DualReviewal: January 2013

We'll be back next week with a new review. But until then, here is a note from +Meehandlebars...

The Life and Times of a Crashed Computer

I know we have been gone for a while. Here is what happened: my computer crashed.

Here is a lesson you can learn from me: be extremely careful when altering the partitions on your Drive with your OS. You might be thinking, "what a n00b," but hindsight is always 20/20.

I was running dual OS (XP/7) to preserve a few of my favorite games that didn't work on 7 well when I first formatted. I wanted to try the risky move of deleting my XP partition and merge it into my 7 partition using the tools in Ubuntu (booted from a USB stick).

Here is where I messed up (and none of my friends caught this when I asked them for advice): I forgot that I installed XP first.

Have you figured it out yet?

The fact that I installed XP first meant that my master boot record was in the partition that XP was on. By deleting that partition, I rendered my computer lifeless.

So, I spent the next week reformatting and reinstalling all of my programs and games, taking the time to make sure everything is perfect (I'm a bit OCD about that).

Then, the holidays hit and both Unsalted and myself were out of town or spending time with friends and family, etc.

THEN, I got my Christmas bonus which have me enough total funds to (get my wife to agree that I could) buy a NEW computer; which was nice, since I hadn't planned that until the Spring.

So, I spent the next week reformatting and reinstalling all of my programs and games, taking the time to make sure everything is perfect (I'm a bit OCD about that).

Want to know and see what I put together? Well here you go. By the way, I used this guide (the "Hot Rod" model) that Unsalted found on Ars Technica to get my process started. I changed a few things around because of brand loyalty and deals on Newegg, though. Not to mention, that I kept my existing monitor, mouse, keyboard and speakers.

1x MSI GeForce GTX 660 Ti 2GB

1x OCZ Vertex 4 256GB SATA III SSD

1x Intel Core i5 Ivy Bridge 3.4GHz Quad-Core CPU

1x WD 2TB 7200 RPM SATA 6.0Gb/s HDD

1x GIGABYTE Z77 ATX Intel Motherboard

2x G.SKILL Sniper 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3 1600 RAM

1x CORSAIR CX500 500W Power Supply

1x LITE-ON DVD Burner

1x LIAN LI Black Aluminum ATX Mid Tower Case

1x Logitech G930 Wireless Headset (not shown)

1x Assassin's Creed III (free with vid card)

1x Shipping on the Case