Logichaos now has a super sweet Minecraft server. If you're into Minecraft, come check it out.

I'm currently hosting a Minecraft server from my Core i7 PC with 8gigs of ram. I do not have any plans to take this server down except for the occasional manual backup (10-15 minutes downtime)... I do not plan on changing this world for a long time so don't worry about losing anything. :)

I'm located in USA (Illinois), so feel free to join my Survival server.

Server Admins

Server Admins: Neillithan & ThyGuyX

Server Rules

• This is a no PVP Server, however, if you want to create a PVP area, just ask an admin. :-)
• Build wherever you want, but please respect other players and build at least 50 blocks away from all other players.
• Always chop down entire trees. Not doing so will displease the admins and likely get you removed from the server. This includes big trees.
• This server accepts foul language and cussing. If you're easily offended, please leave.
• Please act mature. Annoying brats will be removed!
• If you want to prevent griefing, ask an admin to protect your area. Admins will not undo griefing.

Server IP

neilfucker.dyndns.org

World Map

If you want to see the world map, check it out here: http://neilfucker.dyndns.org:8123

The First Guess: Lotto Nation
Mice Rooting for Cats

These are some crazy looking pumpkins.

I have finished another guide. It shows you how to create full backups of your OS (e.g. Windows XP, Vista, 7, etc) so that you can restore your computer at a later date from that backup file. It's a free program called EASEUS Todo Backup and it does what many commercial programs do, except for free. Todo Backup can even restore files from backups, which is a free feature that most commercial programs offer in their Pro version. In addition, it covers how to create a bootable rescue CD to restore your computer in case you can no longer access Windows. This truly is a gem of the internet. Check it out.

How-to Guide to Creating & Recovering Backups of Windows for Free using EASEUS Todo Backup.

Thank you Rachel Maddow for drawing the connection. Without you, I would still be thinking this natural disaster is the first of its kind.

I've been hearing about this for the past couple of weeks now, but I didn't really know what happened or how it happened. This video explains it pretty well. It's still a mystery why it happened, but I have a feeling it has to do with neglect regarding the higher ups.

The title pretty much sums it up.  The popular first person puzzle game brought to you by Valve is now free.  Interestingly, the timing comes at the same time Steam overhauled their site to offer Mac games, one of which is Portal.  Why not install Steam and download Portal?  If you need motivation, check out this video.

In the past, I've used a free version of a defrag program called Ultimate Defrag.  Unlike most defrag programs, Ultimate Defrag lets you dictate which files get high performance priority and low performance priority.  It will then defrag your files and place them accordingly for the best performance.  The high performance files get placed on the outside of your harddrive where reading files is faster and the low performance files get placed on the inside of your harddrive where read speed is not very important.  To top it off, Ultimate Defrag has an option called Strict Placement, which forces your files to be sorted by folder structure and alphabetical order.

All defrag programs claim they boost your system performance.  While this is true, rarely do they consider the impact on gaming.  Lets say you install a brand new harddrive and you install a game on it.  Your game files will be installed in a natural order close to each other. But as time goes by and your harddrive space runs dry, new files and games must be placed wherever free space is available.  Files not only become fragmented, but they also become scattered all over your harddrive.  This can cause hitches and lag while playing games that frequently access your harddrive.

When you defrag your games with Windows Defragmenter or some other Defragger, what you're essentially doing is giving that defrag program the ability to even further scatter your game files all around your harddrive.  This causes game performance to worsen after a defrag.  Ultimate Defrag is the only program I have ever used that manages to intelligently defrag files without worsening game performance, and it keeps getting better.  Version 3.0 is just on the horizon and some of these new features are great.

Check it out

I have been using a commercial H.264 decoder for a few years now, and I figured I'd spread the word about a great deal being offered for a limited time.  CoreAVC, a commercial H.264 decoder by CoreCodec is selling for $10 after you insert a promo code.  This deal is only good until February 28th, so get it while it's hot!  The promo code is displayed at the purchase screen after you click buy for CoreAVC.  CoreAVC is faster than all other H.264 decoders including those found in FFDShow Tryouts (K-Lite Codec Pack or Combined Community Codec Pack).  CoreAVC is both a software and a hardware decoder, depending on what graphics card you own.

CoreAVC is useful for playing 1080p videos or movies on slower computers without lag.  It can be used to watch Blu-Ray movies, too.  If you've ever downloaded a .mp4 file from youtube, CoreAVC plays that too.  I can't tell you everything about it, except that I have used it for many years, it keeps getting better with every release, and it is maintained and updated often.

CoreAVC is a decoder, not a program--which means it can work with Media Player Classic or Windows Media Player (pretty much any player that supports DirectShow for video output.

I am not affiliated with CoreAVC and I was not paid to write this or advertise their program--although I wish I was. lol...

Get CoreAVC at http://corecodec.com/

-Neil