But this post isn’t about that. It’s actually more about why I’m sticking with a dual core processor instead of taking advantage of the possibility to upgrade to quad core, motherboard, and all for less than $300. To most of you the name AMD Fusion probably doesn’t sound that too unfamiliar. The CPU technology has been around or at least the idea has been around for a while. It all started with with the AMD 4×4 system or Quad FX. The idea was for ultimate gamers, and computer users to be able to use two different CPU’s side by side. One could be a dual, or quad core processor, while the other could be a GPU, or hardware accelerator. The idea never came to fruition for gamers, or other home applications, but has slowly developed in the private sectors. AMD has taken it a step further though… By the end of the year they will be offering tri-core CPU’s with built in GPU, and hardware accelerator! This means that high bandwidth jobs, programs that need massive floating point units, and multi-tasking will all be on one chip. Forget 60 frames per second in game, try streaming real time game play!

I’d like to wait for the system to mature myself. But I’ll definitely be getting ready for it. When I make the move to RAID 5EE, and 8 gigs of RAM I may shortly after get a Fusion ready motherboard too. Then when there are some price drops I’ll gram an AMD Fusion processor and be able to load everything in near real time… no more waiting on slow computer loads, with RAID 5EE 4 x 1TB drives, 8 gigs of RAM, tri-core processing, with built in GPU, and hardware accelerator… With extreme water cooling, and my ATI Radeon 3850 video card to supplement the graphics… you can forget waiting on any games, or poor frame rates!

Fusion is more than just awesome hardware though. AMD is working with software developers, the Open-Source community, and Stanford to achieve a new standard in multi-tasking. Hardware has made leaps and bounds as far as technology goes, but software has barely been able to keep up. 64bit is being excruciatingly slow to catch on, and multi-threaded software is still not all that common. Even with Windows Vista, and much of the advancements in technology you’re still not seeing the benefit of even quad core processors… which is another reason for me to wait until Fusion launches full force!

Flak 88 firing with Tiger standing guard

Been playing Company of Heroe’s a lot lately!В  (Not as much as my Xfire profile says there’s some glitch because I have 4 gigs of RAM, and Vista it doesn’t say I’m out of game when I’m out.В  It’s as if the cache isn’t being cleared, and therefore because the game is still on the RAM it’s still registering me as “in game”).В  None-the-less I still have been playing a bit.В  That picture is of a Flak 88 that I built right next to this guys base, and Credal’s Tiger coming up beside it to help guard.

Bombing Run in CoH

This was after a perfectly placed bombing run as the enemies tried crossing the bridge.В  You can see some of the points fading away but a lot of stuff got blown to pieces on that bridge buying time for our troops to get up there and cross.

Volksgrenadiers up close

Just an up close shot of a squad of Volksgrenadiers owning some British guys to take their point.В  I love the detail of this shot, you can see bullets flying from a couple guys guns, flames, and the rubble is pretty realistic for a RTS, I mean, this is at the level of some older FPS games and it’s an RTS!!! I love that with my ATI HD 3850 I can keep things high resolution, and have a little bit of Anti-Aliasing, some Antistropic Filtering, and lots of other details and still get 30-35 frames per second!В  Definitely makes me happy.

Most of you have probably seen that Windows released Service Pack 1 for Vista not long ago, along with a release of SP3 for XP users.В  I decided that it was time to finally make the leap to Vista, it’s been in the plans for a long time, especially since I used it during the Beta and really loved it!В  I still waited for SP1 to come out just because back when I was using it in the Beta some companies such as Logitech still hadn’t gotten around to making any drivers for it… so I figured some maturity time was in order.

One thing that really does bother me a LOT about this purchase is that Microsoft is no longer including the copy of the 64bit Operating System with your purchase!В  They dropped the price by $10 and send only the 32bit Windows Vista Operating System with your purchase, then if you want the 64bit version of Windows Vista you’ve got to go online and order it for $10.В  To me this is backwards thinking on Windows part, I see the merit in it that the 32bit Vista works on any processor and the 64bit edition needs to be run on a 64bit processor… but honestly who doesn’t have a 64bit CPU now?В  And if you don’t why are you trying to install Vista in the first place?!?!

I still really like the operating system none-the-less and have run into very few problems so far… actually a lot of problems I was having (such as with the newer versions of Opera) have gone away… I’m with a lot of enthusiasts who say that if you’re having problems with Vista it’s because your computer is a piece of crap and you need to throw it off a building.В  Seriously Microsoft Windows Vista ran smoothly on my comp when I was doing the Beta and back then all I had was a 2.2ghz Dual Core AMD, 2 gigs of RAM, and an ATI x1600 video card… games were pretty darn slow, but really still playable, though some like Company of Heroes needed to be lowered in resolution and settings.В  Now with a 2.6ghz (OCed to 2.9) Dual Core AMD, 4 gigs of RAM, and an ATI HD 3850 I’ve had absolutely no major glitches with Vista to date… of course I’ve only been running it for a few days so I’ll get back to you on what I think of ReadyBoost, and whatever else pops up as it comes up.

Sapphire ATI Radeon HD 3850

SAPPHIRE 100226L Radeon HD 3850 512MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFire Supported Video Card

I love how technology advances!В  I’ve been holding out from an upgrade of my Saphire Radeon x1600 256MB Video Card for a while now because there’s always something better!В  And boy, oh boy am I glad I did!В  I kept thinking about getting an ATI x2600 series card, but never could really justify it.В  When the ATI HD 3000 series of cards came out it didn’t take me more than a slight price drop to justify the purchase.В  For the same as what I paid for one of my ATI Radeon x1600’s (Used to have two in crossfire, gave one to Credal a while ago though, so been running a single for some time now) I was able to get a ATI Sapphire Radeon HD 3850 with double the video RAM of my current card up from 256MB to 512MB.В  Also GDDR3 instead of GDDR2 so everything about it is a HUGE improvement, for the same price!В  Now when I was looking at the ATI 2600 cards they were the same price as my current card, and even a decent 165% faster in most games than my current x1600.В  But since I was planning on going to Vista, it was a good idea to be on a DirectX 10 card, which is another reason for the 2600 upgrade… luckily ATI came out with the new 3000 series of cards, and the 3850 just so happens to be at the mid price range for video cards.В  I was EXTREMELY happy abou this as the HD 3850 with 512MB of RAM is about 200% faster than the 2600’s and obviously MUCH more powerful than the old x1600 I had been running.В  Power consumption isn’t that huge of a concern either, as it’s got the new 55 nanometer (NM) die.В  It’s nice to finally be able to play all of my games at full resolution (1680×1050) with some sort of anti-aliasing, and antistropic filtering.В  Plus I’m ready for Vista as soon as it gets here!