Eric B

I'm planning on beefing up my family's Dell XPS 420 to be able to run modern games (Starcraft II, STALKER: Call of Pripyat, Tribes: Ascend, and whatever the Summer Steam Sale makes me impulse-buy, primarily). I know my RAM, OS, HDD, and especially my GPU need upgrades, but are there any more that are required for those upgrades to be effective? Here are my specs that I could gather:

Motherboard: Dell 0TP406

CPU: Intel Core 2 Quad Q660 @ 2400 MHz

RAM: 4 x 1024mb DDR2

GPU: ATI Radon HD 3650 256mb

HDD: Western Digital WD5000AAKS-75A7B0 (500GB)

PSU: Dell 375W, don't know specs for sure, standard with XPS 420 pre-built computers

OS: Windows Vista 32 bit

If you have any recommendations for modestly-priced upgrades as well, I welcome your input. Thanks in advance!

I know there's a way to transfer ALL data from one device to another via backup, but I want to know if you can just bring the data from selected apps to your new device, as opposed to every little bit of information.

My girlfriend and I are both fans of movies that have a huge twist that makes you completely rethink the entire movie, such as Fight Club. What other movies with that quality would you recommend? MPAA rating doesn't matter, as long as it's a good movie.

In the game, there are tons of artifacts that have effects on certain attributes to your character. These include "Bulletproof Cap", "Impact", "Chemical Burn", "Rupture", and I think four more. However, in the game, there is no explanation as to what these statistics mean. And spending half an hour searching for an answer didn't help either. Can anybody explain to me what each of these attributes means?

So I installed Firefox 4 to my computer a few days ago, and have been enjoying the new browser greatly. There's only one thing that bothers me: Whenever I hover my mouse over a link, or when a page is loading, this tiny white box with a URL, or a status of what the computer is doing, pops up, and then disappears once the page loads or I move the mouse off the link.

I've looked all around the menus, though I might have missed something, since I'm not totally used to them yet. Is there a way to turn this feature off?

So I have never played a Metal Gear Solid game in my life, and am interested in checking out the series. But after looking around the internet, there are a LOT of games in the franchise. Could anybody explain to me which games are absolutely essential to the story, and which order I should play them in?

I own a PS2, Wii (so Gamecube games are possible), and plan on getting a PS3 in the next couple of years. So don't be recommending the PSP titles.

So a few weeks ago, when reading about the new My Little Pony children's show and its gorgeous Flash-based animation, someone put up a video from a cartoon that simply brought a tear to my eye.

It was a French cartoon, with anime-style art and, if I remember correctly, a pirate theme. Just like MLP:FIM, it's animated entirely using Flash.

Can anybody give me a hand, and help me remember the name of this show?

So I've been going a bit crazy with my complex of underground caves lately, and have ended up with a large chest full of cobblestone blocks. In total, I have somewhere around four thousand of the darn things. And being the uncreative, lazy gamer I am, I have absolutely no idea what in the world I should do with them.

Are there any amazing ideas you guys have? I'm open to building pretty much anything, just not a basic castle. Those always turn out really lame.

So I installed the 32-bit Tortoise SVN program today on my computer, which is running Windows Vista 32-bit, I am positive about that. What I'm planning on using the program for is downloading addons for Garry's Mod, and I've heard it's the easiest, most convenient way to keep the addons up to date.

However, as every guide I've read has suggested, when I right-click the appropriate folder, expecting an option labeled "Tortoise SVN Checkout" to appear, there isn't one. I've seen some other people that had the same problem, they said it was fixed with a reboot: I've restarted my computer three times, and still nothing.

So is there something I should know about this program, something that might be causing it to fail on me? Sorry if this question is a bit vague, I'm relatively new to this.

So after months of inactivity in Garry's Mod on Steam, I've decided to try to get back into it, starting completely from scratch. That means starting over with addons, saved games, etc.

But I've noticed that "deleting local data" on Steam simply uninstalls the game, it doesn't delete all your data about the game. This is exactly what I want to do. Is there a special way to go about doing that? Should I just click on the Garry's Mod folder and hit "delete"?

I have a feeling this is all gonna end in a flame war all because of me, but I seriously can't choose between two games: Gears of War Trilogy (which contains Gears 1, 2 and 2's expansion pack) or Halo Reach for Xbox 360.

See, looking at my game shelf, I noticed a total lack of mindless shooters (minus MW2, but we don't speak of that game anymore). I'm not looking for the game that has the best story, the best characters, the best graphics or ANYTHING, I just want a game that's genuinely fun, online and off. I'm just looking for some dumb fun, a shooter that exists purely for the enjoyment of the player, not something like Mass Effect 2 (which I've been playing WAY too much of lately).

So I'm gonna ask the community here: Which do you think is more fun, Gears of War 1+2 or Halo Reach? Note that I've never played a Gears game, but I have played Halo 3, and greatly enjoyed it. Campaign was ehh, online ruled, but that's not the point. Don't be biased because of companies or anything, just tell me which you prefer, and explain why.

Preferably, explain what's better online and offline for either game. That'll help me narrow it all down even more.

So I'm having a massive problem with my PC's graphics card drivers.

I have a ATI Radeon 3600 HD card, and have recently attempted to update the drivers to get the Catalyst Control Center so I can play Borderlands. However, the installation failed, leaving me with no update and an error message that pops up every time I log into my computer, which says:

"WARNING: The Catalyst Control Center is not supported by the driver version of your enabled graphics adapter. Please update your ATI graphics enabler, or enable your ATI adapter using the Displays Manager."

What's the best way to fix this? Is the only way to completely uninstall all driver software, then install the newest ones? If so, please give a clear guide on how to do that, I'm not completely sure how to do things like that.

Thanks in advance,

Eric

So I'm having a bit of trouble with the horror that is Games for Windows Live.

Today, I decided to give the demo for Viva Pinata a try, since it's on sale today and have never tried it before. So I download and install the demo, but there's a problem.

I have no way to start the game. I go to my downloads list in the client, and there's only one option: Delete. There is no "Play" button, and I cannot figure out any other way to play it. I can't say if this also happens with other demos, as this is the first one I've tried to get to work.

Can anybody give a bit of assistance?

So since my computer is a little over two years old now (all standard parts, not custom built), I'm planning on upgrading a couple components. The one thing I'm most interested in upgrading is my graphics card, since I'm a huge gamer and my current one just barely cuts it.

Right now, I have an ATI Radeon HD 3600, and I want to know what the logical next step up would be. I'm looking for something that's at least good enough to run S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Clear Sky and Call of Pripyat at good graphics settings, so it doesn't look like absolute crap. As well, it can't run too high, I have about a $150 limit.

Does anybody have a suggestion for a good, low-price graphics card that meets my specifications?

So I bought Team Fortress 2 on PC yesterday, and have been loving the practice mode.

Anyway. Whenever I go onto the server list and try to join a match, it only pops up with one server per map. Like it'll say 2fort, with 60 other servers available. The one server they give me is absolutely full. Is there a way I can view the other available servers?

So I'm planning on buying a Turtle Beach gaming headset sometime this year. I'll be using it for Xbox 360 and PC gaming, not PS3. I've narrowed down my choices to two: the PX31, and the X11.

Can you guys make clear what the differences are between these two headsets, and maybe recommend which one is a better purchase?

So on my computer, I always use Mozilla Firefox as my browser. But whenever I click a link or something that opens in a new window (instead of tab), it opens in Internet Explorer. I don't like this at all.

I'm sure there's a way to make Firefox the default browser, can anybody fill me in on this?

So I'm interested in buying my first Final Fantasy game. I've never played one before, not counting Kingdom Hearts. Actually, I'm relatively new with RPGs, besides Mass Effect and Pokemon.

I'm mainly looking into either FFX on PS2, or once it comes out, FFXIII on the 360. If you have any other recommendations for either those consoles or DS, just tell me.

So my mom just got the Samsung Impression phone, and she's trying to save pictures for contacts. We've tried moving the contacts to the phone then saving the photo as a contact, but that didn't work. Does anybody have any other ideas for it?

So I have no idea what version of this I have. I know that's crucial, but just try to be general.

So I wanna record Damn Regret on my bass and guitar in Cubase LE. I figured the best way to do this would be to bring the song into the program so I could time it right, since i dont know the timing of everything perfectly. But it doesn't recognize the iTunes files, and I can't bring them in.

And obviously, I'm very, very new to the program. I've been using it for, oh, maybe twenty minutes, with no avail.