Shoes, Computers, and Mass Effect 2

by ownlyuzinwonhan

Let's get this out of the way quickly: I got a new 360 as most of you know! It feels good to lose to the GB community in SFIV once more, and I still haven't touched Pure or Lego Batman, nor do I feel like I ever will. Oh, and I ended up getting the video card I mentioned last time. I can actually run S.T.A.L.K.E.R in decent settings! It's great!
Here's the thing though Giantbomb community, the video card wasn't enough. After ScubaSteve's thread, it made me realize that I wanted more. More power, more speed, a better computer for the future because while it's alright to live with your parents with you're eighteen, it's not always that way unfortunately. I've already made a wish list on Newegg of parts that I think will help me fulfill my wishes and here it is:

Part	Price
Motherboard-ASUS M4A77D	$80
Computer Case-XION Solaris XON-403 Black with Green LED Light Steel ATX Mid Tower	$55
Power Supply-COOLER MASTER Elite 460 RS-460-PSAR-J3 460W ATX12V V2.31	$36
CPU-AMD Phenom II X4 940 Black Edition Deneb 3.0GHz 4 x 512KB L2 Cache 6MB L3 Cache Socket AM2+ 125W Quad-Core	$146
RAM-G.SKILL 4GB 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Desktop Memory Model F2-6400CL6S-4GBMQ	$120
Hard Drive-Western Digital Caviar Blue WD3200AAJS 320GB 7200 RPM 8MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive	$48
CD/DVD Drive-SAMSUNG Black 22X DVD+R 8X DVD+RW 16X DVD-ROM 48X CD-ROM 2MB Cache SATA CD/DVD Burner	$26

I'm also going to get Windows 7 Professional from my friend for $65 which brings the grand total to $576. Yeah I realize I could save a good chunk of change by getting two 2GB sticks of RAM, but I'd like to just go with one and leave the door open for improvement. So, am I leaving anything out that will leave me bummed out? I'm going to use my TV as a monitor, so I've already ordered this wireless keyboard and mouse combo. Like I said, any advice would be great.

   To keep this delicious gravy train going, let's talk about Mass Effect. Now I played the hell out of the original Mass Effect, but that was on my *ahem*, older 360. So I'm torn between going through it yet again on my new 360 to create a save, so that one particular character in my party does not get shot in the face, and saving $20. Yet that brings up another point, do I get Mass Effect on the PC, or 360? According to System Requirement Labs, the only thing that needs an upgrade for Mass Effect 2 to be playable well on my computer would be a processor upgrade, and I'm willing to wait a month to buy all that stuff on the list.
Basically what I want to know is this, if you don't have a Mass Effect 1 save, will that particular character, that sometimes ends up dead stay dead, or is there an option at the beginning to keep him alive? People that already have Mass Effect 2, help me out here.

   Now I mentioned shoes in my title and with good reason. One of my cats though that my work/basketball pair of shoes was the litter box, and decided to pee on it. Jerk of a cat, I know, but it leaves you all with one final decision! Which color scheme do you like more?
    Oh, and subscribe to Stang's Youtube account, because you're not a bad person, are you?