Cujo

nice find. better vid card. old chipset and cpu though. weird screen size. it's a 16/9 resolution screen which i've actually never see on a laptop or a desktop monitor (natively). the more i think about it that is really strange. such an old chipset and cpu with a brand new vid card, n wireless and vista 64 bit. that laptop is illogical.

bigchief, it would get heavy after some time but unless you're a small guy you should be fine. i got the 14" so it fit better in my lap in the car. as far as the 1gb video it's probably mostly unnecessary as that gpu isn't powerful enough to take advantage of it. preacher, they don't even compare. acer has always been a budget manufacturer. the specs don't compare, the performance won't compare. the one you're linking has intergrated intel gfx which is complete rubbish. i'm amazed you were able to play those games at all let alone well. not to mention the asus would have a better warranty if anything did happen. while they don't use the games you mentioned you can see the performance is dreadful... http://www.techreport.com/articles.x/14261/8

this: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16834220340 or this: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16834220337 depends on the size you want. the 14" will obviously be more portable. both with play most games just fine and be sexy machines. just bought another asus tonight for a friend and i'm so impressed. it came with 2 carrying cases, a bluetooth mouse, and 2 year warranty. not to mention the first year is accidental damage comparable to dell's complete care. the model was the w7s b2w shown here: http://infonec.com/site/main.php?module=detail&id=350465

i switched banks because they were offering a free one of those. i'm not sure what i'll end up using it for though i might just sell it.

http://www.theinquirer.net/gb/inquirer/new...s-msi-head-head haven't read it yet but it can't be more relevant.

i for sure recommend nod32. as for all this new junk being released i find malware bytes does a solid job getting rid of it. a quick scan is much quicker than spybot and 95% of the time it gets rid of everything. make sure you disable system restore before you start and then enable it again once you're clean.

tryin to figure out how to get my bookmarks show in a sidebar like i do in ff. until then i'll stick with ff.

asus.

can't beat those prices.... :S

might take a look. report back your thoughts.

you will get faster performance with the higher risk of data loss. with your laptop i'd probably either use raid 1 or just keep them as two separate drives. one for windows and games and one for data. i wouldn't recommend raid 0. express gate sounds cool. my new motherboard supports it i think but i haven't even played around with it at all. i should though.

argh, yellow font. had to highlight that to read it.

that cpu should hit at least 3.6ghz on stock volts. edit - btw, that mobo model is the P5Q-E. that should help. i have the P5Q Deluxe and i've had 0 issues.

you can change it by buying the 64 bit version and installing it. UNLESS you bought it retail and the disc came with both versions installed. in which case just use your disc to install 64 bit.

usually there will be a process using that cpu. check your taskmanager.

you'll definitely want 2gb for vista. i would just get a used/refurbed unit.

nothing positive to say? how much more positive can you get than a recommendation?? i love my x-fi platinum. i tried going back to onboard to keep my case a bit cleaner and i lasted all of 2 days.

i love that you bought a sound card from a company that specializes in onboard sound. kind of ironic. for that money you could have ditched the pci interface altogether and bought a true gaming sound card.

there is a pcie version of the xfi fatality which is what i'd get if i were in the market for a new card.

Who doesn't like massive overkill? +1

unless you're sitting 15+ feet back from the tv this is massively overkill. sharp makes several aquos models of varying quality. any idea which model would have this panel?

it's not a virus. it's likely his hard drive. if he's lost bookmarks in firefox then it sounds like it's corrupting files. a virus wouldn't do that. i'd try re-installing windows and if installs successfully then you might be in the clear. my guess is it won't.

again, i'm fairly certain you don't have to do that.

get the 15" one. 1gb of memory on a laptop vid card is pure overkill. very few desktop card even have 1gb right now. only the newest ati/nvidia desktop cards even have enough horsepower to utilize that ram.

you want to avoid the 8400 and 8600 series cards from nvidia. afaik, the 9 series is fine. that 9700 one looks badass but reminds me so much of an old laptop a friend had which came with an ati 9700m... lol.