD is only around because it is the only competitor. I don't know if there's really enough of a reason to go for one processor brand over the other as of right now since the differences are only noticeable on the benchmark level. Today's CPUs are fast enough that minor differences in performance results are rather negligible, and I hate to sound biased, but the last thing I heard about AMD was their tri-core processors. It would make sense that AMD is the better design (since Intel's computations have to travel back and forth via a pipe to the Northbridge), but myriad benchmarks say otherwise. Anyone care to add some real insight? I've owned both brands and been happy with both... but then again, my beef is with raw clock power and not so much the minute comparisons between the two. And on another note, Intel has the money and the ubiquity to be compatible with third-party programs, support additional features, and power Apple products.

I didn't think that much of the differences between the two, but like you, I started to wonder and picked out a few things that I've noticed myself, not to mention the benchmarks that I've seen and the general consensus.W7 feels much faster than Vista SP2. Not just by feeling, but by actual numbers. I don't know why Vista likes to take over a couple of minutes to fire up Spore when it takes less than 10 seconds (if that) to fire up any other game on my computer with Windows 7. I don't know why Vista seems a bit sluggish when multi-tasking when I can fire up Firefox, Word, Fallout 3, browse my computer contents with Explorer, and do all other sorts of stuff without missing a beat. I almost feel like I'm doing a Mac vs. PC bash, but to me, I've drank the Kool-Aid AND experienced it too with both operating systems... and it's a wonder why people STILL stick to Vista. I believe the coding behind the scenes is different, although the Aero interface is the same, both operating systems utilize Vista drivers, and the general feel of both operating systems SEEM the same.From an interface level, Windows 7 gets rid of the Show Desktop button and moves it to the far right of the taskbar, giving you Aero Peek (which I still think is kind of useless unless you want to see what image you have currently for your desktop background or to see what's on your desktop) and clicking it minimizes everything. There is no Switch Windows button, since it's rather redundant with "Windows key + Tab" or "Alt + Tab." Jump lists are pretty neat for some programs that support it, and the large preview is a nice touch when you mouse-over an item in the taskbar. (I saw that Vista had that too, but it's a smaller preview that's not as useful... but maybe it's dependent on Aero options.)I'm not sure if Vista has it, but you can activate a slideshow desktop background. I guess you can put WMVs as backgrounds too if you have Dream Scene, but that's not really an arguable point since it doesn't come stock with Windows 7.If you get the Ultimate version, XP mode apparently lets you step back if your programs are not working nicely with the new OS. I'm not exactly sure how this differs from compatibility mode, but I'm guessing that it fires up a virtual XP environment instead of running programs in a compatibility mode. Again, not sure how this is different, but if it works, it works...I haven't personally explored Vista as much as I have with WIndows 7, so these points may be off-base and/or biased. Can you search within directories in Vista (like you can in Ubuntu)? Can you tweak with volume levels by program? What else is there that I'm missing? (I'm sure that I'm missing a LOT.)

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought TPB and MiniNova were torrent trackers, which basically means that they just track torrents, not necessarily host them. It would make sense that if they were to shut down operations in a few departments that we may lose some tracking of torrents and torrents that are solely tracked by just those trackers, but for the most part, it's business as usual with casual torrent users since most torrents have multiple (or multitudes) of trackers. Don't get me wrong... it's still a big blow at the PR level and at the seeming fact that organizations are actually doing something about piracy, but to most of us, the real damage won't set in until more popular trackers go down and we start to lose a significant amount of torrents. Maybe this might be the trend, or maybe it stops now since I don't really know of any other "large" torrent trackers besides TPB or Mininova. Demonoid's BEEN down for months, it seems... "permanent maintenance" seems like a quiet way to go if that's what really happened, doesn't it?

I'll try to help you make an educated decision.For the most part, I aim for hardware specs myself just so I can get the best bang for my buck. The brand doesn't matter too much to me since I don't rely on customer or technical support to fix my own computer, but it might be important to you, in which case I hear that Dell and HP are all right. (It's hard to make that call because some people are hit-and-miss, have horror stories, and their quality of service is always changing.) I believe that Dell makes their computers with cheap parts but that's why they are price-friendly, so if you're looking for a computer that will last you at least a few years, Dell will be good.I've been very happy with HP computers and owned two of them, which one of them I sold for cash and the other I'm looking to sell to update my fiancee's computer. (It used to be mine... go figure that one. ) Never had any real hardware-related problems. Their stuff is pretty solid, in my book, for build quality. HP also sent me recovery discs for one of the laptops, no questions asked, after I requested them since I bought that particular laptop on eBay and it didn't come with any discs. In my book, that's damn cool.Usually, my buddy and I [and some of you may know that I] complain about the Toshibas at work. I think, in all honesty, that they are a hit or miss. My buddy's old laptop had some design flaws that caused a handful of very inconvenient problems, not to mention that it's a heat hog. His newer one seems to be playing nice, though. My old laptop had the power board fail and the keyboard/trackpoint design is still horrible, since our IT guy gave me a replacement laptop of the same make and model so I'm stuck with a laptop with an unusable built-in keyboard and mouse. However, looking in retrospect, I think that model is probably six years old, so for lasting this long without going completely kaput, I guess maybe it's okay. But I wouldn't spend a dollar of my own money on a Toshiba laptop.I'm currently working off of an Asus and this thing is built rock solid too. The only thing I have to complain so far about it is that it runs very hot (as you can probably keep your coffee warm on the left side of the laptop where the vent is) but then again, it's a gaming machine and heat is rather unavoidable with a high-powered graphics card.I used to own a Dell but sold it to upgrade, and it treated me fairly well: no actual hardware problems. Never had to replace anything on it. I adopted Christel's old Dell after giving her my HP (thinking it was dead due to a few spills too many onto the keyboard), but I brought it back to life and aside from couple of missing keys thanks to our bird, it treated me very well too. I had a chance to talk to customer support a couple of times with Dell, and although they're not always native-English speaking folk, they always walked me through everything (probably scripted, I'm sure) for troubleshooting with Dell's "secret squirrel keys," and they sent me a replacement keyboard and hard drive with no real hassle. Also, to note, she now has a Dell Studio 17 and loves how she can play her World of Warcraft and do everything she could with the older HP, but better. Of course, if you asked my opinion, I think that the Dell is pretty solid so far and would be so much better if she let me blow Vista away to install XP or 7 on it, but she wants what she wants... That, and I think that the design aesthetics need a LOT of work from the gray-ish interior that we love about our dull Dells. I've never owned an Apple. However, I've read up just about everything on Apple just to figure out why there were so many good stories and almost nothing on the bad... and I deduced that Apple is a pretty shady company when it comes to PR, but as far as hardware quality, they're as good as a PC.The differences between Apple's computers and Windows computers is a handful that, to me, doesn't justify the price difference. PC laptops are much cheaper in price and are able to run Windows, Linux, and in some cases, OSX. Apple laptops can run Windows, Linux, and natively runs OSX. There are less than 10% of computer users that run OSX, which means that Windows is the largest target for malware and therefore seems to be the least secure operating system, although it's actually OSX that's less secure (but no one is aiming to write password stealers and viruses just to get at the less-than-10% of the market, hence security through obscurity). With this being said, developers aim to develop software for Windows machines because they are so much more prevalent, and trying to get some programs to work in OSX is either a pain or won't work at all unless you dual-boot OSX and Windows on a Macbook, in which case you have to buy Windows for the Macbook... it just gets expensive. The hardware in Mac machines are not any more superior than PCs since they all run off of the same hardware: a computer is a computer. However, Apple specifically designs its hardware to be as efficient and user-friendly as possible with its operating system, which is why only some PCs can run OSX, but any Mac can run Windows.(The Mac hardware statement is only specific to the hardware inside the laptop.) That means that upgrading for OSX is very finicky, but then again, the most upgrading you'll do for any laptop is just the RAM and not much else.(For anyone wondering if I'm an Apple hater, you can figure that I own an iPod Touch 2G 16GB and love it to pieces because it is actually worth what you pay for... at used prices. Not to mention that I discovered and fell in love with the vast amount of power behind jailbreaking it... and now it's like a Netbook, but even smaller!)

Sorry for the late response... I lost this post and didn't think about it until more use of the eSATA feature of the external hard drive. It seems that these speeds are right on the money, although I'm not sure what is causing the inconsistencies. I'm reporting that I do see faster performance, but only up to twice the speed of USB 2.0, which may or may not be correct. I looked up benchmark results and they seem consistent with my findings. The inconsistencies that I found, however, note that it almost seems to "pick up speed" or "slow down" during file transfers over eSATA, like moving a variety of files from 10KB to 6GB and whatnot, either matching USB 2.0's highest speeds, going even slower than that, and then climbing back up to double the usual performance of a USB 2.0 connection. Maybe Windows 7 is incorrectly measuring the transfer rate... I don't know, but I was definitely sorely surprised to find out the hard way that eSATA, although much faster than USB 2.0, is not what I expected. Then again, I'm sure the speeds are comparable with current transfer rates of internal SATA hard drives in a desktop, now that I think of it, so this whining of mine is unnecessary and stupid. In comparison: Speed of SATA: 192 to 384 MB/s (theoretical) Speed of eSATA: about 131 MB/s (real-world) Speed of USB 2.0: 60 MB/s (theoretical) Something else that I am finding, though, that is bit of a pain is that when I connect my external hard drive using an eSATA cable, my computer won't recognize the drive without multiple attempts of re-inserting the cable, either on the computer's port or into the external hard drive's port. Not sure if this is the fault of the cable itself, the OS, or how the port behaves... I usually end up plugging everything in, turning the hard drive on, finding out it isn't being recognized, unplugging and plugging the cable back into the computer port, THEN having it recognized. Anyone else having this issue?

To me, it makes sense that you would be contributing to something detrimental by cracking your joints, knuckles, etc. Over a LONG period of time, of course.Think about it this way: You are producing a cracking sound by "popping" and "cracking" two bones together, having caused friction. Repeated occurrences lead to wear and tear of materials, leading to the dreaded possibility of arthritis.I crack my knuckles a lot out of habit... I'm fine without doing it, but it feels funny when you go to crack them and can't, which leaves you with that funny feeling of having to crack them. I've cracked my back once, and although it felt good, I'm sure it's not good for you to be doing that repeatedly.But hey, I'm just going off of personal thought and not actual medical theory.

Do you have any power options that cause it to go dim? What OS are you using? Any third-party applications that may affect the display? There may also be the possibility of bad wiring, in which case you can double check by cracking the case and taking a peek at how the wires are. They may be kinked, or somehow got loose, or maybe the display is on its way out. Maybe for some reason it's unable to maintain the brightness setting because of an issue involving the capability of handling that much power now. I would have a fellow geek take a look at it before thinking about replacing it. In most cases, LCDs can cost you an arm and a leg, which kind of makes you wonder if you should just replace the laptop. (If I remember right, a friend of mine was looking to replace hers but replacement displays cost upwards of $200 USD.) If you have a spare old monitor (like the CRT monitors we ditched in favor for flat screens) or if you can find one, that's a free or cheap solution that may be viable if you use your laptop primarily in one place.

I have not experienced this sort of problem at all, but I do have a slightly similar issue. Windows 7 itself runs like a charm, but it doesn't seem to play nicely with some programs. Firefox 3.5.5 loves to become unresponsive at times and Fallout 3 likes to crash randomly... not often, but enough to bug me when I'm in the middle of a quest and I don't save it after playing it for 20 minutes. Firefox, strangely, doesn't crash... it just becomes unresponsive. Microsoft PowerPoint (from Office XP) also doesn't play nicely, sometimes crawling with a 2.13GHz dual core processor and 4GB of RAM. (That's rather unacceptable... and I'd hate to have to upgrade to Office 2007, although OpenOffice may be a foreseeable replacement.)Other than those minor issues, Windows 7 seems to run pretty damn well in my book, up to par with XP and much, much better than the sluggish feel of Vista.Do you think that it might be your programs that aren't playing nicely with Windows 7 or vice versa? Maybe you're attempting to run Windows 7 on a machine that theoretically is able to run it, but shouldn't be? Performance benchmarks suggest that W7 is comparable with XP in almost every performance test (except for networking, which W7 completely kills XP with awesome figures), but I don't know if W7 taxes a machine more than XP would. Try running your programs in a compatibility mode or run them under XP mode to see if that works without the frequent freezing and crashing.Like I said, W7 is pretty solid in my book. For an initial release, it's pretty damn good, considering that I usually wait until SP2 to expect it to work quasi-flawlessly.

Er, you can support more than 32GB with FAT32. I know because I have a 500GB hard drive formatted with the FAT32 filesystem to get it to work with my Xbox 360.You just gotta use the right tools... *coughGPartedcough*