It has been brought to our attention that several college students in the Pittsburgh area would like to attend Iron Storm: XI but currently have no transportation to the event. This problem has 2 solutions.

1. Post a message in the forums and their is always a possibility of hitching a ride with someone else in your area
2. Taking a bus to the “T” station and riding the rails to Castle Shannon.

One common thing overlooked about event is that fact that the building also serves and the parking lot for a Port Authority Park & Ride. The back of the building is actually the Castle Shannon station on the Beechview Line. So, all you have to do is take a train (which departs about every 10 minutes throughout the day) from any of the downtown stations and 30 minutes later you’ll be in the parking lot to ISXI. Oh, and with the bus/train ride fair total cost would be $2.75 one way… just sayin’.

The “T” Rail Line Map

42C and 42S Train Schedule

^^das the train you’d take from downtown

Okay, so everyone has been blowing up our forums asking what the schedule is going to look like. WELL we had a staff meeting and finally set it in stone.

Friday March 26th:

• 6:00 PM: Event Opens
• 7:30 PM: Opening Raffle
• 9:00 PM: Street Fighter 4 Tournament
• 9:30 PM: Starcraft
• 11:59 AM: Midnight Raffle
• Open Gaming and Midnight Madness

Saturday March 27th:

• 9:00 AM: Morning Raffle
• 10:00 AM: Left 4 Dead 2 Tournament
• 11:00 AM: Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 Tournament
• 5:00 PM: Counter-Strike Source Tournament
• 6:00 PM: Halo 3 Tournament
• 11:59 PM Midnight Raffle
• Midnight Madness and Open Gaming

Sunday March 28th:

• 9:00 AM: Major Roffle Raffle
• 10:00 AM: Ice Chest Tournament
• 12:00 PM: Closing Ceremonies

*Upon entrance to the event each attendee will receive ONE raffle ticket; Those tickets will be used for all raffles except the “Roffle Raffle” at the conclusion of the event. The 1st 100 people who pre-pay will recieve 3 tickets instead of 1. So… PRE-PAY, it’s worth it!

On another note we will have an ALP system in place in the next couple of days that will have all the tournament rules and guidelines on it along with a way for the people who have paid to select a seat. Keep checking the site for updates and peruse the forums for even more up to date issues.

As you all know, while the LAN grows closer we will be raising the price until we reach the final pre-registration price of $40.  If you happened to MISS OUT on the AWESOME reduced price we had at the beginning of registration the staff decided to throw in an incentive for you cats rolling into ISXI team-style. The more players you pay for at once the cheaper it gets (up to 5 people). TAKE ADVANTAGE of the cheaper prices while you can. And besides, its always better to play with friends; who else is going to make up for your lack of skill?

Dont Wait!

“The study of economy usually shows us that the best time for purchase was last year.” – Woody Allen

Pittco hasn’t had a legit case MOD contest since Iron Storm 3 and after attending the GXL in the fall and seeing some of the entries in their case MOD contest we figured it was about time to bring it back. Pittco has been known to habor some skilled craftsmen and judging from the last Iron Storm event it seems that the competition should be pretty fierce. We will be awarding prizes for the Top 3 cases at the event. Don’t think you console kids are out of luck in this either; I know the modding community is just as large in the hand held world as it is in the keyboard/mouse world. I’ve seen some pretty sick X-Box 360’s, so bring them out and show them off. The more unique the better. LED’s, Cathode Tubes, Custom Paint, Glass Work; It will all score you points toward a kick ass prize.

As of 11:59pm tonight we will be closing the “Early Bird Special” price option for Iron Storm: XI. From that point on we will adjust the price as it gets closer to the LAN. Hey, they say, “the early bird catches the worm”; well, in this case the “early bird” pays less money, and their’s no reason to pay more than you have to. Look at it this way: The sooner you register, the sooner your team can start to discuss strats…

Pittco has opened registration for Iron Storm XI!

This event will be like the past events but bigger and larger than before; who doesn’t love that? We’ve teamed up with fellow sponsors from the GXL who have thrown 500 man LANs, Rec0il Gaming for the epic console setup, and Pwnage.TV who will be simulcasting the whole event!

The event will be 42 hours long which is a lot longer than the events we’ve thrown in the past. Also, we are aiming to fill 250 seats for this LAN. With this support from sponsors and expansion, there is no reason why you should miss out on this LAN, even if you are hours away.

We’ll be running the usual 3 PC and 3 console tournaments not to mention the massive amounts of servers we be providing.

Long story short, up to January 11th, we will providing seats for only $25! Price at the door will be $45. After the 11th, we’ll slide the cost up!

Don’t be a noob and miss out on this early bird special. Check out the next-event page for more information. We’ll be posting as the event draws closer, stay tuned!

CLICK THE REGISTER NOW BUTTON and CLAIM YOUR SEAT!

Taipei, Taiwan, October 13, 2009 – GIGABYTE TECHNOLOGY Co., Ltd., a leading manufacturer of motherboards and graphics cards today is pleased to announce the latest GV-R5700 series graphics cards.  GIGABYTE’s GV-R577D5-1GD-B and GV-R575D5-1GD are built on the highly anticipated ATI Radeon^TM HD 5700 Series GPUs ­­­­­­­─which utilizes the latest 826 million transistors on 40nm fabrication process and GDDR5 memory. GIGABYTE HD 5700 Series graphics cards provide Microsoft DirectX® 11, ATI Eyefinity Technology, ATI Stream technology, Quad mode ATI CrossFireX™ multi-GPU support, UDV 2 and PowerPlay™, and offer an incredibly immersive HD gaming experience and unrivaled performance.

The GIGABYTE HD 5700 Series graphics cards feature ATI’s latest 2^nd Generation TeraScale graphics engine, boasting the power of more than 2 teraFLOPS with 800 and 720 stream processors respectively. With 1GB GDDR5 memory, the GIGABYTE HD 5700 Series provides twice the data per pin of GDDR3 memory at the same clock speeds. Utilizing ATI Eyefinity Technology, each gamer can run up to 3 displays from a single graphics board and expand the field of view across all displays. Gamers can enjoy the ultimate gaming experience with innovative “wrap around” multi-display capabilities with ATI Eyefinity Technology. Furthermore, benefiting from ATI Stream Technology, end-users can easily unleash the massive parallel processing power of GPU for physics, artificial intelligence, stream computing and ray tracing calculations, and tackle demanding tasks like video transcoding with incredible speed.

In addition, GIGABYTE HD 5700 Series graphics cards fully support for Microsoft DirectX® 11 for life-like realism and stunning 3D gaming effects. Gamers can get striking 3D visual effects and dynamic interactivity with DirectX® 11 support, including features like Tessellation, HDR Texture Compression, Multi-threading and DirectCompute. Microsoft DirectX® 11 brings new levels of visual realism to gaming on the PC and gamers can dominate the competition with GIGABYTE GV-R5700 Series graphics cards.

In order to provide the best digital audio/video interconnection between a computer and display monitor or home-theater system, the GIGABYTE HD 5700 Series graphics cards are capable of outputting DispalyPort signals. The DisplayPort interface can support higher resolutions, richer color depth, and increased refresh rate performance, delivering 10.8Gbps of bandwidth over previous generations of connectivity options such as DVI, LVDS and VGA. With added DisplayPort connectivity on the GIGABYTE HD 5700 Series graphics cards, PC gamers are able to play all the latest games on their large-screen home theater displays, providing an audio and visual experience unmatched by any of today’s console gaming systems. Furthermore, the GIGABYTE GV-R5700 Series are equipped with ATI PowerPlay™ technology for breakthrough power and consumption, maximizing performance per watt by delivering the highest level of high performance when needed and conserving power when the demand on the GPU is low.

For more details of the GIGABYTE GV-R577D5-1GD-B and GV-R575D5-1GD, please visit the GIGABYTE VGA website at: http://www.gigabyte.com.tw/Products/VGA/Default.aspx

Taipei, Taiwan October 12, 2009 –

GIGABYTE Technology Co. LTD., a leading manufacturer of motherboards and graphics cards, is pleased to launch its new GV-N220OC-1GI and GV-N210OC-512I graphics accelerators. Featuring brand new NVIDIA^® 40nm GeForce GT220 and GeForce 210 GPUs, GV-N220OC-1GI and GV-N210OC-512I grant wonderful gaming experience by their overclocking settings. Also, both models support Microsoft’s latest operating system Windows 7 and provide terrific visional enjoyment. Besides, GIGABYTE GT220 graphics card adopts GIGABYTE Ultra Durable 2 boards to ensure lower temperature, longer product life, and extreme overclocking stability. Gamers can fully enjoy astonishing 3D game battles with new GPU technology and high product quality.

Premium New Visual Vision

Microsoft Windows 7 is the new generation operating system that will take advantage of graphics processing unit (GPU) and utilizes the computing power of GPU. Supporting Windows 7, GV-N220OC-1GI and GV-N210OC-512I enable users to have a more interactive and efficient GPU-accelerated features and most powerful 3D gaming solution. Along with NVIDIA® CUDA™ and PhysX^® technology, gamers will see lifelike, real-time environmental effects and character interactions such as sea waves and explosions that cause dust and debris.

Ultra Durable 2

By using lower RDS (on) MOSFET, Ferrite Core chokes, and Lower ESR Solid Capacitor, GIGABYTE Ultra Durable 2 board equips GIGABYTE GT220 graphics card with outstanding cooling, lowest power loss, and longer product life. These great quality components assist new GN-N220OC-1GI in better total performance.

Explore new NVIDIA^® 40nm GeForce GT 220 GPUs with GIGABYTE and have fun with realistic physical effects (water, gas, steam, fire, etc) for a lifelike gaming adventure. Enjoy the overclocking capability of the GIGABYTE GT220 graphics card with 720 MHZ core clock speed, delivering 10% performance boost over standard GT220. Additionally, GIGABYTE GT220 and GeForce 210 graphics cards both feature native HDMI support with golden plated connector, introducing the highest-quality home theater experience.

For more details of GIGABYTE GV-N220OC-1GI and GV-N210OC-512I, please visit the GIGABYTE VGA website: http://www.gigabyte.com.tw/Products/VGA/Default.aspx

Contestants invited to “Beat Me If You Dare” and submit their overclocking scores for a total of $9,000USD in cash and prizes

Taipei, Taiwan, 30th September, 2009 – GIGABYTE, a leading manufacturer of motherboards and graphics cards, today announces a world record P16877 3DMark Vantage score and an incredible GPU score of 15297 for the global launch of the GPU overclocking competition, Beat Me If You Dare. GIGABYTE’s in-house overclocking team presents an unrivaled GPU clock of 1100 MHz and memory clock of 1400 MHz. The scores have been posted on the Beat Me if You Dare event website and contestants around the world are invited to challenge GIGABYTE’s scores for cash and prizes.

The champion of each round will receive $1,500USD cash. As an added bonus, any contestant that beats the benchmark set by the GIGABYTE team will double his or her prize. Round 1 for the Beat Me If You Dare competition will start on Oct 1^st.

Beat Me If You Dare Round 1 details:

1. (contestant’s 3DMark Vantage Performance GPU score – 9000) / 9000 = X₁ %

2. (contestant’s game benchmark fps score – 100) / 100 = X₂ %

3. X₁ *80% + X₂ *20% = final score

Contestants may use any brand of GTX 260 Graphics Card and no hardware limitation for participation.

For further details about the GIGABYTE Beat Me If You Dare competition please visit: http://event.gigabyte.com.tw/BeatMeIfYouDare/

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/GIGABYTE-VGA/138376338834?ref=nf

Twitter: http://twitter.com/GIGABYTE_VGA

About GIGABYTE Upgrade Your Life

GIGABYTE, headquartered in Taipei, Taiwan, is known as a global leading brand in the IT industry, with employees and business channels in almost every country. Founded in 1986, GIGABYTE started as a research and development team and has since taken the lead in the world’s motherboard market. On top of motherboards and graphics accelerators, GIGABYTE further expanded its product portfolio to include notebook and desktop PCs, digital home entertainment appliances, networking servers, communications, mobile and handheld devices, servicing every facet of people’s lives at home or business. Everyday GIGABYTE aims to “Upgrade Your Life” with the most innovative designs and impeccable quality and services. Visit www.gigabyte.com.tw for more information.

Greetings,

We have tried as hard as possible to find any way that we can hold Iron Storm XI next Sat-Sun. Alas, it was not to be. We are now in the process of finding a better date where we’ll be able to have an event worthy of Pittco!

To those who already paid:
Thank you for your valiant effort in drumming up other payments and in finding friends. We will be refunding your payments by the end of the week. If there is any complication in that, contact Bob (bkelley@pittco.org).

To those who contacted us as walk-ins:
We did count you in our attempt to reach a feasible number. Thank you for taking the time to contact us.

Finally to everyone else who was unable to come:
We heard your silence, and we’re going to do our best to figure out what factors made for this. If you would fill out this itty bitty survey so we know why you were unable to come, it would help us immensely as we’re still working on our fortune telling techniques! http://is.gd/1RJXq

All in all, let us not look at this as a disappointment, but as an opportunity to better understand the ever-changing climate that is gaming. Keep sharp, we’re not done by any stretch of the imagination.

We’ll be in contact with the rescheduled date for Iron Storm XI!

–
Bob Kelley
Treasurer, Board of Directors

PITTSBURGH LAN COALITION, INC.
http://www.pittco.org