The long trip to a new computer begins

Posted on 07-03-2009 by Benie

Ok. Yesterday I finally got me a name-branded PSU for something like $87 from the guy that built my system.
It’s an Antec GreenWatts 650W PSU. It’s one of those modern ones with the fan inside the case that blows hot air out and through a vent in the back of my system.

It too… didn’t fix my lock ups. Meh.. tried playing TS3. No sooner than 5 minutes, WHAM.
Now I’m beginning to suspect something I didn’t suspect before; my Motherboard. Even though it’s the exact same one that was replaced, it could also have the exact same issue with it that could be causing mine.

But finally I have decided to say “fuck it”. I’m going to start saving up for a new system. Why keep trying to upgrade and swap parts in this thing when I can get an entirely new one. Plus even if I tried to say “ok, maybe it’s the motherboard. Lets try to get a new one!”, it may not be compatible with the hardware in there.
So it’s best to just get everything new, except I’ll be able to salvage a few parts from my current system. Such as my DVD Burner, my primary HDD, and my Floppy.

I called them today and asked for prices. And as things currently stand, the new build will be $903 rounded up, alot more than my current one costed. This doesn’t include the $47.50 an hour installation fee, which will probably add up into the thousand dollar range.
Facepunch is telling me that it’s “so easy” to just build the system myself. Yes I could ‘cut out the middleman’ by building it myself, but not after that episode I had trying to get my 9400GT back in and the damn thing didn’t wanna seat right. I thought I had fucked my motherboard beyond repair. Yet, I didn’t. Still, my brain is recuperating from that.
If I had parents that build computers for a living who where willing to teach me how to build a computer, then maybe I could do it. But I have no experience with building a computer.

Saving the money isn’t going to be a problem. What is, will be the waiting. It could take close to a year to come up with that much money.
Anything could happen between now and by the time I come up $903. My secondary HDD could fail. My computer could suddenly not boot one day. I can only pray that will never happen. But there’s always the possibility.

The 2nd thing is knowing that if I play any game, there’s a guarantee it could lock up at ANY time. I may just have to uninstall games I can’t easily save in.
I’m probably going to commit suicide or have to see the funny farm before I come up with that much money. Though, yeah it’s stupid to wanna do that, since video games aren’t supposed to be your life.
But they’re the only fun I have anymore. Without video games, I got nothing else. Knowing everyone else is having fun but me just fuels the fire to my anger.

Maybe I should save up to get a Nintendo WII or something, or get my old Nintendo Gamecube out of the closet and go buy some more games for it.
But there’s no way in hell I’m buying an XBOX 360. Too many idiots, trolls, and … ehh. It reminds me of those Halo 3 videos I’ve seen. That just shows the majority of players on that system. Whiny little brats.

Well. This seems to be the only way to really fix my lock up issue. However, I still fear that even with this, once I got everything setup the way I want, I’ll put my old files on it, and it will start fucking up again.
I have no proof that it’s not a software-level issue. I wish there was a file scanner like an Antivirus, that will check each file and program and see if it would fuck up my games. That to me would be the only thing that would make me feel any better.
It could be the fact I’m using Service Pack 3. Or one of my old games. It could be ANYTHING. And I fear I’ll just recreate the issue if I just “go back to my old habits”.

But. That’s always a risk.

.
There’s also another thing. A thing I wanted to do after I got the prices for my hardware. I wanted to write down all the names of the hardware, but I think I was pissing the guy off when I kept on trying to get him to repeat himself.
The reason I wanted the names, is to go to Facepunch, post the build and say “can you guys try to find me something better, or is this good enough?”. However my parents believe that I’ve bothered the guy enough, and won’t even let me walk up there to write down the names of the parts. They want me to just get up the money. And I’m supposed to have full confidence he won’t try to rip me off.
When if I went to Facepunch, I could possibly get a better deal, at a lower price. Just to see if I could. And I can’t think of a way to convince my parents of that.

I might still be able to do that. Just save up $900, and then.. well, when the time comes, I’ll ask them before I make my decision.

Posted in Personal | Tagged , | Comments Off on The long trip to a new computer begins

How to Raise a Dragon, a game

Posted on 06-30-2009 by Benie

Not often do I talk about dragons. Actually it’s been awhile. Normally I only talk about my obsession on the WoW blog. But this little, cute game deserves some attention.

http://armorgames.com/play/4046/how-to-raise-a-dragon

ArmorGames.com released a game one day, where you get to play as..well, a dragon. You basically get to learn about the dragon, and why it’s so awesome.
But, it’s story is just one of the billions of theories of dragons. I find half of it untrue.
It starts off as you, in an egg. You use your arrow keys to burst from your shell, and off you go. The story tells you that dragon babies are loners. Again, a lie to me. But I have no proof.
You begin eating colored things using your X key, which causes you to change color. The story claims that a dragon can change it’s color according to what it eats.

Soon a wizard captures you, and the story explains how easy it is to capture a dragon using magic.
So you grow up into a kid. Once again, using the arrow keys to break out of the cell. This time with your bigger size, you will learn how to use your breath, and how to start using your wings.
In this castle are three things for breath; Healing (you can heal people to get them to like you), Fire(BBBUUURRRRNNN!!!), and Nature(Have a green thumb and make plants grow quickly). You can only pick one for your breath. It also goes on that some dragons have no breath at all, due to malnutrition. Once your ‘food icon’ is full, you have that power.

Now all you have to do is escape the castle. You’re a big boy now. An adult. Not yet a Wyrm though, but you can fly and fly well.
Soon you will encounter.. the humans. Now everyone knows the human/dragon relationship. At times it’s downright nasty, like burning the village to the ground, or enslaving the humans. And other times it’s nice. It depends on what you do as a dragon.
But you are all powerful now. Just don’t let it go to your head.

Once you’re ready, you will be able to ascend into the sky and become a Wyrm dragon. And when that happens, a lone Hero will show up to defeat the evil(or nice) dragon.

You play this Hero. Your weapons are a bow and arrow, a flower, and a money bag. You must walk through the village and meet your overgrown self as a Wyrm Dragon. To slay the dragon, or befriend it, is up to you. Depending if you made your dragon evil or nice, you can give him a bag of gold to show your respect for the powerful creature, befriend it with a flower, or put the tyrant down by slaying it.

I really liked this game. I wish more games where like this.

Posted in Personal | Tagged | Comments Off on How to Raise a Dragon, a game

Facepunch remembers Billy Mays .. 1958-2009

Posted on 06-29-2009 by Benie

If you haven’t seen the news, you’ve seen it on Facepunch. Since yesterday morning, reports that the legendary American icon and pitchman Billy Mays, passed away in his Florida home Sunday Morning. He died of an apparent heart attack in his sleep. He was 50 years old.
Fortunally, this has nothing to do with the near plane crash that Billy was on. But his hard head saved his life, in a way. Not to mention it saved U.S. Airways a hefty lawsuit.

Though I never met him in person or know anyone that has, I’m going to miss that jug head of his, and his famous “HI, BILLY MAYS HERE!” line.
When I first saw the news on Facepunch in the thread ‘Billy Mays is dead.’, I cried “FAKE!!”, saying that cnn.com or any REAL news website hasn’t mentioned anything about it, and was flamed for it.
I thought for sure it was just a stupid parody from Micheal Jackson’s death the day before.

Later, more sites began reporting Billy Mays’ untimely death, until eventually cnn.com did. They sure took their freakin’ time though.
When I saw that, I apologized, and paid my respects for the late pitchman. Yet I didn’t feel like I needed to cry. But I also can’t believe he’s gone…

Yes, it was a big loss, but there is no need to cry, lose sleep, stop eating or breathing over it. Shit like this happens. I just wish it didn’t happen to such a nice guy like Billy.

There’s been a few YouTube videos being posted on Facepunch. Tributes for Billy, and his grieving family. Bless their souls. Speaking of the Mays family, their only wish is for everyone that knew him to wear blue shirts like he did, to remember him by.

It would be hard to even think about when funeral arrangements will be made, because his family and friends need to be respected in this difficult time.
May he forever get on the ball, and sell OxiClean to the angels in heaven.

Posted in Personal | Tagged , | Comments Off on Facepunch remembers Billy Mays .. 1958-2009

New info of possible cause of lock up issue

Posted on 06-28-2009 by Benie

Yes I know I said before it would be the last post I would discuss this, but something has come up that needs to be posted.
According to hardforum.com after submitting the info they requested today, they say that my Northbridge on my motherboard is seriously overheating. Like the heatsink isn’t working.

This “Northbridge” from what they told me, is the co-brain of the system, the 2nd in command of my CPU. It controls how much power and RAM for every program I run on my computer, including bootup and shutdown.
The fact it’s overheating can make you think that the video card is going bad, or your RAM. And as always, overheating can cause lock ups.

However I have explained to them over and over, that this has been happening since I first started getting the lock ups, way before I had it replaced due to flashing my BIOS. Nothing has changed.

I feel it’s just a faulty sensor.. but for it to happen twice? Who knows. I’ll have to call the guy that built my computer this coming Monday and tell him what I’ve been told. Though he will probably say “we can’t do anything unless you bring it in”, and I have no money for them to look at it.

But the fact the motherboard is under a year old(got it last month), it shouldn’t cost me anything to get it replaced (again), if needed.
I think it could be something I’m running that’s causing the Northbridge to get so hot.. but what? Service Pack 3 maybe?

However, today I tried to put my index finger on the Northbridge. Slowly my finger got closer and closer until I touched it, and I didn’t feel no “OMG OW!!!” the second I put my finger on it. It wasn’t until 2-3 seconds when I started feeling the heat building.
So, that proves it’s just a faulty sensor, however hardforum.com doesn’t buy that, and still is convinced it’s in my motherboard.

Posted in Personal | Tagged | Comments Off on New info of possible cause of lock up issue

LetMeWatchThis.com, best thing since the internet?

Posted on 06-26-2009 by Benie

Yesterday I got my new Hard Drive, and a CD Drive. As he was installing it, there was a guy in a wheelchair. Though I didn’t know his name, he asks me if I go to any site to watch movies.
I told him I use Netflix, and he said he knows a site that you can watch them as they’re at the theater, for FREE.
He mentions a site called letmewatchthis.com. I checked it out after I got Windows installed and it’s great!

So far I have just watched Pixar’s Up, Star Trek, and Monsters VS Aliens. And I’m not talking trailers. I’m talking the entire movie, for free. No trial accounts. No strings attached.
However, it has ads. Lots of ads. So you gotta be careful with adware, so it’s best to go in there with Firefox’s Adblock Plus, and an antivirus program that can also scan for adware.
There’s also this. The titles are in Russian. And in some movies, the captions are in Russian, but the voices are in English. I think that’s how they’re able to do it for free.

I still haven’t seen Transformers: Revenge of The Fallen. IMO, the first movie sucked. I don’t think this is going to be any better. The copies of what they have on that site are crappy right now, but should improve over time.

However, this site does have a dark side. The fact it’s allowing visitors like myself view these movies that are hosted by other sites before they come out on video, is illegal. Yet they don’t consider it being illegal, which is common.
Lets say it’s just like downloading a mp3 from a site like Limewire. Do it too many times, and you’re in deep shit. Even though you never register, your IP Address can still be tracked down.

Posted in Personal | Tagged | Comments Off on LetMeWatchThis.com, best thing since the internet?

One bad thing leads to another

Posted on 06-25-2009 by Benie

If I don’t have enough issues to deal with, my DVD-ROM/CD-RW Combo drive has decided to stop reading last night! D:
Allow me to explain what happened. In Facepunch, someone posted a thread in the Tech Support forum, asking if his RAM was faulty. I noticed how his issue was similar to mine so I replied, and I was told to run memtest86 by burning it to a CD. Now I’ve been meaning to run memtest86 for sometime.

So I downloaded the .iso, and searched for a blank CD-RW, pop it in and tell Nero 6’s InCD to format it for me. It attempts to. As it’s about to finish, Windows cries foul by saying “SHIT! There’s a scratch on it! I can’t format this!”. So I attempt to cancel. However, my drive has other ideas, continuing to format the CD even though I told it to fucking stop.
On top of it, it starts to slow down Windows until it freezes, forcing me to manually shutdown.
I get the CD out, and try another, and notice what a difficult time it’s having reading it. The read light blinks on and off repeatably. No spin up of the CD to read it either.

So… I fucking broke the drive! This is the 2nd DVD-ROM/CD-RW Combo drive that broke on me in my life.
Fortunately, today things are looking a little brighter (despite we’re under a slight risk of severe weather). I called them and explained the problem and they say “Yeah. You’ll have to get it replaced.”
Though they have no combo drives, they have DVD Burners. I questioned if it would still burn a CD-RW and he said yes.
So I’m not only planning to get a new Hard Drive, but a DVD Burner. And both will be SATA drives.

BTW. If you wanna know if I finally got to run memtest86, fortunately my old 3(1/2) floppy drive still works. I manage to “burn” it to a floppy and ran the program for two hours.
No errors. So it’s not my RAM causing it.

Posted in Personal | Tagged | Comments Off on One bad thing leads to another

Bought TS3 / Final Lock Up Issue discussion

Posted on 06-23-2009 by Benie

Boy did I fucking miscalculate! When I thought I would have the money for all three items, I didn’t think about my bills. If I went on with my plan, I would’ve been fucked!
Anyway, because of that, I’ve decided to finally get my hands on TS3, but I’ll talk about that later. I got something more important to discuss.

I sent the guy that built my computer, one final email. I asked if he could make a final decision for me that would fix or delay the fixing of my lock up issue indefinitely. My options where;
1. Just replace the C Drive for now, then save up to get a new computer.
-or-
2. Go on with my plan of getting all three when I can afford it, of him thinking that one of the three or maybe all three could be causing it.

I waited for hours for his reply. And finally it came. And his decision was Option 1. To be honest, I feel that my best course of action is also Option 1.
I need to stop beating this old horse (even though it doesn’t feel old) and get a new one. That’s the only… only thing I can think of that I will truly be FREE from this Lock Up Issue.
That’s why this is the last post I make about it. It will be a long time until I come up with the money needed to get a new computer, and I will have to do my best to deal with this issue until then.
Something snapped in my head today. I don’t know what it was. I guess it was the feeling of that my constant griping and whining isn’t fixing this thing. And the only sensible way to ‘fix’ it is just to get a new system.
Yet I question myself why did I suddenly snap when I was all “GAHHH why can’t I fix this thing?!” before. But now I’m not. And I also feel upset in ways that all of the hell I went though to fix it, went to this.
I wish I didn’t have to get a new computer. There is NOTHING wrong with this one, except this issue. Why did it have to come to this? Why was I unable to fix it? I’m sorry. I just get… emotional over things like this.
A computer is like a pet to me, and seeing I have to “put it to sleep” like this just makes me.. wanna cry.
That I’ve done all I could, and it still wasn’t good enough. And now I have to save up to get a new “pet”, that will never feel or be like the old one.
It just shows I have no life, if I get emotional over a computer.

.
Alright. Now for TS3, or as it’s normally called; “The Sims 3”. My first impression with it was wow… they’ve really changed this from TS2.
The thing about the area is seamless. Meaning that you can go anywhere you want in the game world. Visit anyone you want, just by clicking, is not a lie. I’m still trying to manipulate this into my favor, but it will take time, especially the fact you cannot create new cities like you can in TS2.

But there’s a few things I’m not happy about that I can handle changes.
One is the CAS (Create-A-Sim) screen. My god I’ve spent over a half an hour JUST getting my sim to look like me in RL, when it took less than 5 minutes to do the same thing in TS2.
Also, I don’t like the new fat/fit bar. I like TS2’s. You gotta be very careful with it or you’ll look like a fucking whale.

The 2nd thing is my sim’s walking animation. When I was doing the tutorial, it wanted me to get my sim to walk over and sit down on a couch I bought for him. When I got him walking, his arms weren’t moving, but his feet where. He just seemed like he was a zombie or something.
The tutorial was bad enough. I thought I was actually playing a Demo or something. I was told that I could plant my sim on an empty lot, and there was none.

Another thing. I’m still trying to get used to the Save/Load feature. You see, when you create a sim, it makes a save of that city. You apparently can have up to 5 saves. That doesn’t mean that every sim you create requires a save.. I hope not anyway. I’m still learning this thing.
Anyway, in TS2, all you did was enter and you would see the map view, then you scroll over to your lot and click to load. With this thing, you gotta click on the save and it will take you to your house. To get into Map View, you gotta scroll out.

I’m still trying to get my sim to move to an empty lot so I can start building. But the features and design of this game have definitely changed since TS2.
In a way it makes you feel like you’re playing Spore, the fact you zoom out to the Map View.

Posted in Personal | Tagged , | Comments Off on Bought TS3 / Final Lock Up Issue discussion

Facepunch Downtime

Posted on 06-21-2009 by Benie

Hard to believe this, but Facepunch has been down all day today, and yesterday it was down for nearly all night.
The last thing I remembered is Garry posting one of his “I’ll be right back” messages, saying he was testing something. Seeing how it was getting late, I went to bed.

Today, Facepunch was down, and has been down for hours. After I came back from the grocery store, Facepunch finally came up… but something was missing. The forum was. All that was left, was a YouTube video, with “ON NO YOU DIUUUNNNN.” over the video. The video is called “Akon – Sorry blame it on me”.

I honestly don’t know what this means. But to put it simply — Garry broke Facepunch. I don’t know if this means Facepunch is gone forever.
Angry’s the only one that has been following this, using mIRC. He first acts like Garry was smart enough to backup the database before he did this, which was to move between hosts. Then he says he didn’t.
I finally managed to get into Facepunch’s IRC server, and asked what’s going on, if Garry did backup the database, and the answer was a flat-out NO.

This means every thread that has been made since 2001 to now is.. gone. Every category.. gone. However, Facepunch isn’t truly dead. And here’s proof that Garry is working feverishly to get everything back to the way it was, well I think anyway.
If this is true that the old database is gone, this should mean when Facepunch comes back, the categories will be back, but the threads won’t. This will be up to us members and the mods.

This could take up to a week or two until the forum is back in operation. I personally find this a big setback, as I use Facepunch to give me something to do. Without it… (shrug) I dunno what I’ll do to keep my mind off of waiting ’till July 1st.

.
And Facepunch has returned Monday. Garry was smart enough to make a backup of the database before he did this.

Posted in Personal | Tagged | Comments Off on Facepunch Downtime

Happy Father’s Day from BeniesBuilds

Posted on 06-21-2009 by Benie

This goes out to all the dads out there. Happy Father’s Day! Hope all of you are taking it easy this fine… hot day.
Oh yeah, this is also the first official day of Summer in the Northern Hemisphere.

I’ve already gotten a taste of summer last week, accompanied with severe weather. Today is no different. AC on all day. At least without the severe weather, so that’s always good. I’m fucking SICK of severe weather!!
And what a very active Spring it has been this year. Tornado after Tornado, flash flooding, hail the size of softballs.
And now we got this heat wave. The year is only half over now. Who knows what Mother Nature will bring for the rest of the year — let alone the rest of this month.

One thing’s for sure. We’re gonna be stuck in the 90’s at day, and 70’s at night. The three H’s will be present. Hazy, Hot, and Humid.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. This is still the day we celebrate dads. Nomatter how much of a bastard they must’ve been to you over the year. Like I gave my dad one of those talking cards.

Posted in Personal | Comments Off on Happy Father’s Day from BeniesBuilds

A possible link in my lock up issue..could it be my Hard Drive?

Posted on 06-21-2009 by Benie

I’ve been typing in my other blogs this night, and in my WoW blog I started thinking “What if I just said “Fuck you!” to my lock up issue, and just played my games? Would it cause my issue to get even worse?”
So I asked gop the 1 million dollar question, and we talked it over, with him still not knowing what caused it. I didn’t either.
To be honest, there just doesn’t seem to be a link between when it started to fuck up in Wurm and Fallout 3, to now of it locking up in all games. Could I say “Fallout 3 broke my video card”? Yet, replacing the card with my 9500GT made the issue worse?

I began to think why the damn thing couldn’t be tracked down by hardware tests, but there was no link there. The diagnostic scan showed nothing wrong with my hardware. So I dug deeper into the past, and came across when I started having issues on this computer.

A long time ago, when I had my old hardware, I accidentally installed old drivers over new ones, and since then I’ve been getting graphic issues. Basically, I’ll be playing a game like WoW, and suddenly it caused my screen to tear, doing stupid shit until I did my temp fix by minimizing and maximizing.

Completely uninstalling and reinstalling the new drivers didn’t fix it. Yet, the hardware upgrade did.
But then, I started to remember how it didn’t fuck up for quite sometime… until I was playing Wurm when I had my 9400GT, and noticed the issues I was having, similar to what I was having before I got my hardware upgrade.
I’ve been reading in my old Wurm logs, of how I said that it stopped doing it after I got the upgrade.

Then it hit me. It’s my HARD DRIVE causing it!!! Somehow the issue is hidden somewhere on my C drive, undetectable by hardware scans. Somehow when I got my hardware upgrade, the graphic glitch mutated into what is now known as my lock up issue. It makes perfect sense! (of course that’s what I said about my PSU and it only worked for just under two weeks)

BOTH things where fucking around with my video card, making me think my card was faulty. When all alone it was a hidden file that can’t be wiped off my C drive. This file could be the 658 reallocated sector thingy, according to my S.M.A.R.T. info.
And also, if I remember right, both things affected only when I was in a game.
A drive is never fully reformatted. It can still contain data like personal info, credit cards, passwords.

Well, once July gets here, I’ll have it replaced, along with a new PSU, and a Video Card.

Posted in Personal | Tagged , | Comments Off on A possible link in my lock up issue..could it be my Hard Drive?