The techs are usually pretty good. Get the guy to stick around for a stress test using the game, or an even heavier graphics load.

And now everything is so awful I just have to laugh.

Dell's techie came today and spent a couple hours swapping out my laptop's presumptively defective motherboard (including graphics cards, I guess) with a brand new motherboard fresh from the factory.  We finally finished, and turned it on, and my (wired) Internet connection didn't work.  The tech started muttering darkly about a misseated Ethernet connector on the motherboard and called the tech techs call when techs need a tech.  By the end of that phone call, my lappy was a brick.  If you press the power button, it will sputter, heat up rapidly, and turn off again.  So now Dell is FedExing me a FedEx box so that I can FedEx them my broke-ass computer so that they can, I guess, repair it.

I have constructed a line graph showing the progression of events, including a trendline to the future.



So where does that leave me?  Well, thank God I have let my old Windows XP desktop collect dust instead of giving it to Gio's mother like I said I would, because I kind of need to use the Internet to work, and also to not go (more) crazy.  And hey, silver linings: I had just backed up my data, and I got to make an awesome line graph using the XP version of MS Paint, which is way better than the Windows 7 version.

All my love to you guys.  Thank you for putting up with my whining. 

Lappy came home from Dell today -- various components replaced -- and the first thing I had to do was spend another hour and a half with tech support figuring out why my mouse, keyboard, video, and audio were stuttering every ten seconds.  (Answer: they shipped it with a badly outdated version of Windows that was causing driver conflicts.)  I haven't figured out yet whether the original problem, which you might recall had to do with gaming, was solved.  I did lose a lot of data for my trouble, though, and it's good that I'm all alone in my apartment so no one has to watch me clutching my head in my hands.  God willing, that is the last you'll hear from me in this thread for a while. 

Moral: Become a billionaire.  And whenever your computer has the slightest problem, buy a new one.

This is probably the wrong thread for this, but it's the closest thing I've found, so here goes.

Recently, I've been amusing myself by vector-tracing SKU screenshots. It all started when I got the stupidest idea to use my trusty CAD program to do something fun, as we're already chained to each other, probably for life.
The problem with it is that it's not an art software, it's used for technical drawing and mostly operates with straight lines, arches and circles. It also doesn't support tapering lines. The plus side is that, once you get a hang of the 3-point arc tool, you can do pretty much everything with it, plus a few straight lines here and there. Modifying lines, editing and deleting them is also incredibly easy and quick. What you get are speedy, precise traces, with crisp, straight lines, perfect for filling in with colour - as the program itself checks for any unconnected lines.
I found this unsuitable for tracing characters, as it's so precise it appears cold and clinical, especially for an anime like SKU where tapering lines are half the battle. However, it has so far been perfect for architectural elements and backgrounds, albeit the product is (so far, more due to my faulty coloring process than the lineart itself) minimalistic.

So that's the process: I vector it out, export it as a .pdf file of GIGANTIC proportions, open it in PS and fill in the colours as sampled from the original image.
And here is where I need help:
I traced this beauty from the EM Gallery


filled it in with simple Paint Bucket, and got this

I tried to replicate the stained-glass effect of the rose, but my settings were kinda crappy so I need to rethink that.

My question is: How do I (using PS or some other program) replicate the sky in the background as faithfully as possible? My knowledge of such things in PS is lacking and the method I use isn't able to replicate the pretty watercolour effect and the subtle transitions, but the image is kind of dull without the night sky. I tried inserting some random SPACE!!! pics, but nothing really does it justice. I would like to eventually print it out as a poster for my room, or at least use it as a phone wallpaper or something, as I absolutely adore that window.

PS Masters, Onegai!!!

I used libreoffice writer the last time I had to do this.

Recently, I am unable to watch videos online, Youtube works fine but everything else (southpark.cc.com for example) - not. I see just a blank space in place where video should be.
I have Shockwave Flash, SilverLight, OpenH264 Video Codec and something called PrimeTime Content Decryption Module, all of them updated. I use AdBlock and anti-virus but I disabled everything and I still can't watch videos.
I've tried to re-install Mozilla, install Opera (miniature of video appeared but when I pressed a "play" button it went into "loading forever" mode) , I have even given Internet Explorer a try and it's still not working at all. 
Do you have any idea what can I do? 
Thanks in advance.

Enea wrote:

Recently, I am unable to watch videos online, Youtube works fine but everything else (southpark.cc.com for example) - not. I see just a blank space in place where video should be.
I have Shockwave Flash, SilverLight, OpenH264 Video Codec and something called PrimeTime Content Decryption Module, all of them updated. I use AdBlock and anti-virus but I disabled everything and I still can't watch videos.
I've tried to re-install Mozilla, install Opera (miniature of video appeared but when I pressed a "play" button it went into "loading forever" mode) , I have even given Internet Explorer a try and it's still not working at all. 
Do you have any idea what can I do? 
Thanks in advance.

What hardware are you running? What OS? What browser were you using when this happened?