MithraPride

I fixed my heater.

I popped open my car's hood to take a look, and I figured it must have gotten cranky because the coolant tank was empty. So, I recited the Rites of Maintenance and Supplication, re-inscribed the Sigil of Vulkan, and made unto the Machine Spirit an offering of engine coolant.

It must have appeased the Spirit, as when I started driving again it blessed me with some of the Warmth of the Infernal Combustion.

And back to computers for a moment:

http://www.thinkgeek.com/computing/usb-gadgets/9836/

This is NOT just a keyboard... it is a set of 113 buttons each with their own OLED screen that can be individually programmed to be whatever key you want, to display any letter/symbol/animated GIF/quicktime movie you want, and that can change its hotkeys/setups dynamically based on which program you have active and what other keys you are pushing.

>.>

Too much for me to handle, but I thought some of the techies might get a kick out of it.

Revolutionary Keyboard Features a tiny OLED screen on each key. 113 screens total.
Each key can be individually programmed to perform a series of functions, open an application or run an Applescript (Mac only)
Various System Monitor functions can dynamically display on a key including CPU usage, CPU temperature, Network Speed, and Memory Usage
Play a GIF animation or Quicktime movie on a Key
Paint images across all keys at once in your image editor of choice
Key sets can be linked to an application, so whenever you open that app the appropriate keys come up
Powerful layer function allows you to combine existing key sets in different ways
Use any language with the appropriate key images including Cyrillic, Ancient Greek, Georgian, Arabic, Quenya, and Hiragana.
Display notes, numerals, special symbols, HTML codes, math functions or any other special symbol.
Any key (or to be exact, a unit consisting of a cap, a microchip and a display) can be easily removed by hands to be cleaned or replaced
Built in USB hub
SD Card Slot for Storing keyboard Settings

Keerith wrote:And back to computers for a moment:

http://www.thinkgeek.com/computing/usb-gadgets/9836/

This is NOT just a keyboard... it is a set of 113 buttons each with their own OLED screen that can be individually programmed to be whatever key you want, to display any letter/symbol/animated GIF/quicktime movie you want, and that can change its hotkeys/setups dynamically based on which program you have active and what other keys you are pushing.

>.>

Too much for me to handle, but I thought some of the techies might get a kick out of it.

Revolutionary Keyboard Features a tiny OLED screen on each key. 113 screens total.
Each key can be individually programmed to perform a series of functions, open an application or run an Applescript (Mac only)
Various System Monitor functions can dynamically display on a key including CPU usage, CPU temperature, Network Speed, and Memory Usage
Play a GIF animation or Quicktime movie on a Key
Paint images across all keys at once in your image editor of choice
Key sets can be linked to an application, so whenever you open that app the appropriate keys come up
Powerful layer function allows you to combine existing key sets in different ways
Use any language with the appropriate key images including Cyrillic, Ancient Greek, Georgian, Arabic, Quenya, and Hiragana.
Display notes, numerals, special symbols, HTML codes, math functions or any other special symbol.
Any key (or to be exact, a unit consisting of a cap, a microchip and a display) can be easily removed by hands to be cleaned or replaced
Built in USB hub
SD Card Slot for Storing keyboard Settings

Showed that to my techie hubby and to quote him "Overkill. It's a computer not a classic Cougar."

Heh the keyboard itself could probably be classified as a computer. $1600? Most expensive keyboard I've seen, only people with more money than sense will buy that

Yea, that keyboard came out a few years ago. Has been making the rounds in tech circles for quite a while. It certainly has the "Cool" factor going for it, but functionally sorta worthless.

Tivia wrote:Yea, that keyboard came out a few years ago. Has been making the rounds in tech circles for quite a while. It certainly has the "Cool" factor going for it, but functionally sorta worthless.

I know what you mean. It's like putting 3 GE Dash-9 Locomotives in front of 1 boxcar and then putting another behind it as a helper unit. Overkill.

Or driving a Bugatti Veyron to the store to buy milk.

If I had a Veyron I'd drive it everywhere just to show off

Made a final case swap decision:




The green parts are going to be painted pink. The dark grayish-silver in the middle of the front door will be black. Silver will be left alone. The blue lenses there, at least I think their lenses, will be swapped out for pink. I have to measure to see if my exos-2 will fit. But overall I'll turn it into the rig from "hell".

Mine was the Cosmos 1000 two years ago.
I still do not regret that choice.

By the way when you are done with it, I really demand some pics for once.

Case is on order. Might be til next year before I start the project. I'm going to look around for the proper pink to use.

Karou Ariyen wrote:.... I'm going to look around for the proper pink to use.

Barbie pink!!!

Thats a pretty sweet looking case =D

This is the case I ended up with for my new XIV Machine.

Don't seem to sell my current case anymore. This is probably the closest:



Only it has a door on the front with a row of LEDs going down the middle. I've come to hate the stupid door, I've kinda ruined it by using a screw that's too big and it's really awkward trying to take the motherboard out, poorly designed IMO. I'm getting a simpler case but still looks pretty good (with a small LED cluster on the front).

I like the Xbox style X on the sides. I'm going to put the Nobel Team logo on it and then paint "Nobel-6" on the bottom of it ;D

Meh, too much steel and plastic.

Yea, I am a case snob..sorry.

Tivia wrote:Meh, too much steel and plastic.

Yea, I am a case snob..sorry.

I can understand that. If you remember the Xion Onyx II, you'll know that I don't like over the top outrageous cases. I like a clean case with a simple window. But that case is discontinued and my door is broke. All the cases I looked at, it came down between the Trigon TR24X and the Cooler Master Cosmos 1000. In the end I went with the Trigon because it isn't over the top like most cases can be. The trade off of getting rid of a window is a tough decision because I have an onboard LCD Monitor on my mobo that helps me figure out why my computer won't boot up. But the overall feel to me is simple without being flashy.

Now what happened to the swap into the Night Hawk ABS Case I worked on? The steel was so soft it bent on me. It's at the bottom of Mount Trashmore and anyone in IL knows what that place is heh. My theory on cases has always been, reflect your personal style. By the way here's an actual non product image of the side panel off:


It's an ATX Midtower, 4 5.25" external, 2 3.5" external and 6 3.5" internal. Dual 80mm Fans on the rear, One on each side. And it looks like the green handles can be easily removed for painting. I'm going to miss my Xion Onyx, but it served me well for the last 5 years. Time to move on sadly.

Ok, my opinion of this case is now clear.
Outward it looks ok, but I really dislike the way it looks on the inside.

This only confirms more why I am a Cooler Master fan.

This is also another one of the reasons I chose it:


The internal bays within the door

You won't see the insides so what does it matter? I hate having doors on cases now I've had to deal with mine for 5+ years, and I don't even use the DVD all that much, just when I was burning stuff it'd always be annoying

Sugami wrote:You won't see the insides so what does it matter? I hate having doors on cases now I've had to deal with mine for 5+ years, and I don't even use the DVD all that much, just when I was burning stuff it'd always be annoying

Well the thing is, if I want a window on the side of my case, I want a full window to see inside. I don't want partial windows or like dots. It's a full window or none. But that's one factor. My hubby mentioned it looked like an alien and I'm glad he did. I know Alienware is not a very good company desktop wise, but I loved their cases, always have. This case, while not similar, has that look. The next factor I looked into was the drivebay's on external. 4 5.25" and 2 3.5" is my set up. The door is always a choice because I don't want my little cousin effing around with buttons. And yes she'll do it. Also I've always been one to keep the door open if I'm burning media and so forth. I like to hide my drive bays. Finally it came down to customization. Very little paint work to be done here, that's a plus for me. I also measured it and my LAN Harness will fit too also it will clear Amtrak's specifications for transport. It will fit under the seat for transport. I travel around the midwest a lot and I tend to take Amtrak and I like to keep my desktop with me if I'm going on vacation. For Example, this christmas we're going to canada. Amtrak to VIA Rail connection, my desktop now won't clear either rail carrier's specifications for underseat or overhead storage. So I have to take my laptop.

Speaking of my laptop, this summer I had some modifications done to my Panasonic Toughtbook CF19. Intel i5 Processor, added a GPS system w/ antenna, 4GB Memory, replacement net card from Sierra (compatable with my sprint service) and a 250GB HDD with a hot swap cage from Panasonic. Yes I have a tablet, but I was originally using it for mechanical work. No point in changing it out now. I love it too much. If you look at the back of the tablet you'll see the dent where my exhaust pipe slipped and hit it. No damage. It truly is hard to kill a toughbook.

So spent a whole afternoon moving my computer into a new case and installing my new ATI HD 5770 and the textures look kinda funny up close.





Kinda hard to see due to not being full screen, hard to describe too, it's like the lighting on the textures isn't smooth and is kinda jaggedy... I've tried all kind of settings to no avail, any idea what's going on?

Edit: Setting Texture quality and filtering to low seems to get it back to what it was, I'll experiment later to see which one if not both is behind it.

I did some upgrades to my system, seeing as I started this thread I thought I should put em' up.

Alienware M17x / SLI "Dual" Nvidia GTX 260m @1.25 each / 8Gig DDR3-RAM / Quad Core Extreme Qx9200 @2.85Ghz
Logitech 5.1 Z-55,000 system, and 42" Acer LCD TV
Razer Lycosa Gaming Keyboard and a Xbox controller (I miss my PS3 controller... to hard to set up every time I want to use it)

The Quad core processor did give a great improvement to gameplay! I also did a cooling mod, lowered temps down to 55-60c. No more problems running the game on max settings =^_^=

As for glitchy looking textures, all I can say about ATI is make sure your drivers are up to date... I am a Nvidia guy, and know nothing about ATI, sry... As for cases and mods... Like I told ya, I did a cooling mod, I love the look of the laptop, but did make a replacement AW (alienware) logo light for the case, a metallica skull. took weeks it mold correctly, but looks great!

Red_Xix wrote:I did some upgrades to my system, seeing as I started this thread I thought I should put em' up.

Alienware M17x / SLI "Dual" Nvidia GTX 260m @1.25 each / 8Gig DDR3-RAM / Quad Core Extreme Qx9200 @2.85Ghz
Logitech 5.1 Z-55,000 system, and 42" Acer LCD TV
Razer Lycosa Gaming Keyboard and a Xbox controller (I miss my PS3 controller... to hard to set up every time I want to use it)

The Quad core processor did give a great improvement to gameplay! I also did a cooling mod, lowered temps down to 55-60c. No more problems running the game on max settings =^_^=

As for glitchy looking textures, all I can say about ATI is make sure your drivers are up to date... I am a Nvidia guy, and know nothing about ATI, sry... As for cases and mods... Like I told ya, I did a cooling mod, I love the look of the laptop, but did make a replacement AW (alienware) logo light for the case, a metallica skull. took weeks it mold correctly, but looks great!

Nvidia's 400 Series drivers are acting up because microsoft did something in the last windows 7 patch that makes them incompatible.

Damn... I guess since you are posting that you are using them? If that is the case, you may want to uninstall the win7 update.

Oh, a cool little note, you can google windowerxiv (megaupload still has it). With that little program you can play in full screen and alt+tab out without crashing the game dew to graphics glitch... damn SE for not making the game alt+tab friendly in fullscreen!

Red_Xix wrote:Damn... I guess since you are posting that you are using them? If that is the case, you may want to uninstall the win7 update.

Oh, a cool little note, you can google windowerxiv (megaupload still has it). With that little program you can play in full screen and alt+tab out without crashing the game dew to graphics glitch... damn SE for not making the game alt+tab friendly in fullscreen!

can that be detected like the windower programs in XI can?

Karou Ariyen wrote:

Red_Xix wrote:Damn... I guess since you are posting that you are using them? If that is the case, you may want to uninstall the win7 update.

Oh, a cool little note, you can google windowerxiv (megaupload still has it). With that little program you can play in full screen and alt+tab out without crashing the game dew to graphics glitch... damn SE for not making the game alt+tab friendly in fullscreen!

can that be detected like the windower programs in XI can?

I have been using it for about a month an a half now, no problems here :3 so I am guessing it can not be detected. It dose not edit or even use any game files (It "playes" with windows files), you run the game at your screen rez, and the windower removes the windows border making it "fill" the screen. say you have a 1440x900 screen, run the game at 1440x900, and the windower will get rid of the window borders, the X00 and Y00 will be placed at X00 and Y00 on your screen making the game "fullscreen" without borders, or a window bar with that bloody min-, max-, and close shizit.

Red_Xix wrote:

Karou Ariyen wrote:

Red_Xix wrote:Damn... I guess since you are posting that you are using them? If that is the case, you may want to uninstall the win7 update.

Oh, a cool little note, you can google windowerxiv (megaupload still has it). With that little program you can play in full screen and alt+tab out without crashing the game dew to graphics glitch... damn SE for not making the game alt+tab friendly in fullscreen!

can that be detected like the windower programs in XI can?

I have been using it for about a month an a half now, no problems here :3 so I am guessing it can not be detected. It dose not edit or even use any game files (It "playes" with windows files), you run the game at your screen rez, and the windower removes the windows border making it "fill" the screen. say you have a 1440x900 screen, run the game at 1440x900, and the windower will get rid of the window borders, the X00 and Y00 will be placed at X00 and Y00 on your screen making the game "fullscreen" without borders, or a window bar with that bloody min-, ma, and close shizit.

I run in windowed mode. It's easier on me and I do run in 1440x900 and I've never had a border issue, although I run on a 22" monitor atm

you say you have never had a border issue, do you mean the window borders dont show, you can alt+tab out, and it consumes the full screen?

"bed time for me, I am falling asleep on my keyboard. zZzZz -_- I will keep an eye on this forum as it is getting interesting again :3, see ya' all in the morning" /bow

Red_Xix wrote:you say you have never had a border issue, do you mean they dont show on your screen without a windower and it is fullscreen, and you can alt+tab out?

I ran full screen once, but I never alt+tabbed out. What happened was my mobo bios locked up the entire system and I had to reboot, so I don't know if I had the alt+tab issue.