McPhee

Just been reading up on this "Enhanced Edition" for The Witcher. Sounds pretty good It's solved a lot of the problems with the game (high load times, crashing, etc.) and added a host of new features. The best part? It's a free download if you already have the game! Getting the extra content now. I can FINALLY play this game (it crashed after the first hour when i first got it, and i never bothered to follow the patches for the game)/

Windows 7 used to be called 'Blackcomb' and was origionally supposed to be the successor to Windows XP. Due to delays Microsoft decided to create 'Longhorn' instead, a new operating system built upon Windows XP, but including improvements, refinements and some of the features initially planned for Blackcomb. Basically Windows 7 is the true successor to XP. It is to XP what XP was to Windows 98. Vista is more akin to Windows 2000, it's a better version of XP rather than a new OS.

Wait a while Odders. HTC are releasing some new handsets between now and Xmas. There's the Touch Pro, which is basically the Diamond with a hardware keyboard, the Touch HD, which is their latest (and most advanced) touch screen phone and the Dream, which runs Google's new Android OS. The hardware keyboard is a must for the Diamond, makes it a LOT easier to use (the screen is a bit small for an on screen QWERTY to work brilliantly) and the Touch HD really does look like it could be something special. I'm a tad skeptical on the Dream though, not sure Android will be very refined. It looks like a good OS, but the Touch HD seems more stylish. Touch HD vid:

The GH:WT kit has a bass pedal. That's the key bit you've been missing S.C.G I'm not sure how it'll work though, presumably the game will know which kit you're using and change the notes accordingly, because WT uses a different colour coding system from Rock Band. In RB the Yellow is the Hi-Hat (which is fine, one of the cymbals can be "Yellow") but the Green is the crash (not good, on the WT kit it's a tom). I'd assume Rock Band will change to compensate for this, otherwise we'll be using a drum pad as the crash cymbal.

The wire on a wired pad is pretty long. If it's too short then USB extenders are pretty cheap and easy to get hold of. 360 games crash in price pretty quick, especially second hand. Take a look here; http://www.gamestation.co.uk/discountsearch.asp?discountid=381 Find-Games is pretty good for finding the best price on new titles; http://www.find-games.co.uk/ And quite a few bargains pop up on http://www.hotukdeals.com

I think there was always the vain hope that we'd get through the LAST match. I kind of forgot it was here though, going to unstick it now

Everything is cross compatable on the 360 As a result i'm buying the full GH:WT kit, the Drums look better!

Might get myself an Arcade soon then and sell my premium off to my bro. Worth it for the HDMI alone!

You guys think Rock Band is a rip-off in the UK? Just been having a gander at monitors and the HP LP3065 is available for $666.81 in the states! A grand over here... The cheapest UK retailer for them is Overstock.com and they're selling US imports! :p lol (except it ain't funny, i'd have 2 at that price!)

QFT! That band is MADE for these games. Witty lyrics, catchy tunes and just general awesomeness! Which ever game includes them instantly wins in my book, would love to sing their songs while my mates play the music! Radio Calling All Skeletons Mercy Me I'm Dying Tomorrow Private Eye Would make a nice little pack. I'd be happy anyways I'd rather see the full back catalogue though, far too many brilliant songs to whittle down to just 5!

40" TV already on my shopping list, just waiting on the right deal. A new monitor will bugger up my plans. Gonna try updating my drivers now

Assuming these are new parts then there's already thermal paste on the heatsink. It'll self-apply when you fit it to the processor. You *should* only need your own tube if you take the processor-heatsink unit apart, or if you fit custom coolers to the CPU or Graphics Card

Time to dig out the warranty and see how long i'm covered for then, i only bought it a year ago (just over a year ago, sadly). I suppose if it is the monitor then it'll give me an excuse to replace it with a 24" jobby I mean vertical Cyan streaks in black areas. Will try taking a picture next time it happens. Bit buggered for spare parts, no spare Gcards and the only other monitor is hooked up to the downstairs PC. Moving it won't go down well, so i'll wait til the next time i have a few hours in the house on my tod + do some testing. EDIT: Thinking about it i've never had this problem when playing Xbox 360 games. I'm not so sure it is my monitor tbh.

That is awesome! Good to see they have a sense of humour The price still ain't quite right though, $170 is about £100. Add VAT, £117.50. Then there's a £62.50 gap. Part of this can be explained as shipping costs. There's also a larger gap between the wholesale price and the retail price than in the USA, so retailers will be taking part of that £62.50 (higher costs in the UK, so they actually do need to take more money than their US counterparts to make the same profit). I don't think EA and Harmonix are pocketing much more, but they are taking something extra. I'd hazard a guess at an extra £10-£15 per unit tops.

If i'm getting Cyan coloured streaks on all the black lines my monitor displays it's bad, right? It doesn't happen all the time, but it's getting more and more frequent! I'm guessing something is up with the graphics card, but the temps are ok, either that or it's reading the wrong temp and they aren't fine

Hopefully they get the demo out before the game, that way i can find out if my mates will buy it or not (if not im getting the PC version). An open beta would be pretty sweet, don't think they'll do it though. It was used to sort the balancing in TF2, it's not so important in L4D

Im pretty sure that says the opposite of what you think it does. Michael Caine is taking the piss out of the idea of those 2 being in the film and playing those 2 characters. If anything it sounds less likely, if it was actually being considered then Caine would have shut his mouth.

Yup, i had to do that for a while when i sliced one of my fingers up goodo, couldn't type with my left but could use the analogue ok. It takes some serious getting used to, you have a lot less buttons and don't try putting crouch on the analogue stick button, you can't use it and move at the same time (same goes for anything assigned to that button).

You know what the big problem is here? You only see one good way of making a product; the Apple way. There are other ways, plenty of alternatives out there. As i've said before, Apple don't cater for every market, so if you can take a significant slice of some other pie then that makes releasing a product like this worth every penny. The Zune didn't 'fail', it carved out it's own section of an overcrowded marketplace. The general public consider a lot of things to be good because they come in shiny packaging.

I loved Dawn Of War. Sold it a couple of years back though and not bothered to re-buy. I've got enough PC games that need playing as it is! Barely played any of The Witcher (great game, but it crashed too much so i stopped to wait on the patch), UT3, KOTOR2, Company Of Heroes (+ Opposing Fronts) or Spore yet, and not even installed Universe at War! No idea when i'll make the time to churn through that lot!

So what actually makes these updates bad again? And in what way does the Zune actually fail to compete with the iPod (other than not being quite so polished on features that the iPod doesn't actually have)? Regardless, it's a different market. People buy Zunes over iPods for the same reason that people buy HTC phones over the iPhone. They like the extra features and the extra freedom that these devices allow. By following Apple's lead these manufacturers would be alienating these users and trying to steal customers from Apple instead, it's not a sensible business move.

Whats not to like? The card runs faster than the 9800GT, it's DX10.1 compliant and has the usual extra features you find in ATi cards. http://www.ebuyer.com/product/146428 The 4850 is a 9800GTX+ competitor, it wipes the floor with the 9800GT.

Don't you just love the irony of "Russia attacked Georgia because they are trying to re-establish their old empire!"? I've been interested in a trip to China for a long time, very interesting country. Had plans to do it this year at one point, then decided against it because of the Olympics (too busy, hotel prices were WAY too expensive). I might go next year, gonna take the trans-siberian railway so i can see a bit of Russia and Mongolia along the way. It wouldn't surprise me to read about McCain having an "accident" after a year or so in power. A nice little "heart attack" would see Palin become the first female President, she'll be a lot better at screwing the world up than Bush was. Hell, under her command i wouldn't be suprised to see another Vietnam or Laos situation happen.

IT'S NOT A PRODUCT, YET. Thats the difference with Beta versions, they aren't 'products'. Google Chrome is still in the Testing stage of development, they've released it as a public beta to test how it works on a large scale. It's common practice these days. If they didn't do public testing then Chrome and loads of other software would never see public use for another year. To top that off it'd also be more buggy upon release in 12 months time than it will through a public beta. Public Betas are VERY efficient at finding problems

Spore will be in my hands tomorrow Can't wait!