Is Three UPSs Enough?

I have three UPS (Uninterruptible Power Supply) devices in the living room. I'm not an electrician, but it seems like we have power surges too often here. One proof is that my CD-ROM drive, USB hard disk and couple of routers and many light bulbs have stopped working without any obvious reason in a very short time, that is, in a few weeks. Yeah, well, machines tend to break anyway, so that doesn't mean it's the power surges. Another proof besides broken stuff is that my three UPS machines are making a clicking noise every day and that noise should only happen when there is a power surge. At least next time when one of my consoles, routers, USB hard disks or other electric equipment stop working I know it's not the power surge (unless the UPS has stopped working, of course) and I can blame the equipment itself. The reason why I have three UPS devices is that I have five consoles (and one backup Xbox 360), a modem, routers, an SVGA monitor, a television, a digital box (TiVo like machine), three computers, home theatre, printer/scanner and other stuff and I don't need to switch cables whenever I'm going to use a certain peripheral.


My three UPSs on the floor.

In each of my UPS devices, there are four outlets with power surge protection and battery backup and another four outlets for only power surge protection. In addition to that there is also surge protection for Ethernet connection. In the below picture the ADSL modem is connected with the red Ethernet cable to the UPS and the wireless/wired router is connected with the blue Ethernet cable to the UPS. One Xbox 360 (white Ethernet cable) and one PlayStation 3 (gray Ethernet cable) is connected to the router.


Ethernet surge protection in practise.

Less Multiplayer, More Achievements

I'm not addicted to getting a higher Gamerscore, but I have so low Gamerscore for too many of my games, so I decided to play multiplayer games less this month. My favorite multiplayer games are Project Gotham Racing 3 (PGR3), UNO, Halo 3 (including co-op campaign), Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (COD4) and Call of Duty: World at War (COD5). After completing Halo Wars campaign on Hardcore difficulty in co-op I played Animal Crossing: Let's Go to the City with my Nintendo Wii until I got to the point where my city now has a waterfall and a lighthouse, and where I could no longer make my house bigger. There's still more to do, but I got bored with it at that point.

I have bought more games than I have time to play, because I've wanted to see different kind of games, so it was time to get some achievements for a while. I played My Horse and Me 2 for 820 Gamerscore and then I finished LEGO Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures for 1000 Gamerscore.

I still have games with 0 Gamerscore, so I have tried to get at least one achievement in those games. I played Kung Fu Panda and SEGA Superstars Tennis a little bit. I tried Feeding Frenzy, one of those few 60 Hz games that don't work with my SVGA CRT monitor, so I needed to play it with my HD TV. I got some achievements in Luxor 2, but I got stuck on level 10-2, so I switched to another game (I might try to finish the stages later, but this game is too simple to be played for many hours). I got two achievements in Warlords, one in Asteroids & Asteroids Deluxe, one in Yie Ar Kung Fu and one in Sensible World of Soccer (SWOS). I also tried Geometry Wars Evolved and Tempest again, but didn't get any achievements for them. Some games really have hardcore achievements! Now for a past few days I've been playing Rapala Tournament Fishing and it's not as simple as you might think. You need to switch lure types and sizes and fishing spots until you start getting certain target fish you are supposed to get to complete tournaments and time challenges.

My Xbox 360 Repair History

My Xbox 360 console has been replaced three times so far. I bought my first Xbox 360 console on January 2nd, 2006. It's the Core version since I thought I would play only by myself, but later I bought a Gold membership for Xbox Live, headset, camera, wireless racing wheel, and so on.

My Xbox 360 showed me three red lights known as "Red Ring of Death" (RRoD) on March 1st, 2007. It took me 20 days to receive my first replacement console on March 21st, 2007 from Germany. That console lasted approximately 6 hours, so I had to wait approximately two weeks to get my second replacement console.

I received my second replacement Xbox 360 console on April 2nd, 2007. It scratched and destroyed my COD4 disc, so I sent it for repair on January 22nd, 2008. Then it scratched and destroyed my GTAIV disc and I sent it for repair on May 7th, 2008. Finally, on January 11th, 2009 it showed me three red lights, so I sent it for repair on January 14th, 2009.

I received my third replacement console on January 23rd, 2009. I have been using it since then. After the NXE update I have installed my games to the Xbox 360 Hard Drive to avoid scratching my discs. Because it takes approximately two weeks each time my Xbox 360 Core console is being sent for repair on January 12th, 2009 I bought an Xbox 360 Arcade console.

Too bad Xbox 360 breaks so often, otherwise it would be even a better console. Why I still use Xbox 360 as my main console instead of using my PS3 or Wii is that the social aspects in Xbox 360 work so well. It's easy to add new friends, send them messages, discuss with them and see what they are doing. I hope the next generation of Xbox consoles will have less technical problems as the current one.

Gamerscore Cheaters

There appears to be websites where you can download game saves to your Xbox 360 console so you can unlock achievements in a few seconds. In 2008 Microsoft punished most serious offenders by resetting their Gamerscore and not allowing them to gain the same achievements again. One cheater, Aaron "ColdRaccoon" Mesec, from Murrieta, California told MTV Multiplayer "I started cheating, I guess, because I got addicted to gamer score completion".

There is a blog, Xbox Cheater Watch, which is dedicated to discussion about probable cheaters on Xbox Live. It has been pretty quiet this year, but you can still find blog posts about unconfirmed and confirmed cheaters. A cheater will get the text "They've been caught cheating." on their xbox.com profile. If you are interested in seeing real life examples, here are some:

aCasinoguy
Bips
CheaterMcCheat
CHIP MLC 01
ColdRaccoon
Copper Nitrate
Essential Matt
FARD0 NL
flamarlins21
Ix UK Woody xI
Kawasaki 450f
NECKSHREDDER
O0000
RiFLE DoEz WoRK
Sly Crime
StripClubDj
The Splinun
TheSwindler89

Games I'm Currently Playing Online

Below is a list of my current games in which you can ask me to play. I like to play co-op campaigns but I also play multiplayer games. I appreciate you first send me a message to max.limitz@gmail.com or a via Xbox Live to my Gamertag Max Limitz so we can agree on a time schedule. After that send me a friend request to my Xbox 360 Gamertag Max Limitz, PlayStation 3 PSN ID MaxLimitz or register my Nintendo Wii friend code 2157 0305 6854 1836 and send me yours. I also have Nintendo DS and Sony PSP, but I don't use them much. I insist you use a microphone with Xbox 360 and PS3 as it makes playing much more fun. I'm in a Finnish game clan and I have other things to do in my life also so it may take a while before we meet. And here's my list of online games I'm ready to play with others as of now:

Animal Crossing: Let's Go to the City (Wii)
Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (X360)
Call of Duty 5 (X360)
Grand Theft Auto IV (X360)
Halo 3 (X360)
Halo Wars (X360)
LEGO Star Wars: The Complete Saga (X360)
Left 4 Dead (X360)
LittleBigPlanet (PS3)
UNO (X360)

My Website and Contact Info

To see some of my game console pictures for Xbox 360, PS3 and Wii, have a visit at http://max.limitz.googlepages.com/ My website tells my nicknames and friend codes for my consoles, but I'll mention them here also. Xbox 360 gamertag: Max Limitz. PlayStation 3 PSN ID: MaxLimitz. Nintendo Wii friend code: 2157 0305 6854 1836. See also my Wii game codes on my website.

If you want to contact me about games, the best way is sending me email to my email address max.limitz@gmail.com or sending a text message via Xbox Live to my Gamertag Max Limitz as I use my Xbox 360 most of my game consoles.

If you want to add me as a friend in one of my consoles, I would appreciate a message telling me a reason, like you want to play a co-op campaign with me or visit my Animal Crossing town or something like that as the friends lists have their maximum number of people and I might wonder "who on Earth is that dude and do I need to remove someone to give him/her space on my list?". Sometimes I clean up and remove people who haven't been using their accounts for many months as that may mean they have a new nickname or they have sold their equipment or something.

Here are some instant messaging nicknames of mine. ICQ: 593921542. AOL/AIM: maxlimitzz. Skype: max.limitz. YIM: max.limitz. QuakeNet: maxlimitz. Google Talk (Gmail voice/video chat): max.limitz. I prefer Google Talk as it doesn't slow down my computer and doesn't take much memory either. I'm not a fan of instant messaging applications and I don't keep my computers open 24/7, so email and Xbox Live is the best way of contacting me.

I'll mention some of my website profiles also: Eurogamer.net. Facebook. Gamebattles.com. GamerDNA.com. GameSpot.com. Giantbomb.com. Google.com. IGN.com. MyGamerCard.net. PlayStation.com. TripleTags.com. Twitter. TrueAchievements.com. WiiSpace.com. Xbox360Achievements.org. YouTube.

And here are some of my Finnish language website profiles also: Gaming.fi. KonsoliFIN. Livegamers.fi. Livenurkka.net. Pelaajalehti.com. Tilt.tv. V2.fi.