My first REAL Gaming Rig - Playing Wow in 2005

 

This was a beast back then, and I'll explain why.

     In 2005 I was already over a year into playing World of Warcraft with my wife. I use to own a small but well known PC Repair Business, which I sold my controlling stake to a friend, so I had no shortage of old and aging PC parts, monitors, keyboards, etc. Really common in the business sector at the time was Pentium 3 Coppermine gateway computers, so I had tons of them laying around. There was a well known FAQ how to get an extra 200-300mhz out of them, and really get them screaming for zero dollars spent. I had an entire box of used Geforce 2-4 video cards, so this was the PC's we rocked at the time for many, many years:

• Gateway Moo-moo box
• Pentium 3 Coppermine T, Overclocked to the tits
• Geforce 4 MMX (or shittier 2/3)
• 512mb ram
• Random sound card
• Random junk monitor

This would be an exact example of what my wife and I gamed on for a loooong time

     We had just moved into our first real house, and we wanted a baby, so money was super tight. I started taking computer jobs again out of the house. Replacing broken modems, selling parts, replacing hard drivers, easy stuff. Our Pentium 3's just screaming away in the office room in the front of the house, still playing WoW on 17 inch monitors. A big job got dumped in my lap from someone I use to get a lot of work from, these huge Dell Dimension Business Class PC's from 2005, brand new, four of them total. They needed to be set up, office installed.. nothing crazy. He dropped the PC's off to me, then came back to grab them about a week later, but with no payment. He promised to pay me in a month, next week, you name it. Needed it right now, and how important it was. We talked over a beer, and next thing you know, in lieu of payment, he offered me one of these brand new PC's. The specs:

• Dell Dimension Business E500 series?
• Pentium D (early Dual Core!) 3ghz
• 1.5GB Ram
• Dual AMD 1900XT Video Cards (why!?)
• Two hard drives
• Random Tape backup drive under DVD rom

    Insane luck. I needed the money, but I wanted this so much more. Instantly went from everything on Low settings and taking minutes to boot, to having the best of everything. This PC got me all the way to playing Skyrim in 2011, and beyond. A friend hooked me up with an old viewsonic 21 inch CRT as he was going the LCD route, and I took it in trade for some work. I was all of a sudden a high-end gamer, and it forever changed my outlook on having a high end gaming PC. For it's day, I did not know many people that even had performance video cards, the market was so small. PC gamers were the huge minority, and many games were just not available, or hard to get. I would later sell this PC, and use a free Core 2 Quad, which I bought two of from the State Library Auction, but that's a story for another day. 

Note: Before you say a Pentium 3 was not good enough, here is a picture from the original manual. We played on dialup by the way!

I'm upgrading my monitor. What is too big?

     I'm willing to find out. As you have seen in the previous posts, i have been delusional about my fascination with upgrading my computer. I started to think.. what makes a computer really, really good?

1) You have your tower, which houses all the good bits: Hard drive, ram, video and sound cards, and  processor(s). All the things that make your computer fast and ripe for gaming rape. Less important things abound, but are ignored for the sake of this article.
2) The keyboard and mouse take control of your virtual command center in which to launch imaginary nuclear attacks. These are the tools in which gauge your speed and accuracy, as well as limit you (or not) to human ability and skill.
3) The speakers that you have on or around your desk provide you with a tangible sense of reality that with the correct speakers, you can actually feel.

4) Your monitor/screen. The portal to everything mentioned above. And most likely the last thing to be upgraded on any computer system.

     Why are monitors the last things to be upgraded, when it is obviously the first or second most important component? I think it's because they last so long. People wait for their old one to burn up before getting a new one. I don't know anyone that has a really expensive monitor. They buy the biggest one that was on sale for the least amount of money over $100. I do i blame them? No, i cant say i do really, only because I'm in that majority of people.

     The last monitor i bought I'm using right now, its a 24" Acer i got from Comp USA on sale for $139.99 or something like that. It's the biggest monitor by screen size i have ever owned. Sure I've had some pretty massive 21" CRT monitors in the past topping 60 pounds or more, but nothing as nice as this one. I'm pretty satisfied with it. The picture is bright, there is no lag, i can watch movies on it and so on. So why would i think of upgrading when nothing is wrong with the one I've got? Simple. Pure size.

     I just want something bigger. There has to be better than what i have now. I'm tired of having what everyone else has. I need to feel and experience my games/movies on a different level, even if i don't know what that level is yet. I feel as if a monitor could help me in the technological, and spiritual journey of horse shit my computer desk has evolved into. So, to make a long story short, i ordered a 32 Inch LCD monitor. It should be here on Friday. See the below images for size comparison.

     The monitor the Asian girl is leaning on is a 21" monitor, as is the small one in the top picture. The large monitor is a 32 inch LCD. It's obvious which one is the larger one, by a huge amount. He is also playing WOW, which i plan as one of my many activities.

3rd Party WOW Macro Creation - What to avoid

I've learned quite a bit in my month or so creating macros with the Nostromo and other gaming devices at my disposal, and what i learned might save you a whole lot of Ban-Hammering in the future. Of course, I'm referring to World of Warcraft, and their stance on Automated Macros.

Let's go over Blizzard's policy on macro creation first.

1) So long as your using your mouse/keyboard as it was designed (as a mouse or a keyboard) your fine.
2) Macros created with the WOW software are fine no matter what.
3) Macros designed by a 3rd party program that press more than one keystroke at a time are considered off limits.
4) Key-bindings are limited to being mapped one button, per key, per button press.
5) No combination of button presses can be mapped to a single key, timed or untimed.

If you are being watched for suspicious activity, ie., Gliding or Boting, you will feel the sweet justice of the banhammer within seconds, with no way of getting your account back. The way you are flagged in the game (from what I've noticed) is the timed button presses.

What draws a red flag in WOW:

1) Patterns of button presses in sequence.
2) Timed button presses faster than 10 milliseconds. (in the past i wrote under 9ms was safe, but i was wrong, i think) Anything faster than 10ms is not normal by human standards.
3) Exact cool down spell manipulation. (Example: It takes 1.23 seconds for your next spell to become available, and at exactly 1.23 seconds, the spell was cast)
4) Any combination of the above.

I have taken the following steps to combat the above:
1) Created four identical macros for my rotation with different pauses at different lengths between button presses, for a basic faux-randomness. I cycle through the four macro cycles with the software provided with the Nostromo.
2) I change the faux-random cycle about every third enemy.
3) I added ultra slight button presses from the arrow keys to mix it up, sometimes not even noticeable at all and in the wrong places. I call these button presses miss-mistakes.
4) After the four macro cycles or there-abouts, i switch cycles by using the same macros over again, mixed around on another key. Often times i get lazy in raids and use the same two keys without bothering to switch the cycle. Enough randomness is going on that i don't think it would be a problem in that case.
5) I saved the all the macros in numbers (1-8) and letters (A-B) then swap them with alternates, (9-16, and C-D) once a week.
6) Looking for and adding randomness where i can to break patterns. Consecration and Exorcism help. (I use a paladin)

What have gained from this? Nothing really. I've asked myself several times, "Why am i doing all this work?" I programmed macros to maximize DPS to it's fullest, but assume a random nature, all just to become automated so i can just press one key and watch the buttons cycle through. It's time consuming and most likely not worth the amount of energy I've put into it. You may be thinking right now.. what's the payoff?

Automated Exact Timing Macro Pros and Cons

Pros:
- 20% gain in  DPS. Yes, I'm serious. By saving time between button presses you can actually save several seconds on average in a full rotation, which adds up big on your DPS numbers. Even the best players who are professional spammers typically hit the spell they want within milliseconds after it has become available, but nothing can match 100% accuracy. You may be able to hit the same key several times in a second, but the macro can hit it once, at the precise moment, and 100 keys at the same time, several times a second.
- Speed, plain and simple.
- The macro never makes a mistake, and the outcome is always the same.
- Super consistent high DPS in dungeons.
- The macro is optimized to use all available mana for dungeons and be conservative during bosses. (single target and bosses on one side and multi-target and raid on the other side)
- You can organize your bags and read or something while your fighting things.

Cons:
- Boring sometimes when all you have to do is hit one key and watch your spells go off before it looks like the cool down is even over yet.
-The last spell in the group-macro, if the enemy is dead, will fire anyways, and if it is an AOE spell, that might hit something you may not want it to, or use needless mana. I don't know how to fix this, but it does happen about once per dungeon at least.
-Random occurrence spells (paladin - Exorcism) then are triggered as a free action must be hit manually for optimum dps. The macro has no idea if its ready or not, so its your job to hit it when it lights up. Not a big deal, but not totally automated either. This could be listed as a pro as it also adds randomness.

Hot Blizzard Cosplay Girls, Part 1

Click to enlarge. Or shut your door to masterbate, your choice.

World's Angriest Gamer Speaks Out Against DIablo III

I guess this fat guy's rant is up to about half a million hits. I guess eating cheetos and playing games will get you noticed these days. By these standards, i should be a god.

I take gaming pretty seriously and give it a go several times a year. This guy makes it his career to sit on his ass and complain that his fingers are too fat for the macros he needs to hit, and that the system requirements for the newest game do not include runs to 711 for those compressed cuban sandwiches.

Whorelore Seasons 1 & 2 videos.. they are something..

I really don't know what to say about Whorelore. I've watched it when Morgan first came over to my house and show it to me, and thought it was pretty cheesy, but funny, and had some really great looking girls on what appeared to be a shoe-string budget.

Included in the link are season 1, "Rogues do it from behind", and season 2, "Pirate Booty".

Link removed. Sorry guys.



Why female armor sucks - Collegehumor

This video is awesome. A must watch for you World of Warcraft playing bastards out there. (I still play, fuck it all)

The Legend of Zelda/The Birth of a Gamer

I was six when I started playing The Legend of Zelda. It was the most amazing game I’ve ever played and remains so to this day. I remember looking through all my uncle’s old games. There was the Super Mario Bros./Duck Hunt combo that I figured I had mastered because I could beat the Dinosaur at the end; also I cheated at Duck Hunt by holding the gun really close to the TV. There was Tetris, which looked like a terrible game that had to do with math or puzzles or something that my teacher would want me to play. There was Donkey Kong which lost its appeal precisely four levels in after I realized that it was the same three levels over and over again…only more difficult each time. I was an aged master of all these games by seven. I even started playing Tetris. (This was purely for the outrageous cartoon sequence at the end with the crazy shaped rockets)

Then one day a friend of mine brought over a Nintendo game that was gold…GOLD!! I was pretty sure it contained actual magic (a fact that has yet to be disproven). There was a problem though. My friend said that it was broken. His logic was that something had to be wrong because when he pushed the “A” button he couldn’t jump on the monsters and whenever he tried he would end up losing hearts and dying. Also there were these things called rupees (obviously misspelled and green instead of red) which were a terrible rip-off of Mario’s coins, except that there were only a few of them in the whole game. Whoever this ‘Zelda’ person was, he obviously couldn’t hold a candle to Mario. (No pun intended.)

Being the logical problem solver I was in my youth, I took a scientific approach to the game. My friend and I wandered endlessly trying every button combination we could think of; dedicated to ridding the in-game world of these pesky jumping spiders, blue goombas, red goombas, and even the dreaded sumo-pigknights with spears. We enjoyed ourselves, but failed utterly at our goal for about 2 months which, by a six-year-olds count, is about 12 years. We were about to give up when we had an epiphany that went something like this:

“Hey, what’s that black spot at the beginning of the game in the huge green thing?”

“Not sure, probably a glitch like when you dropped your Double Dragon 2 in the puddle outside the house and it made everything really blurry…”

“No I don’t think it is”

“Well what is it then?”

“I don’t know. I’m gonna walk over by it.”

Suddenly we went walked down some previously hidden stairs into black chamber. We had seen this before, and were prepared for yet another dungeon to run through until we inevitably died. This time it was different though. There was a man. A sword was in front of him.

Now, yesterday I held off a double six pool zergling rush with my army of two well-placed pylons, three zealots and two spare probes to the thrill of my 2v2 teammate who gleefully giggled as his mutalisk rush simultaneously decimated the home bases of the unprepared Silver League, Rank 2, Zerg players. The day before, I shot 43 cowboys dead in an expert targeting mode, Miners vs. Lawmen, free for all shootout, much to the chagrin of the French players who got second and third and wasted no time in cursing me out in their best English. Last week, my 10^th level subtlety rogue and I set foot in Westfall for the first time ever and immediately Shadowstepping behind an enemy using Ambush to kill it in one shot, only to loot it and find a ring that gives plus three to both stamina AND agility!

None of those amazing gaming experiences can even hold a match to the elation of finally, after two months of devout playing and searching, discovering the sword in Zelda. With those four notes of ultimate discovery, the gaming world made sense. We eventually beat Zelda over the course of the next three or four years. It was really, really difficult, and because of that just as rewarding. No gaming experience will ever match the power held within the Gold Cartridge. It’s truly a piece of the Tri-force itself.

A word on WoW

I am uploading this from my iPhone so there won't be any pictures. Last night I experienced the new WoW and I must say that the graphics look great with direct x 11 support so kudos on that. However the new talent trees and class changes leave alot to be desired. I will comment on the Hunter changes for this article. First off hunters no lnger need to buy ammo which is an odd but interesting change that I'm sure some engineers are going to bitch about. No real con in my opinion though. Next, hunters no longer use mana, instead they use rechargeable focus much like a rogue.

Now the good thing about this is that you can now focus all your gear on the hunters agility which is it's main stat, and you can get some pretty high damage alpha strikes in due to a lack of cooldowns on the hunters shots. In the long run however the hunter runs the risk on losing out on DPS which is what seems to be everyones main bitch about this subject. I will have to toy with WoW some more but from what I've seen so far it seems blizzard is serious about revamping the gameplay as a whole.

Best Dungeon in WOW

    Upon entering the city of Stormwind, travel to the far west side of the city, you will find a dark side alley with a red door. Once you enter the door you will be immediately captured and forced to spend the night. The screen will switch to a dungeon with a bed in it where three elven nymphs will hold you down and rape you repeatedly. Once morning breaks you will be back at the front of the alley entrance, minus half your hit points.

Installing World of Warcraft Cataclysm: WTF Edition

I'll start off by saying i was not able to play WoW on Friday night because i was downloading a 1.68 GB patch, 4.01, stage one, all day. The download was slow and no amount of tweaking made it go any faster. When i got bored staring at the screen, i used Bittorrent and opened the file manually in the "updates folder", in the WoW folder itself.

Day two: I went to try and play again on saturday because for some reason i thought i had something i signed up for (a raid or something) and stage two was ready for download. At this point i got curious and typed my frustration into Google, thinking maybe the search engine had the answer. Nothing really there either. I asked Kerry, my life long friend if she had experienced anything strange and she called me crazy.

I checked my battle.net account and sure enough, it said i had been selected for the beta test of Cataclysm, and congrats and all that. So when stage 2 (3.8 gb) was done downloading, the game opened up and started downloading two 648mb patches, each which took about an hour, and my connection is good. Then i saw the Cataclysm screen for the first time. Initially i thought i had done something wrong that i did not have it installed already.

I clicked install, and waiting began again, this time i slept. 16.8GB install, which took almost 3 hours on my Quadcore Laptop. Sheesh. When i woke up this morning (sunday) i grabbed the computer and opened the program only to assaulted with another 6.1b download. At this point the game will be playable, but there will be further downloads in the background. The way the new launcher works is like this:

You play wow at your own risk and its slow if you have not downloaded all of the update yet. There are three stages at which you can start playing, all of which are slower than waiting for the download to complete. It works the same way the trial edition works, in that it sends the information direct if you have a fast connection, you may not see any difference.

Update: As of 5 minutes ago, the launcher increased the download size to 11.5gb left to be downloaded. So if your keeping track:

Download Tracker!

-1.69gb

-3.8gb

-.64gb

-.64gb

-6.1gb

-11.5gb
------------
-24.37gb downloaded