HAPPY NEW YEAR, EVERYONE OUT THERE! All the best to you in 1999! Yippie!... It's 6pm and I'm still at work... typing this out (no, I'm not cheering about still being here at work)! Well, I have FINALLY finished putting together a PC from scratch and without any hitches... Well, this is actually after 2 unsuccessful attempts with 2 other motherboards that turned out to be defective. This happened all over the course of a little over a week and probably over a total of 10 to 12 hours of troubleshooting which included researching tech-support databases (from the motherboard manufacture, First International Computer or FIC of Taiwan, and the core chipset manufacturer, VIA Technologies) on the Web and reinstalling and reconfiguring software and the BIOS. PC Guide was also kinda helpful — informative, at least! Actually, the first 2 tries weren't complete failures because on the first occasion, the motherboard was defective and just wouldn't boot up completely and on the second occasion, the motherboard worked perfectly and Windows 98 installed just fine on it with CD-ROM, network, and sound working except the USB ports were dead! So this third motherboard, an FIC PA-2013, works great, including the built-in USB ports (the second motherboard, an FIC VA-503+, required a USB riser-card that plugged into the motherboard with an 8-pin connector). Unlike the previous motherboards, the PA-2013 is compliant with the ATX-size platform which requires a bigger case and different power supply than the older "AT" platform. Each newer motherboard I got cost more, but only around US$25 more! I suggest that when choosing between different motherboards you spend the little extra to get a better, more reliable one. I certainly learned a lot over the past week fiddling with motherboard jumper settings, BIOS settings, IDE, floppy, and power supply connectors. It was challenging, frustrating and time-consuming, but well worth it in the end... The reason I needed the USB ports to be working was because for a pitch, we wanted to do a video conference over the Internet with my old boss in New York, Wick Smith, using Microsoft NetMeeting software and a USB-based video camera. BTW, the Kodak DVC323 digital video camera I bought for HK$1,200 (US$150) works super. I'd recommend it over the Logitech, Microtech, and Connectix QuickCam video camera products which are also sold here... I took some pictures using the DVC323 and was planning on putting it up here but it's now almost 6:30pm and I've got to meet Gwen NOW in Causeway Bay for a party at Rob and Janey's place in Happy Valley! I'll put those pictures up here later but in the meantime, I hope you have a wild and crazy but safe Happy New Year's celebration! CHEERS!!! Oh, in case you're wondering, I still prefer Macs and my everyday machine is a PowerBook 3400 which I'm very happy with — although a PowerBook G3 would be nice! I do like Windows PCs too though!