Hardware

4 entries. 4,122 words.

May, 2014

• PC Upgrade, Annoying But Necessary. 2014-05-09 3:00 PM.
  • Hardware
  • Status
  
  My gaming PC hasn’t been upgraded since mid-2012, so I thought it was time. The fact that the computer had a nagging USB mouse driver problem and has been crashing a lot in games also contributed significantly to my decision. And so another PC has been upgraded, and once again I make another vow not to do it myself any more. Pro installation work right there. Oh I wanted to order a pre-built PC. Imagine how awesome it would be to come home from work one day and find a brand new, completely built Alienware PC sitting on the front porch. (In a box, presumably.) (Hopefully in a box that isn’t stamped with Alienware all over it, so it won’t get stolen.) All you would have to do is open the box and plug it in, and you’re done. 539 words.

June, 2018

• Controller Woes: Aging and D-Pads. 2018-06-25 2:30 PM.
  • Hardware
  • Musings
  
  I’ve been playing a lot of Dark Souls Remastered lately, which requires playing on a controller. Technically you can play the game with mouse-and-keyboard on PC (and it’s even easier in the Remastered edition) but the control scheme is completely alien to any other mouse-and-keyboard game, and it takes a lot of getting used to, and it’s just not worth the effort for one game. Even the controller scheme takes a fair amount practicing and learning, even if you’re used to using controller. 915 words.

August, 2018

• Hard Drive Shopping – Blaugust 29. 2018-08-29 2:00 PM.
  • Hardware
  • Musings
  
  Casualties of War aka. Information Technology. This SSD and external USB drive both died last year, both less than two years old. I mentioned my main 2 TB D: drive conked out yesterday morning for mysterious reasons. It’s working again now, but I’m eyeing it suspiciously, because I’ve noticed some odd behavior in my applications and rebooted a couple of times yesterday to straighten it out. I’m not sure it was hard drive related but it could have been. I successfully copied all of my “documents” (which includes documents, music, pictures, and videos) to a safe place, so I won’t lose anything important if the drive dies completely. 1,093 words.

November, 2019

• XIM APEX Mouse and Keyboard Adapter for the PS4. 2019-11-15 2:25 PM.
  • Hardware
  • Reviews
  
  I don’t exactly write “reviews” here on the ol’ blog, but these are my thoughts about the XIM APEX Adapter. It’s a USB gadget that plugs into a Playstation 4 (or an Xbox One, allegedly) and allows you to use a mouse and keyboard to play games that otherwise could only be played with a controller. You may or may not have noticed a recurring theme here in the past year, which is that I constantly mention how much the PS4 controller hurts my hands. Specifically my left hand, and even more specifically my left thumb. If I use the controller too much, I lose a great deal of gripping strength in my left hand for days, so things like holding plates or opening jars become quite a bit more difficult. Normally I have to limit my PS4 playing time to maybe an hour a day, and ideally every other day. It’s not ideal when there’s a game that I’m dying to play. I don’t have the same trouble with mouse and keyboard, so I thought I’d try out this adapter. 1,575 words.