Few people have been asking about my graphic-whoreness and why I'm always posting performance computing related stuff, so I'm just gonna explain it here and paste it whenever someone asks about it again:
Alot of people say these new cards are just for bragging rights.. and many times I agree.. because well, there are alot of ego-fueled dickheads out there looking for a high-end system just to show off their l33tness.
For me, it's a bit more logical and common sensical. One reason why I'd even go SLi GTX for many thousands of dollars comes down to this: I'm a big fan of FPS.. and the highlight of most FPS to me is a good single player. HL2, UT2004, F.E.A.R, Quake 4, Far Cry, Doom 3.. those were pretty much the only games I've bought since I spent $3.5k last year on my X800XT-PE system, and I've barely touched the multiplayer at all. Now some of you guys must be thinking 'you're kidding me, what a waste of money'. Well, I LOVE FPS and sometimes to me, nothing in the world beats the experience of a well constructed FPS single player campaign (one reason why I went skitz when Enoch talked about how 'no one touches the HL2 single campaign unless they're bored.. pffffffffft fuck you). So basically it comes down to lots and lots of $$ vs. around 50-100hrs or so for good single player to me. And that's pretty much the fundamental reason why I'm a graphics whore. Because if I'm TRADING off a whole heap of money for x number of hours of FPS fun, where for a FPS to be successful, it must immerse the player.. and to do that one factor is graphics, then I would prefer to run it at the best possible settings at good frame rates. I mean, if I'm gonna trade that much money for a limited time-amount of fun.. the graphics better look good. So that's one reason why I usually buy a high to top-of-the-range system. Because again, if I'm only gonna play 50-100hrs of a good game on it before another system, it better damn look good.. and when the latest FPS starts to run a little dodgy on it, that's when I consider a new system. For example, how F.E.A.R runs on my computer pretty much would satisfy 99% of gamers. I run it on 10*4, 2xTSAA, 2xAF, 80% of settings on max, rest on medium. Now this game has been one I've been waiting for for a year, some people even recall me raving on about how good it will be around 15 months ago. If I truly had the money a month ago, I probably would of gone 3800+, SLi 7800GT just so I could run this game @ 16*12, 4xTSAA, 6xAF, all settings max. I know this might sound really absurd and wasteful to some.. but the logic is certainly there in my opinion.