It's been close to three years since I built my last gaming PC, and though that computer still kicks ass at most games, it's starting to show its age with next-gen titles. I first knew it was time to start looking at a new computer when I installed and played Bioshock; a great game that forced me to turn down the graphical setting in order to get a decent frame rate. Next, was the Crysis demo which officially gave my computer a heart attack when I tried to run it at High settings and resolutions.

Figures. The weekend I go out of town, is the same weekend they decide to release a demo of one of my most anticipated games of the year, Crysis. So yesterday morning (Monday) I start to download the demo via BitTorrent. I tried downloading from several other HTTP servers, but their download time was going to take a while longer than BitTorrent. Still, the demo took about 3-4 hours to download.

UPDATE: If you are having issues with Media Center freezing while connecting to your Xbox 360 try this fix:

Alternatively, if you are having problems with your Xbox 360 crashing with an error, try to remove the Hard Drive from the 360. If this fixes the problem, then try it again with the hard drive attached. If you get an error again, then there may be an issue with your 360 hardware in which case you'll need to contact Microsoft to get the unit repaired/replaced.

You can read more about this issue here.

This weekend I had to go out and buy a new sound card for my gaming PC. So I spent $70 and bought a Sound Blaster Audigy 2 ZS.

More info on the card here >> Audigy 2 ZS

Ok, so it's not exactly a new PC. I built this PC a few months ago. This computer kicks ass, and should last me a couple of years before I have to upgrade again.

I bought all the parts from the horrible, HORRIBLE company TigerDirect (see why I hate them here). After their crappy service I finally got the PC put together and it has been running flawlessly ever since. Below are the basic specs: