My current gaming PC build

By request these are the current build specs for my gaming desktop; there's still some custom work to be done to the box so I'll follow up with another post for the case modding details later.

Who doesn't love a bit of shopping? Heres the before hardware pile, I buy hardware in America from Newegg or Amazon depending on price best to get on their email list for decent discount codes. In Australia I use MSY or Umart

Case/PSU/Drive build

Mainboard after CPU assembly

Build after wiring

Case: Thermaltake Nvidia Special Edition ATX Full Tower

PSU: Thermaltake SP 1200W 80 Plus Bronze 

Mainboard: Gigabyte G1.Sniper 3 Extended ATX LGA 1155

CPU: Intel Core i7 Ivy Bridge 3770K 3.5Ghz (3.9 Turbo) LGA 1155

CPU Cooling: Thermaltake CLP0579 120mm Contac 30 

GPU: Gigabyte Geforce 660Ti 2GB PCIe 3.0x16

RAM: Corsair Vengeance 1600 DDR3 16GB (2 x 8GB)

OS Drive: Kingston HyperX SATA III 120GB SSD 

Data Drives: 3 x Seagate Barracuda 2TB SATA 7200RPM

Laser Drives: LG 12x Blue Ray DVD Burner Combo Drive

And above the table ... 

Monitors: 2 x Phillips LCD 24" Smart Touch Monitors
Keyboard: Logitech G15 Gaming keyboard
Mouse: Logitech MX518 High Performance Optical
Speakers: Logitech S220
Headphones: Creative Sound Blaster World of Warcraft THX Headset
Webcam: Logitech HD Pro 9000

Some comments on the build:

• This case is huge and will not fit in most desks but you can ride it like a pony
• You can see I am brand loyal to Gigabyte, Logitech and Thermaltake, after years of trial and error and failed hardware these are always my go to vendors
• This board is gorgeous and omits the need for add on wifi, SATA extender, bluetooth and sound cards. I cannot recommend it enough.
• I prefer to buy the Thermaltake Toughpower range but they were out of 950W+ at the time of build, this is still a good modular PSU
• The CPU fan requires a full ATX tower, do not buy if using anything less
• Due to the CPU fan and the size of the case I don't need liquid cooling, CPU stays flat at 21C even after hours of gaming
• The speakers are cheap and cheerful because I had to leave my Creative surround sound set in Sydney and I mostly use headphones in my current house.
• The HD webcam is no longer made at work I use a Logitech HD Pro C920 and would recommend purchasing this as a more current model
• Upgrade paths here are to double the RAM and add another 660Ti  with SLI bridge after the new year

Sleepless in Seattle: PAX Prime 2012

Finding friends in a new city is weird and honestly, I've had some trouble so far. Every time I stand alone and try and look vulnerable in clubs and in public I get the strangest assortment of pick up lines and start up pitches. So I thought about how I made friends when I moved to Sydney and I remember the best thing for me was when the guys from Games Paradise dragged me to a gaming con for the weekend.

Right! Thought I, lets see what's coming up soon. I was going to miss GenCon with a poorly timed trip to Australia but Penny Arcade eXpo was coming up and I'd always wanted to go. Some damage to my credit card later and we were away!

On arrival I had all the love of being given a deluxe upgrade to my room at the Grand Hyatt, despite being on the convention rate. The main advantage of deluxe rooms is always the view, here showing gorgeous weather and downtown Seattle at its finest.

In fantastic news my friend Kevin and his lovely lady managed to get tickets at the last minute, so I wasn't totally a stranger in a strange land. We spent Thursday night drinking and catching up about the US move and all the fun that goes with it. 

On Friday I was determined to hit the Expo floor before all the people who only had weekend passes showed up. I was worried about tales of queues at PAX and this line that took me out the door, through a park and round the corner had me in fear. However it turned out that everyone was lovely, trading game cards and playing DS in the line and despite the kilometer or so of line... we all got in in 15 mins of opening. 

Inside the Expo hall is a gamers wet dream. Just about every game, platform, hardware vendor, tradeable and more. There's games for sale, games for trying, games in competition! New things, favoured things, indie things, all the things!

I walked and walked and walked until I was totally exhausted, realising a little too late that buying a bag full of heavy comics and games wasn't smart. Thankfully though the convention is a several building affair and my hotel was smack bang in the middle so I dropped things off and found people again. 

A group of lovely folk from the PAX IRC channel invited me along to Karaoke and to say it was my kind of night out was a total understatement. Karaoke complete with Concrete Blonde and the Care Bears, Cider on tap (at $4.50 a pint too I might add) and a group of mad geeks belting out songs with not a care in the world. A++ would buy again.

Saturday I spent playing MMOs and earning a lot of free schwag. A hat tip to RaiderZ as I think this is the next big thing in that scene. 

Then it was time for panels, one on MMORPGs and then one on the new Kepler Nvidia hardware which was basically an hour long demonstration of how the GPU I'd just bought was sex on legs. 

And then... then I went for a cigarette, and in my usual fashion this meant I talked to a group of smokers for about 4 hours without moving. In the meantime I met a schwag of awesome people, most of whom it turns our are PAX Enforcers. These are the volunteer army of hardcore nerds and con goers. Between these guys, the PAX IRC folks and some WarCraft contacts I had a really social nerdly wonderful weekend which was totally what I needed. All it wants to make me to do is sign up for promotion activities straight away (hey I waited ... weeks before volunteering) so you can expect to hear about Enforcer talk in future. Later that night I went to the concerts, finally getting my chance to see Jonathan Coulton and MC Frontalot live, complete with building sized singalong of Still Alive. 

Then there was a lot of whiskey and <scene deleted> but I managed to wake up without too much of a hangover and still make it to see Wil Wheaton and isn't that the important bit? Wil gave a great recollection on how he fell in and out of love (and in again) with Magic the Gathering. Other great panels of the weekend included the Gaming Addiction panel and the Ratchet & Clank 10th Anniversary. 

I had a frankly marvellous time, and other than the desperate need to socialise one of the reasons is the scale and variety present. It's the same reason I like WGT over all the other goth festivals - because whatever your *thing* is you can do just that for 4 days straight... 

Shopping

Cosplaying

Tabletop gaming

Hand held gaming

PC Gaming

Competitive Gaming

Hardware modding 

Or y'now... just chilling the fuck out with your fellow nerdkind. 

Me? I mixed it up and did a little of everything. I had a great time, met some great people and came home with some great memories (and a few extra t-shirts).

Vale James O'rance

Today was the memorial for James O'Rance, a good friend who died suddenly and young from complications of a life long struggle with Diabetes.



James was a man of great nobility, he judged people by their actions and their heart, but loved his friends for who they were warts and all. If a measure of a man is those who choose to come to his wake then today was evidence of what we all know - that James was loved by many and touched us all.

Never have I seen so many people attend a funeral, so many openly weep without fear of judgement and more than that so many people console each other through a difficult time. It speaks volumes of not only the kind of man he was, but the kind of people he attracted.

James lived life to the full, he was himself at all times and to the full. He loved, he laughed, he was thoughtful and silly and wonderful. He will never be forgotten.

James would want us to remember him the way we shared his friendship, fondly, deeply and with laughter. The stories we shared today would have made him proud but not the sombre mood. A more celebratory memorial will be organised in the near future.

Capturing a little piece of computing history

As you should know I play WarCraft with my friends, and I love unique things, so when Blizzard announced they were going to sell off their old server blades for charity I simply had to get in on the action. The servers were all deprecated during the pre Cataclysm cluster upgrades but were in use between 2004/2005 and 2010 making the nerdy dreams of many a gamer come true.

Chops and Nat my two dearest boys both play, Nat religiously so I set out on a mission to secure them their own pieces of Azeroth.

From Feathermoon Server Blade

Nat is a long time somewhat obsessive Feathermoon player, I couldn't pass up the chance to present him with a physical piece of his own online life. This great portrait piece also shows the scale of the blade servers perfectly, while making Nat look a little bit rock'n'roll ;o)



I managed to keep the purchase of this Proudmoore blade super secret, leaving my partner Scott completely confused until he opened the box, I call that gift success. The size makes mounting a bit of a puzzle, we're pondering turning it into a coffee table. Either way I'm so happy to know that those I love have their own little piece of internet history secured and in their possession.

If this is Night City where's my heads up display?

When I was a younger thing obsessed with roleplaying all I ever wanted to do was live life in a dark techno future as a bright young corper in a Cyberpunk world...

I don't like to disappoint myself.

So ironic as it is I bought Nat an eReader for his birthday, spending my megacorp Asia bucks on digital devices so that we could read Cyberpunk novels.

We kicked off his birthday weekend with A Scanner Darkly, Strange Days and The Matrix. We've continued this week with Sneakers and the Bridge series by Gibson.

Hey... at least we thought of wireless in the real cyberpunk future.

My desk, my home

So one of the great things about working at the Big G is being able to set up my work space exactly how I like it.



To give a run down here's my accessory setup:

Monitors: 2 x Dell UltraSharp U2311H 23-inch
Keyboard: Logitech G510
Mouse: Logitech M400
Webcam: Logitech  HD Webcam Pro C910
Phone headset: Plantronics GN2100 Telecom
PC Headset: Plantronics .Audio 645

Please note many of these accessories are mine and do not necessarily indicate any kind of procument or brand deal by my organisation. 


At the moment however we're having a "decorate your cubicle" competition. My team has chosen the them "work at home" and so my desk is currently all done up as if it were in my apartment. Those of you who know me well should find this amusing:

My secondary WarCraft Alt

So today I hit level 85 on my second toon Illdriesta, so here's a little review in pictures.

She's a Destruction Warlock, though I've recently been trying out Affliction I think my heart will always belong to Destro.



Illdriesta at Level 14



Level 41 - Gosh I loved those Black Velvet Robes



Level 51 and all colour co-ordinated, the Whitemanes Chapeau was with me for a long time



Level 55 - These robes started off great, but when I couldn't replace them for 10 levels I learnt to hate them. Also the Guild tabard stopped matching my gear :o(



Level 70 and you can see here that the Blizzard Crew took some feedback about making gear sets match after WotLK



Level 77 and the gear looks just like a recoloured version of my Level 70 gear



Level 81 and I'm in guild provided craftables with questing accessories.



Level 83 - item level 303 which is mostly a Deathsilk Tailoring set, looking again like a dark version of the Level 81 gear. Note me cycling through tabards for Reputation.



And finally just after Level 85 (iLvl 326) everything changes! Intellect weapons replacing staves, Shadowflame Robes with mostly Fireweave accessories and a Ramkahen tabard.

My WarCraft Main - A story in pictures

One of the great ideas I've had has been to take screenshots of my World of Warcraft characters so that I can see them change over time

Here's a timeline of my Main - Illdrinn the Rogue



Level 62 - Rocking the hideous coloured Outland gear



Level 72 - In Northrend questing gear with Ankhanet weapons



Level 80 with Gearscore 3981 - Lots of Tier 9 gear



Level 82 - Cataclysm questing gear and Orgrimmar tabard



Level 85 with Gearscore 7847 - No new Justice Point items but good matching Cataclysm Blues, weapons are from Tol'Vir, tabard is for Bilgewater Cartel



Level 85 Gearscore 8765 iLvl 342 - Some Justice Point gear, Firelands cloak and craftables