I have to say I  have really been feeling the RTS itch lately. It's been a very long time since I tested my mouse clicking skills. Too long. Way back, I remember talking with a friend on the phone as I typed 'cc' next to the C:\ prompt in dos. Anyone remember that? The original C&C was NOT a windows game. Oh nostalgia.

Anyways, the game would load up, and after about 10 minutes we'd finally get those damned modems to connect to each other. We had two landlines back in those days for the express purpose of one being dedicated entirely to the computer. This made for MANY very long head to head battle sessions in C&C, Red Alert, Warcraft, Warcraft II, Starcraft, Dungeon Keeper, and who knows how many other strategy games where we made threats at each other well into the wee hours of the morning.

My favorite had always been the C&C series, I stayed with it up to Red Alert, then I guess I got bored with the genre. Plus Westwood Studios had been bought up, and  the sheer magnitude of awesome carried with C&C kind of died with it. Now the long anticipated 'Tiberium Sun' is on the horizon and I for one am looking forward to seeing how my old strategies hold up with the far more advanced AI. In probably one of the best moves they could have made, they're going back to using actual movies within the game, something you rarely see anymore. No one better suited to the best remembered role in that original game than the original Kane himself.

I also want to pick up Supreme Commander. The game just LOOKS fun. Plus the strategy involved and the premise of the tech trees is intriguing. Unfortunately, my computer is likely incapable of running these games. I've upgraded it about as much as I can manage, I've shoehorned in the nvidia 7800GSoc 2 hard drives, maxed the ram, overclocked the video and the cpu, added a massive liquid cooling system, with internal radiator, and a series of fans to help it all not catch on fire. Alas, I'm pushing a solid 3.0ghz on processing power, and that just barely cuts it for Oblivion. Plus I've been putting off a new monitor (old CTS) which makes the graphics capabilities almost null.

I'm considering though just leaving it where it is, and instead switching to a laptop. Since laptops are quickly outmoded, and upgrading them outside of increasing their ram is pretty much impossible. I would want to get the nicest one I can find, without dropping 8 grand on an Alienware. So far, the best gaming laptop for the money I can find is the Dell XPS m-1710. I don't care about the blue ray drive, but starting from the base model, and maxing almost everything except ram (2gb instead of 4) with the 512mb Nvidia 7950, with their 7 to 10% off with a 3 or 4 year warranty, I can grab one for around 4300 and some change. Obviously financed.

To anyone who reads this, any suggestions? Is the Core 2 duo worth it? I know intel is working on, or already has the quad core, but not in laptop form yet. Any help is welcome. Dell is where I keep ending up at, Retail Stores don't have anything that can compare to it, the only way I can see to get better is Alienware, which practically doubles the price. No thanks.