Well if you want more top speed (from the get-go), cutting out the heavier rocket tanks should drop your weight by roughly 25% based on picture estimates.
Being mean to them won't make them buy a legit copy, you know. Pressure them to buy it and support the game, sure, cut them off from updates, yes, but don't unfriend them or punch them or whatever. There's no gain in that.
Getting to Minmus without establishing an orbit is one of the funner parts of it, IMO. I shoot straight for it, miss several times, and chase it around until I can establish orbit. Inefficient? Hell yes - but much more challenging and fun than a predetermined path.
Very nicely done, but kind of oddly-sized, don't you think? More common resolutions are 1366x768, 1440x900, 1650x1080, 1920x1080 and 1920x1200. Just pointing it out for future reference in case you were unaware. Nice job though, seriously.
Are we thinking of the same magic turbine? I tried to make one with normal wings and failed. I attached 8 canards randomly to the capsule and got to 1 km/s in 10 seconds flat...
If there is ever to be any DLC/expansions for this game (I'm almost positive there won't be) new star systems with such exoticisms would certainly fit the bill.
I will admit that I remain completely in the dark regarding the current fuel bug, but as of .15 burn rate scaled linearly with thrust and I think this should remain the case, lest managing your engines become needlessly complicated.
What you want above all else is a high clock speed with good architecture, so a 2.2gHz i7 quad-core won't be as good as a 2.8gHz i5 dual core or something. Assuming of course they're the same generation and whatnot. A decent GPU certainly doesn't hurt either.