OT: New PC!

[Baron Munchausen]

NullAshton said:
He has 2 gigabytes of memory, a little less ram usage isn't going to matter...

Send your computer to me when you get it... Or at least take screenshots of your games.

A 'little' less? the difference is almost an order of magnitude, and there is also a major difference in CPU usage to get the same work done since Azureus runs under the JRE. It's really amazing, and shocking, that all those features can be implemented in a program so tiny compared to all the others that do the same things. Plainly, disregard for efficiency of programs is what has got us to the point of needing a gigabyte of RAM in a standard desktop computer. (Yes, Windows 'Vista' will need close to a gig since the standard 'minimum' system recommendation is always about 1/2 of what you need to use a program properly...)

If more people would program in C++ and not Visual Basic or Python we might not need so much computer power for our ordinary usage.

[Baron Munchausen]

AgentZero said:
Well, the order has been placed, and this is what I'm going with:
Processor AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 4400
Motherboard Asus A8R-MVP Crossfire
Ram 2 GB PC3200 DDR
Hard Drive #1 Seagate 80GB Sata HD
Hard Drive #2 Seagate 400 SATA HD
Optical Drive LG 16X Dual Layer DVDRW
Video Card Sapphire Radeon X1900 XT 512MB Video
Sound Card Creative Labes SB X-FI Platinum
Speakers Logitech Z5300 Speakers
Keyboard Logitech G15 Illuminated Keyboard
Mouse Razor Diamondback Plasma Mouse
CPU Cooling Zalman CNPS9500-LED Aero Flower
Power Supply Enermax Liberty 620W ELT620AWT
Monitor 21" NEC CRT
Case Thermaltake Tsunami

Now, the important part, is all the new software to load onto the system since I won't be getting it hooked up to the internet for the first weeek. So far, I've got:

Tweak UI
AVG Anti-Virus
Ad-Aware
Azureus
Directory Opus
DivX Codecs
Firefox
Foobar2000
Irfanview
Java Runtime Environment
Limewire
Media Player Classic
Open Office Suite
Photoshop
Spybot
Thunderbird
Trillian

Any other recommendations/things I'll be kicking myself if I forget?

Filezilla is a good dedicated FTP client. Sometimes the FTP features of a browser are not enough.

http://sourceforge.net/projects/filezilla/

You are aware of the 'alternatives' for Real Player and Quicktime?

Both Real Alternative and Quicktime Alternative can be downloaded from http://www.free-codecs.com/

Lots of other good stuff is available there, too. ffdshow, for example, which is a really nice replacement for about a dozen seperate codecs like DivX and XviD. (And faster than all of them, and with more user controls!)

Other than these, you will definitely want some sort of archiver software sooner or later. Win XP does 'zip' natively now, but as usual the corporations are years behind the times. You need something like WinRar or IzArc or 7Zip to handle all the new formats.

http://www.rarlab.com/
http://www.izarc.org/
http://www.7-zip.org/

I also notice the lack of a firewall in your software list. The native Windows XP 'firewall' is not worthy of the name. I will not stain this forum with any of the words that people who know about security use when speaking about it. You need an independent firewall product. The now famous Zone Alarm is not necessarily the best. Kerio Free/Personal is supposed to be fairly good. I recommend Agnitum's Outpost, myself.

http://www.agnitum.com/

The only thing is, the 'free' version is rather old and not updated for Win XP. I think you'd want the latest on an XP system. That means $40 instead of free. But there is still Kerio, or you can buy the full version of AVG and get the built-in firewall. Even that is better than the native Win XP firewall.

[AgentZero]

Actually, I was thinking of going with something along the lines of this for my firewall. From the looks of it, it seems pretty secure. Any thoughts from anyone?

[Thermodyne]

I�ve said it before and I�ll say it again. You need to have your firewall between your system and the WAN (Internet). Having it on your workstation is a last resort. Look around and see if you can find an RO 318 by Netgear. They are about the best personal firewall ever built. They went for $95 when in production and will bring as much as $250 new in the box today. They last basically forever and you should be able to find one used for around $125. There is something of a market going on used ones. You can advertise for a used one at Amazon. RO 318
This was one of those products that was way too good for the price, so when the new owners took over they killed it right off, rather than have it compete with their branded products.

[Fyron]

Baron Munchausen said:
If more people would program in C++ and not Visual Basic or Python we might not need so much computer power for our ordinary usage.

You forgot about C#, the bloatiest of all. A simple calculator I made needed 25 MB of RAM. Yikes!

[Renegade 13]

Is bloatiest a word?

[Fyron]

When it takes 25 MB to draw 16 buttons and a text box or two, yes, it is.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

It is constructed according to the rules, such as they are, of the english language.

[AgentZero]

Well, I'm going to be connecting the new machine via a D-Link 524 wireless router (on a wired connection), and it's got a built in firewall so that should be fine.
I just have to wait until Saturday when my dad gets back, since mother dearest can't remember the passwords for it.

[AgentZero]

Well, I've got the machine, and it's up and running nicely. I'm still getting all the applications etc set up, but the basics are there, and I found enough time to fire up Half-Life 2. I have to say, that warm, pleasent sensation didn't last long. But only because pee-soaked trousers go cold fast.
Holy CRAP! I had no idea things could look this good! It's one thing to look at screenshots, but to actually SEE it. Wow.
Now, if you don't mind, I'm going to spend the next few hours shouting "Holy crap! Lookit that!!!"

Although there is one thing I'm wondering. I went to download the free version of 3DMark, and it was about 570MB. Is that normal or did I do something wrong? And why the devil does it need to be so big?