mikeszekely

Well, I love building desktops. I love it so much I'm thinking about grabbing a few certifications and starting my own business custom-building computers for rich kids who want that one-of-a-kind gaming rig but lack the technical know-how to do it themselves. But I personally feel that laptops in general are a pain in the ass to work with. Between that and the fact that I do prefer Mac OS X to any flavor of Windows, I'm happy to have home build desktops (and an HTPC that I also intend to use as a retro gaming box with some emulators), but I really do enjoy Mac laptops. I didn't mean to come down so hard on Linux... I restored an old eMachines my brother threw out with Kubuntu, sold it, restored a Dell my uncle threw out with Vector Linux, sold it, and installed Yellow Dog Linux on my PS3. I had SUSE 10.0 in a virtual machine on my MacBook at one time, but never bothered to reinstall it when I upgraded the hard drive. If I can talk my wife into getting a new computer for herself, I want to take her old one and install something from the Open Solaris kit I ordered, maybe Belenix. I'm really not adverse to open source OSes at all, as I get more of a kick out of installing new software and messing around with it than I do PC gaming. I think my point was really that Linux (with a KDE desktop) is a great alternative to Windows for the computer illiterate for people who want to breathe new life into an old machine and really one want to get on the internet. And yeah, if you really take the time to learn Linux and the Terminal, maybe get Linux certified, Linux distros are remarkably versatile and customizable. The problem is that Linux can be a little unfriendly to someone on a more intermediate level, who is great with computer hardware, has plenty of experience tweaking Windows registries, but hasn't learned Unix. I guess I fall into that group... I want to do more with Linux, stuff that's second nature to me on Windows and Mac, stuff that might be second nature to Linux pros, but I haven't learned the Linux way of doing it. My biggest accomplishments were probably compiling MPlayer for YDL and writing a script that put a PlayStation button on the Dock-thing in YDL that would automatically shut down Linux and reboot back into the PS3s OS when you click on it. As you said, though, the demand for the Linux-certified is pretty good. I think I'll do that after A+. Anyway, you might like Mac OS X more than you think. The Darwin kernel that it's build on is a Unix derivative, complete with Terminal. By default, the highest user account you can create in Mac OS is Administrator; I forget why I did it, but I used the Terminal to grant myself access to the root account.

The "ridiculously overpriced" argument comes up a lot, and it's just not true. I mean, yeah, you could build a solid gaming computer for about a grand less than a Mac Pro, but chances are, you're not building it with the same parts as the Mac Pro. Some magazine tried last year to configure a Dell with parts that were as close to the Mac Pro's as possible, and the resulting Dell was $700 more. I agree, though, that a good home-built desktop is the way to go. If the power supply goes, I want to be able to replace it easily with something off the shelf, not some stupid overpriced, underpowered proprietary unit. But if you want to take that road, it's worth pointing out that HP, Sony, and probably Dell use proprietary parts too. And as far as laptops go, I think we've already pointed out that while you can buy entry-level laptops cheaper than a MacBook, the MacBook Pro is reasonably priced compared to gaming laptops and desktop replacements. As for Linux, people will flaunt the fact that they use it like it's some sort of mark of true geekdom. Frankly, I think it's for two types of people: the computer illiterate and the sadomasochists. The computer illiterate, because most distros come with a web browser, a media player (although they're probably missing codecs), and office software, and if it's probably set out for them in a nice psuedo-windows look they're familiar with. Sadomasochists, because if you really want to get into Linux the way you would with Windows or Mac OS X, you need to learn the Unix Terminal, and you need to learn to compile software for yourself. Honestly, if the Linux people really want to gain grounds against Microsoft, they need to come up with a cross-distro standard equivalent of an exe file.

I don't know about Parallels, but I have VMWare Fusion. One of the advantages is that it can run your Boot Camp partition in a virtual window, so you can have it either way. I think both can run Windows apps through virtualization as if they were native Mac apps. Honestly, aside from games (which work fine with Boot Camp), I think Macs are actually pretty good for software. Pretty much everything I use in Windows has a Mac version or open-source equivalent.

You sure you compared all the specs? You factored in the the built-in webcam and blutooth? RAM speed? Bus speed? And, as previously mentioned, the fastest Vista laptop is a MacBook Pro, which start around $2000. $2000 is entry-level pricing for a gaming laptop; my friend bought an HP laptop for $3500 that's a freaking behemoth. It's true that you can buy laptops for less, and it's also true that depending on what you want to do with your laptop, that cheaper one might meet your needs just as well. But just because it uses a processor from the same family or has the same amount of RAM doesn't mean you're getting the same for less. As for design, you're right, it's not revolutionary. It's a preference, though. I enjoy their minimalist approach. I must not be the only one, as Sony's started selling VAIO notebooks that look an awful lot like MacBooks (not to mention their new line of computer-in-monitor PCs that come with the super slim keyboards ala the iMacs). But what seals the deal for a lot of us is the software. I mean, a lot of us here use Windows. We're used to Windows, and since Windows dominates the market we're confident we can find the software we want for Windows, especially games. For some of us, we even like that Windows PCs can be opened up and have parts replaced fairly easily, like videocards so you can run the newest of said games. But very few people will tell you that they actually like Windows. Many people will tell you that Windows is broken, or tell you about how they have to reformat and do a clean install every so often (I've done it four times on the computer I'm writing this from, for an average of about once a year). The opposite is true for Mac OS X. Yeah, there's talk about the iPod halo effect, and Best Buy is starting to sell Macs, and the number of Mac users is on the rise, but we're not kidding ourselves. Mac users are something like 2% of the market. I've heard (although I don't know if this has changed) that there are more Linux users than Mac users out there. But Mac users continue to buy Apples because we genuinely like the software. Apple's minimalist approach to hardware design also pays off in software. Mac OS is simple and intuitive to use without the hand-holding and babysitting that's a part of Windows XP since SP2 and came with Vista. Subjectively, I think that Mac OS X has a cleaner interface and flat out looks better than even Vista with all it's pretty new visual effects turned on. Objectively, OS X is less resource intensive than Vista and does a better job allocating memory, so a MacBook with OS X tends to run better than a Windows notebook even if the specs are identical. And, if you really can't do without Windows, new Macs that come with the newest version of OS X, Leopard, can dual boot Mac OS and Windows XP or Windows Vista. If you are considering the switch, see if you know someone that has a Mac and will let you play with it. If it's your first time using a Mac since OS X debuted, consider buying a book (I'm not ashamed to admit that I bought Tiger in Easy Steps... Mac OS X and Windows are often very different, and it doesn't hurt to have someone walk you through some of those differences). And finally, if you have some extra hardware (at minimum, a spare hard drive to replace the one you currently have Windows on), it is possible to use modified versions of OS X with certain types of PC hardware. It's not exactly kosher, but I freely admit that I never would have considered buying a Mac if I hadn't tried out Mac OS X first.

I just threw up a little in my mouth. I don't mind a Speed Racer movie, but the races should look more like NASCAR and less like WipEout.

Don't you have any used sellers? Out here, we have a place called CD Warehouse. Their high-def section's getting pretty big, and they always charge $15 for regular movies, and $50 for boxed sets. Aside from 300, TMNT, and the freebies from the Blu-ray offer, I've bought my entire collection there.

Relax. If stand alone players keep dropping as fast as they are, the 360's HD-DVD drive will have to drop to stay competitive. And if not, check Gamestop. I bought a used one there for $130, but if you have an Edge card, you get 15% off. That's how I got mine.

It's bad for everyone (check out Penny Arcade's 12-5-07 cartoon... apparently an Activision exc really did use the word "exploited" in a conference call), but I don't feel as bad about it as I did about EA buying BioWare.

I can't comment on HL2, as I never finished it, nor am I trying to take away from it, but I disagree with you on both ME and Bioshock. Yeah, it's true that all the uncharted planets you can land on are basically a grid of plains broken up by random mountains, but in every other way each one was different. Like one was sunny and green with pollen in the air, one looked kinda like Mars, one had comets streaking through the sky, one had an atmosphere full of swirling dust and a planet hitting its Roche limit dominating the sky, etc. One planet in particular stood out for me, when I drove the Mako up to a high plateau and got out to survey some mineral and paused for a moment to admire the red giant star looming large in the sky. Now, do I think it would have been better if BioWare had made unique maps for each planet to help them stand apart from each other? Sure, but I also wanted to play the game sometime this decade. What's more, I don't think a few hilly grids on planets you don't even have to set foot on to play the game detract from the fact that for a new IP, Mass Effect has a remarkably detailed and fleshed out universe that's on par or better than established sci-fi TV, film, or literary franchises. As for Bioshock, the game fairly reeks of atmosphere. The developers really captured that 1950's vision of what the future would look like in the architecture of Rapture, and the fact that it's run down and abandoned save for gangs of mutants, creepy little girls, and giants in diver's suits with drills on one of their hands really brought a sense of dystopian creepiness. Your complaint about how Bioshock doesn't really mix up the level designs doesn't make the game any less atmospheric. I would imagine that a utopian city built under the sea around one man's vision would be architecturally homogeneous, and too much variety would actually detract from the game's atmosphere. Don't get me wrong, variety helps keep a game fresh. But any game can do the standard fire/ice/water levels. Variety does NOT equate to atmosphere. And while I'm disagreeing in the cases of Mass Effect and Bioshock, I'm agreeing with you fundamentally. For every Bioshock there's a truckload of Maddens, Tony Hawks, GTA clones, and generic JRPG clones. I just feel that this fall has been good to us game-wise.

I find that amusing when the last several pages have been about Mass Effect, and a few months before that it was Bioshock. Don't get me wrong, there's a lot of games that are just out to make their publishers a quick buck, but I think there are a lot of developers who take their craft seriously and approaching their games as a serious art and an alternative to traditional television, movies, or books as a means of storytelling. Yeah, I mean, I started playing, I played one mission that was presented as a flashback, and then I needed a break. The firefights are always intense, and even when you're not surrounded by people shooting at you, the game creates a tension that with one wrong move you could walk into an enemy ambush. I wound up going to the store to pick up a game just to play in between COD4 missions.

I'd be more jealous if I knew what kind of Sony TV. For all I know, you're talking about a 25-year old 19" mono sound unit. And I personally like the Harmony series of remotes better than the Prontos. They have a cleaner interface and remotes that look like remotes and not video games. I am a huge fan of Paradigm speakers, though. If I wasn't living in an apartment where neighbors are a concern, I'd have probably sprung for a set by now.

I like COD4, in short bursts. As for Orange Box, I played Half Life 2 when it was on the original Xbox, and didn't like it at all. I can't imagine adding a bunch of content and prettying it up will make me like it any better.

Thank you!

It's possible, but not too likely. I still think it's a bad IDE cable.

I did that too. I decided that, for Achievements, I've decided to continue my previous Shepard to 60 on Hardcore, trying to play as a Paragon this time, I'll take different party members with me, and I'll focus on the shotgun and sniper rifles. Naturally, that'll also give me the Achievement for finishing it twice. That should just leave me with the last two party members, the tech and biotic masteries, the medi-gel, and finishing the game on Insanity. The last two party members will be a simple third time through, probably on Insanity starting with a 60th level Shepard. That'll just leave the tech and biotic masteries, which brings me to a question. As much as I enjoy the game, I don't think I'm looking to do more than three consecutive runs, as I've got Rock Band, Forza 2, Call of Duty 4, and Super Mario Galaxy all begging to be played. Do you actually need to kill with the biotic/tech abilities, or just use them 75 times each? I'm thinking it'd be much easier to create a character, invest in nothing but enough of one skill to unlock a needed one, and fire away on the wall for awhile, right? As for the medi-gel, I figure I'm a long way from getting it, as I probably used the medi-gel maybe a dozen times in my first run through (Tactician Achievement!), but I'll probably need the medi-gel a lot more on Hardcore and Insanity. Does anyone know if that one's cumulative? Like, if I use it 20 times in my first play, 50 times on my second, and 80 times on my third, does that count as 150 times, or do I have to do it all in one run?

Can I get a "meh"? I might pick up the Optimus Prime, if only because I have a tendency to collect Primes and I hadn't picked up the previous Leader-class Prime. Otherwise, I already bought the deluxe and voyagers for the Transformers that were actually in the movie, and that was enough. The movie designs looked great on screen, but I thought they made for kinda crappy toys after coming off the excellent Classics line. I didn't like them enough to buy all the other movie toys, I'm sure as hell not wasting my money on more repaints.

I just finished it a few minutes ago. Definitely the most rewarding experience I've had with my 360 so far. Halo what now? In all honesty, for a new IP, the ME world is remarkably fleshed out. It's definitely a setting I'm looking forward to revisiting, be in in games, novels, movies, or even a good tabletop RPG. Anyway, quick question... in KOTOR and Jade Empire, regardless of how you played most of the game, there were in both games a "point of no return," if you will, where you make a choice that determines your ultimate ending. Am I correct in assuming that

What he said. I think pushing "input" on a TV remote is pretty much just for SDTVs with only two or three inputs, and 1st gen HDTVs. Most HDTVs today have too many inputs to make that practical. My TV has two cable, two component, one HDMI, and two or three S/composite. When you hit "input," the names of all the inputs come up with a number, and you hit a number to go directly to that input. Can't comment on the receiver's remote... I got it open box missing the remote, which was how I got it so cheap. (I made a sales clerk hook everything up so I could make sure that everything was working, though.) On the face of the receiver is a knob that you turn to cycle through, but when I added it to Harmony, Harmony gave it separate buttons for each input. Chances are, if you buy a HTiB that has a dedicated A/V receiver instead of a DVD player you can add some audio inputs too, it's going to have enough options to warrant more than just hitting "input" until you get where you're going. Yeah, you'll pay a little more, but you'll end up with a device that doubles as an input switcher (handy when you start running out of HDMI inputs), the DVD player being a separate unit means you can take it out and replace it with one of your choosing, and chances are it probably has better sound. I'm not knocking the Samsung HTiBs, I bought one myself five years ago and replaced it recently when because I needed more inputs. It was one of the better decisions I made. Oh, and I was getting a little off track, but it's also worth noting that at any time with a Harmony remote, you can hit the "Devices" key to get dedicated controls for a single device. More of a pain than just programing extra buttons on the LCD for an Activity, but less of a pain than carrying a crapload of remotes.

See, that's odd, because I ended up with extra of everything except Rare Earths and Heavy Metals, which I found right before going to Virmire. The only thing I wound up with a lot more of were Gases, which I had maybe double what I needed. Like I said, I surveyed and kept an eye out for them, but I didn't go out of my way really to get any of them. Perhaps what and where are randomly generated?

IDE, not SATA, right? Just a shot in the dark, but try replacing the IDE cables, especially if the drive is newer than the rest of the computer, and you used cables from a previous optical drive.

And you get more XP if you kill stuff without the Mako. As for the mineral quest, I don't think it's hard to complete. For it, the Asari writings, the Turian Emblems, the Signs of Battle, and the Prothean data discs, you can collect more than is required, but the quest will count as complete once you hit the minimum required. If you take time to do the other side quests, survey everything you can't land on (move the cursor slowly around asteroid belts and you'll occasionally find an asteroid you can survey), investigate everything on the map when you land on a planet (you'll come across mineral piles that don't show on the map, but will on radar as you're driving around), you'll probably complete them all anyway. It worked for me. And about the Charm/Intimidate thing, decide early if you want to be a Paragon or Renegade, then focus only on Charm or Intimidate, not both. 9 times out of 10, if a conversation has an extra option for one, it has it for both. Oh, yeah, almost forgot, try to take the same two people with you on every mission. If you're playing as a Soldier, I'd recommend taking either Garrus or Tali as one of them, and maxing both his/her Decryption and Electronics skills.

I'll study the drawing later. Wanna get some Mass Effect in before bed. Anyway, yeah, I know they're expensive, but the Logitech Harmony remotes are worth every penny and then some. I have the 360 specific one. It takes a little time to set up, but when you're done, you hit the "Activities" button and select an activity. In this case, I'll say "watch a DVD" and use my own setup for reference. It'll turn the TV on, set the TV to HDMI input, turn the receiver on, set it to DVD, and turn the DVD player on. And since every button on the remote is customizable (plus there are four buttons you can label on the LCD, with arrow keys so you can set pages full of custom buttons), you can have it set so that there's a "size" button to adjust the TV picture if you don't like how a particular movie is displayed, the volume buttons will work the receiver's volume, and the stop/play/forward/reverse buttons control the DVD player without having to tell the remote to switch devices. When you're done, hitting the power button will shut everything off, or if you want to watch some TV, hit "Activities" and pick "Watch TV." The remote will shut off the DVD player and receiver, and switch the TV to the cable input. The remote itself is all set up through a PC with an internet connection (Mac compatible too). Adding devices is as simple as telling the software what kind of device, the make, and the model. And you can set up several Activities with any combination of devices. My Harmony controls my TV, DVD player, Xbox 360, receiver, bedroom TV, and bedroom DVD player. The only other remote I have to use is the Bluetooh one for the PS3, since Harmony remotes don't support Bluetooth. And as far as size goes, it's about as long as my TV remote, but not as wide and half as thin. EDIT: I'm slightly amused that as I was writing a long post extolling the virtues of a Harmony remote, two other people chimed in. Yeah, David, they really are that good. If you use three or more remotes at a time, I'd say they're a must-have.

You mean, like if you wanted to play a DVD with only the TV speakers? I guess that would be a problem I'd never considered... but then again, I'm not sure why you'd want to. I mean, my setup at home is basically what you have, except add a PS2 and and my HD-DVD player is the 360's unit. The DVD player and the PS3 are both HDMI, the 360 and Wii are component, all to the receiver. The PS2 is S-Video directly to the TV. For audio, the Wii is still on its component, the DVD is HDMI, the PS3 and 360 are fiber optic Toslink, and I used RCA extension cables to get the PS2's stereo audio to one of the audio-only inputs on the receiver. The reason I went to the trouble was because, even though the speakers on my Toshiba TV are actually pretty good, it didn't have even close to the range that my surround sound system has, and I couldn't stand playing a game with inferior sound. The only thing I use the TV speakers for (I turn them down on the DVD player and the Wii, and the receiver doesn't pass audio-only or Toslink to anything but the surround speakers) is regular TV. If volume at night is a concern, the surround sound system sounds fine at low volumes, and has a headphone jack. And I don't see how the speaker space should be an issue, aside from the sub the center speaker is the biggest, and I'd say it's maybe 4"x8"x4". If you have other audio equipment, the receiver has dedicated audio-only jacks, so you could add them to your home theater and move their old speakers out. In fact, there's a spare front input on my receiver; I used a headphone to RCA cable and use it for my iPod. Maybe if I knew more about how your room is laid out and how you want it to be, I could offer better advice.

I use StyleXP and Icon Packager. The visual style I use is called VistaCG, and the icon set I use is called Vista Ultimate. I think I got both at CrystalXP.net. Download the Vista cursors and wallpaper (I just googled for them) and the end result was the Vista look without the hassle of actually running Vista.

Well, the one I got, like I said, isn't actually the one in the link, it was only similar. The one I got was actually under $350. In any case, part of the problem is that it sounds like you're only thinking of the receiver as an audio receiver, or you're only shopping audio receivers. Spend a little more, and get an AV receiver. Then instead of hooking HDMI to the TV, then TV to the receiver, hook your HDMI equipment to the receiver, then the receiver to the HDMI input on the TV. I know the DVD player, at least, winds up sending the audio the receiver, and the receiver plays the sound over the surround sound speakers and the TV speakers.