January 2011

The Great Computer Project
Submitted Tuesday, January 11, 2011 - 3:49:37 PM by Klaitu

I end up fixing computers quite regularly for people, and usually it's something the user has done.. and rarely does it involve opening the case and messing with all the bells and whistles inside.

Well, the other day my aunt got herself a laptop, and decided that she didn't need her desktop PC anymore, so she gave it to me.

Now, a lot of you people would think "oh great, a crappy old PC" but to me, this PC was a surprising treasure trove of goodness.

It was a home-assembled computer, and whoever assembled it had some strange ideas about PC design.

The lone hard drive that was in it was a 13.6 GB drive from the year 2000. It was connected to the motherboard using a 40 ribbon cable. This type of ribbon cable is appropriate for the hard drive, but you wouldn't expect to see an old 40 type IDE cable in a modern computer.

The motherboard was an AGP board. AGP is quite old, PCI-E is still the motherboard standard now (although I hear that's about to change). The AGP thing wouldn't be surprising except that the Processor fitted into the motherboard is a 2.8 GHz Intel Pentium D (Dual Core) Processor. This Processor was the bad mamma jamma in perhaps 2007, long after AGP was already dead.

Actually, I'm surprised that they would even make an AGP board that supported that processor.

The video card was an ATI Radeon 1650 PRO, an old crappy budget video card. Some of the video RAM was blown out, so the card would just show garbage if you tried to use it. This card requires a 350 watt power supply, but the PC had a 250 in it.. and on top of all that, someone had tried to overclock the card, as evidenced by the partially melted plastic air baffle on the card. I don't know what they were thinking there, the 1650 is crap all the way around.

Also on the rails was a crappy Dynex brand audio board. The motherboard has its own audio system, sO I don't know why you would pay extra for a crappy audio board when you already have a crappy audio board.

Anyways, because of the beefy processor (and 2 gigs of DDR 1 RAM that had been overclocked for no reason) I decided to use this PC as my new server PC. My previous server PC has a 1.3 Ghz single core CPU.

I put in all the drives and reinstalled Vista (you make do with what you can) and now it works like a charm, after I removed some of the extra bits.

I think I've got enough parts left over to get my old server PC into working condition again as well, so that will be fun!

Don't worry though, readers. Nerd time is over for now!



The Human Centipede First Sequence
Submitted Tuesday, January 11, 2011 - 3:25:56 PM by Klaitu

This is a movie about a german surgeon who one day decides he's gonna stick 3 people together to form a human centipede.

Yes, that's right, he surgically attaches people's mouths to other people's butts.

Yes, that's right, it's just as awful as it sounds, although I expected the movie to be more disgusting than it was.

Overall Score: 2 of 10



True Grit
Submitted Tuesday, January 11, 2011 - 3:20:37 PM by Klaitu

*looks around* Alright people, I'm about to say something but you can't take it personally.

John Wayne sucks.

There, I said it, I got it off my chest. John Wayne is a terrible, terrible actor who was the vehicle for the original True Grit. The original True Grit that sucked.

Yeah, I said it. The Original True Grit sucked. You know it, I know it.

How's the new one? Well, it's pretty much identical to the original True Grit, except that it doesn't suck. Jeff Bridges knocks it out of the park.

Overall Score: 7 of 10



Dead Rising 2
Submitted Tuesday, January 11, 2011 - 3:16:08 PM by Klaitu

Do you like killing zombies? Sure, we all do.

If you haven't played the first Dead Rising, you might be surprised at this take on the zombie smash game. In Dead Rising 2, the zombies aren't really an objective, they are more of an obstacle as you travel around doing other things.

As you progress through the game, a timer slowly counts down, and you have a certain time period for each mission, so you're always watching the clock. This is, perhaps, the games biggest downfall.

The game rewards you for getting inventive and building different weapons to kill zombies with, but you don't really have time to kill a lot of zombies since the plot has nothing to do with killing zombies.

It's an alright game. It's worth a shot on your rental queue.

Overall Score: 6 of 10
Quality Rating: 3 of 5
Rent it.



Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit
Submitted Tuesday, January 11, 2011 - 3:06:21 PM by Klaitu

How do I put this? Heed for Speed: Hot Pursuit may be the most offensive video game I have ever played.

Offensive, not because there are street races where people try to evade cops. Not because if you're a cop you have to slam people off the road for racing.

Offensive because there are ads. Unskippable, high definition, full video ads. Before you can even play the game, the first thing when you put the disc in? Ad. Every time you beat a race? Ad. And it's not just the ads that are unskippable, the regular cutscenes are unskippable too!

The first time I put the disc in it took nearly 10 minutes before the buttons on the controller did anything.

THE GAME HAS A FREAKING 10 MINUTE TUTORIAL ABOUT HOW TO USE THE MAIN MENU!

Sure, you do eventually get to a crappy, generic racing game that is identical to all other need for speed games. It's not worth it. I wouldn't play it even if it didn't have ads.

Sorry Need for Speed. You suck.

Overall Score: 1 of 10.
Quality Rating: 1 of 10.
Die and rot in a shallow grave.



Tales of Vesperia
Submitted Tuesday, January 11, 2011 - 2:50:09 PM by Klaitu

You know, Tales of Vesperia makes me wonder.. Have Japanese RPG's gotten totally boring, or have I just gotten too old to appreciate games?

Tales of Vesperia isn't a train wreck, it's just.. there. The graphics are PS2 era. The gameplay is PS2 era, the voice acting is PS2 era. It's not awful, it just has no redeeming qualities.

What's Tales of Vesperia like? It's like Star Ocean. It's like Xenosaga. It's like every JRPG ever made that wasn't Dragon Warrior or Final Fantasy.

I dunno about you, but I'm ready for something new.

Overall Score: 3 of 10
Quality rating: 1 of 5
Pass.