21:16 All uploading has been put on hold due to finally deciding to take the plunge re upgrading my main computer. Had toyed with the idea of a dedicated games console due to not being able to keep up with the latest flight, rail, ship sims, graphic and memory wise. Unfortunately, no console game programmers seem to cater for serious simmers, so either a new pc or my existing one suped up was called for.

Obviously the cheaper option was to upgrade, so i duely purchase 'a bundle'. This comprised of a Gigabyte GA-M68M-S2 mother board/AMD 8850 Phenom triple core CPU/XFX Gamer GT240 graphics card/4 gigs of ram.

I've never tackled this sort of upgrade before, so did so in the certain knowledge there would be some sod's law to hold me up somewhere.

All went well swapping the mother board, but said sod's law came in the shape of the front panel switch plug not fitting the board socket. Bit of head scratching followed, whilst i wondered why the manufacturer didn't think of supplying a suitable plug. Anyway, using logic i checked the plug pins with a multimeter (none of them marked as to purpose) and discovered that if the plug was inserted at one end of the socket the right way round, the switch pins would marry up with the power- on pins of the socket. I wasn't worried about associated led lights etc, but it would seem the manufacturer may have anticipated the fitting of this switch socket as the led did activate anyway. Pitty there was nothing to indicate this arrangement would work in the instructions, assuming of course that it was meant to work and not just a coincidence. It would have saved a lot of hassle.

I had visions of of making my own switch, but this did the trick as the fans fired up ok. The hard drive, unfortunately didn't. More head scratching, then i noticed i had ommited to connect one 4 pin supply to the board. That connected, the drive fired up and the bios appeared on the screen. Thank goodness for that.

The rest, as they say, is history. Needless to say, i have since been loading up and playing all the games i either couldn't before, or at least had to go easy on the graphics etc. Now i can run all my sims with the wicks turned right up, Brilliant!. No doubt next years sims will need 8 gigs instead of 4. Oh well, i'm cool for the time being anyway.

I'll connect the weather centre at least back up tomorrow. I've cleared the desk of radio's to sort out the computer so sstv is out for the time being.