Thanks

Photos

By SS*Ryly and {DFM}Ice-IX

Click on the thumbnails to view the photos


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We signed up within 2 minutes of registration opening but, as you can see, there were a few people ahead of us.


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To beat the high prices at the hotel, we stocked up and brought our own drinks.


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Traveling light!


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We got to the Gaylord Texas at about 3:30 PM … This is a HUGE place!


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The staff is willing and eager to help … for a price.


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The Gaylord Texas … Born May 7, 2004.


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This is the lobby as you first walk in the door.


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The stars above the arches are a nice touch.


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If you didn't come to the Gaylord Texan for Quakecon, there is still plenty to do.


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Riding the elevator up … Weeeeeeeeee!


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This is a view from the balcony of our room.


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Room view … Panorama 1.


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Room view … Panorama 2.


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Room view … Panorama 3. Yup, our room is behind the oil derrick.


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Room view … Panorama 4.


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Room view … Panorama 5.


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Gawd damned smokers!


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Another balcony view of the atrium.


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The room itself.


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The bathroom.


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The tub (it is a very nice shower, by the way).


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Izmu, Alien, and Banshee


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OMG! The giant Grapevine Football!


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There were a number of exhibits in the atrium … Model trains …


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… Complete with a little train station


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Coming 'round the bend.


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There is a caboose.


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Another model train crossing a bridge.


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Almost across.


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A model windmill, well, and waterhouse.


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NASA also had an exhibit with models of the shuttle and photos.


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Bloodwolf gets pwned by the door.


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Ryly is all smiles while waiting to get into the BYOC.


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Alien reviews results from previous tournaments.


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At this point, Izmu has been up for about 23 hours.


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The registration desk … Not quite ready to open.


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These people started lining up at 6:00 PM.


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Remember those green nVidia chairs from last year … They're baaaaack!


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More people waiting to get into the BYOC Wednesday night.


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The Information Desk is full of useful information and suggestions.


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The line finally started moving at about 4:00 AM. We were all a little tired by then.


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We've made the final turn and are heading for the registration desk.


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Finally! Set up in the BYOC at 5:00 AM.


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Let's frag! On second thought, I think I'm going to sleep.


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Some quick shots of the BYOC … The NOC under the Quakecon banner.


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If I can't see the banner, it can't see me! :)


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More PCs, the banner, and the vendor area way in the back.


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This is the tournament area. It was against the far wall, separated from the BYOC by the vendor area … A much better arrangement.


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Fatal1ty was at Quakecon 2005, playing randomly selected challengers in the Creative booth.


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Everyone commented on how terrible the water tasted. I thought it was interesting the pipe was labeled … Hmmmm.


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Black checks Alien's computer for hacks.


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Black and Alien share a moment.


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The lighting in the BYOC was much better this year. Four sets of uplights gave an eerie appearance from the distance.


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The Senior Gaming League was back with their BYOC tourney … Only old guys (over 30) could enter.


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This video game is actually a PC running MAME and could play tons of old video games.


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OK, as bad as the chair looks, this was an acceptable use.


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Make a case mod out of it!


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Friday morning and a few people were still registering to get into the BYOC.


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Ah, motherhood!


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The RtCW contingent.


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Banshee and MsMoody


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Alien and Hack ran a number of BYOC tournaments.


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nVidia had a large booth in the vendor area. This is the entrance.


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They had laptops setup to demonstrate their video chips.


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They also had desktops setup to demonstrate their video boards running the latest games.


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They also had a small LAN setup for gaming.


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The nVidia booth with a booth babe.


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The nVidia lounge area complete with green chairs. :P


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The Intel booth was as large or larger then nVidia's. Here is the front.


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Intel had about 20 machines setup for gaming. Many were running Doom 3 and Quake 4.


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More Intel gaming machines …


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Good grief, even more Intel gaming machines!


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The Intel lounge area with Quake 3 frag videos running in the background.


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Fatal1ty was at the Creative booth.


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This was the deal … Just beat him and win $500 of merchandise. Most people scored -1 or 0.


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Activision had a large booth too.


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The primary attraction was a 10 player Quake 4 Free For All.


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Another shot of the Quake 4 FFA area. It was first come, first serve, play as long as you wanted.


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Razer was showing off their new Copperhead mouse.


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The Linksys booth. Ask a question, get a T-shirt!


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Ageia was passing out information on their new physics co-processor cards. Hopefully Q4 will support them.


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You could learn everything you ever wanted to know about memory at the Kingston booth.


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Enermax was displaying cases and power supplies.


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Even the Guildhall had a booth in the vendor area!


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The Blue Gears booth. They had some neat system monitoring accessories for cases.


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The front of the Alienware booth.


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The Z-board booth.


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A Bawls Slurpee really hits the spot on a hot August afternoon!


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The clothier was tucked away quietly in the back of the vendor area.


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Chillin' at the Linksys booth.


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Ryly entered the Ms Quakecon tournament again this year. The first round was an elimination FFA. She did well. :)


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Ms.X went undefeated through the winners bracket.


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Missy emerged at the top of the losers bracket.


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Ryly finished tied for 7th! W00t!


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What an excellent idea!


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Alien shows 'em how to play Quake 4.


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Duck!


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Hack celebrated his birthday on Friday night.


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… And a good time was had by all.


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Alien and Bloodwolf face off in Air Hockey.


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Alien put up a valient effort …


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… But Bloodwolf won the game 6 - 4.


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Somebody was busy Friday night!


[104] qc053002.jpg

Nice liquid-cooled rig.


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This is Project Lament … the Hellraiser PC.


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This is a nice way to keep both your CPU and your Bawls cool.


[107] qc053005.jpg

This mod began as a toolbox from Home Depot.


[108] qc053006.jpg

This mod pays homage to the Ford F40.


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It features dual exhausts, emergency blinkers (if the LAN fails), a 108db horn, and genuine Ford logos from a Texas dealership.


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This case has a nice wood finish with metal accents.


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Another shot of the same case.


[112] qc053010.jpg

Obviously, the guy is a Parrothead.


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I just liked the wallpaper.


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How … Floral!


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This 100% walnut case took about 3 months to build.


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A commercial micro-tower case.


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Nice looking alien face for the side window.


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This mod was tucked away in the back of the BYOC. The PC is installed inside the mannequin.


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Unfortunately, it looks like it has a virtual memory error, disk controller error, virus, or memory problem. :(


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Another shot, up close.


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The caseless wonder.


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Not really a case mod, but I like model rockets too.


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This rig not only looked nice but scored 15,827 in the Alienware benchmarks. Not bad!


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This is one of two machines Hack brought. He ran 4 tournament servers on each one and they were smoooooth.


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A commercial inverted ATX case, the PC-V2100 by Lian Li.


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A nice diamond-plate case mod.


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This miniature version of the Donkey Kong arcade game actually works.


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After waiting 8 hours to get into the BYOC on Wednesday night, this little unit suddenly makes a lot of sense.


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Another commercial inverted ATX case, the PC-V1000B, also by Lian Li.


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This huge case has plenty of room for storage.


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… And it looks kewl in the dark!


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Another mod using the same case.


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Ellis's Plexiglas case.


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Another double-wide case. Note the Aerocool Gatewatch panel taking up 2 5.25" slots.


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A modded Mac Cube.


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I think these DDR DIMMs are pretty slick.


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This unassuming PC scored 16,319 in the Alienware benchmarks.


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Another diamond-plate case mod.


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This cooling tower resembles Dallas City Hall.


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A closer look at the innards of the cooling tower.


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The fish tank PC. The mother board is submerged in mineral oil!


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Saturday afternoon and there are plenty of seats in the BYOC.


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More empty seats.


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Not having a confirmed BYOC spot is not an excuse …


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... There are plenty of empty seats!


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The Bawls chugging contest.


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More chugging.


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A female chugger!


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MC Hammer's white cousin finished his bottle in 15.6 seconds. Weak!


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The winner (not this guy) chugged a bottle of Bawls in 3.4 seconds!


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The Quake 2 Tourney finals featured PURRI from Sweden, coming from the winners bracket …


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… vs Doze from the United States, coming from the losers bracket.


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PURRI won the first game, the championship, and $10,000.


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The Ms. Quakecon Tourney finals (Q3A) featured Ms.X, coming from the winners bracket …


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… vs Missy, coming from the losers bracket.


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Missy dominated both games and picked up $15,000. Girlz of Destruction finished 1, 2, 3 in the tourney.


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The Doom3 finals featured RocketBoy from China, coming from the winners bracket …


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… vs fnatic\\gopher from the U.K., coming from the losers bracket.


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gopher won both games, including a thrilling come-from behind in the second game to take home the $25,000 first prize.


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This is how you take a fish tank PC home at the end of Quakecon.


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Compared to my DSL connection, the LAN connection is just freaking sweet!


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… And it seemed to have a positive effect on my game. :)


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We literally played till dawn. When we got back to the room, this was waiting under the door. Ouch!