New ways to play games online

Lately, I have been playing some of my older games with my friends online. The problem is that many older games have few online servers anymore, which makes it difficult to join a game with a friend. In turn, either I or a friend must host the game. The issue we encounter here is the fact that I do not have a public IP address any longer, and my friends do not know how to port forward, making it nearly impossible to host. My solution to this dilemma is to use a program called Hamachi. This application allows you to join a network with your friends and creates a virtual local network. Basically it is like having all the computers one one network all in the same room. No need to mess around with router settings and IP addresses. If you are looking to play some online games with friends or even do remote access, then you should have Hamachi.

Skype Beta drive me NUTS!

Along with Windows 7 came many new features and of course some sacrifices. One of the sacrifices I had to make to accommodate Windows 7 was a stable version of Skype. In case you are unaware of what Skype is, it is a voice-over-internet messenger system. Similar to MSN or Yahoo messengers, you set up an account and add people to your buddy list. Unlike MSN or Yahoo, Skype is geared toward voice conversations as it primary function, although it does have a fully functional text based message system just like any other messenger.
My problem with Skype beta is the fact the interface is so ridiculous. In the older versions of Skype, phone number based contacts appeared in gray and Skype buddies were in green. Now both are in green, and even though they use different symbols, they can be difficult to differentiate between from a quick glance. Another tweak to the interface they made was a tweak to the messenger window system. Instead of each chat with seperate people or group being it own window, all the conversations are contained within the Skype main program window. All this makes the interface seem cluttered, as it presents you with everything in one window.
Other than the interface changes, the Skype beta still performs the same as the other non-beta clients, so no complaints from me there.

Google Chrome does not work with Windows 7... yet

It been a little over a month since I have begun using Windows 7 beta. Since the beginning I have found little wrong with it and that remains true to this day. In attempt to break Windows 7, or rather find something that does not work, I decided that I would attempt to install Google Chrome. I was promptly greeted by a message stating simply that the program I was about to install had known compatibility issues. Despite the warning, I forged on ahead with the install. Unsurprisingly, Chrome failed to load correctly and did not run properly. So for now Chrome fans out there will have to live with another browser when running Windows 7. I would certainly imagine that Google will fix Chrome as soon as Microsoft puts a release date on Windows 7, or possibly earlier.

Another benefit of Gmail

Everyone should have a Gmail account. Gmail is by far the best mail service available. Not only do you get about 8 gigabytes of storage for your inbox, you get services that most other mail services might charge for. You can download you gmail into a mail client such as Outlook or Thunderbird. Additionally with thunderbird you can get extensions that synchronize contacts and calendars to and from gmail. This is really handy, especially if you are an iPhone user because you can make appointments on your calendar and they are right there on your iPhone. And if your computer explodes, you will not lose all your contacts information or calendars. Gmail is not full of stupid ads when you visit the web mail site either. Its spam filters are also one of the best. And for those of you technical users out there like myself, gmail also supports IMAP. So if your are not using gmail, you need to get yourself an account right now. www.gmail.com

So much for bookmark backup

Foxmarks is one of my favorite extensions for Firefox. But to my dismay, it appears to have failed me. Normally it backs up your bookmarks or favorites from Firefox to a server, for synchronization to other computers or purely for backup purposes. This time though it the case would seem to be that my bookmarks have disappeared. Fortunately, I may have a copy of my bookmarks elsewhere, in case I decide that they are really that important to me.

Synergy Mod Updated

If you happen to have the Synergy mod which I mentioned in an earlier post, the mod team has released a new version which is required to play. You will encounter an error when you run the old version. After a bit of Googling I discovered that the issue was related to the version being out-dated. http://synergymod.net/

The 3870 Radeon is Awesome!

After using the Radeon 3870 for about two weeks now, I am ready to call it stable. Not once have I experienced any hiccups in performance. The card has been running Folding@Home gpu when I am not playing games, and has completed about 8 work units flawlessly. I love getting new hardware, but I love when it actually works right the first time.

Trying something different

Starting with this post, I will try to make adding content to my blog a daily ritual. This will most likely mean smaller tidbits, but hopefully not any less informative. Undoubtedly some days will just be crap, when in my world nothing of any consequence happened that I should report about. None the less I will try to keep the boring junk to a small margin. Thanks for reading my blog.

Vmex Source map decompiler

I have fun using Valve's Hammer map editing tool. But sometimes I am at a loss when it comes to how to make the level more interactive. That's where the vmex map decompiler comes in handy. I can find an example in an already compiled map, decompile it, and copy the parts I need. This is really useful if you want to create Portal maps, but don't want to screw around making super complex doors, ball launcher/catcher systems, or super-colliding-super-buttons. Here's a link to the Valve software wiki page.

Synergy Mod for Source games

Last night I downloaded a mod for Half Life 2 called synergy. Basically what it does is it allows you to play Half Life 2, HL2 episode 1, and HL2 Episode 2 cooperatively online with friends. Why blast zombies by yourself when you can have twice as much firepower with a friend? It is also supposed to be able to play other Half Life 2 mods across the internet as well, but I haven't tried this yet. It runs on Steam and you need to have HL2 or other Source engine games to play it. So, if you have Half Life 2 and this sounds like fun to you, go to http://synergymod.net/ and download right away.

Out with the proprietary, in with the open-source

As you may or may not be aware, many Internet service providers are now imposing monthly bandwidth caps on their customers. Comcast is probably the company responsible for starting this practice on a large scale, and many other ISPs followed suit. You would be hard-pressed to find an ISP that does not do this now. Sadly, my ISP is doing this too. Even worse, my ISP is a small town local business and they have to pay someone else for the utilities, thus their cost of operation is higher, meaning my bandwidth is capped at 15 gigabytes a month. After being billed for approximately 17 gigabytes over the limit last month, I have decided that keeping an eye on my own bandwith would be a great idea.
I headed over to dd-wrt.com to grab myself some a copy of the latest open-source router firmware. Instead of going with the feature-limited proprietary Linksys firmware, which comes with the router, I flashed the dd-wrt firmware onto my Asus WGL-520GU wireless router. Trying to figure out which version I needed was no so easy, but no the less I was able to obtain the correct firmware. Flashing the firmware requires the Asus firmware restore utility, and under Windows 7 or Vista needs to be run as administrator with the firewall disabled.
After flashing the firmware, changing the settings was a simple matter of copy and past from my old router. The dd-wrt firmware has the bandwidth monitoring feature, which was really all that I was after. The feature gives you graphs to show you how much bandwidth you've used in the month and on what days.
If you are like me and you are tired of dealing with limited router firmware, download a version of dd-wrt and try it out because it is free. Before attempting this however, you should read the instructions and be aware that a screw-up can brick your router.

New graphics card... for FREE

One of my first posts on this blog was about upgrades. I stated at that time that I would probably never upgrade my current computer. Well that turned out to be totally not true, as thus far I have added a new hard drive, a USB PCI add-in card, case lights, a new power supply, and now a new graphics card. Or to be more precise an old graphics card, which a friend had swapped out for a newer part. In the summer of 2008 we got together and assembled a nice gaming computer with a Radeon 3870 graphics card and an Intel Q6600 quad core. Unfortunatley for him the machine was plagued with problems from the start. The first suspect that was eliminated was the graphics card, which we suspected to be faulty, due to frequent BSODs, even with updated drivers. He replaced the card with a newer 4850 Radeon. The computer still doesn't work but that will be another blog post.
I requested the card from him, and without hesitation he mailed it to me. In about a week the card appeared on my doorstep, in tact and nicely nestled in packing peanuts. The install went smoothly on both Windows 7 and Windows XP. The hardware install even forced me to clean up some wiring in my case, as it seems somewhat neater now. The pre-release drivers for Windows 7 work great even with my older games. The card has passed several 6 hours GPU Folding at home session without pause. No BSOD, no crashes. As well as Folding at home, the card has also performed smoothly through several run-thoughs of Source SDK stress test. At 1680x1050 resolution with all options maxed, the 3870 gave a result of 51 frames per second average.
I would not have normally purchased a video card upgrade, but when its free, I can't argue with upgrades.

Snackr RSS reader makes a sweet treat

I love to use RSS feeds to keep tabs on the latest posts form my favorite sites. For those who don't know what RSS is, RSS stands for Real Simple Syndication. It's its the little orange symbol that appears in the corner of your address bar. When you subscribe to an RSS feed with a reader, the feeds automatically update when new articles are posted on that website. For example, if I create a new post on this blog, your RSS reader will update and show your a short version of the post and then you click to see the whole thing. The advantage of using RSS is that you can have all the new articles for your favorite websites all in one place.
Anyways, Snackr is a reader that resides on your desktop and acts like a stock market ticker and scrolls little bits of each article across the bar. Unlike Windows Vista's built in RSS gadget, Snackr runs on its own. It is built on the Adobe AIR platform, which you must install to use Snackr. Snackr is best of all simple to use and can be placed on any edge of your screen. It also runs on Macintosh.
Get it for yourself. Its free.