It is a cold night, and as dark as they get. The seasons change as the rhythmical clockwork motions of The Heavens plays on, oblivious to the events which have occurred on this otherwise typical day. However, this day was distinctly abnormal for a chosen few warriors – men of cunning and intelligence unknown to manifest in their peers. Yes, formidable men indeed.
Our protagonist draws his cloak tighter and tighter still to stave off the night air; to protect him and that which he covets. He is no hero today, he will tell no tales of glory and incredible feats tonight, for in this battle he survived, but he did not prosper. Never will he be immortalised as the man who managed to beat only the combatant who could not attend. The solo fights were unimpressive; he dismisses negative thoughts – racing iron horses isn’t his genre anyway. The team based sparring fared him no better – unity in numbers, yes, but only as strong as the weakest believer, and none had slain any Intel overclocks before. But he bought bravely to the bitter end. Struggling through with dedication and determination has sapped him of strength but he wills himself forward, homeward. He lifts his arms. Heavy. The spoils of war await.
Weary.
He takes his rest, as the morning light will bring the opportunity to examine the loot removed from the battlefield.
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The treasures lie upon the floor; a mysterious green chest marked with cryptic runes, a circular reflective device (‘perhaps a signalling tool,’ the warrior thinks) emblazoned with a Dawn of War II marking, a battle standard for the two great Houses, bit-tech and custompc – a powerful allegiance recruited by ASUS in order to bring together combatants from every corner of the globe.
He takes the chest in his hands, turning it, examining it from every angle. A glint of metal. A flash of steel. The Vorpal Blade of +1 Box Opening slices deftly, removing the security enchantment. The container is pried open and it contents taken. It contains some form of Dwarven technology, a board enchanted with magic blacker than a raven’s pocket with attractive shards of blue material jutting forth. One PCI-E (x16) shard, one PCI-E x1 shard and two PCI shards. Clearly this prize is a Mini ATX form factor magicboard motherboard. But alas, its AM3 zero insertion force socket lies empty, yearning to be filled. Soon. Soon it will be time, but for now our mysterious warrior [it’s me by the way, just in case you didn’t get that by now] can only look on at his fancy enchanted doorstop.
Hark! Word is sent from an Oracle, a messenger carries an as yet undisclosed AMD magic processing widget to our location with haste.
Once more the Vorpal Blade is held aloft, once more its wrath is felt by packaging materials. Emerging from the chaos and orgy of bubble wrap destruction a contrivance of epic importance can be seen. The AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition. An edition so black it makes a goth’s trousers look positively pale. A widget that’s silicon must have been forged in the bowels of a volcano. A device of edition so black, its Machiavellian connotations would spell an eternity of doom for all inhabitants of this universe, should it fall into the wrong hands. A processor our hero will cherish, for it was the very one he was hoping for.
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A flurry of activity breaks the silence. Processor meets motherboard. CPU, TIM and waterblock are unified in an unbreakable bond of threaded rod and nuts. A Corsair TX650 feeds the life giving essence of electrons into the machine as fire breaths life into a dragon. A Lian-Li PCA06B give shelter to the fragile… you get the picture. Behold! A new machine is born into a cold, unforgiving world. It beeps defiantly “you must configure my CMOS settings,” it cries out. But the warrior expects this and has already pummelled the Del key into oblivion.
The Warrior states his opinions aloud, so that The Heavens and The Gods therein may hear his words. “It’s a decent board, does what it says on the tin really for a ‘value’ board. Connectors aren’t great for cable management (not a 90 degree jobby in sight). No annoying whiney chipset fan. BIOS fan control is a little lack lustre. Automatic overclocking works but manual options are again a little lacking as I’m used to DFI BIOSes. Good range of I/O connectors. No floppy connector but that doesn’t matter to me.”
And The Gods Smile upon him, for they know this man has just taken the first step of an epic journey. Drink deeply from your chalice, Warrior. You will be a hero soon.
That's a lot of prizes!
-- I feel I should at this point probably apologise for my terrible writing skills, but I wanted to take this in a ‘different’ direction.