Office can do .odt files. Open Office is pretty good, but when I used it I found it to be a resource hog on my computer. It took a little longer to login with it on my computer.

Yeah, I use OpenOffice on my other laptop (can't say I've noticed a resource problem? strange), but my Mac came with Word and I couldn't be bothered installing OO because for work I only use LaTeX anyway and so don't actually need any text editors other than TeX-specific ones... except that now I've been doing some ficwriting during the breaks and it gets pretty annoying when Word does the keyboard switch *and* it can't open the files I've worked on on my home comp because they're .odt. And although I suppose I could write fic in LaTeX I'm not sure my readers would be too enthusiastic at me presenting each installment in downloadable-PDF format.

What version of Word do you have? I just opened a .odt that I had left over from when I used OO.

lol I think many of your readers wouldn't be happy about a PDF.

EDIT: for clarity

So I'm getting ready to buy my first new computer. The only thing is I'm a little confused about memory. The last computer I had had very, very little. I don't know how much but I do know it was a Windows 98 tower :/ The one I'm planning to get will need to be able to play videos (the last one couldn't) and hold a couple thousand songs on itunes and maybe (hopefully!) be able to play Sims

Here's what I might be getting:

Operating system Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium [64-bit]
Processor Intel® Pentium® dual-core processor G620 [2.6GHz, 3MB cache]
Memory 6GB DDR3-1066MHz SDRAM [2 DIMMs]
Hard drive 500GB 7200 rpm SATA 3Gb/s hard drive
Office software SAVE $40 on Microsoft® Office Home and Student 2010
Security software No additional security software
Graphics card Integrated graphics - Intel® HD graphics [DVI, VGA]
Primary optical drive SuperMulti DVD Burner
Networking Integrated Ethernet port, No wireless LAN
Productivity ports 2 USB, front audio ports
Sound Card Integrated sound

Does that sound like enough for what I need? Or do I need less?

Well, which Sims?

The processor is weak but should be ok. You do not have a graphics card though. That will hold you back on any new games.

Sims 2 or 3. Its not a must though and I figured I can always get a graphics card later (I'm not really a big PC gamer)

Well you should have plenty of memory for what you want to do.

The hard drive should be alright too. I have a 500GB and I'm using just over 300GB. For some people a 500GB won't be enough but for you I think it will.

I think you will need a graphics card for the Sims 2 or 3, but if you already own the games you could try installing and playing them once and see if it works or not.

I'm wanting to buy a new laptop soon and was wondering what a good model would be.

I need it to be able to run most games on at least low graphics, but don't want my pockets to be TOO light. Any ideas?

Hey guys I want to know if my new laptop can run oblivion at a decent framerate and graphics. Heres my specs.

Processor: Intel® Core ™2 CPU T5500 @1.66GHz

Memory: 1.99 GB

I've got over 80 gigs on my harddrive so I'm sure thats enough to hold it. I'm tired of having to use my ps3 as I HATE having to restart if I catch vampirism. So can I run it at decent graphics and framerate?

Nope, sorry. Your laptop has the specs of a netbook.

Guys, how does my new laptop sound? Do you think I could run oblivion? (Yeah, seems to be the big question here)

Oh, and I'm going to be taking advantage of steams "midweek madness" and get oblivion for £4! is it possible to transfer it over to the new laptop when I get it, or is it stuck on the laptop I download it to? Please answer quick!

Well, it sounds better than mine in all aspects, and my laptop could run Oblivion on the medium settings with reasonable fps. (then the dvd drive broke ) Anyway, the one thing that definitely needs to be checked is the graphics card. I couldn't find it on the quick amazon summary.

As for Steam, I think you can redownload games that have been bought. I don't use Steam though, so read the faq first. The answer is probably in there somewhere.

Edit: I'm replying to Solo's toshiba. Yeah, the one with the intel-core is probably underpowered. Intel graphics cards aren't all that hot either.

Any game you have licensed to your Steam account can be re-downloaded infinitely from your Steam profile, whether or not you purchased a digital copy or bought the hard copy.

And no, don't buy a computer with an Intel graphics chip if you intend to play games on it. Ever.

Well, thanks for the info on steam, but one of my mates is going to give me GOTY anyway!

Oh, the graphics card is ATI Radeon HD 4250.

I love the processor name! Turion II X2 Dual Core P520 = Awesome!

My new card is in!

nVidia GeForce GTX 560 Ti.

This completes a long computer overhaul, as my last major component has now gone up to modern hardware.

Before I was on an aging 8800 GT. Now, I'm back with the times.

But before I do anything other than benchmark (and I did get a nice performance boost in Skyrim), I have Christmas dinner to worry about.

Congrats! That is a serious card. You can crank up the AA and anisotropic settings to max. I have them set to x32 and x16 for Morrowind.

And now you are ready for DX11 games. Which I don't think exist because everyone is making their games for 5 year old consoles.

Nice card TK! That's the one I wanted... Ended up with a weaker card, but I'm happy with it. Right now I'm thinking of getting a SSD next for my computer. Maybe in a few months.

My gift this year is a Acer laptop. AMD A8 quad core, HD 6620G (still trying to figure out how good that card is), 4GB RAM.

I'm now posting from the brand new laptop I got for Christmas!

it's not the L650 I thought I would get, but a much better model. the Toshiba Satellite C660-2EL

Here's the quick important stuff:

CPU - Intel Core i3-370M Processor

Graphics - Intel Graphics Media Accelerator HD

RAM - 4GB (DDR3)

HDD - 640GB

Operating System - Windows 7 Home Premium (64 - Bit)

That processor looks decent. Dual core with threading.

My A8 3500M is what AMD is calling an APU that contains both the CPU and GPU in a single chip. It seems to deliver pretty good performance and Skyrim autodetected High graphics settings on it. I haven't had a chance to actually play Skyrim on it yet, but I'll try that in a few days here and see how it runs.

EDIT: Looks like the processor will only get up to 1500 MHz. Those of us with an i7 know that it idles faster than the A8 3500M can work at full speed. lol.
Oh, and no threading either.

Looks like a very nice all-purpose laptop there! Not good for gaming, but I'm fairly sure that was not why you bought it.

Should be great for long trips.

Ive watched a couple movies and some HD videos on youtube and it ran with no problems.

Gaming wasnt my top priority, since the only things I will probably be playing are minecraft, TF2 and some WoW. So far TF2 and WoW work, but I cant get minecraft working.

Its the dreaded "HS_ERR" problem. if anyone knows a solution, please help.

Yay... TDRs.

Looks like I am running into a well known and very well documented bug with nVidia GTX 400/500 cards: browsing the web occasionally (though for me, thankfully infrequently) causes my GPU drivers to time out, causing Windows to deliberately hang them and restart them.

It's a feature called Timeout Detection and Recovery (TDR). For some reason, lots of people have been experiencing TDRs being tripped numerous times while doing nothing more GPU intensive than browsing the web. For me, they only seem to happen when I am browsing. When playing a game, the GPU functions as it should.

I am now experimenting with ways to get around the problem until nVidia discovers the cause of the fault and fixes it. My first experiment: setting my driver profile for Firefox to prefer maximum performance.

I used to have that crap happen a lot. I don't remember when it quit though... perhaps with an update...

I just had an episode where one of my hard drives simply didn't work. As in, I start the PC, and it didn't even see the drive (my HDD access light didn't flash).

This means I may have a hard drive that is on its way out on my hands here. I was able to get it working again after fiddling with the connections, but with hard drives, better safe than sorry.

Tomorrow, I'll be looking into finding a way to back up the data and start looking for a replacement. I am not taking any chances here, even if this was a fluke, the hard drive is seriously THE last PC component you want to have malfunctioning (as it is THE most important).

While I'm at it, I'll also be looking at updating the tech, as well. My MoBo has SATA 6.0Gb/s (SATA III) support, so I'll probably be shopping for those specific drives. And a capacity upgrade would be nice, but it might also complicate the disc backups (I'm at 500Gb now, so upping that would bring me to 1Tb).

I just had this happen to me a few hours ago, while I was writing an email. Nice to know what it is! It happened while a notification message was popping up in my email app's window (I use Thunderbird). So I think that is what tripped it.

Oh, by the way, that proposed solution worked. You will use more power, but it should stop TDRs from occurring. Best you can do for now, since nVidia has no clue what is wrong (and they've been looking really hard, too).

I am now eyeing a new laptop to replace my fried MBP (2006 model), and am curious to know what y'all think of the specs:

Processor: Intel Ivy Bridge Quad Core i7 2.6 GHz with Turbo Boost to 3.6 GHz and 6 MB shared L3 cache
Graphics: Intel HD 4000 plus NVIDIA GeForce GT 650M with Kepler architecture (not sure what that means, will have to research it) and 1 GB GDDR5 RAM and auto-switching capability

RAM: 8 GB 1600 MHz

Storage: 512 GB Flash drive

Display: capable of resolutions from 1024x640 up to 2880x1800 (twice the resolution of a HDTV).

Comments? Questions? What d'ya think?

Processor sounds like a winner, I have a desktop variant of the i7 and I love it. I wouldn't expect it to turboboost to 3.6 very often if at all due to it being a laptop.

I don't know much about mobile graphics, but it looks like the memory for it should be good. I consider my card to be mid to high range and it has 1GB of DDR5. I have no idea what the processing power of that model is though.

512 GB Flash drive? Do you mean Solid State? I've heard those are iffy. They are fast, but have a high failure rate it seems.

here is a linky for the GeForce 650M graphics chip:

I will talk to my techies and see what they say about the solid state drives and confirm what you said. I'm still a fan of the ol' platter drives, but these specs, especially that display, are making me drool soooo much!

If it were me, I'd risk it. But I don't want to tell you to go for it and then have it fail.

I'm right there with you drooling over those specs! I'd expect that thing to handle Skyrim very nicely.

It looks pretty good. I have a desktop with an i7, and have had not complaints. The graphics card looks decent too. 1gb of ram seems a bit small these days. I have not shopped laptops in a long time though, so I am not sure what they usually come with.

The flash drive also sounds iffy to me. Do you mean it has flash memory, like on a thumb drive? I would never go with something like that. It is not very stable. If you mean a solid state drive, I have never had one, but I know they are the best thing out there for performance, so people seem to like them for high end gaming rigs.

The hard drive is a solid state drive. Like I said, I'll consult with my techies and see what they say about its stability. Otherwise I'm getting a more traditional external hard drive as backup!

Yes, compared to the desktop equivalent, 1 GB of RAM for the graphics card seems puny. But compared to the other laptops in the lineup, it is high end. And if it can drive a 2880x1800 pixel display like I've seen it in the demos, it is more than enough to become my main photography machine.

My 2008 Mac Pro (my desktop) has an NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT with 512 MB of video RAM, and it runs Oblivion (and Nehrim) fine at higher resolutions. Native resolution is 1680 x 1050, and that's what it runs TES IV on.

I'm still on the fence regarding Skyrim. I don't want a Steam account just to play the game, so I may still pass. But I am considering running Windows under Parallels or VMFusion and trying TES IV just for the heck of it.

SSD's in laptops are a better bet because they're much more shock-resistant than HDD's. Platters are good for bulk data, so desktops and servers will keep using them. An SDD has a limited life because of the maximum number of rewrites any cell can take, but that's more than the lifespan of the rest of the laptop these days, so irrelevant.

I'm about to order a new desktop for gaming, and I'll almost certainly get both. SDD for fast loading, and HDD for bulk storage. I want to get a multiple-monitor setup, anyone have experience of using that?

Just make sure that whatever system you get has blue lights. My puter works wonderfully and I'm convinced it is because of the pretty blue lights. Oh, and fans - nice little whirling fans that hum along with the in game music!

I know someone that bought a SSD for his desktop and it failed in less than a year. The manufacturer send them a new one at no charge, but still...

H.E.R. should talk to her friends about it like she said.

I have never tried multiple displays. I use one BIG monitor instead.

I'm using a "Main + auxiliary" setup with a 21" CRT and a 15" LCD at the moment, and I like the way I can have a full-screen display of an image on the 21" while all the tools are on the small screen in GIMP. There are several other programs that let me work the same way, and drag the tools over to the small screen.

But that machine is failing, and needs replacing, so I'm think of getting an nVidia Surround setup with 3 x 24" LCD's which will let me have a logical extra-wide display for games, as well as the main + aux setup for "work".
I've had issues with the ATI cards on my current machine, mainly with not supporting DirectX and OpenGL properly in the same driver. I'm reluctant to use their Eyefinity alternative.

I have other machines, so my current workflow runs Blender and NifSkope on a machine where OpenGL works (but the CPU is slower and the video memory is insufficient for gaming) and play-testing under Directx on the faster one (where OpenGL fails). It will be nice to work on only one again.

My techies tell me they've seen very few, if any, issues with SSD's since the MBA first came out.

My only issue with them is the cost per GB - to get anything close to reasonable storage size is outrageous. But maybe this new laptop will be the beginning of a serious price drop on those things.

ghastley, you are absolutely right about SSD's in laptops - I actually recommend the MBA for families with small children because I have a mental picture of two little tykes yanking that laptop between them in a struggle for ownership. As I see it, the MBA can withstand that kind of trauma much better than the MBP, which still used the platter drive. The MBP's are better for college students in spite of its greater weight, and for serious professionals and hobby gamers (the Mac Pro's and high end iMacs are better for the serious stuff). One of my techies actually plays Call of Duty on a 17 inch MBP, but he did trick it out to the max.

I got my hands on a demo of the new laptop I'm looking at yesterday, and I have to say that I'm impressed by it. The decision has been made, I will be getting a new one soon!

I'm not horribly familiar with the multiple display options open to you, ghastley. I think it depends on the graphics cards you have. I know the Mac Pros (the professional level desktop that requires a separate monitor - like the one I currently have) have slots for two graphics cards, which theoretically can allow up to four monitors to be connected at one time (each card handles two). I have never tried connecting a second monitor to my Mac Pro to see how it handles it (NIVIDIA GeForce 8800GT w/512 MB) simply because I've never felt the need for one. I did have my old MBP connected to the HDTV via a DVI-HDMI adapter and it worked great. Speaking of which, the new laptop I'm looking at has an HDMI port!! Whoo hoo!

Sounds great. It may have been an issue with a specific manufacturer then.

Now I want to start looking at new GPUs.

I'm checking out a GeForce GTX 670 which calls for a PCIe 3.0 slot. My Motherboard only has 2.0 slots. Anybody know if the card will still work? Some quick googling suggests they will, but does anyone here know? I'd be disappointed to drop $400+ on a card only to have the damn thing not fit or work.

If my own experiences with PCI2 cards in my PCI1 slots is anything to go by, it will work for a month or so before it fails.

The new machine finally arrived - and it has ridiculous quantities of blue lights. Even the red-eye mouse has a blue light

I'm now spending all my time trying to configure the UI to work on a 6040 x 1080 resolution (spread across three monitors). Most of it is OK, but I'd like to move some more of the HUD items onto the center screen, and stop the game from trying to use the whole width for the maps. I'm learning a lot more about the menus xml files than I intended.

The extra screen space is great for the Construction Set, which likes to open new windows for everything. I can use a whole monitor for the cell render, and still see all the other stuff at the same time.

If I can't find any tutorials etc. on the triple-screen issues, I may end up writing one.

ghastley: Blue lights and three screens! Woot! I can imagine what you mean about having three screens to tinker around in the CS.

Congrats ghastley. Glad to hear you are getting a handle on the three screens. It does sound like it would be handy for using the CS. Just using a second monitor helps me immensely when going between spreadsheets and databases at work.

I have been thinking of getting a new machine soon too. My current one is starting to get tired. I still have not quite made up my mind to replace it yet though.

Extra screen space for the CK/CS would be wonderful. Congrats on the new system.

I'm quite a regular complainer here!

So, I'm trying to run Thief 2 on my laptop, but it refuses to load the disk. It doesn't crash, but when I put the disk in, all my PC does is make some odd clunking noises. It isn't a problem with the disk drive, since it will run other disks and has never made this noise before. Any ideas?

Oh, and the disk is a Sold out version, just in case thats the problem.

Odd clunking noises? Well if the disc isn't ruined, you could try opening My Computer and see if the computer thinks there is anything in the drive.

My PC did exactly that when I put Oblivion in before I upgraded the PC to handle it. Check the game minimum requirements and your PC's - possibly it can't handle the graphics.

Good point - if there's a graphics issue, it might not think it can even display the "fail" dialog!

Well, my old MBP finally died.

And I have my new one - with the same specs except for the display and hard drive. The display is the high-resolution version of the standard display, which can go up to 1680 x 1050 - pretty respectable. The HD is the standard platter drive - 750 GB.

I decided to go with this one instead of the one I was looking at earlier because the display on this is proven, while the display on the other is really new tech. Typically I'm not an early adopter - I prefer to let someone else work out all the kinks on new technology before I get into it. So that's why I got this high end MBP instead of the MBP with Retina display.

I just picked this baby up on Thursday and so far am very happy with it. It does not have HDMI (like the Retina does), but it has Airplay capability which lets me use my HDTV as a second monitor wirelessly. So hopefully I'll be able to get back into writing once again, now that I have something portable.

Hello...

I give permission to treat me like a complete numpty where computers are concerned... ...I said where computers are concerned... ...

Aaamywho...

I'm being hassled to buy Oblivion and Skyrim for the PC...

Sooo...I know you can create alternate users...One each for me, boy and girl...

Reet...If we each create a character or so, does the fact that these users are seperate mean that the autosave won't save over each other's games?...

Aaaaand...

Knowing the boy, he'll want to mod...And probably, so will I...

Sooo...Can we run different mods on the seperate users?...As I can't remember how the turorial that Subrosa sent me said about turning them off or on each time you use the game...

Please use small words... ...Like I said, other than push button, press here to make internet/itunes/word I don't know, really, what I'm doing...


EDIT!!!..Oooh, OOohh...Can you use the PS2 lookalike controllers to play Oblivion and Skyrim or do they not support it?...Ta vm...