Spent 310 dollars today on PSP + PSP game! More details inside!

Today, I’ve thought I had a chance to meet this woman whose name was Nikki at Subway, but she hadn’t showed up. We’ve talked to each other Friday over the phone apparently she knows me from high school, and saw my dad at the pharmacy in Econo Foods. Dad described her as thin, blonde, tight jeans, athletic, and soft spoken. I was polite over the phone when she asked how I liked WITC. Truth is I haven’t been interested in meeting girls at all in my whole life. I’m an only child so that makes sense to not really care to be around people all the time. I can’t even picture this person in my head; however, she can picture me in her head apparently. Today was beautiful out, no snow or rain and 70 degrees with sun shine. I may call her tomorrow. She wanted to see me, and it didn’t seem like she’d was there to alienate me like a lot of other students from high school. Damn alienators. I wasn’t exactly the brain (nerd….yes, brain….no) in Renaissance Academy and was shy in high school, but some of that has changed. I knew I was above average in my skill of writing….why else would I do a blog? I love blogging by the way. I didn’t know anyone at high school cared anymore except Randy (best friend).

I’ve drove to the bank before 2 pm when I was suppose to meet this woman from high school, and withdrew $270. The bank teller didn’t recognize me so I gave her my driver’s license. There is something about not seeing me before which makes me a stranger there. Grrr. I wasn’t about to go a tangent explaining I was there before. It’s not that important….just a bank visit…many people come here every day. Next, I drove straight to Wal-Mart in Hudson, and wasted no time walking to the electronic section to buy a Playstation Portable value pack. Then I’ve bought Wipeout Pure. A console is no good without a game. I was looking for the Nyko rechargeable case Game Stop sells (water resistant case with extra lithium battery to extend battery life.) IGN verified on a full charge, PSP would last me 3 hours & 32 minutes. Lithium batteries also loose their ability to retain battery life as they are used often.

The value pack included:

• Black PSP
• Miniature earphones
• Nylon carrying case with the PSP logo
• 32 MB Sony memory stick Duo
• USB cable
• Spiderman 2 movie UMD
• Game Demo UMD
• Lithium battery charger
• PSP directions

Okay, after almost spilling Mountain Dew on the PSP after I took a photo you see, I almost had heart attack, but the bottle was empty, so I was relieved. I’ve experienced Wipeout Pure now. The graphics are great, but I’ve been having trouble controlling the vehicle if you call it that using the d-pad. The soundtrack is dance music, yeah! So that’s alright. PSP only takes a special kind of memory card called the Memory Card Duo which is thinner so my other memory cards I use with the camera won’t work which is a shame. I was going to try out putting MP3s on PSP. Sony didn’t package a USB cable that fits into it’s tiny slot, but luckily, I have a digital camera which has the same USB cable so I just took that and added it to the PSP packaging box, no problem-o.



you see the PSP packaging box and God of War. See how the PSP box is still in excellent condition? I wish I could say the same for my Dual Screen box LOL

Conclusion: I can deal with 2 dead pixels and a missing USB cable. PSP is great. Now I can play it all the time if I choose to do so. My next PSP game will be the next highest score on GameRankings.com, Lumines, the above average puzzle game from Bandai. My friends at Toyriffic prefer Ridge Racer over anything else because it got good reviews even though Wipeout Pure and Lumines had better reviews. I don’t need extra games. They’re not worth it so all and all Wipeout Pure was worth $40. I suck at it because I hardly spent anytime on it. MP3s transfer threw the USB cable great. I’ve been listening to some songs like Gouryella – Gouryella, Sasha – Xpander, Sylver - Shallow Water (Cj Stone alternative remix edit), and Chicane-Autumn – Tactics (Thrillseekers Club Mix).I’ve thought Gouryella sounded the best on the small speaker & is exceptional song by the way. It has a good beat to it. There is no equalizer on the PSP, but that feature can be over looked. It wasn’t meant to take over as a MP3 player, but makes an outstanding photo wallet. Right and Left triggers do the pictures.

If I had a choice whether or not I would buy it or wait a month until money was added to my savings account, but I’ve been waiting a long time for PSP to come out so I just had to get one out of curiosity and anticipation. I usually pondered on a good portion of the day and if I actually needed a PSP or not yeah know? One thing is for certain; it was a good feeling when I finally got one. Interesting enough, I only saw only 1 PSP missing from the enclosed glass shelf, and it was that way for a reason. The handheld is more than an Xbox or Playstation 2 even though they too are behind glass. Did I make the right decision? I know I’m not in debt, because I paid for it in cash meaning I won’t get in trouble with the bank, which is why I pay videogames in cash.
Now there isn’t a big deal wondering which one is better (NDS vs PSP) because I own both now.
• Okay, we all know it's more expensive then NDS. Was it purchased worth it? Well, in my opinion it's a dumb question because I'd purchased it. Right now there is no way not to pay less without the UMD movie which isn't a important factor anyhow.

You install the battery back in the PSP which snaps into place and put the lid on afterwards. Then you install the memory stick duo which is the only card that fits inside a PSP. Then you turn the thing on and set the time, date, settings, login name for WiFi. Then the UMD disc goes in upside down with the label facing PSP's back so the flat part faces upwards. The PSP automatically reads the disc inside unless you hit the small home button, it'll go the boot screen

Boot Screen Settings

Network update - I don't know

USB connection - after you press X button, a drive shows up on the PC so drag and drop files can occur. Pictures go in the PSP/PICTURES, MP3s go in PSP/MUSIC, MPEG 4 goes in PSP/MOVIES

Video Settings - has settings for audio language, subtitle language and UMD volume

Photo Settings - has an option of how fast you want your slideshow to be

System Settings - Date, Time, Language, Format memory stick option, nickname, Battery information, option to restore default settings, PSP BIOS version (v1.5), About SCEA

UMD disc - plays game

Memory data - displays basic game saves on memory stick duo
* transfers to other PSPs wirelessly
* option to delete saves

Media options

Photo - displays photo, zoom in and out feature incorporated. Option to delete photos

Music - plays MP3s, AAC and can shuffle the music, display the file size, but not the bit rate. Option to delete music.

Movies - NA

Game - displays the game saves on the memory card. Gives you an option of transferring them via WiFi to another PSP or deleting them. Also shows the file size of the game save

The UMD game I’ve bought was Wipeout Pure. The vehicle controls awkwardly because you play the D-pad which is standard issue and fair quality. You’ve 2 triggers to drift your vehicle more closely in a sharp turn, X to accel, square to brake, triangle to rare view. I think the graphics are PS2 quality on the LCD screen. You might disagree and believe PS2 games look better, not on a handheld though. The sound is cd quality and it sounds better wearing earphones, not on the speaker.

The sound must be an 8.5 because the small speaker is in stereo and it's loud, but not crystal clear. It must be a standard issue speaker inside PSP.

The UMD drive is not electronic so you can get the UMD out after the battery is dead. Lesson learned by the faulty PS2 tray drives, plus you wouldn't want a electronic lid on a handheld which Sony knew already. That's a plus

I give PSP a B+ on average.

Pros

• graphics are really good
• download Game saves over Internet
• upload Game saves to other PSPs in the area using the WiFi feature and not sneakernet
• sound is really good
• WiFi game saves to each other
• full charge occurs in 25 minutes
• recharges while hooked up to power while playing game
• Plays AAC audio.
• option to turn off LCD back light in boot screen under System Settings
• storage space on UMD is plentiful
• non-electric UMD lid
• memory card has 32 MB instead of 8 MB
• shows FMV
• volume control buttons on front
• acts as photo wallet; supports JPEG only
• plays your MP3s almost as well as an iPod
• LCD dims when not played to save battery life
• when you shut it off in the middle a game & when you turn it back on, it'll be at the spot you shut it off at.
• games priced at $40 and not $60

Cons

• D-pad only for games
• analog pad is crap or gives bad performance
• battery life ?
• Need Nyko Rechargeable case
• price point
• value pack gives you unnecessary stuff like UMD movie unless you want to watch

Here are the top Playstation Portable games at the moment.



YEAH! I HAVE ONE NOW & IT’S GREAT! I’VE BEEN WANTING FOR THIS FOR A YEAR NOW!

Easter was great until someone stole my game & downloaded Laxius Power II & III

On Friday, Randy and I played Vs Mode in Super Mario Bros. and he won and I gave his money’s worth at it. Randy had made it to World 8-3 because he had found a secret beanstalk in World 5-1 which only appears when invisible squares are hit. Then we went to Perkins in town to eat dinner. I had a juicy bacon cheeseburger with fries. I’ve tried to talk about IRC (internet relay chat), IM and videogames, but he doesn’t like those things. We’ve been friends for a long time so I liked spending time with him and his girlfriend, just not in the restaurant. When we were in the Target parking lot, he pealed out because a couple of teens were looking at him funny. His ego was really big on Friday. Randy is a person you can kid around with. So we went inside the store and picked out God of War for a full $50 and saw the PSP on the self for $250. This means that I don’t have to pay $150 more for a value pack having games I don’t even need. I didn’t buy the PSP, but may purchase it next month when $185 dollars is added to my checking account. That’s next week everyone! It is what I want to have by the way. So we’ve got back and played World Series Baseball 2K3 at my house. He chose the Oakland Athletics and I chose the Minnesota Twins. The Twins won because I kept advancing the bases which he hadn’t learned to do early in the game, but he also made a big come back doing the same thing I did to him. On the front of the controller, the 4 buttons represent the bases and the player can advance using the buttons. We haven’t figured out pitching styles yet (fast, screw, insider, and wine-up). There were few bugs in this game, outfielders controlled extremely well. It’s the 2nd best baseball game for Playstation 2. The best game is EA Sport’s MVP Baseball 2005 from what I saw ranking wise. EA Sports delivered a better game than they usually do.

I’ve treated yesterday like an ordinary day until I got my videogame stolen. Since I now have a satellite in my room, I was watching a horror flick called “The Grudge.” The grudge is a dead spirit that eats people. Actually, it didn’t scare me a bit except the grudge’s first appearance in the film which sent a chill down my spine. I was fascinated the movies setting which is in Japan. Of course, the main character is American exchange student. The grudge eats people who come to its house. Actually, there were 2 grudges in the end. If an existing grudge eats someone; that person becomes a grudge. In public, the grudge looks like an ordinary person and can’t eat anyone.

Then I watched Goldeneye. The first thing I noticed was the film is a lot different than the videogame for Nintendo 64. The movie was entertaining. Boris was a funny character. He’s the Russian nerd who wants to be a genius, and says, “I’m invincible” whenever he hacked into the CIA database & that time right before he was frozen with cyanide when it fell on him. Of course when the computers are inactive he pretty much pounds the monitor to death. It’s probably the 2nd best 007 film starring Pierce Brosman. It’s not as good as 007 films starring Sean Connery. I’ve none of the old James Bond movies on VHS.

I’ve brought the Gran Turismo 4 DVD in its case and the disc was stolen by the only person who could have stolen it – my cousin. I’d caught that Tekken 5 disc was missing, and he told me to check home to see if it was in my other PS2 which was true. He didn’t want to play Gran Turismo 4 when I asked him for that reason. The fricken smart ass.

After the NCAA basketball game, my dad, Uncle Jim who lives there, my cousin’s husband, Jim, and my other cousin’s husband, Jeff. Everyone was playing “Phase 10” (card game). I’ve joined in for a bit, but kept loosing so I went home to check every single case for the missing disc. And I went back to see what if Josh happened to return there or if the disc was on the floor in the room the console was hooked up in. However, I called his place to talk to him, but I’d got a hold of his dad instead so I asked him kindly if he saw a rogue disc lying around to call me back, and I’ll have the answer today. I remember being furious about it and checking every single case it could be in. I am not a person who puts games in different cases out of laziness. It looks like I’ll have to repurchase Gran Turismo 4. First stolen videogame since I gave a former friend Diablo 2 to copy it, and had it stolen at his house!

Anyhow, I am re-downloading Laxius Power II because I couldn’t find it. Laxius Power series are freeware games inspired by Final Fantasy II, Phantasy Star II, and Suikoden. According to the site, a group of people got a little crazy with RPG Maker 2000 making it look like Final Fantasy II. The game play is barely professional, but playable. It does have a battle system which looks like that of Final Fantasy I in Dawn of Souls for GBA. I also downloaded Laxius Power III, and added these games to the new freeware section to my videogame list. This is my 28th major update to the list. All these games are at the Laxius Power Homepage.

Someone didn't warn me about God of War & being a lazy geek too

I admit my last entry wasn’t very good. I could copy / paste all my posts from Catharton, but I won’t because that’s cheating although it would make everything slightly easier. As you know, I haven’t spoken to any person on here, because I’m busy, and this is for other people to read. I update 3 – 5 days regardless of the circumstances. Everything 3rd or 4th day I get really excited, because it’s “blog entry day!”

On Sunday, I went to the videogame store and bought Devil May Cry 2, walked back to my truck, and thought, “Do I really, really want this game? It’s only a 7/10 game, but it would complete my Devil May Cry trilogy.” Deciding I’ll never play DMC 2, I’ve refunded it at the store & spent more money on two extra used videogames. The first purchase was Baten Kaitos Eternal Wings and the Lost Ocean. That usually means it was returned very quickly after first purchased. I remember reading IGN’s review the day before I bought it which also had an effect on purchasing the game. That now makes 31 Gamecube software purchases since September 2001. I couldn’t say games because of the Sonic Mega Collection & Zelda Promotional Disc multiple games thing. Back then, it was true Gamecube didn’t have more then Sega’s Skies of Arcadia Legends and Lost Kingdoms in terms of role playing games. According to IGN, the graphics were a 9.0/10, the game play was 8.5 out of 10, and the sound received a 9/10. The other game I’d bought was Final Fantasy Dawn of Souls brand new for Gameboy Advance. I already own Final Fantasy Origins, but now I’ve Final Fantasy I and II for two different platforms. There is something about Final Fantasy I on a Gameboy Advance which makes the purchase worth it. Not only do both games inside Dawn of Souls feature better graphics than Final Fantasy III, it is 20 dollars less Toyriffic’s asking price. If I didn’t buy Final Fantasy Dawn of Souls; I could have afforded “God of War.”

I’ve asked when the store is getting Valkyrie Profile (super rare and popular PS1 videogame), and Phantasy Star Collection for Gameboy Advance. Neither game existed at the store. Everybody seems to want Valkyrie Profile for Playstation which is my point. People either want it because it’s rare or because it’s a Tri-Ace game. My expert opinion is customers want it because it’s rare, and the one whom has it can brag about it! Wanting the game is very simple to comprehend like the phrase, “if it quacks like a duck, looks like a duck, it must be a duck (an endangered species in this case)” or “Behold this rare specimen, you have nothing! HAHA!” The 2nd part sometimes ticks me off more if I know which developer (team of game developers who form a company) which made the game. The store thinks it can get $80 bucks out of me, well, I can get it cheaper off EBay, and whoever figured that out before isn’t dumb. I don’t blame the people who work there since it’s not their fault game prices were steep, they just sell the games to customers. If only I had a credit card, I could start bidding off EBay which will never happen this year or next year.

What’s this God of War for PS2 which has created quite a stir in the videogame world? Third most phenomenal videogame of all time according to Gamespy? In my point of view, no way! It shall not top Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time, Super Mario Bros 3, Halo 2, Halo, and Unreal Tournament 2004, Half-life 2, Goldeneye 007, Perfect Dark, Super Mario 64, and in that order God of War got a lot of 10 out of 10s….graphics 10/10? Game play 10/10? Sound 10/10? See, I am smarter than this. Half-life 2 got a 12.10/10, and it looks so much better than God of War which doesn’t mean much to Gamespy apparently. According to Gamespy’s review structure, the game shall top the charts due to one person’s point of view of a game for any system. God of War may not be one of greatest videogames (like the review sites from IGN and Gamespy) ever although I can’t deny the game play is better than 95% games out for PS2. I might sound like I’m a rich fellow owning all these big releases when they first come out, but in reality; I’m pretty much broke as far as walking around money. My mother was making a condition so if I go to Target today and get a videogame of my choice, she’d reimburse most of it and it’ll be in my Easter basket this Sunday or almost free. I’ll probably choose God of War for PS2 sooner or later. I was going to get Digital Devil Saga which is hugely popular at Toyriffic for some reason because it’s another RPG I probably won’t play. It would be the third mature RPG I’ve bought as of yet (first one was Fable for Xbox, second one was Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne), plus I’d rather get Atelier Iris ~Eternal Mana~ the 2nd game published by Nippin Ichi America (first was Phantom Brave), but introducing a new developer, Gust. It’s another one of those strategy RPGs like an old Command & Conquer game. So far I have all the Nippion Ichi games which made it to the US. Why would I buy this graphic deprived game? Answer: looks like an old school RPG (SNES style) in my house, so it must appeal to people who remember the 16-bit era.

I’ve this strange feeling that games for Playstation 3 will not be on BD. Videogame file size won’t need anything more then DL-DVD. In fact, Xbox 360 is keeping the DVD-ROM drive without upgrading to a HD-DVD-ROM drive. It’s much cheaper to add 2 discs in games which need it than add the more expensive HD-DVD-ROM drive in every Xbox 360 like previously thought. Heck, for the first year, in my opinion, most Americans won’t own too many next generation discs (HDD, BD), so being able to play the current DVD media on Xbox 360 will be acceptable by most Xbox gamers!

Yesterday, I was playing Mario Kart 64, Mario Kart Double Dash, and Wave Race - Blue Storm. I didn’t get 1st place in every race in Mario Kart 64! That’s because I’m not perfect at it, but back when I was 13 - 15 I was a lot better. It was possible for me to get 1st place in all of the 150cc tracks. One time I’ve lost the lead by getting rid of a red shell which came back and hit me. The other time, I was second and I didn’t get a blue shell at all so there was no possible way to take back the lead. Mario Kart 64 does these little idiosyncrasies I use to play this game a lot when I was growing up to an adult. I’ve played the Star Cup at 100cc. Did you know I use Action Replay on games I don’t care about? Well, I’ve added a code that unlocked everything in Mario Kart Double Dash so I could finally play the locked tracks, and I’ve also got Toad as one of the four unlockable characters. I’ve played as Toad and Bowser Jr. in one grand prix, but I’ll favor Yoshi and Princess Peach (also Toldstool) over all characters. Laugh all you want. I’ve had a gut feeling that the new Rainbow Road lacked design and a decent soundtrack. Nintendo could have had done a better job remixing N64 version of Rainbow Road. I wonder what tomorrow’s videogame shall be? Devil May Cry 3? Dark Cloud 2? Mario and Luigi Superstar Saga? Gran Turismo 4? Prince of Persia - Sands of Time? Who knows?

The same day I did something stupid, I installed the Longhorn Transformation Pack 9.0 from soft32.com. It’s horrible. I remember installing LTP 6.0 and it did the same thing. First, it made my ISP connection really, really bad, slower then normal. Then it would use a lot of system resources and make everything slow. Everyone, take it from me, do not download & install that free Longhorn Transformation Pack 9.0. SO GOT THAT!

I’ve drove back to Toyriffic today to buy Tony Hawk’s Underground 2 and Tony Hawk Pro Skater 2x (as in THPS 1&2) for Xbox. I’ve thought this over and made a vowel I’ll own all the Tony Hawks for Xbox which I’ve fore filled. I was surprised that THUG2 was only $25. The franchise got its reputation on Playstation so might as well own the last two to complete the series. Prior to this, I’ve thought heavily on either buying Saga Frontier 2 or Threads of Fate because both are made by Squaresoft. As my options got better, I’ve finally let those go of the thought entirely. I was also pondering on paying $30 for Square’s Breath of Fire for SNES, but I would never play it, and in reality it was over priced in my opinion which in reality is only worth $15! It did have something to do with graphics by the way….

As for the final WITC writing project, I’m brainstorming a formal evaluation and research report which is due next month. My thought was doing something obvious like DVD collecting at home or why Pentium 4 is better than Athlon 64? Something simple like that because if I’d ask something like what ping do you have at home? I’ll only ask the technical influenced people instead which is why I do the survey at school where everyone knows about Internet bandwidth and them stuff. In my opinion, surveying internet between cable, DSL, or dialup as one of the choices isn’t a great idea because it’s too broad of an answer, plus, I know for a fact that high-speed Internet users out number dialup users 2:1! People with dialup are always the ones who don’t care about the Internet in the first place. Those people don’t need high speed to get a few tasks done. I, on the other hand, tend to be an internet junkie where high ping throughput is very important.


New Games: Tony Hawks Underground 2; Tony Hawks Pro Skater 2x; Final Fantasy Dawn of Souls; Baten Kaitos - Eternal Wings and the Lost Ocean Also showing bloggers all Tony Hawk games for Xbox

That’s all for now. Come back in 3 days.

I've made 87 Applications on 1 DVD! W00T!

About NURBS

Yet’s talk about this NURB thing because it’s used in Playstation Portable and it’s not a polygon which makes it so interesting. It’s the official texture of 4D! I mean how can something be 3D and not support polygons? Well, until now, everything was computed with polygons . NURBS (nonuniform rational B-splines) are mathematical representations of 2- or 3-dimensional objects, which can be standard shapes (such as a cone) or free-form shapes (such as a car). NURBS are used in computer graphics and the CAD/CAM industry and have come to be regarded as a standard way to create and represent complex objects. In addition to curves and surfaces, NURBS can also represent hypersurfaces.

Most sophisticated graphic creation tools provide an interface for using NURBS, which are flexible enough to design a wide range of shapes - anything from points to straight lines to conic sections. NURBS are compact expressions that can be evaluated and displayed quickly. NURBS work especially well in 3-D modeling, allowing the designer to easily manipulate control vertices, called ISO curves, and control curvature and the smoothness of contours. NURBS are defined by both control points and weights. It takes very little data to define a NURB.

A spline is a usually curvy pattern used to guide someone shaping something large, such as a boat hull. The B-spline is based (the B stands for basis) on four local functions or control points that lie outside the curve itself. Nonuniform is the idea that some sections of a defined shape (between any two points) can be shortened or elongated relative to other sections in the overall shape. Rational describes the ability to give more weight to some points in the shape than to other points in considering each positions relation to another object. (This is sometimes referred to as a 4th dimensional characteristic.)

About Yesterday

Okay, enough about NURBS. Yesterday, I’ve made an application DVD with all the latest software crossing over 50 data CDs and data DVDs because a lot of programs on 95% of them are obsolete. I did “tree /f” in the command prompt so I could easily display all the programs I did. With all the applications I ever dreamed up putting on DVD I got 1.4 GB worth. So I added 425 MB of Mp3s. This includes some shareware games, I found out various CDs. This on DVD makes most of my CDs obsolete which is my point. You know of course I put some extra stuff on it that I don’t want Modblog to know about. I’m kind of excited here.



Folder PATH listing for volume Application DVD
Volume serial number is 71FAE346 B1AC:7E9C
D:.
³ My Documents.zip
³ blogger.png
³ desktopscreenie.jpg
³ dvdlist.txt
³ gradiusv.txt
³ granturismo4.txt
³ modblogpic2.png
³ modblogpic3.png
³ modblogsitepic1.png
³ myroom06.01.04.jpg
³ xenosagaepisode2_cheatcodes.txt
³
Blogging
³ wbloggar400.exe
³ wbloggar.gif
³
Codec
³ DivX521XP2K.exe
³ Xing MPEG Encoder 2.20.zip
³ XviD-1.0.3-20122004.exe
³ dBpowerAMP-codec-Nero-mp4.exe
³ dBpowerAMP-codec-wmav91.exe
³ dMC-AAC-Codec.exe
³ divx_v5.2.1_kg.exe
³ in_mp4-2_1_beta.exe (for Winamp)
³ in_mpc_0.99f.exe (for Winamp)
³ lame-3.96.1.cab
³ mppdec-windows-1.95e.zip
³ mppenc-windows-1.15s.zip
³ oggvorbis-dlls1.1.0.zip
³
Compression Tools
³ powarc920.exe
³ wrar342.exe
³
DVD Burning or emulators
³ Alcohol120_trial_1_9_2_1705.exe
³ Alcohol_120_Percent_v1.9.2_build_1705_by_HTBTeam.zip
³ BlindWrite5_setup.exe
³ BlindWrite_Suite_v5.1.1.128.zip
³ Nero_Burning_ROM_Ultra_Edition_v6.3.1.6.zip
³ daemon347.exe
³ nero63115.exe
³ nero6603.exe
³
Desktop Enhancement
³ Longhorn Transformation Pack 6.0.exe (like Winblinds)
³ setup_xpvt_est.exe
³ ³ ³
Emulators
³ ³ mess090b-1.zip
³ ³
Apple ][e
³ ³ APPLEWIN.rar
³ ³ Apple_for_Windows.zip
³ ³
³ Wonderswan Emulators
³ 032 - Guilty Gear Petit 2 (J).zip
³ 086 - Shincho no Yabo for WonderSwan (J).zip
³ Rockman & Forte - Mirai Kara no Chousen Sha (J) [M].zip
³ oswan072.zip
³
Firewalls
³ OutpostProInstall.exe
³
Games
³ ³ Buziol Games.rar
³ ³ ChickenInvadersInstaller130.exe
³ ³ DPacman141.exe
³ ³ HaCKeR.rar
³ ³ JQ2.zip
³ ³ MarioXP121.lzh
³ ³ ParityShot094d.zip

³ ³ SolSuite_2004_v18.1.0 crack.zip
³ ³ Tetris4000.exe
³ ³ ZELDA.ZIP
³ ³ death illistrated 1.05.exe
³ ³ demonshr.exe
³ ³ dieslave.zip
³ ³ eagle lander 3D.exe
³ ³ embodiment of scarlet devil.exe
³ ³ frozen bubble 1.0 install.exe
³ ³ gunmani2.lzh
³ ³ gunviper040.lzh
³ ³ hc_install.exe
³ ³ laserage19.zip
³ ³ laxis Power RPG_full.exe
³ ³ megapop.EXE
³ ³ pacmanworlds.ZIP
³ ³ perfect cherry blossom.zip
³ ³ solsuite 2004 v19.1.exe
³ ³
³ Lagacy Doom
³ ³ FFDOOM2.ZIP
³ ³ FreeDoom with Doom legacy front End.exe
³ ³
³ dinksmallwood
³ DINKSM~1.EXE
³ Dink Smallwood.zip
³ Dinkzilla.zip
³ ahdink106.zip
³ dink smallwood trainer.zip
³ dink.zip
³ dink_107_upgrade_beta3.exe
³ dinksmlful-gh.zip
³ dinksmwd.zip
³
IRC
³ mIRC_v6.16_by_FHCF.zip
³ mIRC_v6.16_by_Rif.zip
³ mirc616.exe
³
Image Editing
³ AJPEGCOMPR.EXE
³ Jasc_Paint_Shop_Pro_v9.01.zip
³ Photo-Brush_v1.42.zip
³ en_psp9011_jasc.exe
³ gimp-2.2.3-i586-setup.exe
³ gtk+-2.4.14-setup.zip
³ irfanview395.exe
³ photo-brush 3.10.exe
³ paint shop pro 900entr.exe
³
Instant Messengers
³ MSN Messenger 6.2.0205.exe
³

Media Players
³ Winamp 5.08e.exe
³ QCD 4.51.exe
³ VideoLAN 0.81.exe

MP3 Rippers
³ CDex_151.rar
³ RipCastSetup.exe
³ RipCast_Streaming_Audio_Ripper_v1.9.zip
³ winLAME-rc3-full.exe

Sound Recorders
³ Digital_Sound_Recorder_v3.2.2_by_Orion.zip
³ digitalrecorder 3.2.2.exe
³
Spyware
³ 007 spy software 3.4.exe
³ 007_Spy_Software_v3.33.zip
³ 007ssinstall 3.33.exe
³
Video Creation
³ 1clickdvdripper.exe
³ AutoGordianKnot.1.25.Setup.exe
³ Ulead_Video_Studio_v8.00.1300_Trial.zip
³ WinDVDCreator.exe
³ uvs8_trial_e.exe
³ vStrip_08f_css.zip
³
Video drivers
³ 66.93_win2kxp_english.exe (nvidia)
³ wxp-w2k-catalyst-8-10-050119a-020581c.exe (ati)
³
Visual Studio Projects
³ Visual Studio Projects.rar
³
Web Browser plugins
³ JPEG2000 for IE.exe
³ flashplayer7installer.exe
³ jpegtbox_setup_v2.exe
³
Web Browsers
³ Firefox Setup 1.0.1.exe
³ aquamac.mskin
³ maxthon 1.2.exe
³ mozilla-win32-1.7.5-installer.exe
³
Web Development
³ CoffeeFire65.exe (old version but didn’t feel like downloading new one)
³ Dreamweaver MX 2004.exe
³ HTMLShrinkerLight260.exe
³ NamoWebEditor6SuiteEnuTrial_magic939.exe
³ Namo_WebEditor_v6.0.2.105_Trial.zip
³ ls_coffeecupfirestarter65.zip
³ macromedia-2004-crack.zip
³ xaramenumakerv1.1976keygenror.zip
³ xara menu maker11dl.exe
³
WinXP Service Pack 1 & 2
³ WindowsXP-KB835935-SP2-ENU.exe
³ xpsp1a_en_x86.exe

download accelerators
gozilla.exe
netants 1.25 free download accelerator.exe

I’m thinking I won’t need to create one of these for a while. I have 200 blank DVDs to write on and I’ve only used half one 1. All the applications almost make up 3 CDs! I was looking for other data to put on this DVD, but couldn’t think of anything.

Ramblings of various stuff including PSP

Sorry about the 5 day response time here at Ian’s Smashing Good Blog Site. First off is more news on next generation consoles. I’ve learned that NEC is only making the semiconductor. Revolution CPU(s), Hollywood, is still being manufactured by IBM. IBM is also doing business with Sony and Microsoft for their consoles too. IBM has the largest silicon chip research and development teams on Earth.

Well, there is ten days until Playstation Portable gets launched. I’ll be excited about buying that. My favorite game for PSP will be Wipeout Pure. PSP is likely to sell out the first day. I’ll be able to afford one at the launch.

Did anyone know that I got a 76% or 22/30 on the Playstation 2 IQ test at PlaystationPro2.com? Well I did. I was excited for a moment there, but I just know the tidbits I guess.

As you might know, I don't concern myself with national problems, today I’ve made an exception by watching the History Channel where I’ve learned about private military sectors which were created because it’s a way around the public’s opinion (who wants a volunteer military). So I was unaware that the American/Arab war in ‘91 was being fought by the US Army / US Navy / US Air force and private militaries also referred to mercenaries when not included in US military. Unlike the US military, soldiers who work for a commercial organization can come home if the going gets tough, and the American soldier can not. I don’t like the private military (which gets paid more than our government’s soldier) than the rightful volunteer military because the private sector does not answer to a Four Star General instead he/she answers their private organization’s recruiter whom answers to the American military strategically. In any case, I learned that people want to earn more money and take vacations instead of working in the government faction.

On Saturday, I went to my friend Randy’s house at 7 PM. It was pretty cold around freezing so I took it slow. His house is in the town of Hammond. It’s pretty small. When I drove there, he and I went down to his basement and we played Burnout 3 on PS2. I suppose his dad saw me when I came in the door. In Burnout 3, you race to the finish line like most racing games, but we all crash into each other for points. The several obscure opponents flip your car or crash it against the railing enough it’ll eventually explode! I’m not complaining since this is how the game forces you to play aggressive-like. The racing part with car against car of Burnout 3 is the most fun. The other part, crashing into an intersection didn’t make much sense to either of us. Speaking of which, I would have bought this game for Xbox, but instead bought the PS2 version. Okay, point here being the head 2 head racing was the only fun part.

Then we tried out four of the PS2 rpgs I haven’t played yet. Yeah, these were imported role playing games from Japan which has been translated into English. First off we’ve played Phantom Brave made by Nippion Ichi. The voices spoiled it, the music was above average, the voice-overs were little cutesy high octave girlie voice-overs The music in Disgaea - Hour of Darkness was a bit crazy, not only above average, I thought the music score was like a cartoon music whomever composed it. The graphics had anime sprites with the oddest backgrounds colorful mixed in with demonic things…weird stuff. Looked dark too, well you play the prince of the underground so everything is evil I suppose. Then I’ve played Lu Pucelle Tactics. That game was developed the same way and by the same team who worked on Disgaea. You start out in the church and you fight demons. The IGN review spoiled it for me. Yeah, that was interesting. I can’t describe it because I only played it for 5 minutes and I don’t care to play it again. Then I showed Randy Ys VI (PS2 game) I’ve bought from Toyriffic he and I were looking all over Woodbury for last week. He had nothing to do that day so we went searching to various stores including Game Stop, Best Buy, CompUSA, Toys R Us and Game Crazy. All and all these games are bad, but yet I love getting the strange imports hoping I’ll get a diamond in the ruff one of these times. He likes country so he let me compress his George Strait’s 50 Number Ones. I’ve always liked new music to add to my mp3 collection. It has about 51 of his songs. Country is a change of style instead of fast paced trance I am use too, plus that’s what my friend is interested around here.

All this week WITC (Wisconsin Institute of Technology College) has been on spring break which hasn’t bothered me because I don’t go to college at all, I just send my homework electronically to them. Carthaton Electronica is offline today so I was looking for something on the Internet to do. I’m already ahead in my college technical writing class so I needn’t to worry about that for now. I shall work on Visual Basic more, but today, I’ve been taking a break in between working on homework… a lot of little breaks for that matter. This week I’ve been learning how to save files in new folders and follow directions precisely. Reading directions precisely hasn’t been working out very well for me. Heck, I’m not complaining, because I know I have to rely on myself to get through it, and starting to dread these following directions in the book stuff because I don’t like retracing my steps. I NEED DISCIPLINE!

Tomorrow, I get to tell whatever is on my mind (doesn't mean I will though because I can be secretive when there are no rules)! My parents are telling me to be nice, and I might agree with them and be nice to this doctor. He’s going to help increase / decrease my meds, but I won’t agree with everything he says.

Damn, I need friends now! What can you do? You’re all in another state!

I shall go to bed and stop my ramblings for now.

To be Wild Blue user! | Saved up $140 toward purchase of Playstation Portable

Only 2 months until my place gets Wild Blue! Wild Blue is a state-of-the-art two-way satellite service supporting up to 2 mbps downlink costing 70 dollars whereas it’d be a lot more money with DirecWay. We’re getting either 1 Mbps or 1.5 Mbps service plan. Wild Blue is bringing the price down further than previously thought possible. Two way satellites use IPv4 Multicasting.

The Satellite

The Modem

Benefits of Multicasting:

• Multicasting can dramatically reduce network traffic by sending a single copy of the data.

• Hosts can be configured for multicasting without hardware upgrades.

• Because newer routers already support multicast forwarding and multicast routing protocols, enabling multicasting on a network is practical and cost-effective.

Multicasting is useful for many types of one-to-many applications, such as the following:

• Multimedia, such as video conferencing and collaborative computing.

• Automatic discovery of resources in an internetwork (in Windows Server 2003 for example, TCP/IP router discovery uses multicasting by default, and WINS uses multicasting during automatic discovery of replication partners).

• Datacasting such as file distribution or database synchronization.

• Mobile computer support such as remote address book updating.

• Distribution of organizational publications.

Satellite looks exactly like this and will go on top of our house next to our DirecTV satellite.

It’s faster than 3G broadband cellular services too which max out at around 386 kbps. The uplink is either 200 kbps or 300 kbps though. Since it’s a straight access internet, one person can use all the speed, and there isn’t a worry about cut ground wire. To my fortune, my father needs broadband at home for his business. The house is already wired for a second satellite dish. We’re asking for the 802.11G (54 Mbps) Wild Blue external modem which will be in my room mounted on a wall. There is no room on my desk for one and plenty of wall space in here. As a backup feature, RJ-45 is installed throughout our basement just in case. RJ-45 is dirt cheap. Wild Blue will be like WiMax countless ways.

After some thought and money to back it up, I am certainly going to buy a Playstation Portable when it launches. The PSP is more powerful than my NES, SNES, Genesis, Saturn, N64, GBA, Playstation, or Dreamcast. Yes, something that’s more powerful than Playstation 2 only handheld size! Though it’s in some ways more powerful than PS2. Once I said I had over 200 dollars saved up for PSP about four weeks ago when I went ahead and purchased both a PStwo and Xenosaga Episode 2…..now I have 140 dollars saved up for PSP again. PSP costs $250. By the time PSP is launched I’m taking out a maximum of $100. For showing off pictures or watching movies, some portable DVD player’s liquid crystal display won’t look as nice as PSP’s screen. Yes, PSP recognizes JPG, PNG or GIF on a SD card and will resize according to Engadget. I’m trying to be conservative with my saving account as much as possible and this problem where my savings account can’t pass $2000.

I’ve already read Engadget’s hands-on review of the Playstation Portable. Engadget suggests it easily feels like a 400 dollar electronic with a good weight and casing to it. The price tag for one of these in USA is now $200. They’ve brought up the issue concerning the long loading times with games and the noisy UMD drive. I suppose I can deal with these small annoyances. I needn’t to worry about dead pixels on the LCD screen, I’ve checked already. These turn color to red or black in pitch darkness. I’ve tried out my Dual Screen in the darkness to make sure there weren’t dead pixels. PSP will launch on March 24th. The shipping day is March 23rd. I won’t get mine until March 25th.

Playstation Portable Specs

• Widescreen, backlit 4.5-inch TFT LCD monitor with 16:9 aspect ratio and 480x272 resolution

• MIPS R4000-based 333-MHz CPU

• Graphics sub-system running at 166 MHz on a 512-bit bus with 2 MB of DRAM, rendering 664 million pixels per second and 35 million polygons per second

• Graphics engine supporting directional 16- or 32-bit color, lighting, clipping, environment projection and texture mapping, fogging, alpha blending, depth and stencil tests, vertex blending for morphing-style effects, and dithering

(Source: Hot Chips conference at Stanford University)

• Media processor using another 2 MB of DRAM

• 3-D graphics processing using NURBS (Nonuniform Rational B-Splines) as well as conventional polygon rendering

• USB 2.0 port, Memory Stick port, Universal Media Disc slot, stereo headphone jack and WiFi wireless LAN port

• Built-in stereo speakers

• Rechargeable lithium-ion batteries

• Weight: 280 grams (9.9 ounces)

• Dimensions: 17 x 7.4 x 2.3 cm (6.7 x 2.9 x 0.9 inches)

I’ve installed Diablo 2 Lord of Destruction and leveled my Barbarian to level 5 in the catacombs before I quit. I’ve had this problem with no music playing during the game. Winamp would actually stop making sound after Diablo 2 boots up, but I am getting sound effects in the game. To solve this tiny problem, I booted up my other computer which had Winamp installed and a DVD full of all the music I wanted and had my earphones connected to it so I could listen to music during the game. I haven’t played Diablo 2 Lord of Destruction for 5 whole months. I’ve had retreated from melee fighting many times into my teleportal to safety. I may be a yellow coward, but I’m coward who won’t loose his gold. There are plenty of looters around here. You know what happens to shed no fear players? They die and then they leave the game because no one will send a “TP” to them or they leave because they keep dieing when a horde of monsters are guarding their corpse. I don’t love this game any less from then I did then. It may have low-res graphics, but because it’s a fun multiplayer game which even works over a modem, I’m more than satisfied. There are plenty to do in this game to play all night. Thankfully, I rebooted the PC and the sound problem went a way. I leveled my barb to level 7.

Yesterday, I was playing were Super Mario Bros. 3 on Super Nintendo for the heck of it. That game was most interesting. A lot of classic platform memories here. It is said SMB 3 is the most beloved NES game. It also comes with Super Mario Advance 4, but I doubt I’ll get that. There’s no point is there? So I got pass the easiest boss. I’ve played SMB 3 twice in the pass 4 days. I am lazy thus I’d been posting reply messages on Carthaton Electronica because I find it fun. Someone gave me minus karma for not being nice to him. What’s the subject? Working at a game store, and thinking that’s great. I knew who gave me bad karma so instant messaged him asking him why? At first he didn’t answer than he asked if he and I were cool. In situations like these you’re either right or wrong so I told him go shove it! Yes, I made someone feel bad. I would have felt guilty except he gave me -1 karma why shall I apologize? That karma stained my perfect +114 karma. I’ve more karma than everyone put together on Carthaton because I’ve had posted about 35 game reviews and am the only other person besides the administrator with a 5 star rating. This particular guy lives in Ireland where games cost a pretty penny.

Devil May Cry 3 plays better than any one in the trilogy not because IGN gave it a high score, but since it truly does a remarkable job at balancing AI with Dante maneuvers. No one is getting cheated out of their money here. There are plenty of challenges ahead to seek in DMC3 #1 being staying alive when it would seem impossible to do so. In fact, I haven’t made it very far at all. It has heavy rock music so I was bothered by first, but what bothers me more is the unseemly difficult game play. I admit my skill level best when it comes to racing. This makes some other games I thought were difficult look like a pussy cat compared to this. At least the graphics and cut scenes were great and saw Dante get pierced with a sword each time he gains skills. Nothing I haven’t seen before in the first game although more frequent in DMC3. It’s been so long since I played DMC. The game looks gothic, but I’ve suspected this (reviews told me about it). This game is more consistent than DMC and I’d be died if I were unfortunate to backup against a wall. The best thing to do is to go berserk 95% of the time (keep moving & pressing the action button). I’ve picked gunslinger as my skill choice. Pretty good game all and all. I’ve heard Devil May Cry 2 was not up to par in graphics, game play or sound, so I’d skipped that game entirely. Okay, so what if it’s only $20! No sense buying a bad sequel, right?

I’ve at least earned 1 credit from the Visual Basic class. All I had to do in the first few chapters was follow the books instructions and copy files to new folders via the program. I missed a couple steps so I had to retrace my steps and got it right the second or third time. I’ve haven’t uploaded a RAR archive to the school in three weeks so I did that yesterday as well. Sometime doesn’t feel right though. Either I haven’t been reading enough or not retaining the information or both.

I wish there was something more to do than set in front of a computer or videogame all day doing homework or blogging or playing games. I will have to figure something to do tomorrow. I hardly watch local TV anymore.

[extension to original entry ]

Today (03/12), I did extensive reading online and was pondering about which games I wanted again. I bought 5 games today (only 1 used) including Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne made by Atlus I found at Toyriffic (last copy), and bought Full Specrium Warrior (a military shooter) and Burnout 3 (looked fun and it was on the top 5 most wanted games for Ps2), Mario and Luigi Superstar Saga for GBA.

This is Ian signing out.

Invitation to Gmail & couple more games

Welcome to my humble blog and I’ve been here a good year in which all of you shall recognize this URL by now. On Thursday, I bought 3 expensive games. Yeah, the ones I wanted. I only opened one though by Sunday. I’ll start by saying I was looking towards buying a videogame I thought only purchasable at Game Stop. I called ahead for this game. IGN and Gamespy actually made me want the game. Like most things, these sites get me excited about many games I’d eventually buy. Game Stop was out of stock which always means it’s a best seller. This specialist store is also 27 miles away from my house. As lazy as I am, I try to get everything east of the St. Croix River! I drove to River Falls ShopKo about Noon. I wish I hadn’t driven to River Falls because ShopKo stocked neither Tekken 5 nor Ys - Ark of Napishtim. It took me 10 minutes to get out of ShopKo because I was pondering on which games are good from the 50+ selection. I drove 15 miles away to Target where I found Tekken 5 on the store shelf. I also was reading Devil May Cry 3 review off IGN thinking that this is a good purchase. I’ve paid Tekken 5 with cash and DMC3 with a check totaling $108. I’ve always liked to chat with Toyriffic people when I’m there, so I went there thinking I’d get a cheap game under $20. I was lucky I went there when 1 copy of this particular game Game Stop sold out of was there. That now makes 71 PS2 videogames. This game was important because I like buying cosmetic RPGs, and is suppose to be better than Shining Tears by 10 points.

When I got home that day and was playing Tekken 5 for the next 3 hours. Actually, one of those hours I was playing Tekken 3 which was a bonus with Tekken 5. As you all know Tekken 3 was critically the best Playstation Tekken and the arcade version was high resolution which is what this is. I am surprised how fewer combos increased so much strategy with all the Tekkens including Tekken 5. I am use to playing games like Dead or Alive which is clearly different. Easy difficulty was like Normal and Normal was like Hard to me. I’ve looked on Gameranking.com and saw the game got 9.2 out of 10 on average based on 10 review sites. IGN gave Tekken 5 a 10/10 in the graphics department. The other two games are still on my shelf. I guess I’ve looked on the back a couple times to see what the graphics were like. Tekken 5 is my 3rd favorite fighting game next to Soul Caliber or Virtua Fighter 4 Evolution. The same day, I’ve had Marvel vs. Capcom 2 in my Dreamcast so I was playing that. My Dreamcast controller has seen better days (I’ve had it for 5 years) and both triggers stick on two controllers. Sega controllers are cheap so after they get dirt in them, something stops functioning. I play rough with all analog sticks in any controller. MvsC2 only used 4 buttons and the D-pad although I am more comfortable with the analog stick since the character’s traction increases. The game was fun when my hands were responsive and agile before they slowed down and my winning streak stopped suddenly, and the game got less fun. I had the most luck winning matches with Spiderman, Doctor Victor Von Doom, and Wolverine. I am pretty sure Dr. Doom is a FANTASTIC FOUR villain. (I cheated and looked on Google). If Dr. Doom is here where are the Flame, Invisible Girl, Ben and Liquid Man? Before, I tried Cyclopes, Captain America, and Ryo, but failed to get to the 2nd round. Mega Man isn’t an option like he was in the prequel! I’m pissed off now; I wanted to play Mega Man badly. MvsC2 is a button masher. It’s very fast, and the music I like. It’s jazz and old school R&B mixed as background music for each stage and plays like Guilty Gear. I was playing that for another hour.

New games: Ys 6, Tekken 5, Devil May Cry 3, Star Wars - Knights of the Old Republic

I’ve been listening to more trance today like usual with my earphones. Also have been talking on Cartharton Electronica, the treads on this British site are getting dried up because it’s the slow transition between current generation and next generation and there isn’t enough to talk about. I’ve been doing quick subjects like “How many games do you buy a month”, “Favorite Mario game”, “Most informative gaming site”, “Favorite MP3 (software) player”, and those posts haven’t done very well. Maybe 30 – 40 hits at the most.

Oh yeah, I got my new Gmail account at renegadeviking@gmail.com. I don’t know what I’ll use it for though. 1000 MB is a lot of space, and I’m use to – 1 MB emails. I’ve got an invitation by Admin of Carthaton Electronica!

Yesterday, I was playing a videogame called Castlevania - Circle of the Moon. It’s hard because I get knocked back by the electricity from the skeleton mages. Then there are gargoyles who throw spears at Nathan (hero of Circle of the Moon), and my timing is off. Which is rubbish as the British would say. My timing got better an hour later. Love the music though. It’s classic videogame track music. Midi at it’s finest….Konami (developer) certainly knows their music. Circle of the Moon is a classical orchestrated inspired Castlevania. I’m about 18.5% completed with the game. The most I’ve completed in this game

Today, I am relaxing in my office chair, looking at the boards because I see it as fun drinking 2 Coke cans already today and it’s only 6 AM CST! Oh yeah, I’ve ate a half bag of chocolate covered M&Ms. Not a bit tired neither. I’ve played Circle of the Moon since 3AM. Then I was writing this entry since 4:30 AM CST.

Right now, I am trying to save up for a Playstation Portable or a 3rd MP3 player called the Archos Gmini. I can’t do both. Both cost about $250. I would buy the PSP if it was less than $200 because I’m into games and it’s not a horrible decision either. In other words, I really want a Playstation Pocket! No, I’m not getting Metal Gear Acid. Metal Gear Acid takes place in 2025. Konami added a card function to it. The one whom deals the best card gets the best damage. The enemy can deal a better card and get your better card. I might own Tales of Eternia and Tales of Phantasia, both Namco RPGs. My first game shall be Wipeout Pure for sure. I don’t remember the last time I’ve used my Dual Screen. It stands to reason because I only have one game for it. I’ve hardly use my mp3 players (iPod, Jukebox) on the go so the reader must see why it’s be difficult decision. Yes, I know…. why would I sacrifice food, water, clothes, and housing? You see the exception is I’m getting those free; otherwise, I wouldn’t be so motivated getting so much software that looses its value immediately. The value isn’t concerning me; it’s the technology changing so rapidly in these transition years. I’ll keep collecting videogames as long as my income allows me too because it’s my choice and all that good decision stuff. It can’t be any worse than collecting movies on DVD!

[Extension to original entry]

On March 8th, I went to Toyriffic in search of an authentic Sega Nomad, but the whole set cost $100. A Nomad is a portable Genesis with bad battery life. I was sure the store didn’t want me to know that though. I was going to get Deus Ex 2 The Invisible War, but then I saw Knights of the Old Republic setting their on the counter for 17 dollars so I’ve asked them if I could purchase it for 18 dollars and the kid there agreed so now I own that game for Xbox as well as PC. It’s too bad I couldn’t bust open the door in one of the ghetto apartments in the beginning where the drug lord is hiding who pleads for his life saying the bounty hunter is after him. Killing him would decrease crime in the entire game and make your mission easier. I’ve learned of this after reading a game faq. Can’t wait to play it!

Game to add to list:

• Ys - Ark of Napishtim

• Tekken 5

• Knights of the Old Republic

• Devil May Cry 3

Bye.

Maxthon is my favorite IE Clone!

The Internet is really dependant on web browsers these days, and I say why trust your browser usage with a 4 year old browser open to viruses and Trojan Horses (also viruses). These viruses can easily download themselves from an unused computer, and usually the user cannot delete these viruses with a simple press of the delete key. I think this freeware alternative called Maxthon is a stable alterative. It’s the most popular at Downloads.com. The advantages of this browser is it turns IE6 into a tabbed browser with popup blocker, custom skin plug-in, search engine textbox, ability to download swf (Macromedia Flash) files to the hard drive once thought impossible with Internet Explorer 6. The browser shows your IP address on the bottom right of the application too.

For diehard Netscape users I recommend Mozilla Firefox 1.0 Final, Mozilla’s next generation tabbed browser. It is very stable, never crashes, takes care of 95% of popups, and runs on minimal system resources reducing the change that your computer will crash. However, the Problem with this browser is you have to download Quicktime, Suns java, macromedia flash to it separately. That’s not a big problem for broadband users because it has a wizard /auto download for these plugins, but modem users would be bothered by the download times. Even without the plugins you don’t need them for most sites. Mozilla Firefox is more stable than the latest Mozilla release. One big thing that Mozilla Firefox is that it gets full support by any Linux. It’s Gnome’s desktop internet browser of choice. There is also Konqueror, KDE’s primary Internet Browser. If Linux’s primary internet browser is Mozilla than you can trust the Mozilla Foundation to bring out a quality internet browser. Netscape used the Mozilla source code for it’s 5x and 6x versions, but Netscape released 7.0 when Mozilla Foundation became independent from AOL/Netscape. Netscape 7x is still free, but Mozilla is a better browser of the two. I hear it’s true that Netscape uses Mozilla’s free source code in their most recent web browser, so basically Netscape 7.2 is a replica of Mozilla 1.6. We’ll never know because Netscape 7.2 isn’t open source. Both browsers allow you to download java with the browser.

It’s hard to make a recommendation, since they’re both very popular downloads and both are on my computer. I prefer Firefox unless it’s absolutely necessary that I use Microsoft Internet Explorer. If that’s the case, I use Maxthon.

For loading times both applications load instantly because I have 2 GB of RAM, so I never have multitasking issues with 2D applications…ever. My guess on slower machines less than 1 GHz, Firefox will load a tiny bit faster than Maxthon. It’s not a big issue because both applications load almost as fast as Internet Explorer. It also depends on how much your hard drive is filled up. For those computers with only 20 % free space on their hard drive, multitasking and loading times will decrease by a couple seconds.

I saw Tekken 5 on the Internet yesterday, and it came out 3 days ago according to IGN. The latest Tekken game is suppose to rival Virtual Fighter 4 Evolution’s graphics because IGN rated the graphics a 9.5 out of 10 meaning Namco pretty much exercised the Playstation 2’s hardware to the limit. The game play exceeds Tekken 4 in quality. I hear the DVD has Tekken, Tekken 2, and Tekken 3 as freebees a long with it. So you’re getting four games in one package. Four times the fun…as soon as I own this game. See, I was planning to spend my money on Devil May Cry 3 except that now I found out that the American version of normal plays as if it was the Japan’s hard setting, I might wait a couple weeks until I pick this one up because I don’t want to pick up a game that I do so badly it’s not playable by me I mean.

Then for some odd reason I got into Puff Daddy – I’ll be missing you. Yeah, I know it’s R&B, but you know…nobody can hear me anyways…my parents weren’t home last night.

I brought over 13 videogames over to his house. After we took turns at Grand Theft Auto San Andreas. We raced Dodge RAM vs. Toyota Lightning on the dirt courses and he won in Gran Turismo 4. Then we raced muscle cars in New York and one other city course. We played Street Fighter III Third Strike. I beat him 3 times and he beat me once. When I was playing Mega Man 3 we planned to go into the city to Best Buy to look around. I am mostly a software person so I like the PS2 section and PC section and he and his girlfriend looked at the surround sound speakers and audio players for cars. I really didn’t care because we also went to the Game Stop nearby. I didn’t see Ys VI because it was sold out so I left there not buying any videogame at all. I went to Game Crazy (in Hollywood Video) for the first time. Game Crazy didn’t have it either. The room was basically very cramped. The person there looked like he was from the ghetto or something.

Last night I’ve been listening to music including Jewel – Hands, Allman Brothers – Jessica, Kansas – Dust in the Wind, Carry On My Wayward Son, Rolling Stone – Satisfaction, Ruby Tuesday, Symphony of the Devil, and listening to trance later in the morning too. I like the DJ Micro – Supernova, Binary Finary – 1999, above and beyond – far from in love, airbase – emotion, runaway, PPK Resurrection, a couple John Digweed/Sasha songs, ATB – Lost in Love, etc.

Which brings me to today. Simply, I have only been on the message boards all day because that’s the only thing a man can do when he’s broke? Also have been doing a little work in Visual Basic assignments made it to chapter 6. It was hard, but I’m doing it. I may not need a tutor after all!

This is Ian signing off!