I eagerly awaited the FedEx man today anticipating the arrival of my new Alienware M17 "desktop replacement" laptop. It finally came in and I was so excited! I could hardly sign for it. I carefully opened it and removed and inspected everything. Its a pretty nice looking laptop and the 17" screen is very luxurious. Speedwise its very fast in terms of running Windows Vista 32bit and doing the general computing that I'm doing on it right now. I started playing with some of the features like using Alienwares Facial Recognition software and the built in web cam to log into windows and using the finger print reader to not only log into windows but also log into websites like gamespot, dslreports, yahoo!, and even my college! How cool is that!? The illuminated keyboard is very nice and I can switch the color from blue, red, green, or off. I haven't played any games on it yet but I'm downloading everything in my Steam account right now! I'll get more in depth with it later and post a proper review by Sunday.

The specs for this beast are as follows...

Intel Core 2 Duo P8600 2.4Ghz
2GB Dual Channel DDR3 Memory (yes DDR3 not 2 )
Crossfire Enabled ATi HD 3870's (yes 2 of them!)
250GB SATA 7200RPM HDD
17" screen (1440x900)
illuminated keyboard
2.0 Megapixel webcam
Fingerprint reader
Memory card reader
HDMI port
Windows Vista 32bit SP1
and a few other goodies

A few months ago, soon after I purchased my iMac. I decided to "quit" gaming. Why I would do such a foolish thing, I don't know. Gaming has been my entire life. I used the excuse that I didn't have time for it anymore. However soon after I found myself sitting idle, not doing anything at all! At the same time I had a very special friend from work encourage me to look at getting back into school and earn a degree and move on. He wants to see me succeed and do something with my life that I love.

I had always pondered how people were able to do something they actually loved with their lives. Is this something everyone gets to do? How does one go about achieving this? I didn't know what I was looking for, or where to begin. When I'd think about all my interests, I often overlooked the one and only passion thats been with me for my entire life. That passion is gaming. The few times I did think of gaming as a career I thought it wouldn't be possible for me to do.

My friend and I were driving around the city we work in one day coming back from a Holiday Party when we drove passed a DeVry University building. He saw it and mentioned to me how thats where he graduated from and that I should check into it. I looked on their website and with his help, found a degree in Game and Simulation Programming. As soon as I saw it, I knew thats what I had to do.

I signed up soon after that and know my classes start very soon. I'll be working very hard for about 3 years and in the end I'll get my Bachelors degree in Game and Simulation Programming! After that I'm going to pursue a job in the gaming industry or possibly start my own company.

Of course when taking a course on gaming you need something that can game, and this iMac isn't going to cut it. So, a few days ago I ordered a brand spanking new Alienware M17. With a 2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, Dual 512Mb Radeon HD 3870's and 2GB's of DDR3 Ram. I'm very excited and I can't wait till that gets here so I can start working hard and playing hard!

With the good comes the bad however. In just 3 days, my very best friend of 11 years (out of my 20) will be moving to another state. She's hoping to make progress in life and make something of herself, and she feels this cannot be achieved here. I'll miss her very much, but if it makes her life better then that's what I want for her. I'm happy that at least I can sit back and know that both of us are trying to improve our lives and make it.

Now that I'm officially back into gaming, after my 5 or 6 month break, I'm happy I'll be here on a daily basis to keep up on gaming, for my future career and my present entertainment!

Thats right! I've been through with PC Gaming for a few months now and was doing just fine using my Xbox 360. However after Microsofts depressing E3 08 Press Conference I decided I needed to own a Playstation 3 instead. I sold the Xbox 360 and havent looked back since. Though I'm holding out for a little bit to get the PS3.

I've been upgrading my digital lifestyle products one at a time. First ditching PC Gaming, then the 360, then losing the Moto Q running Windows Mobile 5 and getting the iPhone 3G, and finally the newest edition...my 2.4ghz iMac!

I've tried to get away from Windows for a while now though every attempt made is met with failure. I've tried Linux about three times. Each time there was something that held me back until I had to move back to windows. First their was no wireless support, then a lack of other drivers, then i couldn't use iTunes, which I need for my iPhone. I knew I had to make drastic changes.

I decided then it was time to make the ultimate switch. There was no going back . I researched the iMac and picked out which was right for me. After I found it, I made my move.

So far I'm very very happy with my iMac and Apple is proving to be a very solid and respectable company with terrific computers!