The Little CPU That Couldn't

This week marks the demise of the metal box under my table that I used to call my PC.....

Just a few days back, the graphics card failed to start, rendering the monitor pitch black. Efforts to bring the PC back to working condition were hampered by the fact that there were just too many parts failing. In the beginning it was the soundcard. It crashed my PC frequently, but it was something that I could live it. Okay, never mind, still can use right? Then came the USB horror. Wiped out a few flash drives before totally going down. Luckily the damage was minimal, so it's okay. Never mind, still got CD-drive. But now, even the graphics card has surrendered and that was the last straw. What was left for me to do? At best I can only hope that my data is still safe in the hard disk...

[skip the ranting in the following two paragraphs if you have used my pc before or if you're already tired to death listening to me complaint about my PC :D]

For the last 3 years or so that I had been using it, I've certainly done a lot of things with it. Those were the days when I would install ridiculously new computer games hoping that it might at least run on ULTRA-LOW settings with almost every single effect turned off while listening to McFly's Five Colours In Her Hair in the background. The games never made it past the intro screens, of course. Not to mention I've seen some of the most obscure computer errors in the world, so obscure that you'd befuddle even the most tech-savvy of people. "Your PC WHAT? I've never heard before such a thing!" Yea, tell me about it.....

Along the way, I've made good progress in my PC knowledge, no thanks to the barrage of problems and 'something-wrong's that I had to deal with every single day. From a PC-phobic little boy, I can now at least repair my teachers' computers at school and solve most of the common problems encountered in Windows XP. I've also reinstalled XP on my PC so many hundred times that at one point, I actually memorised the CD-key! I'm quite sure not many of you would have the tried doing three reformats of your pc in just one week...

[okay, you can stop skipping now :D]

So yea, the loss of my dear PC which has been with me through numerous thicks and thins is indeed a very heart-breaking tragedy. The upside though, is that I've finally managed to move on and I am now the proud owner of an Acer lappy! (laptop, in case you're wondering)

I installed this just to test my lappy's performance...And also play a bit la :D

Design-wise, it might not suit everyone's liking (especially since Justin said it was 'not nice') but hey, I like it, so that settles everything. This baby is also much more powerful than my old PC and packs a punch when it comes to doing heavy-duty stuff like video-editing and even high-end gaming! The lappy also couldn't have come at a better time as the PC's USB died exactly on the day that I brought the lappy back home. Maybe it's a case of jealousy :D

It's obvious though, that the laptop wasn't a free gift of sorts. The few thousand bucks that my dad had to fork out for it is covered in blood, sweat and tears. And a lot of Natural Petroleum Gas, if you know what I mean..I couldn't be more grateful and I only wished that I had at least worked to cover a portion of the costs instead of just taking it wholesale and not contributing anything. Sigh~

Tight budgets for the next few months aside, I hope I'd be able to use this lappy for at least the next 3 to 4 years and in that time it better prove its worthiness to me :D For now, it's Command and Conquers time! Oh, I mean study time!!