A very unexpected gift

I enjoy playing computer games. But lately, I have been VERY frustrated with my gaming experience. Playing World of Warcraft, my guild and I are doing some new adventures, and going after some of the bigger bad guys in the game. And my poor, 4 year old machine just can't quite keep up with the demands of 25 people on the screen casting spells, swinging swords, and all the special effects. I was getting MAYBE 5 frames per second during fights. Even with all the Video options set to "LOW". That's BAD! Television is 30 (29.97) frames per second, film is 24 frames per second. It was affecting my reaction times, and my overall usefulness in the game.

I got an message from a guild mate, that plays the same race and class as I do,( he is actually the our guild's Hunter leader) asking about the specs on my machine. I told him, and I could hear him gasp, he lives 1000 miles away. He asks a few more questions about RAM and Video Cards, and I answer them.

I was starting to wonder if my status in the guild may be in jeopardy. One of the questions we ask applicants, is "Do you have a computer capable of handling the game?". And my answer was obviously becoming a No. I have been in this guild since WoW began, was in the guild in Beta testing of WoW, and was even in its predecessor in EverQuest for years. Could they really kick me out? no... but they could choose not to bring me along on raids anymore, and that is just as painful.

Anyway, my guild mate says he may have some spare parts lying around to help my situation. I may have to buy a new Motherboard, and some better memory. I could do that. Sent him my address, and kind of forgot about it. About a week later, I get an email from him. saying that I didn't have to buy anything, he found some stuff that might work, and that I would be getting it in a couple of days. I was pretty excited.

The box arrived last Wednesday, and it was 2'x3'x1' and weighed 25 pounds. I open it up, and my jaw hit the floor. In the box was a 600Watt BFG Power Supply, 2 Gigs of DDR 400 memory, an nVidia 7800GT Graphics Card (with a SLI bridge, so I could buy another one and really beef things up), a BRAND NEW Asus a8n-sli deluxe mother board, and a FX-57 Athlon 64 Chip. Everything but a case, monitor, and a Hard Drive. But I already have those, and they don't effect performance as much as all the other stuff. I was STUNNED! I put it together over the next couple of evenings, and fired WoW for the first time Saturday. After setting all the video options to "HIGH", I was still getting 50fps minimum... sometimes as high as 85! Everything is so smooth now, and beautiful. Its like playing a brand new game. And I went from being at the bottom of the DPS (damage per second) report to Fifth over all... beating out some good Rogues, and mages.

My friend refuses to take anything for his generosity, not even for the cost of shipping. I have it on good authority that he likes Oatmeal Raisin Cookies, so I may be making a trip to the local Cookie Store, and shipping some off. Karma has stepped in as well for him. As this week he got 2 very good pieces of equipment for his character, and the gun that he has been longing for since we started raiding.

Thanks Karma, and thank you Ryan.