I'm now doing what I should have done nearly three years ago -- purchasing parts and building my own computer. I'll be updating this post as I go.

ESSENTIAL PARTS

CASE: Coolermaster CM590
PSU: Silverstone Element ST50EF 500W
M/B: ASUS P5Q Pro
CPU: Intel E8400
RAM: Mushkin Redlines PC2-8000 2x2GB
VIDEO: Diamond Radeon HD 4850
DRIVE: Samsung SH-S203N DVD±RW w/ Lightscribe
HDD: Hitachi Deskstar 500GB

WISHLIST

+ Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro (CPU heatsink/fan)
+ Arctic Cooling Accelero S1 Rev.2 (VGA heatsink)

PROGRESS

The system is now built and, miraculously, booted on the first attempt (seriously one of the best feelings in the world). Running Windows XP Home.

For all those who either (1.) can't afford Flash CS3, (2.) want a cleaner, less-intensive development environment, or (3.) plan on writing flash apps/games in pure code, here's a plug to the great FlashDevelop, an Actionscript IDE meant to compliment Adobe's free Flex 2 SDK. It features a great Visual Studio-ish GUI, complete with syntax highlighting (of course), property/method listing, code completion, integration with the Flex 2 SDK, and more.

It can also be installed in "standalone" mode, writing nothing to the registry and no user appdata -- perfect for a flash drive.

Here lies the second installment to my flash/actionscript showcase. The first was posted nearly three months ago -- I figured it's high time for an update.

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SHOWCASE #2: AS2's 'Key' Emulation (AS3)

I wrote this class many months ago, refining it gradually to this day (as I do with most of my classes). It completely emulates the old Key class from Actionscript 2, but with built-in constants for every common key on the board. It's quite the nuisance having to look up the ASCII keycode for nearly every key you need (such as WASD), but no longer. In my AS3 Keys class, every letter and number is built-in -- in addition to the general [SHIFT], [CTRL], [SPACE] and such that the AS2 Key class had.

Checking the letter 'A':

In AS2:
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Key.isDown(65);
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With my class, in AS3:
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Key.isDown[Keys.A];
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Note the use of square brackets [] rather than parentheses (). This is because isDown is an array, rather than a function, à la AS2's Key.

Back to AS2's simplicity, and then some. The class handles the event listeners and everything, all you have to do is instantiate it:

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import Keys;
var Key :Object = new Keys(stage);
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You MUST pass the stage as an argument to the Keys constructor so that it can add the event listeners.

Anybody is free to use this class. In exchange, a blurb in your credits would be nice. :)

Comments make me seize with rapture.

~ DarkMana

I've decided to start a sporadically-updated showcase of my Actionscript ability. I'll be posting all kinds of things, from visual effects to useful class files in either AS2 or 3. Check back often!

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SHOWCASE #1: FIRE PARTICLE EFFECT (AS2)

I made this one a while back, it's my best particle effect to date. The (messy, disorganized) source .fla is available if you'd like it, just drop me a PM.

Comments are tasty.

~ DarkMana

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EDIT: Re-linked to a more permanent location.