The Never Ending Spotify Playlist

You are invited to contribute to what could easily become the biggest ever Spotify playlist!

Today I had an idea, wouldn’t it be great if the whole world could contribute to a playlist on Spotify, that everyone could listen to?

So I had a little look into how Spotify could help, and funnily enough, Spotify already has a Collaborative Playlist feature, whereby you may create a playlist and share it with a friend via email (or however you like) and that friend can add to it, with the changes reflected on both computers simultaneously.  Excellent!

So if you would like to get on board and contribute to what could very well become the largest Spotify Playlist ever, then here is the link.

You can also join The Never Ending Spotify Playlist Facebook Group too!

Rules

Now there has to be some basic rules with this kind of thing, so here they are:

1. Only add songs that are NOT already in the playlist

2. Do NOT delete any songs that are already in the playlist, as this will effect other listeners’ playlists too

3. Try to be original, but don’t add anything that will obviously annoy or upset other listeners

4. Add songs that you genuinely think others will enjoy.

That’s it, nice and simple!

Technorati Tags: Spotify,Playlist,Collaborative,Facebook,Group,Rules,songs
Windows Live Tags: Spotify,Playlist,Collaborative,Facebook,Group,Rules,songs

OZL#ONE LAN Party – 3 months to go!

St Austell’s new resident LAN Party organiser, SanOzzelLAN is due to open the doors to it’s first LAN Party in July and I can’t wait!

It’s no secret that I am SanOzzelLAN’s Team Leader, and that I am also sponsoring OZL#ONE, a 24 hour PC gaming event through DieselTekk and am offering a couple of prizes, my Optimise I.T. service and a Free PC Clean & Tidy as prizes for a couple of the events.

However, what is not so well known as that we [myself and my co-founder, Tez] are working really hard to make OZL#ONE the local show-stopper we have longed for in St Austell for so long.

Tickets are on sale now, at just £21 per gamer, and with discounts from our sponsor Tengo! on food purchases throughout the duration of the event, cheap taxi fair’s to and from the venue from Gary’s Taxi’s and a couple of tickets to White River Cinema up for grabs as well as the [likely] BBQ you are getting great value for your money!

We are also working on a bunch of other, big-name, sponsors for the event, such as ThermalTake, Razer, AMD/ATI, Nvidia, Corsair and Crucial so the potential for great prizes is pretty darn good.

Additionally, if you find yourself in need of any new games for the event, Gameseek.co.uk, SanOzzelLAN.co.uk’s chief affiliate offer great prices and offer SanOzzelLAN a 4% commission on your every purchase, which all helps towards building a better event!

We have a bunch of mini-games planned to, more information will be provided on these in our growing forum, where you too can become part of an enthusiastic community, where like-minded folk will welcome you with open arms!

So what are you waiting for?  Get on over to SanOzzelLAN.co.uk!

By the way, just one more thing before I wrap this one up… if you are a steadfast supporter of DieselTekk, even if you cannot get to OZL#ONE, please join up to the SanOzzelLAN forum anyway, because your membership will help us grow, and your contribution will always be welcomed.

Please share this article with your favourite social bookmarking sites,some links for which are provided below…tweets are welcome too!

Transferring Files Over WiFi

In a previous article I describe how you could use Microsoft SyncToy 2.0 to backup and transfer your files to an external hard disk drive.

I use the same method to backup and synchronise files between my Acer Aspire One netbook and my gaming PC.

My iTunes Library and Music is synchronised so that both machines show the same play count, song ratings and playlists etc.

I synchronise my Outlook PST file also, which keeps contacts and appointments, as well as emails on both machines the same.

Certain other files and folders are kept the same so that items such as my past weblog post’s, created in Windows Live Writer are always available for reference or editing.

Any files I download on my Aspire One are backed up to my gaming PC’s Downloads folder, using the Contribute option in MS SyncToy, which means that my netbook's Downloads folder doesn’t get filled with everything from the gaming PC’s folder.

All in all it’s a pretty sweet deal.

However, sometimes things go wrong, as they did for me just the other day, but the trouble started in iTunes

I was sitting at my gaming PC, going through the contents of my iTunes library and making a few changes – things like artist names and filling in missing album artist information, nothing too taxing.  After I had finished I figured I ought to re-sync my iTunes library with my Aspire One so that the updated information would be the same on my netbook, and therefore my iPod too (which I have coupled up with my netbook only).

Upon doing so I realised that there were some 1722 tracks that required transferring from the gaming PC to the netbook, and given the distance between the netbook and the PC, and that they’re both on the network wirelessly the total time to transfer all the files was going to take upwards of 16 hours(!) which is a very long time to say the least.

So I had a little think and decided to use an external USB hard disk drive to copy the library from my PC and then transfer those files to my netbook, which I did.

However, for some unknown reason, after doing this there were still over 1000 operations that needed to be completed by SyncToy to bring everything up to date.

In the end I connected both my netbook and the PC to my network hub and synchronised the two that way, a process that took less than an hour.

What I have taken away from this experience is simple; the very next time I decide to update my iTunes library information, I shall have my netbook close at hand and synchronise the two every few minutes!

Do you have a similar experience you would like to share, or maybe you have another solution, such as alternative to Microsoft SyncToy,for transferring files between computers?  Leave you comments below!

Competition – Win 1000+ EntreCard Credits!

Lately I haven’t been spending the EC (Credits) I earn through EntreCard.  I don’t know why really, I guess I just haven’t really had the time.  Also, DieselTekk has in the last month or so really be taking off on the back of articles alone.

Anyhow, because I haven’t been spending any EC I have a fair amount in the bank.  So, I am giving away at least 1000 EntreCard Credits at the end of next month (February) in a little competition that is easy to enter.

To participate all I want from you is an article on your blog about DieselTekk.  The article that I determine to be the best will win at the very least 1000 EC!

The article can be about any single aspect of DieselTekk, or about the site as a whole.  It must include a backlink to both the homepage [http://dieseltekk.co.uk] and an article of your choosing, except this one.  Extra preference will be given to articles that refer to other places I inhabit online, such as Twitter, BlogCatalog, Digg, StumbleUpon etc. [Find More Here]

Once you have an article up on your blog, leave a comment below this article, giving a link to both you blog homepage and the article itself and I will follow it, read it, save it and at the end February I will tally it up against any other articles.

The winner will be announced in a new article here on DieselTekk, with the top 4 runners up all getting a little link love too.  It’s a win/win situation.

So, get to it, give DieselTekk some kudos and you may win 1000 of my EC to spend as you like!

Now, don’t forget to spread this competition far and wide across the net, Digg, Stumble, Tweet, Furl, or whatever, it all helps!

Competition Coming Soon!

In the next day or two I will be announcing a new competition here on DieselTekk where you could win 1000 EntreCard Credits.

The rules of entry will be simple, and the competition will run until the end of February.

It seems I have built up a small backlog of EC credits, and I want to pass these on to you.

Keep your eyes peeled, the competition will start soon!

In the meantime feel free to make this notice public, use the icon’s below to Tweet, Digg, Stumble and so forth.  You are also encouraged to make use of the comments to discuss this article… it’s free, easy and takes just a minute or two!

Why the new look?

For a long time now I have been looking for a good way to incorporate a third column into the design of DieselTekk, and today I found it.

This new layout allows me to include more essential information such as links to recent articles, the RSS subscriptions link, blog archives etc above the fold.

What this means is that you, as the reader, have to spend less time looking for the information you want because it is all their in front of you, and you no longer need to scroll down looking for the link you want.

I have also removed a couple of bits and pieces, such as the Amazon ad box (I was gaining no income from this, and it was taking up a great deal of space).

Also, the new colour scheme is here because I found the old green to be irritating after a while.  This  new chocolate and mint scheme feels much easier on my eyes!

Please Note:  You will likely notice on any articles from before today, part of the background is green.  i am really sorry about that, but at the moment I just cannot work out how to rectify them with re-posting each and every image!

If you want to comment on the new look, please feel free in the comments box below.

Half-Life for less than a dollar!

You can now download Half-Life, the game that started it all, for less than $1 from Steam, until 8pm TONIGHT (GMT).

This is to celebrate the 10th anniversary, Valve have released Half-Life upon he masses at the hugely reduced cost of just 98 cents, to us Brits, with the inclusion of VAT at the current exchange rate, that is just 79p!  I downloaded mine last night, as I don’t own it yet, and am now installing it upon my Acer Aspire ONE netbook.

You will need Steam to be able to play, so download Steam here and take a look at the offer, while it lasts, here.

Competition

This is the first Diesel-Tekk competition, and I'm hoping to make it at least semi-regular.

What To Win

1st Prize:  The main prize is a brand new, sealed copy of Enemy Territory: Quake Wars for the PC by id Software and Splash Damage.

ET:QW is a online multiplayer, first person shooter game set in the Quake universe, in which you, as the player get to pick up a weapon as either the GDF [Earth's Global Defence Force] or as the Strogg, a mish-mash of genetics and robotics.

I play this game often, and really enjoy it, along with several of the guys at work and some of the KernowLAN players, all in all its great fun.

I will also promote you blog as described below for 2nd Place.

Runners up prizes will be as follows

2nd Place: I will promote your blog 10 times, as well as advertise a 125x125 badge at the top-left hands side of this page for one week.

3rd Prize:  I will promote your blog 5 times, and blogroll you for one week

4th Prize:   I will blog roll you for one week.

[Promotions will be across various sites, directories and so forth - of my choice, not necessarily on this blog]

How To Win?

Promote Diesel-Tekk, or one of it's articles!

That's it, just promote Diesel-Tekk, or one of it's articles as much as possible over the next month sending me links to the relevant pages every time, along with your username for each site.

You can Stumble, Digg, Blogroll, follow, link, review, twitter - anything, so long as Diesel-Tekk is cast in a good light.

Email you entries to diesel@dieseltekk.co.uk!

Who Will Win?

The person that promotes Diesel-Tekk the most, (providing me with links and usernames) over the next month will win.

When Does The Competition End?

The competition shall end at 1 minute to midnight (23:59 GMT+0) on 18th December 2008.

Prize winners shall be announced no later than one week later and the main prize shall be sent out during the first two weeks of January 2009, with runners up prizes coming in to effect during that period also.

Who Can Take Part?

This competition is open to everyone and anyone, however the main prize is open to UK mainland residents only, if you live outside of the UK I will not be able to send you the main prize.  Sorry!

Please Note

The required Minimum System Requirements for the game is as follows:

• 128MB Nvidia GeForce 5700 or ATi 9700

• Microsoft Windows XP/Vista

• DirectX 9

• Intel Pentium 4 2.8GHz or AMD Athlon XP 2800+ CPU (3.0GHz for Vista)

• 512MB RAM (768 for Vista)

• 5GB free hard disk space

• Broadband internet connection

• DVDrom drive

Introducing Poppy Louise, Our New Baby Girl

Baby Poppy Louise was born this morning, the latest addition to our growing family.  You can read about her, and see photo's on my other blog, "our5kids".

She is well, as is Mummy, and I cannot wait for them to come home from the hospital at around lunch time today.

New Web Address - DieselTekk.co.uk

Since this blog has been going from strength to strength since it launched just 3 months ago, I decided over the weekend that it was about time it had it's own, proper domain name.

You can now access this site by typing www.DieselTekk.co.uk into your browser. Don't worry, you don't need to update your bookmarks, and everything will continue to work as it has been since the beginning for the time being.

Also, should you need to contact me, should you wish to submit an article form to post or if you have some comments or suggestions that you want to send direct to me, you can fire off an email to diesel@dieseltekk.co.uk.

Do you like the address? Would you have chosen something else for this blog? Leave your thoughts below.

Google is 10 Today!

Happy Birthday Google!


Today is Google's 10th birthday. Launched in summer 2008, and the 'doodle' tradition, whereby a special graphic is displayed on the Google homepage to signify a special day or event. such as Christmas or the Olympic Games, began in Summer 1999 with a doodle to signify the day Larry and Sergy put a stick figure behind the Google logo to let the world know that they were out of the office at the Burning Man festival.

Get more info at The Official Google Blog.
You can also take a look at the Google timeline, from the very start right up until today!

Girls Can't Play Games – Tarí Táralóm

Rosanna aka Tarí Táralóm,a 19 year old girl gamer form Falmouth and university student who plays around 10 hours or so a week of Counter Strike: Source and Age Of Empires II, a couple of the most recognisable games of the previous generation.

Old school games like these won't go away any time soon, with CS:S still running across thousands of servers worldwide everyday it remains a staple of the gamers diet. AoE on the other hand is a college favourite, with which you can easily create small multiplayer games across a network that last for hours and test's the players strategic intelligence to the limits.

Growing up with her brother she was subjected to gaming all the time, now she can hold her own against the guys at LANparties in some of the most intense first person shooters going, such as Call Of Duty 4, CS:S and Unreal Tournament.

In this article, Rosanna talks about her experience of the KernowLAN#6 LANparty held a couple of weeks ago, a 24 hour gaming event in Cornwall hosted and organised by KernowLAN Gaming Networks.

“Being female and enjoying gaming so much as I do doesn’t fit the stereotype, but there are a lot of us out there who love gaming just as much as the boys!

It was really good to see new people at KernowLAN#6.

I knew everyone that came in the beginning (K-LAN#1) but now it’s starting to get more interesting, meeting more friends and having a wider range of competitors!

Hopefully KernowLAN will continue for a long time yet, it’s difficult to find a good LANparty without travelling a long way from Cornwall; so KernowLAN is a great opportunity for gamers in the area.

I liked that fact that people were helping others with hardware (thanks John for the RAM!) and allowing others to borrow their computers when not in use.

It’s relaxing to know that even though you may not have the best computer, you will still be able to play the games and join in the fun.

K-LAN#6 was a success and I can’t wait for the next one!”

Ros is a little surprise at KernowLAN events. She sits quietly, pretty much keeping to her self with a knowing smile playing across her face, but when the games start you should remember to keep yourself well away, because if she gets close you know it's time to respawn and try again.

Thanks for your views on KernowLAN Ros, I look forward to fragging you soon.

Did you enjoy this article? Have something to say?

Let me know in the comments below!

Interview With A Gamer – Tom Pedder

Tom Pedder, aka “It's Me” and “Yourself” attended KernowLAN#6, and came through with an excellently PC house in the immense ThermalTake Shark case, a real beast of a case that looks aggressive as hell.

Inside was house the following:

An Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 2.4GHz G0 Stepping CPU, seated on a beautiful ASUS Striker Extreme motherboard next to 4GB of Kingston HyperX DDR2 RAM. His graphics power was brought forth from an ASUS 8800GTS, sporting 512MB GDDR3 memory and powered by an Arctic Power 700W PSU. With his Samsung Spinpoint F1 hard disk drive providing 1TB of super fast storage you can see that this PC could kick some pretty fat ass when gaming.

Finally his games were viewed on a big LG W2252TQ 22" TFT.

When someone brings a rig like this to KernowLAN it makes people who know what they're looking at sit up and take notice, which I did. My own PC maybe pretty high spec, and bloody tidy, but Tom's PC put mine to shame.

But did his skills end with picking some good hardware?

Coming 2^nd place in each of the three prize winning tournaments maybe of slight disappointment for Tom, but it proves that while he may not have been the best gamer, he was definitely gamer of the night!

I wanted to ask Tom some questions,

Age:

19

Occupation:

Junior CAD Technician

Home town:

St Austell

Favourite Movie:

Any good Jim Carey movie… Ace Ventura I think.

Favourite Music Band:

Rage Against The Machine

Hobbies/Interests:

Gaming, Rollerblading, mountain biking, Body Boarding

Tom, what is with your gamer tags? (It's Me/Yourself)

The gamer tag “Its Me” was just me being a bit random, no one else that I know of has it as a gamer tag so I thought to myself why not. The gamer tag “Yourself” was originally thought up by me in college when playing a game of Unreal Tournament 2004, I thought it would be hilarious if when I fragged or got fragged the text on screen read “you killed Yourself” and its stuck ever since!

How did you choose the spec for your rig, and did you make any upgrades specifically with KernowLAN in mind?

I made sure that each of the components worked well within itself, so for instance I wouldn’t be running ddr2 ram that could outperform the board it was on (which would mean I wouldn’t be getting the full potential) and generally went for a high end pc. I didn’t bother with SLI as the money spent on this would not be matched by the added performance.

I didn’t update in anyway for KernowLAN although for #7 I am hoping to install water cooling, I will also have two of the Samsung F1 Spinpoints in RAID 0 and maybe a new graphics card.

Have you overclocked you PC in any way?

Not as yet. I’m waiting until I have water-cooling installed.

How much time do you spend playing games on your PC each week and which is your current favourite game?

I would say about 5 hours on average as sometimes I only get to sit down over the weekend. My favourite game right now (thanks to KernowLAN) would have to be Call Of Duty 4, which until last Monday (the K-LAN event) I had never played before! (I came 2^nd in the tournament too).

What upgrade path are you planning to take, and why?

Whatever is for the best really! But I have been told of Intel's new quad core release that they are planning, with 6.00GHz speeds, which will then mean I'm going to be upgrading to a board that supports ddr3 RAM and will go and purchase some of the stuff. Also a new power supply, and then possibly a new graphics card.

What is the one thing you would recommend for any PC user to do to increase their PC's gaming performance?

Graphics isn’t everything, you don’t need the game to look awesome. At K-LAN#5 I was playing on my laptop!

I find that having a powerful processor and a decent hard drive goes along way. Obviously you need some sort of graphics suitable to play the game, and the better the card you have the better the game can look which can help you in most cases considerably, but there is no point having awesome graphics if your pc struggles to run the game itself.

Do you read any specific PC magazines, which ones and why?

I try to get the latest issue available for Custom PC whenever I can. This is as it really is a good source of information for what will be available in the future and what the best at the moment. The guys at Custom PC really do all the leg work for you.

Other magazines I've flicked through, such as pc pro are gimmicky and generally are of little help whatsoever.

If your into PC's and want up to date information go with Custom PC, a gaming PC magazine for gamers with PC's to match!

Do you want to give a shout out to anyone?

Just to one, Matt Marks, where the hell did you go at the beginning of the event - never to be seen again?!

Another BIG thank to all the KernowLAN crew for making these events happen!

Have your PC upgraded by Custom PC

Here's a chance not to be missed by anyone looking to get the ultimate performance from their PC.

Custom PC magazine are offering readers the chance to get there PC upgraded, tweaked and overclocked by the CustomPC crew free of charge, as well as getting featured in the magazine!

How cool is that?

Just go along and read the article on their website to find out more.

Click here to go there now!

KernowLAN#6 – The Review

Should you have read my previous two posts you will know already that KernowLAN Gaming Networks held their 6th LANparty event on Monday and Tuesday.
The event lasted 24 hours, starting at noon on Monday 25th August and ended at noon on Tuesday the 26th.
This, the 6th event, dubbed K-LAN#6 was once again held at St Austell Church Hall, which can accommodate up to around 50 gamers, each of which can bring and set up their own gaming PC's.

Personally this is my favourite aspect of the LANparty, being able to look around at at all the other hardware, see how it is 'crafted' by each owner, looking at the variations in style, in hardware choices, in tidiness and in ability.

There were many very different PC's at K-LAN#6, including Rufus' aka Santhenar's infamous Acer laptop, an ancient (by today's standard) piece of kit that will strangely run most of the games he wanted to partake in quite happily. Also in the “odd to see” category was a Dell PC that Liam aka RogueFighter, brought along, sporting not only dust, but also a large mass of cobwebs.

A couple of the more exciting computers were brought along by Sam aka Rookie and Tom aka It's You.
Sam's SLi'd 8800GTS's housed in a huge Antec P182 certainly showed that he was a serious gamer. My one criticism of Sam's rig though, was that it was far too dusty for my liking, and showed not enough respect [I'm sure he will be upset with me for that comment].
Tom's ThermalTake Shark case looked big and mean and very impressive; after seeing it I would, if I were currently in the market for a new case, buy one.
He made some good hardware choices too. The 8800GTS is a firm favourite amongst the KernowLAN members, several people were displaying them at #6, while there were some at #5 too back in December also. Also, a ASUS Striker Extreme RoG Edition motherboard, with it's impressive heatpipe cooling and fantastic overclocking capability showed how serious he was about his tech.

It was great being able to talk to people about there future plans for their PC's.
Terry aka Cubedout, is a little hard up at the moment, but plans some good choice upgrades in the near future to bring his PC up to a similar spec to that of the best machines at K-LAN#6, while Matt aka MattFerrit is looking into a new case to replace his modded Aerocool Black M40 MATX Cube case with something along the lines of the Antec P182 or similar.
I'd think Liam is also considering a major case upgrade too, since his Dell cost him a great deal of ridicule!

I'd like to think that my PC also showed off some good technology, but alas it was far from the best when it came to the most modern hardware. My 2.1GHz dual core AMD Athlon X2 5200 was a far cry from the prowess of some of the Intel Core 2 Quad CPU's running in some of the PC's, but I am proud to say that I think mine was the only PC their running 8GB of RAM or a 9800GTX graphics card! Additionally, I am proud to say that I honestly believe my PC was likely the tidiest, cleanest machine their too.

The tournaments that were played included Unreal Tournament 2004, Counter Strike: Source and Call Of Duty 4.
The winner of the Unreal Tournament 2004 match was Sam Pascoe, playing as Rookie. He really showed off some fantastic skill, and even his closest competitors were usually a good 12 or more frags behind him on the leader board. He thoroughly deserved his prize of a 2GB of Crucial Ballistix RAM!

Matt Ferrit aka MattFerrit (see what he did there?) walked away with a Hanns-G 19” Widescreen TFT kindly donated by Microtest Ltd after winning the Call Of Duty 4 tournament in which he truly excelled, despite having never played the game before. I had a few issues in this game, whereby I had to downgrade to the same earlier version as all the other players by reinstalling the game on my PC which unfortunately held up the tournament for about 40 minutes (sorry guys).

Lastly the Counter Strike: Source tournament was won by Liam... kind of. By this I mean that the tournament was actually won by Matt, who having already won a prize kindly offered his prize of an Inno3D Nvidia 9600GT graphics card, once again donated by Microtest Ltd.
He was especially pleased with his prize, since he was currently running an ageing 8600GT card.
However since his Dell PSU could not accommodate the power needs of his new card, I ran home to grab a spare PSU I had laying around for him.

After all the tournaments had finished, people started playing their own choices of games among themselves.
I finally got to re-challenge Rufus (Santhenar) to an InstaGib match in Unreal Tournament 2004 since our match back in December was never finished.
It was a very close contest, but for a while I was really worried as somehow Santhenar was seriously kicking my arse, however by the end of the round we were fragging neck and neck, but the eventual outcome was 24-23 frags to me. DieselLives once again!

Tarí Táralóm aka Ros, the only girl-gamer at K-LAN#6 and I'm hoping to get a chance to interview her for this blog. I didn't get the chance to do so at K-LAN#6 since everyone was so busy playing, but hopefully will soon as a female perspective on gaming could make an interesting read.

All in all the event was a lot of fun for everyone involved, but also very tiring. 24 hours of sitting in front of a computer screen, concentrating intently on fast moving images is harder than it may sound, but highly rewarding too.

There are a few suggestions I have for the KernowLAN Crew, some of which were also made by the other gamers too.
i.The tournaments good have done with a little more structure, and definitive layout.
ii.There should have been more tournaments. Games should be held throughout the night, with several tournaments running at the same time. Maybe a survey could be placed on the KernowLAN website asking which games people want to play?
iii.Refreshments were available, such as Relentless energy drinks, as well as hot dogs and pasta, but there were no snacks on hand or other cold drinks. Tea was available, but I didn't see any coffee.
iv.There were too many quiet times, especially after 1a.m. when people were starting to feel tired. The music should have continued to play, or maybe some game video's on the projector etc., something to fill the silence would have enhanced people's experience.
v.I would have liked to have seen more encouragement for people to partake in some of the additional activities on offer, such as the AudioSurf tournament and the Wii bowling games. Also the Lego building Contest and Pub Quiz did not take place. I especially missed the Pub Quiz since it was a lot of fun at K-LAN#5.
vi.Mood lighting, not really something important, but the lights on or off didn't enhance the experience enough. There was stage lighting, a mirror ball and so forth available, they should have been used.
All in all, KernowLAN was a success. Everyone had a great time and the prizes were worth winning. I, along with all the others, am looking forward to KernowLAN#7, which is pencilled in for the week between this Christmas and New Year.

If you would like to see the photo's, or read more in to what KernowLAN is all about, please go along to the KernowLAN website.

If you have enjoyed this review, or if you attended K-LAN#6 please feel free to post your comments below.

KernowLAN TODAY!

KernowLAN #6 starts in a little over four hours from now.
I'm going to be there early to help get it all up and running.

I've just been checking over everything that I need to take with me so that I don't forget anything, and so far it's looking like I'm going to have to make two car journeys to get it all up there!

In summary, this is what I am taking:
2x Computers (my own, and one for KernowLAN use, from work)
1x 17” Acer TFT for KernowLAN use.
1x 19” Hanns-G Widescreen TFT for Cubedout (Terry) to use
1x 22” Hanns-G Widescreen (for myself)
1x PC transporter bag containing games, accessories, leads, and a sleeping bag.
1x Hiper PSU box containing two sets of headphones and a few other bits.,

Luckily, if I were to forget anything, I live just 10 minutes away from the venue, but I wouldn't really want to be doing that would I?

KernowLAN#6 Starting Soon

I'm looking forward to this coming Monday.

KernowLAN is holding their 6^th event, at St Austell Church Hall, at which up to 50 participants can get together and enjoy their games in the company of like-minded folk and celebrate their nerdiness without fear of getting a beating!

I'll be there, as I was at K-LAN#5 back in December and am particularly looking for to seeing the hardware that other's are bringing.

I am more of a hardware enthusiast than a gamer, although I do love a good frag-fest in games such as Unreal Tournament, Call Of Duty 4 and so forth, as well as my current favourite, Enemy Territory: Quake Wars.

My personal gaming PC has been upgraded quite a bit since the last event. I am now running an Antec P182 case, which house an ASUS M2N-E SLi motherboard, an AMD Athlon X2 5200+ (same as last time) with 8GB RAM, an Inno3D Nvidia 9800GTX graphics card, a Hiper Type-R Mark II 880W PSU, over a terabyte of storage, Creative X-Fi Audio Extreme sound card and everything is once again cast in cool blue lighting. Also I now have a few other bits and pieces, such as a Saitek Cyborg keyboard, a Microsoft Sidewinder mouse, 22” Hanns-G TFT and a Sharkoon l33t gaming mat, oh and a new Logitech Open Air Precision headset & mic. Wow... that's a long list of stuff!

On top of all this, the company I work for, Microtest Ltd, is sponsoring the event, and has offered up a couple of nice prizes, such as an Inno3D 9600GT graphics card and a 19” wide-screen TFT. Also sponsoring is Crucial who have handed out a competition prize of a 2GB kit of Ballistix DDR2 memory.

Microtest Ltd are also providing a HTPC (Home Theatre PC), TFT, keyboard and mouse to host the AudioSurf challenge on, which is set to be a great deal of fun, and one hell of a challenge.

All in all I am really looking forward to KernowLAN on Monday.

I'll write up a review of the event early next week, so watch this space!