I just got my new keyboard from newegg. A day early, as usual. Can't beat newegg. My keyboard is a Saitek Eclipse II, and I highly recommend it. The keys are just the right firmness and as a bonus, this keyboard makes no noise whatsoever when you type. The space bar is extra wide so you can hit it easily. So far as looks it can't be beaten, obviously. Lights up in three colors, and the font of the keys on the keyboard is even nice. It also somehow has a narrower base than my old sucky Dell default keyboard, meaning it fits better on my keyboard shelf. It also has rubber feet so it has no chance of sliding around. It feels sturdy, nice and heavy. One of the greatest things though is that it does NOT have tons of stupid useless keys. It has a few multimedia control keys I could probably live without, but other than that, nothing. No "EMAIL" key, no "HEWLAT PACKERD!1!!!11" key, nothing extraneous. I never use that crap anyways.

Works great in Linux, for the most part. This guide on Gentoo-Wiki worked well enough to get my few multimedia keys working, using xmodmap and xbindkeys (both in Portage). I just set every key to run various dcop amarok player commands. KDE doesn't play nicely with some of the multimedia keys however. XF86AudioMute is usurped by KDE and does nothing but display "Mute On" or "Mute Off" in some ugly OSD window. Apparently KMilo is to blame but I can't figure out how to either turn it off without b0rking all my keys, or leave it on and get it to let me control the keys myself. Such is life.

I got a new computer a few days ago. This is my first try at building one myself from scratch. I got everything from newegg. I HIGHLY recommend them. I paid for 3-day shipping, and had it in 2 days. All parts work great. Very good updates on order status etc. And the prices are very good.

• CPU AMD|A64 X2 3800+ 2.0G 939 1M R - Retail (Qty=1, Price=$297.00)
• MEM 1Gx2|CORSAIR Twinx2048-3200c2pt - Retail (Qty=1, Price=$188.00)
• MB ASUS A8N-SLI NF4SLI 939 - Retail (Qty=1, Price=$106.99)
• VGA XFX|GF6800XT 256M PVT42EUDE3 RT - Retail (Qty=1, Price=$129.99)
• HD 300G|ST 7K 8M SATA2 ST3300822AS - OEM (Qty=1, Price=$99.99)
• PSU ASUS | A-50GA 500W RT - Retail (Qty=1, Price=$99.99)
• xCASE COOLERMAS|CAC-T05-UW BLK RT - Retail (Qty=1, Price=$44.99)
• SATA II CABLE |SILVERSTONE CP02 RT - Retail (Qty=1, Price=$5.99)

Total: $992.53

Not a bad deal at all. There's $100 in mail-in rebates too. When I take into account selling my old computer(s) it'll be maybe $500-$600.

The ASUS A8N-SLI motherboard works very well with Linux. I finally get a computer that supports lm_sensors! I'm in geek heaven. (I now can tell that CPU fan is currently running at 1739 RPM!) Dual core goodness makes Gentoo-compiling things a breeze.

I've taken some pictures of the computer. *is a geek* *enjoys being a geek*

One,Two, Three, Four, and a screenshot.