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I was very pleased with the Audigy 2 ZS Platinum card I got for my desktop PC, so I was excited when I learned Creative was producing a PCMCIA version for notebooks. This is a great sounding card with some nice features- but there are some other things you should probably be aware of before you buy one for yourself.

First off, here are the good things about the card: - Reliable, good sounding card with nice optional effects (EQ, reverb, etc.) - The headphone jack has a cool red light inside it, making it easy to locate the jack without having to squint around looking for the right one. - Optical and analog in/out, and a special cable for connecting to 5.1 and 7.1 speaker setups. - When no sound is playing, this card is silent. I mean so silent that two times I actually thought there was something wrong until a sound actually played. It's very impressive, but takes some getting used to if you're accustomed to always hearing some hiss or hum in your headphones when you're plugged into a computer.

But here are the things that may not be obvious until you actually own one: - When the card is plugged in, you cannot use your notebook's built-in speakers; you MUST use headphones or external computer speakers, and only the audio connections on the card itself will work. If you normally use your notebook with headphones or external speakers, this won't be an issue for you, but if you're used to playing games on the notebook's built-in speakers, your behavior will have to change. - The card comes with no printed documentation whatsoever, other than a little insert saying that you can't use your built-in speakers. To install the card, just plug it in, then insert the driver CD when the Add New Hardware wizard asks you to. After the drivers are installed, you can run the software installation off the CD. (There is an electronic user's guide with installation instructions, but you can't install that until after the card and drivers are already installed!) - Note that you do not have to disable your built-in audio or uninstall any drivers. In fact, you shouldn't because you'll have to use your old integrated audio if you ever need to use the computer speakers. When you plug in the Audigy card it automatically becomes your computer's default sound device, and when you remove the card the integrated audio works again. It's pretty seamless and reliable. You probably shouldn't do it while a game's running though. - I have learned that the card does not plug in to some notebooks correctly. (The thick end of the card that has audio connectors prevents you from plugging the card in all the way.) Check out the forums on www.soundblaster.com for more info- I think Creative is mailing adapters to people who experience this problem. (I have a ThinkPad T42p by the way, and I didn't have any trouble.) - If you're thinking of getting this card as a way to improve gaming performance, don't. Yes, technically, by offloading sound generation tasks from integrated audio to the Audigy card your computer frees some of its own resources for other things, but unfortunately this does not translate into any noticeable difference in gameplay. (In fact, if you're not prudent in your selection of which of the bundled programs to install, you may end up HURTING both performance and reliability.) The real power of the Audigy is its ability to transform audio with digital effects and to deliver high bitrate multi-channel sound. About the only ways to really improve performance on most notebooks are to upgrade RAM, get a faster hard drive, and disable all services/startup items that you don't need. - If you're like me and you like running a LEAN system for maximum performance, don't be fooled by Creative's "drivers only" option. If you don't install at least the Creative Volume Control, Creative Speaker Settings, and Creative EAX Console, your ability to use this card will be severely limited. (It's the same way with the desktop Audigy.) I did a full install of all the bundled software and then used Mike Lin's free Startup Control Panel to disable the following startup items: CTDVDDET, CTPerformanceUtility, Creative Detector, and Creative MediaSource. Plus I had to manually uninstall the idiotic MediaSource Go! launch bar that attached itself to the top of my desktop- I couldn't make that one go away by editing my startup items. (The software also installs a service called "Creative Service for CDROM Access" but I'm not sure what it does yet.) - Note that without the Creative Speaker Settings program installed you will probably not be able to use your computer's built-in volume and mute buttons (again, they're normally tied to the integrated audio). Make sure to check the "Synchronize with Control Panel" option to get that functionality back.

1. The CD-ROM drive wasn't broken, I was just using the wrong power supply with it. (Same plug, different volts/amps.)
2. I had thrown away the power supply for the Linksys router, and didn't have anything remotely compatible with it anymore.
3. I never throw away broken equipment that readily! I've got four, count them FOUR broken wireless routers in my cabinet right now that I've dragged around with me for the past two years! I was trying to be tidy that ONE time, and look what it got me! Aaaaagh!

1. Call Linksys's customer support number. You'll find that on their contact page.
2. Tell them that you need a new power supply for a router, and request that they give you an RMA number so that you can fill out the form online.
3. Browse to their RMA page (you get there by going to Support > Customer Service > Warranty Return from the main page).
4. Under Shipping Terms, select Power Supply, and then click the appropriate button for your geographic location.
5. On the next page, enter your RMA number by Case ID Number, and fill in the rest of the information.
6. Somewhere on the pages after that, they ask for specific information about your router and where/when you purchased it. Be honest- I've heard it doesn't matter how old the router is as long as they still have supplies.
7. You'll be given the option to accept their free ground shipping or to pay for quicker methods.

• Apparently my sister met Mike secretly on December 23, when she had ostensibly gone shopping for Christmas presents. I even kidded with her that day about sneaking off to see Mike. Sheesh. Like I've said before, I know she's an abused woman, and abused women do some pretty seemingly idiotic things- but I still get damn angry thinking about how she sneaks around to see that baby-beating bastard. It just makes me question whether anything she's told us about her current state of mind is true- did she really ever make it clear to him that she didn't want to be with a guy who kept assaulting and intimidating her? Or was she just all like, "Oh it's all my parents, baby- I miss you so much." [Oops, I nearly made myself sick typing that last sentence.]
• Also, a little more insight on why Mike called my parents, shit-scared, Saturday morning. He actually got arrested on Wednesday because of my mom's charge about his verbal threats. Apparently someone bailed him out- we assume it was his current girlfriend (poor thing). So, I'm guessing that being arrested and THEN confronted with the questionable legitimacy of his recent complaints against my parents got him worried. Well, good, Mike. There's more to come.
• I've been looking for a place to slip this little anecdote in, so I'll just spill it here... a few weeks ago, when Amanda had first come back into town to see Mike (the week that he tackled and almost killed her), Mike told her about something that had supposedly happened to him at work that day. He said a woman came up to him, ran her fingers through his hair, and commented on his highlights. (Yes, he actually has highlights, the vain redneck son of a bitch.) Well after spinning this little tale, he looked Amanda in the eyes and told her, in all seriousness, "You're lucky to have a guy who's so hot." Yeah, Mike, the 'retarded mustachioed hillbilly' look is so in these days.
• My poor dad. He has to attend some kind of bizarre arbitration session related to Mike's "menacing" charge, even though he was already booked to work all week in Toledo. If he skips the court date he risks fines or other penalties, but if he makes the date, who knows how much work he misses out on, because Toledo's like 5 hours away from Cincinnati in normal traffic.
• My parents have hired a lawyer (a very good lawyer, Mike) who will be defending them against Mike's lame charges and pursuing their own charges against him.
• And yes, they have pressed charges against Mike for that new crime I mentioned earlier. I still can't reveal details, though, as much as I'd like to.

Petitioner states that Respondent has engaged in the following act(s) which create an immediate and present danger. [My mom] relentlessly continues to contact petitioners residence by home phone and cell phone to harass him due to the reconciliation of his relationship with girlfriend [Amanda], [My mom's] adult, daughter. [Amanda] is not a resident at [Mike's address] which does not entitle [my mom] to make calls to the petitioners home. [My mom] has obtained a pass key to the Petitioner home and has entered without permission to take Petitioners personal effects. Records have been placed with Cheviot police department. [My mom] calls the petitioner at all hours of the day to insult, uses profanity and threaten physical harm to the petitioner. On December 26 in front of the petitioner's home, [My parents] stated they would run petitioner over with their automobile. Cheviot police was contacted to escort [my parents] from the premises. [My mom] also states she will have her two sons physically attack petitioner if petitioner continue to agree to see daughter [Amanda].

1. My mom never relentlessly called anyone, especially not Mike. We have known for weeks that there's no point in talking to the sick bastard, so we've had little reason to talk to him at all. I was there this week when my mother called Mike to tell him she was on to him. And she never threatened him in any way- but she did cuss at him a bit, that's true. Heh.
2. My sister was indeed a resident of that address and had lived with Mike the past few years until she fled the premises for her life! Some of her possessions still remained in his apartment, and those were the things my mom was trying to get back. No one was ever interested in any of Mike's belongings, even if most of them were things he had mooched off my family anyway.
3. "Obtained a pass key to petitioner's home?" My sister LIVED there, she had a key!!!
4. Unlike Mike, my mother actually sleeps at night. Mike's the one who woke my sister up by calling her at 4:00 in the morning when she was visiting me last summer, and who woke my dad up when he was abroad on a business trip. Phone records should prove this out. I'm sure he can provide them! (Oh, and the days he stole my sister's and mother's cell phones don't count! Who knows what he did with those phones then!)
5. No one in my family has ever threatened physical harm against Mike, vehicular or otherwise.
6. On the night of the 26th, my parents were the ones who contacted the Cheviot police! They had to call the cops because Mike wouldn't relinquish my mother's cell phone! Again, this can be easily proven by the Cheviot police (who are big fans of Mike, by the way- they just love those narcissistic woman-beater types). Also, the police didn't escort my parents from the premises- they ordered Mike to go back into his apartment!
7. Finally, my mother never threatened to sic me and Chris on him. As much as we hate Michael Lacey, we would only inflict physical harm on him if he presented a clear and present danger to any member of our family and we were there to do something about it. Neither of us were there when he brutalized our sister, and we haven't touched him yet. We're just hoping the legal system will work and punish him if he gives us any more problems.

Charlotte and I have never played an MMORPG. While her primary reason for this would be the monthly expense, my reasons have more to do with the other players. I sort of keep tabs on the various MMORPGs, and over and over I keep hearing about abuses committed by players for either juvenile or professional reasons. Players who 'gank' lower-leveled characters for fun, players who script 'bots' to level up their characters so they can collect loot and experience, and then sell their characters and items for real world money on auction sites, players who exploit bugs or use hacks to perform better than others. I don't put up with people like this in my real life, so why would I pay to put up with them in a virtual one? Unfortunately, there are very few co-operative multiplayer games for the PC that AREN’T MMOs. In fact Neverwinter Nights is the only good one I can think of. (It actually lets you go through the complete story mode in multiplayer, and- gasp- lets you save multiplayer games!) Also, my very favorite role playing games (Morrowind, Gothic, Gothic II) are single-player only. What I love about them are the huge landscapes and open-ended gameplay. You can go almost anywhere and do almost anything in those games. But I’ve played all of them! No, if I want more of that kind of gameplay, it seems that my only hope, other than waiting for Morrowind II and Gothic III, is going to be signing on with an MMORPG. But with MMORPGs, even though you can play with your friends, you also have to co-exist with some of the lowest scum of the Internet. Well, it seems that Blizzard, developers of World of Warcraft, have made some great strides toward enforcing fair gaming on their servers, and limiting the havoc that disruptive players can wreak. They have banned accounts found to be using bots. They have banned players who are discovered selling their virtual wares on auction sites. They have reduced the frequency of 'kill stealing' by implementing a system where the first player to engage with an enemy is guaranteed the loot/experience from it. Unfortunately, however, there is one rather big problem on World of Warcraft's Player vs. Environment (PvE) servers that is going to keep me from buying the game until it's addressed. You see, even though on the PvE servers, you’re not supposed to be able to fight other characters without mutual consent, some people have discovered a way to force people on these servers into Player vs. Player (PvP) combat. It works like this:

1. An unsuspecting player engages in combat with a creature.
2. A malicious player casts the Mind Control spell on the creature, which temporarily makes that creature an ally of the caster.
3. As a result of the first player being in combat with a creature that is currently being controlled by another player, both players are forced into PvP mode, and the malicious player can now attack the first player directly.

Last week, my wife was surprised when she attempted to check her Yahoo email and was informed that her password was incorrect. She had never changed it. She called me up to ask for help. I tried logging in to her account and got the same results. At first I thought maybe it was a server problem, so I tried logging on to my own Yahoo account. No problem. It appeared that her account had been hijacked. I advised her to try to contact Yahoo to resolve the problem, and we got off the phone.

A few minutes later she called me back. She wasn't able to log on to eBay either. This was serious. I came home early so we could figure out what was going on. Charlotte's attempts at recovering her account through eBay and Yahoo's password recovery wizards failed; the hacker had changed her personal information, on both accounts. While Charlotte tried to track down customer support phone numbers for both sites, I wondered why anyone would want to steal another person's eBay account- or email for that matter. I discovered my answer when I searched eBay for auctions held under my wife's ID. This person was selling 2 brand new Dell laptops with Charlotte's account, with a starting bid of $1.00- and bidders were already fighting for them.

Interestingly, further down the auction pages, the graphic that contained photos of the laptops said that the seller would only accept payment by Western Union (not a common eBay payment method) and that if people wanted to buy the computers outright for $999 they should contact the seller by email (a big eBay no-no). If potential buyers clicked the "contact seller" link, an email would be sent to Charlotte's Yahoo account, which the hacker also controlled. So it became clear- the hacker had stolen Charlotte's identity to sell laptops that were either stolen or (more likely) completely non-existent. Once the buyers discovered they'd been had, they'd be blaming Charlotte for it.

Funny enough, I wanted to complain about all this the day it happened- but Blogger actually got hacked that day too, so I couldn't even whine! Talk about helpless!

So, we found eBay's phone number pretty easily. Within about 45 minutes, the fraudulent auctions were closed, and Charlotte had her account back. Since eBay had access to our bank account via our check card, we cancelled the card (even though eBay was pretty sure the hacker had no direct access to this information- however we would have been charged listing fees for any items he would have listed).

Yahoo was a different story... their number was much harder to find, so Charlotte actually spent a couple of days dealing with their email-based customer service staff. She couldn't answer half of the verification questions they asked her (duh- because the hacker had changed her info!), so they said they didn't believe her. I eventually figured out what their phone number was, but we had to wait until Monday to call. Once she was actually able to talk to someone, they finally gave her account back to her.

She found a bunch of email from potential buyers in her Inbox, and replies from the hacker in her outbox. Naturally, most of the eBayers who wrote wanted to know why Western Union was the only method of payment. The hacker actually told them- get this- that he was travelling around Europe toting these laptops around with him, and there were Western Union offices all over Europe.

Charlotte emailed every person who had written to her to let them know what had happened. At least two of the people wrote back to thank her, and said that they didn't go through with the deal because it sounded too fishy. Well, good on them- it was!

The hacker is still at it- we found identical items listed under some other person's account yesterday. (I noticed that eBay had shut the auctions down by this morning though.)

How can you keep what happened to Charlotte from happening to you? Use a different password at EVERY web site you use. Also, pick passwords that do not have anything to do with you or the site you're logging onto, and that have combinations of letters and numbers. (Many passwords are case-sensitive. You can mix case for added security.)

How can you tell when a hacker is fraudently listing items for auction? Check the seller's other items for auction- are they very different from the item you're interested in? (Charlotte usually sells used books and CDs- it seemed strange to some people that she would be selling multiple brand new laptops. Also that other hacked user we saw last night usually sold hunting gear.) Also, limited or unorthodox forms of payment (like "Western Union only") are a good tip-off. Finally, anything in the auction that encourages you to do anything that obviously violates eBay policies, like contacting via email for an off-eBay transaction should make you very suspicious.

Surf safe and shop smart!

1. Grim Fandango - Wonderful script and story, great characters and performances, very smart and funny.
2. The Curse of Monkey Island - Excellent cartoon-like graphics, great music, performances, and humor.
3. Escape From Monkey Island - Longer than Curse, but not quite as fascinating. Still great fun though.
4. The Longest Journey - Lives up to its name- it's the longest game we've played so far. Very immersive and complex. Great story, memorable characters.
5. The Secret of Monkey Island - The original game in the excellent Monkey Island series. I was a little concerned that I wasn't going to enjoy this game because it was 10 years older than some of the other games we'd played. The graphics and sound are nowhere close to the later Monkey Island games, but this one was still inventive and laugh-out-loud funny.
6. Syberia - Absolutely fantastic graphics, good music, and chalenges that are just easy enough to complete, and hard enough that you feel a sense of accomplishment when figuring them out. Some of the voice perforances weren't all that great, and a couple story elements were kinda lame, but the atmosphere and attention to detail of the game overshadow its inadequacies.
7. Beyond Atlantis - Wow, gorgeous graphics, great sound, really immersive environments. I really liked ALMOST everything about this game. There's one aspect of it though that really bites. You have to "record your journey" into a crystal you carry, and the process is tedious, somewhat difficult, and definitely not fun. This game might have gotten a higher rating if not for that one silly thing.
8. Day of the Tentacle - A very funny and inventive game where you play 3 characters in 3 different time periods who must work together in order to win. I was continually surprised by the humor and clever design of this game.
9. Atlantis: The Lost Tales - We experienced some technical quirks with this game, probably because our PC and graphics card are much faster than this 1997 title was designed for (none of them prevented gameplay though). Despite that, I was impressed by the lush 3D environments, and interesting story. There are a number of sequences where you must complete certain tasks very quickly, and without any mistakes or you will die. Charl found it very stressful (she's usually the "driver"), and I found it annoying that you couldn't choose where to save your game- the game automatically saves at certain points, and you sometimes have to repeat lengthy sequences in order to repeat a difficult and deadly challenge.
10. Monkey Island II: LeChuck's Revenge - The graphics in this second part of the Monkey Island quadrilogy are improved in the sense that there is more color and detail than in Secret of Monkey Island- however, the added detail actually makes it more difficult to notice important objects and hotspots in the game. Still definitely worth playing.
11. The Cameron Files: Secret At Loch Ness - While I enjoyed the Scottish atmosphere and music in this game, the character animation was not as good as in some of this game's contemporaries. Also, like Atlantis The Lost Tales, there are some timed sequences where you can die- but worse, but here the game actually ends. And this game doesn't save automatically, so make sure you save often. This was also probably the shortest game we've played so far. We finished it in 2 nights.
12. Beyond Atlantis II - This game is really odd. Despite the name, its story doesn't have anything to do with the first two Atlantis games. Also, the vocal performances are pretty bad, and there's this part of the game called "the membrane" which you must go through numerous times, that is incredibly difficult and frustrating to navigate. There are actually two phases in the game which I thought were pretty cool- one where you're a young thief in and Arabian fantasy, and another where you're a cave woman, but that darned membrane! This game also seemed sort of short. Oh- and the options menu, while looking really cool, is utterly obtuse- none of the controls are labeled, or even look like they do something useful. You basically just click and pray that you didn't accidentally just end the game. Oh well.