Saturday, May 14, 2011

My Summer Arsenal

Ah, I have to say, it's nice to be able to relax after such a strenuous year of college! The weather's getting nicer, and I'm sure a lot of you are nearing the end of your school years, if you're not already out! Extra time means extra simming! :D

So how am I tackling the large amounts of TS3 I'm planning on partaking in over the next few months? With my awesome ARMORY OF TECHNOLIGICALNESS!!!


On the left is my Dell, fulfilling the duties of TS3 Forum, blogging, and Photoshop computer. Its high screen dimensions are perfect for working on edited piccies and staring at all of your pretteh little avatars!

On the right, my dearest MacBook Pro, running The Sims 3 through Bootcamp on its Windows side. I've been really impressed with how well the game runs on it, and how nicely its graphics card has been performing. I actually have the game installed on both computers, but the poor old Dell can't quite handle TS3 and the game lags quite a bit.

With this setup for the summer, I'm able to simultaneously sim, blog, 'shop, and talk to all of those wonderful people on the TS3 Forum! *Psssssttttt, That's you!!* It's truly a simmer's dream come true. :D

You guys can expect a bagful (<-- WTF?) of updates coming up within the near to immediate future! For the first time, I'm actually backed up with blog posties! They're all anxious and waiting in line.

So I want to know from you guys now: How do you sim? What kind of computers do you use? Do you play your game while intermittently checking the forum? Leave a comment and let me know! (You don't have to have a blogger account to post one.)

19 comments:

  1. I'm lucky enough to have a pretty good desktop and dual monitors so it's easy to play and chat or whatever my multitasking involves :). That sounds like and awesome setup :D

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  2. I use a gateway laptop. I'm pretty sure I'm slamming the graphics card on the ground and jumping up and down on it when I play Sims 3 on high settings....but whatever! when it breaks I'll have an excuse to build a delicious desktop, with some form of lights or maybe fish in the tower hehe.

    I normally have one firefox window up with multiple tabs open, one chrome window up with multiple tabs open, my game and whatever movies/tv shows I'm watching on VLC media player. I just tab between all of them :D

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  3. I have an ASUS laptop from 2008. I dropped it last week -- on concrete, but it's pretty much indestructible. And runs like a dream.

    I check the forums and ACE while TS3 or some other game is loading / whenever I feel like it.

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  4. Awsome!

    I use my dell coputer. I got it for meh b-day quite some time ago. the game lags horribly when I put the graphics too high, so my graphics are always on low and it bothers me. e.e

    When I play TS3 its teh only window open mwhaha yes yesy yes, 'cause I don't like to be bothered when I sim xD

    I check onto forums pretty much everyday with googlechrome. It's faster and deleting history is just so easy xD

    -Silver :)

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  5. I play a bit, minimise and check the forums, play etc ;D My lappy is a dell :P

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  6. my laptop is a gateway what is getting old im killing it with all this CC and crap : ] and I always play sims minamize and check the fourms i normaly keep them open in tabs

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  7. @JK: Ooohh, so fancy! Our setups are very similar, that's so rad!

    @PK: A fish in the tower??? That would be the coolest. Thing. Evar! You'd absolutely have to post piccies, I would just die from the amount of AWESOME. Sounds like you're quite the multitasker! An ADD simmer, hehehehe :D

    @Choux: Whew, I'm so glad your compeh was alright! You were probably as terrified in that moment as I was when I spilled water on my MBP. It was awful! D: But both our laptops are stone cold warriors. >:P

    @Archivist: As are YOU, madam! I'm sorry you were hit with the banhammer :( It's happened to me twice, it's not fun. Especially without reason :/

    @Silvie: Ah, a focused simmer, I see! Totally understandable. Sometimes I get quite "in the zone" myself! :)

    @melodic: That's totally the way I did it during the school year when my MBP was flyin' solo. ;)

    @Puggy: CC shalt be the death of a lot of us, methinks. Hahaha :P

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  8. Oh! another thing I totally forgot to mention in the actual post: See that white thingamajigger underneath my MBP? It's a Belkin Cooling pad, it's pretty much a base with a fan in it that plugs into a USB port. It keeps it nice and cool while I'm gaming, I suggest that you laptop users get one! It was like 20 bucks, and it makes the game run better and keeps your computer healthy!

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  9. Already have one ;D

    I'm a geek.

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  10. I thought that was a plate XD
    Totally need to get one :P My laptop gets real hot real quick O_o

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  11. I am IN LOVE with your new blog banner

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  12. @Choux: Geeks unite!!! *Fist pump*

    @melodic: Hahaha, you must have thought I was such a weirdo! And I think you should definitely get one, you wouldn't want to ruin your comp! O.O

    @Puggy: Awwh, thank you!!! :D

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  13. Rexy that setup is SCCHWWWWEEEET xD I'm such a minority - I don't play on a laptop (my laptop is 14" little dino several years old with a 1.6ghz Celeron processor and 1G of ram...not much simming there! Though I put TS1 on it o_O). I only have one monitor (a dual setup would be so cool) and like PK I switch around tabs alot, so I usually have Photoshop, Firefox, and at least one game open, or if I'm not gaming it'll be Netflix or Word. When I'm simming, I usually have Firefox open and sometimes a chat or at least Photoshop. I rarely have ONE thing open at a time lol.

    We upgraded our home-built computer last year (i'll probably only go with custom systems in the future - building is too fun); I wanted to go with an X58 (1366 socket) motherboard to handle future processors, so I was able to get one that also has a Sata 6gb/s port and a USB 3.0 (haven't used yet), and added an i7 930 (still not overclocked), a Corsair H50 cooler, 6 gigs 1600 ram (the ram we have in on SALE now and I wanna pick up 3 more sticks to upgrade to 12 gigs), and a GeForce GTX460 Cyclone that we had to buy after our 8800GTS blew up (I believe b/c of the fps issue in Sims 2). I'm kiiiiinda itching to get a new card since the 5 series is out now...but there will be something newer than that soon so I'll wait patiently (HARD). My case is the same case we've had for 4 years, an Antec 900, and I have all 5 fans operating (the one on the back is in a push/pull with the Corsair H50 - the temps on full load rarely ever exceed 50, 52 degrees or so, so the fans & cooler really help cuz all that shiz gets HOT).

    If I ever set up an SLI config and have 2 graphics cards running, I'll look into a watercooling setup (I dun know JACK about custom watercooling, but it looks like such a COOL & geeky hobby), and eventually I want to either buy all new parts to build a 2nd system or transfer over all these current parts to a 2nd system as we upgrade this main pc. *adjusts pocket protectors & nerd glasses*

    My monitor is a Dell though lol but I reeeeally want a new one (size isn't too bad, 20" at 1680x1050 res, but something a little larger might be interesting, larger & a lil faster)...and a new case - the antec 900 Two has front air filters AND wire management, and the inside is painted all black ^_^ Oh yeah, and I added a blue cold cathode tube inside the case so it glows more 'bluey' lol. The front fans of the case glow blue anyway, but the cathode makes it look way cooler. I love my baby Azu *sniff*

    *Geeky computer rant over*

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  14. I'm uber jealous of your awesome laptopeh-ness! I have this crappy asus netbook! my game used to lag horribly and the graphics were terrible. and now, my game won't even open at all! I'm so mad because I have a modeling assignment due tomorrow and I haven't even started yet because my game is unplayable! D: I REALLY want to get a new laptop, any suggestions? (I'm not really looking to get a mac or a super duper high priced laptop, just one that will run my game with good graphics and no lag :D )

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  15. @Cel: Well madam, I definitely understand now why your graphics are so delicious! I always marveled at them, and now I know that it's because you're a gaming computer guru! I'm SO incredibly jealous of your graphics card, it's simply to die for! It kicks mine right in its little graphics butt!
    The one unique feature my MacBook Pro does have is the ability to swap between two separate graphics cards based on what I'm doing. For normal junk, it has a built-in Intel HD graphics card, nothing to cheer about. If I'm doing more strenuous things with it (i.e., simming), it switches itself over to an NVIDIA GeForce GT 330M. It's a very mid-range graphics card, nothing fancy, but twice as good as the one on my Dell. It gets the job done, but it's still not near yours! I'm hoping to get something like that one day (when I'm not a broke college student). Hehehe ;)

    @twilight: Awwh, that's such a shame! I'm so sorry :( I'd love to help you out by suggesting a computer, but I'm really a Mac person and I don't know a ton about PCs! I'm sure if you just shop around a bit, you can find something more than suitable. :)

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  16. I use an Acer laptop for EVERYTHING.
    It's my baby Gary, and he's got broken keys and keys that were colored with marker. I don't really know if I could manage two computers at once. I used to- but it was just for twso different locations.

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  17. @Rexy -> I wish I was a gaming guru >.< that would be sweeeeeet lol I'm just a dork that knows a couple of things about a couple of parts. Building our system 3 years ago taught me a LOT, a whollllllle lot - I pretty much knew what ram was and what a hard drive was and not too much else lol. But I learned a crapload in doing all the research for finding the right components to put together. And with last year's upgrade I finally learned more about motherboards (the first time around we just picked whatever was the cheapest in the store....) and a lil more in depth about how everything runs together as a whole and ESPECIALLY about cooling (even down to the thermal paste - didn't know jack about the importance of it before). Now I'm more anal about hardware and itching to do more upgrades in the future.

    I fell in LOVELUST with this graphics card. We seriously think TS2 had a big role in burning up the 8800GTS - it had been a GREAT card and one day it just konked out, no warning whatsoever. I started reading about the fps problems with TS2 and how not using an fps limiter could ruin your card...not saying that was definitely the thing that did it but I wouldn't be a bit surprised if TS2 had a hand in it :( So we were going to buy a new graphics card anyway, but not so soon. PITA scraping up the money so quickly (i was 2 weeks without a computer, besides my crappy lappy, and in total hell lol) but it was definitely worth it. The Cyclone version keeps the temps down quite a bit and it's reeeeally quiet.

    Lolz you can have my lappy and I'll take your Dell if ya want xD I can't complain too much...my stepfather won the thing in a contest at work (what's that been...4 years ago? ish?) and he barely knows how to turn a computer ON much less DO anything besides watch dvds! He finally gave it to me a couple of years ago after a wee bit o'beggin, and it's been a lifesaver for some stuff but it's SO underpowered and sloowwwwwwww...a sloth would fall asleep waiting on the thing to load. What I really want is a KICKazz laptop, something just as powerful as my pc so that I can do stuff away from the desk. Still too broke & poor myself to get one anytime soon, but I can dream! ^_^

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  18. I've got my MSI AE2220, my trusty companion in all that I do (mostly). I have my game running and a few tabs up in Internet Explorer. All tabs are Sim related, though ^_^

    But meh stupid game lags coz I filled up my C drive, bleh D:<

    Love Shay (damnit, I ain't anonymous no moar!)

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