Originally this post was going to be a review of this video card, but instead, it’s a consumer warning. Having mostly been a lightweight gamer, I’ve never felt the need to buy a full tower case. I only need a few drives, a single video card and maybe a large CPU cooler, but a mini-tower case has filled my needs since I bought my first PC.

However, last week I upgraded my video card. My Nvidia-based BFG 7950GT can’t handle the new games out there and even the latest patch to World of Warcraft (3.0.2) dropped my FPS quite significantly. The new GTX 260′s will handle almost everything that games can dish out now, except for the fact that it’s huge! It weights in a 2x heavier than my laptop (albiet the lightweight e4200) and it’s 10.5″ long. That means that my poor Antec Solo case cannot fit it behind the internal drive bays.

Off to Canada Computers to look for a new case…

There is no arguing that the Xbox has been successful, very successful. But the designers at Microsoft didn’t really plan for the list of games to grow to such a huge extent – nor the explosive success of “casual” games. It’s becoming a pain to scroll through long lists of games on your Xbox to find the one you want to play, or buy the right one in the marketplace, they have redesigned the user experience.

Next Wednesday, the 19th, a new update will be pushed to the Xbox with a dramatically different user inteface. A preview is on the Xbox Live site. Along with the new update, there will be a Video Marketplace, Parties, Community Games and Avatars.

I saw this recipe on Roger’s TV show this week and gave it a shot myself, with a few exclusions because I was crunched for time. Served with some sauted spinach that had a dash of sesame oil.

While the Americans get their $9990 Nissan Versa Sedan, Canada’s cheapest car comes in as the $13,595 Hyundai Accent Hatchback. Earlier this year, the Accent was priced at $9995 but our dollar is not as strong as it was in April.

The Toronto Star took delivery of one of the $9995 models in June and have been blogging regularly about it since then. Their Accent Blog is pretty insightful about what you give up to slip into Canada’s most inexpensive car.

I’ve noticed for quite some time that this is one of my most read posts on my blog. It seems there is a lot of pent-up interest in the status of this condo development project. The 1 Bloor East, or 1BE as it’s known on the forums, is a large, luxury development at the corner of Yonge and Bloor. The developer is Bazis from Kazakhstan.The original buildings have been demolished and the grounds have been leveled and cleared before the winter. However, the lot has remained dormant of construction activity for quite some time.

Two articles have recently commented on the lack of building activity on the site. Toronto Life published a long article that confirms a lot of the Urban Toronto rumors – the financing of the building and ownership of the laneway is tied up with Lehman Brothers. Lehman went bankrupt last year and the ownership rights are being fought out in US courts. This is also apparent from the City of Toronto filing and an article from Global News.

The latest information is always available at the Urban Toronto forum, be sure to navigate to the last page of the thread – it’s 250 pages at last count.

Before the weekend my new Dell e4200 arrived. The first thing I noticed was how light the packaging was – this laptop is really light! A 2.2lbs weight is fine, but the accessories including the external drive and power adaptor are also featherweights. The power adaptor was the biggest surprise as it’s the same size as an iPhone – no large bricks for this small laptop.

This notebook is packed with great features, LED backlight for increased power consumption and reduced size/weight; an external battery meter that lights up 5 LED’s to indicate how much life is left on the battery without turning the laptop on; solid-state drives for better performance, power consumption and the reliability of no-moving-parts; speedy DDR3 RAM; and, a thin 0.75-1.1″ profile and 2.2lbs weight.

Overall I’m pretty happy with the laptop. The fast memory and fast hard drive make Windows performance zippy even though the CPU speed is a slow 1.2ghz. It’s as thin as IBM’s X300 and has more features than the Macbook Air like an SD card slot, ethernet port and eSATA port.

Watches are pretty important for a guy. For most, it’s our only piece of jewelery besides a wedding ring. While Rolex has always been known for the “king” of the elegant watch, I’ve always found their style a bit boring – a bit too traditional.

While helping my friend shop for a nice woman’s watch, I stumbled upon a new update to a classic Rolex. The Oyster Perpetual Day-Date II. The II is important since it signifies the updated, contemporary look. Now I have to start saving my pennies.

Every Christmas season iLounge releases a buyers guide for everything iPod. This covers and rates many of the accessories that have made the iPod as hot as it was from the first day. From earphones to docking stations to armbands, they cover the whole gamut of accessories. Check it out at iLounge.

Saw a TV segment this week about Roger’s new CD: Soul Food. He’s also been on TV with his show, Everyday Exotic. If you plan it right, you can find Roger bouncing between Kultura and Nyood cooking up some of the best food I’ve tasted. He’s also doing a cooking demo at Summerhill LCBO on Saturday, Nov 15th.