Room Quality: There are several room types at the Planet Hollywood: Hollywood Hip, resort, resort vista, and then several suites. Only the non-suites are ones that us lowlifes can afford. The Hollywood Hip rooms are slightly larger than average at 450 s.f., and a huge amount of that space is in the bathroom. Each has "real" movie memorabilia in them. If you're lucky, you can get the coveted "Manos: The Hands of Fate" room. The bedroom is actually pretty average. The carpet is light and subdued, the furniture is very good and each room has a king or two queen beds, a nice little stuffed chair and a writing desk. You can connect to the Internet at high speed for an ungodly fee. Just think, you can sit in your hotel room and read what we have to say about it! Walls are reportedly thin so you can hear the better times other guests are having. Bathrooms have marble counter tops, separate soaking tubs and showers and a private little water closet so you can take care of business as noisily as you please. There are flat-screen TVs, ironing boards and safes. The rooms also have two phones (one of which is cordless). Hollywood Hip rooms have disappointingly small windows, but Resort Vistas are better. They and the plain Resort rooms are also another 100+ square feet larger with loveseats and bigger bathrooms.

Service Quality: Well, the lobby is too small and fills quickly at check-in time. You should expect some potentially long waits. Parking is painfully far away unless you valet, which we're too cheap to do.

What You Get Bottles of in the Bathroom: We expect better, but we have to settle for body lotion, bath gel, final rinse and shampoo. The sizes are larger than average, which is nice. Where is the grand prize, the motherlode, the sewing kit?

Clientele: Lots of young urbanites with cash to blow. You'll see lots of silk shirts on the fellows and expensive looking mini-skirts on the ladies.

How's the Pool? Really average. There are two plain pools on a deck off the first hotel floor, which is above the casino and shopping complex. The pool is open for limited hours, so don't bother getting up early to beat the crowd.

Table Games: They have two casinos, and we'll talk about the lame one for us common folk first. There are loads of tables with all your favorites. Look for 3x4x5x odds at the craps tables, blackjack six- and eight-deck shoes and super-lousy single deck, Let It Ride, Caribbean Stud and roulette. Warning: the single-deck blackjack has very unfavorable rules! The High Limit area upstairs is a chi-chi area that's all quiet and formal. They have blackjack, roulette, Pai Gow and baccarat. The main area has a "Pleasure Pit" where go-go dancers shake their money-takers right by the tables.

Bet Minimums: $10 in the common casino at almost all games (occasionally $5), and more in the high roller salon upstairs. Too rich for our blood. We'll be the guys swilling the free booze then heading down to the El Cortez for a cheap craps game later.

Machines: Amid the very slot signage and confusing layout are plenty of machines. They go anywhere from a penny for us cheapskates all the way up to $1000 a spin in the High Limit area. They have a huge selection of the newest and loudest video slot machines, but the video poker selection is poor and so are the VP pay tables.

Cocktails? The cocktail waitresses used to dress like genies with bare midriffs and gauzy veil pants, but they don't anymore and they will not let you put them in a bottle. Trust us on this one. The service is good.

Who Gets Comps? It's about the same as any other Strip casino. What we have been told is $100 a hand for four hours gets you a room, $150 gets room and some food, $250 gets you full room, food and beverage. We also heard rumor that $15 an hour for two hours may get a buffet comp. The slot club is pretty good, with generous cash back and comps for slot players.

Cabo Wabo: Sammy Hagar's Mexican restaurant-slash-drinking parlor-slash-nightclub has fair food (although Rubio's fish tacos are better), very loud music and antics that would seem outrageous any place but Las Vegas. Although it wants to be young, Cabo is really for folks in their thirties and forties more than anyone else. After all, who else even remembers who Sammy is?

Earl of Sandwich: You don't have to wear a powedered wig to get a sandwich here. There is a lot of hooha about artisan bread and premium meats, and to be fair, the sandwiches are pretty good and reasonably priced. But with us you could call stuff from the backshelf of the bakery thrift "artisan" and we'd believe you. Heck, "crusty" and "stale" are pretty close cousins.

Koi: Don't worry, you don't have to eat those pretty carp of the title. Instead, you can enjoy Japanese cuisine like kobe steak, seared salmon and sesame encrusted lobster tail (yum). The restaurant is only open at night. Also, when you enter you'll think it's a lounge. Keep walking; you'll find the eating part.

P. F. Chang's: A popular chain serving Americanized Chinese food. This is usually good fresh food with light and spicy sauces. Get some of those crunchy noodles. Meals are about under $30 per person including drinks and tip.

Planet Dailies: This coffee shop has a huge menu, but it's still just a coffee shop, and more expensive than most. Still, if you have a big group with a lot of different preferences, probably everyone can fill their bellies.

Spice Market Buffet: This is a very good buffet, and right up there with Bellagio, Paris and Wynn. Genuine prime rib, peeled shrimp, crab legs, sushi (with ass-kicking wasabe) fill out the seafood area. There is rack of lamb, dim sum, and some real middle-eastern dishes like Tabboulleh and tart black olives. For dessert, the pastries are hard to beat, and that's in addition to the bread pudding and peach cobbler for the American traditionalists. The big hit is dessert crepes made to order. Oh, the fresh fruit has us drooling as we write this. Oh, wait, sorry, that's our medication. One bad feature to the buffet is that it's not laid out well and waits can be long for some food areas.

Strip House: This fancy steakhouse serves up good meat in a somewhat overdone room. By overdne, we mean the photos of partially clad showgirls that give the joint its name. You're sort of paying for more than just the meat when you eat here. Like we said, the meat's good, but the room is overpriced.

Yolos: Come for the 13-foot margarita fountain, stay for, well, um, you don't have to stay. This Mexican restaurant offers pretty basic food, like chicken quesadilla, taquitos, tacos, enchiladas. It's all pretty solid, just not adventurous. Prices are generally reasonable.

Hoop Hall of Fame: This is an offshoot of the Basketball Hall of Fame, only smaller. Figure a real enthusiast might spend an hour in here and the casual basketball fan might find a half-hour a stretch.

The Living Room: Sort of purplish, the Living Room is another fancy lounge with low seating. You're supposed to come here and rest your weary feet after all that shopping you did at the local mall. And, as long as you're hear, why not have an apple-flavored martini, or a chocolate one, or maybe one that tastes like chicken?

Miracle Mile: This huge mall is built into the hotel. Half of it is very nice, and half looks like your average mall. There are 130 stores, many of which are upscale and already in the Caesars Forum Shops. If you love shopping, you'll probably enjoy a stroll through here. Rumor is there are also some strolling performers in the mall. We once saw a group of about five African dancers/acrobats put on a little tumbling and limbo show, but we can't say how often something like that goes on.

Peepshow: A topless production show with a live band and the promise of lots of sexy numbers from the numerous dancers. The story is some nonsense about a scantily-clad fairy type helping a meek office worker discover her sexuality, select a mate and user her "power" through naughty interpretations of fairy tales. There is suggestive nudity and a plan to rotate the stars at the top of the bill (although, those stars won't always take off their tops... but they may).

Performing Arts Center: A 7,000 seat theater, with good sound and a nice layout, but at 7,000 seats it's sure to be an impersonal experience. If you dig arena rock shows, like Moody Blues or the Jonas Brothers this is about as good as the any other big venue.

privé: This is a me-too nightclub designed primarily to separate you from your money through cocktails rather than wagers. There aren't as many great-looking people as the other high-end clubs on the Strip. On the plus side, it's not as hard to get into.

Tony and Tina's Wedding: For a fee you can be part of the wedding and reception at this "comedy-interactive show." There's an Italian buffet, the wedding, lots of high-drama within the families and even dancing. But for these prices? Come on, all it took to get into Matt's sister's wedding was to gift-wrap an ashtray from the 99-cent store.

Number of TVs: Thirty-three medium-sized plasmas fill this small space. There are two bigger ones as well. They split the TVs up about half for sports and half for racing.

Number of Seats: About 75 decent leather lounger type seats are spread out in front of the TVs. If you're some sort of hot shot, you can sit on couches in the VIP area. La-di-da.

How Many Betting Windows? Five, with electronic signboards.

Free Drinks? Bet the ponies and they'll load you up right. Bet the sports and you need to ask for a drink ticket. Boo!

Snack Bar? No, but there's a bar nearby for liquid nutrition.

Minimum Wager: $5 for sports, $2 for races.

Other Notes: The new room is a vast improvement over the old sports book, which was just plain embarrassing. Still, it's a smaller room for the Strip and only passable.

Number of Tables: About 15 tables almost all of which are dealing Texas Hold'Em, with the very occasional Omaha game. During busy times about almost all of the tables might be going.

Comfort of Chairs: These are what you'd call your average chair. If you have an average butt, you're in luck. Sadly, we have superlative fannies and the chairs don't do much for us. The felts are dark, which is a switch from the sand-color that is so popular right now.

Closed Room or Open to Casino? The poker room is an actual room, and a nice large one too. But it can get noisy since it is near a karaoke bar. Man, I'd hate to hear someone belting out "Mandy" when I have a big decision to make.

Game Spreads and Limits: Like we said, Texas Hold 'Em at $2-$4 and up. They have no-limit games usually at $1-$2, occasionally higher. They say they deal stud and hold'em, but so do many other places that never actually manage to get a game going.

Beginner Games or Classes? Beginner lessons at nine a.m. Too bad, we were hoping for those "expert player" lessons.

How Crowded is the Room? Most times the wait is short. On weekends, maybe you wait 30 minutes, but otherwise you can get right in or wait less. They have a decent area to sit and wait.

Comps? Expect below the standard, downright tight, in fact. There is no hourly tracking.

How Good Are the Players? This hotel really draws the rookies, and many want to play poker. You will find some fish at all tables. So, play smart and find some pockets to pick.

What Else Do I Need to Know? Similar promos and tourneys to most strip hotels. One notable fact: no food at the tables. Apparently they got wind of the time we smeared an entire table with Mayonnaise. But hey, we licked it up. Also, cocktail service is poor and is limited in what they can serve poker players (mostly just cheap stuff).