well that Matt in NYC was me, so I thought it might be fun to reply to some of the things I read about my "performance".
"...BOTH THE F*CKTARDS put the floppy cables in backwards so all they got was $100+pib. jeez, the second guy had like 5 minutes to double check everything just to make sure it would boot but no. what a joke, the people didn't belong on stage."
-thanks for the f*cktards part, but first of all, no one said that either of us belonged on stage. i got picked as one of the five, and even though i gave some pretty stupid answers, i still ended up building a box in front of a crowd.
"One of the builders was too funny...he started putting the cards in while the motherboard was still out of the case. People couldn't believe it. I guess it can be done, but why would you?"
-seriously, i got a lot of crap about that, but here's why i did it (and i never tried that approach before). one night late on techtv they were talkign about how if you put an agp card in its slot while the mobo is mounted theres a chance that the mobo will bend from the pressure and it wont seat right. i thought i wouldnt take my chances, but man did you guy yell at me.
"I think I might have overheard someone talking with Matt after the match, about him being colorblinded or something but can't be sure. But even so, colorblinded or not, he should still be able to see that red lined edge on one side of the floppy cable and all he had to really do was to make sure it was aligned with the pin 1 on the floppy connector. "
-color deficient, not colorblind. it's not black and white, but most everything looks like something else. ive only put together two computers before that night, and neither time have i ever noticed a red stripe/edge/whatever. worse than any stripe was the damn spotlight in my eyes that glared everything over.
"The other guy obivously never built a box as he was trying to put in the graphics card in before installing the MB. You should have seen as he was attempting to use his entire body wait to force the card in not realizing the tab for the AGP slot... I think he busted the tab. "
-that 4600 is huge. the problem was it was catching on the ram tab that i didnt see, and it overlapped the ide cables. i did that not once, but twice. the assistant guy seemed to think it was funny.
"and that T&L question, that's an easy 4 points out of 5 there You should have been the one putting that rig together, not that clown trying to force that GF4 card down the agp slot And what was that remark he made about someone's girlfriend? lol"
-yeah, the t&l question that i got wrong. i cant build a box well...fine. but getting t&l wrong was the worst part of the night. the girlfriend remark was that; in the middle of the contest i start getting a phone call, so as i went to hang up i noticed that it was the gf of a friend who i went to the show with. i figured i should let him know
"The "Battle of the Boxes" event should have more qualifications. Just answering questions --many of them memorized from internet postings from people who went to previous events-- does not qualify someone to actually build a pc. Some determination should be made that contestants actually have some hardware knowledge. Otherwise, it can easily turn into a lame half hour demonstration. Yes, no winner of these contests saves AMD money, but the idea is to show off winners, isn't it?"
-i didnt memorize anything...my group just didnt have Will in it. sorry it was lame, but i dont think amd was trying to save money since there really wasnt much to the building part. i just got a lot of the software questions right, and many wrong, but still came out on top.
"Yeah and those guys up there doing the battle of the boxes were pretty much idiots I mean wouldn't you check to make sure the floppy cables were connnected directly and not do the same mistake like the other guy... "
-yeah, usually i would have made a mental note of what happened to the other guy, but for some reason i didnt pay attention to when his boot failed and after that i kinda toned out because pacing myself was going a little too slowly.
"I do this all the time... and I'm sure everyone have done it as well. That is why my current box does not have a floppy. And being on stage, with everyone screaming at you makes it that much harder. But they did have plenty of time and should have double checked their work"
-honestly, when i build a cpu i dont care if it boots in one shot. the whole contest was kinda silly to me. i guess thats why im into software. but it was still real fun, and afterwards i got to be a local celebrity for a short time. one of you guys squeezed the crap out of my hand before getting on the uptown subway. next time maybe you will be up there, and hopefully you'll win.
-matt