[RAMChYLD]

Still no match for SCHNITZEL BONG!

Erm, sorry, Violette II.

Nothing beats quad-core CPU + CrossfireX GPU when games are involved.

[cpd2009]

Still no match for SCHNITZEL BONG!

Erm, sorry, Violette II.

Nothing beats quad-core CPU + CrossfireX GPU when games are involved.

True, but you know me. Greta will do just fine for my needs.

[huckleberrypie]

Sup, homies?

[RAMChYLD]

Not feeling too good this morning. Had the flu, and don't think I'm getting any better.

[huckleberrypie]

Not feeling too good this morning. Had the flu, and don't think I'm getting any better.

I know what you feel, dude.

[RAMChYLD]

I just have to let it out.

[cpd2009]

A couple things I forgot to mention in my initial review...

Greta's speakers are amazing for a laptop. It's a bar-like speaker running along the top of the keyboard, and the sound quality is on par with Chrysanthemum's speakers. I think the sound level is just right when you have the volume all the way up...unsure why other people reviewing the laptop at HSN say the sound is too low.

As for the included software....thankfully, there isn't too much preinstalled bloatware. There is the Norton Internet Security trial (which I promptly synced with my Norton account to use my already-purchased year of protection), Cyberlink PowerDVD 10, Microsoft Office Starter Edition, Gateway Games, Nero Essentials 10, standard laptop-utilities like recovery and web cam apps, and a neat Social Networks app that utilizes the much hyped Social Networking key on the keyboard. There's also other stuff like some AUPEO! radio app, Evernote (which I also have installed on Lilly), and the B&N Nook PC app. I also didn't activate MS Office Starter since the PC Essentials DVD came with the full version of "Corel Office."

I'm somewhat excited about CyberLink PowerDVD 10. It's two versions behind the current release, but it works great with DVDs. It has some of the best de-interlacing I have seen. I'm going to test the screencapture function and see how it compares to VLC.

I'm still alive!

I hope the new member posts. I've been interested in The Chipmunks recently myself, albeit more interested in the older versions than the current version.

Sorry I forgot you initially....

Good to know you are still around. I hope the move-in is going well.

[cpd2009]

It appears I am the only one who is posting here recently. Well, at least I'm keeping this place from getting too quiet.

Anyway, I just had an interesting experience with PowerDVD 10. I put in an Angelina Ballerina disc (I bought a good load of them about two weeks ago), and it was region 1, the first R1 disc I had Greta play. I thought the drive was already set to region 1 at the factory, so when PowerDVD attempted to play it, it gave me the window where you can set the region, and it said I had five region code changes left. Confused, I hit cancel, and the disc didn't play. But when I went into the settings for the DVD-RW drive region code, it says I had four. That means Windows automatically set the region code of the disc even though I told PowerDVD not to. Thus, when I played the Angelina disc back again, it played like normal.

I didn't know that Windows would automatically set the region code by itself if an R1 DVD was accessed. I searched on Google about this, and it's apparently been this way since Windows 2000.

When I first played a region-coded DVD with Lilly's external DVD-RW drive, Mac OS X actually asked up front to set the initial region.

Other things...I also tested PowerDVD's screencap capability. While PowerDVD is great at DVD playback, not so great when it comes to screencaps. In fact, sometimes trying to capture a frame will freeze PowerDVD for no reason, leaving a frozen window on the desktop and you can't terminate PowerDVD with the task manager! A reboot is necessary when that happens.

VLC shall still be used for screencaps then. I may use Wendell for that purpose.

[Blackberry Bun]

It appears I am the only one who is posting here recently. Well, at least I'm keeping this place from getting too quiet.

Let's just say that... each of us has some life issues.

Anyway, today is my parents' anniversary.

[cpd2009]

Decided to switch him over to PCLinuxOS.

I have a long, storied history with PCLinuxOS. It was one of my distros of choice from 2005 to 2007 when Ubuntu didn't work out.

The ATI video drivers work properly with PCLinuxOS. I can adjust the screen brightness unlike Ubuntu. It seems a lot faster too.