Well, I've been testing out various addons today. I wasn't particularly impressed with some of the popular ones.

I've decided on these ones after testing out the ones that were kindly suggested:

• SimpleSelfRebuff
• Atlas (I used to use this one and I much prefer it over the others I've tried such as Cartographer - K.I.S.S. and all that)
• Bagnon
• QuestGuru (I didn't like MonkeyQuest or QuestHelper)
• Factionizer
• RatingBuster
• SellFish
• Sell-O-Matic
• ProfessionsBook (The jury is still out on this one - RecipeRadar, RecipeBook and Ackis Recipe List are buggy with 3.0.2)
• Auctionator (I haven't had the opportunity to try this out yet but I didn't like Auctioneer - again, K.I.S.S.)

I'm still looking for addons for the Shaman and Mage classes.

The downloading process has finally finished!

I've created a toon on Azuremyst called Maralith. She is a Blood Elven Mage. Feel free to send me a /tell if you have an easy-going guild that doesn't have too many requirements. I'm not into raiding, and I solo a lot but I would be up for grouping once I get my paws on a decent desk so that I can use my laser mouse. I'm playing with the laptop on my lap so it's going to be solo play for me at the moment. I'm also well into crafting and I've decided to take advantage of my racial trait and go for Enchanting. Yes, I know, it's an expensive profession but I figure I could make money from loot, gathering and questing and I'm in no rush. I just need to decide which gathering profession to go for - one that sells for good money in the AH on my server. I've also created an alt. She's a Draenei Shaman called Kema. I've decided to go with the Leatherworking and Skinning professions.

A little bit about myself: I'm a 26 year old female from the UK. I can't stand 1337 speak, little kids thinking it's cool to flame everyone in sight, and random group invites. In other words, I'm seeking a guild where I can talk to like-minded, friendly, reasonably intelligent, sociable people. I also like to have alts because I get bored easily and I like variety.

If your guild is on Azuremyst and you think I would fit in, please get in touch with Maralith (Horde) or Kema (Alliance) in-game.

I'm still deciding which addons to use. So far, I have:

• MonkeyQuest
  
• Auctionator
  
• CrapAway
  
• Cartographer
  
• Factionizer
  
• QuestHelper
  
• TurnIn

on my shortlist. If you have any suggestions about which addons would be useful, please comment.

I've got to say that I'm very happy with WOW's performance on this laptop. I've got practically everything on max and it's running nice and smooth.

I woke up this morning to find that I now have a massive 3.27 GB patch to download. I've downloaded 14% of it so far.

I'm still compiling a list of addons to install. But I'm running WOW on Vista and I can't find the addons directory.

I received my new laptop this morning and after spending hours installing everything that I needed, I installed WoW from five discs and several hours later I'm downloading the third huge patch which is 1.1 GB. This is taking an age on a 2 mbps ADSL connection (ranging from 30 kbps up to 75 kbps with P2P turned off - the download wouldn't start with P2P enabled).

But after the torment is over, I plan to delete all of my old toons and give everything away - yes, even my hard-earned coin - and then I'm going to start with a clean slate. Whoever gets my coin will be a very lucky sod.

I'll probably side with the Horde this time. I'm not sure which class I'll choose, it's a toss-up between the priest and the shaman classes. I can't even remember which server I used to play on, it's been a good 10 months since I last played.

I guess I'm going to have to wait until morning before I can play. I hope there aren't any more huge patches to download after this one. In the meantime I'm hunting for addons here. If you have any addon-related suggestions, please comment.

Four hours and counting...