CALLING ALL COMPUTER NERDS! Need computer buying help

In the past when I have purchased computers, the main consideration behind their specifications was Simming. So I would purchase them with the intent of having an ATI graphics card put in, if it wasn't already part of the package deal. I fought tooth and nail for the last one I bought, the guy was really pushing me for an NVIDIA. Sorry, ATI only for me, bucko. (NVIDIA cards are notorious for not working well with The Sims 2, for some reason)

So now I am possibly in the market for a new computer. Well... I pretty much am for certain, as my beast is coming up on the three year mark and it has gotten really laggy and tired, (had it custom built and had problems with it early on) and I don't want to spend money on this thing when it's a perfectly good excuse to get a new one. Plus I want Windows 7 so by the time I upgraded the system and buy the new OS, I might as well just buy a whole new machine.

The Sims 2 is my main game of choice (The Sims 3 just did not get my attention, I don't like the look of the game in general, plust it still doesn't have pets and that just doesn't roll with me) but I do like some of the shockwave games and such, plus I've been admiring Starcraft 2 from afar for a while.
(system requirements: http://us.blizzard.com/support/article. ... leId=26242 )

I don't really do any heavy gaming, though, and not usually for any real extended period of time. So I don't need a major gaming machine, or anything. But I do like to run my games on high specs and performance in that respect does matter to me.

I've been kind of scared away from http://www.TigerDirect.ca by a friend who says that most people in the industry avoid dealing with them at all costs due to a previous snafu of them refurbishing Dell PCs and selling them as new. But if anyone sees a system on there I should be seriously considering, I'd like to know.

I don't want to spend more than $700 (before taxes) on the new machine. So right now I am looking at two very different ones.

I am wondering if it is technological blasphemy to even consider getting a Dell, and I hate to admit that I've seen a system that has grabbed my interest. I have heard that the quality of their systems has improved leaps and bounds since their "Dude, you're getting a Dell!" days, but I've been carrying around a bias against them for a long time, LOL

http://www.dell.com/ca/p/xps-8300/pd

The 8GB of ram and the dedicated graphics card is really selling me on this one. In my price range I'm not seeing many systems with more than 4GB and because everything is being sold with Windows 7 64bit and the OS itself requires 2GB, I really do want some extra memory. Plus, it includes shipping, (will have to see if they only ship with Canada Post, hahahaha) and it has pretty good ratings.

On the downside, the graphics card is not a gaming level card, but it should take pretty much anything I'm going to throw at it, since I'm not hard core, right?

I know with hard core gamers, power supply is a big consideration. But for my casual level of gaming, is it something I really need to consider? Is a larger power supply just a good idea all around?

If so, I am looking at this computer:
http://www.canadacomputers.com/product_ ... _id=037503

It has an admirable graphics card, and a beefed up power supply, but only 2x2GB - not the 8 I would prefer. But if I don't need the power supply, then I don't want to greatly increase my electricity bill for no reason.

But, I'm pretty open to suggestions. As long as they don't include buying a mac or building my own computer.

Changes afoot.

You may be noticing some changes, around here. Most notably, the name of the blog has changed. "Moon's 50 Books" and "50 Books in a Year" worked nicely for my first challenge, which was very obviously to read 50 books in the span of 52 weeks. So, that's done now. In fact, I surpassed that goal and now I am keeping myself from reading because I want a nicely rounded out start date for my next challenge.

My next challenge will be to read 15,000 pages in a year, and I'm aiming for a July first start date. If you allow 300 pages per book, it still works out to be 50 so, yes, I'm essentially doing the same thing. I'm curious to see how different my book count is at the end of it all, though.

So, a change in challenge, means a change in name. I didn't want to rename it "15,000 Pages in a Year" or something equally lame, because a) that's boring and b) I am thinking there might be a side challenge here and there. We will see.

A pat on the back and bragging rights go to whomever can tell me what "My Kingdom for a Good Book!" is based off of. 

The only other real change you'll see around here is, obviously, the look of the blog. Something book related seems appropriate, but we'll see how long the current style sticks. I'm still fiddling a bit

That's all, folks.

Dearly Devoted Dexter – Jeff Lindsay

In Darkly Dreaming Dexter, we meet Dexter Morgan who is a serial killer super hero. We learn about his past, why he does the things he does, and how he covers his tracks. The biggest element in his cover is Rita, his girlfriend who’s ex was a drug addict and abusive who left her life when he turned on her two kids, Cody and Astor. In Dearly Devoted Dexter, the second in the series, Dexter has to use the “happy family” cover even more when Sgt. Doakes starts tailing him. That certainly puts a damper on his favourite extracurricular activities. But Dexter is starting to think that Cody is carrying a “dark passenger” of his own, as he spends more time with them.

Amongst all this, a new kind of baddy has hit the scene, and he’s not even killing people. He’s just systematically removing their appendages as well as all facial features and leaving them alive to suffer. How fun!

The Dexter tv show takes a pretty clear deviation from the books, and that’s good, because this would have been one messy, disturbing season to shoot. But I enjoyed this book, it was an interesting aside to the world of Dexter that never made it to TV. 

Haven – Justin Kemppainen

This was a free download on my e-reader and the author encourages people to share it. After my first experience with a book that is only available for free on e-reader (A Bride for Tom), I was skeptical and assumed another very immaturely written story. But Haven was good, if not a little disturbing. I found it hard to read before bed because it would usually put me in a bad mindset. But, it was very much an early draft... poor editing and alignment issues galore. It was messy, purely from a structuring point of view, without proper chapters and so on. Since I downloaded it, it has been revised quite a bit and most websites have it for $0.99 now.

Since Prop 172 came into effect, you no longer have to worry about mixing with the garbage of society - those who are not genetically sound enough or useful enough to let continue on. The rabble gets reprogrammed as workers and labourers, and your city is perpetual clean and beautiful. What a wonderful city is Haven!

But, the Haven that the Citizens live in was just built on top of the original city. Those people who did not make the cut have been left behind in the dark, sunless, infrastructure-free city down below. Not a fun existence. Gangs of people band together to steal from one another and try to stay alive. And they've decided to do something about it.

Apparently Haven 2 is in the works and I'm curious to read it.

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland – Lewis Carroll

I’m still a little surprised that I had never managed to read this. And I was very surprised at how much I enjoyed it, and how well Lewis Carroll managed to portray a dreamscape. The absurdity of it all, the inability to do something that’s typically easy for you (in the story Alice is asked to recite verse that she apparently knows but she gets it all wrong) and the way that the things change and move – the way that one second you can be in one place in a dream and suddenly you are somewhere else entirely – just read so true to what a sorts of experiences I have while dreaming. Just add a good dose of talking animals to any of the dreams I would have had as a kid, and you have Alice’s adventures.

I was surprised how short it was too. There is certainly a lot more to the Disney rendition that we all know and love.But I suppose that's because most versions include Through the Looking Glass now.

April’s Grave – Susan Howatch

Karen has been back in America for three years when she is contacted by Marnie, her ex-husband's best friend.  Her short-lived marriage ended when her slutty, vagabond sister April interfered. So when Karen asks Marnie how April is doing, and they realize that no one has had contact with her since that fateful night, the search is set in motion. Where is April? And is she even still alive?

This was a pretty light murder-mystery. I found it easy to read the characters but I didn't get too emotionally involved either, so I didn't feel a terrible amount of tension as it came to a close. It did feel a bit rushed in the end, trying to tie up all the loose ends, but that's ok. We're not talking about great literature here. But on the whole, the writing style was clean and easy to read.

Hard Candy – Mary Lynn Baxter

Ugh… this was bad. A little bit formulaic crime drama, a little bit cheesy romance novel, and all sorts of hilariously bad. I found myself groaning, rolling my eyes, and just getting exhausted trying to read it. It reminded me of a bad plot on a soap opera. 

The Publishers Weekly synopsis really describes it rather nicely. 

"Not only had he kissed his main suspect, he wanted to fuck her, as well," is one of many bits of tacky internal dialogue from bully detective, Ryker Delany, regarding his prime murder suspect in this one-dimensional, raunchy crime drama by the author of Autumn Awakening. When Blythe Lambert's dead husband washes up on the shores of a local lake, Ryker would love nothing more than to pin the murder on her. (Apparently she'd ticked him off once by mistaking him for one of her landscaping company's laborers). Bitchy and self-absorbed, Blythe doesn't like Ryker any more than he likes her, but she likes him well enough to hop into bed with him, which doesn't seem to complicate their hate/hate relationship. Between battling her in-laws, searching for a missing will and lamenting her failing business, Blythe is dogged by someone who wants the mysterious but valuable "Hard Candy" that her husband supposedly had in his possession when he died. But Blythe and crew are so distasteful that it's hard to care about her predicament or whether she gets out of it."

And that covers it. Every single character in the book is so vile, I kind of hoped it would end up with everyone being caught up in an unfortunate gas explosion. No such luck.

The Modern Dog – Dr Stanley Coren

If you have any real interest in dog behaviour, you are at least mildly familiar with Dr Coren, or you’ve heard his name. He speaks all over the world and has written a number of books. He has a way of presenting ideas and information in his books that makes them very readable, even for the more casual dog enthusiasts. And if you are a dog owner with an interest in behaviour, but not a whole lot of background, this is a good read for you.

In The Modern Dog, he covers all sorts of areas in which dogs enrich our lives, but also explains how we got to where we are as species sharing our lives cohesively.

As someone who has read a few of his other books and has heard him speak at seminars and in various television programs, there wasn’t much of anything new in this book for me. But, because he gives real-life examples to go along with what he’s discussing, everything from stories he has heard on the road to accounts of how famous figures and historical character interacted with their dogs, it was still enjoyable.

Persepolis - Marjane Satrapi 

Persepolis is an autobiographical graphic novel about a young girl's life in Iran in 1980. And I keep re-writing this second sentence, but I just can't say anything that does this story justice. It is so beautiful, and sweet, and sad. The artwork is so simple, it offsets the often heavy subject matter. I can't believe that so much story and emotion is crammed into 153 pages.

Persepolis is also a movie and is available on netflix. I am SO going to watch tomorrow. Available on Amazon here.

****

Book count: 52/50

I guess that's it... I've done my 50 books and surpassed the goal. It was actually accidental, I forgot about a book when I was doing my mental calculations (that's what I get for not blogging often enough) and the Persepolis was a bathroom add-on. 

It is hard to believe that a year has almost gone by since I started this. Next will be the 15,000 pages challenge, I think. But we'll see.....

Books 44-45

Death Masks - Jim Butcher

Jim Butcher is starting to lose my interest now. I really liked the first couple of books in The Dresden Files series, but, there was just too much going on in the last couple of books and I'm starting not to care anymore. I don't care what happens to Harry, or his ex-girlfriend, or Murphy... I just didn't care.

Harry has to duel a murderous Vampire. But, he gets a little sidetracked and starts looking for the Shroud of Turin which has been stolen. And there's some monsters, and the fact that Harry has to wrestle with his feelings for Susan as she's returned to town with some guy. Hmm haww. Blah.

Darkly Dreaming Dexter - Jeff Lindsay

So, I've watched the Dexter series with Ian a couple of times now, and the show is so addictive. The first season is so exceptionally endearing, and the style of the show is really just exceptional. The music bounces off the shots which are accentuated with colours and patterns and... it tickles all the senses. The opening theme to Dexter is a visceral, delicious experience alone. Grinding coffee, cutting into an egg yolk, juicing a blood orange... it almost makes me hungry.

So, you can tell how I feel about the show. And, the book is always better, right?

Meh. I enjoyed the first Dexter book but man, it was not nearly as good as the show. Not even close. The bones of the characters are there, but the show fleshes them out so nicely, in a way the book just does not. I do think I would have enjoyed the book more if I hadn't seen the show, but it certainly does stand on its own merits.

If you don't know the basis behind Dexter,  he's a serial killer, who only kills bad people. But there's all sorts of other things going on in his past, and in his present, so it's not just about him killing.


****

Book Count: 45/50

Books 41-43

Summer Knight - Jim Butcher

I finished this one quite a while ago and I don't remember it very well. So I guess that's a bad sign. But I did enjoy the book and, yet again, I was surprised at the ending.... and that's a good sign when it comes to mystery novels.

Harry Dresden, Wizard P.I., is in an incredibly depressed funk now that his girlfriend is gone. He is trying desperately to find the solution to her... little problem, and locks himself in his basement lab. Eviction notices pending, he finally gets back out in the world when weird stuff starts happening. Raining frogs is a bad sign, especially when they are real frogs.

Annnnnd huge war in the land of Faerie ensues, at some point.

I can't wait to read the next one.

The Prince - Machiavelli

I am only vaguely interested in politics at the best of times. So, reading about politics that are not even remotely current.... was painful. Why do the classics seem to let me down?

This is, in a nutshell, Machiavelli's guide to being a prince, and how to deal with situations whether you created a principality, took one over, or were born into one. Subjects don't have to love you, they should fear you, but not hate you. Got that? Good. Because that's the nuts and bolts of it all.

Some of the anecdotes Machiavelli includes to back up his points were interesting, like crib sheets on how certain rulers failed.

And other bits were just... cold and disturbing. You don't want to piss off your subjects, but throwing a few lowly farmers off their land to give to your nobles is ok. They're not important enough to make a difference. That bit sounded pretty current to me.

The Moses Expedition - Juan Gomez-Jurado

This book was thoroughly engaging and I blew through it in no time.  I am getting tired so am just going to steal the description from Amazon:

"A lost treasure, a Nazi war criminal, and an expedition to find a legend . . .

After fifty years in hiding, the Nazi war criminal known as the Butcher of Spiegelgrund has finally been tracked down by Father Anthony Fowler, a CIA operative and a member of the Vatican’s secret service. He wants something from the Butcher—a candle covered in filigree gold that was stolen from a Jewish family many years before.

But it isn’t the gold Fowler is after. As Fowler holds a flame to the wax, the missing fragment of an ancient map that uncovers the location of the Ten Commandments given to Moses is revealed. Soon Fowler is involved in an expedition to Jordan set up by a reclusive billionaire. But there is a traitor in the group who has ties to terrorist organizations back in the United States, and who is patiently awaiting the moment to strike.

From wartime Vienna to terrorist cells in New York and a lost valley in Jordan, The Moses Expedition is a thrilling read about a quest for power and the secrets of an ancient world."
 

Books 39-40

Grave Peril - Jim Butcher

The third book in The Dresden Files series, Grave Peril did for me what Storm Front did not, and added significant flesh and some fat to chew. It was a little daunting to get into as ghosts, faeries and vampires are all thrown at your pretty quickly, and some how end up all lending to the plot line.

I often find that with mystery movies and books I am able to figure out how things are going to end pretty early on. But so far the plot twists have been many and I've been pleasantly surprised that my assumptions have been incorrect. It's nice to get a surprise ending now and then!

Anyway, Grave Peril starts with our second favourite wizard named Harry rushing off with an acquaintance (and Knight of the Cross) named Michael to go deal with a particularly nasty ghost. They chase her into the Nevernever and, after dealing with the ghost (who they find out is being tortured), Harry's godmother greets him. The problem is, she is a high ranking fae and these are not the sweet faeries that sit around on toadstools and drink dew drops and play with sunshine.

Throw in some murderous vampires, and a maniacal demon, and... well it sure gets messy. But it makes for some pretty good reading.

Bone #4: The Dragonslayer - Jeff Smith

This.... series...  is.... so...... good.

****

Book count: 40/50

Books 36-38

He, She, and It - Marge Piercy

This is not what I expected.

Our world in the future is run by huge corporations, and Shira has been an under appreciated worker in one of them for a while. We meet her at the custody hearing for her son, and it's a brief one... custody is given to her ex-husband and shortly after he is shipped off to work on a different planet. Shira's appeal for custody now must wait the two years until they return to earth, so she returns to the free Jewish city where she was raised to live with her Grandmother and work for her ex-boyfriend's dad.

On her return she finds that they've been busy developing Yod, a cyborg who's main objective is to protect the settlement. But he's very different from previous attempts - he is able to feel, to learn, to create emotional connection. Love story ensues.

At the same time, we hear the tale of Joseph the Golem who was created to protect the Jewish ghetto in Prague.

It's an interesting combination, futuristic science fiction and ancient Jewish mysticism, but it works.


Fool Moon - Jim Butcher

Fool Moon is the second in the Dresden Files series. Fast, fun, and entirely enjoyable..... if not even remotely believable. But that's not what the Dresden Files are about.

Harry Dresden, professional Wizard, is called in to consult on a bad murder case. It leads us into the world of werewolves, of which there are many sorts and we meet at least a few of them. There's magic, treachery, violence and sexy sexy goodness... how can you go wrong?

Actually, I found this book particularly thin in comparison to Storm Front, the first in the series. I am hoping they thicken up a bit after this. I'm a completest and having started the series, I intend to finish it.

Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town - Stephen Leacock

According to Amazon, this book sits at #19 in there listings for Canadian Classics. And it's easy to see why. This book is pretty funny, and very real, it is every small Canadian lakeside town and anyone who has spent any time in a town of that nature knows the people within. What makes this book amazing, though, is that even though it was published in 1912 (that's almost 100 years! Basic math! Whoa!). Somehow, this book has managed to remain funny, and somehow oddly current, despite its age.

Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town is based in the fictional town of Mariposa, largely believed to be Orillia, Ontario. And, it's entirely true to the title... little stories about the goings on of Mariposa, and the characters within. I think my favourite was the chapter about the Mariposa Belle, the steamboat that takes the townspeople on excursions about the waterway. But then we find out that a sinking of the Mariposa Belle is not unexpected.... so much so that if you're late for an engagement, telling them the boat sank is a completely understandable excuse. Why aren't people more worried, why, the lake is only 6 feet deep at the deepest point....

What makes the book completely special is that you don't realize you're reading anything comedic until something strikes you as funny. The fact that Stephen Leacock was British is not big surprise, as the dryness of wit comes through completely clear in the writing.

****

Book count: 38/50