Father Xmas

It will run the game but I seriously doubt ultra mode or even high. Integrated graphics as oppose to a discrete laptop graphics processor aren't the best when it comes to 3D gaming on anything but minimum to maybe medium settings.

I would expect 15-20 FPS if you tune the graphics settings properly, as in no shadows. 100% world detail or less, no UM features and only the more basic shader settings (bumpmaps should be OK).

"Look, I CAME HERE FOR AN ARGUMENT, I'm not going to just stand...!!"
"OH, oh I'm sorry, but this is abuse."

Both are fun series but be warned that they do show their age in both style and tropes of their time. Dirty Pair is 25 years old now while Ghost Sweeper is over 15.

Enjoyed the extreme parkour was good. You can get pretty close to his transformed look with our costume creator. It's on again two more times this week, 1st time is right after Young Justice Friday night.

Ultra Mode? Not a chance. Heck this would be hard pressed to get better than 15fps at it's native resolution with all the settings at their lowest.

It doesn't even make a good browser since the small 28 watt battery coupled with a 35 watt CPU means it's battery life is would be shorter than your average movie.

Also to upgrade to 4GB you will have to chuck the existing memory in the system since their isn't any free slots.

It would make a good PC for an 8 year old so they aren't on Mommy's or Daddy's PC but for anything beyond "Backyard Baseball" or "Zombies Vs Plants", I'm thinking you are looking at $200 of disappointment.

I wasn't expecting it to be an actual song from an actual group, I was assuming it and the other two bits of music in Sym-Bionic Titan were in the stylings of a particular genre and group. Never thought that they would actually license real music.

Funny thing is that "Space Age Love Song" is EXACTLY the kind of early 80s rock that got used in the anime music videos fans made back when I went to anime cons in the 90s. That's probably where I heard the song before. Well that and early MTV back when I was in college when the song first came out.

It would bring a literal meaning to "quick hop to the store".

Hasn't been a thread about CN's Friday night hero block recently.

Batman: Brave and the Bold - Alternate future dealing with the son of Bruce Wayne and Selina Kyle

Ben 10: Ultimate Alien - Trying to help Kevin after he saved the universe but went mad in the process.

Sym-Bionic Titan - A very cute episode, I'll comment about later.

Generator Rex - An origin story on how the team came together plus how White Knight became nanite free.

Star Wars: The Clone Wars - Very little Anakin this season.

Now Sym-Bionic Titan had some interesting music homages this episode but the last one, as the redhead cheerleader Kimmy walked home while she was oblivious to the kaijin battle going on behind her was a style that reminds me of a band that I can't quite put my finger on.

Pre-edit: When I went looking for a clip I found it's A Flock of Seagulls.

The Princess and the Frog was OK but not great. Most of the songs were OK but the production numbers somewhat lacking. It's biggest drawback was the appearance of "hey we need a black princess to market, quick find a story" feel to it.

(stupid forum logoff bug ate my reply, twice! Grrr)

Once more from the top.

Yikes, hadn't looked at the bottom line lately, and boy have the prices dropped. I would list this configuration as a $1250 rig today, if I wasn't planning on tweaking it soon.

The two pieces that have dropped the most has been memory, now that DDR3 is the mainstream standard for both Intel and AMD's current CPU lines and the video card. Back in April, the ATI HD 5850 was starting to creep above it's MSRP of $299 since there wasn't any real competition from nVidia. Since then the GTX 4xx series arrived and after a price war or two and recently with the introduction of the AMD HD 6870, the price of the HD 5850 fell like a stone. There's also been a few price reductions on parts like the case and hard drive as they are no longer the new shiny hyped at review sites.

The tweaks I'm looking at and/or waiting for are the following.

First I would swap out the HD 5850 and put in the HD 6870. Reason I haven't yet is due to the limited availability of the HD 6870. NewEgg can't keep them in stock and I rather not list a configuration you can't actually get right away.

Second, I've received reports from people that the Corsair TX750 is a little flaky. This saddens me since the TX750 was a very popular and well thought of PSU. However that said there are a few options out there but they are all a bit more expensive. The TX750 listed at $140, but like most PSUs are on nearly continuous sale. The ones I'm considering are the Antec New TP-750 for $160, the Corsair HX750 for $170 and fugly green fan aside, the XFX 750 watt Black Edition (it's built by Seasonic) for $160. The Antec is 80 Plus Bronze while the Corsair and XFX are 80 Plus Silver (their efficiency rating) and have modular cabling. All three can push 62 amps at 12 volts, essentially all of their 750 watts rating.

Lastly you may want to go with 8GB of memory. More memory never hurts, unless they physically get in the way of the 3rd party CPU cooler. A pair of 4GB sticks aren't at a ridiculous premium anymore over four 2GB sticks but are probably easier to overclock besides avoiding possible conflicts with a CPU cooler.

On to your questions.

1. I have no insight on whether now is the time to buy or if you should wait. If I knew the future I would be playing Powerball. The only "new" thing coming soon are the AMD HD 69xx video cards mid December, but I believe they are targeting the GTX 580 so I don't expect them to drive down the prices of mid range cards any time soon.
2. That motherboard supports either Crossfire or SLi in x8/x8 mode. I'm quite sure any of the PSUs I mentioned here can drive either configuration. I picked the PSU size of 750 watts because of SLi/Crossfire possibilities as well as moderate overclocking of the CPU. A pair of overclocked GTX 460s will use more power than a stock pair of HD 5850s but there should be more than enough spare power to handle them. If you feel concerned, step up to an 850 watt version of any of those three PSUs I listed above.
3. Stay away from the GTX 465, it was a short term gap filler that the GTX 460 eliminated when it came out. The GTX 470 may be a bit faster but uses a lot more power than either the GTX 460 or the HD 5850. A lot as in 50+ more watts per card for not a lot of additional performance. I would definitely step the PSU up to 850 watts if you are planning two GTX 470s.
4. Well, I already gave you my changes. If you want you could go with the i7-870 for $81 more list. It can use DDR-1600 memory without needing to OC the CPU and is a little bit faster, has better turbo boost as well as hyperthreading. And unless you compress video or use some other massively multicore aware application, I think it's overkill for a gaming system.

Well hope that provides you with some answers and options.

There's one thing that I've noticed in this series, actually haven't noticed. They haven't used the Z word. Reminds me of the British supernatural series Ultraviolet which never used the V word.

Passed by a sign board in front of a smallish store that read...

Shop here, we don't play Christmas music in November.

I think it's time to break camp after brain bolting the casualties. To many walkers, to much cover.

Neat pic of Harry.

I thought it was very good. Only three episodes right now, was on PBS a few weeks back.

I prefer the adage "friends help you move, real friends help you move bodies".

Well, didn't expect near death by stampede.

Not thrilled about Deus Ex Chloe.

Just wait for Black Swan, supposedly some hot scenes of Natalie Portman with Mila Kunis.

Cyber Monday is the first Monday after Black Friday. It's the Black Friday of web shopping.

All of them. There was virtually no new effects made after the original Pilot/mini series. Not even the cockpit footage of the vector graphic targeting screens. I think they finally filmed a few bits more the next season once they ran into the city of light and went to Nazi planet with the space U-boats.

Of course the store might let you buy one thing, maybe, after you tried 7 times.

You are running the game now right? GR doesn't change anything, it simply allows you to start characters in Praetoria. No need to change your graphic settings. If your frame rate is acceptable on the Rogue Isles then I don't see anything that would cause you problems in Praetoria.