The Taming of The Beast

A long time ago, in a country far, far away a certain guy commissioned a computer to be built. A computer of epic proportions. And so it came to pass that The Beast came into being. And, if you hadn’t already guessed, that guy was me.

My computers usually have to serve me for a good many years (often spanning several releases of Windows) and therefore I don’t balk at spending a fair amount of money on them.

The brief was fairly simple. It had to be silent. It had to be capable of running two displays (one of which was my projector). Also, I wanted it to run the latest version of Windows. Vista; Ultimate Edition no less. Five hard disks, the most expensive processor I could justify buying and a water-cooled case.

I’d put together a few computers in my time. This time I handed the baton to my good friend Julian who helped me choose the components and, more importantly, put it together.

The computer was built and eventually arrived. And boy was it big. And heavy. While its considerable bulk and mass could be considered by some as an antitheft measure (how can you steal what you cannot move?) it certainly didn’t help Julian’s hernia when he had to get it into the boot of his car and bring it to me. Luckily nobody was (seriously) harmed in the process of moving the computer and I was able to enjoy my new computer. For a while anyway…

Things started to go wrong with the computer and I had to frequently delve into the computer to fix one thing or another. It is said that an angry swan has enough power in its wing to break a man’s arm (or leg, I can never remember which). So it was with The Beast’s case. The door to the motherboard was so heavily sprung that I swear it could easily inflict mortal injury.

Eventually the computer died one component at a time and The Beast became a monolithic testament to the times when I had more money than sense. With a move to Poland in the offing, it no longer seemed such a good idea to have a computer in a suitcase-sized box. Eventually I donated the case to my friend, bought a new motherboard (with built in graphics) and salvaged the remaining components. The Beast had undergone a metamorphosis. It had shed its outer skinner and now lived caseless on top of my wardrobe.

I moved to Poland and for nine long months The Beast waited patiently for me in the Bat Cave (as I call my garage back in Brighton). Then in January 2012 I brought The Beast to Poland. We have lived happily ever after (apart from another change of motherboard). I even bought a case (named Harry) and even considered a name change. But the name remains the same, serving to remind me of those heady days of when I was a reckless consumerist. 

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