Hardware Support Courtesy of AMD / ATI

AAAAhhhhhhhhhrrrrggg. Ok, so now you know something is up. Yes, my computer might as well be up in smoke. You see I bought A new computer at a Boxing Day sale. Yes I finally broke down and bought it. I figured I didn't need to spend so much time tweaking and modifying and boosting and bypassing/ disabling things so that my old PIII 500 -(OC'd stable no Xtra cooling 3 years at 1Ghz) could kinda keep up with the big boys. I just wanted something to work.
You see what I wanted do was to save up the money and pay cash, part by part to build myself my own little Uber-Computer. I wanted the best of everything. Crazy memory, massive hard drives, unparalelled connectivity and a stereo that would embarass some of those bass-tubes you see scraping their bottoms down the road covered in duct-tape, bondo and primer. Due to my lack of ability to save anything but myself from the "Perils of wealth and affluence", it was off to the good old Future-Shop with the good ole maxxed out credit-card. Yeah baby! I was a sucker waiting for a mouth. I looked and searched and dug and fought to get the best off-the-shelf "solution" to my problems. "Oh gee sir, that one is sold out but.." they would start and I would say "No! I won't be oversold on things I don't need and won't use." I turned my back and stormed out in a perfectly indignant, definately offended manner. After about 5 hours of searching I slunk back into Future-Shop with my head hung low. I did however make sure that I was not at the original location. I didn't need to see that self-satisfied smirk. The model that I had shunned before was the only one left in my price range that had most of the features I wanted and it was an Acer which may be ok but the Hewlett I could have gotten might have served me much better IMHO. With a worried look, I broke out the card and the vaseline handing him the business end of my undoing. Just as he had rung up the last item he said "Oh, I almost forgot, are you going to be playing any games?" My heart sank and my stomach clenched. I forgot all about the video card. Now I had some limited experience with video cards and in particular Nvidia. My Winfast Ge-Force 3 Titanium 200 (purchased used for $30) had been a reliable source of problems since it's installation which no amount of re-installing or driver upgrading could conquer. It did work though. Sometimes a-w-f-u-l-l-y slowly but it didn't actually crash that much. He said "Hey! we have this new ATI Card the HD2600 it has DDR3 that is even faster than DDR2." The hook was already set when he said, "It's on sale." He didn't need to insult me with "Look, it's the last one." He just didn't need to go that far. I should have known. Mea culpa. I am rending my t-shirt and gnashing my teeth as we speak. SO he piled it on and I walked out the happy sap hoping that the guys in the back of the shop were just chuckling, not rolling around holding their bellies, crying with mirth at my expense. Long story kind of shortened, It is now February and despite much frustration; tweaking and re-installing and using the options the video card for no apparent rhyme or reason occasionally resets in the middle of a game. Oh and ATI Video-Cards DO NOT LIKE Linux .That is for all the people like me who didn't check first. I hope U find Out before you buy. I'm using open suse but I wanted Ubuntu. I play Project-Torque and am trying to play Last Chaos on Aeriagames - I have to plug them because they let anyone play unlimited time for free. If you don't need to sleep you can still play! It's great. Back the issues. When I was playing Project-TOrque, it didn't bother me so much I'd lose about 5 seconds when it happened but as I still got my points, I couldn't care less. Last Chaos however is another story. In the game I have a Guardian who agreed to help me until I levelled up. Very generous person and I am In his debt. (Thanks TheDark. UR Awsome. Calico) However, whenever I play, Poof reset and black screen. Ctrl-Alt-Del and start again. So he, effectively has helped someone who cannot play. I've wasted his time and money. (I'm so sorry dude.)
Countless hours of searching led me to this:
http://support.ati.com/ics/support/KBAnswer.asp?questionID=28927
I don't know if I have the right to do that here but they asked how I rated the answer, so I wrote:
"Useful information. Walk in to the C.E.O. with this. To think, I actually paid you to pay someone to type this. Webspace is actually reserved for this answer. I am ashamed for you. If I had looked at this answer first I would never have purchased your product. I see that I am "stuck" with a shoddily supported "brick". This answer is insulting as it serves to illustrate just how much your customers mean to you. I am offended that you didn't take the tome to formulate some sort of answer. I am soon to purchase a new card to replace the ATI card that doesn't work and this flippant disregard for your customers will be paramount when making my decision. The drivel you have tried to unload upon me fills me with disgust. I can't believe the audacity of actually giving someone the opportunity to rate this answer. Thats like a "How's my driving?" bumper-sticker on a drunkard's car. The card being broken is oddly not as bothersome as the cavalier attitude this garbage conveys. Next time save the space."
Was that too much? I don't think it was enough. Picture yourself with a brand new computer / video card that doesn't work properly getting this type of answer from the company that MANUFACTURED it. So here I am, AAAAAHHHHHRRRRRggghh! Crying and gnashing my teeth over my own stupidity.
Any help would be much appreciated. People who bought Nvidia cards to begin with, there will be no gloating. O.K. I'll allow minimal gloating but no "Bwahahaha"'s. I'm not for that.
CUL8R (Shout out to Mark (Scarface) from Centennial) ;-)

Did I mention that I got Vista HOME already burned into the drive and can't remove it because it will void the warranty? AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGHHHHH!!!
Sir Rantsalot