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mikeszekely

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Everything posted by mikeszekely

  1. mikeszekely
    Well, you are talking about the company that gave us Windows Vista.
  2. mikeszekely
    For David and anyone else who wants anime hair: Get more hair colors.
  3. mikeszekely
    Same for me, but substitute PC for PS3. I build a new box in late spring/early summer, so not only do most games look better on my PC, they tend to be $10-$30 cheaper. I'd prefer to get into the PS3 more, since my 360's a launch-day unit and I'm still dreading it red-ringing on me. In fact, I was going to pick up the new Need For Speed for the PS3, but then I heard that the PS3 version was the worst for dropping frames, and went with the 360 version at the last minute. Oh well, it gave me an excuse to turn my Xbox on and grab the update.
  4. mikeszekely
    Ever so true. Especially Newegg. A few years ago, some stores would occasionally run some sales that might tempt me to shop there, but lately Newegg's prices are leaps and bounds better. And that doesn't even get into their ridiculously fast turn-around times... Crossing my fingers that Newegg has 3.5" drives for black Friday. I'm still content with the 60GB HDD in my PS3, but I'd love a 1TB for my PC.
  5. mikeszekely
    Not through the Netflix app, anyway. You can buy/rent HD movies through the regular Xbox Live Marketplace, ala the AppleTV or similar devices. Me. That's why I'm not installing my games. I'm using what space I have for Rock Band tracks. Any update on that? I don't have a ton of Xbox originals left, but the ones I have I will want to play again.
  6. mikeszekely
    So you went with Gillian Anderson?
  7. mikeszekely
    Definitely as Optimus Prime
  8. mikeszekely
    I went to my local Best Buy ONCE on a Black Friday. BF's are kinda nuts around here in general, but that was the worst. There were ZERO parking spaces maybe 10 minutes before they even opened, and by the time I worked my way back to the TV section, they were already sold out of what I wanted. Transformers Blu-ray for $10 would almost motivate me to do it again. That is, if I didn't already own it.
  9. mikeszekely
    Thanks! I'll look for it today!
  10. mikeszekely
    Where? I'm at 13, now... maybe a third of the way to 14. I know there's more stuff to find in the Wasteland, but it's been awhile since anyone gave me a quest. I'm actually contemplating looking for dad...
  11. mikeszekely
    I'd hacked my previous phone, but I just haven't cared enough to do this one. I care even less because I'm thinking about dumping Verizon and getting an iPhone anyway.
  12. mikeszekely
    Was the story really improved from the first one? I beat the first one once, and played it up to the final boss in co-op, but I never had a clue what was going on.
  13. mikeszekely
    I guess it's hard to predict, what with the poor economic climate and all, but I heard from Kotaku (no idea what source they used) that Blu-ray sales quadrupled in October. If the prices stay low for the holidays and enough people are suckered into new TVs for the digital switch, maybe Blu-ray will really take off in 2009.
  14. mikeszekely
    Man, you guys got a lot of cool tones. Do you make them yourselves? Us poor Verizon customers are stuck with whatever Verizon's offering in their "Get It Now" crap (unless you're into hacking your phone, which surprisingly I'm not). I managed to find some good ones, though. Incoming call: Lion's Transformers theme (from the 1987 movie) Incoming SMS: Peter Cullen saying "Incoming Message from Autobot Headquaters"
  15. mikeszekely
    Okay, that's something we can ALL agree on!
  16. mikeszekely
    Okay, I understand you now. I thought you were talking about the markup versus a standard Deluxe-class figure. I didn't realize you were talking about a markup on a markup.
  17. mikeszekely
    I'm going to hold off on importing anything. The coneheads were never as prominent in the cartoon as the other Seekers, so I can live after custom-painting an Acid Storm as Thundercracker. I'll wait and see if Hasbro will use the Henkei molds, maybe as a store exclusive, and buy them at a more palatable price then. If not, like I said, I can live.
  18. mikeszekely
    Short? Did you stick to the main quest or something? I've been playing for over a week now, and I'm not even 100% sure what the main quest is. I guess I'm supposed to be looking for my dad or something? Guess I'd rather look for bobbleheads.
  19. mikeszekely
    Sure, but while we're considering variables, we might as well consider that Netflix has been renting Blu-rays for a year now, and they're only now deciding that they should charge more for them? I'd guess it's because, despite pundits predicting Blu-ray's demise, they're starting to take off. I'm reading that a lot of people are buying HDTVs (maybe in anticipation of the digital switch?) despite the financial crisis, and I hear that a lot of retailers are tossing in the Blu-rays for added incentive. The question then, is an increased demand screwing with the math and forcing Netflix to stock extra Blu-rays that people quit watching, forcing Netflix to raise the price to remain profitable, or is Netlfix taking advantage of an increased demand for Blu-rays to make an opportunistic extra buck? I'm inclined to believe the latter. But what really floors me is how everyone here seems so quick to rush to Netflix's defense. Maybe I'm being a little cynical about Netflix's motives, and even a bit cheap with my decision to dump Blu-ray rentals, but I've readily conceded that Netflix is within their rights to charge more and the decision to pay more or dump Blu-ray is a personal one. To each his own, right? But man, you guys act like I insulted your mothers.
  20. mikeszekely
    Simple logic. Sure I don't have any numbers, but logically if you're not selling, then you don't need to restock. A limited inventory can service a theoretically unlimited customer base. In simple terms, if you buy a DVD for $15, and charge everyone a dollar to rent it (which is about the cost if you have the 1-at-a-time, unlimited per month plan), then you're going to make money the sixteenth time it's rented. If you buy a Blu-ray for $30, it's going to take twice as many rentals, but the 31st person would still be profit. And if you have a large pool of customers, the cost can be offset by buying fewer Blu-rays. Two DVDs would take as long as one Blu-ray to make money. And I either Netflix does stock fewer Blu-rays or the demand for Blu-rays exceeds DVDs, because new release movies are quickly available on DVD, while the waiting list for new releases on Blu-ray is often weeks. Now, we could debate Netlfix's model by figuring the average cost of a Netflix subscription, the average number Blu-rays that person would watch in a month, the cost of that many movies plus postage against the the cost of the subscriptions, and try to estimate how many people would have to watch each movie before Netflix would recover the cost. And again, while I do concede that Blu-rays cost more than DVDs, I only concede that the number of people who have to rent it before Netflix makes money on it is a higher number than the number of people who would have to watch a DVD. As long as enough people rent the movie, though, and I suspect they have more than enough people ready to rent the movie, it still becomes profit. Look, at the end of the day, Netflix is a business. If they think they can make more money, or make their profit faster, if they charge Blu-ray users a dollar a month premium, that's certainly within their rights. And if you, as a customer, don't mind paying the premium, that's fine too. It's your choice, and you're money, and maybe like eugimon it's worth it to you. But I think you, or Netflix, or anyone else would have a hard time arguing that it's necessary for Blu-rays to remain profitable for them. So when Netflix says "we're going to charge you more because Blu-rays cost more," I'm betting that it's less "Blu-rays are more expensive so we can't afford to offer them if we don't charge a premium" and more "Blu-ray players, HDTVs and home theater equipment necessary to maximize the HD experience that Blu-ray offers are rather expensive, so people who rent Blu-rays are likely have more disposable income and therefore less likely to object to us charging them more if we point out that Blu-rays cost more than DVDs."
  21. mikeszekely
    Except that we're not buying, we're renting. If we were buying Blu-rays, then the extra cost of stocking them would rightly be passed to the customer. But we're just renting. It doesn't matter what the cost is, after X number of rentals the cost is recovered and it's pure profit after that. Netflix also mitigates the extra cost by buying fewer of them. If Netflix buys 50 copies of a DVD for a certain price, and say they need 100 rentals on that title to break even on that investment, they may only buy 5 copies of the Blu-ray, and they may make that investment back in 25 rentals. The "we're charging you more to rent because Blu-rays are more expensive to buy" line smacks of an excuse to milk a demographic that they figure likely has more income and possibly will think less about paying the extra. I, for one, refuse to be taken advantage of.
  22. mikeszekely
    Be ABSOLUTELY certain the card will fit. Get dimensions, and do some measuring. A friend of mine has a 3850 and he was quite shocked at the size. I have a 9800, and it dwarfs his 3850. In fact, my home-built computer sits in a mammoth Antec P182 full-size ATX case, and I had to remove one of the hard drive bays. Also, check the power connectors on the card, and make sure the power supply has the necessary cabling. I've seen cards that require no dedicated power rail, some that use 4-pin, some that use 6-pin, and mine uses a pair of 4-pins. Antec's website has a PSU calculator that'll tell you if your power supply is adequate for a certain setup. Without know exactly what kind of hardware you've got, but going by what you listed, I estimated you can use the 3870 and be sitting at about 300w. If you use the 9800, you'll be around 340w. So the PSU should hold up fine as long as you don't spring for something on the NVIDIA's GTX 2 line (although I don't recommend ATI's X48 series either, as that'd put you awfully close), providing the card can actually fit in your case.
  23. mikeszekely
    Yes. As long as Cy-Kill is in it, it counts for me.
  24. mikeszekely
    Where in the world are you at? $50 each is $39 vs the MSRP. At retail, it's more like $35-$42.
  25. mikeszekely
    A dollar extra a month isn't such a big deal in the sense that if they were just raising the base price across the board for everyone a buck to stay profitable, I wouldn't bat an eyelash. But the whole "Blu-rays are more expensive, so we're going to have to charge you more if you want them" excuse doesn't quite fly. For starters, as the "Very long wait" status for most of the movies in my queue will attest to, they buy fewer Blu-rays. And while Blu-rays do cost more, we're not buying them, so you don't have to pass the extra expense on at a 1-1 rate, or even a 1-10 rate. After the movie's been rented enough times, the initial cost has been recovered and it's making money on the investment. So, at the end of the day, pay a dollar extra a month for the "privilege" of waiting longer for the move, just to have a moderately better picture? Especially when Netflix for me is mostly for comedies and stuff I'd only want to see once, and most of the movies I'd want to see in HD I'm buying anyway? Pass.
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