I was fiddling with my computer about a month or go for the sake of installing a VGA slot fan which I think to be honest, does jack shit but whatever; I don't feel like removing it (I think I'm done with single slot VGA fans by the way. Noisy ass fans). My current card, which is finally starting to show its age, is an EVGA 512MB 8800gt. It really wasn't all that bad of a value considering that I have had it for almost 3 years. It will still run most things at a reasonable frame rate at high and very high settings, but the temperature and noise rise greatly as a result.

The room in which my computer resides is warm but not warm enough to warrant running the air conditioner unless it is unbearably hot outside. Consequently, my video card has been running at range of 80 to 84 degrees Celsius on the hotter days this summer (idling at 55 to 60 degrees Celcius); Which is within the card's normal upper temperature range (it runs hot), but makes the fan speed ramp up to 100%. BZZZZZZZZZZZZZ. If it bothers me that much I can add an aftermarket cooler, but that is a pointless expenditure on a 3 year old video card.

But anyway, long story short: My original intention was to buy a new card when I built this machine (but Newegg as well as every other vendor was out of the card that I had wanted). Now that NVIDIA has released their new line of reasonably priced mid-range cards, I am thinking of getting one soonish. Maybe in September or October (but definitely before Cataclysm releases), depending on what else is available. I don't want to spend more than $200 to $250; I am going for the best value per performance.

This is the card that I am considering: The Gigabyte 1GB 460 GTX. I am also thinking of just maxing out the last two RAM slots on my motherboard since it will only cost about $100 more. I regret not doing so when I built this machine. Because of my stupid huge ass CPU cooler, I will either have to remove and re-seat it or figure out a way of prying off of the fan clips without breaking them in order to fill up the last two slots. I wasn't actually sure if there would be enough overhead clearance for another two sticks + the RAM heatsinks but I checked on that when I installed the slot cooler. There should be enough clearance.

Three years is a record. Three years without spilling on, trashing or utterly destroying yet another keyboard; All to be ruined by one morning cup off coffee. But I digress, the Gods laugh and Keiya gets an excuse to purchase yet another toy.

The Logitech G110 is exactly the same as the Logitech G19 minus the color LCD. The keyboard that I ruined was the old school G15 (the older one with more buttons and adjustable screen). I used to use the LCD to monitor system stats while I gamed. But since switching over the Windows 7, I prefer to use the desktop widgets docked on my secondary monitor, which are a lot better anyways particularly since there are widgets specifically for Riva Tuner, NVIDIA, etc. The only real use that I have for the LCD nowadays is to see who is speaking on Ventrilo, which isn't worth an extra $100.

Q: Are there any plans for you to run unsigned applications, like on Android?
A: There is a porn store for Android to go to. You can download them, your kids can download them. That's a place we don't want to go. We're not going to go there.

You know, I laughed at loud when I read that question off of Engadget today, causing a coworker to look at me inquisitively. But really, if you want porn on your iPhone there's really nothing stopping you from acquiring it some other way. Seriously, who goes to the app store to find porn?

I am actually fairly satisfied with the 4.0 announcement. Multitasking was announce as predicted; From what I under stand, instead of being a battery raping free-for-all, it works by pausing the app completely except for specific services like say, the ability to play music. No home screen widgets though is sort of a bummer. I was kind of hoping for that one, but whatever.

I still cann't remove first party apps but honestly, the only reason why I ever wanted to do that was to reduce home screen clutter. The folders are a more elegant solution for people who have massive amounts of applications. Just because I don't use the stock app or the compass doesn't mean that it should just vanish I guess. Stashing it away is more than sufficient.

Oh, forgot to list these on the other post. I whinge about the iPhone platform not having them from time to time in WoW, over Gtalk or whatever. I didn't really expect Apple to implement them, yay!

• Game Center: It's a petty wish I know, given that it's mostly for epeening achievements ala XBox Live. There are several existing services that do something similar with achievements, friend matching for mutiplayer, profiles and what not such as Open Feint, but there really isn't any unified place to do that sort of thing and it feels silly.
• Bluetooth keyboard support: I've gotten used to the touch screen keyboard, but it's still not nearly as fast as just typing on a normal keyboard. Also, a keyboard would allow me to edit blog posts and lengthy documents on the go.
• Playlist creation within the iPhone OS: Oh snap I didn't think that they would ever add this feature in reasonable time. I like creating playlists of songs that I like, select songs from certain genres and whatever. It's irritating not being able to do that on my phone and having to wait until I get home so that I can play with iTunes.

...I have to wait until this summer though. Ignore the shittacular editing, it's late.

I totally caved into a huge itch and switched over to AT&T recently for the sake of getting an iPhone. It has since been the object of my tech obsession. My predictions and wishes for tomorrow's iPhone OS 4.0 announcement.

1. Multitasking for non Apple produced applications. I want to be able to text AND still listen to Pandora.
2. A new UI doodad: Hopefully in the form of a homescreen enhancement. I keep my phone sync'd with my Google calendar. I would love a summary of the day's appointments on the homescreen along with any mail and message notifications.
3. Pseudo file management through iTunes (like how the iPad does it)
4. The ability to change the background. iPad does it right? It's my God given right to have the ability to use my own ugly ass background without having to jailbreak my phone :P
5. (Maybe) The ability to remove certain first party applications so that I don't have to shove them all onto the last app page and pretend that they don't exist when in reality it bothers me that they are there.
6. (Maybe) Software rotation lock....at least in Safari so that I can surf in bed in a non-awkward manner.
7. (Probably not) Some form of over the air syncing
8. (Probably not) A unified native chat client for both text messaging and services like GTalk and AIM.
9. A pony?

If Apple doesn't at least announce multi-tasking the entire internet is going to cry foul. It has been the number one speculation on every single tech site and blog for months on end. Actually to be honest, I can't think of too many things that I really would want to multi-task with other than services like Pandora. Please can we have some sort of rotation lock in Safari? I surf and read things in bed; Playing the tilting game is fucking annoying.

Oh also: I don't know/think that any phone actually does this, but I have always wanted the ability to customize the phone vibration. For example, 1 short pulse for text messages and 2 short pulses for something else.

Late posting for the lose. I guess CES is little more than an afterthought at this point given that I am posting this way after the con had ended. Anyway, I had the pleasure of attending the Consumer Electronic Show this year with someone special (<3 2-man raid FTW). For those who don't know what CES is: it is a trade show held annually in early January, showcasing the latest and greatest in the world of gadgets, electronics and doodads.

So the show: Being a first timer, I can't really draw a comparison to last year's CES. It's my understanding that the recession has obviously hit the electronics industry. There was a lot on display, but not too many big announcements or anything that reallywow'd me in terms of being innovative or new tech. Of the popular 'themes,' 3D home theater technology was obviously the big thing this year; Nearly every major booth had some sort of 3D television or device on display.

All but the lenticular 3D television display (missed this one sadly) utilized wireless polarized glasses with active shutter technology to produce the 3D effect. They are kind of like the movie theater glasses, but chunkier and more expensive. The televisions themselves need to be 3D capable in order to work, though speculation is that at some point, this feature will be integrated into the new televisions whether you want it or not.

I honestly don't see it being integrated into home television viewing life any time soon. The 3D effect itself is pretty neat, especially on movies and videos designed to maximize the effect (like Avatar). It's still an expensive gimmick though. The equipment is expensive, the glasses are kind of uncomfortable and dumb looking, and there aren't many videos designed for it yet. One of theTV's was very angle sensitive. The effect didn't seem to work well at all unless we were standing dead center.

I was very impressed with what Nvidia had to offer in terms of 3D for games. I know that this has been on display at several cons, but I've just sort of brushed over it before. It is still a glasses based system that requires a special monitor (well, 120hz refresh rate); and it's still expensive, but it's usable on the current generation of video cards and looks fantastic in my opinion. I think that this system has a lot of potential in the future but it's still too expensive and too taxing on most systems (huge FPS hit when the 3d effect is on according to several benchmarks).

We spent quite a bit of time at Microsoft's booth playing with the Surface and enjoying the cushy carpet on our weary feet (seriously, it was soft). The 4-player touch tower defense game was one of the things that instantly drew me. Multi-touch in general was on display in multiple booths. I think I have a video somewhere of Intel's cube thing.

The LEGO MMO looked much much better than I really had ever expected it to be for whatever it is worth coming from a dedicated WoW veteran. I have looked into it further since the con and have only heard and seen good things. I am pretty jaded on newMMO releases at this point but I might keep track of this one because it looks interesting. Oh, the bit about being able to build things in game and then order the model in actual LEGO bricks is pure win.

D-Link had a router that also served as a digital picture frame and NAS drive dock. I am not sure why this sort of device isn't more common. Networking equipment is butt ugly and a pain in the ass to keep out of sight or hide unless you are particularly clever about strapping things to the underside of your desk. So why not make them attractive looking of functional in some visual sort of way? D-Link offers this solution.

Overall, CES was great. I attended mostly for vacation purposes. Consequently, I missed quite a few things that I kind of wanted to see and unfortunately didn't bother taking too many notes. I think next year I am going to see if I can get a press pass and perhaps uuh have an itinerary of some sorts. It's such a huge con, so much to see. I took quite a few pictures, most being goofy/cute couples photos for my personal collection. I'll post of the a few on this site later.