musings of a neurotic mind

…is what keeps me sane. no kidding. as for music, i couldn’t live without it. i prefer alternative rock, punk rock, grunge or just classic rock like Meat Loaf. CS is what helps me to vent my frustrations and anger. some people claim that playing games like CS makes you kind of “conditioned” to violence and the media takes this up and runs with it, blaming CS to be the root of all evil and of shootings at school and stuff. that’s simply nonsense! playing a computer game does not teach you how to handle a weapon… and i believe there is a huge difference between the virtual fighting and things that happen in real life…

neocron, yes, again. i needed a few more screenshots so i shortly entered the game for a few hours yesterday. i can’t help myself but i have ambivalent feelings towards this game. on one hand, a part of me somehow yearns to play it, to immerse myself in this universe and to leave the real world behind. but on the other hand, i hate the game for it’s concept and gameplay, for being an enormous illusion of freedom you do not have. it’s really strange how a phenomenon like a MMORPG can generate such strong feelings.

finally, halo was released for the PC last week. got my copy on monday and started playing… so far, so good. now i am at the level were you are in the covenant ship and have to rescue the (captured) captain. at this stage, the game is almost unplayable, i can’t aim neither drop grenades because something is slowing down my system dramatically! it can’t be the CPU (hey, this runs even on a p3 733 mhz!) and surely not the graphics card (brand new fx 5900). so, what’s left? the fault is my “antique” soundcard, a 1999er model of the famous SoundBlaster Live Player. after turning of EAX (which suppossedly isn’t handled correctly by the soundcard), speed improves and makes the game great fun again… the downside: music and what’s left of the “environmental audio” is really awful… the soundcard is the oldest component of my pc, so i decided to replace it with a current model: SoundBlaster Audidy2 ZS. it should arrive tomorrow.

i am still recovering from my cold but feel way better today. i made some snapshots of my chieftech case after putting in two blue cold cathodes. i took the pictures with my old webcam, so please excuse the poor quality.