Jernlov

I kind of want to be an English Second Language teacher, either working here or abroad. I would have to improve my Japanese a lot and get over my fear of school, though. It's probably more than feasible in the long-term.

What is it with you kids and "hating the mainstream" when the music you listen to is mainstream?

There are still plenty of reasons to use XP over 7, at least for me - a lot of my Japanese-language applications have poor support for builds of Windows over 2600. This is, of course, not a problem with Windows 7 but a problem that stems from the atrocious state of software development in Japan. They have absolutely fantastic technology but they are very slow to adopt and adapt to new standards. If you've ever browsed .jp domains, you will still find a lot of sites with plain HTML code and .gif backgrounds. However, Japan is now rapidly gaining on the western world in terms of web and program development. I'm not really sure if you know what you're talking about. Laura has already said it - if it has always worked with XP, it should and most likely will always work with XP. I've never had any of my programs, not even the specialty ones, break due to an update. Nothing broke when I upgraded to SP3 either. Anyway, yes - if you decide to install XP again, I would be more than happy to give you some help with doing so if you need it.

Yes. I also drop a lot of my letters.

You could always try moving your router a little. If my router is moved ever so slightly from where I have it, it'll weaken my wireless signal and slow my connection speed to a crawl. It's amazing how much difference moving something around slightly can make.

Coaltar of the Deepers is another band I like. The inspiration for Plastic Tree's "Platform." http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pADYaKph7Uo http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fOBObMkwMvA&feature=related And finally this one, from their most "experimental" album, "NO THANK YOU": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Ifp61aoCtA&feature=related

Definitely going to recommend losing AVG and keeping Avira. I've just switched to Avira from Avast... what a huge difference. Everything feels faster.

Thanks guys. I just wanted to double-check before I started playing around with it and trying to cool it.

Recently, I came to notice that my 8800GTS has been reaching exceptionally high temperatures. When I first built this PC, it idled 65-70C. Now, it usually sits in the 75-80 range idle, but under load it can quite easily reach up to 100. I've not modified or overclocked the card in any way - it is stock. There does not seem to be an abnormal amount of dust in the fan from what I can see, but I'll unscrew the card and double-check later. Here are some screenshots from GPU-Z: Overview: Idling: Max temp after playing Portal for five minutes: My screen resolution is currently 1280*1024, 60Hz, and I was running Portal at the recommended settings (all textures set to high, 4x AA). I am aware that I am slightly behind on driver versions, but my Internet connection is not stable at the moment so I will upgrade those later. I have searched Google for optimum temperatures and some people are reporting idle temperatures of <60C. Are XFX cards known to run hot, or is mine really abnormal? I have nothing between the bottom of my case and the fan of the graphics card. I am not experiencing any lag or screen artifacts whatsoever; I'm just curious as to why it is running so hot when it doesn't seem to have anything blocking the airflow.

Number Girl. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CQ_zAuxaDRc http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TDoNX0lRL1g From post-hardcore to noise rock influenced by Japanese music. They changed their style a lot in five years, whilst still retaining the doom-laden, echoing sound of their earlier albums.

I'd say it is at the upper end of average. Mine is generally around 45ms to servers in GB. The highest I've ever seen it at when using local servers is 145ms. However, latency can depend on other factors; e.g., the load of the server you are playing on. The first thing I would do if I were to start lagging is change to a different server.

大塚愛 - Happy Days

The new Hidamari and Nodame.

Probably not hip-hop as much as folk music with rapping, but Asa is my favourite hip-hop artist. Also Nujabes, GZA/Genius, DJ Shadow, J Dilla and Madlib.

Ne'er mind.

The actual picture quality of the displays can't be faulted - whites look white, blacks look black, greys look grey - it's just annoying that I had 4 or 5 stuck pixels suddenly crop up across both screens in less than two weeks of use.