Starting over.

Aka, what the fuck?
by AC - permalink

I woke up this morning (okay, afternoon) to an insurmountable drive error that ended up with me being forced to perform a full system recovery. For whatever reason, the sector on my primary hard drive containing all the boot data was irreparably corrupted. So after hours of fruitless troubleshooting and more hours of reinstallation, here I am again, with a clean Windows XP install and all my 120+ GB of whatever-I-had-that-took-up-all-that-space gone. It's actually not as bad as it could have been. At first, I thought my 200GB primary drive was fried, leaving me with my backup 100GB drive. If I'd been forced to reinstall Windows to that drive, not only would my total drive space have been cut by two-thirds, I would have lost all my backup data I was using it for in the first place.

Still, it's going to take me days to restore everything, and a lot of data has been lost forever. The timing is just fucking perfect, as I'm in the middle of the readmission process. I'm trying to get back into college full time, and I'm going to need my PC. The last thing I need is a driver error that wipes out a damned thesis and all my research. So I'm concentrating on getting all my drivers and software updates reinstalled and working together.

The stock-level system restore has brought to my attention all the gradual updates I've made to this rig, and how difficult it was getting everything to work. Since I bought this PC last January, I've added a second hard drive and a new video card, yanked the modem, and replaced the power supply unit, CPU, main cooling fan, and heatsink. On top of the 76 updates I've already downloaded from Microsoft, I still have to re-up the sound and video drivers, find all the Media Center and Media Player updates, and rip my entire CD library again.

Just to get ready for all the re-installations I had to spend an hour uninstalling all the prepackaged software I never wanted in the first place. My favorite moment has to be when my PC suddenly crashed and rebooted during the removal of the AOL software. Now I'll need TweakUI just to remove the defunct AOL entry in the add/remove programs list. But that's the tip of an iceberg, I have Gigs worth of utilities to reinstall, everything from Open Office to Ad-Aware.

Okay, I'm going to microwave some leftovers and start combing through all my backup discs now. 'Night all.

Friday Night Nerd News.

You know you love it.
by AC - permalink

Well, we have to start with Harry Potter, don't we? In an interview with The Today Show, geek superstar J.K. Rowling reveals a few nuggets of Potter lore that dorks like me are eating up. First up is the aftermath of Voldemort's death. Rowling envisions Harry and Ron not only fulfilling their fourth-year fantasies of becoming aurors, but that they "utterly revolutionize the auror department" at the Ministry of Magic, and sees Hermione high up in the department of magical law enforcement. She also reveals that McGonagall would probably be too old to assume the headmistress role at Hogwarts and that a new character would take the job. The Defense Against the Dark Arts position can now be held permanently, as the death of Voldemort has broken his curse against the position, but Harry won't take the job. He will, however, drop in occasionally for a guest lecture. I'm guessing nobody will be skieving off those classes.

Rowling also revealed that Arthur Weasley was scheduled to die in Order of the Phoenix, but was given a permanent reprieve because she just couldn't kill him (he is rather likable, isn't he, what with his fascination with batteries and parking meters?). Instead, another parent had to take his place in Deathly Hallows. I have to assume this means Lupin and Tonks. Rowling also said that she was leaning towards writing a Potter encyclopedia, as she still has reams of back-story and information about the universe that couldn't be worked into the books. I'm sure this will eventually be published, but don't be surprised if someone else is given the assignment with J.K. as a consultant.

Moving on to Trek, it was revealed at Comic-con that Leonard Nimoy will be reprising his role as Spock in some form in the J.J. Abrams-helmed Star Trek 11 project, and that young-Spock will be played by Zachary Quinto, best known as Sylar from geek favorite Heroes. It's currently unknown whether Spock will be slicing off the top of anyone's head to gain their powers in the new movie, but I'm guessing that yes, it will be an integral plot point, and only a meek Japanese guy serendipitously named Hiro can stop him.

Finally, movie nerds everywhere are flipping the fuck out about the DVD release of Hot Fuzz next Tuesday. The last Simon Pegg/Edgar Wright project, Shaun of the Dead, was not only a veritable geekgasm put to film, it was also one of the most feature-packed DVD's ever released. In related news, I'll be buying Hot Fuzz next Tuesday.

Harry Potter comes to the close.

Almost.
by AC - permalink

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows finally went on sale Saturday, and I'm nerd enough to admit that by Sunday evening I'd finished it. A book review here would be pointless, as this will be the most heavily commented-on novel so far this millennium. But I'll give it the highest praise I think a book so highly anticipated, by myself no less than anyone else, can receive: it works.

SPOILERS START HERE! -- you've been warned

It's a worthwhile end to the saga. And after seven novels, it is a saga, easily transcending childrens' lit, and earning a place in the fantasy pantheon. All the stray plot lines are neatly tied up, and all of our beloved characters' arcs are given satisfying finishes, assuming they survived what can only be described as a bloodbath. By my count, no fewer than ten regular characters are killed off in Deathly Hallows, more than the other six books combined. At a certain point it just became numbing, and I started to question whether the finale could be worth losing so many characters.

SECOND SPOILER WARNING -- stop now, you fool!

Fortunately, it was, though how we got there was a little too calculated for me. I loved Harry's final stand-off with Voldemort, and the inexorable duel between them was awesome, brief though it had to be. But it seems like Harry got off on a technicality, and one that doesn't follow the logic of six books worth of Potter lore. If the Elder Wand really belonged to Harry, then every time anyone successfully disarmed anyone, a wand changed ownership. Harry's wand would have rightfully been Lupin's since year three, for example.

It can be argued that this logic only applies to the Elder Wand, but if that's so, there's no precedent for it, and it isn't expressly laid out anywhere in the book. Still, it's the only explanation that makes sense, and I'm willing to accept it because I love the series so much.

Moving past my quibbles, I'm fucking thrilled at how fully Neville came into his own as the leader of the underground at Hogwarts. My favorite moment was when he pulled Gryffindor's sword out of the Sorting Hat. After all, no matter where the sword is (or which goblin has his hands on it), "Only a true Gryffindor could have pulled that out of the hat," and Neville spent his first few years at school worrying that he didn't deserve to be in Gryffindor house at all.

It was also awesome to finally get the Hog's Head barman, who we all suspected to be Aberforth Dumbledore, in on the action. And finally, I was right about Snape. I know a lot of other people have suspected this as well, but I'll say it again. I knew he was a double agent, not a triple agent! He killed Dumbledore at the end of Half-Blood Prince on Dumbledore's orders, and spared Harry's life again and again because he was on Harry's side all along. We didn't know it was because of his love for Lily, and not just his remorse for the Potters' fate, but of course we never believed that completely anyway.

As for the epilogue, I don't have much of a problem with it. As I read Deathly Hallows, I checked in a couple of times with Tasha and Genevieve's liveblogging at the A.V. Club, and neither of them were happy with it. But honestly, I was hoping for something of the sort. If Rowling is sincere about not writing any more novels in the Potter universe, I wanted some sort of look into the main characters' future, and contrite as it may be, she gave it to us. Personally, I thought Harry would end up as a teacher at Hogwarts, if not headmaster, but at least we know Neville is still there, teaching herbology, and he's probably head of Gryffindor house, assuming McGonagall is still headmistress.

I could ramble on forever, but there's no point, really. If you've read this far, you've read the entire series for yourself, and you can draw your own conclusions. But I'm glad that we still have the last two movies to look forward to. Three, in my case, as I won't see Order of the Phoenix until I pick it up on DVD. The movies are only cinematic reimaginings of the books, of course, but that doesn't make them any less valid. As a Tolkien fan who also loves the Rings films, I know how to appreciate both. In a few years, I'll have seven Harry Potter books sitting next to seven Harry Potter DVDs, and I'll be content.

Another developer joins Steam.

The list grows.
by AC - permalink

Earlier today Valve announced that THQ is the latest developer to hock games via Steam. Several games are already available for direct-download purchase, including Company of Heroes and the Full Spectrum Warrior series. More of interest to me, S.T.A.L.K.E.R. is coming to Steam as well. Hopefully a demo will show up at some point; I would have bought it already if I knew my rig could handle it. Half-Life Fallout has the full press release.

THQ is a good pickup for Valve. They have a solid RTS pedigree and a huge number of kiddie games in their inventory, which could help Steam's demographic if any of them are headed for digital distribution. They're joining an increasingly impressive list of publishers already on Steam. Among others, Valve has Activision, Eidos, 2K Games, and PopCap, although all but PopCap are offering only portion of their software line-up. I'd really like to see a partner like Ubisoft (Ghost Recon, Far Cry, Splinter Cell), Rockstar (GTA, Manhunt), or Epic (UT, Gears of War) come on board with their full libraries.

I have my gripes with Steam, but most of my complaints have been with Valve's own games and their long tradition of forcing often unneeded patches that seem to do more harm than good. But Steam now lets you disable automatic updates for individual games, and registering a game with Steam eliminates the need for a CD-check, which I absolutely despise. Unnecessary wear-and-tear on my DVD burner just to play a little Call of Duty or Tomb Raider = not so fantastic.

Oh, Steam also has Penny Arcade now, accessible from the front page. That's cool, I guess.

Flock jumps a fraction.

Too bad about the site, though.
by AC - permalink

You'll have to forgive me for not delivering the promised Avant Browser 11.5 review, because Flock was updated the day of my last post, and frankly, it's better. The last stable Flock release was 0.7, but apparently the new version was close enough to the target for 1.0 that a skip in version nomenclature was warranted. The beta, 0.8.99, had some notable bugs, most of which have been ironed out for the Flock 0.9 release.

From what I can see, the new release appears to be based on Firefox 2, giving it a number of new features its Firefox 1.5-based predecessor didn't have. The new theme is the most obvious improvement, along with much more comprehensive customization options. In addition, you can now place folders on the bookmarks toolbar, an old Firefox feature that was oddly missing in Flock until now. The range of toolbar buttons has expanded and encompasses all of Flock's custom features, but isn't completely overwhelming as in Netscape. The default toolbar layout is fairly cluttered, though. Click the image below for the slightly modified layout I've settled on.


The integrated blog editor is much better now. I've only used it in conjunction with this Blgger account, so mileage may vary and all, but in my case it now features nearly every Blogger posting feature, including images, tags, and most formatting options (no justify options, though), as well as source editing and preview functions. The new Web Clipboard is similar to Opera's, but with more functionality, and it's directly accessible within the blog editor window.

Bookmark management is also vastly improved, this time using Firefox 2's native UI, much better than the previous Flock's overly complicated and somewhat unintuitive in-tab manager. The RSS viewer, already the best in-browser feed reader I've ever used, is slightly better as well. A major new feature is My World, a browser-generated portal, intended as a homepage, that lists new RSS articles, media subscriptions, and recently accessed bookmarks, along with a search bar and some feature quicklinks. Looking closely into it, the My World page is ultimately redundant, and it doesn't help that it takes a curiously long time for the feed list to fill out.

A few other things still need to be addressed before 1.0. In less than a week's worth of use, I've come across a few bugs that should be fixed ASAP, including a couple from the beta that I didn't think could possibly persist to the stable release. There's still only one theme available, and there are only a handful of extensions. A new official site was launched along with 0.9, and unfortunately it's ugly and weird compared to the old one. Flock is still an open-source project, but you'll have to dig around for a while to find any sort of information about getting involved in its development, or to even find the source at all.

Still, the positives dominate the problems with the new release, and of all the major browsers on the market, Flock may well be at the top of the list now. Not bad for a product that hasn't even hit version 1.

Blogged with Flock

Tomb Raider wrap-up and browser news.

Boredom Post™ ahoy.
by AC - permalink

I finally got around to beating Tomb Raider: Anniversary early this morning. I got a little sick of the game just after reaching the final chapter (the Lost Island) and took a detour into some Call of Duty 2 before plunging back in for the final laps. I'll admit that I ended up referring to a couple of guides at GameFAQs (this one by ipino and this one by rikku4788) when I got stuck. For more than three-quarters of the game I wouldn't let myself do that, and I made it through fine, but eventually the jumping puzzles get so ornate and Mario-esque, and the combat becomes so frequent and tedious that I just wanted it to be over so I could start going back and replaying the earlier levels for more unlockable content.

Just like the original Tomb Raider this is based on, combat is far and away the worst part of the game, and it sucks that it becomes more and more focused on the fighting late in the game, I guess in an effort to make it progressively harder. It all culminates in a couple of big, fat, 16-bit-style boss battles. The first is actually pretty fun, but the final one, against Natla herself, is the gaming equivalent of root canal: it went on forever, was painful as all hell to get through, and left a very bad taste in my mouth. TRA is a beautiful, simple game with a lot of depth and exploration-oriented gameplay, and it's polished off by a long, idiotic combat sequence and a short, forgettable cinematic.

So that sucked. But the good news is, there's still a lot of replay value here. You can replay every level individually to try to find all the artifacts and relics for some really nice unlockable content, and try to beat the time trials for even more. There are developer commentaries accessed by using crystals styled after the save points in the old games, and while they're scarcer than I'd like, they are fairly long, and surprisingly fun to listen to. It's like a two-man DVD commentary, much better than the scripted (if informative and much more numerous) commentary tags in the Half-Life 2 series. To sum up three posts worth of rambling about the game, it's easily a buy at $30 considering its relatively generous length and above average replayability.

Okay, moving on. I finally got around to upgrading to a new build of Avant Browser (11.5 build 12), and I like what I'm seeing. The overhauled UI from the 10 series has been significantly tweaked, and the integrated ad blocking is even better. It's just a remarkably full-featured and polished browser for such a small project. Once I've had more time to play with it I'll post a more detailed review.