Unreal

My bank won't let me purchase things overseas with my debit card unless I call them first and request the restriction to be lifted for a day. I needed a Windows 10 key, but they're $130 or so in the U.S. In Europe they're $44.04. Long story short, after I still couldn't get the transaction to work even after calling the bank, I noticed the shop I was using had an Amazon Pay option. I looked it up. It lets you pay through Amazon with your debit card for no fee. It worked! I have my new Windows 10 Pro key.

Unreal Engine 5.x

Aside from the fact that Windows is slowly dying on my PC, I need to upgrade in order to run Unreal Engine. I don't have enough free disk space. For those not familiar with it, it's a piece of software that can be used to develop video games and make things like videos and still images. YouTube has some videos of things people have made with it. It can be quit amazing, especially Unreal Engine 5.2. One of the things I can use it for is making what I hope will be awesome book covers.

I've used the BigWorld game engine in the past while trying to help a startup company get up and running. The project turned out to be too big for a startup, and the company never took off. I'm hoping I'll be able to use those skills to stage book covers in Unreal Engine and possibly make trailer videos, although book covers would be enough.

With the Windows key, I'll be able to install a clean copy of Windows onto an SSD drive. My PC won't run Windows 11, and a  new PC is simply too expensive. So, for the cost of two SSD drives(one for Windows and one for software) and a Windows key, I can get a significant upgrade. One of the SSD drives is already here. I burned a Windows install disk before even trying to buy a key. All I need to do now is wait for the other drive to arrive tomorrow. If I don't run into any problems, I should be able to do the Windows install this weekend. After that I'd have to install all the software I use, which will take a long time.

For future upgrades, I could upgrade the CPU, the memory and the video card. Memory and CPU would give me relatively small improvements. The video card would be significant.

If the learning curve isn't too steep, there should be real book covers coming. I'd like to do the novella cover first and get it out the door. It depends on what I can do with Unreal.

Have a great weekend.

Meaningless Interlude

It's been a while. Last week something unusual happened. My internet connection was down. It's the fiber line that replaced the cell phone I was using that replaced the 1.5Mpbs dsl line that was the only other option where I live. The week before that I hit a wall with fatigue due to another sinus infection. I think I have another tooth abscess. Isn't that fun. It's kind of like it's one thing after another.

Other than that there's not a lot to report. It's been a somewhat negative month. I need a new computer, but it's too expensive at the moment. I'm thinking of buying a cheap OEM license for Windows 10 and an SSD drive and using my old components for an "upgrade". Why would I need a new Windows key? The computer I have now was one I bought "off lease" and upgraded. The company that leased it kept the Windows key for themselves. That's a violation of the license. It's my understanding that OEM licenses are supposed to stay with the first computer the OS is installed on.  Microsoft support literally wouldn't listen to me when in contacted them about it. I guess this happens all the time, and they don't care about customers. I also guess it didn't matter that I had a valid Windows 7 key I was using to upgrade but wouldn't work.

So, I might get a new license key and a new SSD drive now and upgrade the CPU and video card later. The problem with that is that Windows 11 only works on newer CPUs. There's kind of no point to upgrading the PC I have now(except the video card). However, Windows is slowly failing. I have no choice.

I'm hoping to get the novella out soon.

Have a great weekend.