ValveTime

HL2Fallout member, target_practice, recently e-mailed Valve's Gabe Newell for information on Half-Life: Source requesting a comparison shot between Half-Life and Half-Life Source. Doug Lombardi replied with these images:

As you can see, despite the game not getting a complete overhaul like Counter-Strike: Source has, the game still looks considerably better in the Source engine. The noticable differences will be the addition of world and ragdoll physics, the shader system, dynamic lights and shadows.



You can find the original forum thread here.

The long awaited Half-Life 2 pre-load has started! Please restart Steam to receive the update. At this present time the content servers are struggling a little but remember, there's no rush! Take it easy. Additionally, the cache we're downloading at the moment is called "base source shared materials.gcf" and it weighs in at a whopping 1.01GB.

Our forum member, killahsin-[CE], has posted on our forums news that the Half-Life 2 pre-load starts tonight. The news comes directly from the top, Gabe Newell:

This means that in approximately three hours, the non-changing parts of Half-Life 2 will be downloaded and cached on your system. This will likely be the models, sounds and textures, in an encrypted format.



According to this page, which is the marketing pop-up for the Half-Life 2 pre-load, you can pre-load now and pay when you're ready.
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You can catch the original forum post from Gabe Newell here.
UPDATE: Erik Johnson has posted on the PlanetHalfLife Forums with an update:

I will post as soon as the pre-load is available.

As reported in this thread on the Steampowered forums, Valve have started shutting down Steam accounts that have used a CD key exploit or an a fraudulent credit card number to illegally obtain Valve's games.

Valve 1 - 0 pirates

Remember kids - buy your games

Oh, and for the person on the Steampowered forums that tried to wriggle out of it :-

The nice fellows over at CSNation have just posted news of their new CS:Source beta guide. The guide is very informative and will explain some of the differences you'll find between CS:1.6 and CS:Source as well as the low down on some of the newer features to the game and the new engine. Here's a quote: The article is very informative and a great read. It even taught me a thing or two.
You can read the full guide here.