Interlude

Not to meditate every day at a certain time, or for a set amount of time, but to meditate as soon as you feel yourself coming back into chaos. Then take the time, no matter what time it is, to hold, close your eyes, center yourself, and be there once again.

Zen and the Art of Building Mechs

When I was a kid we had a nice house and a full pantry, but to everything else: "We can't afford it!"

Consequently, most items from furniture to electronics were a hybrid of credit-bought and hand-crafted. Since my father has always been a tinkerer, he made everything himself. Most importantly he made his own computers. He began tinkering with these machines as soon as they hit the market and he's always been a PC guy.

He taught me how to build my very own computer around 14 years of age, just as I began to get into Photoshop. I remember it was all quite confusing at first. Dad gave $36.00 to the doorman at the MarketPro computer show and we began the hunt. I remember almost everything to this day, just like anyone else might remember catching their first trout shooting their first pheasant. It was a veritable rain forest of towers and chips and boards. He knew I couldn't possibly comprehend everything I needed on that first hunt, but he did a good job of summarizing what he was doing and making the final decision, and cooling my excitement to fit his actual budget.

Years passed with that computer. I even used it through college. I used it until I drove it into the ground, and while I liked that computer a lot, I wasn't as attached to it as one I'd put my own hand to. My father built it for me. I took it for granted.

After college and into career I purchased an OEM laptop as a replacement--having forsaken my father's lessons in self-reliance and independence (via computers)-- in the hopes that something shiny and new would help my career path. The Gateway MX7527 was a great bargain and a decent 'gaming' laptop but it had no soul. It was a prefab soldier. I pushed it to its limit, but I didn't even know what it's limits were. I all but forgot I had this power hidden within me, until I'd given up illustration and gaming completely, until I witnessed the glory and majesty of a WACOM tablet wielded by Andrew Jones.

I bought one immediately.

And my Gateway was too slow to run it smoothly. I was crushed.

Don't get me wrong, it worked, but choppy, and choppy is absolutely useless when it comes to Illustration. Since I'd spent all my cash on the WACOM, I gave up and wrote any possibility of creating satisfying illustrations and animations altogether. I had a crappy job, a crappy laptop, and a crappy degree in computer animation.

But it wasn't the WACOM that pushed me over the edge. I'm sorry to report that it was a videogame. Fallout 3. Bethesda's post apocalyptic revamp of Oblivion (basically). I barely played Oblivion on the Gateway, and Fallout 3 was a must for me. No way to play that without proper hardware. No way to get the proper hardware but to shell out a fortune for a new laptop... unless...

Remember Armored Core & Armored Core 2? I loved that game. I could sit there for hours and hours and hours doing missions and gaining credits to upgrade weapons and armor and systems until I had the best possible mech. Sometimes this didn't even require the most expensive items. Sometimes the advantages of cheaper items allowed maximization beyond the newest and best. The same works with building a custom PC. I got so good at this game that it was impossible to beat me. (So impossible no one would play challenge me, unfortunately.)

Buying an OEM computer is like hiring a mercenary. The job gets done but you don't know how. You have no real control over your unit. Building your own PC is like training your own ultimate warrior. I prefer to look at it as building my own personal mech warrior because that's cooler.

Here's the metaphorical personification breakdown.

CPU = Mind. Like all things, it's all in the mind, especially when it comes to the warrior's path. This is where every situation is assessed and solutions are made. This is the difference between a soldier (OEM) and a warrior (Aftermarket)

GPU = Tactical Systems. The Graphics cards are like the tactics learned or the tactical systems of the Mech. In Armored Core I would always buy the big ticket, long range, multi-target targeting system and match that with basically pea shooter weapons, with a big bada-boomer backup to finish off my prey once it was riddled with smoking holes.

RAM = Guns. These are your guns. They are loaded with data from the HDD and they blast that shit out as fast as they can. You can't store data there, just like you can't store rounds in a gun, but you can load, point, and shoot.

HDD = Ammo. You might think your Hard Drive would be something else, but essentially its the ammo casing. Your actual ammunition is the data itself. You want fast, well produced casings and you want a lot of them. In the case of a specialty setup like mine, I've added a Solid State Drive to run my OS from. This is like specialty ammuniation. Armor piercing rounds, let's say. The bulk of the files run from the Hard Disk, but when it counts you go with the big guns.

PSU = Heart. A warrior needs a strong, steady heart to do battle. The more badass the warrior, the hotter the battle, the more heart this devil will have to have to make it through the war without suffering a heart attack, or a burnout.

Motherboard = Circulatory/Cables and Transfer Points. Basically, like our own circulatory system, the motherboard essentially transports energy and nutrients to the body. It's a simple function, but the more options those systems give you to transport data and power, the better.

Case = Armor. This will protect your systems from dust, dirt, grime, water, anything else that is the enemy of cyber systems, but the coolest part of this is the looks. I like to keep mine understated and slick, but maybe with some red and black accents just so you know what's up.

Monitor = UI. You know those Anime where the EVA Mechs are controlled by hot young men and women in jumpsuits surrounded by HD screens flickering battle scenarios? Yeah, it's like that. Especially if you're hot and young. You should definitely get either a Bruce Lee style yellow and black jumpsuit or a motorcycle outfit. It will really help your game here. If you can find any of that just use spandex.

Overclocking =  Elite training. You make the best warrior you can, and then you put it through the torture test. Consequently you find the upper limit and you expect that level from your warrior at all times. This training of course, must be accompanied by some sort of temperament training/meditation, bringing us to our next imperative entry.

Cooler = Temperment Training/Meditation. This part comes after the whole Warrior Mech is up and optimal. This is like training in Zen, cooling the tempermatic nature of dual and quad core extreme processors. It's necessary if you want to utilize every advantage outlined in Musashi's Five Rings or O-Sensei's Dynamic Sphere. Advanced techniques.Without this, your warrior will have a hot-head instead of a cool head. It will kill itself before it gets killed by any outside force.

When you put them all together, balance the right parts for each attribute and squeeze everything you can get out of it, you'll have your perfect robot slave. Or robot companion. Or Mechwarrior.

Having said all that, I've decided to record some of my nerdy progress for posterity. I've begun by uploading the first batch of components received by mail since Monday. Everything was purchased off eBay. The total system cost me $527.00. I have to insert though that if I'd waited a couple more days I could have budgeted it out better. As much research as you can do, there's always more to learn. Especially the cost of certain things, like Windows XP and peripherals like speakers and cameras.

Below:
Intel Core 2 Duo e6750 processor - $60 A good mental capacity, takes well to training.
Seagate Barracuda 7200 16mb buffer 300mhz 500gb - $33.00 Ammo for the workhorse guns.
Corsair V32 32gb Solid State Drive - $56 Threw down on this for ridiculous speed. Big gun ammo basically.
Sapphire ATI Radeon HD 4870 1gb w/ crossfire bridge - $100.00 Locks on quick and has good range.
1x2gb Corsair XMS 6400 - $35 Bigger gun.
2 Quad 8mm silent fans - 4.00 Also takes ballroom dancing classes.

The rest (case, mobo, sidearm) to come, but probably not before Thanksgiving :(.

Teh begining.

I thought I'd start this display with quotes from people much more incredible than me. It symbolizes well the ideal I'd like to hold myself to. (Yes, I said that correctly. Ideals I'd like to hold myself to. Grace or beauty I wish I had the strength to push myself towards.)

 

It is by the goodness of God that in our country we have those three unspeakably precious things: freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and the prudence never to practice either of them.

Mark Twain (1835 - 1910), Following the Equator (1897)

 

Self-reliance is the only road to true freedom, and being one's own person is its ultimate reward.

Patricia Sampson

 

To know what you prefer instead of humbly saying Amen to what the world tells you you ought to prefer, is to have kept your soul alive.

Robert Louis Stevenson (1850 - 1894) 

And then I will put a picture of myself up, in order that the magic is complete.

See? I'm in there.

I won't disappoint you after some time. It'll take a minute to get the ball rolling, but I'm sure there will be something worthy of skimming once in a while.

I'll try to be concise. I'll try to make it easy to read so you don't have to pay that much attention. 

We write because we want to stay alive. We want to know that we've experienced something. We want to remind our future selves of who we thought we were and were we thought we'd go. 

And since I live in a fantasy world sometimes, this book is also about how the world falls into chaos, and the man who saves it from destruction.

Not really.