Posted 07/24/2009 at 11:39:07am

Rick

I gotta agree with John P.: yeah, I know Diablo 2 is old, not true 3D, and uses sprites on a background; but it, and other Blizzard games are Popular. The D2 ladders are still full! The news of Diablo Three has caused firestorms! I still love the bird's eye camera, no-fuss controls, and gameplay as simple or complicated as you want (normal, NM, or hell difficulty). I have a bunch of character classes at different points along the game.

The only reason I don't play online is because of all the PlayerKillers and Cheaters Duping and selling items-for real cash. But that's gotta tell ya something about popular! I'll get set in a comfy chair, mouse table, hand-held keypad, and just lose myself for a while. Like a peaceful walk by a mountain stream, with a$$kicking. And I'm preordering D3 as soon as I save the money. (I've got some other upgrades going on.)

Posted 07/24/2009 at 10:51:04am

Just wanted to add:

I just bought an nVidia 260, the soup-up by BFG for $129! I paid attention and got the Core 192 model just like the MaxPC article said to. Even in a slot gimped to 8x this thing is sweet. Eye candy in games. So much screen resolution sometimes I have to turn on the Magnifier to read things. I'm tempted to get a second, but by the time I get $1200 saved up (Core i7-920, a huge Thermaltake, Rampage II Extreme, DDR3, Win7 (Preorder-I'm using the RC now)) there'll be a new power-cheapie. For now I love it.

Rick

Posted 07/24/2009 at 10:09:01am

Rick

I had one of those Rage 3d cards running in a P266 after some Waste of Flesh STOLE my Sony Vaio, and it was tolerable even in 2003! BTW: a good bud gave me both, and that was the last box I haven't hand-built thanx to MaxPC (primarily). I figured out how to install XP on the TINY HDD, and was golden from there: thanx to message boards.

Looking at that Old Rage 3d and thinking of playing Diablo 2 on it brings mixed feelings. Mostly that I had SOMETHING again, (just didn't have cash flow...) and guilt that I haven't talked to Dennis for too long. Now I'm saving up to buy a Core i-7 920 and Rampage II Extreme and should have that beauty perking over the 3.5 GHz line easy. *Ssssiiiighhhhhhhhhh*

Posted 07/22/2009 at 12:51:51pm

Most of the people who have problems with windows now have problems with Vista. Apple is making inroads with inferior hardware (even an older Core2 Duo can strut over Apple non-Intel machinery) and a pretty, friendly GUI that isn't continually pi$$ing off it's user, (I know that's past but memories sting), and isn't a resource hog.

All that is about to go away! I am writing from within Windows 7 Release Candidate, and it is SWEET. I am not a MS fanboy. I never bought Vista for the usual reasons: unstable at first, a code-patchwork frankenprogram afterward, always a resource hog, hassle, and I just ain't paying $300! The O.S. is meant to RUN MY PROGRAMS, not show me pretty 3D windows, not DO everything but cook me dinner...

Let me tell ya. After reading MaxPC's issue featuring all about the RC, I spent a week gathering all kinds of web pages about install problem fixes, downloading 64bit drivers, and backing up everything: it installed on a seperate HDD in 1 hour like butter. If I want XP, take the DVD out. Otherwise boots right into Win7. Vista Hardware Advisor told me "dont even bother" (the score was something in the 2.3 range), Win7 gave me 4.6 and that only because I'm still running my old Athlon64 3600 (OCd to 2200MHz and counting).

There are none of the PITA effects of Vista with this: you can easily change the number of alerts without crippling security, the media center is sweet, backups and system restores are smooth, etc. The whole 64 bit environment seems clean. I haven't noticed one hitch with my old hardware, and when I've saved up a few months for a Core i7-920 and OC it I'm gonna be pumpin.

They seem to have gotten the message: this has plenty of components that will do processes for you, but if you supply your own it won't argue. And the price points (preliminary) are a lot more reasonable. Except for Ultimate, it's back down around what you paid for XP Home and Pro.

(And I and a lot of other testers will be making certain it stays that way: try it out and haunt the boards--your input could give us another five peaceful years like XP SP1 and onward's days.)