I doubt your library is intentionally blocking steam, Steam just hates proxy servers, and I'll bet your library connects through one of those. Same thing happens to the Access Centre, which is an absolute pain for the games nights. We circumvented the restrictions on the government network by getting our own ADSL2 connection in for gaming, people who hookup their laptop or use their smartphone etc. You have no idea how paranoid the Education Dept. is about its network, and the crazy restrictions we have to try and run an Internet access centre under -- some foreign email sites get blocked simply because they are not english (european sites). Great fun when you have European tourists wanting to use your centre to check their emails (big reason why we got our own connection) ...........


Most of the source games build their levels properly. Its only really HL2 that has half done geometry (just enough to look done unless you go somewhere you shouldn't).

i am not sure why Steam does not work at my Public Library but i no longer really care. As long as i can get at least 20 hours of unmetered bandwidth a month, it will give me at least one new game every month; i can get at least 16GB downloaded in that period; and that is about all i can personally manage time-wise for an evaluation of a new game to bench it and to add it to my benching suite (or not).

In the future, if i need even more bandwidth, i will get Hughes Net Satellite in addition to my current satellite ISP
- together they should be good for at least 60GB a month.



HL2 looked pretty good in 3D Vision. The real irritation is that Nvidia doesn't support OpenGL games.

At least my 512/128 (and the 256/64 before it) is "unlimited" (though how much can you really pull in per month at those speeds?) Still unlimited is not the norm here in Australia, you have to search it out and for a long time no-one was offering in Tasmania at all.

Unlimited used to be the norm here. Satellite was the big exception (17GB for $80 a month for me) and now most of the wireless Internet plans are capped (some to 5GB a month for $50).

i deliberately went over my plan and carefully monitored my bandwidth usage (to realize that WildBlue definitely cheats their customers). What i discovered was that there is an unmetered period of up to 24 hours a month where the meter is frozen (and i guess they reset their SW). That is the one feature that makes it worthwhile for me - to get realistically double my allotted bandwidth for the same money
(other than that, WildBlue is a really BAD ISP; sloppy and with terrible CS recommended for the truly desperate).


i used to get up to 12GB a month over 56K dialup until i dumped my landline. That used to be the way i supplemented my bandwidth. Now i can get an *extra* 16-40GB a month at (up to) 1.5MB/s (depending on when WildBlue freezes their meter - every other month for 40 hours a month). Research is good; no one else knows about this.

I've noticed what happens with my ISP is I connect at 1500/512 (according to the modem) and their servers shape me to 512/128. Not a bad setup actually since sometimes you will go way faster than you normally could with the speed you are paying for, depends on how much load is on the servers (remember Tasmania only has two undersea cables connecting it to the rest of Australia, one belongs to greedy Telstra and the other is still fairly under-utilized at present -- most of the capacity if reserved for the NBN that is being built).

Well, satellite has a particularly pathetic upload speed. Business will pay $200 to $350 a month to get 512kbps upload speeds. Mine is advertised as up to 256kbps but i am lucky to get half that; sometimes my 56K dial-up was faster.

i am not so worried about the speed; technically mine is 3X faster than yours at 1.5 MB/s down. Realistically, i can get about 8GB in 10 hours over Steam; 1GB an hour over over faster networks.

Yet i would trade half of my speed for an unlimited plan; for now. at least i found a way around my ISP's cap that seems to work great for me until i can get two ISPs in here.

So, you reckon Shogun II is alright? Compared to Napoleon and Empire? which were utter bollocks.

That's the hard part really because one needs a platform to really appreciate it and the hardest thing about offering views like this. It's almost a trust thing or credibility thing for gamers. The only way I know how based on my limited knowledge is to discuss what the 3d experience does when compared to 2d gaming. Explain what someone may see and the differences, with some detailed writing.

Just a walk from Stormwind to Goldshire is a treat where everything is more real as one is gaming in the imagination world of Azeroth. A simple bunny hopping, bird flying, butterfly floating around is like one can reach out and grab them. The terrain is transformed as highs and lows are tangible with your eyes from great distances. Buildings have incredible shape and form; as does the models, with their gear, and the animals and monsters. The effects surround your environment and touches your own world, with out-of-screen experiences that are simply amazing.

For example: Riding though Stranglethorn Vale and was flanked by a horde, at a specific angle and this horde went out of screen; as this huge Tauren was attacking me from my chair. It was like WTF? Actually scared me because it came out of no where, hehe!:)

The world feels more alive and simply part of the experience itself -- this is what 3d stereo brings.

Well done, Sir Pauly!


Great description of S3D! And you hit the nail on the head about the matter of trust. Readers will see a reviewer get a couple of thousand dollars of HW to evaluate and say, "what's not to like for free?"

Well, 3D Vision Surround is "nice" but i cannot give it any recommendation except for those with a LOT of disposable income. And frankly, when you are in 3D over 3 displays, unless the game is well-balanced and probably designed for it, it can be a real distraction. And where there is a happy accident like Oblivion; or Just Cause 2 (which seems designed for and really well-suited for panoramic 3D views), it is an extra-ordinary gaming experience. But i am not really going to review it; just single panel 3D Vision which in my opinion is affordable once a gamer upgrades to a 120Hz display (which is a real upgrade in most cases, with or without 3D).

When a gamer has a 22" to 27" 1680x1050 to 1920x1080 display; then for the price of two new PC games, you can buy the active shutter glasses ($99) to experience S3D for yourself. And you can return them if you are not satisfied. It is something that should be tested in the home and evaluated by each gamer considering S3D imo.

3D vision has become affordable and it is a way to experience a much more IMMERSIVE gaming experience. Not many gamers can afford over $1000 for a quality 2560x1600 panel; just about everyone can afford $220-$320 for a 120Hz display which will generally improve their gaming experience over their 60Hz display - and then $99 for 3D glasses can reopen the last ten years of a game's library to them again. That is a reasonable investment in my opinion.



No idea .. i have 1.5GB still left of my D/L


Going by reviews, it is a much better game than the last few in the series. Going by the screenshots it is spectacular-looking and will really work out a top PC. These kind of games have never been my favorite; i will play it as i can and then bench it. i should be able to have it in my next benching suite (within 3 weeks when i return to benching).

OtOH DiRT 3 can be benched immediately and i will play the game for a couple of hours tonight.

Jericho.. hmm! What about Alan Wake? Not on the PC yet? I also played Condemned: Criminal Origins in 3D, perfectly fine (same engine and textures as FEAR, but better game IMO). The original Unreal Tournament worked in 3D under OpenGL but that was with my 7900GTX in SLI when Nvidia used to support OpenGL for S3D.

The cross-eyed method is a huge inconvenience for those who cannot even cross their eyes long enough and hold it there. Most people I know cannot even do it at all when looking at stereo images intended for this. Now Youtube supports 3D-vision:

NVIDIA 3D Vision Video Now Available Worldwide on YouTube
Users Can Easily Share and Enjoy High-Quality, Stereoscopic 3D Videos on YouTube With Their NVIDIA 3D Vision PCs
http://pressroom.nvidia.com/easyir/cust ... rid=760926

[BBvideo]http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=FpSR2xUc-CI[/BBvideo] (Won't work here?)

for more, go to http://www.3DVisionLive.com